Sitting of 16 May 1916

Preamble
The House met at a Quarter before Three of the clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Colonial Bank Bill,
Lords Amendments considered, and agreed to.
Local Government Provisional Order (No. 6) Bill,
Read a second time, and committed.

LIGHTHOUSES, ETC. (LOCAL INSPECTIONS).
Copies presented of Reports to the Board of Trade by the Trinity House of Deptford Strond, the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses, and the Commissioners of Irish Lights, of their Inspection of Local Lighthouses, Buoys, and Beacons in 1915 [by Act] to lie upon the Table.

UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW.
Copy presented of Abstract of Accounts of the University of Glasgow for the year 1914–15 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.
Copy presented of Annual Statistical Report by the University Court of the University of Glasgow for the year 1914–15 [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.

CIVIL SERVICES, 1916–17 (REVISED ESTIMATE).
Estimate presented of the Amount required in the year ending 31st March, 1917, to pay the Salaries and Expenses of the House of Commons [by Command]; Referred to the Committee of Supply, and to be printed. [No. 75.]

LUNACY.
Paper laid upon the Table by the Clerk of the House:—Copy of Return of the Lord Chancellor of the number of Visits
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made, the number of Patients seen, and the number of Miles travelled by the Visitors of Lunatics, between 1st October, 1915, and the 31st March, 1916 [by Act].

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  WAR.

    GREECE.
    Mr. KINGasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, in order to elucidate matters on which there is doubt in this country and hostile criticism abroad, he will now publish diplomatic correspondence and documents showing the relations between Greece and this country since July, 1914?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir E. Grey): I regret that the labour involved in the preparation of such a publication would be out of proportion to the requirements of the case. It would be absolutely impossible to publish Papers respecting the relations of Greece with one of the Allies alone. Greece has not had separate relations with us apart from other Allies, and any Papers laid would have to include the whole, to receive the previous consent of the Allies, and probably to be published simultaneously with Papers laid by them.
    Mr. KINGasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether he will issue a statement or lay Papers upon the Table to show the exact nature of the Greek invitations under which the Allies sent troops to Salonika, and the objects and intentions with which they retain control of the Salonika region of war?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Tennant): As regards the first part of the question my hon. Friend should, I think, address himself to the representative of the Foreign Office; but I think he can hardly expect that any statement of intentions in the Salonika region of war should be publicly furnished to him, and, incidentally, also to the enemy.

    PORTUGAL.
    Mr. KINGasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether Portugal has signed the pact of London not to

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    make a separate peace, if so, on what date; and whether it is intended to lay Papers showing the diplomatic negotiations previous to the entry of Portugal into the War?
    Sir E. GREY: The answer to both parts of the question is in the negative. The Treaty with Portugal is the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance which is published.

    AIR SERVICES.

      ENEMY RAIDS.
      Sir A. MARKHAMasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether he has any information that telegraph and telephone wires were cut in the vicinity of a town on the East Coast recently visited by Zeppelins?
      Mr. TENNANT: I do not confirm and I do not contradict the suggestion contained in this question. I simply state that it is not in the public interest to give any information on this subject.
      Sir A. MARKHAM: Is it not in the public interest, when these wires were actually cut between headquarters, that the public should know that these alien enemies are living in their midst?
      Mr. TENNANT: I think it very undesirable to make any public comment on the subject.

    COMPLAINTS BY SOLDIERS.
    Sir A. MARKHAMasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether an Order has been issued by Lord Kitchener, headed Irregular Complaints by Soldiers, to the higher commands in the Army instructing them that they are to take steps to prevent men, particularly of the New Armies and Territorial Forces, communicating with Members of Parliament in respect to grievances; whether he is aware that the great majority of these complaints refer to the pay of men and allowances to their wives which, owing to the negligence of the War Office, have not been properly paid; and whether, in view of the privilege granted to Members of Parliament that officers and men have the right to communicate with them if such letters are addressed to the House of Commons, he proposes to take any action in the matter?
    Mr. TENNANT: What is stated in the second part of the question does not represent my own experience and, if I may with great respect and deference venture to say so, my experience in this matter is wider even than that of my hon. Friend. Great efforts have been made to secure that such complaints shall be regularly and promptly attended to, if made through the official channels. The Army Council instruction in question refers to officers and men both of the New Armies and the Territorial Force who compose the great bulk of the Armies in the field. It does not prohibit communication with Members of Parliament in respect of grievances, but it lays down that soldiers are not to utilise third parties in general with a view to bringing such grievances to the notice of superior authority. In so doing it merely draws attention to an old Regulation, paragraph 439 of the King's Regulations, and I think these efforts have been crowned with success. With regard to the privilege extended to Members of this House I can only express the hope that it will not be abused.
    Sir A. MARKHAM: That is not an answer to my question. What I asked was whether this order had been sent out, and does it not specifically state in that order that officers and men are not to communicate with their Members of Parliament?
    Mr. TENNANT: Yes, I did say so. I may inform my hon. Friend that cases have occurred in which officers and men have ventilated their grievances through the medium of Members of Parliament, and third parties generally. But it does not prohibit communication with Members of Parliament.
    Mr. ASHLEY: Are we to understand that out constituents are only to communicate with us after failing to get satisfaction through the military authorities, and that they must call on the military authorities in the first instance?
    Mr. TENNANT: I think probably that that is the right light in which to look at it. I do not want to go so far as to say that it is desirable for soldiers to communicate grievances to Members of Parliament.
    Sir A. MARKHAM: If a soldier has not had his pay, can he communicate about that with his Member of Parliament or is that an infringement?
    Mr. TENNANT: It is competent, and the proper course is, for him to communicate with his commanding officer.
    Sir A. MARKHAM: If he cannot get it through him?
    Mr. TENNANT: I assure my hon. Friend that he is quite misinformed in thinking that there is any real grievance in the way of pay. They get their pay with the greatest regularity.
    Mr. TYSON WILSON: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that there are many scores, if not hundreds, of these cases in which it is absolutely impossible for these men to get their allowances except when they communicate with Members of Parliament?
    Mr. TENNANT: The estmates which have been made have been really in excess. There is not anything like that number. It is very rare.
    Mr. HOGGE: Can my right hon. Friend say why Members of Parliament can raise those points in this House while their constituents in the Army cannot address them on the subject?
    Mr. TENNANT: Really my hon. Friend ought to realise what the Army is. I do not think that he has any very good idea of it. It is very undesirable for soldiers to communicate irregularly.

    GENERAL HOWELL.
    Mr. KINGasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that a memorandum dealing with the situation in the Balkans, published as having been written by General Howell and since repudiated by him, has been attributed to General Howell in a circular letter sent to all Members of both Houses of Parliament by Professor Burrows and Dr. Seton-Watson; and, seeing that the publication of alleged confidential documents of this kind is calculated to injure national interests and inflict damage on the Departments and public servants concerned, what action it is proposed to take in the matter?
    Mr. TENNANT: I am not one of those Members of Parliament who have been favoured with a copy of the circular letter referred to in the question. If, as I suspect, my hon. Friend is alluding to the memorandum which was the subject of a
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    question put to me on the 9th March by the hon. Member for Pontefract, then I would refer him to the answer I then gave. May I add that I welcome my hon. Friend's efforts to secure that the public interest is placed before individual gratification in the matter of the disclosure of official information, though I believe that the memorandum referred to had no official authority and was not a public document. No obstacle will be placed in the way of General Howell seeking any remedy he desires, subject to the exigencies of the military situation.
    Mr. KING: Does the right hon. Gentleman not see that there is a peculiar point in this case? You get an eminent man mentioned in connection with a document, and which he suggests is a forgery, and yet he takes no steps, and the War Office take no steps, to bring these facts to full light.
    Mr. TENNANT: I do not think that it is the business of the War Office to bring the suggested facts to full light if the document in question was not a public document, and I understand it was not a public document. General Howell has repudiated it. Any remedy that can be sought will be got by him when opportunity occurs. He cannot do it as long as he is in Salonika.
    Mr. KING: May we take it that the repudiation of this document by General Howell is accepted by all persons in the War Office and in his command?
    Mr. TENNANT: Yes. I understand that that is the position.

  MILITARY SERVICE.

    EXEMPTION OF TRADESMEN.
    Mr. HANCOCKasked whether, under the new Military Service Bill, any consideration will be shown to a man who is doing a considerable business as an outfitter, has put all his money into the business, has not and cannot get any assistance, and whose business would be completely ruined in case he is called up; and whether arrangements can be made for men under these circumstances to be trained locally and allowed a portion of time for dealing with business and domestic matters?
    Mr. TENNANT: My right hon. Friend the President of the Local Government

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    Board dealt with a phase of this question last night in Debate. The exemption of a man situated as described in the question is entirely a matter for the local tribunal to consider.

    RESERVE BATTALIONS.
    Mr. ASHLEYasked what steps the commanding officer of a Reserve Battalion is to take if a recruit on joining the battalion is considered by his captain unfit for military service, in view of the fact that medical officers attached to these units are only allowed to examine for infectious diseases?
    Mr. TENNANT: I think the captain must subordinate his opinion to that of others who know better. Recruits sent to a Reserve Battalion as fit for general service have been so classified by a Recruiting Medical Board, which has a far wider knowledge and experience than any captain in a Reserve Battalion can have. It is recognised that a recruit, though organically sound, may not be physically fit for active service until he has completed his training. The captain should bend his efforts to making the man physically fit. If, on the completion of training, the medical officer considers the man to be unfit for active service, he may bring him before a Travelling Medical Board, which will decide on the man's fitness or otherwise.
    Mr. ASHLEY: Have we to keep these men in the battalions in order that they may be trained at the public expense, and then turn them out?
    Mr. TENNANT: What we are anxious to do is to see that they do become competent for the force, and to keep them two or three months in order to ascertain that. That is surely not a waste of public money or public energy.

    CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
    Mr. MORRELLasked the Under-Secretary of State for War if he will have inquiries made into the case of Jack Foister, a school teacher, of 17, River Side, Cambridge, who applied for exemption on grounds of conscience, and was recently enlisted for non-combatant service, and particularly if he will say whether, on 8th May, a notice was sent to this man from the Cambridge recruiting office calling him up for service with the Colours on 23rd May; whether on 25th April,
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    nearly a month before the date on which he was due to join, he was arrested as a deserter and taken before the Cambridge bench of magistrates; whether he then asked for a remand, which the bench refused to grant; whether he was detained in prison till an escort could be sent for him, and then removed first to Northampton and afterwards to Felixstowe; whether, on 1st May, he was released from camp and allowed to go without escort to Peterborough for the hearing of an appeal before the district Appeal Tribunal; whether his appeal was dismissed and he then returned to Felixstowe; whether, on 3rd May, he was sentenced by a court martial to twenty-eight days' imprisonment for refusing to sign a paper, and kept in solitary confinement; whether, on 8th May, while still under sentence of imprisonment, he was removed to France; and whether, in view of the fact that this man was illegally arrested, illegally detained in barracks, illegally imprisoned, and illegally removed to France, the War Office will take any action in the matter?
    Mr. TENNANT: I have called for a report.

    UNFIT FOR MILITARY SERVICE.
    Mr. NEEDHAMasked the Under-Secretary of State for War the names or numbers of the recognised certificates which show that a man is not fit for any form of military service?
    Mr. TENNANT: I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave yesterday to the hon. Member for East Edinburgh.

    REFUSAL TO SIGN ATTESTATION PAPERS.
    Mr. JOWETTasked the Under-Secretary of State for War, (1) concerning an absentee under the Military Service Act, 1916, named Alan J. M'Dougall, who was handed over to the military authorities on 25th April last, and who afterwards, at Scotland Yard, refused to sign attestation papers, and was, notwithstanding this refusal, passed for general service and sent to the depot of the 4/3rd London Regiment, where he was mishandled by some soldiers, and who afterwards forcibly put khaki clothes on him; if he will say where Alan M'Dougall is now; whether he is awaiting or has undergone court-martial; if not, what has been done with him; (2) if he is aware that Norman Gaudie, a conscientious objector, of Sunderland, who was fined £2 at Jarrow

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    Police Court and handed over to the military authorities on 19th April, and was subsequently taken to Newcastle Barracks, and from there to Richmond Castle, has been subjected to severe treatment, his own clothes torn off and khaki clothes forced on him, and afterwards put in irons on account of his resistance and handcuffed; whether he will cause inquiries to be made into the conduct of the military authorities concerned with the object of preventing the continuance of this method of treating conscientious objectors; and (3) what has become of W. Hammond, a conscientious objector, who was arrested on 17th April last, tried on 18th April, fined £2 and handed over to the military authorities, was afterwards taken to the Mill Hill Barracks and from there to Northampton, where he was put in the guard room for seven days, was on hunger strike and without food for five days, as the result of which he had to be removed to a military hospital, and was due to be tried by court-martial on 2nd May?
    Mr. TENNANT: As my hon. Friend has not seen his way to respond to the appeal I made last week, a report has been called for on the matters alleged in this and in the next two questions.

    UNATTESTED MARRIED MEN (STATISTICS).
    Mr. GORDON HARVEYasked the President of the Board of Trade if the 200,000 unattested married men whom the Government have decided can be taken from industry without impairing the commercial and financial needs of the country are in addiion to the 1,000,000 men stated by him on 21st December to be available for service in the Army?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Runciman): The commercial and financial needs of the country were fully considered before the proposals of the Government were made. Only part of the additional 1,000,000 men sanctioned in December have so far been on the Votes.

  SOLDIERS (INDUSTRIAL WORK).
  Mr. T. WILSONasked the Under-Secretary of State for War approximately the number of soldiers who have been temporarily released from Army service for employment in industrial work?
  Mr. TENNANT: I do not think that I can, without detriment to the public interest, state, even approximately, the
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  number of soldiers who have been temporarily released from Army service for employment in industrial work.
  Mr. CLYNESasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether he can state the reasons why soldiers are employed at Morecambe on factory building; what wages these men are paid; whether he is aware of statements by officials of building trades unions that other labour is available; and that the proceeding named is viewed by workmen as a form of industrial compulsion?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): Soldiers are only allowed to be employed on such work on the understanding that civilian labour is not available. I will make inquiry as to the facts in this case. Soldiers so employed receive the proper rate of working pay allowed under the Regulations.
  Mr. SUTTON: Is my hon. Friend aware that the soldiers are only receiving 4d. per day?
  Mr. FORSTER: No, Sir. They receive 1s. a day, and this is additional. It varies.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: Is the pay the same as the trade union rate in the district?
  Mr. FORSTER: I think to arrive at that you will have to add the value of the separation allowance.

  MANCHESTER REGIMENT.
  Sir FREDERICK CAWLEYasked the Under-Secretary of State for War how many deaths have taken place in the Reserve Manchester Regiment since they left Southport on 19th April for their present camp at Altcar, and the cause of same?
  Mr. TENNANT: I have called for information.

  DISTURBANCES IN IRELAND.

    BOMBARDMENT OF BUILDINGS.
    Mr. GINNELLasked the Under-Secretary of State for War why no notification was given to non-combatant civilian residents in the bombarded area of Dublin, and no attempt made to get them, or even the women and children, out of that area before the bombardment was begun?
    Mr. TENNANT: The hon. Gentleman is not correct in suggesting that there was any general bombardment. The Artillery fired on the houses which it was clear the rebels were occupying in force. It was not possible to give notification in such cases, but all possible endeavours were made to remove women and children.

    REFUSAL TO OBEY ORDERS.
    Mr. GINNELLasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether any officers at the Curragh in 1916 followed the precedent of their predecessors at the Curragh in 1914 by refusing to obey orders unless given a guarantee by the Government that they should not be required to fire on the insurgents; and, if so, whether the guarantee was given or any other action taken?
    Mr. TENNANT: I cannot enter into the accuracy or inaccuracy of the hon. Member's historical allusions. As regards the behaviour of the troops in the difficult circumstances in which they were placed, he will be glad to learn that there is abundant testimony from all quarters that the orders given showed wise appreciation of the situation, and that they were obeyed promptly and with all possible consideration for all persons concerned.
    Mr. GINNELL: I did not ask about the troops, but about officers Did any officer refuse to act, as in 1914, without a guarantee?
    Mr. TENNANT: No, Sir; certainly not.

    COLLECTION OF ARMS.
    Mr. GRETTONasked the Under-Secretary of State for War if the arms taken during the rebellion in Ireland will be distributed to the Home Guards, and other formations in Great Britain to which these arms would be useful for drill purposes?
    Mr. TENNANT: I can assure the hon. Gentleman that an appropriate method of disposing of any arms taken under the circumstances he mentions will be found, and that all relevant considerations, military, political, sentimental, and otherwise, will be taken into account before any particular method of disposing of the arms is adopted.
    Mr. T. M. HEALY: Will it not be desirable to collect all those arms so that the House may have some idea of the magnitude or relative size of the rebellion?
    Mr. TENNANT: I will consider that.

    SHERWOOD FORESTERS.
    Sir J. D. REESasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether the War Office has any information regarding the condition of the Sherwood Foresters wounded in the street fighting in Dublin?
    Mr. TENNANT: Arrangements have been made for all dangerous and serious cases to be reported to the War Office for communication to the next-of-kin. So far only one Sherwood Forester has appeared on the dangerous list and one on the serious list.
    Sir J. D. REES: Is the description of the rebellion as a "feather-head" rebellion endorsed at the War Office, seeing the crushing casualties that have been suffered?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That is a question for debate.

    TELEGRAPHIC AND TELEPHONIC COMMUNICATION.
    Mr. O'DOWDasked the Postmaster-General whether he can state when telegraphic and telephonic communication as between Great Britain and provincial towns and villages in Ireland will be re-established?
    The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Pease): Telegraphic communication between Great Britain and the provincial towns and villages in Ireland has been generally re-established and is now available for public use, subject only in a few cases to some delay where direct communications have not been restored and to such restrictions as the local military authorities may find it necessary to impose. Telephonic communication between Great Britain and Ireland is also open, but at the moment one of the lines is restricted to official use.

    LETTERS FROM MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT.
    Mr. O'DOWDasked the Postmaster-General wheher letters addressed to their families in Ireland by Members of this House are being censored; and, if so, can he say when such censorship will cease?
    Mr. TENNANT: There is no censorship on letters going to Ireland except on those from Irish prisoners taken in rebellion and now in England. There is, therefore, no censorship on the letters of Members of Parliament.

    RECORDS OF SEARCHES.
    Mr. GINNELLasked whether in any house-to-house search by the military or police in Ireland a record will be kept and a return made and presented at the earliest possible date of all cases in the Unionist portion of Ulster in which German arms and a portrait of the German Kaiser are found?
    Mr. TENNANT: The hon. Gentleman may be assured that in all searches which it may be necessary to make in any part of Ireland, as a result of recent events, records will be kept of the facts ascertained, though I cannot promise that an inventory of all the portraits of crowned Sovereigns will be preserved.

  ARMY ORDNANCE DEPOT, STIRLING.
  Mr. PONSONBYasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office whether he has received an application made on behalf of the workers in the Army Ordnance Depot in Stirling for improved wages; and, if so, whether, owing to the increased cost of living, favourable consideration of this application may be expected?
  Mr. FORSTER: This application has been received and is under consideration.

  BUDGET PROPOSALS.

    MOTOR-CAR DUTIES.
    Mr. CATHCART WASONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in connection with the question of exempting the motor-cars used by doctors from increasd taxation, he will consider if it would be desirable and practicable to draw a distinction between cars used for business purposes and cars used for pleasure and luxury, so that petrol could be obtained at a more reasonable rate by professional and business persons?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. McKenna): I may remind my hon. Friend that the existing law provides for repayment of one-half of the duty used for supplying motive power to cars used by a medical practitioner or by a veterinary surgeon for the purposes of his profession, or to trade cars.
    Mr. WASON: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that it is practically impossible for doctors to obtain petrol owing to its scarcity?
    Mr. McKENNA: That is a matter which does not come within the purview of my Department.

  HAY AND CORN HARVEST (ASSISTANCE OF SOLDIERS).
  Sir JOHN SPEARasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture if any alteration has been made to facilitate the giving of assistance to farmers during hay and corn harvest by soldiers serving with the Colours; whether that assistance may be obtained by direct communication, between those requiring such assistance and the officer commanding the men available to render it; and whether the Board of Agriculture will publish a clear and definite statement on the subject?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Acland): The Board have been in communication with the military authorities on the matter for several weeks past, and they hope to be in a position to make an announcement upon it shortly. They realise to the full the urgency and importance of the matter.

  FOOD SUPPLY.
  Sir RICHARD COOPERasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if the Queensland Government has recently passed an Act fixing the price of meat for the Britihs Government at 4 7/8d. per lb., whilst the price of meat for consumption in Queensland, is fixed by the same Act at 3¼d. per lb.; was the Colonial Office consulted before the Act was passed; and can he explain why a Colonial Government charges, 50 per cent. more than market price for meat for British and Colonial troops during the War,
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: My right hon. Friend has requested me to answer this question. The hon. Baronet is under some misapprehension, as no Act fixing the price of frozen meat sold to
  the British Government has been passed by the Queensland Government. The price was the subject of negotiation and compares favourably with that paid in other Australian States and is not above but below

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  what could have been obtained in an open market. The Queensland Government have an agreement for the supply of a comparatively small quantity of meat for local consumption at 3¼d. per pound, but this is fresh meat and is delivered under such conditions as make any comparison between the two prices quite misleading.

  CEYLON.
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what steps were taken by Sir Robert Chalmers, Governor of Ceylon, to bring to justice the soldiers who, on 10th June, 1915, entered the house of Watuhenegamage Podi Singho, a law-abiding citizen, dragged him from his bed, tied his hands behind his back with his bed-sheet, led him to the bank of the Algoda River, without trial or accusation, shot him through the heart, and ordered his widow to bury the body there under penalty of being shot herself if she attempted to take, the body elsewhere; why the six English gentlemen who superintended those proceedings have not been brought to justice; and whether any of these latter accompany Sir Robert Chalmers to his new post in Ireland?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Bonar Law): I have no reason to believe that there is any truth in this story; the last part of the question, therefore, does not arise.
  Mr. GINNELL: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is unable to give any more convincing answer to this most explicit question?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I am not able to give any more convincing answer.
  Mr. KING: In view of the very painful allegations which are made in this way, will the right hon. Gentleman consider now having a public inquiry, or do something in some way that the public may know what the truth is about these allegations, which have been going about and causing great pain and anxiety?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I have most carefully considered this, as perhaps the hon. Member will see if he studies the Papers before the House.
  Mr. GINNELL: The question is not whether the right hon. Gentleman has considered it, but whether he will grant an English inquiry.
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will specify the law under which Sir Robert Chalmers, Governor of Ceylon, had compensation for damage to property during the riots of June, 1915, awarded to Mahomedans. only, and exacted from Sinhalese (Buddhist and Christian) only, even when the latter had sustained damage; also the law under which Sinhalese ladies were arrested and imprisoned as hostages until male members of their families, having no connection with the riots, surrendered themselves; the law under which confessions of guilt were forced from innocent people by threats of torture and employés were bribed to give false evidence against their employers; why such persons, on their evidence being found false, were not indicted for perjury; and why the Sinhalese gentlemen who pray for an English inquiry into these matters are not tried if their allegations are untrue?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Provision for the payment of compensation in the case of damage caused by riots is made by the Ceylon not Damages Ordinance, No. 23, of 1915. I have no reason to believe that there is any truth in the suggestions made in the remainder of this question. If the hon. Member will refer to page 50 of the Correspondence presented to Parliament on the subject of the Ceylon riots he will see that the Government of Ceylon were considering the question of instituting proceedings against one person who had circulated false accounts of the action of Government officers, and I have no doubt that if they think it desirable they will take such action as the circumstances require in any similar case.
  Mr. GINNELL: If the right hon. Gentleman is so confident of the position he takes up, what, then, is the reason for refusing an English inquiry?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The reason is that, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would do great harm in Ceylon by reviving the controversy.

  WIRELESS OPERATORS (QUALIFIED SOLDIERS).
  Mr. CLYNESasked the Postmaster-General whether persons who, prior to enlistment in the Army or Navy, were employed as Marconi operators will be allowed at some later date to enter the limited competitive examinations for wireless operators; and. if so. will the time

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  spent during the War in wireless service in the Army count as qualifying for a future position in the postal service?
  Mr. PEASE: Vacancies for wireless telegraph operators in the service of the Post Office are filled by the selection of skilled telegraphists already serving in the Post Office. Certain tests are imposed; but no competitive examination is held. The number of vacancies is small, and there is no intention to offer appointments on the Post Office wireless staff to candidates outside the Post Office service.

  FROZEN MEAT STORES.
  Mr. T. WILSONasked the President of the Board of Trade how many thousands of carcases of frozen meat there are at the present time in the cold storage stores at Liverpool and Birkenhead?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I do not think that it is in the national interest to publish details as to the stocks of meat in the various cold storage depots in this country.
  Mr. WILSON: Is the sale of this meat under the control of the Board of Trade?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: The sale of it wholesale is under the control of the Board of Trade.

  WOOD IMPORTS.
  Mr. G. HARVEYasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that there is a certain amount of maple and birch wood regularly imported for the manufacture of bobbins; that the timber for this purpose is brought over in a form unsuitable for the manufacture of furniture; that the prohibition of import will affect the carrying on of the textile trades, to which a constant supply of bobbins is a necessity; and, if so, will he say what action he proposes to take?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: I am giving directions for the issue of a general licence for the importation of bobbins and reels.
  Mr. HARVEY: Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that what is wanted is the removal of the prohibition of the importation of the material out of which the bobbins are made and not of the articles themselves?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: As at present advised I only propose to give a general, licence for bobbins and reels, but if there is necessary timber for the cotton industry if my hon. Friend will make representations to me on the subject I will, of course, consider them.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is plenty of birch in this country available?

  SUGAR.
  Sir J. D. REESasked the President of the Board of Trade whether any steps are proposed to ensure that before any sugar is released for the manufacture of sweetmeats, chocolate, and the like luxuries the 75 per cent. promised by the Royal Commission on Sugar Supply shall be secured for domestic consumption?
  Mr. McKENNA: This question is now occupying the attention of the Royal Commission, and the manufacturers of such goods are being invited to a conference with the Commission upon it

  BARLEY, MALT, AND HOPS.
  Sir J. D. REESasked the President of the Board of Trade whether the export of barley, malt, and hops is now prohibited; whether British brewers are compelled to use 14 per cent. less material than they formerly used; and whether, seeing that if export of above products is permitted, tonnage is nevertheless required for their accommodation, and that in that case neutral brewers in proximity to Germany will be able to profit by restrictions imposed on the Home trade, he proposes to take any action in the matter?
  Mr. RUNCIMAN: The Bill which has been circulated is intended to reduce the use of brewing materials as a whole by 14 per cent., so as to attain a reduction of 33⅓ per cent. in brewing imports. The exportation of barley and malt is prohibited to all foreign destinations. There is no prohibtion on the export of hops, but I see no reason to suupose that any considerable export will take place.

  INTERNED GERMANS.
  Mr. C. WASONasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if there

  1343
  is any method of discrimination in the German internment camps, so that Germans of undoubted character who have been long resident in this country, married English wives, and have English children, will not be mixed up with treason mongers?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Herbert Samuel): Interned aliens are classified so far as practicable, but any exact discrimination on the lines suggested is not possible.
  Mr. GARDNERasked whether the Government have allowed Germans from internment camps to come out and bake bread for German bakers in any case?
  Mr. H. SAMUEL: During the last three months no Germans who were bakers have been released from internment. Among the men recommended for exemption by the Advisory Committee for special reasons, and released accordingly during the previous few months there appear to have been a very small number of men who were bakers, but none of these were released on account of their trade or in order that they might take employment with German bakers. The total number of Germans released in the last three months out of a total of about 26,000 was seventeen, and several of these were only technically of German nationality. The number interned during the same period was 203. I would add that the statement recently made by an English baker, when applying at the Wandsworth Tribunal for exemption for his son, which has attracted some attention, to the effect that he had German bakers on each side of him and that it seemed very hard that the Government allowed Germans from internment camps to come out and compete with him, is found on inquiry to have no basis in fact.
  Colonel YATE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say how many German bakers there are now plying their trade in London?
  Mr. SAMUEL: No, Sir, but they are exceedingly few.

  MUNITIONS.

    EMPLOYMENT OF WOMEN.
    Mr. ANDERSONasked the Minister of Munitions whether he will state the lumber of hours worked per week, and the
    1344
    length of the working day, by the women employed at the controlled establishment of Messrs. Vickers, Maxim, at Lancaster; and whether these hours are in conformity with the recommendations of the Committee appointed by the Minister to deal with the welfare of munition workers?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of MUNITIONS (Dr. Addison): The hours worked by women per week at the controlled establishment of Messrs. Vickers, Maxim, at Lancaster, are sixty-one and half during the week on day shift and sixty per week on night shift; the length of the day and night shift is ten and a half and ten hours respectively, these periods including overtime. The hours on the day shift are one and a half hours beyond those recommended by the Health of Munitions Workers' Committee, and I am informing the firm that, except in cases of emergency, the Minister of Munitions is not prepared to sanction a total of hours worked by women from week to week in excess of the maximum recommended by the Committee.

  CONCESSIONS (INDIA).
  Sir J. D. REESasked the Secretary of State for India whether he is aware that Messrs. Heinrich Brandt and Company, of Hamburg, own mica mines, and that their German manager, Mr. Illgen, has a concession for radio-active ore in the Nellore district; whether they are to continue in possession of these concessions; what powers the local government or the Government of India have taken, or possess, to cancel such concessions, and to re-grant them to British applicants; and, if no such powers exist, is it proposed by the Government of India to undertake the necessary legislation?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Mr. Chamberlain): I have no recent information as to the particular case mentioned in the question. The wider questions of policy raised are occupying my attention.

  BURMA (PROPOSED UNIVERSITY).
  Sir JOHN JARDINEasked the Secretary of State for India if he will state what progress has been made in the project of establishing a university for the province of Burma; and whether he can say when it is likely to be created?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I have as yet nothing to add to the answer given to the hon. Member on 14th March.

  TIGRIS AND EUPHRATES (TROOPS).
  Sir J. JARDINEasked the Secretary of State for India whether he is in a position to make a statement as regards the employment of the troops on the River Tigris and the River Euphrates?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir, I cannot make any statement on the subject.
  Sir J. D. REES: Are there any troops on the Euphrates, as distinguished from the Tigris?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I said I could not make any statement on the matter.

  ANGLO-INDIAN MILITARY FORCE.
  Sir J. JARDINEasked the Secretary of State for India if he will state what arrangements have been made for creating a military force of Anglo-Indians; whether the numbers have been fixed for each arm; and whether units will be attached to particular provinces?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Enlistment in the Regular British Army has now been opened to the domiciled Anglo-Indian community, for general service with British troops for the duration of the War. The conditions of pay, pensions, etc., of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men will be identical with those of British troops serving in India. Two field troops Cavalry, one section Field Artillery, and sixteen platoons of Infantry will be raised in the first instance. The Infantry will be recruited on a Territorial basis. The units will be attached for training to British Cavalry regiments, to Regular Royal Field Artillery batteries, and to Regular battalions of British Infantry, as the case may be. After completion of training a unit or any part of a unit will be liable to be sent to any British unit of the same arm of the Regulars or Territorials serving in India or on active service.

  LOSS OF ADMIRAL CRADOCK'S SQUADRON.
  Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he
  1346
  can now see his way to lay Papers with regard to the loss of Admiral Cradock's squadron at Coronel?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): As my right hon. Friend the First Lord informed the hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme on the 10th November last, he is convinced, after full reflection, that it would not be in the interests of the public service to lay Papers on particular incidents connected with the War at the present time. If Papers are laid in connection with one incident, they can hardly be refused in connection with another, and he does not think that any useful purpose would be served by a discussion on the personal questions which would thus be raised.

  Greenhill Lane Post Office, Derbyshire.
  Mr. HANCOCKasked the Postmaster-General if he is aware that the post office at Greenhill Lane, Derbyshire, which has been open during the last sixty-five years, is now being closed; and whether, seeing that the local council is strongly and unanimously opposed to the closing and that inconvenience will be caused to a large population, he will issue instructions for it to remain open as hitherto?
  Mr. JOSEPH PEASE: The office was closed on the occurrence of a vacancy because the business done was small. There are two other offices in opposite directions little more than half a mile away, and a letter box is being provided near the site of the office which has been closed. I do not see any sufficient ground for incurring the expense of reopening the office.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  Motion made, and Question put, "That the proceedings on the Military Service Bill, if under discussion at eleven of the clock, be not interrupted under the Standing Order (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. Bonar Law.]
  Mr. SNOWDEN: May I ask—
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member cannot speak on this Motion.
  Question agreed to.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: On a point of Order. When Motions similar to the one just passed have been before the House, have you not allowed Members to put questions?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The Motions were not similar. The Motion just passed is an exceptional Motion under Standing Order 1, and it does not permit of amendment or debate.

MILITARY SERVICE BILL.
As amended, further considered.
MILITARY SERVICE BILL.

  CLAUSE 1.—(Extension and Continued Operation of Military Service Act, 1916.)
  (1) Every male British subject who has at any time since the fourteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fifteen, been, or for the time being is, ordinarily resident in Great Britain, and who has attained the age of eighteen years, and has not attained the age of forty-one years, shall, unless he either is for the time being within the exceptions set out in the first Schedule to the Military Service Act, 1916 (in this Act referred to as the principal Act), as amended by this Act or any subsequent enactment, or has attained the age of forty-one years before the appointed date, be deemed as from the appointed date to have been duly enlisted in His Majesty's regular forces for general service with the Colours or in the Reserve for the period of the War, and to have been forthwith transferred to the Reserve.
  The appointed date shall, as respects men who come within the operation of this Section on the passing of this Act, be the thirtieth day after the date of the
  1356
  passing of this Act, and, as respects men who come within the operation of this Section after the passing of this Act, be the thirtieth day after the date on which they so come within the operation of this Section.
  (2) The principal Act shall be construed as if the foregoing provisions of this Section were substituted for Sub-section (1) of Section one of that Act, without prejudice, however, to the operation of that Sub-section as respects men to whom it applied.
  (3) Sub-section (4) of Section one of the principal Act is hereby repealed.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the word "eighteen," and to insert instead thereof the word "nineteen."
  The proposal to raise the age to nineteen, which has been discussed on former occasions, has always commanded a large measure of support in this House, and the President of the Local Government Board must have found out that it commands great and increasing support in the country generally. I should like the House to consider the matter, first, from the point of view of the national interest. The number of lads affected by the provision as it stands is between 300,000 and 400,000. That is roughly the number of boys who in each year attain the age of eighteen. Therefore the proposal affects a very considerable number of persons, and affects directly almost every aspect of the national life. You are going in this arbitrary and sudden manner to divert the streams which run through the whole of our national life; you are going to interfere with the education of these boys for expert professions and occupations; you are going to take them also from the general industrial life of the country. Although it may be possible to do this for a short time, it is impossible to do it for any extended time without inflicting a most serious injury upon the economic life of the nation.
  But that is not the main ground upon which I wish to urge the acceptance of this Amendment. I would ask the House to consider the claims of the young lads themselves. I submit that eighteen is too young an age at which to take these lads compulsorily into the armed forces of the Crown. I can well understand the temptation that a Government has to take these lads. I remember that when this

  1357
  matter was being discussed on a former occasion an hon. Member opposite interrupted and said that these lads had no votes and no rights. Undoubtedly there is a temptation, and because these lads are both voteless and voiceless their claims may not receive the same measure of consideration and inquiry as follows when the claims of older persons are being considered. I suggest that in many cases these boys are immature both in mind and in body, and that the age is altogether too young. I should like to see it raised much higher. To my mind there is something peculiarly repulsive in this House adopting a Bill which conscripts schoolboys.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Our own sons.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE: I will say a word on that presently. I think that in the national interest the lives of these lads should not be interfered with in this way at so early an age. I believe that it would be sound economy from the national point of view not to conscript boys until they have reached a higher age. [An HON. MEMBER: "How old?"] My Amendment proposes to raise the age to nineteen. Even one year is some improvement on the proposal of the Bill. I would mention also the consideration which this House ought to show for the parents of lads of so tender an age. My hon. Friend interrupted me on that point a moment ago. I should like to read a letter which I have just received from one of the parents concerned. I am sure that all Members have received letters on this subject. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Then they are indeed fortunate. A great number of Members will have received many letters from parents of lads affected by this provision. I will read one that I have received, and I am sure that Members, whether they agree or disagree, will at least realise its sincerity and the right of these views to be expressed:—
  "Dear Sir,
  I hope you will excuse my taking the liberty of writing. I know I am only one mother out of millions, but I have a boy, nearly 18, and it is troubling me too much to sit and think and yet do nothing to try to save him, because he is not fit for a soldier; he is such a boy, and does not look over 15. Oh, Sir, it is horrible, I could not bear it. Will it be taking too much of your time to read this? I was left without a husband when my first baby was born, and I have simply lived for him, and worked to keep him until he was 14. I have always been a delicate woman and had no one to help me besides my boy. All I had was a widowed mother and a invalid sister who could not work for her living. We four have struggled along together. My mother and sister are partly dependant upon me and my boy. Oh, sir, can you advise me what to do? He will not be 18 until July. Each day I awake with such
  1358
  a load on my mind, because it is a day nearer. Oh, sir, can it not be prevented? I would not grieve so much if he were a man, or if only I could take his place. Have these gentlemen got boys of their own who want this conscription?"
  HON. MEMBERS: Yes!
  Mr. W. THORNE: I have a lad not yet eighteen, and he wants to go now.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: So have I.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE: I would not have spoken upon this point, knowing the bravery, chivalry and love of adventure of English boys, but surely it is our duty not to be guided only by these characteristics of English boys, but to see to it that the arrangements that are made are wise, just and fair alike for them and for the nation. I have read the letter I have because I think this expression of sorrow and anguish is almost epic in its intensity. Because it reflects not only the opinion of the mother, but the feeling in the country, of which we have had overwhelming evidence. I venture to appeal to the Government to raise the age to nineteen, when these boys will at least be a little more mature in mind and body. I decline to go on believing that it can be necessary for this great wrong to be continued. I trust very much, in view of the evidence that has been submitted on former occasions to the Government, that the right hon. Gentleman, in reply, will not content himself by saying that the matter has been considered and that no concession can be made. There are few provisions in this Bill that have raised greater resentment than this particular provision. If the Government could modify it at all they would give great satisfaction to a great number of people who are directly affected. I earnestly hope, before we have disposed of the Bill, that this matter may meet with at least some partial Amendment.
  Mr. HOGGE: I moved this Amendment in Committee, and I approach this subject from a slightly different standpoint to that of my hon. Friend. I have taken the position, ever since the House determined by an overwhelming vote that we must have compulsion, that it is no use any of us who are opposed on principle to compulsion beating our heads against a stone wall. All we ought to do, and what I think the House will perhaps agree to let us do, is to try and secure some measure of fair play where we think such does not operate in the previous Act. It is entirely from that point of

  1359
  view that I desire to offer my observations. I would remind the House that at the moment—I think the President of the Local Government Board will agree—there is very considerable inequality existing in regard to the boys who are fighting, or who may be called upon to fight in the Army. As we all know, boys of well under eighteen years of age have been fighting for us at the front. Many of these boys have done extremely well. Many have secured coveted distinctions, and everybody must be thoroughly proud of them. But the fact remains, that a great number of these lads are under eighteen years of age. Under the Derby scheme no boy of eighteen, after he was enrolled, could be called up until he was nineteen. Owing, however, to military exigencies an arrangement was come to whereby those boys were offered at eighteen and a half the option of being called up for immediate training, or, if they wished it—the Government were quite proper in every part of this agreement—they could return to their homes, after being medically inspected, and could not be called up till they were nineteen. What does this Bill do? It calls up all those boys at eighteen years and one month. They are allowed one month's grace in which to recruit voluntarily. I think I am expressing the feeling of the House when I say that a very large number of these boys will recruit voluntarily within the month, and save us the trouble of calling them up. We have, therefore, these three different states. It is perfectly obvious that some of these lads of eighteen may by this Bill be actually called up, and be fighting before the lads who are called up under the Derby scheme. That is a possibility in time, and I suggest to the House, and to the President of the Local Government Board, that if he does not, and cannot, meet this question and raise the age from eighteen to nineteen, he will be doing the fair thing to equalise the position more than has been done by any methods yet suggested. For instance, I do not think it is fair to call up under this Second Military Service Bill lads of the same year as were called up under the other, and actually have these fighting before the men whom we conscripted in the first Bill. I do not think it is fair. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, if he cannot go the whole way that I suggested
  1360
  in Committee—and presumably he cannot, for I agree that if a proposal is beaten in Committee it must have very, very strong reasons behind it before it can be accepted on the Report stage—he might go half-way, and he might agree to co-ordinate this particular Bill with the Derby scheme so that the lads called up under the Derby scheme and under this Bill would be in the same position.
  There are two other reasons—quite shortly—why I favour this present proposal. The President of the Local Government Board always replies—I think he is entitled to reply—that the tribunals will look after the question as to how many of these boys shall be taken. I think the House will agree that there is a shortage in what one might term here, without any reproach—the supply of boys for professional classes. We are running very short of doctors; that is one of the great things during the whole campaign that has created difficulty. Everybody knows that boys at that age are beginning a medical curriculum at our universities. As I say, the reply may be that a tribunal might not take a boy of that sort, and that that boy would be given an opportunity of going on with his studies; but I do suggest there is something in the economic argument that you are depriving the State of the material which will enable the State to take up the fight with the rest of the world after this War is over and peace is declared, a point which we ought never to forget, because if we are going to meet the conditions which will obtain after the War, we must be well equipped, and if there is a large hiatus in the supply of boys coming into professional and scientific branches of education, we are bound to be less equipped than we otherwise would be.
  There is a third point, and it is the last I make, in favour of the argument that there is a hardship on the parents of those boys, which the House does not quite appreciate. At the age of eighteen a boy has left school—in the working classes certainly—and been away from school for at least three years. He is three years through his apprenticeship, and he is within reasonable distance of earning a wage which would enable him to contribute to the upkeep of his parents. The House will also agree that in many cases the lad of eighteen who will be taken is the last boy in the family. The elder boys have all been enlisted. Now,

  1361
  when that boy applies to the War Office for support for his parents, because he is an apprentice, and because his parents are making sacrifices in order to enable him to go through his apprenticeship, he cannot prove that his parents are dependent on him, and he cannot get a penny separation allowance out of the War Office. I see my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars (Mr. Barnes) in his place. He was a member of the Pensions Committee, and I remember talking with him about this very subject. He told me then that on the Pensions Committee they had discussed this question of apprentices, and he himself felt that the question of dealing with the apprentices from that point of view was an extremely difficult one, and that it was a real hardship. If you are going to take these lads of eighteen away from families which have already contributed largely to the Army and Navy by giving up other members of the family, I hope the parents will not be left stranded, but that some contribution will be made to the home. I do not think it is fair on the Report stage to elaborate too much those points which have been touched upon in Committee, but I do ask the President of the Local Government Board to consider the points I have made, and to appreciate the fact that I do not make them with a view of stopping the progress of the Bill, but of trying to adjust what seems to me a certain amount of unfairness in this proposal both with respect to the boy and with respect to the parents.
  The PRESIDENT of the LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD (Mr. Long): I am sure that my hon. Friend who has just spoken expressed what everybody feels when he said that these Amendments, each one of which has been discussed either generally on the Second Reading or individually in Committee, cannot lend themselves to much further discussion at this later stage. We have discussed this question of the age of eighteen—nineteen on the original Act, and on several occasions during the progress of this Bill, and the Government feel quite as strongly as any of those who have spoken to-day or on previous occasions that it is regrettable that we are obliged to call on those lads to come and take their share in the service of the country, but it is a national necessity. It is put forward as a national necessity, and it is my duty to put that to the House with as much emphasis as I can command. A
  1362
  great deal has been said about the hardship inflicted upon those lads by taking them away from home and imposing upon them military training and discipline so early, but I think everybody who has watched the lads in the course of their training will agree that the improvement, physical and mental, that comes to these boys after two or three months of good military training is extraordinary. I know a case—one individual case, I know, does not make the whole right, but it is no exception—of a mother whose lad enlisted at the age of eighteen, and insisted upon going, and she was broken-hearted. She said he was taken from nome, and it would mean his destruction. He came back after three months' training with the Colours, and his mother herself admitted that she could not have believed so much change for the good could have taken place in a lad in so short a time. He was physically built up, strengthened mentally, and given a view of life he did not entertain before. I do not think anyone who has followed closely, as many of us have, the lives of these young soldiers can contend that anything but benefit comes from the condition of life which they are called upon to bear. It ought to be said here that we are engaged in this great conflict with a very powerful enemy, that we have many disadvantages, and that we are often reproached that we started without due preparation. Well, we have to overtake those arrears as best we can, and we have striven to do so, but we ought not to increase our disadvantages. And let the House remember that other countries take their lads much younger than we do. My right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for War tells me that Germany calls her lads up for training at seventeen.
  There is an aspect of the case altogether different from the one put by my hon. Friends the Mover and Seconder of the Amendment that they ought to consider, speaking as friends of these lads and parents. I think, perhaps, the worst thing that can happen when you are creating a new Army, as we are doing, is to be called upon to send men out to take their places in the trenches before they have had an adequate amount of preparation and training. Let the House remember that this modern warfare has none of the dash and glory and hot-bloodedness of the old-fashioned warfare, the constant attacks, the constant excitements which attend the sort of warfare we have hitherto been

  1363
  accustomed to. Every soldier to whom I have talked about this great War tells me the same thing, that never were training and discipline so essential to success as they are in this present form of warfare, where the men have to endure the peril of being constantly under heavy fire, constantly in exposed and difficult positions, where, if they do not obey the orders to the letter, they sacrifice their own lives and risk the lives of others. Therefore, never have you required training so much as now. The proposal of the Army Council is to take those lads of eighteen and train them until nineteen, by which time they will be really efficient soldiers, ready for the work that they have to perform, and, I venture to say, that it is in the interest of the Army and in the interest of the lads themselves—the very point of view from which my hon. Friends have approached the question—once you admit the fact that their education, the adoption by them of civil careers, have all the time to go by the board, and let it be remembered that this condition does not apply only to the lads who are taken now under this Bill for soldiers, but that in every class, from the highest to the lowest, from the richest to the poorest, the same sacrifices have had to be made. Thousands of young fellows have given up their educational preparation for all sorts of professions, and are now fighting in France or lie buried in one of our theatres of war, young fellows who had fully intended and partially prepared themselves for all sorts of professions. This is one of the horrors of war. It is one of the evils which we cannot avoid if we are going to carry a war of this sort to a successful conclusion. If those elementary conditions are admitted, as I think they must be, the question remains whether in the long run the balance of argument is not in favour of taking these lads of eighteen and giving them a training to make them efficient soldiers by the time they go to the front.
  There are two outstanding questions, one the liability for dependants raised by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge). The hon. Members say that these lads cannot show that their parents have been dependent upon them and therefore they may be exposed to great financial loss through the lads going to the Army at this early age. Surely that case is met by the new Committee which has been appointed to consider the liabilities and
  1364
  the financial difficulties of those who are called upon to go to the War and their dependants who are left behind. I know of nothing to prevent that Committee dealing with a case of this kind. Then there is the question of sending these boys abroad to France. I notice that there is an Amendment on the Paper in the name of three hon. Members providing "that no man who comes within the operation of this or the principal Act shall be sent to serve abroad before he reaches the age of nineteen. It would be impossible for the Government to accept that Amendment for two reasons. Firstly, because it is open to the objection that by putting those words into the Act you impose a liability upon the Army Council and their representatives which it is not fair to impose upon them, and which I do not think they ought to be asked to accept; nevertheless, I am authorised by the Adjutant-General to say quite distinctly that he has no intention of sending these lads abroad until they are nineteen.
  At the same time he says, what he has stated in every one of these cases where he has authorised me to make a statement on his behalf, that you cannot bind yourself to any condition when circumstances may be too strong for it. You might have lads close upon nineteen years of age, well trained and physically strong, and you might have some terrible pressure at some part of your line, and the general officer might be urgently demanding that in extra number of men should be thrown into that particular part of the line, and this might make the difference between success and failure. It is inconceivable that this House, in such an emergency as that, should put into the Statute words that would not enable the authorities to make the best use of these men, although at the present time the Adjutant-General thinks that it will not be necessary to send these, men abroad, and he only takes this power as a precaution, and not because he wishes to make a wrong use of this power, but simply because he does not want his hands and the hands of the Army Council tied in such a way as would prevent them if necessary using all our forces in order to secure success. There are some words which I am prepared to insert which are not quite the same as those which have been proposed, but which I think would really carry out the greater part of what they desire. They are to this effect:

  1365
  "Provided that steps shall be taken to prevent as far as possible the sending of men to serve abroad before attaining the age of nineteen, except in the case of military necessity."
  [An HON. MEMBER: "Are you going to put those words in the Bill?"] I propose to put those words into the Bill instead of the Amendment which has been moved. I hope the House will not accept the Amendment, but will support the Government in what is a very sacred duty, to provide the men we want for our Army.
  Mr. BARNES: I shall not enter upon the question that has been foreshadowed by the right hon. Gentleman because my hon. Friends have an Amendment down, and they will deal with that point directly. I want to say a word or two on the question of liability, which, strong as it was when the Pensions Committee sat more than a year ago, is much stronger now, because we have a compulsory system instead of a voluntary system. When we discussed this matter on the Pensions Committee eighteen months ago, I made repeated efforts to get some provision whereby the parents of these lads might get some benefit of a financial character if they went away, and I was always met with the plea that the principle of prewar dependants mast be laid down rigidly and not departed from, and therefore nothing was done with regard to those boys. These cases are very hard, and they are not exactly on the same ground which the right hon. Gentleman wishes the House to believe. With regard to apprentices, we have had brought forward the case of the better-to-do people whose parents are better off than the poor boys who are apprentices. The right hon. Gentleman also says that provision has, he understands, been made by the Statutory Committee to deal with these cases. Might I inform him, as a simple matter of fact, that no such provision has been made. I have brought the matter forward before the Pensions Committee, and, rightly or wrongly, they feel that they are more or less tied by the same principle laid down some considerable time ago that the pre-War standard of dependants must be the rigid principle to be applied, and therefore neither by the flat rate nor by the supplementary allowances now being, or about to be, made to dependants and others is any provision made for the parents of the boys who are now to be compulsorily taken, and who, after serv-
  1366
  ing three or four years of their apprenticeship, are taken into the Army compulsorily instead of voluntarily.
  4.0 P.M.
  What is the position of these lads? I have gone through the process myself, and I know. Parents struggle hard and at great sacrifice to get their boys a trade, and in order to do so they send a lad to a trade at about fifteen years of age, at a wage perhaps of 3s. or 4s. a week for the first year. Perhaps at the end of four or five years the boy may get 14s. or 15s. per week, perhaps less or more, and then he is taken away to the Army within a few months, perhaps in some cases within a few weeks, of his apprenticeship terminating. If that apprenticeship had terminated a little earlier, instead of receiving 14s. or 15s. a week, the lad would probably have had £2 per week, and then the parents awould have been in a position to reap some of the advantages they have been looking forward to as the result of a very long sacrifice and struggle. That is the position in the case of hundreds of parents throughout the length and breadth of the country. I believe the Statutory Committee have decided, after much discussion, to give something within a period of five or seven years to the parents after the boy is dead, in the event of him being killed in war, provided it is found that those parents are in poor or poverty-stricken circumstances. I want to submit to the right hon. Gentleman and to the Government that it is a miserably inadequate provision to make for the parents of these boys. It was passable a year ago, perhape, to make no proper provision. I do not say it was justifiable, but it was arguable at all events that while the boy went voluntarily the community was not to the same extent under the obligation to pay something to his parents. But now that you are taking them compulsorily, it is incumbent upon the Army Council, or whoever deals with these matters for the Government, to alter their Royal Warrant in such a way that the boy's parents will have something, even if he is killed, to make up for their sacrifice in giving him a trade. I commend that view not only to the right hon. Gentleman but also to the Financial Secretary to the War Office.
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. H. W. Forster): The conclusion to which the Select Committee arrived with regard to separation

  1367
  allowances payable in respect of apprentices was part of a general conclusion with regard to the grant of separation allowances as a whole, and it is utterly impossible, in a comparatively rigid administration such as you must have and such as you cannot avoid in administering an Army of This kind, to forsake the realm of fact and to embark upon the sea of probability. I do not suppose anyone who has not had any practical experience of administering a gigantic undertaking such as the Army is at the present moment realises what the effect would b'e if you adopted an unduly elastic system. You would never get anything done at all. Out of the millions of cases with which we have to deal one knows what would happen. Members of this House would be bringing hundreds of cases to my personal attention where they now bring one, and it would be quite impossible to get anything done at all. That is no argument, I agree, against setting up some other authority to deal with those cases which do come within the realm of probability, and it was in order to deal with cases of that sort the Government adopted the recommendation of the Select Committee which considered this question and called into being the Statutory Committee of the Royal Patriotic Fund. That body is not tied as the hands of the War Office are tied in dealing with this question, and I venture to submit to the House that is the proper authority to deal with the separation allowances which might properly be allowed in respect of apprentices.
  Mr. BARNES: Give them the tip.
  Mr. FORSTER: I honestly do not think that body will want any tip. I think they will realise just as much as anybody else that when you graft upon a voluntary system a system of compulsion the problem is altered substantially. No one who has studied the question can come to any other conclusion than that this matter requires most careful thought and investigation. It is obvious that I cannot carry the matter further at the present moment. All I want the House to do is realise that there is in existence now a body specially charged with the consideration of these cases, and I am quite sure they will consider them with sympathy.
  Mr. PROTHERO: I do not think the question of age which has been raised
  1368
  now admits of argument. The President of the Local Government Board has clearly shown to us that the military exigencies of the situation require the age to be taken at eighteen, and he has shown us that boys of that age will not suffer by being so taken. When I recollect how hundreds, and almost thousands, of boys between the ages of eighteen and nineteen in my Constituency have gone to the front voluntarily without any thought but that of doing their duty by their country, and when I recollect how our colleges are emptied, how our quadrangles are silent, and how the not of life is stilled on the rivers and playfields of Oxford, I do not think anyone can say that the age of eighteen is too young to satisfy the call of patriotic duty. I must say that the question of apprenticeship has been, in my mind, a very serious one. It arises only on the Military Service Act and the present Military Service Bill, because they are the first to apply compulsion. It is a very difficult question, and I should like to add my voice to that of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Blackfriars Division (Mr. Barnes) in an earnest appeal to the Government to arrange to meet the very difficult and very hard case of appreticeship. I know a case in my own experience of a widow woman who has brought up a boy from almost childhood by her own exertions and has paid for his apprenticeship. Up to the present moment, of course, she has derived no advantage whatever from the money which she has expended. Her son will fall under this Bill before she is able or he is able to derive any benefit from the years of expenditure which his apprenticeship has caused. That is a situation which, I think, the Government ought to meet, and, under this compulsory system, to meet with generosity. There was another point which was raised by the Amendment which stood in the name of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Blackfriars Division, which we appear to be able to discuss under the present Amendment. The Amendment proposed to be placed in the Statute by the President of the Local Government Board is a much wider Amendment in one sense than that of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Blackfriars Division. Whereas his Amendment is confined to young boys under the Military Service Act and under the present Bill, the Amendment as proposed by the President of the Local Government Board applies

  1369
  to all boys, whether volunteers or enrolled under the two Acts, and that is an addition which I most cordially welcome.
  It would have been a monstrous inconsistency to place a volunteer who has come forward patriotically in a worse position than the man who has come forward under this system. May I put a case which came to my notice only the other day? A boy enlisted on 9th September, 1914, at the age of sixteen and three months. He had his nine months' training, and then went out to Gallipoli. He was slightly wounded in the head by shrapnel, and he was badly wounded in the knee by a rifle bullet. He was invalided home; he is now convalescent, has rejoined, and is at this very moment expecting to be sent abroad again a second time before he is of the age of eighteen. This boy, I may say, has no wish to be kept at home, and he is physically fit, but it is a parents' question, and I do really think that you will be outraging the feelings of parents if you do not extend to the parents of the volunteer the same protection against foreign service which you are now giving to those who are brought in under the compulsory system. On the other hand, I must entirely accept the principle that was laid down by the President of the Local Government Board that, whatever rule you make, you must make it subject to the exigencies of the military situation. I do not think that putting a distinct prohibition in the Statute would in the least help to produce the result that we all desire, that boys should not be sent until they have attained the age of nineteen. What penalty could be enforced against a commanding officer who, under the stress of military necessity, allowed a boy to go to the front? I do not believe there is any judge or any court which would pass any sentence upon a man who acted in the best of his discretion when in a position of such absolute difficulty, and I think those who, like myself, are in favour of the proposal not to allow boys to go to the front until they are nineteen ought to accept, and accept gratefully, the words which the President of the Local Government Board proposed to put in the present Bill.
  Mr. S. WALSH: The House, I think, will be in possession of my views on this particular Amendment. I spoke a few days ago upon the same point, and I have not seen any reason at all for de-
  1370
  parting from the opinion which I then expressed. I find that my opinion, in so far as I have been able to test Labour opinion throughout the country, is backed
  up by every representative body of which I know. Last week we had a meeting of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, and I only refer to it because, after all, it is a very great representative organisation. We took the main points of this Bill into consideration. The miners may at once be said to have supported the Government from the commencement of the War in a way which has not been exceeded by any other body of people in the country, and, while on every other point there were marked differences of opinion, upon this one point as to the very serious mistake—as we believe national mistake—of taking boys so early into the Army there was absolutely unanimity of opinion. There seems rather a tendency to look upon this matter from the point of view of the financial burden that may be entailed upon the household unless certain Regulations are altered. That, of course, is a serious enough aspect, but I submit the most serious aspect of all is the terrible depletion that this condition will make in that which, after all, is the highest capital of this country, the young life of the nation.
  When the President of the Local Government Board tells us that it is a matter of military necessity I am bound to say one must pay very great attention. There must be authority somewhere. There must be some person in whom we can place our belief, and when the right hon. Gentleman, with a full sense of responsibility, tells the deputation that he met last week, and when two of his colleagues also tell them the same thing, one does feel a tremendous difficulty in opposing such a definite authoritative statement. At the same time, one must regret that the position of this nation is such that we are bound, by reasons of military necessity, to take away this very valuable young life. Let us see whether we are treating these young people honestly. Are we treating them on the same lines as we treated them in the principal Act? Then those young folks were told—and I make no complaint that the promises and statements then made have been departed from, provided, of course, that a military necessity has arisen, and the Secret Session convinced me that it has—I make no complaint that the pledges are

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  not being kept. But then these young men were taken on at eighteen years and seven months. The appointed day was the 22nd of March. They had a complete month after that time, and they attained the age of eighteen on the 15th of August in the previous year. Therefore they were only embodied in the Army at eighteen years eight months. I take it they are entitled to something like six months' training. If the military necessity does exist, why cannot we co-ordinate the treatment in both classes of cases?
  I can hardly imagine that our condition has become so parlous that we are bound to take these young people at eighteen and put them into the Army even for home training for twelve months. I do not intend to go into the other part of the matter, but one would like to see, after all, this House of Commons have some definite control over the military authority. I can see no possible shadow of ground why, if it be the keen desire of the military authorities not to take these young fellows before they are nineteen, that cannot be definitely expressed in the Act of Parliament. There have been so many things left to chance that, with the very best will in the world, one is driven to the conclusion that, after all, we are not being treated quite fairly. If there is a distinct desire—and even Lord Kitchener himself has expressed that desire—not to take these young people until they are nineteen, if it is the case that nineteen is the earliest at which they can make effective soldiers, surely that might very well be expressed in the Bill itself, and then we should be giving to the nation at large the idea that, after all, the parents of the boys are being treated fairly and openly. I hope I have not said a single word that can be unfairly construed. Honestly, after listening attentively through the Secret Session, I have reported to everyone over whom I have any influence that a serious military situation has arisen, and that this necessity exists, and yet, with all my desire to place confidence in those who possess authoritative information, I can hardly believe that our nation has been driven to such a pass as to be compelled to take these young folk so early. I would appeal to the right hon. Gentleman, on behalf of hundreds of thousands outside this House, to give us something more definite than the statement he has made.
  Colonel YATE: I should like to express my entire agreement with what has been
  1372
  said by my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford University (Mr. Prothero) as to the statement of the President of the Local Government Board, and I also agree in hoping there will be equal treatment to men of eighteen under the different schemes. But I do ask the right hon. Gentleman not to proceed with the addition he has suggested. Talk of eighteen! Why, good gracious, I went out to India at eighteen as a soldier, and yet we are here simply talking of their going to France. I cannot agree with the hon. Member for Mid-Lanark (Mr. Pringle) in what he said as to the age of nineteen. My belief is that the age of eighteen is the time when a man can best be spared from industrial work. No man can be called a skilled labourer at eighteen, and I believe that the majority called up at eighteen would be found perfectly fit to go abroad six months later. It is only the young immature men who would have to be kept behind. I do trust that this question may be treated as it has been treated in the principal Act, and that no fresh change will be made.
  Suppose I was called upon to jump a parapet and charge a German trench. Which would I rather have with me, these active young men of eighteen, or a lot of fat old married men? We want young active men to charge German trenches, and eighteen and nineteen are just the ages at which they can do it. To call upon men of forty, who have never had a day's military training, to do it is dangerous to them. They are apt to break down. I trust there will be no hesitation in calling out all the young men in the country. I do not believe there is a man in the country in any employment whatsoever between eighteen and twenty-five, years of age that can really be deemed to be indispensable. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to make arrangements, as soon as he can, to call up every man from eighteen to twenty-five. I should like to call the special attention of the right hon. Gentleman to the tremendous discontent among the older men of thirty, who say, "Here am I being called up; look at those young fellows still at work." Let us have every young fellow from eighteen to twenty-five out, and then these men of thirty will also come out with satisfaction and contentment, which they do not do at the present time.
  Mr. WARDLE: I am sure we listened to the last speaker with a good deal of curiosity on this side of the House. But we cannot follow him in his argument that

  1373
  there is no age intervening between eighteen and forty, and that if you cannot have people at eighteen you must have those at forty. The argument remains, and I think it is a very strong argument indeed, that a boy of eighteen is certainly not as mature, as able, or as capable of being a soldier as a man from twenty-one to twenty-six and up to thirty. My view is it is possible and, in fact, it has occurred there are these immature boys; for, after all, boys of eighteen are not all alike, any more than are men of forty or fifty. There are immature boys of eighteen who have been taken into the Army, and many of them have suffered very severely. It is quite true, as those of us who go about with our eyes open know, there are some boys taken on at seventeen or eighteen who immediately begin to pay for the training. There are others whom it is exceedingly difficult to train, and who are found to be only a burden. You can make nothing of them. I quite agree with the President of the Local Government Board that in the case of a person with stamina to begin with, there is a likelihood that physical training will aid development and give the boy a better physique. But there are cases where it has an exactly opposite effect, and therefore there is no cast-iron rule which can be laid down as applicable to all boys of eighteen.
  May I be permitted to say, in passing, it is quite true, as suggested by the hon. Member for Oxford University, that, as regards men who go to Oxford, you do get at eighteen a very fine physique. But in some of the staple trades in the country where boys begin work at ten or eleven years of age—in my time they used to begin at eight or nine—you get undeveloped physique in the factories, in the mines, and in other places where they have to work, and it is upon these that the strain falls. Therefore we feel, when you take the whole broad question into view, that eighteen is too young to take these boys into the Army. Apart from the general question, on which I do not desire to touch further, I should like to come to the Amendment in my own name. It was mentioned in the speech of the President of the Local Government Board, and in several speeches by other hon. Members, and it may save time in coming to a conclusion as to what should be the policy of the Government and of the House if we take a general discussion upon this point. In regard to this question of sending abroad boys who are under the age of nine-
  1374
  teen, I am rather sorry the right hon. Gentleman cannot accept the full implication of my Amendment.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: I desire to ask how, if the hon. Member is going to discuss his Amendment, and the right hon. Gentleman has given his assent to his doing so, we are going to proceed? What will be the course of the Debate? In what position will the House be after the first Amendment has been disposed of?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I do not think it will make very much difference. These two questions are very closely bound up, and there does not seem to be very much objection to discussing them together. We shall have to take the Amendment of the President of the Local Government Board separately, and the House will have an opportunilty of pronouncing upon it.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: But will it be possible to move any Amendment to it? You will not allow any further discussion.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I should think the House will hardly want any discussion.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: Does that mean we shall not be able to take a vote on the next Amendment on the Paper?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I shall certainly call on the hon. Member in due course, if he wishes to move it.
  Mr. WARDLE: When I was interrupted by the hon. Baronet the Member for Mansfield (Sir A. Markham) I was endeavouring to say that I was very sorry the right hon. Gentleman could not see his way to accept the Amendment in the form in which it appears on the Paper. I quite recognise, however, that there is some force in what was said by the hon. Member for Oxford University (Mr. Prothero), that the suggested Amendment only deals with those who come under this Bill and not with those who come under the previous Act, and that this Amendment deals with all boys between eighteen and nineteen. There is one part of the Amendment to which I take some objection, namely, the words "except in the case of military necessity." I quite see the difficulty of binding the military authorities down absolutely by saying that in no circumstances should a boy go out before he is nineteen years of age. He may be a week or two off nineteen, and he may be in a battalion in which there may be ten or a dozen of boys close upon nineteen, and it

  1375
  would be a great difficulty if in that instance those boys could not be sent out. If the words I have read in the right hon. Gentleman's proposed Amendment are left out, it will then provide, "Provided that steps shall be taken to prevent as far as possible the sending of men to serve abroad before they attain the age of nineteen." I am prepared to accept those words instead of the Amendment which is in my name upon the Paper. I recognise that is as far as we can get, and I am prepared to take that Amendment rather than sacrifice getting something into the Bill which indicates to the military authorities, to the country and to anxious mothers, many of whom have written to me, and I have no doubt to other Members of the House, that these boys should not go before the age of nineteen. If that Amendment is put into the Bill it will reassure public opinion and prevent in a large measure the sending out of boys before they are nineteen.
  Sir R. ADKINS: I only desire in a sentence to associate myself with what has been said by my hon. Friend who has just sat down, and to thank the right hon. Gentleman for putting in these words. They will meet a very widespread desire. I quite understand that it is not possible to carry them further. I can assure my right hon. Friend that the reason why some of us have pressed this matter is because we welcomed his own statement as to the intention, and because the more of my right hon. Friend's speeches we can get embodied in the Act of Parliament the better it will be.
  Major-General Sir IVOR HERBERT: I rose in the first instance after my hon. and gallant Friend opposite (Colonel Yate) to say that I entirely disagreed with a great deal that fell from him with regard to the best age at which to take men for the Army. I agree with him that eighteen is a very excellent time for taking recruits, but the experience of all officers who have served abroad has been that it is too early for the average young man of this country to go on active service, especially in tropical climates. At the same time, I would ask my hon. Friends whose names are attached to this Amendment not to press for the putting into a Statute a limitation with regard to age. There are very serious objections to that when we are dealing with such a Bill as this. At the same time we ought to have—and I
  1376
  believe the President of the Local Government Board is anxious to find—something which will give a guarantee that the principle which we here all hold is maintained, and that a lad will not be sent out before he has had time to become fully matured. I have known many cases since the War began of lads of eighteen who joined the Army solely with the idea of going out at once, and who felt a certain amount of grievance that they had to go through a considerable amount of training before they were allowed to go to fight the Germans. That is a very natural feeling. There are many cases where the lads are perfectly capable and physically fit and able to stand it. Therefore I would not put a limitation upon commanders that would make it impossible for them to give a young man of that sort a chance of attaining his natural ambition. As I came into the House just now the Financial Secretary to the War Office was speaking, and I was glad to hear from him that the question raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for the Blackfriars Division (Mr. Barnes) has been considered, and that the question of apprentices is shortly to be referred to the Committee presided over by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board—
  Mr. FORSTER: I am sorry to interrupt my hon. and gallant Friend, but he is carrying the matter a little further than what I said. What I said was that the question of apprentices had been considered by a Select Committee of this House, and that the Government, in pursuance of the recommendations of the Select Committee, had created the Statutory Committee to deal with it.
  Major-General Sir IVOR HERBERT: I am sorry that I went further than my hon. Friend intended, and recognise that that comes from getting up to speak after one has only just come into the House. I did not hear the whole of my hon. Friend's speech. Perhaps he will consider the advisability of taking the step I have suggested, and of going a little bit further, and of referring it to his right hon. colleague, who, I am quite sure, will be most anxious to deal with that and other matters which will eventually come before the Statutory Committee. It is a very important matter. I have had several cases of apprentices sent to me where there undoubtedly was considerable hardship. It is certainly a case which should be met in the provision that is going to be

  1377
  made. If it had been possible when this Bill was before the House for us to have been in possession of the details of the provision that is going to be made, it would have assisted considerably in the passage of the Bill. Apparently that has not been possible, and I would ask the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill, who, I am quite sure, appreciates how closely these two things hang together, to use his influence to get these matters submitted to the House as soon as possible.
  Mr. RADFORD: My hon. and gallant Friend who has just spoken has given us a valuable military opinion to the effect that nineteen is a better age than eighteen for young soldiers; nevertheless, he said that it was undesirable to put the age of nineteen in the Bill, because there should be no limit placed upon a commander in selecting men. His argument cannot be said to have been very convincing when one remembers that the age of eighteen is already in the Bill, and that the commanding officer will be confronted with the same difficulty whether the age is eighteen, seventeen, or any other age.
  Major-General Sir IVOR HERBERT: May I correct a misapprehension of my hon. Friend's? A man can be enlisted at eighteen, and a very good age it is—I do not think you could have a better. The question I was discussing was whether be should be sent abroad at the age of eighteen.
  Mr. RADFORD: I pass to the point of the age at which a man should be sent abroad. As one of those who reluctantly voted for the Second Reading of this Bill and of the previous Military Service Act, overborne by authority and not by the arguments which were used in favour of the measure, I am bound to say that I will be no party to voting for the reduction of the age of the young recruit. It is proposed by this Clause to lower the age by eight or twelve months. I have heard no reason alleged in favour of that, and I will certainly be no party to it, so that if my hon. Friend, who moved this Amendment goes into the Lobby, I shall be bound to go with him in support of it. The proposal of the age limit is complicated by the further addendum to the effect that although a man is enlisted at eighteen, he is not to go abroad until he is nineteen. That is plausible, and is helped to some extent by the Amendment which is to be proposed by the President of the Local Government Board; but I should like to point out to the
  1378
  House that when we once put into the Bill an Amendment, such as that proposed by the right hon. Gentleman, we have really no further control over the matter. The right hon. Gentleman does not intend that men should go abroad before they are nineteen, and the Army Council probably has the same desire. Their intentions are honourable and they mean to stick to them. I do not impugn the word of the right hon. Gentleman in any way, but I know perfectly well that these monstrosities will happen. I would like to remind the House once more of the case I mentioned last week of a boy who was enlisted, trained, sent abroad, put into the trenches, shot dead, and buried, all before he attained the age of seventeen. That is contrary to the law; it is contrary to the intention of the right hon. Gentleman, but it happened, and it goes on happening, and I feel certain that is what will happen. In these circumstances, I will be no party to these possible atrocities. I hope the Amendment will be carried to a Division, and that I may have the pleasure of voting in support of it.
  Sir HARRY SAMUEL: I cannot help feeling that in these discussions—I have listened to nearly all of them—we lose sight of the great object which we all have at heart. We have got to win this War, and it is absolutely certain that we have to follow the advice of the Army Council, nay, more, the dictates of the Army Council, if we desire to win it at the earliest possible moment. There is not a thing we have done here which has not made some person or other sacrifice something. Every civilian who has to close his civilian career and go to the front as a soldier has to make a great sacrifice, but he is making that sacrifice because he knows he is one of the men who are privileged to carry upon their backs the honour and welfare of the country of which they are citizens. I am certain that none of us desire to take boys of eighteen, nineteen, or even twenty, if we can possibly avoid it, but anybody who, like myself, has watched the making of the New Armies, who has had a boy in one of those Armies from the day a particular regiment was formed, and has gone down from time to time to watch the development of the boys and men in that regiment, will have noticed that the Army training has done an enormous amount of good for the physical welfare of the boys and the men. I have had that experience. My boy joined

  1379
  a battalion of the Lancashire Fusiliers almost at the commencement of the War, and I watched, day by day I might almost say, the growth of that regiment from simply a mass, as it were, of untrained, raw recruits into trained soldiers. I watched the physical development of every single man in it, and I have had it from the men themselves that they are of opinion that their military training has done a very great deal for them in every way. I think my right hon. Friend (Mr. Long) has given every single thing it is possible for him to give subject to the requirements of the Army Council. We in this House, we who have, so to speak, to order the affairs of the country during this War, are nothing but, the trustees of the generations to come. These boys of eighteen are going to be our critics in the future as to whether we have done our duty or not in winning this War. How are we to stand before the tribunal? How are we to answer to them if we lose this War because we had not enough men and because we have declined, for sickly motives of sentiment, to ask these boys to come and do their duty in helping us to win the War? I should be ashamed and afraid to meet any of them. I know lots of these boys are burning to go out and are only longing for the day on which they may be of military age and permitted to go out. There is a boy whom I have known ever since he was a child. He is in the Navy. He joined one of his Majesty's ships just after he was sixteen, and has been in engagement after engagement. He has been practically round the world since the commencement of the War. I met him only two or three days ago with his father. He is a very proud man. He is proud of having done his duty. His father is proud of him. He is a gallant sailor and, more than that, he has developed into a splendid man physically. I cannot help thinking, looking to all the needs of the occasion and the great necessity forced upon us as the custodian of the welfare of our Empire, that it is our absolute duty to vote against the Amendment.
  Mr. LEIF JONES: The hon. Member has announced with great emphasis that he wishes to win the War, and in that he is echoing the desire of every member of the Assembly. The real point in reference to this Amendment is whether you make the best use of the material which you are going to take by taking boys at eighteen or somewhat later. There is practically complete agreement in the House appa-
  1380
  rently that boys are not to be sent abroad before they are nineteen, and the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Long) is going to put into the Bill words which will have the effect of preventing boys going abroad before they are nineteen on the whole. If you really wish to prevent boys under nineteen from being sent abroad the best way is not to have boys in the Army ready to go tbroad before they are nineteen. You want a different standard, properly applied, when you are going to compel all the lads to come in from when you are dealing with volunteers, such as the hon. Member has been describing. We all know boys of eighteen who are ready and ripe for service, but there are large numbers of boys of eighteen who are immature and not fully developed, and who would be all the better for another six months or a year before they go into the Army, remaining at home or at their occupation. In your consideration of what use you are going to make of your material you have to take great care that you do not reap your crop too soon. In the last Act you did not take your boys at eighteen. You took boys over eighteen and a half. I do not know if hon. Members think the War is going to end very soon, but this is going to be a continuing Act, to take boys as they reach the appointed age continuously, and therefore a mistake may have very serious effects upon the Army of the future, and I think the Government, if they really are sincere in not wishing to send boys abroad before they are nineteen ought to achieve that object by not taking boys until they are eighteen and a half, when practically no boy would be ready to go abroad before he was nineteen unless he was one of those who had volunteered at an earlier age, and I do not object to an earlier age for volunteers. It seems to me that under the volunteer system—
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Volunteer!
  Mr. JONES: Boys can volunteer for service. My hon. Friend must know enough about it to know that. Only yesterday I was talking to a boy selling tickets at a railway station. He said, "You are not going to make a conscript of me without giving me an opportunity to volunteer, are you, sir?" I said the Bill provided a month for him. He will be eighteen in two or three months, and he is only too anxious to volunteer for service. All the boys fit for service are most eager to volunteer. But when you are going to take all the boys and give

  1381
  them this military training you had better not take them before they are sufficiently developed. The Government should put this Bill and the last Act on all fours by fixing eighteen and a half, which was the age in the last Act, if they will not give us the nineteen, and thereby the boys would not be going abroad before they are nineteen, and you would really achieve the purpose which the House has in view in putting in the Amendment of my hon. Friend. I think that is the course of wisdom, and I am positive it will be welcomed by the parents of this country, who very much dread, not military service, but the boys being taken for military service before they are mature enough to profit by it and make the best use of their strength.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: I think certain members of the Labour party are to be congratulated upon a death-bed repentance. The number of those who have opposed this Bill and who voted in Committee and yesterday on Report in support of certain Amendments proposed by the Government is not so large that we can afford to feel otherwise than grateful for any increase in numbers. We therefore welcome the new-found enthusiasm of certain members of the Labour party for the protection of boys of eighteen. The second Amendment on the Paper, which we are discussing in association with this, stands in the name of three members of the Labour party. It is copied word for word from an Amendment which was put down in Committee in the name of the right hon. Gentleman (Sir J. Simon), and not one of the three members in whose name it now appears voted in support of it. My hon. Friend (Mr. Walsh) has said this afternoon that his views upon this question are very well known to the House. It is perfectly true that in the Debate on an important proposal made by the Government a fortnight ago the hon. Member spoke very strongly against the conscription of young boys, but he did not feel so strongly upon this question as to make the effort to put down an Amendment on the subject in the Committee stage of the Bill, neither was he sufficiently enthusiastic in their cause as to be present when we raised this question in Committee and divided upon it. The hon. Member expressed himself the other day as having been in favour of compulsion for a fairly considerable length of time. He ought to know then that the conscription of youths of immature age is an essential part of Conscrip-
  1382
  tion. This proposal of the Bill which we are now considering—the proposal to conscript boys of eighteen and to take them as they reach the age of eighteen—is the very essence of a system of Conscription, and therefore if my hon. Friends are prepared to support the Bill generally I think they are somewhat inconsistent in opposing this most essential part of the Bill. My hon. Friend spoke about Labour opinion upon this question. When did my hon. Friend begin to pay attention to Labour opinion upon this question of Conscription? Labour conferences, without a single exception, have, by overwhelming votes, expressed their opposition to the Bill of last January and to Conscription generally, and they would, by an equal and, I believe, a larger majority, have opposed this Bill had they been given the opportunity to express themselves in a national conference called by organised Labour, but the leaders of the trade union movement have been afraid to give them that opportunity and have declined to call a confernce for this purpose. It appears that the hon Member is quite prepared to accept the voice of Labour when it coincides with his own, but when it does not he ignores it. But my hon. Friend has, in other respects, become a great admirer of German methods and the German model. [Interruption.] I can quite believe that hon. Members do not like this, but the hon. Baronet (Sir A. Markham) ought to be the last person in the world to interfere when observations relating to remarks made by a previous speaker are being made.
  Mr. RUTHERFORD: How about the Amendment?
  5.0 P.M.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: If I am not in order, Mr. Speaker will call me to order. The hon. Member (Mr. Walsh) told us he was prepared to trust the military in matters of military necessity, and immediately afterwards—[Interruption.] Did he not say he had been convinced by the case which had been made at the Secret Session that there was grave military necessity for this Bill? If hon. Members are going to begin to speak about their impressions derived from what happened in the Secret Session, those of us who hold a very different opinion in regard to what was said in that Session will equally find ourselves at liberty to give expression to our own views. Having said he was prepared to give considerable weight to the plea of military necessity, my hon. Friend

  1383
  went on to say he was not prepared to trust the same military authority not to send boys to the front unless they were distinctly prohibited from doing that by an expressed Clause in the Bill. I do not accept the Amendment which has been suggested by the Government. It is like a great many of the compromises which have been made in the course of the discussion on this Bill. I think the speech of the President of the Local Government Board gives us reason to doubt very much whether the words which he proposes to incorporate in the Bill will be effective in achieving the purpose which, judging from the speeches which have been made, with one exception, is generally desired by this House, namely, that boys should not be sent abroad until they are nineteen years of age. The right hon. Gentleman said that a military situation might arise where we would be very hardly pressed in a particular corner of the field of battle, and where it might be necessary to send out boys who had not reached the age of nineteen. I do not want to put a callous construction upon those words, because I am perfectly certain that that would be doing the gravest injustice to the right hon. Gentleman, but still the right hon. Gentleman's words might mean that a military situation might arise, or that the military exigencies might be such that you are going to send immature boys, only partially trained boys, who have not reached the age of nineteen, into the hottest part of the line.
  Mr. LONG: The hon. Member, I am sure, does not want to misrepresent me. I think I was careful to say that circumstances might arise in the battlefield which would require the sending out of special troops from the garrison reserves, and in that case it might be necessary to use boys who were close on nineteen and who had been trained. I never suggested sending immature, untrained men out.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: I am glad to have given the right hon. Gentleman an opportunity of making what he said a little plainer. [HON. MEMBERS: "It was plain enough."] I notice that hon. Members say it was perfectly plain although they were not in the House at the time. I suggest that we are in order in discussing the Amendment which the Government are about to propose. In that Amendment the Army authorities may send out boys before
  1384
  they reach the age of nineteen. It seems to have been inferred and implied by certain Members that it is not the practice of the War Office now to send out boys before they are nineteen years of age. The Under-Secretary for War, however, has upon record the reply to a question that he gave to me last November, which he calls his locus classicus. According to that locus classicus a boy may be sent abroad, and boys are being sent abroad, under the age of nineteen. I have had quite a number of cases which I have brought to the attention of the right hon. Gentleman. Confirmation of the statement that these boys may be sent abroad, and of the statement I am about to make, can be found in a score of replies which the right hon. Gentleman has given to questions in this House. Boys can be sent abroad now if they are turned seventeen years of age, provided, on the certificate of a medical officer, they have the physique of a boy of eighteen and a half years. That is the practice of the War Office at the moment, and now we are seriously asked by the Government to trust the Army authorities not to send boys abroad under nineteen years of age unless there be a grave military necessity. The simple fact of the matter is that the Government are unwilling to put words in the Bill making it illegal to send boys abroad before they reach the age of nineteen, because they are going to send boys abroad before they reach the age of nineteen.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: The hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) likes to pose in this House as a kind of Robespierre. I will leave him and the hon. Member for Ince to arrange some Sunday afternoon when they can work out in detail the constitution of the Labour party, which he has been bringing before the attention of the House so prominently this afternoon. I would remind the hon. Member for Blackburn, when he refers to the Amendment of the right hon. Member for Waltham-stow (Sir J. Simon) having been copied by the Labour party, that he (Mr. Snowden) was only a short time ago proclaiming in my part of the country that no member of the Labour party, and particularly himself, would ever have anything to do with the Liberal party, or be associated with it in any movement.
  Mr. SNOWDENmade a remark which was not audible in the Reporters' Gallery.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: You came into the Division of North-East Derbyshire, and

  1385
  now you are hand-in-glove, working with the right hon. Member for Walthamstow. I simply wish to point out that the hon. Member holding these principles so dearly to his heart only a short time ago is now working in close union with a Liberal group whose objects and aims he has for many years denounced in the country. He is one of the middle-class exploiters of the Labour party, and I will leave him to settle his differences with the hon. Member for Ince and the Labour party outside the House. Turning to the subject of the Amendment I will point out that I have on innumerable occasions raised the question of boys below the age of eighteen being sent to the front. I think I know how far I can transgress at Question time, and how far I cannot, but you, Mr. Speaker, have allowed me considerable liberty in raising the question of boys of the ages of fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen, who have been sent to the front, despite the orders of the War Office. I want to know where is the Under-Secretary of State for War to-day. Is the President of the Local Government Board representing the War Office and Lord Kitchener, or who is responsible? There is an absolute disagreement here, and I think the House is entitled to know how it comes about that on this most important point the President of the Local Government Board can come down to the House and give an undertaking that no young man under the age of nineteen should be sent abroad unless the military exigencies compel the War Office to take that step. I have been asking the War Office persistently for the last twelve months, week after week, and month after month, to say that they would not send boys of fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen years of age to the front. I have always been of opinion that boys of eighteen should go and help the country at the present time, but the War Office have always persistently refused to give me an undertaking. What is the position now? If this Amendment is accepted how many classes of recruits are we going to have in this country? There will be one class under the principal Act where boys cannot be sent abroad until they are nineteen. You have another class that you are sending abroad under Lord Derby's scheme, where false ages were given in the case of boys of fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen years. There will be a third class now proposed by the President of the Local Government Board,
  1386
  where boys of eighteen may be taken, with an undertaking that the promise that they shall not be sent out until they are nineteen shall in effect be carried out.
  Mr. TENNANT: I understood the hon. Baronet to say that under the Derby scheme false ages were given. I think in all cases the birth certificate is required.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: I stand corrected. I should have said the pre-Derby scheme—the direct enlistments before the Derby scheme. I am sure that my right hon. Friend (Mr. Tennant) in his own mind and in his own good common sense is not in favour of sending these youths out. He is the spokesman of Lord Kitchener and of the Army Council in this House. If he had been the Secretary of State for War we should not have had all this nonsense to deal with. However, as the representative of the War Office, he is responsible at Question Time, and has to stand all the odium, although I am quite sure he is not in favour of these boys going out under age. After this promise has been given in the House to-day are you going to send boys to the front at seventeen years of age and upwards, or will the Under-Secretary for War give to the House an undertaking now that when it is brought to his attention that a boy is under eighteen years of age he shall not be sent to the front? He replied to a question which I asked two or three weeks ago, and said that no boys were now being sent out at seventeen years of age. On the following day I received a batch of leters from people, and I sent these letters to the right hon. Gentleman, showing that boys were still being sent out under the age of seventeen, although their parents had written to the commanding officers. In one case the letter said: "Relating to Mr. Tennant's statement in the House of Commons, I hope that you will take steps to see that my boy is not sent abroad until he is seventeen years of age." After the statement has been made to-day, in order to get this Bill through, that boys are not to be sent abroad until they are nineteen years of age, unless the exigencies of the War demand it, surely the War Office will take the steps we have asked for so long, and will say, "We will send no boy whom, we know to be under eighteen years of age to the Front at the present time."
  In regard to the reply given at Question Time to-day about statements coming from officers at the front, I shall feel it

  1387
  to be my duty next week to put down a number of very serious questions, which have relation to these very young boys. I will not deal with the matter now, but I will only say that you have actually shot boys of seventeen years of age. You have shot them at eighteen years of age, and I know to my own knowledge of one boy who has been shot for leaving the trenches under very heavy trench fire at the age of seventeen. I will give my right hon. Friend a full opportunity of dealing with these particular cases, which I am sure no one regrets more than he does, but in regard to which, owing to the stupidity and blundering of Lord Kitchener, no step whatever has been taken to alter them. He must have known of his own knowledge of all the thousands of men who have been enlisted in this country from the commencement of the War, and yet they have continued sending boys of sixteen and seventeen to the front, and boys have even been sent to fight in Gallipoli at fourteen. When all these things have been brought to the attention of the War Office, and attention has been called to them in Parliament, how can you expect to get any decent people to take the word of the War Office as worth anything?
  One more word about the hon. Member for Blackburn and the hon. Member for the Rushcliffe Division (Mr. Leif Jones), and others who agree with them. I always notice that when any question of attempting to amend the principal Act or the Bill comes before the House these hon. Members say they want to get the best use out of the materials. But when they are preventing the House getting the best use out of the materials, I am not going to believe that these people, who are always seeking to close the avenues under this Bill whereby the Army can get men, are sincere. There is no deathbed repentance for the Labour party so far as I know. The hon. Members of the Labour party concerned with this Amendment can show that they represent their constituents; they are not like the hon. Member for Blackburn, who never represented his constituency. The hon. Gentleman must remember this. Sitting on these benches one night I wanted to get some information from him, and I said—I do not know whether I should be in order in saying what I said—but I used rather strong language in order to draw on the subject, and I succeeded in doing so. The hon. Gentle-
  1388
  man all through has been against this War. He has never had the courage to go out openly and say so from the commencement, while other members of the Labour party have done so. Therefore I ask the House to pay no attention to the Member for Blackburn, whose whole object at every stage of the War has never been on any one occasion to help the country. He has never assisted the voluntary movement, and now, when we have the question of compulsion, he delivers his vitriolic speeches and drops his acid drops in every direction to serve the interests of the nation. Let him be on one stool or another. Let him say once for all, "I am against taking any man whatsoever, and let the Germans come to this country." That is an argument which I could understand. But he takes no step whatever to assist his country in any direction; he thwarts the country at every stage, and then quotes the Member for Walthamstow as his bosom friend.
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Tennant): I am glad to have the opportunity of saying one word lest the House might be left under a false impression as to what was my position, and that of my Noble Friend the Secretary of State for War. My hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield has indulged in rather strong expressions with regard to the War Office policy in relation to boys who were of tender years, and he has dissociated me from the administration with respect to these matters and laid the blame upon my Noble Friend the Secretary of State. I want to say that I stand here as sponsor for everything done by the War Office and the Secretary of State. I do not want to be dissociated from any indictment which might be made as regards the War Office.
  Sir JOHN SIMON: It would be very unfortunate if the discussion on this important matter is not directed to the real point. The real point has nothing whatever to do with the bandying of charges between one Member and another. It is a question which everybody must regard as serious, and it has to do with a proposal which I am sure nobody in this House delights in. Nobody can like the idea of taking a youth so young as eighteen and compelling him, whatever may be his character and antecedents, to join the Army. It may be a necessary thing to do, but, since every Member of the House of Commons is necessarily over the age of eighteen, I should be very sorry to think

  1389
  that there was anybody here who did not realise that among people of that age there were many to whom this would be a most terrible ordeal. That is no reason why it should not be done, accepting the principle of the Bill, if it is necessary, and I quite concede that if the authorities come forward and tell us that they have military advice to that effect, it is a very serious matter which no sensible man, accepting the principle of the Bill, which we ought to do at this stage, can wholly set on one side. What I would point out is that it is not the case that by accepting the Amendment you are losing what you may call a whole crop of people. It would be so if your compulsion was really going to take everybody between the limits of military age, because, of course, if that was the case, then to let off people who are in the first year of military age would obviously reduce the total number whom you took; but the very essence of the scheme is that you are to have a reservoir of persons of military age, and that out of that reservoir you are going to take a certain number—how many it may not be in the public interest to state, and I do not ask—but, admitting only a certain portion of the total reservoir and supposing this Amendment were to be carried, supposing the Government were able to accept it, as I am sure they would do willingly if they thought that the arguments justified it, the result is not to reduce the total number of people to be put into the Army. The result is, no doubt, to make a rather larger call upon this reservoir, which consists of people between the ages of nineteen and forty-one. I quite admit that it is a substantial call, but I cannot believe that, if it could be done, people would not very much prefer to see the call made on those who have reached the age of nineteen, rather than eke out the necessary number by taking boys of the age of eighteen.
  It is largely a practical matter, and, as a practical matter, may I call attention to this? There is a real practical difficulty in many parts of the country due to what remains of our apprenticeship system. It was felt to be such in the days of the Militia Ballot Act, because that Act expressly exempted from its provisions every apprentice. We have not done that here, but while we have not done that I wish very much that I understood what was the real position of a man who was an apprentice and who is taken under these compulsory powers. What happens to his
  1390
  indentures and to the premium which he has already paid. Somebody spoke just now as if that is to be met by compensating his master, because he was losing the services of somebody who would soon be a skilled worker. I am equally concerned with the position of the apprentice and the apprentice's father. In many cases in which an apprentice or his father has paid a premium, something substantial, it is not an easy matter to define the result. What happens to the premium if the State interferes in he middle of the apprenticeship and insists upon the apprenticeship being broken? That really is not a small point. It is a point about which many of us have felt greatly concerned. The question was raised in an earlier Debate upon the first Bill. Up to the present I have never heard any answer to that.
  The next point which I wish to press is this: It is perfectly true that many people who have reached the age of eighteen are thoroughly mature for the purpose of being soldiers. If I understand that that is what has been said by the hon. Member for Mansfield, I quite agree. But the point about compulsion is, that you are not alone taking those who are so mature that they are the sort of people who volunteer to fight, but that you are applying your Regulations to people of all sorts and characters of temperament, and in order to judge whether it is right to apply compulsion to boys on their eighteenth birthday, what you have to consider is not the case of the youth who is physically developed and has got courage which makes him quite prepared to take the part of a skilled man, but you have to consider the case of the youth who is not so developed or so prepared, because it is he who is really affected by the sytem of compulsion. The arguments which I am addressing to the House are not in the least degree unmindful of the fact that such training in many cases would improve both the physique and the moral of these youths. I do not doubt that. But it is a very serious question indeed for the House of Commons whether or not we, all of us necessarily over this age, are going to impose compulsion on boys and youths of eighteen, none of whom have got any votes, who are absolutely without direct representation of any sort, many of whom cannot possibly express their own position in any organised way.
  Are we really compelled, by the stress of this emergency, to apply compulsion at such an age as that? If so, accepting with

  1391
  loyalty the principle of the Bill, which was carried on the Second Reading, I do not want to have anything to do with any Amendment which undermines or cuts at the root of the principle itself, because the Committee or Report stage is not the time for that; because, as I follow it, the argument hitherto has been that we shall necessarily lose, and therefore have fewer people whom we can by compulsion put into the Army. I would point out, if that is true, that what really happens is that you will make an additional demand on all ages from nineteen to forty-one. That is quite a different thing from saying that you will lose the group for a whole year. One final point. I am sure that many of us must have through actual experience had brought to our notice again and again boys of eighteen or boys of seventeen who will be eighteen in a few months, and who are the last remaining son at home. If we had in this Bill an exceptional provision that the last remaining son would be excused from compulsion, that would be quite another matter. We have no such provision. I am not only speaking of the last remaining son of a widow. Many of us have received letters obviously sincere, deeply pathetic, from parents, not only mothers but fathers also, pointing out the fact that this particular provision of this Bill is not only going to take away someone who is little more than a child and who is not in development, constitution, or character in the least fitted to play the part of a skilled man, but is going to take compulsorily the last remaining brother at home of three or four who are already at the front. I do not believe that the House of Commons likes doing that at all. I do not believe that the arguments that it will be welcomed and embraced will receive the least response in the House of Commons. I respectfully urge the Government to say whether they cannot really reconsider the matter, if not here, then in another place, because there is a great body of opinion—not opinion that I am using as a threat at all, but opinion which is thoroughly sympathetic in other respects—that this particular provision is one which does no credit either to its authors or to the judgment of the House of Commons.
  Mr. CURRIE: I think that it is high time, in dealing with this Amendment, that the House of Commons should come to the question with the hon. Member for Blackburn. Speaking on the 2nd of
  1392
  June, 1913, in this House, the hon. Member used the following language:
  "Suppose we had an invasion by German aeroplanes and they succeeded in imposing on us in this country German government, is there any man here who thinks that as soon as the ravages of the invasion hail been repaired, the working classes of this country would be any worse off economically or socially under the German Government, than under their own British Government to-day?"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd June, 1918, col. 686, Vol. LIII.]
  If these be the views of the hon. Member for Blackburn, why should the hon. Member for Mansfield be surprised? Why should we have the speech from him that we had to-day. This House is a representative institution, and I suppose that the dregs of the people are entitled to be represented here.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: The views of the hon. Member for Blackburn which have been quoted have not any relation to the Amendment at present under discussion.
  Mr. CURRIE: With the greatest respect I merely wished to draw attention—
  Mr. SNOWDEN: A charge has been made against me. I do not know whether it is worth while answering it at all or not, but if the hon. Gentleman would read the speech from which he has been quoting he would see that I was using the Tariff Reformer's argument.
  Mr. CURRIE: No, I do not see that at all.
  Mr. SNOWDEN: The Tariff Reformer's argument, which has been used thousands of times, pointing out how much better off the German working man was than the British working man.
  Mr. CURRIE: I think that I may be permitted to say that I consider the hon. Gentleman's explanation is a piece of unmitigated humbug. I read what he said last night and I verified the quotation, and if he chooses to say whether he still holds those views or not, that is another matter. I merely wish to call attention to the fact that the views of the hon. Gentleman to which he has given expression on this Amendment seem to me to be very largely undermined by the opinions which he has not yet repudiated.
  Mr. PRINGLE: The hon. Member opposite has made a poor return to the hon. Member for Blackburn in respect of the great contribution he made to him in his return for the Leith Burghs.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Perhaps the hon. Member will proceed to discuss the Amendment.
  Mr. PRINGLE: I was just going to point out that I deprecate all these irrelevancies, and, in regard to the Amendment, I desire to point out that the question we are discussing is in two parts, the question of the age of the recruit, and the question of his afterwards being sent to the front. In regard to the first question, which is the real question at issue under the Amendment, apart from the time when he is required to go to the front, I am going to support the proposal. In the first place, the age now in the Bill represents a retrograde step. It is true that in the original Military Service Act the age of eighteen was the age of eighteen on the 15th August last; consequently the lads to whom it applied were at least eighteen years and eight months old when the Act came into operation. We are now applying the age of eighteen to every youth as he reaches that age, thus going back on the decision which we made in the month of January last. We hear all this talk about military necessity which impresses to such an extent the minds of hon. Members, but we had exactly the same statement about military necessity against the proposal to bring in men of eighteen. We remember that the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board announced that in a conversation with Lord Kitchener the latter said that, without calling on any boy until subsequent to his becoming eighteen, we had enough men to win the War. We do not hear so much about winning the War in these Debates, but I would point out to hon. Members that these contradictory assurances from the Government and the highest military authorities in the country make us necessarily sceptical about anything put forward as the means of securing a decision in this House.
  That is not the only point. We are told that there is no intention on the part of the Government to send these boys to the front before they become nineteen; but the question of the training of these boys is a very important matter. We know that a large proportion of the recruits enlisted under this Bill are to be trained in great haste, and that efforts are going to be made to have them ready for the field in the month of September. That obviously means that the great majority of the recruits secured under
  1394
  this Bill have to be put under a very hard system of training. It must be so if they are to be ready in time. We have a right to know from the Army Council and the representatives of the War Office whether these boys, as they are enlisted, are to be trained in the same units as other recruits secured under this Bill. Obviously if they are, they will be submitted to the same rigorous training, and obviously, again, it would be unwise to apply the same rigorous course of training to immature boys of eighteen that you apply to older men. The only basis on which we can accept the assurance of the War Office is that we should be told that these youths are to be put in a different unit and under a different system of training, to which they could be subjected with perfect safety in respect of their health.
  But you have to consider the position of these boys who are brought in. Have we any security that there will be, on the part of the War Office doctors, an adequate examination, which is absolutely essential if the health of many of these recruits is not to be fatally impaired by the training. We know the kind of examination which has been going on with regard to recruits during the last few weeks. We know that men have been passed who were suffering from organic disease. If the same system of examination is to be applied to these youths as is applied to other recruits under the Military Service Act, we may take it as an absolute certainty that many of these youths will have their health completely undermined for the rest of their lives. It is for these reasons we regard it as most inexpedient that power even for the purpose of training should be given to the War Office to draft in youths as they reach the age of eighteen. Apart altogether from any undertaking given in this House or in the Act with regard to the period at which these youths should go to the front, the House should not allow the age of eighteen to be inserted in the Bill. The age of nineteen is quite early enough for a compulsory measure. Hon. Gentleman opposite have spoken of their own individual experience as to how they were at eighteen years of age. The hon. Member for Nottingham said he was sent to India when he was eighteen, and no doubt he was fit, as a large number of boys at that age undoubtedly are. It is perfectly fair to send out boys of that age under a voluntary system, because they would be boys who were thoroughly

  1395
  fit; but, under a compulsory system, these youths will be sent out irrespective of the condition of their health. We have had some experience of what has occurred in the Army in regard to immature youths, but I do not desire to go into that question, which has been referred to time and again by my hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield. We have experience of sending out youths at this early age under the present system, and I think the House is bound now to vote against bringing in youths at an earlier age than nineteen, in view of the tremendous hardships to which they will be exposed.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: We have a restriction as to sending lads to the front, but it is calculated to give a false impression to the country, which does not know the ways of the War Office so well as this House, when those youths have been secured. It would be very much better that everyone should recognise what are the actual facts as to boys enlisted at eighteen, namely, that subsequent to that, if the War Office demands it, they will be sent to the front. There was great force in what the right hon. Member for Walthamstow said on the question of the need of men, that, as a matter of fact, the number required could be drawn from the reservoir that exists, and that the raising of the age of recruiting does not limit the number to be secured. I wish to point out the extraordinary difference presented in this House at this moment, when discussing the question of keeping these boys from training, and the position presented last night when discussing the question of securing that tradesmen of military age should not be sent to the front. When it comes to a question of business, then, as usual, there is greater sympathy for the exclusion of men from military service, but when it comes to be a question of boys and youths, then we are told that every man must go to the front, and that national necessity demands it. If the Conscriptionists were absolutely honest, they would take the view presented by the Member for Wolverhampton last night, who said that if national necessity demanded it, every man of best military age should go. That is the true and honest method of applying compulsion. [HON. MEMBERS: "Divide! divide!"] As hon. Members cry "Divide!" I shall go on. I have something further to say. I am interested in
  1396
  this question of age, in the first place, because of various cases brought before my notice of boys being sent to the trenches and shot for desertion under the age of eighteen. I have pressed the right hon. Gentleman who represents the War Office in this House to give me the number of men who have been shot. [HON. MEMBERS: "Divide!"]
  Mr. SPEAKER: That does not seem to be relevant to this discussion.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: I was endeavouring to show that if we send immature boys to the trenches, their nerves give way under the strain which exists there.
  Mr. SPEAKER: If that had been what the hon. Member was saying I should not have interfered. When I intervened he was pressing the War Office to give him a return, and that did not seem to me in the least relevant to this discussion.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: My argument—
  Mr. SPEAKER. I heard the hon. Member's argument, and I understood it perfectly.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: I was not permitted to put my argument. It was that there should be—
  Mr. SPEAKER: I hope the hon. Gentleman will not enter into a controversy with me. I heard the hon. Member's argument and then I heard him proceed to say that he would press the War Office to give him a return. This is not the time to press the War Office for a return, and I must ask the hon. Member to confine himself to the Amendment before the House.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: I will observe your ruling, Sir. One reason why boys of eighteen should not be sent to the front is that the strain to which they are subjected is likely to destroy their nerves, and subject them—
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is only a repetition of the argument that has been frequently used during this Debate. The hon. Member must bring forth some new argument for discussion.
  Mr. OUTHWAITE: I would point out that I am quite confident that there is no question in connection with Conscription, which is so much in the minds of the people of the country, and especially among the workers of the country, as this proposal with regard to boys of eighteen years of age. For these reasons I

  1397
  submit that if the Government desire to gain more sympathy for this measure they will be well advised if they make a concession on this point.
  Mr. HASLAM: I desire to put one point before the House—
  Sir P. MAGNUS Sir P. MAGNUS rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
  Question put, "That the Question be now put."
  The House divided: Ayes, 207; Noes, 32.

  Division No. 19.]

  AYES.

  [5.46 p.m.

  Abraham, Rt. Hon. W.

  Gardner, Ernest

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartonshire)

  Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

  Pearce, Sir William (Limehouse)

  Amery, L. C. M. S.

  Gilbert, J. D.

  Pennefather, De Fonblanque

  Ashley, Wilfrid W.

  Goldman, C. S.

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Goulding, Sir E. Alfred

  Peto, Basil Edward

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Grant, James Augustus

  Phillips, Sir Owen (Chester)

  Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

  Gretton, John

  Pratt, J. W.

  Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

  Gulland, John William

  Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

  Barnes, Rt. Hon. George N.

  Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.)

  Prothero, Rowland Edmund

  Barran, Sir John N. (Hawick Burghs)

  Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

  Pryce-Jones, Colonel E,

  Barrie, H. T.

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

  Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

  Bathurst, Col. Hon. A. B. (Glouc., E.)

  Harris, Henry Percy (Paddington, S.)

  Reid, Rt. Hon. Sir George H.

  Beauchamp, Sir Edward

  Harris, Percy A. (Leicester, S.)

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Beck, Arthur Cecil

  Haslam, Lewis

  Richards, Thomas

  Bellairs, Commander C. W.

  Henry, Sir Charles

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

  Herbert, Maj.-Gen. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.)

  Robinson, Sidney

  Benn, Com. Ian Hamilton

  Hewins, William Albert Samuel

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Bentham, George Jackson

  Hibbert, Sir Henry F.

  Rowlands, James

  Bethell, Sir John Henry

  Higham, John Sharp

  Rutherford, Sir John (Darwen)

  Blair, Reginald

  Hinds, John

  Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

  Bowerman, Charles W.

  Hodge, John

  Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood)

  Brace, William

  Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Bridgeman, William Clive

  Holmes, Daniel Turner

  Shortt, Edward

  Broughton, Urban Hanlon

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Smith, Sir Swire (Keighley, W.R.)

  Brunner, John F. L.

  Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian)

  Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert

  Bryce, John Annan

  Horne, Edgar

  Stanton, Charles Butt

  Bull, Sir William James

  Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

  Stewart, Gershom

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Hume-Williams, William Ellis

  Strauss, Arthur (Paddington, North)

  Burn, Colonel C. R.

  Hunt, Major Rowland

  Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

  Butcher, John George

  Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk.

  Sutherland, J. E.

  Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

  Ingleby, Holcombe

  Sutton, John E.

  Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred

  Jacobson, Thomas Owen

  Swift, Rigby

  Cassel, Felix

  Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

  Sykes, Col. Alan John (Knutsford)

  Cator, John

  Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney)

  Sykes, Sir Mark (Hull, Central)

  Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Talbot, Lord Edmund

  Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich)

  Kenyon, Barnet

  Tennant, Rt. Hon. Harold John

  Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

  Kerry, Earl of

  Terrell, George (Wilts, N.W.)

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A.

  Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Chambers, James

  Knight, Captain Eric Ayshford

  Tickler, T. G.

  Clynes, John R.

  Larmor, Sir J.

  Tootill, Robert

  Coates, Major Sir Edward Feetham

  Law, Rt. Hon. A. Bonar (Bootle)

  Tryon, Captain George Clement

  Coats, Sir Stewart A. (Wimbledon)

  Layland-Barrett, Sir F.

  Walsh, Stephen (Lanes., Ince)

  Cochrane, Cecil Algernon

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Walton, Sir Joseph

  Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

  Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

  Warde, Colonel C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Cory, Sir Clifford John

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Colonel A. R.

  Wardle, George J.

  Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

  Long, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay T.

  Craig, Ernest (Cheshire, Crewe)

  Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston)

  Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

  Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

  M'Callum, Sir John M.

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Craik, Sir Henry

  MacCaw, Wm. J. MacGeagh

  Weston, John W.

  Crooks, Rt. Hon. William

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  White, Sir Luke (Yorks, E. R.)

  Currie, George W.

  Mackinder, Halford J.

  Whiteley, Herbert, J.

  Dalrymple, Hon. H. H.

  Macmaster, Donald

  Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

  Dalziel, Davison (Brixton)

  M'Micking, Major Gilbert

  Williams, Thomas J.

  Davies, Timothy (Lines., Louth)

  Macnamara, Rt. Hon. T. J.

  Williamson, Sir Archibald

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, S.)

  Macpherson, James Ian

  Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Worcs., N.)

  Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardigan)

  Markham, Sir Arthur Basil

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Denniss, E. R. B.

  Meux, Sir Hedworth

  Winfrey, Sir Richard

  Dickinson, Rt. Hon. Willoughby H.

  Middlemore, John Throgmorton

  Wood, John (Stalybridge)

  Dixon, C. H.

  Millar, James Duncan

  Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

  Duke, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

  Morgan, George Hay

  Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

  Wright, Henry Fitzherbert

  Edge, Captain William

  Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Yate, Colonel C. E.

  Faber, George Denison (Clapham)

  Neville, Reginald J. N.

  Yeo, Alfred William

  Fell, Arthur

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Young. William (Perthshire, East)

  Fenwick, Rt. Hon. Charles

  Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Younger, Sir George

  Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey

  Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield)

  Yoxall, Sir James Henry

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

  Nuttall, Harry

  Forster, Henry William

  Paget, Almeric Hugh

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—

  Foster, Philip Staveley

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Sir P. Magnus and Mr. Booth.

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Parry, Thomas H.

  NOES.

  Anderson, W. C.

  Jones, Leif (Notts, Rushcliffe)

  Radford, George Heynes

  Arnold, Sydney

  Jowett, Frederick William

  Rees, G. C. (Carnarvon, Arfon)

  Baker, J. A. (Finsbury, E.)

  King, Joseph

  Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

  Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

  Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

  Rowntree, Arnold

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

  Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allsebrook

  Byles, Sir William Pollard

  Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

  Snowden, Philip

  Chancellor, Henry George

  Mason, David M. (Coventry)

  Thomas, James Henry

  Goldstone, Frank

  Molteno, Percy Alport

  Whitehouse, John Howard

  Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

  Morrell, Philip

  Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

  Outhwaite, R. L.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Hogge and Mr. Sherwell.

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  John, Edward Thomas

  Pringle, William M. R.

  Question put accordingly, "That the word 'eighteen' stand part of the Bill."
  The House divided: Ayes, 201; Noes, 46.

  Division No. 20.]

  AYES.

  [5.55 p.m.

  Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D.

  Fenwick, Rt. Hon. Charles

  Macpherson, James Ian

  Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartonshire)

  Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey

  Magnus, Sir Philip

  Amery, L. C. M. S.

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace Edward

  Markham, Sir Arthur Basil

  Ashley, Wilfrid W.

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

  Meux, Hon. Sir Hedworth

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Forster, Henry William

  Middlemore, John Throgmorton

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Foster, Phillip Staveley

  Millar, James Duncan

  Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Morgan, George Hay

  Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

  Gardner, Ernest

  Morison, Hector

  Barran, Sir J. N. (Hawick Burghs)

  Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

  Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

  Barrie, H. T.

  Gilbert, J. D.

  Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Bathurst, Col. Hon. A. B. (Glo., E)

  Goldman, C. S.

  Neville, Reginald J. N.

  Beauchamp, Sir Edward

  Goulding, Sir E. A.

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Beck, Arthur Cecil

  Grant, J. A.

  Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Bellairs, Commander C. W.

  Gretton, John

  Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield)

  Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

  Griffith, Rt. Hon. Ellis Jones

  Paget, Almeric Hugh

  Benn, Com. Ian Hamilton

  Guest, Major Hon. C. H. C. (Pembroke)

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Bentham, G. J.

  Gulland, John William

  Parry, Thomas H.

  Bird, Alfred

  Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.)

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Blair, Reginald

  Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

  Pearce Sir William (Limshouse)

  Booth, Frederick Handel

  Harris, Henry Percy (Paddlngton, S.)

  Peanefather, De Fonblanque

  Brace, William

  Harris, Percy A. (Leicester, S.)

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Bridgeman, William Clive

  Haslam, Lewis

  Peto, Basil Edward

  Broughton, Urban Hanlon

  Henry, Sir Charles

  Phillips, Sir Owen (Chester)

  Brunner, John F. L.

  Herbert, Maj.-Gen. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.)

  Pratt, J. W.

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Hewins. William Albert Samuel

  Priestley, Sir W. E. B. (Bradford, E.)

  Bull, Sir William James

  Hibbert, Sir Henry

  Prothero, Rowland Edmund

  Burdett-Couttts, W.

  Higham, John Sharp

  Pryce-Jones, Colonel E.

  Burn, Colonel C. R.

  Hinds, John

  Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

  Butcher, John George

  Hodge, John

  Reid, Rt. Hon. Sir George H.

  Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

  Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy

  Rendall, Atheistan

  Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred

  Holmes, Daniel Turner

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  Cassel, Felix

  Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian)

  Robertson, Rt. Hon. John M.

  Cator, John

  Home, Edgar

  Robinson, Sidney

  Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

  Houston, Robert Paterson

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich)

  Hume-Williams, William Ellis

  Rowlands, James

  Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

  Hunt, Major Rowland

  Rutherford, Sir John (Darwen)

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Worc'r., E.)

  Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk.

  Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

  Chambers, James

  Irgleby, Holcombe

  Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood)

  Coates, Major Sir Edward Feetham

  Jacobson, Thomas Owen

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Coats, Sir Stewart A. (Wimbledon)

  Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

  Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

  Cochrane, Cecil Algernon

  Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney)

  Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton)

  Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth)

  Joynson-Hicks, William

  Shortt, Edward

  Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

  Kerry, Earl of

  Smith, Sir Swire (Keighley, W.R.)

  Cory, Sir Clifford John (St. Ives)

  Kinloch-Cooke. Sir Clement

  Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert

  Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

  Knight, Captain E. A.

  Stanton, Charles Butt

  Craig, Ernest (Cheshire, Crewe)

  Lambert, Rt. Hon. G. (Devon, S. Molton)

  Steel-Maitland, A. D.

  Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

  Larmor, Sir J.

  Stewart, Gershom

  Craik, Sir Henry

  Law, Rt. Hon. A Bonar (Bootle)

  Strauss, Arthur (Paddington, North)

  Crooks, Rt. Hon. William

  Layland-Barrett, Sir F.

  Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

  Currie, George W.

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Sutherland, John E.

  Dalrymple, Hon. H. H

  Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

  Swift, Rigby

  Dalziel, Davison (Brixton)

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Colonel A. R.

  Sykes, Col. A. J. (Ches., Knutsford)

  Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

  Long. Rt. Hon. Walter

  Sykes, Sir Mark (Hull, Central)

  Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardigan)

  Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston)

  Talbot, Lord Edmund

  Denniss, E. R. B.

  Lyell, Hon. Charles Henry

  Tennant, Rt. Hon. Harold John

  Dickinson, Rt. Hon. Willoughby H.

  M'Callum, Sir John M.

  Terrell, George (Wilts, N.W.)

  Dixon, C. H.

  MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir J. B.

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  Tickler, T. G.

  Duke, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

  Mackinder, Halford J.

  Tryon, Captain George Clement

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Macmaster, Donald

  Walton, Sir Joseph

  Faber, George Denison (Clapham)

  M'Micking, Major Gilbert

  Warde, Colonel C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Fell, Arthur

  Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J.

  Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay T.

  Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannan)

  Williams, T. J. (Swansea)

  Younger, Sir George

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Williamson, Sir Archibald

  Yoxall, Sir James Henry

  Weston, John W.

  Wood, John (Stalybridge)

  White, J. Dundas (Glasgow, Tradeston)

  Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Geoffrey Howard and Mr. James Hope.

  White, Sir Luke (Yorks, E.R.)

  Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

  Whiteley, Herbert J.

  Yate, Colonel C. E.

  Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P

  Yeo, Alfred William

  NOES.

  Baker, J. A. (Finsbury, E.)

  Jowett, Frederick William

  Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

  Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

  Kenyon, Barnet

  Rowntree, Arnold

  Bliss, Joseph

  King, Joseph

  Sherwell, Arthur James

  Bowerman, Charles W.

  Lambert, Richard (Wilts, Cricklade)

  Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allesbrook

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

  Snowden, Philip

  Byles, Sir William Pollard

  Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

  Sutton, John E.

  Chancellor, Henry George

  Mason, David M. (Coventry)

  Thomas, J. H.

  Clynes, John R.

  Molteno, Percy Alport

  Tootill, Robert

  Goldstone, Frank

  Morrell, Philip

  Walsh, Stephen (Lancs., Ince)

  Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough)

  Nuttall, Harry

  Williams, Aneurin (Durham, N.W.)

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

  Outhwaite, R. L.

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Harvey, A. G. C. (Rochdale)

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Winfrey, Sir Richard

  Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

  Pringle, William M. R.

  Young, William (Perth, East)

  Hogge, James Myles

  Radford, George Heynes

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Roes Griffith Caradoc (Arfon)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Whitehouse and Mr. Anderson.

  John, Edward Thomas

  Richards, Thomas

  Jones, Leif (Notts, Rushcliffe)

  Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

  Question, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Sub-section," put, and agreed to.

  6.0 P.M.
  Mr. WARDLE: I beg to move, after the word "Reserve" ["forthwith transferred to the Reserve"], to insert the words, "Provided that steps shall be taken to prevent so far as possible the sending of men to serve abroad before they attain the age of nineteen."
  I do not want to travel over the ground which has been already covered, and, therefore, I will content myself with simply moving the Amendment.
  Sir R. ADKINS: I desire, without comment, to second the Amendment
  Mr. HOGGE: I do not know whether or not we are going to divide on this Amendment, but I do not see why we should thank the Government for it at all. The words are "so far as possible." They do not mean anything, and I for one do not thank the Government for them.
  Mr. KING: I wish to associate myself with the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge) in his proper appreciation of the value of this Amendment. May I call the attention of the Government to the value which their own supporters place upon their words and promises? The hon. Member for Mansfield just now told us that the word of the War Office could not be believed. If this is the way their own ardent supporters regard their promises, I think we ought to have something better than a pious opinion, for that is all that this Amendment is.
  Mr. CHANCELLOR: I wish to express my dissent from my hon. Friends who have
  1402
  just spoken. This Amendment will make a difference. The existing practice has been to send these youths to the front when they were not wanted. I understand that under the words now proposed they will be sent to the front only when they are wanted. The position will be that when they are not wanted they will be left at home, but when they are wanted they will be sent to the front. It is not a great insurance against the position objected to in the last Debate, but it is a little less bad than the existing state of things.
  Mr. T. WILSON: While I do not consider this Amendment to be one of any great substance, it certainly places these young lads in a far better position than under the Bill as it stands. Therefore, I shall not oppose it. I would like to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he can explain what steps it is proposed to take, whether by regulation, by request, or by instructions to the War Office, to prevent the sending out of these lads. I would ask also whether under the Bill the young men who have been rejected by the Medical Board will be called up again, or whether the first rejection will be final.
  Mr. LONG: As to the method, I understand that the Adjutant-General, who directs what men are to be sent out, will give the necessary instructions to those who are responsible for forming the drafts. The medical question does not arise here.
  Amendment agreed to.
  The SOLICITOR-GENERAL (Sir G. Cave): I beg to move to leave out Subsection (2), and to insert instead thereof the words
  "All the provisions of the principal Act, as amended by this Act, with the exception of those defining the appointed date, shall, so far as applicable, extend to men to whom this Section applies in the same manner as to men to whom Section one of that Act applies."
  This is really no more than a drafting Amendment. In the discussion in Committee doubt was raised as to whether this Sub-section would have a certain effect, and this Amendment is to make the matter quite clear.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Mr. E. HARVEY: I beg to move to leave out Sub-section (3).
  I move this Amendment in order to call attention to a very kind undertaking given by the Solicitor-General at an earlier stage, if possible, to insert some words to preserve a right given in the original Act. The Sub-section in the original Act which it is proposed to omit provides that persons coming back to this country from abroad shall become conscripts thirty days after their arrival, but that during that period they are to be permitted to make their claims if they have valid grounds for claiming exemption. It was generally felt to be very undesirable that men should come back and make their claims as conscripts, as they would have already passed into the Army. The hon. and learned Member for St. Pancras spoke in strong terms of the extreme undesirability of soldiers making claims before the tribunals. It was felt that men coming back from abroad, some of them from long distances— the Argentine, Australia, and other places—after the passing of the Act, ought to have their right maintained of making a proper claim before the tribunal, and that whilst it might be proper to shorten the period—I might suggest fifteen days instead of thirty—there ought at least to be a brief interval within which the men would still be civilians. If the Bill passes at it stands, you will have the anomalous position that these men before they reach this country will have become soldiers. The moment they set foot on English soil they automatically become conscripts, and they will have to make their claims, if any, as soldiers. That is not a proper position for them, it is not convenient for the Army, and it puts the
  1404
  tribunals in a very awkward position. I cannot suggest other words, and, if the Solicitor-General does not consider it right to omit the Sub-section, I hope that in another place words may be inserted providing that there shall be a short period after their return to this country during which these men may, as civilians, make out their case.
  Mr. KING: I beg to second the Amendment.
  Sir G. CAVE: I am afraid that the Amendment which has been moved would not have the effect which my hon. Friend desires. There are really two points between which his speech did not thoroughly distinguish. Under the present system a man resident in the Kingdom on 15th August, 1915, became liable to serve. A man coming to reside in the Kingdom after that date also became liable to serve thirty days after he so came to reside. Under this Bill exactly the same state of things obtains. A man resident here at this time becomes liable to serve at once, and not thirty days after the Act comes into operation. But a man coming to reside after the passing of this Bill will have thirty days, according to the second paragraph of Sub-section (1), in which to go and make his objection. The only object for which dealing with this Sub-section is suggested is covered by the second paragraph of Sub-section (1). So far, therefore, as the actual Amendment goes it really is unnecessary, and the matter is reduced to one of mere drafting. But the point the hon. Member raised in his speech was this: He was thinking of a man who is resident here to-day, and who happens to be out of the kingdom at the moment the Bill passes, and who, as he supposes, cannot get here within the thirty days. Then he says, quite truly, that when that man lands in this country he will, according to law, be at that very moment liable to military service. He wants him to have time in which to apply for exemption. The same point was raised under the old Act, and the answer was given, which I think, applies to this Amendment, that the last paragraph of Sub-section (2) of Section I applies. That is the paragraph which allows the tribunal to extend the time for applying for exemption when the Members are satisfied that the failure to make application within the required time has arisen owing to the absence of the applicant abroad. That exactly meets the point under this Bill, as under the Act,

  1405
  and I cannot conceive that a tribunal would refuse to allow time in any proper case. I rather challenge my hon. Friend to draw up an Amendment which would cover his point. I have, in conjunction with our advisers, given the fullest consideration to the point, and I have come to the conclusion that it could not be done without injury to the Bill. If you give every man so much time after he returns here to apply for exemption you encourage men to remain out of the country for a long time, seeing that a man knows he always has his thirty days after he gets back. I could not really find a way to satisfy the argument of my hon. Friend without injury to the Bill, and I assure him I tried to consider the matter very fully. He himself has not succeeded either. I hope, therefore, he will be content not to press the Amendment which does not effect the object he desires. Any suggestion of words to carry out his view without injury to the Bill I have no doubt will be considered.
  Mr. HARVEY: I will not press the Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

  CLAUSE 2.—(Prolongation of Expiring Terms of Service.)
  During the continuance of the present War, Sub-section (1) of Section eighty-seven of the Army Act, and Sub-section (5) of Section nine of the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act, 1907 (which relate to prolongation of service in certain cases), shall have effect as if after the words "not exceeding twelve months" where they occur in those Sub-sections respectively there were inserted the words "or in the case of men whose time for discharge occurs before the end of the present War not exceeding the duration of the War provided the man referred to in such Sections is under the age of forty-one."
  Mr. KING: I feel very strongly about calling back to the Army time-expired men, go I put down a Motion to reject this Clause, and also Clause 3, Sub-section (1). I realise, however, that the matter has been very fully debated in Committee, and also that there are other matters which possibly may be more advantageously taken up. I, therefore, propose neither to move my Amendment on this or the succeeding Clause.
  Sir G. CAVE: I beg to move to leave out the words "provided the man referred to
  1406
  in such Sections is under the age of forty-one," and to insert instead thereof the words, "provided that this Section shall not apply in the case of men who when their time for discharge occurs have served a period of twelve years or more and have attained the age of forty-one years."
  This Amendment gives effect to what was indicated in the Committee stage. The final words of Clause 2, as now framed, were inserted in Committee, and my right hon. Friend said he must consider other words before the Report stage. He also desired to make provision for the case of men who have served more than twelve years. With that view this Amendment has been framed, and the proposal is to omit the proviso and to insert the words I have moved.
  Mr. JOWETT: I should like an expression of opinion or some intimation from the Solicitor-General regarding the position of time-expired men who have gone back into civil life So far as one can gather those men are by far in a worse position, or will be, under the provisions of this Bill than the men whose time expires whilst they are on service. In some instances—and I should like to direct the attention of the right hon. and learned Gentleman to this matter—men will be called back who are only a few months short of attaining their forty-first year. If all this is not so, I should like to be corrected; but it seems a very hard case if it is so.
  Sir G. CAVE: That point does not arise on this Clause, which only deals with a prolongation of the service of men in the Service.
  Mr. LOUGH: Does this Amendment mean that if a man happens to be forty-three or forty-four, and if he has not served his full twelve years, he may be called back? If so, is that intended?
  Question, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill," put, and negatived.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the words proposed be there inserted."
  Captain AMERY: I beg to move, in the proposed Amendment, to leave out the word "not" ["shall not apply in the case of men"], and after the word "apply" to insert the words "as regards home service only."

  1407
  I have a slightly different Amendment down later on the Order Paper, but I believe in the interests of discussion it would perhaps be better to embody it as an Amendment to the Amendment of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I think the House generally expressed its views sufficiently strongly the other day as regards the hardship involved in keeping these men in the trenches, and I am not prepared to discuss that question any further. But there are certain points, and we must remember that these men whom it is now proposed to discharge, if they are over forty-one, are men of the very greatest value, not so much in the trenches as from the point of the training of the Army. In almost every case the man who has served continuously and has reached the age of over forty-one is a non-commissioned officer, and in a very large proportion indeed a non-commissioned officer who has been on the training staff either of the Regular Army or the Territorial Forces. These men are the very salt of the Army. They are invaluable as a nucleus, or as a part of that very inadequate small nucleus which we have for training our new soldiers. There are plenty of instructors in the Army to-day who went through the old Egyptian campaign of 1882–85. I was told only this morning of an old sergeant-major who has rejoined his battalion and, I believe, is going back to the front in a a week or two who fought at the Battle of Abu-Klea in 1885. He, therefore, is well over fifty. It seems to me a very grave thing if these men are to be allowed to go out of the Army. I would not keep them in the trenches—certainly not! But I would use them for the training of our young soldiers at home. There is no other national interest—consulting national interests first—involved in getting them away from the Army. In practically every case these men are the men who have made the Army their profession.
  They are not skilled munitions workers. They are not skilled farmers. They are not producers in any essential industry. If you allow them to go they will start anew in some form of unessential work. One must always remember, in discussing an Amendment like this, that if you allow one man to go you have to fetch another man to take his place. Everyone of these men whom you allow to go from the Army into civil life means some other man called up—some other man less useful for training
  1408
  purposes, less fit, and possibly a man like the men whose cases were discussed yesterday, in connection with whom very grave hardship may be involved. After all, though it may be a hardship that a man who has served his twenty-two years is not allowed to go and open a small shop after his period of service expires, it is not nearly as great a hardship as taking the man who, after years of toil, has been successful in building up a small establishment, and who sees his work sacrificed. These men will not lose anything substantial in being kept back for a year or two from the day on which they will re-enter civil life. There is another question, and one of great gravity, which the House really ought to consider when dealing with these men. My hon. Friend (Mr. Jowett) referred to the very great hardship to men who had been allowed to go into civil life and then are recalled to the Army. In many cases it means that the little sum of money invested in a business is wasted. What is going to happen in the case of those men? They have mostly got a little bit of money saved. They open some sort of business with a view of living contentedly for the rest of their days. That is a most laudable and proper ambition on their part, but what is going to happen to these men?
  In a very few months you are going to raise the age of service—there can be no question about that! The Committee the other day did not, I know, accept the Amendment. The Committee did not wish to raise the age. These questions, however, do not depend upon the wishes or the desires of this House. They depend upon the inexorable course of the War. This House did not wish for compulsory service. It did not wish to extend the service to married men or boys when they become eighteen. Stern necessity intervened. The Bill was passed. Those things were looked at from the position of the War at the front, and the reasonable prospects of it. We can be certain, whatever our wishes may be, that before many months are up we shall be compelled to raise the age of service. In that case can there be anything harder than calling back these men, because they not only will lose that quiet life and probably the little capital which they put into their new business? In this case there can be no greater injustice than to follow the dictates of sentiment instead of clearly and squarely facing the necessities of the situation. Therefore, I do submit

  1409
  that what I propose as an Amendment to the right hon. Gentleman's Amendment does not inflict any hardship upon these men. On the contrary, it is likely to save them very great hardship in the near future. From the point of view that must dominate everything, the needs of the Army and the safety of the country, it is very desirable that these men, be they only 5,000 or 6,000 in number, should be kept in the Army and not discharged into ordinary civil life.
  Colonel YATE: I will heartily second the Amendment. As it happens, I have had put in my hand a letter from a company sergeant-major at the front, urging the very same consideration that has been urged by the hon. and gallant Member who moved this Amendment. All these old non-commissioned officers of the Regular Army say that they cannot hold their own with the young men at the front, but that they do wish to come home and do their duty in training the new recruits, and I do hope that every effort will be made to keep those men on in the Service for the express purpose of training those young men.
  Mr. LONG: I confess that I am rather sorry that this Amendment has been moved, because the other day we came to what I regarded as a general arrangement. I expressed, on behalf of the Government, what certainly was the general feeling of the House, namely, that these were the men whose compulsory re-engagement was regarded with greater regret than any other part of this necessary Bill, and I entirely disagree with the hon. and gallant Member who moved the Amendment, when he drew a comparison between the hardship on the man now in business and the hardship on the man brought home from the front. The man in business has made no contribution as yet to this great War, having borne no share of the fighting or suffered, whereas these men very often have been in the trenches from the beginning of the War, and many have suffered severely, having been wounded more than once. Everyone feels that they have done their duty, and done it splendidly, and those men know that the day they come home, if they choose to take it up, civil occupation of a remunerative and suitable character awaits them. The hon. and gallant Member who supported the Amendment did so on the ground that many of those men wish to be given service at home.
  1410
  Those men can re-engage for Home Service, to-morrow if they choose. There is nothing to prevent them. They can all re-engage for Home Service, and I have no doubt, if they wish to do so, they can re-engage for Foreign Service. At present the War Office have not been taking re-engagement for Home Service, because they do not want, if they can help it, to add to the complication which arises by having two branches for the Army, one for general service, and one only available for home defence. But I have not the smallest doubt that if any of those men really wish to rejoin, then arrangements will be made for them to do it. I can answer for a man who joined the Army only the other day, a man who came under my own personal knowledge. I know nothing about how he did it, but I know his age. Wild horses will not drag his age out of me, but he comes within the description of my hon. Friend.
  It is not a question of voluntary re-engagement. The question the House has got to decide is, are they going back upon the arrangement made the other day? There was a very general feeling in the House, not confined to one quarter, that there ought to be some compromise over this question of men who have attained a certain age and have served a certain number of years. The Amendment I accepted was with the full knowledge, concurrence, and approval of the Adjutant-General himself. The Adjutant-General is a member of the Army Council who is directly responsible for advising the country on these important questions. The arrangement I accepted is one which he entirely approved, and he approves of it still. Everything my hon. and gallant Friend said is no doubt true. You cannot foretell what may happen in war. He is very confident that this House is going to raise the age; he says in two or three months. I hope he will turn out to be a false prophet. That is all I can say, but, however that may be, I prefer to take the advice of a distinguished soldier who is in the important and responsible position of Adjutant-General of His-Majesty's forces. He is the man upon whose advice we rely, and to whom we are entitled to look for guidance. He is satisfied with the position the Government are taking up. We are not taking it up in opposition to him. Do not think there has been political pressure. I notice that things are said, but there is no foundation whatever for them. There is no

  1411
  difference between us. We came the other day to an arrangement, and I must ask the House to adhere to it, and not to bring up a new proposal which would not, in my humble opinion, be in keeping with what has been said.
  Major GUEST: I must say that I very much sympathise with the Amendment, and I feel strongly inclined to support it as much as I can. It seems to me this is the class of man which, if we could keep in the Army, we should keep in the Army, because these men have long experience of military service and of discipline in the Army. The one thing we have to teach most seriously to the newly-joined men is the principle of discipline, and it is the older soldiers who can instil that into new soldiers better than anyone else. The right hon. Gentleman, in replying just now, spoke about the fact that any man can enlist for Home service. I cannot help thinking he is misinformed there, because I do not know of any possible means of such enlistment at the present time.
  Mr. LONG: I did not say that any man could enlist for Home service. That is exactly contrary to the fact. What I said was that if these old soldiers coming home were anxious to enlist for Home service, I am perfectly certain that that could be arranged. That is quite a different thing.
  Major GUEST: I think if that could be arranged it would be an advantage, but, even so, it would not quite meet the point whereby these men's services could be retained for the country, and I strongly support the Amendment of my hon. and gallant Friend.
  Colonel YATE: Will the right hon. Gentleman give them a bounty to re-engage?
  Mr. LONG: Yes, I should think any man who re-engages would come within the bounty, of course. That, no doubt, would have to be arranged with the War Office. There would have to be a special arrangement. I cannot answer for that now.
  Words, "Provided that this Section shall not apply in the case of men who when their time for discharge occurs have
  1412
  served a period of twelve years or more and have attained the age of forty-one years," there inserted.

  CLAUSE 3.—(Modification of Exceptions from Service.)
  (1) Paragraph five of the First Schedule to the principal Act shall cease to have effect so far as it relates to men who have been discharged from the naval or military service of the Crown on the termination of their period of service. Provided that such man if discharged from the naval or military services of the Crown on re-enlistment shall be restored to the same naval or military rank as they held before the termination of their period of service.
  (2) Paragraph six of the First Schedule to the principal Act shall, on the first day of August, nineteen hundred and sixteen, cease to apply to a man who has offered himself for enlistment and been rejected since the fourteenth day of August, nineteen hundred and fifteen, if the Army Council are satisfied that he should again present himself for medical examination, and send him notice to that effect.
  (3) Sub-section (5) of Section two of the principal Act shall have effect as if the words "before the appointed date" were omitted therefrom.
  Mr. KING: I beg to move, to leave out Sub-section (1).
  Question proposed, "That the words in Sub-section (1) down to the word 'effect' stand part of the Sub-section."
  Mr. JOWETT: I wish to raise the point which I attempted, inappropriately, to raise when the last Clause was being considered. The particular case that I wish to bring before the President of the Local Government Board is the exceedingly disadvantageous position in which time-expired men who have already gone into civil life will be as compared with time-expired men whose term actually expires whilst they are serving at the front. The men who have already gone into civil life—at least, those I have particularly in my mind at the present moment—have served during the War, and have already been allowed to go. They will have grown accustomed to being back in their homes. They have made arrangements regarding their employment, and have fixed up in civil life one-way or another. They will be called back again, and called back under conditions,

  1413
  so far as I am advised, that will be actually worse than the conditions of those whose time has not expired up to now. I have had cases brought to my notice of time-expired men who have gone into civil life after serving in this War, and who are within a few months of forty-one, who will be called up to serve for the remainder of those few months, and I am advised that when they reach forty-one they will not be qualified to receive the advantage of Clause 2. [An HON. MEMBER: "No; they will be kept on!"] If that is correct, they will be kept on indefinitely. It is monstrously unfair that they should be kept on. Many of them, as I have said, have actually served in this War up to the last few months, and I do not think the Bill ought to be allowed to pass in that state if the explanation given to me of the state of affairs is true.
  Mr. LONG: I am afraid I have nothing to add to what I said before on this subject, which has all been raised in Debate previously. There is the old question of bringing back those men. All that my hon. Friend said is quite true. Of course, they would not be affected by Clause (2), unless they were able to come within the provisions of Clause (2). If they fulfil the conditions there they come within it; if not, obviously they remain outside, but they must be brought back. It is necessary. That is all there is to say.
  Captain AMERY: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words, "so far as it relates to men who have been discharged from the Naval or Military Service of the Crown on the termination of their period of service."
  This is an Amendment which the President of the Local Government Board promised to consider before we arrived at the Report stage, because, at any rate, it seemed to me that the answer he gave on a previous occasion implied a misunderstanding of the scope of the Amendment. There is no intention in this Amendment to compel the military authorities to re-examine every man who has been discharged as medically unfit. Obviously there has been a large number of men discharged since the outbreak of war, whom it would be a mere waste of time to re-examine, but the object is to prevent a
  1414
  man claiming the right, which he can claim if the Bill is left in its present form, that he is entirely excepted from the provisions of the Bill, that he is as completely outside the scope as a woman or a clergyman, if at any time in his past life he has left the Forces of the Crown or been discharged from them owing to ill-health. We know a great many men were discharged for ill-health—enteric and other complaints—in the South African War. In a very large number of cases those men are perfectly fit and strong now, and if they have been hanging back from their duty to serve, surely it is an absurd thing that they should not be compelled to serve to-day. There is another case, and I think the majority of cases which will be affected by this Amendment, and that is the man who left the Territorial Force before the War on the ground of ill-health. It is difficult for us to take our minds back to the spacious and easy days before the War when you joined the Territorial Force on a four-years' obligation, but could in practice always get free of your obligation either by pleading claims of business or the state of your health. I believe that in every year before the War something like 15,000 persons left the Territorial Force without completing their term of engagement, either on the plea of business or of ill-health. That means something like 100,000 persons, and, assuming the majority who could have actually joined voluntarily, it is still probable that the Bill excepts quite accidentally, by haphazard, 5,000, or possibly 10,000, men who ought to serve. I admit from the military point of view 5,000 men is not an immense number. At the same time, 5,000 men just make the difference between a weak and disorganised division and a division brought up to full strength to go into action, and one division can turn the scale of a battle. The reason that I earnestly urge this Amendment upon my right hon. Friend's attention is that even 5,000 cases of men being exempted by an oversight of the law at a time when you are trying the conscience of the people is very hard. We have had hours of discussion about some 15,000 conscientious objectors and we are going to compel countless people to break up their businesses and sacrifice the fruit of their life's work, and what will be their feelings if they find that there are men in their neighbourhood who are fit and eligible to serve and who have nothing

  1415
  much to lose by serving, but who will not go because they happened to be in the Territorial Force and had to give it up because they could not go to night drill because it did not suit their asthma. There does not seem to me any difficulty involved in accepting this Amendment. It would be perfectly easy for the Army authorities to announce that they did not intend to re-examine a single person who has been discharged within the last two or three years as long as they have the right in regard to those who left the Territorial Force six or ten years ago. This is not a question of increasing the scope of compulsion for compulsion's sake, as I have sometimes been accused of doing; it is a question of fairness and of justice, and from that point of view I thought this was purely a drafting Amendment. I hope in pressing this proposal I shall have the friendly consideration of the right hon. Gentleman and the friendly support of hon. Members of the House generally.
  Major HUNT: I beg to second the Amendment.
  Mr. LONG: I regret that, although I have made every inquiry, I have been unable to ascertain the number of men who would be affected, and I have been quite unable to get any estimate of what this proposal means. It is not thought that there is any necessity for this Amendment, and our proposal is not an oversight at all. We had a similar Debate to this during the Committee stage, and my hon. and gallant Friend, as far as I can recollect, made, word for word, the same speech, and, as far as I know, I am making the same speech in reply to it. A large number of these men have long ago come to the Colours, and the Adjutant-General does not think it worth while to make this Amendment. It must not be forgotten that by this Bill every man who does not come within certain exemptions is compelled to serve. We have to embark upon the most complicated machinery to carry out the proposals of this Bill, and the Adjutant-General has undertaken to set up, and is setting up, complicated machinery to deal with medical rejections in a way which will be fair to the men, and he does not wish to add to their number and therefore I ask the House to reject the Amendment moved by my hon. and gallant Friend.
  Amendment negatived.
  Mr. KING: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), after the word "service" ["on the termination of their period of service"], to insert the words, "and accordingly in that paragraph the words 'and subject to any provision which may hereafter be made by Parliament, men who have been discharged from the naval or military service of the Crown on the termination of their period of service' shall be repealed."
  This Amendment is one of a large class of Amendments I have put down which raises only drafting points, but raises them in a very important way. I shall be glad if I may have the attention of the Solicitor-General in regard to this Amendment which raises the whole principle of the way in which the Bill is drafted.
  Mr. SPEAKER: This Bill is drafted in the Government style. When the hon. Member brings forward a Bill, he can bring it forward in his own style.
  Mr. KING: I only intend to put my point very shortly. I wish to ask the President of the Local Government Board and the Solicitor-General whether in view of the fact that this Act has to be constantly interpreted with the earlier Military Service Act, and will have to be applied by tribunals which are not strictly legal bodies and by military representatives who are not legal men, whether we may look forward to anything in the way of a consolidation of this Bill and the previous Military Service Act within a reasonable time, so that we may have the two Bills in the form of a single Act of Parliament which can be much more easily understood and acted upon than the present two Acts. The Amendments I have got down are all with the object of making the Bill more clear, either by direct repeal or the direct insertion of new words. I move this Amendment because I want to put the point before the Solicitor-General to know if we may look forward to a Consolidation Bill at an early date which will be more easy for tribunals and conscripted persons to understand.
  Amendment not seconded.
  Mr. LONG: I beg to move, in Sub-section (1), to leave out the words, "such man if discharged from the naval or military services of the Crown on re-enlistment shall be restored to the same naval or military rank as they held before the termination of their period of service," and to insert instead thereof the words,

  1417
  "where a man is transferred to the Reserve, in pursuance of the principal Act, or this Act, he shall, if he has been so discharged from the military service of the Crown as a warrant officer or non-commissioned officer, be restored to the military rank which he held immediately before the termination of his military service."
  The question was raised whether men who retired from the Army were entitled to resume the rank which they held on leaving. In the course of the Debate which took place on this question we considered the question of the warrant officer, and also the question of those in the Navy. I confess that I did not know what the custom was in regard to officers, and therefore I propose, in moving this Amendment, to make a short statement. With regard to the warrant officers, or non-commissioned officers, they return to the same rank in the Army which they occupied before they left, and this Amendment carries out that proposal. With regard to the men it is suggested that if a man has held a similar rank in the Navy he ought, on joining the Army, to have something equivalent, and at first sight it seemed to me that there was a case made out for this. I wish to point out, however, that the Navy have the first call upon these men who come in either under the parent Act or under this Bill, and if they think that a man is worth restoration to the Navy in any rank it is obvious that they will restore him. The Army, however, are not prepared to accept the position that if the Navy does not think a man is worthy of restoration to his rank in the Navy he should be given an equivalent rank in the Army. The War Office are not prepared to undertake this in regard to the Navy, and I shall resist it for this reason. In the first place, I have been unable to find what is the equivalent rank in the Army. If a man has been a boatswain in the Navy, what rank is there equivalent to that in the Army? It does not follow that because a man can steer a boat he can ride a horse. Of course, if the Navy do not care to take a man into the Navy, the Army will take him as a private, but it will not undertake to give him equivalent rank.
  7.0 P.M.
  I now come to the case of the warrant officers. All those below the rank of a commissioned officer return to the same rank. I ask the attention of the House to the question of the officers, because I am obliged to say that the War Office are not
  1418
  prepared to carry out the arrangement which has previously been indicated, for reasons which I will give. This question has been very carefully examined, and the Army Council believe that, so far as the men who have held commissioned rank are concerned, everyone suitable for employment in commissioned ranks has been taken back already. There are some who have had commissioned rank and who have been called upon to resign that commission. The Government will resist, on behalf of the Army Council, with all the strength we can command, any attempt to force us to take these men back as officers who, in their deliberate opinion, are not to be trusted with the leadership of men. As this would be the inevitable result, and as men who had held commissions and had been found, possibly through no fault of their own, to be not fitted for the responsible task of leading men would come back with commissions, the Army Council are unable to accept the arrangement, and I have been advised so to amend this Bill as to make it clear that we deal with the non-commissioned officer as I have described, that men not taken by the Navy will be taken by the Army in the ordinary way, and that men who have held commissions cannot be taken back as officers. The position of men who have held commissions may be, and in some cases no doubt will be, one of hardship. I have known cases myself, but it is not for me or the House to review these decisions of the Army Council. It is absolutely impossible to do anything of the kind, and I am convinced that this House would resist any suggestion which would result in committing the lives of our men to the leadership of those who are not fitted to be trusted.
  Mr. ASHLEY: I am sorry to say that I find myself in total disagreement with the right hon. Gentleman, not as to the wording of his Amendment, with which I entirely agree, but as to the two statements which he made in his speech in moving the Amendment. The Amendment recognises the right, or at any rate the justice, of the claim of a man who is brought back into the Army under this Bill to be reinstated in the rank which he occupied when he left the Army, not through any fault of his own, not turned out in disgrace, but when he left it in the ordinary course of events, either because his term of service had expired or for

  1419
  some other reason. The right hon. Gentleman quite recognises that in the case of the ordinary non-commissioned officer, and by this Amendment he is going to give him back his rank. Then he makes a class by itself and he treats them extremely unjustly, namely, men who are being brought back under this Act and as to whom the Navy has first choice. The Navy say they do not want these men, and they are therefore handed over to the military authorities. The right hon. Gentleman says that those men who are not wanted by the Navy are not to be given the rank which they previously occupied. [HON. MEMBERS: "How can they?"] These are not men who have served previously in the Army, but in the Navy.
  Mr. LONG: That is exactly what I said. What does the hon. Member regard as the equivalent rank in the Army to that of a boatswain in the Navy?
  Mr. ASHLEY: After all, it is for the Government, surely, to define the equivalent rank. It is very hard that a man who, by his merits, has raised himself to a position of trust and who comes under this Bill should be put back on the lowest rung of the ladder for no fault of his own, but simply because he is not wanted in the Navy. I am not suggesting that any officer who is turned out of the Army for dereliction of duty, the King having no further need for his services, should be given a commission, but what is sauce for the non-commissioned goose should be sauce for the officer gander, and, if you give back his rank to the non-commissioned officer, why, in the name of justice, should you not give back his commission to the officer. The right hon. Gentleman simply said these men are not fit to lead. I challenge that statement. Why are they not fit to lead? They have been officers and have retired in the ordinary course of events.
  Mr. LONG: You must not misunderstand me. I speak on the authority of the Adjutant-General. I do not know, they do not come before me, but they do come before the Adjutant-General, and he says that he has taken all the officers whom he is prepared to trust to lead men. If a man proves unfit he is called upon in his own interest to resign his commission. Does my hon. Friend suggest that he should come back as an officer?
  Mr. ASHLEY: Of course, no man who is called upon to resign his commission should be reinstated in the same rank. All I ask is that a man who has resigned in the ordinary way, because he is tired of the Army or wishes to take up another position, and who is called up under this Act, should be given his rank.
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I agree very largely with the position taken up by the right hon. Gentleman opposite. An officer who has been called upon to resign his commission ought not to be brought back as a leader of men, but you are bound to take into consideration the position of these officers who are going to be called back to the Army. I do not suppose, in the first place, that their number is very large. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman could tell us—
  Mr. LONG: I said that the Adjutant-General authorises me to state that he has taken into the Army every officer who has previously served and whose services he desires to have.
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I do not think the right hon. Gentleman heard my point. What is the number of officers who will be affected by this decision? It cannot be very large. It may perhaps be 100 or 150 at the outside. It seems to me you will be doing an injustice to a number of deserving men if you call them back to the Army as privates or as non-commissioned officers when they once held commissioned rank. They have not been educated for the sort of life which the ordinary private soldier lives in barracks. The number affected cannot be large, and they cannot be of very great value to the Army as private soldiers. I would suggest, therefore, that the Government might find words which would except those who have been discharged as officers and who under the right hon. Gentleman's proposal would be called back as private soldiers. We should be doing a considerable injustice to men who have left the Army through no fault of their own, but because they were not thought worthy to lead men, and they ought not to be brought back in the position of privates. There may be grudges against people who have once borne commissioned rank which might very easily be paid off in the obscurity of the barrack room. Such occurrences and the possibility of a very disagreeable feeling between this class of man and those with

  1421
  whom they would have to serve as privates would be obviated if the Government could see their way to leave these men out from the application of the Act and prevent their being called back to the Colours at all.
  Captain CASSEL: I should like to call the attention of the House to the fact that this hardship, if it be a hardship, has already been inflicted upon all single officers. Under the original Act, single officers in this position are liable to come in as privates, and, as all the single groups have already been called up, this hardship has been inflicted on every single officer in this position. The only result would be to put married officers in a different position from that of single officers. I fully sympathise with what my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool (Mr. Ashley) said, if any case of that kind is likely to arise; but one infers from what the right hon. Gentleman said that no such cases are likely to arise. Although in the case of single officers this course has been, followed, I am not aware of a single complaint.
  Colonel NORTON-GRIFFITHS: It is of great importance, from a practical point of view, that officers should not be forced back into the Service against the will of commanding officers and others. I have known many cases, and have dealt with some personally, where in increasing the Army by leaps and bounds men have crept in somehow or other and have got commissions who never ought to have got them. They never had the qualifications and never were intended to be leaders of men, and they stood in the way of much better men. Those who know what responsibility officers, from subalterns upwards, have at the front in an attack know how very important it is in the interests of the men themselves to ruthlessly clear out those who are not probably the best leaders, and put the very best in their places. You cannot very well give equivalent rank in the Army to a man who has held non-commissioned rank in the Navy. He does not necessarily become a good non-commissioned officer in the Army; but to-day any good man who is worthy of being a non-commissioned officer will be marked down at once, and before two or three days are over will get his one, two, or three stripes, and, if he is going to be made a sergeant-major, he will quickly get his four stripes. To-day the great trouble is to find good non-com-
  1422
  missioned officers, and I do not think the House need worry about any injustice being done to these men.
  Mr. KING: The right hon. Gentleman just now complained that he had to make the same speech over again that he made in Committee, but I may be allowed to say that he has made just now a speech directly opposite.
  Mr. LONG: I said so myself.
  Mr. KING: I want the House to realise how complete is the volte-face which the right hon. Gentleman has performed. The matter was very carefully and fully considered in Committee, and the conclusion to which the right hon. Gentleman came was as follows: "The understanding which has been arrived at is that those men who have left the Service are to come back, whether they belonged to the naval or military services, either with the same rank they held in the Army when they served, or the equivalent rank if they served in the Navy." That is the first point. I shall not venture to develop it further than to point out that it is perfectly easy to recognise, from the standing which a man has and the rate of pay he has, as well as his other advantages, what is his corresponding rank in the Army. I often meet men in the Navy who tell me "My rank is so-and-so, and it is equivalent to such and such a rank in the Army." It is a perfectly well understood thing that might be easily adjusted by some order or other which would recognise that a certain rank in the Navy corresponds to a certain rank in the Army. And now I come to the question of officers. On this point the right hon. Gentleman has completely changed his point of view, and I think very unfortunately. He said on the 10th May:
  "I am prepared on behalf of the Government to accept the inclusion of officers subject to this clear understanding that the Army Council reserves to themselves the right that they now possess, and of which I am sure the House would not wish to deprive them, to deal with an officer as they deal with him now, and of not reinstating him if he is not found fit."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 10th May, 1916, col. 780.]
  Nobody objects to that. What is strongly objected to is the point taken by several hon. Members who spoke immediately after the right hon. Gentleman sat down, and repeated by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury), who said it would be very hard to call a man who had been a captain back to the Army as a private, becuse in doing so you would inflict a great

  1423
  slur upon him. That is what you must inevitably do if you bring back to the position of privates men who have been for years holding the commission of His Majesty. I know myself at least two cases in which the prospect seems to be, for men between thirty-five and forty years of age who served in the South African War, but who for one reason or other have not been able to join the Army in this War, of being sent back to the Army as privates. I say it is totally unjust, and it will not be for the good discipline of the Army itself. Of course, whatever changes the right hon. Gentleman makes, just as, whatever views he may choose to alter, the House will, of course, support him under present circumstances. But I most emphatically protest against this change in regard to a promise which was given in Committee, seeing that it will inflict grievous injustice and cause great discontent.
  Question, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause," put, and negatived. Words, "Where a man is transferred to the Reserve in pursuance of the principal Act, or this Act, he shall, if he has been so discharged from the military service of the Crown as a warrant officer or non-commissioned officer, be restored to the military rank which he held immediately before the termination of his military service," there inserted.
  Mr. PRINGLE: I beg to move to leave out Sub-section (2). One of the exceptions which was granted in the original Act provided that men who had been medically rejected since the 14th August, 1915, should not be compelled to serve under the Military Service Act. This Sub-section which I propose to leave out modifies that provision to this extent, that all those men hitherto excepted will be liable after the 1st of August, 1916, to be called upon to offer themselves for re-examination, if the Army Council are satisfied that they should present themselves for medical examination, and send them notice to that effect. This question was discussed on the Committee stage of the Bill, but it is one of such importance, and it affects such a large number of men, that we believe it is necessary to invite the decision of the House upon it on the Report stage. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Local Government Board has complained that, in respect of other Amendments, he has been compelled to repeat the speeches he has made on the Committee stage. I sincerely hope he will do nothing of the
  1424
  kind in reference to this Amendment, because I think, in the opinion of the majority of those who heard him, nothing could have been more unconvincing than the arguments which on that occasion he placed before the Committee.
  He then stated that this provision was necessary because large numbers of men were in possession of rejection certificates which they had improperly obtained. That was his first ground. The second ground was that the medical examination" of recruits had been very loose in the earlier periods of recruiting, and that it was absolutely necessary now to give power to the Army authorities to re-examine everybody who had been rejected. In respect of the first defence, while it may be admitted that there are cases where certificates have been improperly obtained, it is unnecessary to throw the burden of re-examination upon every man who has been properly rejected in the past. Surely it would have been possible to invent a machinery which would deal with offenders in this respect without throwing a burden upon men who are properly rejected, and causing them at the same time, what is of far greater importance, a great amount of anxiety. In respect of the other defence, the whole of the right hon. Gentleman's arguments related to the earlier stages of recruiting. The provisions in the original Act only relate to rejections since the 14th August, 1915. It is almost universally admitted that at that period if the examination erred it did not err in the direction of excessive rigour, but rather in the direction of excessive laxity; indeed, I remember during the Debates which we had on this subject of compulsion in the autumn, several speeches by the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for South Birmingham (Captain Amery), in which the gravamen of this charge against the voluntary system was that it was so difficult to obtain men voluntarily for the Army that they were really taking in the blind and the halt, so as to get the number they required. We all know that the hon. and gallant Gentleman had a great knowledge of the methods of recruiting, and I think that this evidence regarding the method of examination which prevailed at that time should be conclusive that the examination erred on the side of laxity, rather than on the side of rigour.
  We may claim that in many cases men who submitted themselves for examination in the latter part of last year were allowed into the Army when they ought not to

  1425
  have been, and many men who had been rejected in the earlier period were then for the first time found fit for military service. Consequently, the main part of the right hon. Gentleman's contention on the Committee stage referred to a period in recruiting history which was quite irrelevant to the proposal just now before the House. I would point out that this very proposal was before the House when the original Bill was being considered. It was then put forward by the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for South Birmingham, and on that occasion the President of the Local Government Board made a different speech from that which he made on the Committee stage last year, and which was a much sounder and much more reasonable speech. If he is going to repeat any speech now, I hope he will repeat that one. He said it was unfair and unjust to men who had presented themselves and who were not shirkers, but had obviously desired to do their best for their country, now to call upon them to submit themselves for re-examination. He accepted the contention then made that many of them had taken on themselves important responsibilities, believing their rejection was final and that there was not the slightest likelihood that in this War they would be called upon for military service.
  The contentions which he then put forward against this proposal have been greatly strengthened by our experience of War Office administration in the intervening three months. The ink was hardly dry on this exception in the Military Service Bill before the War Office had endeavoured by other means to force into the Army men who were legally excepted under this provision—men who were excepted and of whose rejection there were records in the War Office and in the offices of the various recruiting authorities. Men in every part of the country received notices calling upon them to present themselves for re-examination—notices, in fact, to enlist. It was suggested, indeed, that some of them had not received satisfactory certificates, and that only certain certificates would be allowed to exempt men from service, quite ignoring the fact that, in the Schedule to the Act, there was no reference to certificates at all. By these means quite a considerable number of men were illegally forced into the Army. There was another significant thing. For the first time, new standards of medical fitness were laid down. It was not only a question of a man's fitness for general service, which was understood to be the test during the
  1426
  period of the voluntary system, but a new classification was invented as soon as the compulsory system had been adopted, and they then began to accept men, not only because they were fit for general service, but because they might be fit for garrison duty, or for some sedentary work. Men suffering under very serious physical disabilities were brought into the Army for this purpose. It is rather significant that for the first time this measure, which, to some extent at least, amounted to the employment of the compulsory system, was adopted only after compulsion became the policy of the country. We have numerous examples of how men have been brought into the Army who are totally unfit for military service. On the Committee stage of the Bill the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Snowden) gave a number of harrowing examples of men who, within a few days of being enlisted, had died; cases in which inquests were held and in which the strongest disapprobation was expressed of the practice of the War Office authorities. I do not intend to detain the House with, any lengthy examples at this stage. [HON. MEMBERS "Hear, hear!"] Examples are relevant to the consideration of this Amendment. I will give two examples, given to me by a colleague in this House. A man was taken and passed for general service, although his card was marked:
  "Suffering from chronic bronchitis."
  That man within three days was taken ill and sent to hospital, and within three months he was dead. That is an example of the practice. A brother of that man, also suffering from bronchitis, was also passed, and within a month he was invalided out of the Army. Those methods are going on at the present time. Men are being passed for general service without any real regard to their physical condition. There is a case, of which the personal details are known to myself, of a boy who offered himself in the first place in November, 1915. He was rejected then on account of a form of heart disease. He was not content with that rejection, and offered himself again within a few months and was again rejected. When the-Derby scheme was opened he offered himself and was passed. When the question of his being called up arose he was passed, not for general service, but for motor transport. What happened? It turned out that the motor transport was full up, and because of that, and not because of any change in his physical condition, he was

  1427
  passed for general service. When we find things like that going on, I ask the House not to place the life and health of all the medically rejected men in the hands of authorities who are abusing their powers in that way.
  We know, of course, that there are large numbers of medically unfit men in the Army at the present time. Why do you want any more? The hon. and gallant Member for South Birmingham told us of large numbers who were enlisted under the voluntary system—indeed, it was one of the crimes of the voluntary system. What was one of the crimes of the voluntary system now turns out to be one of the prime virtues of the compulsory system. It was a crime under the voluntary system to accept an unfit man who offered himself. It is now to be a virtue of the compulsory system to force an unfit man to serve against his will. How many unfit men have we? It is known that they run into hundreds of thousands. There are over two hundred thousand in this country and probably a similar number in France. Surely the large number of medically unfit men the Army now have are sufficient for garrison duties and sedentary occupations, without drafting any more unfit men out of industry. We have been told that the medically unfit men in the Army at the present time are to be discharged. It is a most extraordinary thing that while, on the one hand, you are to discharge medically unfit men whom you have trained for military duties, on the other hand you are to withdraw men who are profitably employed in civit Han duties who are also physically unfit and who have not been trained for military duties. This is one of the most muddling and insane, proposals which has ever come from our War Office.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: What about the doctors who have been squared?
  Mr. PRINGLE: If anybody can prove that the doctors have been squared— apparently my hon. Friend knows of such doctors—I would invite him to give instances.
  Sir A. MARKHAM:I know of them.
  Mr. PRINGLE: I dare say there are cases, but you will not get at the men who have squared doctors by re-examination. It is the honest man who is really unfit who will be the victim. The man who has been able to square the doctor before will
  1428
  be able to square the doctor again. There is the further point that it is undoubted that those men who have been medically rejected since 14th August, 1915, have assumed that they had a statutory safeguard of their position. They believed in an Act of Parliament, and thought, after all, that when the British Parliament passed legislation it was intended to endure for more than three months, and that the securities which it offered to British subjects were not to be cast aside after only a few months and without any adequate reason being put before the House of Commons. These men, believing in this statutory guarantee, have taken upon themselves obligations. Many of them have gone into business. A good many of them are doing good work in the national interest. You are going to put every one of these men in a position of doubt and anxiety as to what his future position is to be. They do not know where they are. They do not know when they are to be called up, or how often they are to be called up. If the War goes on for two years or more they do not know whether they are to be called up every six weeks or two months or any other period. Under this Bill they can be called up for an ever-recurring period. It has been intimated by the hon. and gallant Member for South Birmingham, who may be taken to be the authentic voice of the War Office, that it is the intention of the War Office to do this.
  Mr. TENNANT: No.
  Mr. PRINGLE: The hon. and gallant Member has admitted that it is absolutely essential to have a periodical examination. [An HON. MEMBER: "Germany does it!"] That is the conclusive argument which is advanced. Whenever it is a question of injustice or inequality under the Bill, the only answer we get is that Germany does it. I hope those who are fighting Prussian militarism will not accept an argument of that kind, not only are these men anxious as to their present position in civil life, but when they are called up they are in still greater anxiety as to what their future position will be in the military service. These men know that they are suffering at present from diseases. The War Office does not take responsibility if a man is incapacitated through a disease from which he was suffering before the entered the Army. They only take responsibility if the disease which has incapacitated the man

  1429
  either developed during his service or was aggravated by his service, while the only people who are to decide those two questions are a Medical Board appointed by the War Office themselves. Obviously, there must be great anxiety among men who know themselves to be medically unfit, and who have been certified as medically unfit in the past, as to their future, should they be disabled as a result of their service in the Army. These are the reasons why we think it necessary once more on the Report stage to put forward this Amendment. We believe that up to the present time no answer has been offered to these arguments, and we now once more invite the Government to return to the position they took up upon the original Act, to remove this anxiety from these men and, at the same time, to refrain from perpetrating an act of injustice.
  Mr. HOLT: I beg to second the Amendment so ably moved by my hon. Friend. I should like to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether he will say quite distinctly if I am not right in stating that under this Clause as at present worded it would be lawful for the War Office to call up very person who has either been rejected or, at any future period may be rejected for re-examination as often as they please? I submit that that may be the meaning of the Clause. It is quite clear that that is not the meaning which the right hon. Gentleman attributed to it in the discussion in Committee. It is quite clear to those who listened to his speech then that he contemplated that only people who bad been improperly rejected in the hurry of dealing with so many candidates should be re-examined. I am sure he will agree it is most essential that the Clause should say what he means. It is really intolerable that there should be large numbers of people—it is practically almost everybody—left in such a position that they do not know whether or not they have been finally rejected as medically unfit, and, whatever the justice or injustice of the re-examination may be, it is certain that it will be most unjust that any further re-examination imposed upon those men should not be final.
  Mr. LONG: I am sorry to disappoint my hon. Friend who has put forward this Amendment, and who indulged in a great deal of speculation as to which of the various speeches I made in the course of this and the other Bill I was going to re-
  1430
  peat on the present occasion. I will put him out of his pain at once by telling him that I am not going to repeat one of them, nor am I going to make a fresh one I am going to make a very few remarks, because, as the bulk of the attack upon the Government has been directed to actual War Office administration, I shall be glad to leave that matter in the hands of my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for War, who, I have no doubt, is very well able to show that the attack is without solid foundation. After all, it is very easy to criticise and pick cases out of the hundreds of thousands of cases which have had to be dealt with by the War Office or their representatives throughout the country, to pour ridicule on their work, and to ask why they have failed in this or that. I wonder if some of the critics who have been most loud-voiced in their criticisms here would have presented very different results if they had been charged with the duties with the performance of which they now find so much fault. In regard to the previously rejected men, we are—notwithstanding the ingenious argument of the hon. Members—where we are in the Committee stage. I stated quite frankly on behalf of the Government on the Second Reading and on the Committee stage that the situation has changed, that there were a variety of causes, not merely the one cause referred to by the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Holt), which have led the War Office and the Army Council to the conviction that they must take powers for re-examination. The principle of policy was decided times out of number by the House on the Second Reading and in Committee, and the only question outstanding is whether the War Office have been able to devise such machinery as will enable them to deal with these cases with the minimum of inconvenience and annoyance to these people.
  As to the speech quoted by my hon. Friend (Mr. Pringle), it would be an insult to his intelligence not to say that he knows perfectly well that it was directed to a totally different set of conditions when it was made, and that it has no bearing on the case as it stands now. In the first Bill we were dealing with men who were affected by what is known as the Prime Minister's pledge. The language he has quoted, which I used then, was perfectly proper language to use in regard to the men who had been rejected and who could be regarded as coming within the Prime Minister's pledge. We

  1431
  are dealing with no pledge. We have no circumscribed field to deal with now. We are dealing simply with the question whether or no there are, for different reasons, men now covered by medical certificates whom the War Office ought to have a right to re-examine and ascertain whether they are fit and whether the certificates are genuine or not. That is the whole story. We are taking that power, and all I have now to tell the House is that we already give two months in the Bill—the date is 1st August—and I have Amendments on the Paper making 1st August 1st September, which will extend the period to three months. The men who are to be called up are to be called up by the War Office authorities, and they are now preparing—I myself am personally acquainted with it—machinery which will cover the country and which, I believe, will give the medically rejected men all the information they require in the shortest possible time, and the evils which my hon. Friend anticipates will not arise.
  There is a further special concession which the Adjutant-General is prepared to make. Although it is perfectly true that the groups are closed on the appointed day, we propose to make special arrangements by which he will take into the groups men who were medically rejected since 14th August last and who choose to offer themselves for attestation during the period of grace—that is to say, before 1st September. This disposes of what was one of the main arguments of our critics in the earlier stages, that we are treating these men unjustly and unfairly. There is no injustice. All we want is that where there has been fraud it shall be exposed, and that this shall be done with a minimum of inconvenience to these men who have suffered under this unfortunate disability. We cannot depart from the position we have taken up. The War Office and the Government will do everything in their power to lessen the inconvenience to those who are affected by the Amendment. There is no justification for the interpretation the hon. Member (Mr. Holt) gave, because everyone can interpret Clauses of Bills as he pleases. We are quite certain this Bill will do what we want and will give us the power we want.
  Mr. G. LAMBERT: I do not wish to criticise the right hon. Gentleman or the Bill—I have been supporting it from the first, whatever my previous convictions have been—but I want him to minimise the
  1432
  inconvenience to those men who have been medically rejected. The strong point, as I thought, of the speech of my hon. Friend (Mr. Pringle) was that a statutory decision was come to by this House in January last that these men who were rejected as medically unfit would not be called up again. I have had cases sent to me of men who, by virtue of that statutory enactment, have entered into business and other engagements, and they want now to know exactly what their position is, and they want to know it as soon as possible. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Long) states that he has extended the date to 1st September. Might I ask this, with a view to obviating inconvenience to these persons: Would it be possible to have the medical examination now?
  Mr. TENNANT: I am going to say a word about that.
  Mr. LONG: That is part of the scheme.
  Mr. LAMBERT: Then I will not pursue my argument, but I ask the Government to avoid and to minimise as much as possible inconvenience to these people. There are a good many in the country who at present are in a state of uncertainty, with the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads, and do not know whether they are to be called up or not.
  Sir J. SIMON: I sympathise entirely with what has just been said by my right hon. Friend, and I wish to point out two or three matters which I hope the Undersecretary will find it possible to deal with. I wish, first of all, to ask if he will deal with this. I quite understand that the War Office wish to chock the possibility of some fraud having been perpetrated, and no sensible person, whatever his views on this general subject, can possibly desire that such fraud should not be exposed and punished. Though I have several times heard this referred to in general terms, and though I have had a great many cases brought to my attention, I do not know of a specific case of such fraud, and if there be such a thing I cannot imagine why the War Office is so lax that it does not prosecute, because every such case of fraud is a perfectly plain conspiracy. It is a criminal offence, because it is perpetrated as between the man who really gets the certificate and the man who is pretending it is his. I cannot believe there is a great number of
  such cases, but if there is by all means let us see if they can be got at and exposed. But really I would ask him not

  1433
  to go burning down the house for the purpose of roasting the pig. There are probably 1,000,000 people in the country by this time who, relying upon what happened last January, came forward patriotically, many of them again and again, and in effect were assured that if they were genuinely rejected by a genuine examination, they were entitled to regard themselves as outside the operation of compulsion. If they were really rejected because they were not fit, they will not be of any use to the Army, and the consequence is that an immense amount of anxiety is being caused all over the country by this unhappy Clause—a Clause which is not in the least necessary in a general Bill for the purpose of compelling married men—I say nothing against that for the moment—and which is going to produce comparatively little result.
  The second point I would put to the Under-Secretary is this: Does he realise that this applies not only to men who came forward under the Derby scheme, but also to men who offered themselves for direct enlistment? Does he really say, in the name of the military authorities, that men who have offered themselves for direct enlistment have been improperly rejected by the doctors? I cannot believe it. I do not believe there is a shred of evidence to support it. Surety he ought, at any rate, to exclude from this Clause men who offered themselves for direct enlistment and were rejected as the result of the medical examination.
  The next point is this: The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Long) says that he is making a concession in that he proposes to alter 1st August to 1st September. Will the House just see what is really involved? A number of people came forward at the end of last year, or in the early months of this year, quite genuinely to join the Army. They were volunteers. They were examined and were rejected. They undoubtedly built upon that and they believe that as the result of that they were safe and were entitled to enter into whatever obligations they have entered into. Many employers would not employ anyone until he had offered himself and until it was clear that he could not fight, and all sorts of arrangements have been made all over the country, both in industry and in private employment, on the basis that some of these people are people who have really been rejected. It is not really an assistance to them to tell them you are going to hold this sword over their
  1434
  heads till 1st September. The thing they want to know is, "How soon can the War Office tell us whether we are people whom they want to examine again?" That is really a reasonable point. It is not a question of saying, "I am going to leave you in a state of uncertainty, not till 1st August, but till 1st September." The question is, How soon is it practicable for the War Office to give them notice—and I submit it ought to be written notice—that it wants to examine them again? Until they know that they really are in a difficulty which we are not entitled to put them into. It is not as though these people were not entitled to our sympathy. They are the very people who are entitled to everything we can do for them, and I would press my right hon. Friend (Mr. Tennant) to tell us what is the latest date at which the military authorities will be able to give such persons as they propose to re-examine notice of their intention. That is really fair and right, and with that in mind I have handed in a proposal which I hope my right hon. Friend may see his way to accept. It is to apply in this way: That the paragraph shall, on 1st September, cease to apply to any man who offered himself and has been rejected if the Army Council is satisfied that he shall again present himself for medical examination and send him written notice to that effect before 1st July. I cannot judge whether 1st July is a fair date, but I am quite certain it cannot be the wish of the War Office to leave all these people right through the summer—there are hundreds of thousands of them—in complete uncertainty as to what their position is. I do not know how business can be carried on or how new commitments can be entered into, and it seems to me in the highest degree harsh and unfair to do that to these people, who are really entitled to a special measure of assistance and consideration. I would ask my right hon. Friend, therefore, to say whether he could not arrange that any notice that he has to give should be a written notice, which ought to be given once and for all—it ought not to be repeated—that the notice ought to be given before a certain date—I should have thought 1st July was long enough—and if he thinks it right to extend the other date to 1st September no harm will be done.
  Only one other thing. I quite understand that when you say a man under this Act is deemed to be a soldier as from a

  1435
  particular date, 1st August or 1st September, he has got another month. Therefore, I hope my right hon. Friend will not imagine he meets the point by telling me there is a month to run before the Bill really operates in respect of him. I know that; but the point is that a month is regarded as the least you can concede to the skulker, the shirker, the man who ought to have come forward long ago. These people are not of that class, and they are people who, because they are not of that class, in many cases have committed themselves to all sorts of obligations, and you must give them time to get out of them. If, therefore, one month is the amount you concede to the least desirable member of the community, surely you ought to concede from 1st July to 1st September, together with the month, to those of this character. I think, and I hope the House will think, the points I have mentioned are really practical points. They have nothing to do with objection to compulsion as a principle at all. If the Bill is going to work, you cannot have in every quarter of the country a lot of people who feel that you are doing them real injustice when they are the very people who have done their best to come forward.
  8.0 P.M.
  Mr. ANDERSON: I really feel that we are entitled to a clearer statement of policy from the War Office than we have yet received on this question. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Long) said that it was the desire of the War Office authorities that there should be a minimum of inconvenience and annoyance caused. I am quite sure we ought to accept that, because I cannot believe that the War Office would desire to cause endless annoyance and endless inconvenience to the hundreds of thousands of people who are involved in this matter. But if the matter is left where the right hon. Gentleman left it, it will cause consternation, anxiety, and alarm among large numbers of people who are suffering already, and it is wicked and wrong that we should add needlessly to their sufferings and not permit them to know where they are going to stand in regard to this question. I want to ask the Under-Secretary for War, first of all, if there is any certificate at all of medical unfitness granted by doctors to these unfit people which he is willing to accept as exempting them from service. I raised this question during the Committee stage, and I pointed out that whilst it was quite possible that in certain classes the doctors
  1436
  had said these men for the moment are unfit, and on that ground exempted them, it is also absolutely true that the doctors ire many cases gave men certificates that they were totally unfit for service, and, as I could prove from scores of letters I have received, doctors gave men certificates that they were permanently unfit for the service of the Crown, either in the Army or the Navy. If these men hold certificates showing that they can never under any circumstances make fit or efficient soldiers, what is the use of keeping them uneasy and uncertain on this point for months to come? What is the use of asking them to undergo re-examination? I can well understand that a man may have been suffering from some temporary illness which incapacitated him for the time being, but the cases about which we are far more concerned are the cases of men whom the War Office know will never be able to undertake military service. They are people who are suffering from tuberculosis, people who are suffering from heart trouble, and from diseases of that kind which will never be put right. I maintain that certain certificates ought to be guaranteed by the War Office immediately as being certificates which, if they are held by a man, will be a guarantee that he will not have to go up again for re-examination, and he will be quite sure where the matter stands. Unless that is done there is going to be a great deal of needless cruelty and a great deal of needless anxiety imposed upon these people It is not as if you are imposing this anxiety upon fit men. You are imposing this anxiety and this strain upon ailing men, upon sick men, upon diseased men. It is absolutely true also that, as a result of accepting under the last Bill what they regarded as a pledge embodied in the Act of Parliament, and believing themselves to be clear of military obligations, many of these men undertook business commitments that they would not otherwise have done, and they have gone into business in some cases. I do say that where the illness is of the character I have indicated it is absolutely a waste of public money to enrol these men as soldiers.
  I want to ask the War Office what they propose doing if they do draw in large numbers of these unfit men. I believe there are 200,000 unfit men in the Army already. [An HON. MEMBER: "And the same number abroad?"] I do not know how many there may be abroad. I hear

  1437
  there are none abroad. At any rate, it is believed that here at home there are about 200,000 unfit men in the Army. Surely that is quite sufficient. I do not believe that there is an officer in the Army who does not regard these unfit men as grit in the military machine, and absolutely of no value. What responsibility is the War Office going to accept towards these men? If they impose the strain of training upon them and the men break down, what compensation are they going to get? I would ask the Under-Secretary of State for War to give us a clearer statement than we have yet had, to tell us who are going to be in and who are going to be out, in order to relieve, if possible, a great deal of needless anxiety. I would remind him that the President of the Local Government Board promised me during the Committee stage of this Bill that whilst he could not accept a form of words in an Amendment that I proposed, he would see between then and the Report stage what could be done with a view to definitely embodying in the Bill the fact that if a man had been certified by doctors to be totally and permanently unfitted that that man would be exempt straight away, and no further worry would be caused to him. Nothing has been done by the Government to redeem that pledge, and, so far as I can see, the whole of the men who are ill are now going to endure needless anxiety for months to come unless we get a better statement than we have had. I hope we shall get a better statement from the Under-Secretary for War.
  Sir R. ADKINS: I desire very briefly to support what has been said by the right hon. Member for Walthamstow (Sir J. Simon). He approaches this Clause from the point of view of one who is opposed to the Clause, but as one who desires to make the Clause workable if it is to be adopted. I approach it from the other point of view. On the whole I agree with this Clause, and said so in the Committee stage, and I also am most anxious that this Clause which, so far as my experience goes is unhappily in my judgment necessary, should be made workable as far as possible, and particularly on the point of not keeping these people in a state of uncertainty a day longer than is absolutely necessary. I admit that it must take some time for the War Office to go through the very large number of cases there are, and to make up their minds as to whom they are going to summon
  1438
  for re-examination. But on the other hand, it is surely essential, and I hope the Under-Secretary for War will agree on this point, that the notice should be in writing, and that the date of the notice to go up for re-examination should be a date substantially previous to the date on which the re-examination should take place. As the Clause stands, a man may receive on 31st July a notice that he is to be medically re-examined, and the month may begin to run the very next day, the 1st August. That is obviously wrong, and I ask my right hon. Friend, from the point of view of a supporter of the Bill and of the Clause, to make the Clause better in one vital point by giving a fixed date as soon after this date as can possibly be done, and by securing that the notice shall be in writing, thus making this Clause clear where at present it is vague and indefinite.
  Mr. ROWNTREE: I desire to speak on two points. In the first place I wish very warmly to support what has been said by the hon. and learned Member for Middleton (Sir R. Adkins). From the standpoint of the man it is of the utmost importance that early notice should be given, and I think also from the standpoint of the employer that is also extremely important. I know of small businesses which are really dependent now upon a man who has got a certificate as a medically unfit man, although, of course, he can do this particular work well. If that man is to be re-examined, and has to go into the Army, it is absolutely essential from the standpoint of that business that time should be given to the employer in order that he may get other labour, or else the business will have to be closed. I know large businesses where some of these men have been given very important positions because it was thought that at any rate these men would be able to stay right through the War. From that standpoint it is equally important that these employers of labour should have adequate notice if these men have to be removed. The other point I desire to suggest to the right hon. Gentleman is that I hope the War Office will do something rather more definite than they have done in order to see that the knowledge of the family doctor is obtainable and given when some of these men are re-examined. I have known cases where the medical examination has been hurriedly done, and where the certificate and advice of the family doctor has been laid on one

  1439
  side. Two or three cases I have in my mind have gone before the medical board, and in these cases the advice of the family doctor has been found to be right, and has been accepted by the medical board. Care ought to be taken to see that the certificate from the family doctor is given as evidence of the real condition of these men. That suggestion was made, I think, when the Bill was in Committee, and I hope my right hon. Friend will be able to say that he will do something to see that that advice is taken in these cases.
  Mr. TENNANT: The hon. and learned Member for Lanarkshire (Mr. Pringle), who moved this Amendment, although he is strongly opposed to the Clause being incorporated in the Bill, did, in point of fact, admit that there was some ground for it, inasmuch as he made the admission that a certain number of persons had been improperly rejected. I do not know whether he holds that view, but he certainly did make that admission. I am glad to think that most of the hon. Gentlemen who have spoken realise that there is a real necessity for revision of these medical certificates. I am not going into the long story which was set out by the hon. Member for Lanark as to the mistakes we have made, all of which I have answered in the past, and which we put right as soon as we could; but I cannot pass over in silence the statement which he made, and which I think is a gross exaggeration, that there are not only 200,000 unfit men in the Army at home, but that there are 200,000 unfit men in the Army in France. That is a statement which I do not think ought to go unchallenged. It is not a desirable statement either for our Allies, or for our enemies, to hear coming from a responsible quarter such as the House of Commons. I am perfectly at one with nearly every Gentleman who has spoken, that there is a real ground of apprehension that persons who have been medically rejected and who have made business and other arrangements may be put, not only to inconvenience, but to considerable anxiety, by such a proposal as is contained in the Bill, if it were unaccompanied by any other statement. I respond at once to the invitation which has been made to allay these suspicions, and, if possible, to quell the anxiety which may be existing in the minds of many people. I will tell the House exactly what it is that we propose
  1440
  to do. Of course, my right hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow, and other hon. Gentlemen, I am sure, realise that there is no desire on the part of the Army whatsoever to take men who are not going to make efficient soldiers at the front. We may take those who are less physically well set up for Home defence, in order to release those who are now in our Home Army for service in the trenches in France and in Flanders, but there is no desire, and I hope the House will accept this assurance from me, that this Clause shall be administered in a vexatious manned at all.
  What we propose to do and what is now being drafted is an instruction to recruiting officers to the effect that men who have been rejected at the primary military examination by the recruiting officer, or subsequently by one of the medical boards set up in the recruiting areas, and whose rejection by either of these authorities is recorded in the military register, will not be called up for re-examination. Those are two important points. The man who is rejected at the primary military examination, which is an examination to show whether the man was or was not possessed of the requisite number of limbs, and was a person obviously unfit for military service—that rejection, of course, would count. Again, a man who has been carefully examined by the military medical authorities, and whose rejection was recorded in the military register will not be called upon in any event to come up again to be re-examined. I will now deal with the next point raised by the right hon. Member for Walthamstow and other speakers. On the question of giving a man the power of ascertaining whether or not he is liable to be called up, we are proposing to give facilities of the widest possible kind in order that a man who wishes to know how he stands should be medically examined by the medical board of the area in which he resides provided that he makes an arrangement. He cannot walk in and say, "Here I am; examine me now," but he can send a note a day or two beforehand and ask for an appointment. Arrangements are made with recruiting officers according to appointment by each individual man. So that any man for whom there is a conditional apprehension, who does not realise what his position is, has merely got to ask the recruiting officer of the area in which he lives whether he requires to be medically examined or can be medically examined or

  1441
  not. No man will be called up, as the Clause in the Bill says, unless the military authorities are satisfied that he should present himself for medical examination. The House knows that it will be necessary for the recruiting officers to call upon these men to present themselves for further examination. Any man who does not do so will not be called up unless there is real ground for thinking that he is a person who has been improperly rejected.
  Mr. THOMAS: Does the right hon. Gentleman mean that those persons who would be permanently excluded according to the first concession, which I frankly admit is a very great concession, will be acquainted with the fact that they are so exempted, as this will save anxiety and would not involve very much labour seeing that you have got the records?
  Mr. TENNANT: It lies with the War Office to call up these men. Is that the point of my hon. Friend?
  Mr. THOMAS: No. I am dealing with those who, you have stated, will be exempted, because there is a record kept of the medical defects, and I want to know whether you will acquaint them and relieve them of any anxiety?
  Mr. TENNANT: What my hon. Friend asks me to do is a very considerable undertaking He asks me to tell the million of men in all cases whether they will or will not be called up. That, I am afraid, is too large an undertaking for us to grapple with. What I believe is not improper is to advertise the fact, as I am trying to advertise it now, that facilities are going to be given in the area in which men live for them to be medically examined. If they have any doubt in their own minds they ought to tell the recruiting officer what the nature of their objection is.
  Mr. THOMAS: From the standpoint of labour, will there not be less labour in the military authorities themselves sending that intimation and saving everybody bother?
  Mr. TENNANT: You think that the recruiting officer should send notice to the man to say that he was to come to be examined?
  Mr. THOMAS: No. What I gather from the right hon. Gentleman is, that the concession with which he is meeting us is shortly, that where the War Office has a record of a man's medical rejection that man will be troubled no further, and what
  1442
  he proposes is that the man can make inquiry and be informed to that effect. What I suggest and want to know is whether, from the standpoint of labour on the military authorities, it will not be a saving of trouble if instead of inviting the man to come in and be bothering them, they will acquaint him by a note of his position.
  Mr. TENNANT: I am sorry that I have mistaken my hon. Friend. The reason was that several people were speaking to me at once, and that always makes it difficult to follow an hon. Member. I do not think that what my hon. Friend suggests is in any way insuperable, and I will see whether we cannot arrange to do that. My right hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow made another point as to whether we could not let people know within a definite date. On that point, if we do as I have promised we should do, grant these facilities and inform men that they are definitely rejected and are on our register as being rejected, and give men notice to the effect that they have been so rejected and will not be called up again, I think that that goes a very long way. I think that that is as much as you can expect a very much overworked Department to undertake in the middle of this great War.
  Mr. L. JONES: Is there no date at all after which men will know that they are not going to be called?
  Mr. TENNANT: The 1st of September. I think I see what my hon. Friend is thinking about—that we may not call the man up until the last day of August and may ask the man to come forward on the 1st day of September. We cannot do that; we will give a month.
  Sir J. SIMON: What I think is this. Whatever date you put in your Bill, whether the 1st of August or the 1st of September—at present the Bill has got the 1st of August as the date, and you propose to alter that to the 1st of September—whatever date you fix now there will be the thirty days that follow, which I call a month. My suggestion is that you ought to give more notice than that.
  Mr. TENNANT: I do not think that that is a very good argument. You have got from now—the passing of the Bill—until the end of August. That is quite a long time in which the man has to make up his mind as to whether or not he is a person who ought to come under military service.
  Sir J. SIMON: Surely the War Office does not intend to put every single person who has been rejected, however often, and however genuine his rejection, in a state of doubt until September.
  Mr. TENNANT: No; I never suggested that. All I said was that I did not think it possible for the recruiting officers to say that by a particular interval, like the 1st of July, suggested by my right hon. Friend, they could achieve the large task of reviewing all these cases of rejection and discovering that there were no others that they were going to take on. That is all that I suggested. My right hon. Friend does not appreciate the magnitude of the task. It is a very large task indeed. I am very anxious that the House should not press me on that, because it is a most difficult matter. I hope that my right hon. Friend will not think it necessary to do so. The opening speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, and other speeches, seem to me to be the kind of speech which does not realise what this Bill is intended for—that is to get men for the Army. I would like to remind hon. Gentlemen that there is a very great necessity to get men for the Army, that the country rather looks to Parliament to help it to get men for the Army, and that speeches such as those of these hon. Members do not really help us to do that. It is said that if you take so and so you are going to do an injustice to the man. That is not the intention at all of this legislation. We want to get men for the Army. I must appeal to my hon. Friend to help us in that very difficult problem. There is no desire to take unfit men who would not be useful to us. We do not want to have them at all. I know that my hon. Friend believes that we have taken them.
  Mr. PRINGLE: You have.
  Mr. TENNANT: Taken them in order to gain some private end?
  Mr. PRINGLE: No.
  Mr. TENNANT: I am at a loss to know why my hon. Friend thinks that we have done so. That is not our intention. All that we desire to do when these cases of fraud occur is, if we can discover sufficient grounds, to take proceedings against the persons who perform that fraud. My hon. Friend is acquainted with the difficulties of these cases, and he will agree that it would be very foolish to undertake a prosecution that is not likely to succeed. I think he will realise that we cannot do
  1444
  that. I hope the House will agree with me that we have made very considerable concessions.
  Mr. GEORGE GREENWOOD: I have a letter from a constituent of mine who was rejected. He has suffered from cerebral hemmorhage, and he states that he has got certificates from the Army doctors and a Harley Street specialist of his absolute unfitness for the Army, but he is worrying himself, and is making himself quite ill, lest he should have to make a long journey from Northampton to come again before the Medical Board, who might find for him some form of sedentary service. How soon will that man know whether or not he will have to come forward and again present himself for medical examination?
  Mr. ROWNTREE: Will the right hon. Gentleman also answer my question?
  Mr. TENNANT: My hon. Friend (Mr. Greenwood) speaks of a Constituent who wants to know what he is to do. If his correspondent goes to the recruiting office he can easily find out. It would not be very difficult to go to a recruiting office in his area.
  Mr. GREENWOOD: I do not bow whether he was aware of the fact that he could take his certificate to the recruiting officer, but at any rate he was worrying as to whether this proposal was going to apply all round to rejected people. When is he to know and how is he to know?
  Mr. TENNANT: I think he must go to the recruiting officer and ask. With regard to the question put by my hon. Friend (Mr. Rowntree) as to the certificate of the family doctor, so far as I am aware I think that kind of evidence is always desired by the Medical Board. I will speak to my military advisers, but the certificate of the family doctor can only be accepted as auxiliary, and I think that it would probably be very valuable. In regard to the question of notice, it is provided in the Act that notice is to be sent.
  Mr. PRINGLE: A number of forms are issued by the War Office, and will the right hon. Gentleman say whether any one of these will be accepted as final evidence of rejection?
  Mr. TENNANT: All forms of rejection which state that a man has been rejected because of chronic disease would certainly be accepted.
  Mr. GOLDSTONE: The right hon. Gentleman has expressed considerable good will, for which I am sure the House is grateful, but I would like to know how far that good will is to be translated into administrative action. Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me specifically the number of any rejection form held by any men which would entitle them to regard themselves as permanently disqualified for military service? Will he tell us the number of any certificate issued by the medical authorities of the War Office which entitles a man to regard himself as totally exempt on medical grounds from military service?
  Mr. TENNANT: I could not possibly do that. These are medical forms, and it would be improper for me to say on which of any of these forms a man is entitled to exemption.
  Mr. GOLDSTONE: To that extent I feel that the concession which has been outlined by the right hon. Gentleman is not very material in its effect as going to meet the views which have been advanced by supporters of this Amendment. The view is entertained, without a doubt, that this particular Clause is to be used to secure, for some service or other, men who have been rejected previously, and these men, rightly or wrongly, feel that the grounds on which they have been rejected are permanent grounds. Various medical standards are adopted by the War Office, the effect of which is to get men into the Army, with results not entirely satisfactory. The results will not be satisfactory from the State point of view, and certainly not from the point of view of the men. We have not yet got the admission of the War Office, in the case of the man who is now taken, and subsequently proved to be unsound, organically or in some other way, that responsibility is accepted for diseases which may be developed even under the new form of medical examination. Can we have from the right hon. Gentleman a guarantee that if, under the further medical examination to be imposed under this Clause, all the men who are taken on that examination will be regarded as fit subjects for military service? In the case of disease or disablement other than by wounds and so forth, is the War Office prepared to accept responsibility for that man, if, as the result of training and hardship, a disease which is there now develops during that training? We have not yet got that guarantee, and these are things
  1446
  which, taken together, leave in the minds of large numbers of men now holding certificates of one kind or another the impression that the intention is to get them into the Army to perform some minor duties, whereas, as a matter of fact, from the point of view of the State, from the point of view of the commitments of these men, undertaken as a result of their rejection, there is every reason why there should be an explicit instruction given and an explicit declaration made at the very earliest date as to what their position is. Some of us cannot help thinking that this is an attempt of the War Office to rectify a position which brought them into sad disrepute a little while ago. It will be recalled how the right hon. Member for Walthamstow drew attention to the illegal action of the War Office in bringing in men who had exemption under the Military Service (No. 2) Act, and it does seem, to us at least, that this Clause is an attempt of the War Office to give an answer to those who called attention to their illegal action in administering the Military Service (No. 2) Act. So far as I am concerned, though I acknowledge the good will expressed by the right hon. Gentleman, I regret I find very little substance in the admissions he has made to the House.
  Mr. L. JONES: I think the procedure the right hon. Gentleman has outlined is a great improvement on that in the Bill. In one respect, though, I think he has worsened the position of some of the men. Those we are thinking of are men who would probably ultimately be rejected, but what they are suffering from is uncertainty as to their fate. The giving of another month increases the period of uncertainty. It is true they may go before an Army Medical Board for re-examination privately before the period expires, but in many cases they may not wish to do so. You are not dealing with men who are shirking service because ex hypothesi these are men who have volunteered and have been rejected. Many came to me at the week-end and asked me to ascertain, if possible, certainty for them. If the right hon. Gentleman will not insert 1st of July, why not insert 1st of August, which I think is not an unreasonable request. It would secure two months' notice, which would make a considerable difference in the arrangements of these men. To complete the scheme and make it fair, the right hon. Gentleman should go a little further and name some date, and I suggest the 1st August.
  Mr. CARADOC REES: The forwarding of a postcard to men affected would prevent the necessity of going to the recruiting offices of men who are in many cases hopelessly unable to fight. Otherwise you bring the whole thing into disrepute by the War Office calling up men who are unable to fight. The Army, if they have records before 1st July, could simply send to those who are obviously unfit a postcard to say that they need not present themselves. Otherwise there is no system, and those men will be presenting themselves at different dates and the whole work will perhaps have to be done twice over. If a date is given there is no overlapping. It seems to me a question of detail which any officer would do and a few clerks would arrange in a few hours. It would save a lot of unnecessary trouble and relieve a lot of men of the necessity of presenting themselves when they ought not to be asked to do so. It is not the fault of these men that they are not fighting for the Army, it is their misfortune, and they ought not to be put to any further indignity.
  Mr. G. THORNE: From what has been said it appears that these men will be absolutely uncertain up to 31st August, unless they have previously of their own accord offered themselves for re-examination. What we desire is that notice should be given.
  Mr. TENNANT: Unless they receive a postcard.
  Mr. THORNE: They are absolutely uncertain up to 31st August, unless they previously receive a postcard that they are to offer themselves for re-examination.
  Mr. GALBRAITH: I feel that fewer words and a little more wisdom would lubricate the machinery and accelerate the passage of this Bill. On this subject I have more letters from people in the Constitutency I happen to represent than on any other point. I know several cases myself of men who hold medical certificates that their kidneys, liver, lungs, and other organs are diseased. Why can we not save time and money and a prolific source of vexation by keeping those men in doubt and notify them by a simple halfpenny postcard that there will be no further trouble and the thing is at an end? They will then become canvassers for recruits instead of becoming obstructionists. I do hope that the Government and the Under-Secretary will see that it is most
  1448
  discreet and wise to do so. A tactful man can take a sting from a bee without being stung. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will act on that principle.
  Mr. TENNANT: By leave of the House, may I say that my hon. Friend who spoke just now seemed to think that the whole problem could be settled if you named a date by which notice should go to the rejected. That is really not the point. I am perfectly willing to give a date for that, but the point that has been raised, and was raised originally by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Walthamstow (Sir J. Simon), was to name a date, after which no notice would be sent to anybody. That is what I cannot do. I will undertake to do this, to consult with the military authorities again, although I am not very hopeful, to see whether it is possible to make any such concession. If it is possible I will make the essay with my military authorities to know whether their machinery is sufficiently large and expansible to undertake this particular work. I do not want to make another speech, but I wish the House would realise that it does involve a great amount of labour. To give an undertaking that after a specified date no more notices shall be sent out involves going over the whole of the possible lists in the shorter time. That is the real difficulty. But I will agree to ask the Adjutant-General's Department if it can be done. If it can be done, an Amendment can be inserted in another place.
  Mr. JONATHAN SAMUEL: The statement of the right hon. Gentleman, I think, makes the case very much worse. I agree with the hon. Member for Mid-Durham (Mr. Galbraith) that there is a very strong feeling in the constituencies about these rejected men. How are the Army Council going to deal with these matters? Subsection (2) says, "If the Army Council are satisfied." How are the Army Council to judge whether or not a man should present himself? There is in the medical register a record of every man who has been medically examined. I have seen the system at work. I have seen scores of men medically examined. The doctor, who is paid for this work, is under an obligation; in fact, he is under a very severe penalty. He has to answer about a dozen questions as to the man's physical condition. Those questions are recorded in the medical register, and at the end of the statement it is entered whether the man is fit or unfit. If the man is unfit, no attestation papers are made

  1449
  out. That is really the point. The object is to test whether or not a mail is fit before the attestation papers are made out. During the Derby scheme, when there was a great inrush of recruits, an order came from the War Office that the medical examination was to be set aside, that the attestation papers were to be made out, and that the men should be medically examined when their groups were called up.
  A case was put to me the other day when I was speaking about the great rush in the year 1914, when we had about 35,000 men coming up every week to be enlisted. My own observation in that great rush was that the men were carefully examined by two doctors, and there is a record kept of every man. If the Army Council are going to state whether or not these men are to be recalled, how long are the men to remain in doubt? The Army Council really cannot deal with this point. The President of the Local Government Board definitely told me the other day that it is the local recruiting officer who will decide this point. He cannot decide it, because the records are local. I believe, personally, that the recruiting officers should not decide the point. The only person who can decide whether a man should be re-examined is the medical man who was at the recruiting office. He is the only person who can judge from the record whether or not a man should be re-examined. Therefore, I think it is very easy to carry out the suggestion that a definite date should be inserted. I do not see any difficulty. It should be for the doctor in each recruiting district to go through the list. It should not be for them to send the books or a report to London, and then for the Army Council to decide whether or not men should be examined. If that is done, the Army Council in London will never be able to deal with the point.
  I have nothing to complain about in regard to my right hon. Friend's action in these matters. He has been very courteous and careful. We can all speak well of the War Office in that respect. Therefore I do not complain of anything that he does in this matter. But I called attention the other day to the case of a young man who had been medically rejected. He was a shop assistant, and his employer told me that for two years in succession he had sent him away into the country to try to prevent the inroads of consumption. This young man was medi-
  1450
  cally rejected and had a certificate. He was persuaded, so he says, to go before the medical board to be re-examined. He was passed and sent to a regiment, with the result that within a few weeks he was in hospital. It is a scandal to send young fellows like that into the Army with the result that they drift into hospital and are a great cost to the nation without being any benefit. I have called attention to other cases where men have been discharged from the Army as medically unfit, and the Army, after taking them, have repudiated responsibility as to their finance. I am certain that a serious blunder is committed by speeches to which I have listened in this House and by articles that I have read in the Press in reference to the large numbers of men who have been recklessly examined by the doctors. Personally, I do not believe it. If the doctor is in any way conscientious, he is bound to answer the questions in the medical register, and if those answers are in accordance with the physical condition of the man, that register ought to be the guide as to whether he is fit or not. Therefore I say that this uncertainty should not be held over these men for a very long time, but a definite date should be put into the Bill.
  Mr. GREENWOOD: When I brought before the right hon. Gentleman the case of a man suffering from cerebral hæmorrhage he told me that the man ought to take his certificate to the recruiting officer. Is the recruiting officer entitled to tell him whether he must present himself for re-examination?
  Mr. TENNANT: Yes.
  9.0 P.M.
  Mr. THOMAS: I do not think there is so much difference between us as there was prior to the concessions being given. There are differences of opinion as to whether the position now is any improvement. As I understand the situation, it is that as the result of this Debate the right hon. Gentleman has promised that all those who according to the War Office medical register are permanently rejected shall receive an intimation by post to that effect. The point that I want to put on that is this: if that record is kept, then clearly the record of other people must be kept. If it is not so, we are in this position: that the remainder of the Clause is useless—because that is what it amounts

  1451
  to! If it is not so, it means that you cannot call anybody up, because if you have no record for them how can you call them up? If you have a record for them then it is just as easy to acquaint them all as it is to acquaint one section. Let me show another side. The right hon. Gentleman said that so far as he could gather the case he wanted to deal with was someone who had had, say, the measles, and was rejected at that date, but who at this moment may become an efficient soldier. I gather that is the kind of case he has in his mind, or it is a typical case. A man was rejected on grounds that were not permanent. That is the kind of case that we want to hear about. Surely the way to deal with those is this: Having gone through the register and acquainted those that are to be totally exempt, it is an easy matter at the same time to acquaint the others to come in immediately for examination. By that means you relieve them of a tremendous responsibility. That is all we want.
  Mr. TENNANTmade a remark which was inaudible in the Reporters' Gallery.
  Mr. THOMAS: Very well, if you are going to do that, that is exactly what we want. Up till now we have not gathered that.
  Mr. TENNANT: I cannot give a date, that is all.
  Mr. THOMAS: The date, I think, is really not such a difficult matter as the right hon. Gentleman suggests. He said, in substance, in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, that he could not tell the kind of certificate that will be exempt. Surely that is what he can say! No one can get up in this House and suggest that the medical board, or the doctors engaged by the Army Council, have not got varying certificates. They have got them. Those of us who have been occupied with recruiting know very well there were different kinds of certificates given. Some were for those temporarily unfit.
  Mr. TENNANT: Yes.
  Mr. THOMAS: Exactly. Well, now, that is admitted, that they have been written across in different ways. Is it not an easy matter to ascertain at an early stage who are those that are to be permanently excluded, with an intimation to that effect?
  Mr. TENNANT: I will tell my hon. Friend why. Different recruiting officers use the form in different ways. Therefore I would only be misleading the House if I gave what he asks.
  Mr. THOMAS: I think that is a substantial objection to the point, and I agree at once. That, however, should not prevent the other suggestion that has been made, namely, as to the date.
  Mr. TENNANT: I cannot give that.
  Mr. THOMAS: Let me put this to the right hon. Gentleman: This Bill is the result of the previous one which was rejected. The House of Commons rejected that Bill, rejected the Cabinet so-called crisis scheme, solely on the ground of urgency—that is to say, that the men were immediately required. I think the right hon. Gentleman must see that the proposal that we are making is all on the side of getting men. It is we, now, who are anxious for you to get the men. I do not know that we can press it further. I submit that it is not now a question of compulsion we are discussing, or the merits of Conscription or voluntarism. All we are asking is that the men who have shown their patriotism, who have offered their services, and who subsequently have entered into business obligations shall at this stage receive the maximum fair treatment that they have a right to expect from the Government.
  Mr. CHANCELLOR: I want to ask one question as to the position of a man who has been already examined three or four times. I presume he will be registered in three or four places. I have in mind a young man who first of all was passed for general service. Then he offered to join a regiment and was rejected. Then he went to the Board at Holborn, and got some different kind of paper. At any rate, he had four conflicting results from four examinations. Will that young man be liable to be advised from all these four sources in view of four different medical examinations? Will there by any finality in such a case?
  Mr. TENNANT: That is a very difficult question to answer. I hope the case my hon. Friend has given is rather an unusual one. I cannot think there are a great many people who have different results in the way described.
  Mr. CHANCELLOR: Oh. yes; there are quite a number.
  Mr. TENNANT: I do know that doctors vary. I should say, speaking offhand, that possibly the man will receive a notice from the recruiting office which has got him on the register as definitely and permanently rejected, and only from that office.

  Division No. 21.]

  AYES.

  [9.3 p.m.

  Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis Dyke

  Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence

  Pryce-Jones, Colonel E.

  Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D.

  Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

  Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Harmsworth, R. L. (Caithness-shire)

  Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Haslam, Lewis

  Rees, Sir J. D.

  Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

  Henry, Sir Charles

  Reid, Rt. Hon. Sir George H.

  Barlow, Montague (Salford, South)

  Hewart, Gordon

  Richardson, Albion (Peckham)

  Bathurst, Col. Hon. A. B. (Glouc., E.)

  Hewins, William Albert Samuel

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Bellairs, Commander C. W.

  Hibbert, Sir Henry F.

  Robinson, Sidney

  Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

  Hodge, John

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Boyton, James

  Holmes, Daniel Turner

  Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

  Brace, William

  Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian)

  Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

  Bridgeman, William Clive

  Horne, Edgar

  Samuel, Samuel (Wandsworth)

  Brunner, John F. L.

  Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

  Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton)

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Illingnorth, Albert H.

  Shortt, Edward

  Bull, Sir William James

  Jacobsen, Thomas Owen

  Smith, Sir Swire

  Carlile, Sir Edward Hildred

  Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

  Stewart, Gershom

  Cochrane, Cecil Algernon

  Kellaway, Frederick George

  Sutherland, John E.

  Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

  Lamb, Sir Ernest Henry

  Swift, Rigby

  Cooper, Sir Richard Ashmole

  Larmor, Sir J.

  Sykes, Col. Alan John (Knutsford)

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Layland-Barratt, Sir F.

  Talbot, Lord Edmund

  Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Terrell, George (Wilts, N.W.)

  Craig, Ernest (Cheshire, Crewe)

  Lewis, Rt. Hon. John Herbert

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

  Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

  Tickler, T. G.

  Craig, Norman (Kent, Thanet)

  Long, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Tootill, Robert

  Craik, Sir Henry

  M'Callum, Sir John M.

  Toulmin, Sir George

  Crooks, Rt. Hon. William

  MacCaw, Win. J. MacGeagh

  Walton, Sir Joseph

  Currie, George W.

  Macmaster, Donald

  Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay T.

  Dalrymple, Hon. H. H.

  Magnus, Sir Philip

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Denniss, E. R. B.

  Middlemore, John Throgmorton

  Western, John W.

  Dixon, C. H.

  Millar, James Duncan

  Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

  Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir J. B.

  Morgan, George Hay,

  Williams, Aneurin (Durham, N.W.)

  Duncan, C (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Morton, Alpneus Cleophas

  Williams, Thomas J.

  Edge, Captain William

  Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Wood, John (Stalybridge)

  Fell, Arthur

  Nield, Herbert

  Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

  Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey

  Norton-Griffiths, J.

  Worthington Evans, Major L.

  Finney, Samuel

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Wright, Henry Fitzherbert

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

  Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

  Yate, Colonel C. E.

  Flannery, Sir J. Fortescue

  Pearce, Sir William

  Yeo, Alfred William

  Fletcher, John Samuel

  Pennefather, De Fonblanque

  Young, William (Perthshire, East)

  Forster, Henry William

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Yoxall, Sir James Henry

  Gardner, Ernest

  Phillips, Sir Owen (Chester)

  Gretton, John

  Pollock, Ernest Murray

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

  Gulland, John William

  Pratt, J. W.

  Mr. James Hope and Mr. Beck.

  Hancock. J. G.

  Prothere, Rowland Edmund

  NOES.

  Anderson, W. C.

  Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

  Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

  Jones, H. Haydn (Merioneth)

  Rowlands, James

  Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

  Jones, Leif (Notts, Rushcliffe)

  Rowntree, Arnold

  Bliss, Joseph

  Jowett, F. W.

  Runciman, Sir Walter (Hartlepool)

  Bowerman, Charles W.

  King, J.

  Sherwell, Arthur James

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

  Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allsebrook

  Buxton, Noel

  Markham, Sir Arthur Basil

  Snowden, Philip

  Byles, Sir William Pollard

  Mason, David M. (Coventry)

  Sutton, John E.

  Chancellor, Henry George

  Malteno, Percy Alport

  Tayor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

  Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid)

  Morrell, Philip

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Outhwaite, R. L.

  Wardle, George

  Goldstone, Frank

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Whitehouse, John Howard

  Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, W.)

  Radford G. H.

  Wilson, w. T. (Westhoughton)

  Hinds, John

  Raffan, Peter Wilson

  Hogge, James Myles

  Rees, G. C. (Carnarvon, Arfon)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Richards, Thomas

  Mr. Pringle and Mr. Thomas.

  John, Edward Thomas

  Amendments made:
  In Sub-section (2) leave out the word "August" ["on the first day of August, nineteen hundred and sixteen"], and
  Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out down to August, nineteen hundred and sixteen," stand part of the Bill."
  The House divided: Ayes, 140; Noes, 48.
  insert instead thereof the word "September."—[Mr. Long.]
  After the word "him" ["and send him notice to that effect"], insert the word "Written."—[Sir J. Simon.]
  Mr. LONG: I beg to move, at the end of Sub-section (2), to insert the words "before the first mentioned date."
  Sir J. SIMON: I beg to move, in the proposed Amendment, to leave out the words "mentioned date," and to insert instead thereof the words "day of July, nineteen hundred and sixteen."
  The matter has been already discussed, but I submit it is right to fix a certain date, and I hope I may get support for my proposal.
  Mr. LONG: I was not here a few minutes ago, when my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for War dealt, I think, with this question, and I understood from what he told me that he undertook to discuss this with the Adjutant-General, and if there was not some insuperable objection to insert the date. If I may make a suggestion to my right hon. Friend, I think that would be the better course rather than to insert this Amendment here, for this reason. I think, so far as I am able to understand the situation, we all want that there shall be a time, and as early a time as possible, when all those men who have been medically rejected shall know that their cases have been revised and settled for all time. That is to say, those who are to be re-examined, and called up for service in consequence, shall know what their duty is; and, on the other hand, those who are rejected again will never again be harried and called upon to undergo a fresh examination. There is an impression, I know, that it is the intention of the War Office to keep on re-examining medically rejected men, and that a man who was medically rejected a year ago may not necessarily be medically rejected to-day, and that a man medically rejected to-day may not necessarily be medically rejected in six months' time. That is an entire misapprehension. There is no intention whatever to renew these reviews of medical examination. I am quite in accord with what my right hon. and learned Friend wants, but I am bound to put this view before the House. There was, in the early stages of these medical examinations, a great deal of confusion, and there were some very unsatisfactory results in the way of certificates, largely due to the immense amount of work thrown upon Royal Army Medical Corps and their representatives and the War Office. We do not want to run that risk again. What
  1456
  you are saying to the War Office is, that by the 1st of July you must have completed your re-examination.
  Sir J. SIMON: That is not the meaning of my proposal at all. I did not make a speech because we have had some discussion upon it, but what the right hon. Gentleman has said is not even the meaning of his own Amendment.
  Mr. LONG: I am not talking of my own Amendment.
  Sir J. SIMON: My Amendment is only altering the date, and to fix a date by which the Army Council must give notice to a man to present himself for medical examination. My submission is that really by the 1st of July next the Army Council ought to be able to give notice to those men they want that they are to present themselves.
  Mr. LONG: I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman, but I think the House understood my argument. I was dealing with the object of the Government, and what I think is the object of the majority of the House, namely, that there should be a fixed limit of time at the expiration of which these men shall not be subjected to any further doubt or difficulty as to their position. The difficulty of the War Office is that if you shorten the time during which the War Office has to make-their intimation to these people you hasten the work, and the risk you run is great. This work is not done in Whitehall, but it is done by men all over the country, working under
  great pressure and very often under very difficult circumstances. Take, for instance, the difference in these two cases. In a country village this work can be done probably in a quarter of an hour, and in a country district perhaps in two days without any difficulty; but when you come to such places as the East End of London, Leeds, Manchester, or Birmingham, you lay a totally different task upon the shoulders of the medical department of the War Office. Therefore we do not want to expose these men to any measure which might lead to action being taken which, with a little more time, might be avoided. I do not want to argue with the right hon. and learned Gentleman as to the meaning of words or phrases. The Under-Secretary for War has undertaken

  1457
  to discuss this matter with the Adjutant-General as to how the point can best be met. I think it can be met and ought to be met. On the other hand, I am not responsible for the work which is to be done, and I do not want now to promise anything without consultation with the Adjutant-General, who knows exactly what the work is that has to be done and who is approaching his task with a good will and devotion and industry which the House can hardly realise. I do not want to throw upon him, in order to escape a Parliamentary difficulty, a task which might prove to be a very heavy one, and which might defeat the object we have in view. I ask that the Amendment I have moved may be adopted on the understanding that the Under-Secretary will see the Adjutant-General and endeavour to get this matter fixed so that a man shall know whether a man is to be called up for re-examination or whether he is permanently rejected.
  Sir J. SIMON: My right hon. Friend has spoken sympathetically, and I know very well quite genuinely. The last thing I wish to do is to occupy time over a needless Division. It is clear that what I am anxious about is to get inserted such date as is practical, and the earlier the better, by which the Army Council should give this notice, and my right hon. Friend I am sure appreciates that it is not a question of getting the medical examination over by that date, but of letting the man know whether he has got to undergo the examination or not. The reason for this is that so many of them have really made arrangements which entitle them in common fairness to the earliest notice which is reasonably practical. I hope that it may be possible for the military authorities to meet this point, and I ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

  CLAUSE 4.—(Provisions as to Certificates of Exemption).
  (1) Where a decision of a local tribunal has been varied on appeal to the Appeal Tribunal, any certificate of exemption granted in pursuance thereof shall be reviewed or renewed only by the Appeal Tribunal on an application made direct to that tribunal, and the provisions of
  1458
  the principal Act as to the review or renewal of certificates of exemption shall apply accordingly.
  (2) A certificate of exemption may be granted under the principal Act subject to the condition that the certificate shall not be renewable or open to review except on an application made with the leave of the tribunal, and unless leave is so given, the provisions of the principal Act as to the renewal or review of certificates shall not apply to a certificate granted subject to such a condition.
  The decision of the tribunal granting or refusing leave under this provision shall be final.
  Amendment made: In Sub-section (1), after the word "tribunal" ["renewed only by the Appeal Tribunal"], insert the words "by whom the decision has been varied or by such other Appeal Tribunal as may be provided by regulations."—(Sir G. Cave.)

  CLAUSE 5.—(Amendment of Section 3 (3) of the Principal Act).
  Sub-section (3) of Section three of the principal Act shall be construed as if "two weeks" were substituted for "two months," and as if the words "unless in the meantime the man has made an application for a renewal of his certificate" were substituted for the words "unless in the meantime the man has obtained a renewal of his certificate."
  Sir J. SIMON: I beg to move the omission of the Clause. I must ask the House briefly to consider whether Clause 5 as it stands ought to remain in the Bill, because it is not one of the cardinal Clauses of the measure. Up to the present I have entirely failed to understand the explanation which has been offered as to the merits of this Clause. The matter stands in this way. In the original Bill there was a provision that a man who was given a temporary certificate would not come under the compulsory powers of the Act unless two months had elapsed from the end of that temporary period. I quite appreciate that there may at first have been some misunderstanding, and that consequently certain persons may have been given a longer temporary exemption than was intended, but I should like, first of all, to ask whether this Clause is not intended to apply to certificates which are granted in the future. I have so understood it hitherto, and, indeed, I so understood it as

  1459
  the result of inquiry I made, but if that is the case it is quite plain that no mistake which has been made in the past will be affected by it. A great many people who have applied for temporary certificates and have shown that they are entitled, for example, to three months, have not been given certificates for three months, but only for one month, the interval of two months having been taken into account in granting it. Every one of those will be unfairly treated if you now cut down the period. Finally, we were told in the Committee stage that in substance this would not make any difference, and that the only people who were going to be affected by it were the people who had got, as the right hon. Gentleman thought, an improperly long period of temporary exemption. Is not that right?
  Mr. LONG: No.
  Sir J. SIMON: I am sorry, but I understood we were told that the classes that were excluded in groups, such, for instance, as the miners, or the railway men, would not be, in the judgment of the Government, affected by this Clause, and that the only people who would be affected were a limited number of people whom it was suggested held temporary certificates to an extent which was not justified.
  Mr. LONG: The language to which my right hon. and learned Friend has called attention was used in reference to an interruption; it was not used in the course of my speech or general remarks. It was in answer to an interruption, and when I come later on to reply I think I can explain it in full. I did not confine it to the narrow limits which the right hon and learned Gentleman suggests. This Clause in its original form was intended to prevent industrial compulsion, and not to deal with the narrower point. I was dealing then with the difference between the skilled employø and the ordinary employø who gets a certificate of exemption and uses this Clause in order to escape service.
  Sir J. SIMON: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman. I am speaking quite sincerely when I say that I have never understood this Clause. It has been pointed out that though you cut down the two months to two weeks you do not, on the other hand, bring a man in under compulsion if in the course of the two weeks he makes an application for exemption,
  1460
  and we are assured that it is as broad as it is long. If that is so, what is the good of the Clause? I cannot understand how the Clause has any virtue unless it cuts down the extent of the protection which the original Act gave. The Government have told us again and again that it is not their desire or intention inside the four corners of this Bill to approach the dangerous territory of industrial compulsion. I believe them entirely. I have never made any accusation against them to the contrary; but what is the object of striking out two months and writing two weeks if we are then to be assured that it does not make any difference, because instead of having to get an exemption you have only to apply before the period is up? It is no use my right hon. Friend saying that he has heard this argument before.
  Mr. LONG: I did not say so.
  Sir J. SIMON: I am sorry. It is no use my right hon. Friend, when he comes to reply, saying that he has heard this argument before, and that the point was put in the Committee stage, because, although that is quite true, it has never been answered, and I really want to know what is the object of the Clause. I cannot see that it has got any object, and I therefore propose to omit it.
  Mr. D. MASON: I beg to second the Amendment.
  Mr. ANDERSON: I raised this matter in Committee, and I am bound to say that the reply which was made by the President of the Local Government Board left me more mystified than ever as to the reasons for this change. We were told, first of all, that it made no difference in point of time, because whilst in the one case there were two months in which the workmen could turn round in order to find other employment before being called upon to serve in the Army—and so to prevent a form of industrial compulsion—in the other case he was going to get two weeks in which to make his preliminary appeal to the tribunal. The whole machinery would then come into operation. There would be an appeal to the first tribunal, and then an appeal to the Appeal Tribunal, and in point of time there would be no difference between the first and the second arrangement. If that is so, what is the reason for the change proposed? I gathered the other argument to be this: There might be cases, not affecting skilled workmen but others, where the two

  1461
  months ought not to operate, and where the workmen ought to be passed more quickly into the Army. If that is true, there is not going to be any difference between the method of dealing with the skilled workmen and the method of dealing with the unskilled workmen. They are going to be subjected to precisely the same machinery, and precisely the same time will elapse. The unskilled workman will have a fortnight in which to make his preliminary appeal. Then he will be able to appeal to the first court, and afterwards to the second court, and exactly the same amount of time will elapse. There therefore seems to be no difference, so far as I can see, in the machinery dealing with the skilled workmen and the workmen who might not be supposed to be eligible to have this machinery at his disposal. You cannot have one set of machinery for one clas of workman and another set of machinery for another class of workman.
  I suggest, since the proposal of the Government to delete the two months and to substitute two weeks under a new arrangement has caused a good deal of suspicion in the minds of many workpeople, and since it is going to effect no substantial change at all, according to the right hon. Gentleman's own declaration, that the President of the Local Government Board would be well advised to delete this Clause and to allow the matter to stand as it stood in the first Act. The two months put into that Act, after all, constituted a pledge given to Labour that it was no part of the intention of the Government to allow employers simply by dismissing men suddenly to pass them into the Army. It has been used since at Trade Union Congresses and Labour Party Conferences to show that there was this reasonable safeguard. I suggest, since so little is going to be saved, according to the argument of the President of the Local Government Board, that the Government are making a great mistake in bringing about this change, and I ask them to delete this Clause and to allow matters to revert back as they were in the original measure.
  Mr. LONG: The position with regard to this Clause is really rather interesting. The Clause in the original Act was inserted in consequence of a promise made by the Prime Minister that if there was anything in the Bill which could lead to what is called "industrial compulsion," steps should be taken to render any such
  1462
  consequences impossible. There was a good deal of discussion in the preparation of the necessary Clause, and I confess it was extremely difficult to apprehend the precise danger and to provide the remedy for it. This Clause is intended to deal with industrial compulsion. Labour happens to be very strongly represented in this House, and Labour has taken a very prominent part, and a very honourable part, not only in connection with the prosecution of this War, but in all these discussions we have had in this House and on this and on the parent Bill. On this Clause, described by my right hon. and learned Friend (Sir J. Simon) as so ineffective and so dangerous, the only critics are my right hon. Friend, who does not, I presume, specially claim to represent Labour, and the hon. Member for Atter-cliffe (Mr. Anderson), who pursues a somewhat independent course in this House and has not got in agreement with that course anything but a minority of those with whom he usually works.
  I am asked, what is the object of this Clause? The object is to try and find machinery which, while avoiding risk of industrial compulsion, will not provide facilities by which men who are not entitled to be covered by any certificate of exemption or badge can escape from military service. But that is not the object of the Labour party in this House. It is not the object of Labour in the country. What they ask, and what they are entitled to ask, is this, that supposing there is a difference of opinion between employers and employed, and supposing the employer finds reason to believe that a particular workman has been obnoxious to him, it ought not to be possible for that employer to use this compulsory Act in order to punish the workman and to drive him into the Army. With that I think everybody agrees. My right hon. and learned Friend was very critical about this Clause, but he never thought it worth while to tell us what success the original Section had which he desires to adhere to. nor did he think it worth while to point out that this Clause would do mischief. All he asked was, "What does it mean?" And he added, "It is going to do no good." The effect of it is this: We think that the two weeks plus the period of inquiry before the application to the tribunal is ample to protect any workman who is liable to persecution. I quite agree with what the hon. Member for Attercliffe said just now, that we get the same protection under this

  1463
  for those workmen who ought to be acquired. At all events, they make application for them, and if they are going to prosecute their case before the tribunal, they will remain where they are.
  Two cases occurred recently to which I would like to draw attention. In one case fifty men were released from the occupation in which they were engaged. Those fifty men passed automatically and almost certainly without forty-eight hours delay into other employment. We do not want to interfere with them. If they had taken three weeks or a month it would have been the same thing. They were all men who ought to be re-employed. On the other hand you have got—you cannot help it, you were discussing it last night—the power of Government Departments to protect their workmen, and the House was very strong that that power ought to be limited. But the only way you can deal with that, for you cannot limit the power of Government Departments, is by extending what is called the combing system. We have got our Combing Committee, who find in certain works which have been protected as a precautionary measure, that there are a large number of men who, neither individually nor because of the employment in which they are engaged, are entitled to any form of protection. Nor are they men who are wanted in the national interest to work in any particular industry. But they get the same protection that you give here. What do they do? They go rapidly from place to place, because wherever they go they can get employment. They know they are liable to military srvice. They are not essential, neither in themselves nor in their industry, but they escape enlistment, and they are the very men who were pressed upon us last night as the men who were escaping enlistment because they were protected by the Government Reserved Occupations system.
  On the other hand, this Clause as it stands in the Act, and for which my right hon. Friend is so enthusiastic, what has it done? Has it prevented men being enlisted in the Army who ought to be retained in industry at home? My right hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars (Mr. Barnes) brought before me the other day, and my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Education (Mr. Henderson) has told me, of cases of the same kind. There have been hundreds of men who ought to have been left in industry
  1464
  here at home who have been taken into the Army. [An HON. MEMBER: "That is the fault of the War Office."] It is no good blaming the War Office for it. The fact remains that men have been taken into the Army and have had to be returned to industry here. What does that meant? It means a waste of trouble, of money, and of time. It means that the very thing we wanted to prevent has not
  been prevented by this Section. Have there been alleged cases of industrial compulsion? I do not know; I have not had them brought before me.
  Mr. THOMAS: We will give you some directly.
  Mr. LONG: I am quite sure my hon. Friend will be as good as his word, and I will only say this, and I say it frankly, I think it would have been fairer to the Government and also more in the interests of labour if the cases had been given to me before, because I had been doing my very best to prevent it, and I have been prepared to take any steps which we could properly take to avoid anything of the kind. I have been seeking for evidence. If there have been cases of industrial compulsion, it proves still further that the Section in the original Act has not been effective. If a better scheme can be proposed I am willing to accept it on behalf of the Government. I believe there is only one way out of the difficulty. The Section, as it stands, has not prevented the enlistment of these fitters and engineers and other men who ought never to have been taken for the Army. It is not necessary I believe to prevent industrial compulsion. In my opinion the only remedy is to be found in a small Committee really representative of Labour—because this is a question which affects Labour itself—a small Committee of two, three, or four men, who can sit regularly and will be able to deal with the War Office, with the Admiralty, and with any other State Department at first hand. I believe the appointment of such a Committee, with for instance, my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Education, or anybody else whom you like, as president, sitting regularly, dealing with this question, because it is an administrative question, is the only way in which you can prevent these troubles arising. I certainly cannot accept my right hon. and learned Friend's suggestion that this Clause should be deleted. As it at present stands, it is the only alternative which has been proposed to the existing law which has

  1465
  turned out to be unsatisfactory. I do not think the Amendment will be effective in preventing the enlistment of the men to whom I have referred. I hope the House will support the Government in making this alteration. Of course, if any Amendment which does not cut into the principle is proposed, we shall be ready to consider it.
  Mr. BARNES: I take note of the concluding sentences of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, in which he said quite frankly that the Government are not disposed to accept the Amendment put forward by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Walthamstow (Sir J. Simon). I am disposed—I say this quite advisedly—to advise my friends whose names are down on the Paper—along with my own, by the by, with that of the right hon. and learned Gentleman—to have regard to the concluding statement of the President of the Local Government Board and to accept the position. In accordance with the practice which has been followed by the bulk of my hon. Friends who sit here with me, and which I perfectly well know will be used to our detriment outside, I am going to suggest that they should put forward and strenuously support the alternative Amendment which follows that of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Waithamstow. I should like to say a word or two, if I may, to help to clarify the position somewhat. The two months were put in, as the right hon. Gentleman has stated, to carry out the promise of the Prime Minister, that no one should be put under any form of industrial conscription as a result of the Military Service (No. 2) Bill. The Munitions Act contained a provision penalising a man who had left an occupation without a certificate, and the penalty was six weeks, during which he could not be employed by another factory owner or munition works. It was pointed out that the six weeks corresponded to the six weeks that was at first put into the Military Service (No. 2) Bill, and that, therefore, a man might be conscripted at the end of the six weeks, or immediately after the end of the six weeks. Because of that an additional fortnight was inserted, in order to give the man a chance of getting into another job before he was taken away.
  That had results which were quite unexpected, because it was found that, as soon as the tribunals got to work, they were dealing not only with workmen at the munition shops, not only with fitters and
  1466
  turners, and men of that sort mentioned by the President of the Local Government Board, but with all sorts of people altogether remote from munition works, people who were not workmen at all in the ordinary sense of the word, shopkeepers, butchers, bakers, candlestick-makers, and all sorts of people. When the tribunals began to deal with these people, as well as with munition workers, these men claimed and sustained their claim to two months, in addition to any period of postponement that might be given to them. That is the simple explanation of why it became necessary, I suppose, in the minds of those who framed this Bill—I do not know anything at all about it, but I assume that is the reason—to put in a provision that everybody should not have two months' exemption or postponement. In my judgment in making that provision they were altogether too drastic. They might have exempted the butcher, baker, and candlestick-maker from the two months, still leaving the munitions worker in the same position that he occupied. The Amendment I am going to put forward is to carry that out, and I hope the President of the Local Government Board will see fit to accept it. Let me briefly explain it to the House. If adopted, the Amendment would be inserted at the end of the first line of Clause 5. The Clause reads:
  "Sub-section (3) of Section three of the principal Act shall be construed as if 'two weeks' were submitted for 'two months.'"
  I propose that after the word "shall" the Clause shall read
  "apply only in the case of a man who has been engaged in an occupation certified by a Government Department to be work of national importance, or whose conditions of employment have been subject to the provisions of the Munitions of War Acts, 1915, and in all other cases the Sub-section shall"—
  Then it will go on to read as printed in the Bill. The net result of that will be that all the men in munition factories and all the men in certified occupations—that would cover miners and a lot of people whose occupations are down here; there is a long list of about 300 or 400—will be covered. If the Amendment I now suggest were adopted, the two months would still apply to certified occupations—that is to say, that any man in any occupation connected in a direct way with the prosecution of the War would still have the two months

  1467
  within which to get a job before he could be pressed into the Army, and all the others would only have the two weeks within which to make their application. Let me deal with the argument of the right hon. Gentleman in regard to the two weeks as applied to munition workers. He said that the munition workers—I took his words down—
  "would not be worsened."
  He also said that the two weeks would be ample to protect the workmen. I venture to say it is not so. It is perfectly true that under the provisions of this Bill the workman, instead of having to get a certificate of exemption in the two months, has only to make an application within the two weeks.
  Mr. LONG: Hear, hear!
  Mr. BARNES: Therefore, if he is a man of common sense and knows the law, he would make an application. Having made an application, he could keep it alive for a number of weeks. According to the right hon. Gentleman, he could spin it out to two months. But, as has been pointed out, if he did not make the application within two weeks, he would be lugged into the Army. That is an important consideration. On the other hand, if he does make an application within the two weeks, it might be disposed of very soon after the two weeks. Therefore, the munition worker, under the Bill, would be in a far different and, as we say, a far worse position than he is now. We ask the right hon. Gentleman to have regard to that fact and to place the munition worker in the same position that he was in under the Military Service (No. 2) Act. He would be acting fairly in doing that, and he would prevent a great deal of misconception and misunderstanding outside. From the political point of view, from the point of view of maintaining something like the unity of the nation which has been spoken about so much and so often, with a view to making this Bill, I will not say sweet to the workmen outside, because it never will be that, but in order to give it a better chance than it otherwise would have, I appeal to the right hon. Gentle man, if he cannot accept the deletion of the Clause, at all events to accept this modification of it that I now propose.
  10.0 P.M.
  I want him to make another declaration which, coming from him in his place, might have some effect in guiding the military authorities. The military authori-
  1468
  ties just now are taking men out of the ranks of industry and putting them in the ranks of the Army, and they are taking men whom in the national interest they ought to leave alone. A little while ago we were over in France getting men there, and we were trying to get men who had been most useful in the munitions works about the country—fitters and turners, and just that class of men mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman just now. There are some men in the engineering trade who are so scarce that I think, speaking from memory, after about a couple of months combing out of the armies in France, we did not get more than fifty to a hundred. I refer to men called tool setters—men who are accustomed to setting up tools for other people, for these regimental workmen and workwomen that you are now taking into the shops, who cannot work unless they have people to set their tools up for them. Would you believe there is a certified list of trades issued on 1st May, and I find that tool setters are exempt only if they are over the age of twenty-five. The local tribunals, having this before them, have no option. If application is made by the military authorities for a tool setter, and it is found that he is twenty-four years of age, they have to agree with the military authorities and allow the man to be taken away and put into the Army. I only use that as an illustration. There are tool-fitters in the same position, and mechanics who are engaged in the repair of employers' plant and so on. The same applies to them. There is a shop just across the river, not far from where I am speaking, which employs millwrights, whom they send out to keep munition tools in operation, and they are actually taking these men away now and have been during the last few weeks. The manager of that workshop having taken one case to the local tribunal, I think at the Wandsworth Town Hall, and having had to put his case before a lot of local people who knew nothing about engineering, and the man having been taken away, was so disgusted that he told the other three men, who are to be called up on the 18th of this month, that they could go away as far as he was concerned, because he was having no more of the local tribunals. I cannot blame the local tribunal. They could do nothing else. Here is a list issued by the Ministry of Munitions, drawn up, I suppose, by some academic young gentleman who

  1469
  knew nothing about industrial occupations. I take it upon myself to say that if this thing remains in operation for a matter of a few weeks, very likely as many men as we were able to comb out of the Army in France as the result of two months' operations and the spending of many thousands of pounds of public money will be swept out of industry and back into the Army. That is preposterous. It is idiotic. Talk about waging war on scientific, or even common-sense principles! It is no wonder the Germans get the best of us under these conditions. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to make some statement here to-night which will get to the local tribunals, and to amend this list as speedily as possible. No matter whether men of this sort are in munition works or not, wherever they may be, supposing they are in places where they could be dispensed with—and I believe there are a good many in railway shops and so on—surely the common-sense thing to do is to hold them up for a few days in the place where their services have been dispensed with and send them off to Gretna, or Glasgow, or Liverpool, or Newcastle, or somewhere else where all the employers are gaping for this very class of men. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will consider first of all the modified Amendment I have submitted. I think it would carry out, in the main at all events, what we are driving at. I believe the miners are content with it, though I have no right to speak for them. I believe it would fairly well serve the purpose of the engineers and other people of that sort, and that it would not apply to the people who were not intended to be covered by the No. 2 Act when passed three months ago. I hope he will also say something to put the local tribunals somehow or another upon the footing that they need fitters, turners, toolsetters, and toolsmiths where they are, because being left where they are they are doing far better national service than they could possibly do in the trenches.
  Mr. THOMAS: I do not know who is responsible for my right hon. Friend's name being attached to this Amendment, but I presume it is the Labour party. Whatever may be the views of my right hon. Friend, he cannot deny that it is the Labour party as a party which is responsible for this Amendment for the deletion of the Clause. That incidentally answers the right hon. Gentleman as to the sup-
  1470
  port that Labour is giving to this particular proposition. But I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend as to the position of the toolmaker. Of course there are engineers to-day being taken into the Army who ought not to be there, but that is the result of the combing process under compulsion. Prior to the last Military Service Act, prior to the date when compulsion was introduced, which was going to be a scientific method of organisation, which was going to be the one scheme which would put everybody in place, which would be the one method of stopping square pegs in round holes, this was a starred trade, and therefore, instead of compulsion up to now doing everything that has been urged for it, it has had the very opposite effect, according to my right hon. Friend's statement. But the right hon. Gentleman has not attempted to explain why this Clause is introduced. It is true that the Prime Minister made a pledge to labour, but it had nothing to do with fixing two months. Let the House observe that this two months' period only came in as a fair period in which to allow a man to join. Why it came in was that the Munitions Act provided a penalty of six weeks for any man who disobeyed orders and was dismissed, or if he left his employment. When the trade unionists met the Prime Minister they pointed out to him that six weeks being the provision in the Military Service (No. 2) Act and six weeks being the provision in the Munitions Act, if a man was serving a penalty under one Act he automatically went into the Army, and that in our judgment was industrial compulsion. In order to get over that difficulty the two months' period was inserted. Now that two months' period is reduced to two weeks, and it means this: That a man who has left his employment voluntarily because, if you like, his employer has refused him an advance in wages, is penalised for six weeks under the Munitions Act, and under the provisions of this Clause in two weeks he is to be forced into the Army. It is no use bothering and pretending that this is not industrial compulsion. I agree that it is not intended. The Minister of Munitions openly believes that industrial compulsion is good. With that exception probably there is no Member of the Government but who genuinely feels that industrial compulsion ought not to be put into operation under this Bill. But that does not dispose of the fact that it is there. Let it be remembered that we

  1471
  are not dealing in this matter with the Government. We are dealing with employers, and what we have got to show is that Parliament should not and must not give the right to any employer to use the weapon of forcing a man into the Army in order to exact conditions from the working classes. The right hon. Gentleman asked, "Is there any illustration?" I do not know whether he has heard that within a month of the passing of the last Bill there was a strike at Dundee. I am not now arguing whether that strike was just or whether it was bad. On the contrary, I repeat, what I have often said, that I do not think there is any matter which ought not to be capable of adjustment in the present crisis round a table. However, the fact remains that there was a strike at Dundee, and within a month of the passing of the Act what did the employer there do? He did not use the ordinary methods of a dispute and fight it out. He did not ask for arbitration, but he immediately reported these men to the military authorities, and they were called up under the Act. To give any employer that power is not only a dangerous thing, but something which the working classes of this country have strongly fought for years.
  The right hon. Gentleman knows that there are two classes of employers in this country who are independent of the tribunals. The Post Office is one, and the railway companies represent the other class. The railway companies are employing at this moment approximately 520,000 workmen. No military authority can say, "We will take this man," no matter what his age may be. They are not empowered to do it. Neither is a tribunal allowed to say that any of these men shall be taken into the Army. All that the railway company has got to do is to say, "We cannot spare these men." I put it to the House that that is a tremendous power. We as a trade union will strive to see that it is only used wisely and well, and I hope it will be so used, because if advantage is taken of it by a railway company in order to get rid of prominent men, the House will see immediately where the trouble will come in. The House will remember that not very many weeks ago I drew attention to the fact that the first two men who had been released at a certain station were our
  1472
  branch chairman and our branch secretary, with over fifteen years' service. It was all very well to go to these men and say, "You can be spared," but their answer was, "If we can be spared, how is it that younger men in the service are not spared? And how is it that we can be spared because we are prominent trade unionists?" It is not easy to skip over these things. If these things happen they are just the sort of thing that are bound to cause trouble. My right hon. Friend the Member for Blackfriars (Mr. Barnes) will be the first to admit that whatever his personal views are to-day they are not the views of the society which years ago he led so well, and for which service that society is indebted to him. He realises as well as I realise that the Society of Engineers are against this Clause. The very proposal that he makes is a proposal to give preferential treatment to the skilled worker as against the unskilled worker. Just imagine this House to-night accepting a proposal, by a member of the Labour party, that says to a skilled worker, "You are to have two months exemption," and to an unskilled labourer, "You shall have two weeks." Is that the sort of thing that is going to unite the country, to use his own phrase? Is that the kind of thing that the workers will tolerate? I submit that this Clause is unnecessary. The right hon. Gentleman said that there is no difference in this and the original Act. If there is no difference, why proceed with it? If there is a difference let us know what the difference is. It is because I want to remove any power of industrial compulsion, because I am satisfied that it is not the Government's intention, and because I am equally satisfied that this Clause does give power for unscrupulous employers to abuse and prostitute their authority, that I would urge the right hon. Gentleman to remember that this is a Motion in the name of the Labour party, that this proposal was made at the Bristol Conference, and at the London Conference, and that the Minister of Education (Mr. A. Henderson) emphasised it himself. For these reasons I do submit that there is strong ground for the withdrawal of the Clause.
  Question put, "That the words of the Clause, down to the word 'on' ['Crown on the'], stand part of the Bill."
  The House divided: Ayes, 189; Noes, 62.
  Mr. LONG: I beg to move, after the word "shall" ["shall be construed"], to insert the words, "as respects the certificate that ceased to be in force after the date of the passing of this Act."
  This is merely a formal Amndment, to carry out the operation of the Bill.
  Question, "That those words be there inserted in the Bill," put, and agreed to.
  Mr. BARNES: I beg to move, after the words last inserted, to add the words, "apply only in the case of a man who has been engaged in an occupation certified by a Government Department to be work of national importance, or whose conditions of employment have been subject to the provisions of the Munitions of War Acts, 1915, and in all other cases the Sub-section shall."
  I more or less formally move this Amendment, but there is only one thing I would like to say about it. In his speech my hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) charged me with differentiating between skilled workmen and unskilled workmen. Nobody who knows me would believe that I should subscribe to any Amendment having any such differentiation in view. I want to assure the House that it is the very last thing that I should have in my mind. Nor does this Amendment give rise to anything of the kind. It seeks to apply the old terms, what might be called liberal terms, to certain men doing work certified by the Government Department to be work of national importance. What is work of national importance? The most important work that I know of just now is that of the agricultural labourers, and whether skilled or said to be unskilled—and the agricultural labourer is, in my mind, skilled rather than unskilled—this Amendment would apply liberal terms to agricultural labourers, who, after all, are the most numerous class in the community. There are many other cases. Is the docker who goes to the dock gates for two or three hours looking for work a skilled worker, and does he rank as highly skilled? Not at all. Yet this Amendment gives him the liberal terms. The Amendment goes on "or whose conditions of employment have been subject to the
  1476
  provisions of the Munitions of War Acts, 1915." That brings in all the men who are employed not only as mechanics, but as machine men, or men no matter of what degree of skill or no matter how organised or disorganised they may be. It seeks to set up no differentiation, and it acts in no way unfairly against unskilled men to the benefit of skilled men. In spite of gallery talk to the opposite, I should subscribe to nothing of the kind.
  I hope the right hon. Gentleman will accept this Amendment, not only because it is fair in itself but because it does substantially carry out the promise made three months ago. Let me remind the House that when that promise was made those outside of the Munitions Act were not in mind at all, and we had no mind of the people who have claimed two months in consequence of that. Therefore this Amendment, I think, does substantially carry out what was promised three months ago. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to accept the Amendment for another reason, that I do not want it to enter into the minds of the men outside that we are trying to get behind them and are breaking a promise. Everybody knows what has been going on for the last two or three days, when statements made have been tortured and when people have been charged with breaking promises of one form or another. If there is anything that would give rise to that sort of talk outside, I hope the right hon. Gentleman will prevent it being done. I believe that, on the whole, if this Amendment is adopted, it will carry out the promise of three months ago and will prevent a great deal of misapprehension outside, and that it will be an Amendment which will commend the Act, if it is possible to commend it, to the great mass of the workers.
  Mr. WARDLE: I beg to second the Amendment. The proceedings on the benches in this direction this afternoon have been very lively. I want to say quite frankly that I do not think certain members of the Labour party have been treated fairly by their colleagues. It is not the place in this House to deal with that question, and I do not, therefore, proceed now

  1477
  to deal with it. But I must say with regard to the present Amendment that if my hon. Friend the Member for Derby is such a stickler for the Labour party's Amendments being carried, then in this case at any rate he is bound by his own proposition to support the Amendment.
  Mr. T. WILSON: I hope the right hon. Gentleman will accept this Amendment, or if he cannot accept it that he will introduce words bearing the same meaning. [Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but they know perfectly well that that is the way many a time in which the Government get out of difficulties. Last Thursday morning, about three o'clock, I made practically the same suggestion to the right hon. Gentleman. I pointed out then that if they press this matter too far they will have industrial trouble in the munition centres. If the hon. Member for Bedford could tell the House what he knows about the trouble that is going on and the resentment that is felt in munition areas with regard to certain sections in certain Acts of Parliament, the right hon. Gentleman would have no hesitation whatever in accepting the Amendment. As to industrial compulsion, one large firm only a few weeks ago discharged joiners of thirty years of age with the object of forcing them into the Army. At a great munition works of the Government all the carpenters under thirty years of age were discharged with the object of forcing them into the Army, and yet they cannot find ship joiners and carpenters to do work of national importance. With a view to allaying suspicion and resentment in the minds of these people, the Government would be well-advised to accept this Amendment.
  Mr. LONG: My hon. Friend has suggested that if the Government do not accept this Amendment they should propose other words which do the same thing. The truth of the matter is that, whether among those who represent Labour or among those who represent the Government, nobody has been able to devise the exact form of words that we want to meet the difficulty. I am afraid that this Amendment, as it stands, goes a little too far. I should like it better if my right hon. Friend would limit it to Section 7 of the Munitions Act. We all want exactly the same thing. We do not want men engaged upon munition work or such work as shipbuilding to be disturbed. We certainly do not
  1478
  want to take the men referred to by the right hon. Member for Blackfriars. We do not want to take men who are honestly engaged in munition work, or other work essential to the country. On the other hand, when these various works have been closely investigated, and it has been found that a certain number of men in them who are not, under existing conditions, entitled to certificates or badges, have been certificated or badged, and when these men are not needed in other work of a similar character, we want to get them for the Army without delay. I have been trying to find words to meet this exact case ever since the difficulty first arose. We have puzzled ourselves over this, and the draftsmen have done their best. Now we have an Amendment which has been produced by the representatives of labour, and which, I think, does limit it as compared with the original Section in the Act. I think it is true that this Amendment will be confined to the munitions workers and the people protected by certificates and those otherwise protected. On the other hand, I am only afraid it will allow a very considerable number of men whom we are combing out, not to escape altogether, but to escape for the time being. In practice we find that that is so. We find that men that are de-badged, as we call it, and who are not entitled to re-employment, yet escape for a time, and sometimes altogether, by passing, I suppose, from one place to another. I do not exactly understand the method, but I am told they pass from one place to another.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Hear, hear!
  Mr. LONG: And it is impossible for the military authorities to follow them up. While they are not essential for civil industry, they are not available for other industry, and this is not what my hon. Friend wanfs, or what anybody wants. I say, quite frankly, that the position of the Government in this: that throughout the original Act, and throughout this one, we have been bound by a distinct pledge, and so far as I know everybody desires that the difficulty referred to should be avoided. If my right hon. Friend is prepared to limit his Amendment to Section 7 of the Munitions Act, and will accept the condition that the Government must reserve to themselves the right to make quite certain that this does not carry us further than we want to go, and does not really release people who ought not to be released, I

  1479
  am prepared to accept the Amendment limiting it to Section 7. I feel that we are bound not to break the pledge that we have given, and given on behalf of the Government on more than one occasion that we would do nothing as a result of a measure of this kind that would help to bring in industrial compulsion.
  Mr. J. PARKER: I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman has not seen fit to accept the Amendment in its entirety. Those of us who were responsible for putting it on the Paper have no desire to do anything outside that which the right hon. Gentleman himself tells us he is seeking to do. What will happen if we accept the suggestion which the President of the Local Government Board has put forward just now? As I understand—although it is not very clear—Section 7 of the Munitions Act would confine the application of this Amendment to controlled workshops engaged on the production of munitions. Well, now, that is not our object at all. Take the mining industry. It is conceded that you cannot take many more men from the mining industry. There are many other trades and occupations from which it is practically agreed all over this House men ought not to be taken. We are submitting, under the terms and wording of this Amendment, that the combing process, as it is called, can go on. Men who are not indispensable would not be affected by this Amendment of ours. If the Amendment is to be really effective it must have a wider application, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to accept the Amendment in its entirety. I do not think for a moment it would materially affect the number of men whom the right hon. Gentleman would get under the Bill. At any rate, so far as it did affect them, it would leave the men to do the work necessary for the nation, which they ought to do.
  Sir R. ADKINS: I am very sorry support for this Amendment has come only from hon. Members who, in popular language, represent Labour, because I am sure other Members in this House feel as they do both the difficulty and the delicacy of the position. I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend the President of the Local Government Board for the tone of his remarks upon this Amendment. I quite see what he wishes the House to do, and I understand how it could simplify the matter if the
  1480
  operation of the Amendment were confined in the way he suggests, but I would ask him to risk on this occasion the comparatively short delay or the comparatively small number of persons which would be involved by the acceptance of the Amendment as it stands. I am very glad indeed that the Clause to which this is an Amendment has not only been proposed, but has been carried by the House, for those who work on tribunals know how detrimental the too wide application of the two months' delay has been to the carrying out of the provisions of the Military Service Act, and some alteration of that was obviously necessary; but there is the gravest danger which will arise in this country if the shadow of industrial compulsion falls upon the operation of the Military Service Act, and my hon. Friends who have spoken from the Labour Benches are in the position to realise that perhaps better than anyone else. I therefore desire to associate myself with them in support of this Amendment. While all these proposals cannot be reduced to absolute precision of operation, and it is perfectly impossible for anyone to know exactly how many men you can get, and how many may possibly escape, I do earnestly ask the Government to accept this Amendment, and I am sure they would gain more in the widespread and sincere co-operation of those who speak for Labour than they would lose by the possible escape here and there of some adroit shirker who, in the long run, would be caught and put to serve where he ought to serve.
  Sir G. CAVE: I think there was some misapprehension shown in the speeches of the hon. Member for Halifax (Mr. Parker) and the hon. Member for Middleton (Sir R. Adkins) as to the offer my right hon. Friend has made. He does not propose to confine this Amendment to cases coming within Section 7 of the Munitions of War Act. What he proposes is that it should extend, as it now extends, to the whole of the occupations certified by a Government Department to be work of national importance, and that only the following words referring to the Munitions of War Act should be confined to Section 7. The object of that is quite plain. If the words stand as they now are in the Amendment, they would apply to all occupations coming within the Munitions of War Act or any part of it. So far as I know, there is no occupation in the country which floes not come within some part of the Munitions of

  1481
  War Act. Section 1 extends to other occupations, and the object of my right hon. Friend is to confine it to Section 7, in which case the man may not be liable for six weeks.
  Sir R. ADKINS: Do I understand that the Government are prepared to accept this Amendment if the words "subject to the provisions of Section 7 of the Munitions of War Acts, 1915," are inserted?
  Sir G. CAVE: Yes, I am going to move that Amendment. I beg to move as an Amendment to the proposed Amendment, after the word "of" ["the provisions of the Munitions of War Acts, 1915"], to insert the words "Section 7 of."
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Something has been said about the number of men who have gone into the mines in order to escape service. I take it that although the right hon. Gentleman said that the Act generally applied to most trades, this particular Section does not apply to mines. In works with which I am associated some 18 per cent. of the men are not attending to their work.
  Sir G. CAVE: Section 7 does not prevent them coming within the earlier words of the Section.
  Sir A. MARKHAM: Let us assume that a man who is covered by Section 7 intends to do two or three days' work a week and spends the rest drinking. Is that man entitled to exemption? The percentage of absentees in South Wales collieries with which I am associated is 18½ of the total amount of men employed underground and who are still getting exemption from military service. The hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) fell foul of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Black-friars Division (Mr. Barnes), who would never recommend that the labourer should be treated differently to a skilled worker. The hon. Member does not remember the fight which took place years ago, when on one principle I fought the union to the best of my ability. The union said, "Once a labourer always a labourer," and that a man who had been a labourer should never rise above that position or take the work or in any way engage in the work of a skilled workman. I thought that was a vicious principle, but that was the position which the Amalgamated Society of Engineers have always taken up. I believe that is their view to-day. No man, even if he is a skilled labourer in the way of putting pieces of iron in the machine—
  Mr. SUTTON: On a point of Order. Is the hon. Member speaking to the Amendment?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I have a difficulty in following him. The Amendment now before the House is whether we should insert "Section 7" before the words "the Munitions of War Acts."
  Sir A. MARKHAM: I was only replying to the point in the discussion between the hon. Member for Derby and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Black-friars Division, but I do not wish to pursue it. All I want to know is this: Is the House, under the acceptance of this Amendment, going to exempt men who are only attending to their work two or three days a wëek? I say that no man, whether in munition works or other industries associated with munition work, as mines are, ought to be exempted unless he attends regularly to his work. There is only one object in giving these exemptions, and that is that the men should be engaged on work of national importance. Seeing that a number of men are not following their calling, I say that the exemptions should not apply to men unless they regularly attend to their work, and it ought to be the duty of the President of the Local Government Board to make it quite clear that those men who do not regularly attend to their work ought to be roped in and not have the exemptions which they get at the present time.
  Mr. BARNES: I think it would meet the general convenience of the House now if this Debate were to close. I simply got up to say that the hon. Baronet (Sir A. Markham) must not fasten on to me an endorsement of a principle that would tie a man to a particular job all his life. I never did endorse it, and I hope I never shall. With regard to the men who absent themselves two or three days a week, the Board of Control will look after them. The Amendment suggested does concede to us substantially all that we want. It applies to all the men covered by the six weeks' exemption and to men engaged in work of national importance. On that understanding, I gladly accept it.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I think the House does not quite understand that this may be a very serious step. As far as I can make out, when the right hon. Gentleman introduced this Bill he told us that the exemption of two months had resulted in a large number of men who ought to have joined

  1483
  the Colours not joining, and as a result of the two months also the military authorities were unable to trace these men. That being so, he intended to alter
  the time from two months to two weeks. Now I understand the effect of this Amendment is to revert to the two months' principle which we were told by the President of the Local Government Board had acted so badly as far as obtaining men for the Service goes, for all men engaged in occupations certified by Government Departments to be work of national importance, and in addition to all men who come under Clause 7 of the Munitions Act, I say these are just exactly the men whom you should not exempt. The men who are to be exempted, who are engaged in work of national importance are the very men who have taken advantage of this exemption to go into these places in order to avoid service with the Colours. And now the right hon. Gentleman, because the Labour party ask him to go back from what he said was necessary, comes down and practically accepts the Labour party's Amendment, which will exempt the men whom the right hon. Gentleman told us a short time ago it was necessary to have for the Army. I do not know quite what good this Bill is going to do, and, as far as I am concerned, I do not care whether it passes or not.
  Mr. LONG: I am very glad my right hon. Friend has at last made here the speech which he has expressed in different quarters on more than one occasion.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I have not spoken anywhere except in the House of Commons during the last year
  Mr. LONG: The right hon. Gentleman charges me personally with having riddled the Bill with Amendments which make it worthless.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Hear, hear!
  Mr. LONG: Perhaps he will point them out at some other time. But a more absurd suggestion I have never listened to. He then charged the Government, or rather me, with giving way to the Labour party, who moved this Amendment. A more ungenerous or unfair charge I have never listened to in my life. The right hon. Gentleman can easily fling these charges across the floor of the House to those who have been political friends and associates in his political career. But he
  1484
  chooses to ignore the fact that the Labour party—and I am not ashamed to say it and to repeat it here and elsewhere—that the Labour party has played a very honourable part in this great War. We are not ashamed to acknowledge it when we are talking outside the House of Commons that it has played that part. If he wishes to provoke a conflict with Labour and break a promise which the Government distinctly gave, I am not prepared to do anything of the kind. I take full responsibility for the course which I have adopted, and I repudiate in toto the insinuations he has made.
  Question, "That those words be there inserted," put, and agreed to.
  Proposed Amendment amended by leaving out the word "Acts" ["Munitions of War Acts"], and inserting instead thereof the word "Act."
  Question, "That the proposed Amendment, as amended, be there inserted in the Bill," put, and agreed to.

  CLAUSE 7.—(Proof of Offences in Connection with Deserters and Absentees.)
  11.0 P.M.
  Mr. KING(who had given notice of an Amendment to omit the Clause): Although I strongly object to the pro visions in this Clause, at this late hour I do not propose to move my Amendment.

  CLAUSE 8.—(Duty to Produce Certificate of Exemption or to Give Particulars.)
  (1) Every man who holds a certificate of exemption granted under the principal Act shall, if required by a constable or by any person who has authority for the purpose from the Army Council, produce his certificate or give particulars as to the authority by which the certificate was granted and the grounds on which it was granted.
  If any man fails to comply with this provision or gives particulars which are false in any material respect, he shall in respect of each offence be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months.
  (2) If any person alters or tampers with a certificate of exemption granted under the principal Act, or personates or falsely represents himself to be a person to whom such a certificate has been granted, or allows any other person to have possession of any such certificate issued for his use alone, he shall be

  1485
  liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months, with or without hard labour.
  Amendment made: In Sub-section (2), after the word "or" ["or allows any other person to have possession"], insert the word "improperly."—[Sir G. Cave.]

  CLAUSE 10.—(Transfer to Reserve under Special Circumstances.)
  The Army Council may make arrangements, to take effect during the continuance of the present War, for the transfer to the Reserve of any member of the Regular Forces or for the temporary demobilisation of any member of the Territorial Force, notwithstanding anything in any Act or in the terms of his enlistment, in cases where the transfer or demobilisation appears expedient in the general interests of the country and the Army Council are satisfied that it can be effected under conditions which will render the man transferred or demobilised immediately available for service in the case of military necessity. Provided that during such period of demobilisation the man shall not be subject to military discipline.
  Amendment made: After the word "of" ["during such period of demobilisation"], insert the words "transfer or."—[Sir G. Cave.]
  Mr. JOWETT: I beg to move, at the end of the Clause, to add the words "but no such man shall be employed under military orders in any trade or industry."
  I did not move to leave out the Clause because of the assurance given by the Government to the effect that its object and purpose is merely to put men into the Reserve in the same manner as men are now in the ordinary circumstances placed in the Reserve. If that be the effect of the Clause, it is impossible to argue against it. But the wording of the Clause is somewhat obscure and suspicious. The Clause says:
  "The Army Council may make arrangements … for the transfer to the Reserve of any member of the Regular Forces."
  These arrangements may be of a kind that will allow the military authorities to retain a hold on the Reservist who has passed into general industry and limit his choice of any particular district where he might wish to work. That point is rather emphasised by the words later in the Clause:
  1486
  "under conditions which will render the men transferred or demobilised immediately available for service in the case of military necessity."
  I apprehend that there is nothing in the wording to prevent the Army Council making conditions which, in effect, would place such a man under military orders. My Amendment would make the position quite clear.
  Mr. T. RICHARDSON: I beg to second the Amendment.
  Mr. LONG: I could not possibly accept these words. It is curious that there should still be a lurking suspicion about the purposes for which these Reserves are to be used. It is really a clear-cut, straightforward way out of industrial compulsion. The supposition which is held in certain quarters—it is held by the Mover of the Amendment—that the War Office has some extraordinary power which it can exercise over workmen who are released from military service for industrial employment has no foundation whatever. If with the Colours, a man is under the absolute control of the military authorities. If he goes to the Reserve, he is as free as any other labourer in the country. No restrictions can be imposed upon him. To put in the words would be not only unnecessary but absurd.
  Amendmet negatived.

  CLAUSE 11.—(Amendment of the Army (Transfers) Act, 1915. 5 & 6 Geo. 5, c. 43.)
  The first proviso to Section one of the Army (Transfers) Act, 1915 (which provides for the maintenance of the rate of pay of a soldier transferred to a corps not of the same arm or branch of the service as the corps in which he is serving), shall have effect except in cases in which the Army Council direct that that proviso shall not apply.
  Amendment made: After the word "shall" ["shall have effect except in cases"], insert the word "not."—[Sir G. Cave.]
  Sir G. CAVE: I beg to move, to leave out the word "except."
  Mr. RAFFAN: I am told there is a considerable amount of misgiving with regard to the first part of the Clause.
  Mr. SPEAKER: To what Amendment is the hon. Member speaking?
  Mr. RAFFAN: I am speaking on Clause 11.
  Mr. SPEAKER: There is no Amendment on Clause 11.
  Mr. RAFFAN: The Solicitor-General has an Amendment.
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is only a drafting Amendment.
  Amendment agreed to.

  CLAUSE 12.—(Transfer of Officers and Men of the Territorial Force. 7 Edw. 7, c. 9.)
  (1) During the continuance of the present War, notwithstanding anything in Section seven of the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act, 1907, the orders and regulations for the government and discipline of the Territorial Forces made under that Section—

  (a) may authorise a man of the Territorial Force when belonging to one corps to be transferred without his consent to another corps, and may authorise a man of the Territorial Force to be posted without his consent to a battalion or other body of the Regular Forces included in the corps to which he belongs or is transferred; and

  (b) in the case of an officer or man in the Territorial Force who is liable to service outside the United Kingdom may, for the purposes of such service, and notwithstanding anything in any instrument defining

  SCHEDULE.

  Session and Chapter.

  short Title.

  Extent of Repeal.

  5 and 6 Geo. 5, c. 104

  The Military Service Act, 1916

  Sub-section (4) of section one; the words "before the appointed date" in sub-section (5) of section two; and the words "and, subject to any provision which may hereafter be made by Parliament, men who have been discharged from the naval or military service of the Crown on the termination of their period of service in paragraph 5 of the First Schedule."

  Schedule (b) brought up, and read the first time; read a second time, and added to the Bill.
  Mr. LONG: I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read the third time."

  Division No. 23.]

  AYES.

  [11.9 p.m.

  Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis Dyke

  Baird, J. L.

  Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick G.

  Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D.

  Baker, Rt. Hon. H. T. (Accrington)

  Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

  Allen, Arthur A. (Dumbartenshire)

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Barlow, Montague (Salford, South)

  Ashley, W. W.

  Balfour, Sir Robert (Lanark)

  Barnes, Rt. Hon. George N.

  the conditions of such service, authorise the drafting of any such officer or man to any unit of the Territorial Forces within the corps to which he belongs or to which he may be transferred;
  and those orders and regulations shall also provide for the maintenance of the rate of pay of a man who is transferred without his consent to a different arm or branch of the service except in cases in which it appears not desirable to the Army Council that the rate of pay should be so maintained.
  Amendment made: Leave out the words "not desirable" ["it appears not desirable to the Army"], and insert instead thereof the word "undesirable."— [Sir G. Cave.]

  CLAUSE 15.—(Short Title.)
  This Act may be cited as the Military Service Act, 1916 (Session 2), and the principal Act and this Act shall be read together and may be cited together as the Military Service Acts, 1916, and the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act, 1907, and this Act (so far as they relate to the Territorial Force) may be cited together as the Territorial Force Acts, 1907 and 1916.
  Amendment made: At the end of the Clause insert, "(2) The enactments specified in the Schedule to this Act are hereby repealed to the extent mentioned in the third column of that Schedule."—[Sir G. Cave.]
  [Sir G. Cave.]
  Question put.
  The House divided: Ayes, 250; Noes, 35.

  Barran, Sir J. N. (Hawick, Burghs)

  Gretton, John

  Paget, Almeric Hugh

  Bathurst, Col. Hon. A. B. (Gloe., E.)

  Griffith, Rt. Hon. Ellis Jones

  Parker, James (Halifax)

  Beale, Sir William Phipson

  Hamilton, Lord C. J. (Kensington, S.)

  Parry, Thomas H.

  Beauchamp, Sir Edward

  Hancock, John George

  Pearce, Sir William (Limehouse)

  Beck, Arthur Cecil

  Harcourt, Rt. Hon. Lewis (Rossendale)

  Pennefather, De Fonblanque

  Bellairs, Commander C. W.

  Hardy, Rt. Hon. Laurence

  Perkins, Walter Frank

  Benn, Arthur Shirley (Plymouth)

  Harmsworth, Cecil (Luton, Beds)

  Peto, Basil Edward

  Benn, Com. Ian Hamilton

  Harris, Henry Percy (Paddington, S.)

  Phillips, Sir Owen (Chester)

  Bentham, George Jackson

  Harris, Percy A. (Leicester, S.)

  Pollock, Ernest Murray

  Bentinck, Lord H. Cavendish-

  Haslam, Lewis

  Pratt, J. W.

  Bethell, Sir J. H.

  Henry, Sir Charles

  Pretyman, E. G.

  Blair, Reginald

  Herbert, Maj.-Gen. Sir Ivor (Mon., S.)

  Price, Sir Robert J. (Norfolk, E.)

  Booth, Frederick Handel

  Hewart, Gordon

  Prothero, Roland Edmund

  Bowerman, Charles W.

  Hewins, William Herbert Samuel

  Pryce-Jones, Colonel E.

  Boyton, James

  Hinds, John

  Radford, George Heynes

  Brace, William

  Hodge, John

  Raffan, Peter Wilson

  Brookes, Warwick

  Hohler, G. F.

  Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

  Broughton, Urban Hanlen

  Holmes, Daniel Turner

  Rea, Walter Russell (Scarborough)

  Brunner, J. F. L.

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Rees, Sir J. D.

  Bryce, J. Annan

  Hope, Major J. A. (Midlothian)

  Rendall, Athelstan

  Bull, Sir William James

  Horne, Edgar

  Richardson, Albion (Peckham)

  Burdett-Coutts, W.

  Howard, Hon. Geoffrey

  Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

  Burn, Colonel C. R.

  Hunt, Major Rowland

  Roberts, Sir J. H. (Denbighs)

  Butcher, J. G.

  Hunter, Sir Charles Rodk.

  Robertson, Rt. Hon. John M.

  Buxton, Noel

  Illingworth, Albert H.

  Robinson, Sidney

  Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

  Ingleby, Holcombe

  Roe, Sir Thomas

  Cassel, Felix

  Jacobsen, Thomas Owen

  Rowlands, James

  Cator, John

  Jones, Edgar (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Rutherford, Sir J. (Lancs., Darwen)

  Cave, Rt. Hon. Sir George

  Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

  Rutherford, Watson (L'pool, W. Derby)

  Cawley, Sir Frederick (Prestwich)

  Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen, East)

  Salter, Arthur Clavell

  Cecil, Lord Hugh (Oxford University)

  Jones, William S. Glyn- (Stepney)

  Samuel, Sir Harry (Norwood)

  Cecil, Rt. Hon. Lord R. (Herts, Hitchin)

  Kellaway, Frederick George

  Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

  Chaloner, Colonel R. G. W.

  Kenyon, Barnet

  Samuel, J. (Stockton-on-Tees)

  Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A.

  Kerry, Earl of

  Samuel, Samuel (Wandsworth)

  Clive, Captain Percy Archer

  Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

  Scott, A. MacCallum (Glas., Bridgeton)

  Coates, Major Sir Edward Feetham

  Knight, Captain Eric Ayshford

  Shortt, Edward

  Coats, Sir Stuart (Wimbledon)

  Lambert, Rt. Hon. G. (Devon, S. Molton)

  Spicer, Rt. Hon. Sir Albert

  Cochrane, Cecil Algernon

  Larmor, Sir J.

  Stanton, Charles Butt

  Collins, Sir Stephen (Lambeth)

  Law, Rt. Hon. A. Bonar (Bootle)

  Stewart, Gershom

  Compton-Rickett, Rt. Hon. Sir J.

  Layland-Barrett, Sir F.

  Strauss, Edward A. (Southwark, West)

  Cooper, Sir Richard Ashmole

  Levy, Sir Maurice

  Sutherland, John E.

  Cornwall, Sir Edwin A.

  Lewis, Rt. Hon. John Herbert

  Swift, Rigby

  Cory, Sir Clifford John (St. Ives)

  Lloyd, George Butler (Shrewsbury)

  Sykes, Col. A. J. (Ches., Knutsford)

  Cory, James H. (Cardiff)

  Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A. R.

  Sykes, Sir Mark (Hull, Central)

  Cowan, W. H.

  Long, Rt. Hon. Walter

  Talbot, Lord Edmund

  Craig, Ernest (Crewe)

  Lonsdale, Sir John Brownlee

  Taylor, Theodore C. (Radcliffe)

  Craig, Col. James (Down, E.)

  Lowe, Sir F. W. (Birm., Edgbaston)

  Tennant, Rt. Hon. Harold John

  Craik, Sir Henry

  M'Callum, Sir John M.

  Terrell, George (Wilts, N.W.)

  Crooks, Rt. Hon. William

  MacCaw, William J. MacGeagh

  Thorne, G. R. (Wolverhampton)

  Currie, George W.

  M'Curdy, C. A.

  Tickler, T. G.

  Dalrymple, Hon. H. H.

  Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

  Tootill, Robert

  Dalziel, Davison (Brixton)

  McKenna, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Touche, George Alexander

  Davies, Timothy (Lincs., Louth)

  Mackinder, H. J.

  Toulmin, Sir George

  Denniss, E. R. B.

  M'Laren, Hon. F.W.S. (Lincs., Spalding)

  Tryon, Captain George Clement

  Dixon, C. H.

  M'Laren, Hon H. D. (Leics.)

  Walters, Sir John Tudor

  Dougherty, Rt. Hon. Sir James B.

  Maclean, Donald

  Warde, Colonel C. E. (Kent, Mid)

  Du Cros, Arthur Philip

  Macmaster, Donald

  Warner, Sir Thomas Courtenay T.

  Duke, Rt. Hon. Henry Edward

  M'Micking, Major Gilbert

  Wason, Rt. Hon. E. (Clackmannon)

  Duncan, C. (Barrow-in-Furness)

  Macnamara, Rt. Hon. Dr. T. J.

  Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

  Edge, Captain William

  Magnus, Sir Philip

  Weigall, William E. G. A.

  Edwards, John Hugh (Glamorgan, Mid)

  Markham, Sir Arthur Basil

  Weston, John W.

  Faber, George Denison (Clapham)

  Mason, James F. (Windsor)

  White, Sir Luke (Yorks, E.R.)

  Fell, Arthur

  Meux, Sir Hedworth

  Whiteley, Herbert, J.

  Fetherstonhaugh, Godfrey

  Middlemore, John Throgmorton

  Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

  Fiennes, Hon. Eustace Edward

  Millar, James Duncan

  Wiles, Thomas

  Finlay, Rt. Hon. Sir Robert

  Mills, Lieut. Arthur R.

  Williams, Aneurin (Durham N. W.)

  Finney, Samuel

  Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred

  Williams, T. J. (Swansea)

  Fisher, Rt. Hon. W. Hayes

  Money, Sir L. G. Chiozza

  Williamson, Sir A.

  Flannery, Sir J. Fortescue

  Montagu, Rt. Hon. E. S.

  Wood, John (Stalybridge)

  Fletcher, John Samuel

  Morgan, George Hay

  Wood, Rt. Hon. T. McKinnon (Glasgow)

  Forster, Henry William

  Morrison-Bell, Capt. E. F. (Ashburton)

  Worthington Evans, Major L.

  Foster, Philip Staveley

  Morison, Hector

  Wortley, Rt. Hon. C. B. Stuart-

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

  Wright, Henry Fitzherbert

  Gardner, Ernest

  Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Yate, Colonel C. E.

  Gibbs, Col. George Abraham

  Neville, Reginald J. M.

  Yeo, Alfred William

  Gilbert, J. D.

  Newdegate, F. A.

  Young, William (Perthshire, East)

  Goldman, C. S.

  Nicholson, Sir Charles N. (Doncaster)

  Younger, Sir George

  Goulding, Sir Edward Alfred

  Nield, Herbert

  Grant, J. A.

  Norton-Griffiths, John

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Mr. Gulland and Mr. Bridgeman.

  Greenwood, Granville G. (Peterborough)

  O'Grady, James

  Greig, Colonel J. W.

  NOES.

  Abraham, Rt. Hon. W.

  Arnold, Sydney

  Barlow, Sir John Emmott (Somerset)

  Anderson, W. C.

  Baker, Joseph Allen (Finsbury, E.)

  Burns, Rt. Hon. John

  1490

  1491

  Byles, Sir William Pollard

  Macdonald, J. Ramsay (Leicester)

  Sherwell, Arthur James

  Chancellor, Henry George

  Mason, David M. (Coventry)

  Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John Allsebrook

  Clynes, J. R.

  Molteno, Percy Alpert

  Snowden, Philip

  Harvey, T. E. (Leeds, West)

  Morrell, Philip

  Thomas, J. H.

  Hogge, James Myles

  Outhwaite, R. L.

  Trevelyan, Charles Philips

  Holt, Richard Durning

  Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

  Whitehouse, John Howard

  John, Edward Thomas

  Pringle, William M. R.

  Williams, Liewelyn (Carmarthen)

  Jowett, F. W.

  Richards, Thomas

  King, Joseph

  Richardson, Thomas (Whitehaven)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Leif Jones and Mr. Goldstone.

  Lamb, Sir Ernest Henry

  Rowntree, Arnold

  Lough, Rt. Hon. Thomas

  Runciman, Sir Walter (Hartlepool)

  Bill read the third time, and passed.
  The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House of the 22nd February, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."
Mr. HOGGE: Can the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury state the business for to-morrow and Thursday?
Mr. GULLAND: To-morrow the Motion of the hon. Member for Brentford (Mr. Joynson-Hicks) on the Air Service will be taken, and on Thursday the Second Reading of the Finance Bill.
Question put, and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-one minutes after Eleven o'clock.

WAR.
  MOTOR-CAR DUTIES.
  MOTOR-CAR DUTIES.
  WILLS OF DECEASED SERVICE MEN.
  WILLS OF DECEASED SERVICE MEN.
  PROGRESS REPORTS (INDIVIDUAL SOLDIERS).
  PROGRESS REPORTS (INDIVIDUAL SOLDIERS).
  COMPULSORY SERVICE IN OTHER COUNTRIES.
  COMPULSORY SERVICE IN OTHER COUNTRIES.
  NAVAL AND MILITARY SERVICES (PENSIONS AND GRANTS).
  NAVAL AND MILITARY SERVICES (PENSIONS AND GRANTS).
  MICHAEL BRENNAN'S CASE.
  MICHAEL BRENNAN'S CASE.
  CONGESTED DISTRICTS BOARD (IRELAND).
  CONGESTED DISTRICTS BOARD (IRELAND).
  FISHING INDUSTRY (ARAN ISLES).
  FISHING INDUSTRY (ARAN ISLES).
  IRISH PRISONS.
  IRISH PRISONS.
  DOUGLAS GOLDRING'S CASE.
  DOUGLAS GOLDRING'S CASE.
  HAY SUPPLIES.
  HAY SUPPLIES.
  Index of Townlands (Ireland).
  Index of Townlands (Ireland).
  Turbary Rights.
  Turbary Rights.
IRVINE'S DIVORCE BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read: Counsel called in: Witnesses examined: Moved that the Bill be now road 2a; agreed to: Bill read 2a accordingly.
LORD HARDINGE OF PENSHURST.
The Right Honourable Sir Charles Hardinge, K.G., G.C.B., G.C.S.I., G.C.M.G., C.C.I.E., G.C.V.O., I.S.O., late Governor-General of India, having been created Baron Hardinge of Penshurst, in the County of Kent—Was (in the usual manner) introduced.
LORD STRABOLGI.
The House being informed that his Lordship was attending with his writ of summons, the Lord Chancellor explained to the House his Lordship's descent: Then his Lordship was called in and took the Oath and then took his place on the Baron's Bench.
ST. JOHN'S CHURCH, KINGSTON-UPON- HULL BILL.
Read 2a, and committed.
ABERDARE AND ABERAMAN GAS BILL. [H.L.]
Reported from the Select Committee, with Amendments.

RETURNS, REPORTS, &c.
Workmen's Compensation (Industrial Diseases)—Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending the provisions of Section 8 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1906:
Royal Observatory (Edinburgh)—Twentysixth Annual Report of the Astronomer Royal for Scotland:
Presented (by command) and ordered to lie on the Table.
Lighthouses, &c. (Local Inspections)—Reports to the Board of Trade by the Trinity House of Deptford Strond, the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses and the Commissioners of Irish Lights, of their inspection of local lighthouses, buoys, and beacons in 1915:
Shops Act, 1912—Orders made by the under-mentioned local authorities and confirmed by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, affecting certain classes of shops within their respective areas—

Council of Borough of Swansea;

Council of Borough of Eastbourne;

Council of Borough of Lewes;

Urban District Council of Rowley Regis:

Laid before the House (pursuant to Act) and ordered to lie on the Table.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (No. 2) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read la; to be printed; and referred to the Examiners. (No. 35.)
SMALL HOLDING COLONIES BILL. [H.L.]
A Bill to provide for the acquisition and management of land by the State for experimental Small Holding Colonies, and to extend the powers of acquisition and management of land by certain Government Departments under the Development and Road Improvement Funds Act, 1909, and for other purposes connected therewith—Was presented by the Earl of Selborne; read la; to be printed; and to be read 2a on Thursday the 25 th instant. (No 36.)
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA BILL. [H.L.]
To be read 2a on Thursday next.
SUMMER TIME BILL.
Brought from the Commons, read la, and to be printed. (No 33.)
BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Moved, That Standing Order No. XXXIX be considered in order to its being suspended for the remainder of the week (The Lord President (M. Crewe); agreed to, and ordered accordingly.

SUMMER TIME BILL.
[SECOND READING.]
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, taking advantage of the Motion which has just been made by the noble Marquess the Leader of the House, I beg to move the Second Reading of the Summer Time Bill. This Bill is a modest attempt to establish a closer correspondence between the hours when people are awake and at work and the hours of daylight. In principle, no doubt, that correspondence is supposed to exist already. We thank the wise Providence who gave us—
… earth and heaven, darkness and light; Who for toil the day has given, for rest the night.
That is the principle to which we all pay lip service, but in practice we are very far from abiding by it. We are in practice the slaves of conventions, which lead us to misuse both the light and the darkness. At one end we treat the hours of daylight as if the sun had not risen; at the other we spend millions upon artificial light which, because it is artificial, is inferior to and is obviously much more extravagant than sunlight, which costs us nothing. It has often been said that if in this country any one were able at five o'clock on a summer's morning to lift the roofs off the houses he would see that, in spite of bright daylight, the greater part of the population was sound asleep with closed shutters; that if, again, he were able to perform a similar operation at ten o'clock in the evening, he would find a great part of the population using artificial light in order to make up for their own mismanagement earlier in the day. The object of this Bill is to introduce a small measure of additional Common sense into these arrangements.
This question is, of course, very far from being a new one. Indeed, one was reminded of its antiquity by a very interesting letter republished in the
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Observer of last Sunday and written by Benjamin Franklin in the year 1784. That letter puts the whole case almost for daylight saving, and I would like to read to your Lordships two sentences from it which seem to me to sum up the whole question in a nutshell. Franklin was then living in Paris, and his letter was addressed to the people of that city. He ended his letter in these words—
"They are as well instructed, judicious, and prudent a people as exist anywhere in the world, all professing, like myself, to be lovers of economy; and, from the many heavy taxes required from them by the necessities of the State, have surely an abundant reason to be economical. I say it is impossible that so sensible a people under such circumstances should have lived so long by file smoky, unwholesome, and enormously expensive light of candles if they had really known that they might have had as much pure light of the sun for nothing."
That really is, in a few words, the case for this Bill. Your Lordships may be aware that this question came before a Committee of the House of Commons in the year 1908 That Committee reported in favour of the measure which I am now proposing, or of a similar measure. In 1909, another Committee of the House of Commons reported against the Bill by a majority of one; but it is to be noted that their adverse opinion was founded not so much upon the merits of the case as upon the fact that there existed a great diversity of opinion with regard to the measure and that it was likely to cause inconvenience to many important interests. The House of Commons as we know it to-day has taken a much more courageous view of the question, and the Bill which I am asking your Lordships to read a second time was read a second time in that House without a Division.
One may make some rather interesting conjectures as to the ill-success of this proposal in its earlier days. That ill-success was probably due, in the first place, to apprehensions that we should disorganise our own business arrangements at home, and also to the apprehension that it might lead us into complications with other Powers with whom we are in business relations. I shall say a word about that part of the case in a moment. But I imagine that the real obstacle to the change was to be discovered in what I should almost call the innate conservatism of the national temperament. We do not like changing our habits, still less do we like

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changing them under instructions from Acts of Parliament. Such changes are always a facile prey to ridicule, and it is easy to make cheap jokes at the expense of a Daylight Saving Bill. Besides that, I think many people were probably convinced that there was something impious, almost sacrilegious, in laying hands upon an institution so venerable as Gree wich mean time. To many of our fellow-country Greenwich mean time probably looks like something that stands upon the same level as the British Constitution or the Thirty-nine Articles. But I need not remind your Lordships that our arrangements for describing time are purely the result of a series of conventions. Local time, as we have it in the provinces, does not, of course, bear any correspondence with true or solar time. Local time, instead of varying all over the country, is made to accord with Greenwich mean time. On the other hand, Greenwich mean time is, I am informed, itself the result of a convention. I confess that I always imagined that noon at Greenwich was determined by the fact that the sun was at that moment over the Greenwich meridian; but I learn on further inquiry that the sun himself is by no means to be trusted in these matters, and that all careful astronomers base themselves not upon the movements of the sun but upon certain movements of the stars. I venture, therefore, to think that we need have no scruple whatever in laying hands upon an arrangement based upon such a foundation as that.
In these days we take a rather stricter and more matter-of-fact view of these problems. The real justification of a Bill of this kind, particularly when we ask Parliament to agree to it in time of war, is that it is a measure which conduces to efficiency and economy, and there can, I think, be no doubt whatever that this Bill will have those results. Our proposal is that in the five summer months we should push on the clock by one hour, and thereby encourage people to begin the day and the night earlier than they have hitherto been in the habit of doing. The arguments in favour of the proposal seem to me fairly obvious. It is, of course, the case that the hours of daylight are limited, and it seems to follow that it is our duty to turn them to the best account that we can. I understand that the result of this Bill will be that during the summer months 130 additional hours of daylight will be available in consequence of
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it. It is not less true that this Bill will have extremely valuable results in that it will give art additional hour in the evening when the days are long for purposes of creation. All of us must have been struck of late years by the wonderful increase in the number of parks, open spaces, and recreation grounds in the vicinity of London and of all the larger cities, and it is surely no small thing that we should be able by an arrangement of this kind to put it in the power of the people who frequent these parks and recreation grounds to use them for an additional hour every day of their lives during the summer. I think the same argument applies not less strongly in another case—that of the people who have gardens or allotments in the country, and whom most of us have often seen perhaps at the end of a hard day's work in the fields enjoying their short spell of leisure by working in their own little plot.
With regard to the question of economy, I will not take upon myself to name to the House the sum which it is believed will be saved to the country by this change in the law. The estimates must obviously be very conjectural. I have seen it placed as high as £10,000,000 a year, but I should be sorry to assume any responsibility for that or any other figure. It is quite clear, however, that if we can get people to consume sunlight instead of electric light and lamp light, the national bill for illuminants must be reduced to a material extent. I may mention another reason for which I think the change may be made without any misgiving. Foreign countries, which at one time apparently paid as little attention to this question as we did, are now most of them adopting a change of this kind. In the French Chamber of Deputies a resolution in favour of it was unanimously passed. Holland is also about to adopt the change. Denmark has adopted it; and I understand that in Germany and Austria something of the same kind is about to be done. These precedents are, of course, very valuable, not only because they are precedents but because they show that we need no longer have the same apprehension that we used at one time to entertain—the apprehension, I mean, that by altering the time here we should find that we were out of accord with the people with whom we are in business relations abroad. At home the Associated Chamber of Commerce have advocated the

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measure. The Committee which is now watching over for the Government the question of the consumption of coal attach great importance to it and have recommended it to us. The Post Office raise no objections; and I am given to understand that the Stock Exchange, whose mysteries I have never been able to fathom and which was at one time very adverse to the proposal, now at any rate regards it with equanimity. I need not say more of the arguments in favour of the Bill.
With regard to the arguments against the Bill, I will only say this. So far as I am able to see, the only practical inconvenience which is likely to be occasioned to any one at the moment of transition will be a very slight and momentary inconvenience. It comes to this, that people will be expected to get up a little earlier at the beginning of the summer season, and they will not get back the hour of sleep that will be owing to them until some time in the month of October. With that exception, the transition from the old to the new system ought to present no material inconvenience; and I think it may be fairly argued that to any one who has been in the habit, for example, of passing from this country to Ireland, where the mean time is different, or, still more, to any one who has travelled across the Continent of America and found himself obliged to alter the time of his watch as he went on, this slight disturbance will not appear very formidable. I believe it is the case that there are some industries in which the alteration of the time may cause some inconvenience. That is likely to be the case in regard to the fruit-picking industry; and, to some extent, also, in regard to the dairying industry; but I would only say, as to that, that these are people who have been already to a considerable extent accustomed to turning night into day, and who probably will not greatly mind if they find a few additional hours of work before sunrise imposed upon them. But, at any rate, I venture to say that any of these local or special inconveniences ought not to be weighed in the balance as compared with the general advantage to the whole public which we believe will result from the passing of this Bill.
It is sometimes asked why it is necessary to legislate at all, why you cannot leave
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people to make these changes for themselves. I am sure that any one who pauses for a moment to reflect will realise that no change of this kind can be carried out unless it is made general and universal. Why did we resort to Greenwich mean time. Because of the inconvenience of having one time in one part of the country and another time in another district. Just in the same way social arrangements of all kinds would be absolutely impossible if there were a kind of go-as-you-please system in force, under which some people could adopt the new arrangement of time while others adhered to the former plan. A change of this kind obviously ought not to be imposed upon the country if there were any reason for supposing that the country was reluctant to accept it. All the evidence which is in our possession leads us to suppose that the country is ready to accept it; certainly that it is ready to accept it in view of the condition of things under which we are living at this time. This Bill, as your Lordships know, will have effect only while the war lasts. It may therefore be regarded in the light of an emergency measure, and as an experiment. If the public are dissatisfied with the results produced, the Bill can easily not be renewed at some future time.
I have only one word more to say. It is this. On account of the number of notices which will have to be issued to persons concerned all over the country it is most important that, if the Bill is to come into operation, as we hope it will, by Sunday morning next, no time should be lost in passing it into law. It is for that reason that we have adopted the unusual course of asking your Lordships to take both the First and the Second Reading this evening; and it is for that reason that we shall put the Bill down for Committee to-morrow, in the hope that if the House approves of the Bill it will be allowed to pass through the remaining stages on that day.
Moved (Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended), That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Marquess of Lansdowne.)
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Lords, the closing words of the speech of my noble friend opposite will have explained to your Lordships, what I do not think any of you had realised till that moment, that we are discussing, not the First Reading, but the Second Reading of this Bill. That remarkable circumstance has

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arisen from the fact that at the beginning of business, on the Motion of the Leader of the House, as is usual when we are asked to legislate nowadays, our Rules were suspended; and we have been called upon to legislate upon a Bill which technically we have never even seen. That is the present position. Indeed, there was a moment of extreme anguish—not witnessed by many of your Lordships—when we were almost on the point of reading the Bill a second time before it had actually reached your Lordships' House. For some reason it lingered in the passage, and was only delivered just a second or two before my noble friend rose to his feet. I cannot take this Bill very seriously, and therefore I cannot pretend to use tragical accents in describing how your Lordships' House is being treated in the matter of legislation.
The Bill itself is an experiment. My noble friend explained at the end of his speech that it is a temporary measure to be passed for the period of the war. It is recommended upon general and upon special grounds, and the special grounds are that it will contribute to economy and efficiency, which are so much required at this moment. For these reasons, if for these reasons alone, I think almost all your Lordships would be willing to give the Bill a trial. Anything which ministers to economy, considering the situation in which we are placed, ought to be, accepted by your Lordships' House even if it is trivial and even if it is inconvenient. With respect to the rest of the case, my noble friend anticipates all sorts of wonderful results from the passage of this Bill. I cannot say that I am equally sanguine. I do not believe it will prove of very great permanent advantage to the life of the people.
My noble friend said that, as far as he had access to any evidence, there was a general consensus of opinion in favour of the Bill. He did not tell us what the working classes thought about it. That is what I should like to have heard. As regards the upper mid middle classes, I do not think they ought to come to Parliament for a Bill of this kind. If they want to go to bed earlier or to get up earlier, why do they not do so? Personally I have not much sympathy with a Bill of this kind so far as they are concerned. But if this change really would be an advantage to the working classes, that would be, a great argument because they are not free agents in the matter; they cannot alter their hours to suit themselves, but are
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bound by all sorts of conditions which make it incumbent upon them to trust to general rules. My noble friend did not mention any evidence of the wishes of the working classes. He did not tell us of any view expressed by the Trade Union Congress, or of any resolution passed by a Trade Council. I dare say there is such. I do not urge the point strongly because, for my part, I should not suggest any opposition to the Bill, on the ground which I put forward at the beginning of these few remarks—namely, that if it is felt by the Government that this Bill will minister to economy in this time of war then I think it should be tried as an experiment. But let it be quite understood that it is an experiment. Do not let it be said when the war is over, if people have found the change an inconvenient one, that there will be any inconsistency in going back to our old adherence to the clock. I am sorry that my noble friend, who generally speaks respectfully of every one, spoke rather disrespectfully of the sun. He said the sun was no more to be relied upon than the British Constitution.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: No; I did not say that.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Not quite so low as that?
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My noble friend has mixed up two different parts of my speech. What I said was that some people had come to think of Greenwich mean time as if it were on a par with the British Constitution or the Thirty-nine Articles.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I will not say anything about the Thirty-nine Articles. But any one who places any reliance on the British Constitution at this time of day is likely to be very much disappointed. So far as this Bill is concerned, I do not think that in any quarter of your Lordships' House opposition will be offered to it as a temporary measure. My noble friend said that it is important that it should be passed at once, that certain notices have to go out by Sunday. There always are these desperate reasons why your Lordships' House should legislate at breakneck speed. The notices, no doubt, are prepared and ready to be issued, all dated for Sunday, and therefore it is no good crying over spilt milk. If, therefore,

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your Lordships are willing to pass this Bill into law in the course of to-morrow, I do not think any of us on this Bench will resist it. But we cannot, pretend to approve of procedure which makes legislation somewhat of a farce.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I have not had an opportunity of seeing this Bill, which it is stated is a temporary measure. But I should like to ask the noble Marquess whether it can be extended merely by Proclamation or by Order in Council, or whether for the purpose of extension it will have to come back to the Legislature. Although Constitutional matters are not regarded as of much weight nowadays, I entertain great objection to legislation of this kind being extended by Proclamation. I do not know whether that principle is embedded in this Bill, and therefore I have ventured to ask the noble Marquess a question on the point.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, the answer to the noble and learned Lord's question is this. In Clause 2 it is laid down that the Bill is to be in force in the year 1916 between the two limits of time mentioned. Then the clause goes on to provide that His Majesty may, in any subsequent year, by Order in Council made during the continuance of the present war, declare the Act to be in force during that year. Therefore the Act can be renewed for one year only, and then only if the war is still in progress.
May I say a word with regard to what fell from my noble friend Lord Salisbury as to the views of the working classes? I am not able to produce to him any authoritative statement proceeding from ally great body of working men, but I am able to tell my noble friend that the Labour Members in the House of Commons supported the Bill—there was no Division against it—and my noble friend, who knows the House of Commons better than I do, knows quite well that the Labour Members are not likely to support any measure which is calculated to outrage the feelings or interfere with the convenience of their constituents. I should be inclined to go further and say that obviously this Bill is advantageous to the working classes, because they are the people of all others who are likely to gain by getting the extra hour of daylight in the summer evenings.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: But they lose an hour's sleep in the morning.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Their day will not really be any longer. They will spend a certain amount of time in the open air instead of indoors. There is only one other point. I have heard it suggested that this Bill might be the occasion of much more overtime work being done; but there, again, I think one may safely trust the working classes of this country to see to it that they are not deprived by any side wind of the advantage which this Bill undoubtedly gives them.
LORD HINDLIP: My Lords, the noble Marquess referred to the industry of fruit-growing as one which would be placed under some disadvantage by this Bill. I should like to point out that these people will in wet weather lose probably an hour in the morning if not two, but they are going to lose very likely another hour in the evening. It has been the habit of the railway companies to close their goods yards in fruit-growing districts at rather an early hour, and if they close them an hour earlier still after this Bill becomes law the hardship inflicted on this industry will be very great. In the past it has been extremely difficult to get fruit to the railway goods yards in time; and I would ask the noble Marquess whether the Board of Agriculture could not bring some influence to bear on the railway companies so as to secure that in fruit-growing districts the goods yards may be kept open for a reasonable time.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I am obliged to the noble Lord for his suggestion, and I will make representation on the subject to the President of the Board of Agriculture.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.

DISABLED SOLDIERS.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY rose to ask His Majesty's Government whether they can now state precisely what provision will be made for disabled soldiers upon their discharge from hospital pending the payment of their pension.
The noble Marquess said: My Lords, I do not desire in putting this Question to detain your Lordships with any lengthy remarks, because I have already felt it my duty to address the House more than once upon this point. Shortly stated, the situation is this. When soldiers are discharged from hospital disabled—that is to say, discharged not only from hospital but from the Service as well—there is an interval before their pension is fixed and begins to be paid. That interval ought to be short, but it is sometimes long. In any case it is absolutely necessary that some provision should be made during the interval for the soldier's livelihood and for the livelihood of his dependants. Certain concessions have already been made by His Majesty's Government, but we all thought they were inadequate. I am given to understand that, having taken time to consider the matter, the Government are prepared to go further than they have done hitherto. I therefore put this Question to my noble friend in order to give him an opportunity of stating exactly the position which the Government take up at the present moment, and how far they are prepared to go.
LORD BERESFORD: My Lords, this is the third time that this matter has been brought before the notice of your Lordships' House. On March 15 I asked my noble friend opposite whether disabled soldiers received pay until such time as the pension was awarded. The noble Lord replied—
"Pension dates front the time of discharge. There should be no period of time during which a man is not in receipt of pay or pension."
I further asked my noble friend whether the gratuity of £2 awarded under Royal Warrant No. 1117 was given to the men. He replied—
"The £2 gratuity on discharge is credited to the man's account by his paymaster and issued as part of his balance. It is provided that a man going on pension shall have at least 20s. in his pocket on discharge, even though the account is in debt. All men should be settled up with on discharge."
I may point out that the position is still very unsatisfactory. I give every credit to the Chelsea Hospital Pensions Committee for doing their best, but it appears to me that they are totally understaffed.
I would like to state a few cases to your Lordships. Private H. Walker, late of the Scots Guards, was discharged on April 28. On May 11, although he had written to the
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paymaster for arrears, he had had no money, nor even an answer to his letter. He has had no money since his wife's separation allowance stopped on April 28. This man had twenty years' service. The next case is that of Private F. J. Ardley, aged 20, of the City of London Regiment. He was wounded in the spine, and is paralysed in one arm and one leg. At the end of March be was discharged from the London General Hospital; yet on April 26 he had not received back pay or pension, and was without any means at all. His father is in the Army and his mother is living on the separation allowance. The next case is that of Trooper J.J. Impleton, of the 1st Life Guards. He had been receiving 25 s. a week—now reduced to 10s. a week—and ls. 3d. a week for his child for life. This is all he has to live upon. I may mention that his left leg has been amputated, and he is suffering great pain in the stump. Then there is the case of Private H. A. Clarke of the 8th Royal West Kent Regiment. He lost a leg at Loos; he was discharged from Millbank Hospital, but has not yet had any pension. The only money he has received was £2 paid on February 23, since which time he has not received a penny or any reply to his letters. Private Samuel Wood, of the 1st Lancashire Regiment, was discharged from the London Hospital, and sent to the "Star and Garter" with injured spine. He is very worried about his wife and children. It is five weeks since his wife drew the separation allowance. He has no pension, and nothing to send to his wife. The last case with which I will trouble the House is that of Private H. Power, of the 8th Manchester Regiment. He has received no pay since his discharge on March 16. He is now in the Lewisham Military Hospital with asthma. He tried to get civilian clothes, but had not the 17 s. 6d. to allow him to pay for them and return his khaki. If he got pay and arrears of pay he might be able to push along until he secured employment. At the present moment his wife is penniless, and he is still wearing his uniform.
Though the Chelsea Committee is very much overworked, I submit that it is our duty in both Houses of Parliament to see that these things do not occur. These men were told that they would never suffer for their patriotism, and that, if wounded, they would get a good pension and be well looked after. I can vouch for the eases which I have read out, and I hope my noble

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friend will be able to tell us something to prove that the Government are going to put a stop to this sort of thing. There may be many of these cases of which none of us are aware, for unless a man has a powerful friend he cannot get his case known. Consequently there may be many of these men suffering the greatest distress at the present moment. I hope that we shall get a satisfactory answer from the Government.
LORD SANDHURST: My Lords, I can assure the House that the Secretary of State deplores the existence of these cases, the hardship of which is patent to us all; and if the noble and gallant Lord will be so good as to send me particulars of the cases he has mentioned I will look into them myself at Chelsea and see that as little delay as possible occurs in regard to relief. Some time ago when, at the instance of the noble Marquess opposite, I explained the system of pensions, there was one matter which rather perplexed him, and I was not in a position at the time to give any satisfactory reply. The noble Marquess will remember that I stated that a man who lost a leg received 25 s. a week for two months after discharge, but if he had lost an arm he received only 20 s. a week. The noble Marquess wanted to know why a leg was valued at more than an arm. That matter has been gone into, and I am pleased to inform the noble Marquess that an arm is now to be regarded as of the same value as a leg, and whichever of these limbs a man loses he will receive the 25 s.
I think I am right in assuming that this Question of the noble Marquess's arises out of one or two replies which I have given, and also owing to representations that have been sent to me from various sources as to delay in paying pensions when pay has ceased on discharge. I have been the recipient of a great number of these cases and have done my best to hurry matters up, sometimes, I am pleased to say, not entirely without success. But now I am glad to be able to tell the noble Marquess that the Secretary of State has made new arrangements by which the discharged soldier will be kept in touch with and a payment will be guaranteed to him every week from the date of discharge until the Chelsea Commissioners have settled his claim for pension. The main new departure is as follows. If by the date of the man's discharge the Pensions Issue Office have not received the decision as to pension
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from the Chelsea Commissioners, they will on the date of discharge issue to the man 10 s. if he has no dependants, and 20 s. if there are dependants, and the payment of this sum will be repeated weekly until the pension question is settled. When the Chelsea Commissioners have decided the pension, if it is more than the 10s. or 20s., as the case may be, the Pension Issue Office will refund the balance. That is to say, if the pension in the ease of a single man should be 15 s.—namely, 5s. more than the weekly temporary allowance of 10 s.—the extra 5s. will be refunded to the pensioner; but if the pension should turn out to be less than 10 s. per week, a refund on the part of the man will not be required. And, further, a man who has been waiting some time for his pension will receive the arrears of the 10 s. or 20 s. unless he has been receiving aid from the Soldiers' and Sailors' Help Society. But the soldier will not be called upon to refund money to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Help Society.
In reply to the point raised by the noble and gallant Lord opposite I may explain that when a man leaves, the officer in charge of the hospital provides him with plain clothes, advances £1 of the pay warrant gratuity that becomes due to him on discharge, and gives him a railway warrant to his home, which the man should reach twelve or thirteen days before his formal discharge. The officer in charge of the hospital notifies the soldier's paymaster, who arranges (1) for rations for the soldier between leaving the hospital and his discharge; (2) for a cash allowance instead of clothes if the man already has a suit of plain clothes; and (3) for his approximate balance of pay. If the soldier is in debt to the public no deduction is made from the rations or from the clothes allowance, so that the position will be materially improved.
The noble Marquess referred to the delays that had taken place at Chelsea. Nobody deplores those delays more than the Chelsea Commissioners themselves. But the work which has been thrown on the Chelsea Commissioners has been very heavy. Cases have come in at the rate of nearer 6,000 than 5,000 per week. Each case has to be tabulated, various references have to be made, and very often the papers are sent up incomplete; but when, which unhappily seldom is the case, the missing documents are not important, the case is proceeded with and adjudicated upon. To show how great has

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been the work, I may mention that some of the clerks at Chelsea have been working often up to three and four o'clock in the morning to expedite the cases. The noble and gallant Lord opposite said that more staff is needed. He is quite right. We want more room and additional staff. Construction has either begun or will be immediately begun to increase the accommodation, and a much larger staff will then be employed, which we trust will result in more prompt dealing with the cases. In the meantime there is this provision for ready money to be given to the soldier immediately on his discharge, and it will be continued until the pension is payable. It is hoped that in this way delays may he prevented in future, and that these men who have done such good service will no longer have this suffering imposed upon them.
LORD BERESFORD: My noble friend said that the money, a very large sum, advanced to the men by the Soldiers' and Sailors' Help Society will not be deducted from the man's pension when it is given. Are the Government going to refund the money to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Help Society?
LORD SANDHURST: I believe that some arrangement has been come to on this matter between the War Office and the society.

THE KUT FORCE.
THE EARL OF DESART THE EARL OF DESART rose to ask His Majesty's Government whether they are able, or expect shortly to be able, to publish the following information—(a) The names of the wounded and sick officers and men of the Kut Force who have been handed over to the British authorities; (b) The names of those who have died since the last publication of the losses in that Force; (c) The names of those who are now prisoners of war in the hands of the Turks.
The noble and learned Earl said: My Lords, I should like to say a few words before putting this Question. As we know, after considerable fighting at Ctesiphon and other places the Force under General Townshend operating in Mesopotamia was finally invested in Kut. For a time after that investment some information came out, but, if I am rightly informed, since about the middle of January of this year no, or very few, friends or relations of officers and
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men in Kut have received any information as to what had been the lot of individuals composing that Force. It held out, as we know, through its fortitude and gallantry, up to the early days of last month, and we had the news of the unhappy surrender about three weeks ago. We know that in the fighting at Ctesiphon and at other places before the investment a considerable number of officers and men were wounded. Some were sick; and there have been rumours—I hope not well founded—that there was a great deal of sickness in Kut during the investment. But since the investment we have received no information as to individuals.
Among the suffering from bereavement and loss which in this great war has fallen so heavily on the community, and on no body of men more than on members of your Lordships' House, I think perhaps the most trying is a long period of suspense with no knowledge as to the fate of those dear to people at home, and there is no doubt that this period of three months has been an extraordinarily trying time to those who have friends in the Kut Force. Now we know that those who are sick and wounded have been handed to the British authorities by the Turks, to whom in this respect I think one should pay a tribute in comparison with others of our enemies who, before the war, posed as the exponents of the highest specimens of the martial virtues, among which up till now we had included consideration for sick, wounded, and prisoners among enemies. There are also those who have been made prisoners of war, and whose names will be known if they are not already known. I do not for a moment suggest any blame to the Government or to any member of the Government because this information has not yet been given. I can well imagine the difficulties. They may not yet have been overcome.
I am sure that every member of the Government would desire to terminate at as early a date as possible the suspense under which the friends and relatives of these men have so long suffered. I will give a concrete case, and there must be others very much like it. A young officer with whom I am well acquainted was wounded in the fighting at Ctesiphon, and, like many of our officers and men, managed to carry on and fought continuously until the investment. After the investment he was seriously wounded, and the last news—not at all reassuring—which his

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parents received was in the middle of January. Since then they have not heard anything. When the investment came, with the feeling of sorrow for the necessity of the surrender there was this amount of comfort—that relatives at home thought they might soon get news of those belonging to them. I am sure they will receive it as soon as it can be given. But it would be of some consolation to them if the Government were able to give an idea of the date at which relatives and friends in this country may hope to know whether those belonging to them are in our hands as sick and wounded, whether they have passed away altogether during the siege, or whether they are prisoners of war in the hands of the Turks. That is my only motive for putting this Question. It is in no sense an attack upon or criticism of the Government, who must be as anxious as we all are that the information should be given at as early a date as possible.
LORD SANDHURST: My Lords, I am sure that all your Lordships fully sympathise with what has been said by the noble and learned Earl, and that the Secretary of State for War will be the very first to desire to alleviate the anxiety which all relatives must feel for those who are dear to them and who have done so well. The noble Earl has placed three specific Questions on the Paper, to which I shall be glad to give answers. At the same time I will carry in my mind what he has said, and will make it my duty to report it to the Secretary of State.
First the noble Earl asks for the names of the wounded and sick officers and men of the Kut Force who have been handed over to the British authorities. Four British officers were exchanged. Their names are Lieutenant F. G. S. McLean, Lieutenant W. A. G. Hinds, Lieutenant F. W. Portsmouth, and Lieutenant J. H. Bulloch. The two former belong to the Indian Army, and the two latter to the Norfolk Regiment. It is hoped to publish these names in the casualty list to-morrow. There were also exchanged one conductor, one chief petty officer, and one petty officer of the Royal Navy, 97 British rank and file, and about 970 native officers and other ranks. The names of the conductor and of the two petty officers have not yet been received. The names of some of the rank and file have been received and have been notified to the next-of-kin. A full list has been asked for, but has not yet arrived.
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Next the noble Earl asks for the names of those who have died since the last publication of the losses in the Kut Force. Deaths were notified as they occurred during the siege. An inquiry has been sent as to whether there are any deaths which have not yet been notified.
Lastly, the noble Earl desires the names of those who are now prisoners of war in the hands of the Turks. No lists of those taken prisoners have yet been received from the Turkish Government, but the United States Embassy have been asked by the Foreign Office to try to get lists as soon as possible, and it has been suggested that the officers who are prisoners should help in compiling them.

THE AIR SERVICE IN GALLIPOLI
LORD BERESFORD LORD BERESFORD rose to ask His Majesty's Government whether it is a fact that certain British and Australian military officers attached to the Royal Naval Air Service during the Gallipoli Campaign were mentioned in Despatches by their commanding officer and by the Vice-Admiral commanding the Eastern Mediterranean Naval Forces, and that their names were omitted when those of the Naval officers belonging to the same Service and mentioned in the same Despatches were published in March last; if so, what was the reason for such omission; whether a supplementary list of awards will be published relative to these military officers, and giving effect to the Vice-Admiral's recommendations; and, if not, what is the reason for differentiating in the matter of rewards between naval and military officers of the same Service mentioned in the same Despatches.
The noble and gallant Lord said: My Lords, I have put this Question on the Paper as there is a very keen feeling in the Naval Service, a chivalrous feeling, that these military officers who were working together with them at the same duty—a very hazardous and dangerous duty, executed with wonderful ability—should receive the same treatment. The Naval officers were mentioned in the Despatch by the Admiral, and I desire to know whether the military officers were mentioned in the same Despatch, and, if they were, why they were not gazetted and why they did not get the same reward. The Naval Service feels this, and justly

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so, to be rather a slur on their comrades in the sister Service who were doing exactly the same work and doing it with the same gallantry. My noble friend the Civil Lord of the Admiralty made a mistake when he answered my noble fiend Lord Sligo on this subject on March 22. The noble Duke said, "The Military wing of the Royal Flying Corps was not represented, except in the person of one officer." That is true. But there were officers taken from their regiments who had been working with the Navy for a considerable time. My noble friend said at the end of his remarks on March 22, "There will, I understand, be another set of Despatches published later, and no doubt due mention will be made of the work of the Air Service on that occasion." I would ask the noble Duke whether those Despatches are going to be published sooner or later, and I would also ask him whether he can answer the detailed Questions which I have put upon the Paper, more particularly whether or not these military officers were mentioned in Admiral de Robeck's Despatch, and, if they were, why they were not gazetted afterwards.
THE CIVIL LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE): My Lords, I am afraid I am only able to answer the Question in the broadest terms. The list of names sent in by the Vice-Admiral was too large, judged by the scale generally adopted for other operations of the war. It was therefore returned to him to reconsider, and the list as gazetted was in accordance with final recommendations. Some names which were included in the first list were not included in the final list, but in all cases their services have been noted. This applies to both naval and military officers; there is no differentiation between them. I am not able to make a statement as to the further question raised by my noble friend, but I will make inquiry as to whether any further Despatches will be published in due course.
LORD BERESFORD: Thank you.
House adjourned at twenty-five minutes before Six o'clock, till To-morrow, a quarter past Four o'clock.