Sitting of 5 August 1919

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

PEIVATE BUSINESS.
Private Bills [Lords] (Standing Orders not previously inquired into complied with), —MR. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the case of the following Bill, originating in the Lords, and referred on the First Reading thereof, the Standing Orders not previously inquired into, which are applicable thereto, have been complied with, namely:
British and Continental Bank Bill [Lords].
Ordered, That the Bill be read a second time.
Clowes Settled Estates Bill [Lords],
Read the third time, and passed, without Amendment.
Birmingham Corporation Tramways Bill [lords], Blackpool Improvement Bill [Lords], East Ham Corporation Bill [Lords], Leeds Corporation Bill [Lords], London Electric Railway Bill [Lords], Shoreham-by-Sea Urban District Council Bill [Lords], Tynemouth Corporation Bill [Lords], West Hartlepool Corporation Bill [Lords].
As amended, considered; to be read the third time.
Private Bills,
Ordered,
"That Standing Orders 220 and 246, relating to Private Bills, to suspended for the remainder of the Session."
Ordered,
"That, as regards Private Bills to be returned by the House of Lords with Amendments, such Amendments (if unopposed) shall be considered forthwith."
Ordered,
"That, as regards Private Bills returned, or to be returned, by the House of Lords with Amendments, such Amendments (if opposed) shall be considered at such time as the Chair man of Ways and Means may determine."
Ordered,
"That, when it is intended to propose any Amendments thereto, a copy of such Amendments shall be deposited in the Committee and Private Bill Office, and notice given on the day on which the Bill shall have been returned from the House of Lords." —[The Chairman of Ways and Means.]
Dundee Harbour and Tay Ferries Order Confirmation Bill,
"To confirm a Provisional Order under the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, relating to Dundee Harbour and Tay Ferries." presented by Mr. MUNRO; and ordered (under Section 7 of the Act) to be considered To-morrow.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  CZECHO-SLOVAK REPUBLIC (AMBASSADOR).
  Lieut.-Colonel Sir S. HOAREasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs who was the Minister who had been appointed to the Czecho-Slovak Republic; and who were the political representatives to be sent to Vienna and Sofia?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE, for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Cecil Harmsworth): My hon. and gallant Friend will realise that the changes produced by the War necessitate a number of new appointments besides those to which he refers. All the various posts have to be considered in relation to each other, and the compilation of a list of the new appointments is an exceedingly complex matter. In point of fact, the list is now practically completed, and my hon. and gallant Friend may rest assured that it-will be made public at the earliest possible moment.
  Sir S. HOARE: Does the hon. Gentleman remember that, a fortnight ago, he told me that these appointments had actually been sanctioned and that the names had already been sent to Paris? How is it that a delay of a fortnight has taken place and these names have not yet been sanctioned?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: There have been delays, but certain consents have to be obtained and these are in process of being obtained. I hope in a few days to give the hon. and gallant Member a longer list than he has asked for.
  Sir S. HOARE: Would the hon. Gentleman give me this longer list if I put this question down next Tuesday?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I shall endeavour to do so but I cannot give a definite answer.
  Sir S. HOARE: Is my hon. Friend aware that he has given me that answer once a week for three months?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: Yes. In reference to these appointments to the Diplomatic and Consular service it is most difficult to give complete lists.
  Sir S. HOARE: Is my hon. Friend aware that the Armistice has now existed for, I think, six months, and that three-quarters of our Diplomatic posts are still vacant? Is that a satisfactory state of affairs?
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the enormous importance of sending to these new democratic States an entirely different type of man?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I can assure both my hon. and gallant Friends that all these matters receive very serious consideration.

  ROUMANIA (BESSARABIA ELECTIONS).
  Sir S. HOAREasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Roumanian Government proposed to hold in Bessarabia elections for the Roumanian Chamber; if so, whether the Allies had yet determined the future of Bessarabia; and, if the Allies had not yet determined it, whether they would arrange with the Roumanian Government to abandon their intention to hold the elections?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: It is understood that the elections for the whole of Roumania and Bessarabia will be held in the early autumn. It is probable that by that time the Peace Conference will have decided as to the future status of the Province, and there is no reason to suppose that the Roumanian Government will not loyally respect the decision of the Conference.
  Sir S. HOARE: Does that answer mean that, supposing Bessarabia is not ceded to Roumania, Roumanian elections will, none the less, take place in Bessarabia?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: I understand the elections will take place in any case.
  Sir S. HOARE: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that that will mean that Roumanian elections will take place in a country that is not ceded to Roumania?

  PEACE PROPOSALS, AUGUST, 1917.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention had been drawn to the statements made in the Weimar Assembly by Heir Erzberger and in Paris by M. Painlevé with regard to the alleged Peace offer made to Germany by the Allies in August, 1917; whether an exchange of Notes did take place in August and September, 1917, between the British Minister to the Vatican and the German Chancellor through the good offices of the Holy See; whether the initiative was taken by the British or by the German Governments; and when the relevant documents would be published?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: It is the intention of His Majesty's Government to lay Papers on this question before Parliament as soon as possible. Meanwhile, I may inform the hon. and gallant Member that the statements made by Herr Erzberger at "Weimar are not an accurate presentment of tins facts. On 21st August, 1917, His Majesty's Minister to the Vatican was instructed to inform the Cardinal Secretary of State that His Majesty's Government could not say what reply, if any, would be made to the Pope's peace proposals, as His Majesty's Government had not had time to consult their Allies; and in any case it appeared to be hopeless to try to bring the belligerents into agreement until the Central Powers had given some indication of the objects for which they were prosecuting the War. Cardinal Gasparri, in his answer, narrowed the issue by stating that the German Government had declared their intention to restore independence to Belgium, pointing to the Reichstag resolution in favour of peace without annexations. Count de Salis observed that His Majesty's Government had no authoritative text of this document and that it was not satisfactory, as the decision did not rest with the Reichstag. On 24th August the Cardinal asked that the following reply should be sent to the message from His Majesty's Government: "The Cardinal Secretary of State reserves to himself to answer the

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  telegram after having received from the German Government an official declaration relative to Belgium, for which he has asked."
  The Cardinal asked Count do Salis for his opinion on this reply, and the latter, thinking that there would be no objection to his expressing a personal opinion, stated that a declaration regarding Belgium seemed desirable, as the point was important, especially for Great Britain, but that the Cardinal would remember that it was only one of many issues between the belligerents. Oh receiving Count de Salis' report of this conversation, His Majesty's Government thought that it was undesirable to be drawn into a piecemeal discussion of this question, and that, if the Central Powers wished to negotiate, they should state their terms in full Count de Salis was, therefore, instructed not to intervene in any way in the negotiations between the Vatican and Germany, and that if he were again asked for his opinion he should decline to give it. The matter then dropped, as the German Government made no declaration regarding Belgium.
  It is thus clear that His Majesty's Government made no advance towards Germany at this time, but they were of course ready to examine, in conjunction with the Allies, any genuine proposals tending to Peace, which they might receive from the German Government.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY:Does that mean that we are to have Papers?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: Yes, it does.

  RUSSIA.

    SOVIET REPUBLIC (BLOCKADE).
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether war had been formally declared between His Majesty and the Russian Soviet Republic; if not, why a blockade was being exercised against the Russian Soviet Republic; whether notice of this blockade had been given to neutral Powers in accordance with international law; and whether drugs, anæsthetics, surgical instruments, lint, and bandages were contraband of war if destined to Soviet Russia?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. No blockade has been declared or is being exercised against any part of Russia. The third and fourth parts of the question, therefore, do not arise. Although no blockade exists either in the White Baltic or Black Seas, the existing conditions which are the result of the aggressive measures taken by the Soviet party in Russia against those portions of the former Empire which decline to acknowledge their authority render it, I believe, physically impossible for goods to reach the interior of Russia.
    Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: Are we at war with the Soviet Republic?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: The hon. and gallant Member knows that that subject has been discussed in this House.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Could the hon. Member say why neutral trading ships are prevented from proceeding to their destination, but are arrested and sent back?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman give me details of such a Case. I am not aware of such a case.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I will do so.

    COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARY ARMY.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Secretary of State for War whether the Russian counter-revolutionary Army under Prince Lieven, recently at Libau, was equipped by the German military authorities; whether General von der Goltz and other German officers had joined this Army; whether this Army had recently been furnished with Allied transports; and whether this Army came under the orders of General Sir Hubert Gough or was otherwise co-operating with the Allies in the Eastern Baltic provinces?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Mr. Churchill): The force under Prince Lieven, recently at Libau, was equipped by the German military authorities. As far as is known neither General von der Goltz nor other German officers have joined this force. A portion of the force was recently moved by sea in ships provided locally. The force is not under the orders of General Sir Hubert Gough.

    COST OF MILITARY OPERATIONS.
    Sir D. MACLEANasked the Secretary of State for War if he will state what is the estimated cost of our operations in Russia, and also the estimated cost of munitions of war, food, or money sent in support of Russian military operations since the date of the Armistice to 1st July, 1919?
    Captain W. BENNasked the Prime Minister whether he will cause to be prepared a statement showing the total sum spent since the Armistice on the wars in Russia, distinguishing, if possible, the cost of shipping freights and munitions from the cost of maintenance and personnel?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I propose to make a statement on this subject before the House rises.
    Sir D. MACLEAN: Does my right hon. Friend remember that I have given him a margin of £10,000,000 for error, and does he not agree that the House is entitled to this information; and I would further ask him if he does not think that, within that margin which I have given him, the House is entitled to the information before the House rises, so as to give us an opportunity of making some comment on the information?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I will do my best to meet the request of my right hon. Friend.
    Captain BENN: Is he aware that the War Office has this afternoon given a full statement as to the expenses of the expeditions in Ireland?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: My hon. and gallant Friend cannot connect Ireland with Russia.
    Captain BENN: No; but there cannot be any more difficulty.

    EXPEDITIONS (COST).
    Captain BENNasked the Prime Minister whether any estimate of the cost or record of the expenditure in connection with the Russian expeditions has been considered by the Cabinet?
    Mr. BONAR LAW (Leader of the House): The financial aspect of this question has been constantly under the consideration of the Cabinet.
    Captain BENN: Has the right hon. Gentleman any precise figures as to the cost of the assistance rendered to the Russian Armies?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: We never have had detailed estimates, but we have always tried to form some idea of what the expenditure was.
    Captain BENN: Will the right hon. Gentleman convey to the House, as has been conveyed to the Cabinet, some idea of what the expense is?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I think that is not necessary, because I understand a promise has been given that more detailed estimates will be given to the House.
    Captain BENN: Before the end of the Session?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I hope so.
    Lieut.-Colonel C. MALONE: Are any options on concessions, or other forms of, credit, being obtained to pay for this expense?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: No.

    PEACE INQUIRIES.
    Lieut.-Colonel Lord H.CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Prime Minister whether the Government will make inquiries in Russia with the object of finding out whether it is possible to secure peace which is consistent with our obligations of honour to those who are our friends in that country?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: It is impossible to add anything on this subject to what has already been said in Debate by the Government.
    Lord H. CAVEND1SH-BENTINCK: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is an increasing impression in the country that the bulk of the Government's activities in Russia merely leads to the strengthening of Bolshevism in this country and to giving it a fictitious popularity in this country?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: It is obvious, I think, that is not a subject that can be dealt with by question and answer. It would have to be discussed in Debate.

  EGYPT (CAPITULATIONS)
  Captain W. BENNasked the Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs what steps the Government proposed to take for the representation of the interests of the non-Egyptian population on the abolition of the Capitulations?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: His Majesty's Government do not propose to take any steps in this matter until they have received the recommendations of Lord Milner's Mission.
  Captain BENN: In view of the changed status of Egypt will this House be consulted in this matter?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: That question should be addressed, surely, to the Leader of the House.

  BRITISH REPRESENTATIVE, BRUSSELS (STATUS).
  Commander BELLAIRSasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs how many representatives of other nations had precedence over the British Minister at the recent Belgian celebrations when President Poincaré visited Brussels; and whether there was any intention of raising the status of the British representative to that of Ambassador?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: As has already been announced in the Press, His Majesty's Legation at Brussels was raised to the rank of an Embassy on 25th July. As the visit of President Poincaré took place before that date, it is to be presumed that the United States and French Ambassadors took precedence of Sir Francis Villiers on that occasion.

  ARMY TRAINING (EDUCATION).
  Lieut.-Colonel A. MURRAYasked the Secretary of State for War whether, in view of the statement made in the pamphlet issued with Army Order No. 7, of 13th May, 1919, that educational training is not to be regarded as a secondary consideration, but as an essential element in the making of a soldier and an Army, and provides a link with civil life and the nation at large, he could say whether some such educational system as had proved so successful in the British Army of the Rhine will be a definite organisation of the future Army?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I am glad to be in a position to say that it has been decided that education is henceforward to be regarded as an integral part of Army training. Hon. Members will, however, realise that the establishment necessary to give
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  effect to this principle cannot be laid down in detail until the composition and conditions of service of the future Army are finally decided.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAYasked the Secretary of State for War whether, in view of the statement made on 11th June by the President of the Board of Education, that the fact that education was henceforward to be an essential part of Army training was one of the great steps forward in social progress, he would say what arrangements had been made to afford to Regular units proceeding overseas the advantages of the present Army educational scheme?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Arrangements are being made, as far as possible in the present circumstances, to ensure that Regular units proceeding overseas shall not suffer a break in the continuity of their present educational training, but shall be enabled to carry into effect the decision I have announced in answer to the previous question.
  Captain BOWYERasked the Secretary of State for War if he will state the nature of the facilities provided for the general and technical education of apprentices and others in the Army at home and abroad, and in particular of the Army of the Rhine; and the results that have attended the provision of these facilities?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: A full statement as to the educational organisation in the Army was given in my reply to the hon. and learned Member for York on the 3rd April last. This organisation has been confirmed and, where necessary, modified or supplemented by an Army Order issued on the 13th May which sets forth the principles, curricula, and the whole system. I am sending my hon. and gallant Friend a copy of the Army Order. Very satisfactory results have attended these educational facilities. For example, the last Return from the Array of the Rhine, to which my hon. and gallant Friend specially refers, shows that the numbers attending classes during June were 1,295 apprentices and 72,075 other students. In this Return the additional students in the three Army colleges, namely, the General and Commercial College at Cologne, the Science College at Bonn, and the Technical College at Siegburg, are not included owing to the fact that during part of June there was a break between the courses at these colleges.

  ARMY CLOTHING SUPPLIES.
  Mr. WALLACEasked the Secretary of State for War what were the total quantities of khaki cloth, flannel, hosiery, and blankets held by the War Office at home and abroad, and the number of finished garments in cloth and flannel, including any such cloth and flannel invoiced by the War Office to makers-up; what quantities of cloth and garments were required as reserves and upon what basis such reserves were estimated; and what quantities under the above categories had been declared surplus to requirements by the War Office since the Armistice?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster): The figures asked for in the question cover so wide a field that I regret I am not at the moment in a position to give my hon. Friend a detailed statement. If he will be kind enough to postpone the question till this day week, I will do my best to give him the information.

  ARMY COMMISSIONS (UNIVERSITY CANDIDATES).
  Sir HENRY CRAIKasked the Secretary of State for War whether, in view of the valuable type of officer supplied to the Army by the universities, steps would be taken to put an end to the present embargo which made it impossible for any student at a university to enter Woolwich or Sandhurst?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: There is no embargo such as my hon. and learned Friend suggests. I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT a more detailed reply to his question.
  The following is the reply referred to:
  There is no embargo on students at the universities competing for Woolwich or Sandhurst. They can do so in the same way as any other candidates, provided they fulfil the conditions as to age. In the case of those students who were serving in the Senior Division of the Officers' Training Corps on the 1st March, 1919 (or who had served prior to that date), they are allowed to compete for Woolwich or Sandhurst up to the age of twenty-one. A limited number of students can be recommended by universities for nomination to cadetships at Woolwich and Sandhurst. This number is dependent on the strength
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  of the university's contingent of the Officers Training Corps. It will be possible for a student to obtain a commission in the Army through a university as an alternative to passing through Woolwich or Sandhurst.
  Sir H. CRAIK: Is it the case that unless special terms are obtained for the universities the age limit shuts them out? I hope my right hon. Friend will keep in consideration the fact that the Commander-in-Chief of the victorious British Army was himself a man who joined the Army through a university?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Yes, but the Regulations which are contemplated will make it possible for a student to obtain a commission in the Army from a university as an alternative to passing through Sandhurst.
  Sir H. CRAIK: At present that is stopped.
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I do not think so. At any rate it will be a great mistake for the Army to cut itself off from the supply from the universities of a proportion of its officers.
  Colonel ASHLEY: Could the right hon. Gentleman say that a definite number of commissions will be reserved for the universities, as was done before the War?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I think that the time has now come when it is possible to examine with some approach to practical results the problem of the composition and scale of our future Army.
  Mr. J. JONES: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the possibility of giving freedom and equality of opportunity to all men to become officers in the Army?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Certainly; equality of opportunity according to merit.
  Captain W. BENN: Will the right hon. Gentleman appoint a Committee to inquire with a view to unifying the conditions for all three Services?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I could not answer any question that does not refer to the Service for which I am responsible.

  DEMOBILISATION.

    RELEASE ON COMPASSIONATE GROUNDS.
    Mr. N. MACLEANasked the Secretary of State for War whether he was aware that Sapper D. Logan, No. 282320.

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    L Signal Battalion, Royal Engineers, Havre Detachment, A.P.O. 1, Le Havre, France, was forty-one years of age and was unable to secure demobilisation; that Sapper Logan was with the 56th Divisional Signal Company up till the 21st February, 1919, when he was transferred to the 4th Army; that before transfer he had an interview with the commanding officer, Royal Engineers, in the endeavour to secure release on compassionate grounds; that he was informed that his demobilisation would not suffer, and that he was certain to be released within three months; whether he had been subsequently transferred to the D Corps Signal Company and to the 4th Area Signal Company; and whether, seeing that men of similar age and service had been released from each of these units, he would take immediate steps to release Sapper Logan?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: As I stated in reply to a similar question by the hon. Member for Morpeth on Wednesday last, if Sapper Logan's age is as stated in the question, he will be released in accordance with the instructions recently issued making provision for the early release of all men eligible for demobilisation.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will amend Army Council Instruction No. 287, of 1919, so that a soldier who is the only child of a widowed mother in necessitous circumstances may not be precluded from being demobilised on compassionate grounds?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: As was stated on the 23rd July in reply to the hon. Member for St. Rollox, the Memorandum published on the 17th instant greatly enlarges the scope of the demobilisation regulations, and also renders eligible numbers of men not previously eligible for release. Under the circumstances, I regret that I cannot at present consent to any further modification of the Regulations governing demobilisation. During May and June, 7,864 releases on compassionate grounds were authorised, in addition to over 25,000 in previous months.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENT1NCK: Does not the right hon. Gentleman consider that a soldier who is the only child of a widow in necessitous circumstances is a subject of compassion?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: Yes, certainly of compassion, but whether it falls within the category of compassionate cases or not is another matter.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCK: In view of the fact that compassionate regulations cause a great deal of hardship, is it not time they were amended?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I think we had much better try and wind up the whole question of retention of men in the Army. In the course of a limited number of months it will be achieved, and it is not worth while at this stage introducing a lot of complicated Regulations, when we are trying to bring them home from every theatre, and to release them as fast as we possibly can.

    ORDER OF RELEASE.
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir F. HALLasked the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that in the early days of the War a large number of men offered themselves for general service with the Colours, and at each attempt were refused as medically unfit; that in August, 1916, a scheme was put forward by the administration of the War Office whereby men, who had previously been rejected, could present themselves for re-examination and, if acceptable, subsequent enlistment; and whether, considering that such men evinced their willingness to serve their country at an early date after the outbreak of hostilities, he is prepared to consider their claim to demobilisation on the same lines as those laid down for the release of Derby men?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: The procedure set out in the Memorandum recently published was only decided upon after very careful consideration, as the beet method of releasing men and mitigating hardships. I regret, therefore, that I am unable to entertain my hon. and gallant Friend's suggestion.

    RAILWAY MEN.
    Mr. WATERSONasked the Secretary of State for War if he is aware of the need of railway men being released from the forces in order to cope with congested traffic and prevent overtime being worked; if he is aware that many of these men were not allowed to join the forces at the commencement of the War because of their occupation, which was vital to the country; and if he intends now to penalise these men by retaining them in the Army of Occupation?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: The demobilisation Regulations apply to all men alike. Any of the men referred to by the hon. Member who were applied for by the railway companies and registered by the War Office as pivotal or for special release, or who are otherwise eligible under the Memorandum recently published, will be released in accordance with procedure explained therein. I regret that I can take no special action to release men not provided for in those instructions.
    Mr. WATERSON: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that many of these men went to the recruiting offices three or four times, and were turned away because of their occupation, and at the present time they cannot get released from the Army, which is a serious penalisation on them, and is causing congestion of traffic on the railways?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I cannot reopen pivotalism under any circumstances. The only course worth while pursuing now is to release all these men—all Conscript men from the Army as fast as they can be released from the Colours.
    Mr. WATERSON: Has the right hon. Gentleman had any conversation with the Railway Executive with reference to the release of these men, or is that Executive merely relying on his generosity in this respect?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: No, Sir. The Government have come to the definite decision in principle that we will not reopen pivotalism in any shape at any time.

    1/9TH HAMPSHIRE TERRITORIALS.
    Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSONasked the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that the l/9th Hampshire Territorials have been on active service since 1914; whether he can state if any arrangements have been made to bring them back from India; and, if so, when they may be expected home?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: This battalion is serving in Siberia, and, as I stated during the Debate on Tuesday last, the two battalions in Siberia are to be withdrawn.

    1/4TH DEVON REGIMENT.
    Mr. GEORGE LAMBERTasked the Secretary of State for War if the l/4th Devon Regiment having served three years in Mesopotamia, and while waiting to embark for home, was detained in India
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    and is now to be sent to the Afghan front; and if he is aware that this regiment after its hardships is not fit to take part in a. new campaign?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: As I have already explained, it was found necessary, owing to the conditions prevailing in India, to detain men from Mesopotamia who were being sent home for demobilisation viâ India, but as soon as demobilisation in. that country recommences these men will be among the first to leave.
    Mr. LAMBERT: Has the right hon. Gentleman taken notice of the last part of the question as to whether these men are now to be sent to the Afghan front?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: No one is more anxious than I am that these Mesopotamian men should be brought home to this country at the earliest possible moment, and every instruction to that end has been given. At the same time the authorities in India are facing emergencies of a serious character at the present time.
    Mr. LAMBERT: Can the right hon. Gentleman reply to my question—are those men being sent to the Afghan front?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I do not know.

    IRISH VOLUNTEERS.
    Major O'NEILLasked the Secretary of State for War what priority in the extended scheme of demobilisation is given to Irish soldiers who volunteered for service after 1st January, 1916?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: The Memorandum recently published sets forth the procedure we hope to carry out for the release of all classes of men, and I regret that, unless the men referred to by my hon. and gallant Friend are provided for therein, I can take no steps to grant them any priority of release
    Major O'NEILL: Is he aware that the Memorandum does not provide for these men, and does he mean to say that these men are to placed in worse categories than Derby men who enlisted up to June 1916?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I think the gain will only be a very few months in the case of any class picked out for early release. We are bringing home and endeavouring to release all our conscript soldiers.
    Major O'NEILL: But may I point out that these men are not conscript soldiers;

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    and does he mean to say that absolutely no priority of any kind is to be given, as against Derby men, to Irish soldiers who volunteered, often in face of the strongest representations against volunteering, and can the Government give no other information than that which they have given me to-day about this matter?
    Mr. CHURCHILL: I will not refuse to consider the point, which undoubtedly is one of some substance.
    Sir F. HALL: Does he recognise that these people have been treated in a worse way than conscientious objectors?

  SANDHURST AND WOOLWICH (CADETS).
  Sir F. HALLasked the Secretary of State for War if it has been decided to revert to the pre-war arrangements as regards the fees and expenses of cadets entering Sandhurst and Woolwich; if the result of this will be to make it impossible for parents not possessing ample means to enter their sons for the Army; and if, in view of the proof afforded by the War of the importance of securing officers of intelligence and initiative, irrespective of their financial resources, he will consider the question of continuing the practice followed during the War, under which a career in the Army shall be open to all suitable candidates?
  Mr. FORSTER: The question of the scale of fees to be charged at Sandhurst and Woolwich is under consideration.
  Sir F. HALL: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me whether it is the intention of the Government in future to allow such conditions as will enable all classes of men to go to Sandhurst irrespective of the financial standing of the parents?
  Mr. FORSTER: That is the point that is under consideration now, and I hope when a decision will be reached it will be in accordance with the desires of the hon. and gallant Gentleman.
  Sir F. HALL: Will it be reached in the near future?
  Mr. FORSTER: I hope so, but I cannot say.

  WAR DECORATIONS (SERVICES AT HOME).
  Lieut.-Colonel RAWasked the Secretary of State for War if he will consider the desirability of awarding the General Service Medal to all those nurses and Voluntary Aid Detachment nurses who were engaged in nursing soldiers and sailors in home hospitals?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: As already stated, the question of an award in recognition of services rendered at home during the War is under consideration. I must add this word of warning in order not to encourage false hopes. Every medal which is given to people who did not take part in the fighting detracts from the distinction enjoyed by those who have earned their medals through taking part in the fighting.
  Mr. J. JONES: Does that include the men working on the guns for the barrage in connection with the air raids?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Up to the present, the only decision, taken by the Government is that the War Medal is to be given to those who embarked from this country to proceed to the theatre of war. When you come to consider the question of services rendered at home, quite another issue is raised and one which must be very carefully considered if justice is to be done.
  Mr. JONES: Will some medal be given to those people who took part in such operations at home?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: That is not settled yet, and I hope the House will think first of all of the soldier who went through the actual fighting.
  Mr. HOGGE: Will the right hon. Gentleman, at any rate, consider some concession to those men whom he and his predecessors compulsorily retained in this country in order to train them and who would otherwise have gone and desired to go all the time, and asked to go all the time, to the front?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Of course, there are numbers of hard cases. If a medal for home service is to be given, it must be considered entirely separate from the War Medal to those who went out to fight in the War. Whether it is practicable to give a medal for home service or not is

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  not yet decided, because the forms of service are very varied and the difficulties of appreciating them are so varied also.
  Mr. ROYCE: Does the right hon. Gentleman include in those the services of men engaged in connection with the rebellion in Ireland?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Up to the present time we are confining the War Medal to those who left this country to proceed to the theatre of war against the enemy. I do not regard the services which took place in Ireland as coming within that definition, though certainly a number of men lost their lives.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: If there is a separate medal for home service, will the right hon. Gentleman see that the ribbon is a different one from the other?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I take a strong view on this subject. I am in entire agreement with the purport of the question just asked by my hon. and gallant Friend.

  ARMY IN IRELAND (COST).
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Secretary of State for War what is the cost per month of the British Army in Ireland?
  Mr. FORSTER: Approximately £900,000.

  ARMY OFFICERS (PROMOTION).
  Major GLYNasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will consider the possibility of granting to all officers of the Regular Forces now serving who have completed ten years' service the right to retire at once with the pension to which they would be entitled in seven years time; whether he is aware that at present a considerable number of officers are remaining in the Service for the purpose of qualifying for a pension, thereby retarding the promotion of younger officers who have previously risen to higher, temporary, or acting rank, which they have filled with success and distinction; and whether, in the interest of the Army, younger officers shall not be discouraged as to their chances of promotion?
  Mr. FORSTER: The measures to be taken in furtherance of the object indicated by my hon. and gallant Friend are
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  already tinder consideration, but I am unable to adopt the precise method indicated by him.

  TERRITORIAL FORCE (CONDITIONS OF SERVICE).
  Major COURTHOPEasked the Secretary of State for War when he will announce the conditions of service and pay of the Territorial Force?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: It is hoped to make an announcement on this subject at a very early date.

  SOLDIERS' LEAVE (OVERSEA SERVICE).
  Captain FALCONasked the Secretary of State for War if soldiers who have served a long period overseas during the War without leave are entitled to seven days or any additional leave for every six months so served abroad without leave; and whether, if they are so entitled, facilties will be given to ensure that these men are now granted this extra leave?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The period of demobilisation furlough has been fixed at twenty-eight days in all cases. This furlough is additional to the one month's time-expired leave granted to warrant officers, non-commissioned officers and men under Army Council Instruction 851 of 1918, if entitled to the same on termination of engagement and retention with the Colours under the Military Service Acts. Careful consideration has been given, to the question of granting additional furlough or of a bonus in lieu in the cases suggested, but I regret it has been found impossible to depart from the existing Rules.

  CIVIL LIABILITIES DEPARTMENT (APPLICATION FOR ASSISTANCE).
  Major Earl WINTERT.ONasked the Secretary of State for War if he will explain why no answer has been sent to Mr. L. T. Jacobs, Southcot, 8, Pavilion Road, Worthing, in reply to the application he has made to the Civil Liabilities Board for assistance?
  The MINISTER for LABOUR (Sir R. Home): I have been asked to reply to this question. I have not received the application mentioned by the Noble and gallant

  159
  Member. If Mr. Jacobs will communicate with the Civil Liabilities Department at Savoy Court, Victoria Embankment, London, W.C. 2, I will see that the matter is inquired into.
  Earl WINTERTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman make inquiries as to whether there is not some default in the Department? Constantly men make application, and the answer is given in this House that no application has been received. This is about the third such case I have brought to his notice.
  Sir R. HORNE: I shall be very glad to make inquiries.

  EX-SERVICE MEN (EMPLOYMENT).
  Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEEasked the Secretary of State for War if he can say what steps have been taken to ascertain whether ex-Service men are available as motor drivers and to make the requirements of the War Office known; and whether he will consider the possibility of forming a corps of such men to act as motor drivers in place of the women at present employed, the necessity for whose employment has now ceased with the conclusion of Peace?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Instructions as regards the employment of men in civil life to fill vacancies created by demobilisation were issued to all commands shortly after the Armistice. The requirements of the War Office are fully made known through the medium of the Labour Exchanges. Ex-Service men are employed wherever possible. Revised terms for re-enlistment in the Army for mechanical transport duties have also been issued, which enable ex-soldiers who are motor drivers to re-enlist for short periods.
  There are certain services which it is considered must be performed by enlisted soldiers or properly enrolled persons; the number of women drivers employed is being gradually reduced as enlisted soldiers becomes available to take their places.
  With regard to the latter part of the question, I am afraid it is not feasible to form a separate corps of civilian drivers, as my hon. and gallant Friend suggests, but he may rest assured that ex-Service men are being, and will be, employed as far as the exigencies of the Service permit.
  Colonel ASHLEY: Is he aware that especially in Dublin and the surrounding districts, there are a large number of unemployed ex-Service men who were trained in the Army and are competent to drive motor cars, and that women continue to be employed there, in large numbers, and will he substitute these ex-Service men, when they come forward, for these women drivers?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: I will make an inquiry into the special fact which has been brought forward by my hon. and gallant Friend.

  FLAGS FOR SERVICE BATTALIONS.
  Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEEasked the Secretary of State for War whether, under the Army Order issued on 24th July, silk Union flags will be issued for service battalions disbanded prior to the Armistice, such as the 12th (Bristol) Battalion the Gloucestershire Regiment, which served in France from November, 1915, and was disbanded on the 5th October, 1918?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Yes, Sir.

  SERBIAN MILITARY DECORATIONS.
  Major ENTWISTLEasked the Secretary of State for War whether the recommendations of officers and men in the Mechanical Transport Section, Army Service Corps, Salonika Forces, for Serbian decorations, invited by the Serbian Government, have been rejected by the War Office; and, if so, for what reason?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: The answer to my hon. and gallant Friend's question is in the negative.

  INDIAN ARMY OFFICERS IN FRANCE (PAY).
  Colonel YATEasked the Financial Secretary to the War Office if he will state why officers of the Indian Army appointed to command brigades or divisions in France have not been paid at Indian rates the same as in other theatres of war; and will he have the money deducted from the pay of those officers refunded?
  Mr. FORSTER: I think my hon. and gallant Friend is under some misappre-

  161
  hension. Indian Army officers appointed to the staff of British formations have no claim to draw Indian staff rates whether in France or elsewhere. They draw British rates with the option of the pay of their last Indian appointment if more advantageous.
  Colonel YATE: If an officer in France is ordered to take command of a brigade, why should his pay be stopped?
  Mr. FORSTER: When the officer takes over an appointment in the British formation, he draws British rates of pay.
  Colonel YATE: What is the reason? He comes from India and is guaranteed Indian rates of pay; he is ordered to do certain duty, and he does it, and he is under his original guarantee.
  Mr. FORSTER: I would point out that in the last part of my answer I say that they have the option of the pay of their last Indian appointment if it is more advantageous to them.

  WEIGHTS AND MEASURES ACT.
  Mr. ALFRED SHORTasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has received any representations in favour of the administration of the Weights and Measures Acts being transferred from the police and put in the hands of civilian inspectors; and whether he will consider the advisability of taking steps to this end?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Shortt): The question has received much consideration, but I do not see my way at present to interfere with the discretion vested in local authorities with regard to it.

  INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS (SONS OF DEMOBILISED MEN).
  Major ENTWISTLEasked the Home Secretary whether Donald Hill, son of Gunner S. Hill, No. 39434, Royal Field Artillery, who was committed to the industrial school at Stockport in 1917 for playing truant from school during his father's absence on active service, can now be restored to his home, in view of the fact that his father was demobilised in March last and now desires his boy's return, and is capable and willing to look
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  after the boy in the future; and whether he will give general instructions in similar cases for the return of boys to their fathers when the latter are demobilised?
  Mr. SHORTT: I have caused inquiry to be made into this case and am communicating the facts to the hon. and gallant Member. I should not feel justified in giving general instructions such as are suggested in the latter part of the question, but all such cases will be considered sympathetically with reference to the history and character of the child and the character and circumstances of the parents.

  POLICE PENSIONS.
  Colonel ASHLEYasked the Home Secretary if he will state what steps are being taken to revise the pensions of those members of the police force who retired previous to the outbreak of war, in order to compensate them for the increased cost of living; and whether special consideration will be given to the claims of those who re joined subsequent to August, 1914?
  Lieut.-Colonel A. HERBERTasked the Home Secretary if those constables who left the force before 1914 are not to receive equal treatment with regard to pensions with" those who left the force later?
  Mr. SHORTT: I would refer the hon. and gallant Members to the replies which I gave to the hon. and gallant Members for Dùlwich and Yeovil on the 10th and 22nd July respectively.
  Colonel ASHLEY: Could the right hon. Gentleman answer that part of my question which is not answered, whether special consideration will be given to those who rejoined subsequent to August, 1914?
  Mr. SHORTT: I am afraid that cannot be done.

  WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION ACT.
  Mr. W. CARTERasked the Home Secretary whether he will expedite the findings of the Committee appointed to consider the Workmen's Compensation Act, as the high cost of living makes it impossible for the recipients of compensation to get the bare necessities of life?
  Mr. SHORTT: I am not in a position, to interfere with the procedure of the Com-

  163
  mittee, but I am sure that they will use the utmost expedition. Meanwhile, I have under consideration proposals which have been laid before me by certain organisations of employers and workmen for the Amendment of the Workmen's Compensation (War Addition) Act, 1917, and I hope that it will be possible to reach, in consultation with the general body of employers' organisations, an agreement which will enable me to take immediate action.

  PROHIBITION CAMPAIGN.
  Mr. INSKIPasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that a number of American subjects are preparing a campaign in this country on American lines, to be financed by American money, with a view to the prohibition of the sale of alcoholic drinks; and whether, in view of the bitterness and disorder which this campaign may arouse in this country at a very critical time, he will consider the possibility of informing these persons that the British electors prefer to settle their domestic questions for themselves?
  Mr. SHORTT: I am not indisposed to agree with the suggestion that the British people can settle this matter for itself, but as I informed the hon. Member for Nottingham last Thursday, I do not think any steps by the Government are necessary.
  Sir J. D. REES: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the hon. Member for Nottingham was not satisfied with that answer?
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Will any obstacle be placed in the way of our retaliation, of our sending missionaries to America to reconvert them back to our system in this country?
  Mr. SHORTT: Perhaps my hon. and gallant Friend will consider that.

  UNITED STATES AMBASSADOR.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAYasked the Prime Minister whether he is now in a position to announce the appointment of a British Ambassador to the United States of America?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I regret that I am not yet in a position to state the name of the new Ambassador,
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Minister-Plenipotentiary, Mr. Barclay, who did very valuable work, is now back in this country; that the Chargé d' Affaires at the Embassy has not yet received the rank of Counsellor; that the bulk of the Embassy staff is new; and that there is a Minister on the Front Bench who would fill the post very admirably?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I have no doubt as to the last part of the question. The reason, for the delay is that we felt that at that moment nothing could be more important for the future relations of the whole world than to get the best man possible for this post. It is now under consideration, and if, as I hope, he is able to accept it, I am sure the House will think it has been worth while waiting.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: Are we likely to have that information before the House rises?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I shall certainly be greatly disappointed if we are not able to-announce the name before the House rises.

  CIVIL LIST PENSIONS.
  Mr. RAPERasked the Prime Minister the number of persons on the Civil List of pensions, the average annual amount paid, the highest and lowest pensions, and the total amount?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: There are at present 310 persons drawing Civil List Pensions— the average pension being £77. The highest is one of £300, and the lowest one of £20. The total amount of pensions at present in existence is £23,714.

  CELLULOSE INQUIRY.
  Mr. RAPERasked the Prime Minister When Lord Simmer's Report on the cellulose inquiry will be forthcoming?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: It is hoped that the Report will be in the hands of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the course of a few days.
  Mr. RAPER: Is it not a fact that it was stated in this House by the Prime Minister, in reply to a similar question a few weeks ago, that the Report would be forthcoming before the end of last month, and may I take it the Report will be forthcoming before the House adjourns?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I think that is certain.
  Mr. LAMBERT: Will the Report be in the hands of Members as well as the Chancellor of the Exchequer?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Oh, yes.

  PEACE TREATY.

    BULGARIA.
    Sir F. HALLasked the Prime Minister if the terms of the Peace Treaty proposed by the Allies in the case of Bulgaria have yet been determined; if they have been presented to the Bulgarian Government; and whether such terms provide for the cession to Bulgaria of any territory which was not in her possession before she entered into the War?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. The other two parts, therefore, do not arise.

    MILCH COWS FROM GERMANY AND AUSTRIA.
    Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the fact that the shortage of milk is not such as seriously to affect the population of Belgium and France, and that the withdrawal of 140,000 milch cows from Germany and Austria would endanger the lives of 600,000 babies, the Government will take steps to induce the Governments of France and Belgium to postpone execution of this obligation?
    Mr. BONAR LAW: I cannot add anything to the previous replies on this subject.

  LIQUOR TRADE (STATE CONTROL).
  Mr. SITCHasked the Prime Minister whether at any time during the War the War Cabinet had definitely resolved upon a policy of State purchase and public control of the liquor trade; if so, whether in the interval the considerations which induced them to adopt this policy have lost anything of their force; and, if not, whether it may be assumed that the Government are still prepared at the appropriate moment to give effect to this policy?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I have nothing to add to the reply which I gave to the hon. Member for Silver town on 6th July.

  MISS VIOLET DOUGLAS-PENNANT (SELECT COMMITTEE).
  Sir J. BUTCHERasked the Prime Minister whether the expenses of the Select Committee ordered by the House of Lords on the case of Miss Violet Douglas-Pennant will appear on the Votes and, if so, under what heading; and whether the Government will consider the desirability of refusing to pay any of the expenses of this Committee?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Any such expenses would be chargeable to the Vote for House of Lords' Offices, which includes provision for witnesses attending the Committees and shorthand-writers. The answer to the last part of the question is in the negative.
  Sir J. D. REES: May I ask what course the head of a Department must adopt in future when he thinks it desirable to remove a lady who by birth, brains, or beauty possesses powerful influence?
  Mr. SPEAKER: That does not arise out of this question.

  FEDERAL DEVOLUTION.
  Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONasked the Prime Minister when the Committee on Federal Devolution will be appointed?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the answer which I gave yesterday to a question by my hon. and gallant friend the Member for Midlothian and Peebles.

  GENERAL STRIKE.
  Lord R. CECILasked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the proposal to bring about a general strike of all those engaged in the coal-mining, railway, and other transport industries so as to force the Government, by the dislocation of those industries, to adopt certain policies in connection with Russia, military service, and conscientious objectors; and whether this House can be assured that the Government will resist with all the resources at its disposal this revolutionary attempt to set aside the constitutional authorities of this country by the action of sectional organisations of its citizens?
  Mr. BONARLAW: Any attempt to force a decision on political questions which affect the whole community by the methods suggested in the question would, if it were successful, mean the end of democratic and constitutional Government in this country, and it is, therefore, unnecessary to say that it would be the duty of the Government to resist such an attempt with all the resources at their disposal.
  Mr. J. JONES: Will equal treatment be served out to all who disobey the laws?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Certainly.
  Mr. ROSE: In, view of the momentous issues developed by this agitation, and in view of the fact that the Labour party have chosen to play the role of Mr. Facing-both-ways in reference to it, will the right hon. Gentleman give facilities to the House for discussing this question and coming to an opinion?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I really do not think there is any doubt—I should be sorry to believe there was any doubt—as to the opinion of the House upon this question.

  PEACE CELEBRATIONS (EAST LONDON).
  Major BLAIRasked the Prime Minister if, in view of the fact that the East End of London has always, since the Armistice, been left out of official Peace celebrations, processions, triumphal marches, and pageants, he will give the reason why the River Pageant yesterday could not have started opposite Greenwich and Poplar and finished at Chelsea instead of making the return journey and thus afforded a larger number of wounded and war workers an opportunity of viewing the pageant; and, considering the amount of war service done by the residents of the eastern portion of the Metropolis, will he see that the East End has its share in any future official rejoicing?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The River Pageant was not a part of the official Peace celebrations, although the Admiralty rendered every assistance possible. I am informed that the factors governing the length of the course were time, tide, landing facilities, and the fact that the principal boats-were pulling boats which rendered any extension impracticable. As regards the position of the East End, I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the previous answers which I have given on this subject.

  SUB-POST OFFICES (FAIR-WAGES CLAUSE).
  Mr. R. YOUNGasked the Prime Minister whether the Fair-Wages Clause which is inserted in all Government con tracts requires all Government contractors to pay the rates of wages agreed upon between the employers and the workpeople's representatives; whether this Clause is inserted in all agreements between the Post master-General and the contractors who act as scale-payment sub-postmasters; and, if not, whether he will see that such a Clause is inserted for the protection of the badly-paid clerks for whose conditions the Postmaster-General declines responsibility?
  The ASSISTANT POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Pease): There is no agreed rate of wages for assistants at sub-offices, but sub-postmasters are required to give their assistants not less favourable pay and conditions of service than those of shop assistants in the service of good shopkeepers in the same district.

  COAL INDUSTRY COMMISSION.
  Lord H. CAVENDISH-BENTINCKasked the Prime Minister whether the Government has decided on a policy with reference to the second Report of the Sankey Commission?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I can add nothing to previous replies on this subject.

  MINISTRY OF WAYS AND COMMUNICATIONS.
  Colonel GRETTONasked the Prime Minister if any appointments have been made to the staff of the proposed Ministry of Ways and Communications; if any offices are yet acquired; and if any salaries have yet been paid on account of the staff of the new Ministry?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: No appointments have yet been made, but certain highly qualified officials have been invited, in the event of the Ministry of Ways and Communications being established, to join the staff. The names of these gentlemen have been announced. No offices are yet acquired, and no salaries have been paid on account of the staff of the new Ministry.

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  A certain number of staff from other Departments have been loaned in connection with the preparation of the Bill.

  CENTRAL CONTROL BOARD (LIQUOR TRAFFIC).
  Colonel GRETTONasked the Prime Minister when the proposals of the Government for the abolition of the Central Control Board (Liquor Traffic) and setting up a Commission in its place will be laid before Parliament; and will these proposals involve legislation?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I regret that I am not yet in a position to make any statement. The answer to the last part of the question is in the affirmative.
  Sir S. HOARE: Can my right hon. Friend say when he will introduce the Bill of which he spoke?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: We do not know that it will be possible to introduce it before the Recess.

  MR. JUSTICE SANKEY.
  Sir RICHARD COOPERasked the Prime Minister if Mr. Justice Sankey, before his elevation to the bench, had held the position of standing counsel to the Miners' Federation; and was this fact brought to his notice when he asked Mr. Justice Sankey to preside over the recent Coal Commission?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I am unaware whether or not the suggestion contained in the question represents the facts; but I am quite certain that the inuendo which it contains against the impartiality of a Judge of the Realm ought not to be made.
  Sir R. COOPER: Is it not in the public interest that rumours which have got very widespread should be crushed by hon. Members asking deliberate questions on the matter?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: No; but I think it is in the public interest that Members of this House should do their best not to spread, but to crush such rumours.
  Mr. W. CARTER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that questions of that kind usually come out of the minds of men who judge of the character and honour of other people by their own?

  PRIME MINISTER (ATTENDANCE AT THE HOUSE).
  Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSONasked the Lord Privy Seal whether the absence of the Prime Minister at Question Time is to be a permanent arrangement for the present Parliament, or whether the Prime Minister will resume the leadership of this House at the earliest possible moment?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I can add nothing to what has already been said on this subject.
  Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: May I very respectfully ask the Leader of the House whether the arrangement that now exists is to be permanent throughout the present Parliament?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: No, Sir. We have come to no conclusion in that respect. All that has been decided is that, so long as the pressure on the Prime Minister is as great as it is now, we shall not alter the present arrangement.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: The House as a whole quite understands the great pressure upon the time of the Prime Minister at present, and also understands that he is very much wearied with his great labours in Paris—we all understand that—but can the right hon. Gentleman give any assurance that when the House meets after the Autumn Vacation we may expect to see the Prime Minister take his accustomed place in the House of Commons?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: No, Sir, I cannot give that assurance. But I can say that it is only a question of special pressure. At this moment, so far as I can judge, the pressure on the time of the Prime Minister is as great as it was during the War.
  Lieut.-Colonel A. MURRAY: Would not the pressure on the Prime Minister be removed if ordinary Cabinet Government were resumed?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: No, Sir.

  NATIONAL FINANCE.
  Mr. G. MURRAYasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in order to attract investments from sources which have not been tapped by the Victory Loan, and with a view to reducing the floating debt, he will consider the desirability of issuing a long-term loan bearing interest at 1¾If per cent., and free of Income Tax, Super-tax, and Death Duties?
  The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Chamberlain): I shall naturally consider all suggestions for dealing with the debt, but, as at present advised, I do not think I could adopt the policy of a tax-free loan of the kind indicated.
  Mr. LAMBERTasked what were the amounts of the currency note issues on the 1st April, 1918, the 1st April, 1919, and the 1st August, 1919; what were the Bank of England note issues for the same dates; and the amount of the gold reserve?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The nearest available figures are as follow:
  Currency Notes. —3rd April, 1918, £230,851,192; 2nd April, 1919, £332,122,712; 30th July, 1919, £338,787,087. Bank of England Notes. —3rd April, 1918, £79,007,145; 2nd April, 1919, £101,943,655; 30th July, 1919, £104,681,285. The gold held in the Currency Note Reserve Account has been on all three dates £28,500,000, and that held by the Bank of England Issue Department at the dates named £60,557,145, £83,493,655, and £86,231,285 respectively.
  Major O'NEILLasked the exact amount of the floating debt which has been or will be liquidated as a result of the recent Government Loan and the amount which will remain outstanding after such liquidation?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Between the 12th July, the date on which the Loan closed, and the 2nd instant, there has been a net reduction in the floating debt of about £377,000,000, the total outstanding being reduced from £1,558,676,600 to £1,181,255,600. There are about £90,000,000 of the proceeds of the Loans still to be received. I give these figures with all reserve, since the extent to which it may be possible to make any further reduction or even to maintain the reduction already made must depend on how far the Budget estimates of receipts and expenditure can be made good.
  Major O'NEILL: In regard to the reduction of the floating debt, and the result of the Loan as it affects it, is the £250,000,000 which is to be borrowed for this year's current expenditure, referred to in the answer of the right hon. Gentleman, considered a reduction of the floating debt?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The hon. and gallant Member asks me what amount of floating debt has been or will be
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  liquidated. I have told him the amount of the floating debt which has been liquidated. I have given these figures, subject to a caution as to the future which was indicated at the end of my answer. What the position of the floating debt will be at the end of the financial year depends upon the question of how far the estimate of receipts and expenditure given to the Budget Statement is realised.
  Sir D. MACLEANasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the amount of Treasury notes issued at the date of the Armistice, at 1st January, 1919, at 1st May,. 1919, and at 1st July, 1919?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The currency notes (including certificates) outstanding, as shown in the weekly Return published in the "London Gazette," have been as follow:

  £

  13th November, 1918

  …

  293,790,972

  1st January, 1919

  …

  323,240,501

  30th April, 1919

  …

  348,339,626

  2nd July, 1919

  …

  342,952,149

  I am glad to be able to add that on 31st July the amount had fallen to £338,787,087.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: May I ask my right hon. Friend, in view of the very serious position disclosed by these figures, whether he has brought to the notice of the Prime Minister the very great urgency of a ruthless cutting down of unnecessary public expenditure'?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: My right hon. Friend is as fully seised of the necessity for economy in every branch of public expenditure as I myself am; and I take this opportunity of expressing my gratitude to him for the assistance he has given me.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Am I correct in assuming that at the present moment the currency note issue is £40.000,000 larger than it was at the date of the Armistice?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I think my right hon. Friend can make the calculation in his head as rapidly as I can.
  Sir F. BANBURY: As the right hon. Gentleman has asked me to make the calculation, will he take my answer that my calculation is correct?

  INCOME TAX.
  Mr. T. WILSONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is

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  aware that, under a recommendation of the Coal Industry Commission, miners received during April last arrears of pay for work done in the previous financial year; whether this sum will be reckoned as part of this year's income; and whether, in view of the fact that to reckon it as part of this year's income in the case of a man whose income last year was under the Income Tax limit will work hardship, ho will give instructions that this particular sum shall be regarded as income for the previous year?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The arrears of pay to which the hon. Member refers are regarded for Income Tax purposes as earnings of the quarter in respect of which they accrued —i.e., the quarter ended 5th April last —and will not be reckoned as part of this year's income.
  Mr. MURCHISONasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether any stops can be taken to prevent the loss of revenue to the Treasury caused by a large number of people who are not ordinarily resident in this country investing their money in War Loan for the sole purpose of avoiding the payment of Income Tax?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The exemption in question is one of the privileges given under the terms of certain war issues, and there can, of course, be no question of depriving holdersof such issues of their prospectus rights.

  SUPER-TAX.
  Mr. MURCHISONasked what steps, if any, are taken to collect Super-tax from British subjects who are not ordinarily resident in this country and whose incomes are over the Super-tax limit?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Non-residents who are known to be in receipt of income from this country in excess of the Super tax exemption limit are called upon to make returns in the same way as residents. Provision is also made in Section 7 of the Income Tax Act, 1918, for the assessment of non-residents through resident agents where such exist. I may add that the law is not effective to secure the collection of Super-tax in all cases from persons resident outside the jurisdiction of the Courts of this country, and that the question of the avoidance of Super-tax by non-residents is one of the matters which will be considered by the Royal Commission on the Income Tax.

  ACCOUNTANTS (APPOINTMENTS).
  Commander BELLAIRSasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that the restriction of permanent appointments as accountants in the Board of Inland Revenue in a recent advertisement to members of certain societies prevents many public accountants of wide experience and practical ability in every branch of their profession applying; whether he is aware that mere membership of any society gives no guarantee that the applicant is a practical accountant; and whether, in order to widen the field of selection and obtain the best men, he will allow members of other incorporated societies of accountants to apply for the appointments?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the reply I gave to a question by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Deptford on the 15th ultimo.

  AUSTRIA-HUNGARY (PEACE TERMS).
  Sir F. HALLasked the Prime Minister if he can state approximately the latest date which will be agreed to by the Allies for the acceptance or rejection of the terms of peace which have been offered to Austria-Hungary?
  Mr. HARMSWORTH: The Austrians have been given to 6th August to reply to the Allied peace terms. Until such reply is received and considered no date can be given by which the term must be finally accepted. No terms of peace have as yet been submitted to Hungary.

  NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.

    ACCIDENT IN TRENCHES.
    Mr. N. MACLEANasked the Pensions Minister whether he is aware that ex-Private George Armstrong, No. 46G1, 18th Highland Light Infantry, has been discharged from the Army and refused a pension, although he has lost one of his legs through an accident with his rifle in the trenches; whether he is aware that this soldier has served four years and five days during the War, was wounded at the Somme, 17th July. 1916, and gassed at Guillemont Farm, 9th July, 1917, and has

    175
    been given the silver badge; whether he is aware that this man is now compelled, in order to earn a living for his wife and three children, to play an organ in the streets of Glasgow; and what steps he is prepared to take to secure to this man the pension to which his service and disability entitle him?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of PENSIONS (Colonel Sir James Craig): Pension could not be awarded to Private Armstrong under the Royal Warrant, because the accident was caused by his own serious negligence while he was cleaning his rifle. In the circumstances of this case, however, the Treasury were approached with a view to the Grant of a modified pension under the Dispensing Warrant, and authority has now been obtained to award Private Armstrong a pension of 22s. a week for thirteen weeks and then 11s. a week permanently, with proportionate children's allowances. Immediate steps are being taken for the issue of this pension
    Mr. MACLEAN: Does not the granting of the silver badge acquit this soldier of any fault with regard to negligence and will the hon. and gallant Gentleman take into consideration the possibility of granting to this soldier the full pension and thus removing from the streets of Glasgow a sight which is causing a good deal of unrest amongst the people.
    Sir J. CRAIG: When the pension warrant was drawn up it had no relation whatever to the silver badge. In the meantime I think we have done all that is possible to modify the form of pension for this man.
    Mr. CLYNES: In a case like this could not the hon. and gallant Gentleman cause steps to be taken which would continue the support to be given to the women and children referred to in the question, even though the man might be in fault.
    Sir J. CRAIG: I will consider this point with the Minister.
    Mr. MACLEAN: Does the hon. and gallant Gentleman know the circumstances, because this man is playing a barrel organ in the streets—[AN HON. MEMBER: "Speak up, you are just having a conversation."]

    TREATMENT ALLOWANCE.
    Colonel ASHLEYasked, in view of the fact that where a disabled man's medical adviser disagrees with the medical referee an independent medical man may be called in; why the case of Private A. Kemp, No. 12101, Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry, was not referred to an independent medical man when the matter was brought to the notice of the Ministry, as not only this man's medical adviser but the medical officer of the Birmingham General Hospital, where he attended for treatment under instructions from the pensions committee, both certified that he was unfit for work, while the medical referee stated that he was fit for light in-work and in consequence his treatment allowance was stopped; and whether this case will be reconsidered with a view to-the retrospective payment of treatment allowance from November, 1918, to March, 1919, when Kemp was compelled to return to work against medical advice?
    Sir J. CRAIG: On the report of the medical referee that Mr. Kemp was "fit for light sedentary work," treatment allowances ceased on the 26thNovember, 1918. In the following month the pension was re-assessed at 80 per cent. and payment at that rate has been made as from the date when the treatment allowances ceased. The certificates given in this case by Mr. Kemp's medical adviser and by the hospital medical officer appear to have been in the form "that he is not fit for his usual employment," which does not necessarily conflict with the medical referee's certificate.

  STEAMSHIP "MACEDONIA" (REPAIRS).
  Mr. G. LLOYDasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Shipping Controller if he is aware that the steamship "Macedonia" was ordered to Newport, Monmouthshire, for refitting over six months ago; if the nature of the repairs are unusual for the port, and if they are too extensive for the port; if there is but a very limited supply of shipwright labour; if such shipwright labour as is available refuse to work overtime; if there have been continual delays and interruptions during the progress of the work; and if he will in the public interest order the vessel to some other port for completion of repairs?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Dr. Macnamara): I have been asked to reply. I am advised that after consultation with the local authorities, the repairs to this ship were not considered too extensive for the port in question. Shipwright labour is limited and in great demand all over the country. There have been delays and interruption during the progress of the work, but at this late period it is not considered expedient to order the vessel to another port for her completion.

  TRANSPORT WORKERS' BATTALIONS.
  Mr. MARSHALL STEVENSasked what civilian work the transport workers' battalions, recently disbanded, performed under the direction of the Port and Transit Executive Committee; whether they were solely used to supplement proved deficiencies in civilian labour, or whether they were used to compete with civilian labour; what disputes with labour arose through their employment; what number of soldiers formed the battalions; what was the aggregate time worked by the men, the tonnage of traffic handled by them, and the civil pay earned by them; to what extent was the work of the battalions effective; and did they while serving at the ports maintain their efficiency as units in the Home Defence Army?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of SHIPPING (Colonel Wilson): The transport workers battalions supplemented civilian labour wherever there was a proved shortage in the ports, railway centres, canals, and iron and steel works in the discharge of cargoes. They were solely used to supplement proved deficiencies in civilian labour, and on no occasion did they ever compete with civilian labour, nor were there any disputes with civil labour in regard to the employment of men of the Transport Workers' Battalions. The Transport Workers' Battalion scheme was inaugurated with the sanction of the War Cabinet in May, 1916, one battalion being then formed. Early in 1917 the number of the battalions was increased to a strength of 5,000 men, and ultimately to an effective strength of 35,000.
  The men did some 5,712,200 days' work throughout; they handled 27,341,000 tons, they earned £2,069,245 of civil pay, and
  178
  while so working saved £980,000 to Army funds by paying for their own food and billets. The work of the battalions again and again stopped a port becoming blocked. I am glad to say that the scheme was a complete success from the start, and from all reports received by the Port and Transit Executive Committee the battalions maintained a very high state of efficiency as units of the Homo Defence Army.
  Mr. STEVENS: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman consider the granting of some honours to this wonderful battalion of workers to-morrow?
  Colonel WILSON: This battalion has already received some thirty-two decorations, and fourteen more have been recommended. I hope my hon. Friend's suggestion will receive favourable consideration from the authorities.

  CARPENTERS AND JOINERS (WAGES).
  Mr. T. WILSONasked the Secretary for Scotland if he is aware that the Board of Agriculture for Scotland is employing carpenters and joiners on work at Nigg, Ross-shire, and only paying them at the rate of 1s. 4d. per hour for a fifty-two-hour week, the rate of pay for the district being 1s. 8 ¾d. per hour for a forty-four-hour week; and whether he will take steps to enforce the provisions of the Fair-Wages Clause in connection with this work?
  The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Mr. Munro): I am informed by the Board of Agriculture for Scotland that the carpenters and joiners employed by them at Nigg, Ross-shire, are paid at the maximum rate for the district in which they are employed. The rate of Is. 8 ¾d. mentioned by the hon. Member is, I understand, a rate fixed for Invergordon and district under an agreement between certain contractors and the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters, Cabinet-Makers, and Joiners. According to the information before me, Nigg does not lie within this district.

  HOUSING SCHEMES (SCOTLAND).
  Mr. RODGERasked if the Scottish Board of Health has fixed or recom-

  179
  mended that rooms in houses erected under housing schemes be limited to the following dimensions: Area of floors, living room 180 feet, principal bedroom 150 feet, second bedroom 100 feet, height of ceiling 8 ½ feet; and, if so, will he specially reconsider the dimensions of the living room both as to area and height of ceiling, in order that the houses may better fulfil the necessary conditions of family comfort?
  Mr. MUNRO: The floor areas of the apartments cited by my hon. Friend are those referred to in the Report by the Committee on Building Construction, presided over by the hon. Member for Bright-side as being desirable minima, and they have been adopted as such by the Scottish Board of Health in houses being erected under State assistance. The Board, however, have neither fixed nor recommended that the floor areas of the apartments in question should be limited to these dimensions. They have approved many plans showing greater floor areas. As regards the height of ceilings, the Board are of opinion that a height of 8 ft. 6 ins. is sufficient for one and two-storeyed houses. In tenements, however, minimum of 9 ft. is insisted upon.

  FOOD SUPPLIES.

    POTATOES.
    Mr. WILLIAM SHAWasked the Food Controller if he can now state the tonnage of 1918 potatoes remaining on the hands of growers in Scotland for which compensation has been claimed; what the approximate loss to the Exchequer will be; and will he state the number of tons claimed for, respectively, by farmers and merchant-growers, and the number of tons claimed for by the members of the allocation committees?
    The MINISTER of FOOD (Mr. Roberts): The total quantity of potatoes tendered by Scottish growers on the 30th June was 51,000 tons, including 649 tons tendered by merchant-growers and 984 tons by members of the Allocation Authority. Of this quantity, 29,000 tons have been delivered since the 30th June. It is impossible at present to give any estimate of the loss to the Exchequer, as a large proportion of the loss will fall to be borne by foreign Governments who
    180
    have failed to take delivery of the whole of the potatoes which they contracted to buy.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Sir D. MACLEAN: May I ask the Leader of the House what Bill he proposes to take after eleven o'clock to-night, and particularly what he proposes to take after nine o'clock? Will it be either the Ministries and Secretaries Bill or the War-Emergency Laws (Continuance) Bill?
Mr. BONAR LAW: We only hope to take the first two Orders to-day. We should like to proceed with the Ministries and Secretaries Bill if we have an opportunity after nine o'clock.
Sir D. MACLEAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the great interest taken in the Ministries and Secretaires Bill? I think we should be given an opportunity of raising questions relating to the Prime Minister and the War Cabinet.
Sir F. BANBURY: Does the right hon. Gentleman intend to take more than one stage of any Bill after eleven o'clock?
Mr. BONAR LAW: Not to-night. I think we had better judge of the form the discussion is likely to take after we come to the Bill. I am sure my right hon. Friend and the House will realise that it is very important, if we can, to push on these Committees on account of the Adjournment.
Lieut.-Colonel GUINNESS: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Ministries and Secretaries Bill is the second Order?
Mr. BONAR LAW: I said we would take the first two Orders, and I would take the Ministries and Secretaries Bill after nine o'clock.
Lord R. CECIL: I would like to know whether the Government intends to issue any Paper explanatory of the Welsh Church Tenporalities Bill, and, if so, when will it be issued?
Mr. BONAR LAW: Such a Memorandum has been prepared, and the delay is due to difficulties of printing. I think it will be available this afternoon, or, at any rate, by to-morrow.
Colonel ASHLEY: Are we to distinctly understand that the War Emergency Laws (Continuance) Bill is not to be taken to-night? If that be so, will the right hon.

181
Gentleman say when it is going to be taken, because a good many hon. Members attach great interest to it?
Mr. BONAR LAW: It is not going to be taken to night, but I cannot say now when it will be taken.
Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: May I put a point to you, Mr. Speaker, with reference to the Forestry Bill? A Report has been issued which is largely founded upon, the Report of a Sub-committee of the Reconstruction Committee. I asked in the Vote Office this morning whether I could obtain a copy of that Report for 1917, and there was no such Report in the Vote Office. 1 wish to ask whether on a similar occasion in the future it will be possible to obtain such a Report in regard to a question of this kind before the House is asked to consider it?
Mr. SPEAKER: If the hon. and gallant Gentleman had given me notice, I would have seen that copies were there. But it is impossible to know what hon. Members may want, and it is not practicable to keep
all documents in the Vote Office, which is very small. They are, however, all kept in the Sale Office, and if the hon. and gallant Member will go down to that office, which is only a few steps further, he will be able to get a copy.
Captain W. BENN: There are thirteen pages of the Schedule of the War Emergency Laws (Continuance) Bill relating to War enactments which it is proposed to continue. Would the right hon. Gentleman consider the possibility of publishing a Paper, so that hon. Members may know what are these enactments?
Mr. BONAR LAW: I will consider that suggestion with my right hon. Friend who has prepared the Bill.
Motion made, and Question put,
"That the Proceedings on Government Business be exempted at this day's Sitting from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sitting of the House)."—[Mr. Bonar Law]
The House divided: Ayes, 224; Noes, 50.

Division No. 83.]

AYES.

[3.56 p.m.

Adair, Rear-Admiral

Cooper, Sir Richard Ashmole

Hacking, Captain D. H.

Adkins, Sir W. Ryland D.

Coote, Colin R. (Isle of Ely)

Hall, Lieut.-Col. Sir Fred. (Dulwich)

Agg-Gardner, Sir James Tynte

Cope, Major W. (Glamorgan)

Harmsworth, Cecil B. (Luton, Beds.)

Ainsworth, Captain c.

Courthope, Major George Loyd

Harris, Sir H. P. (Paddington, S.)

Astor, Major Hon. Waldort

Cowan, D. M. (Scottish University)

Henderson, Major V. L,

Atkey, A. R.

Cowan, Sir H. (Aberdeen and Kinc.)

Hennessy, Major G.

Bagley, Captain E. A.

Craig, Col. Sir James (Down, Mid.)

Henry, Danis S. (Londonderry, S.)

Baird, John Lawrence

Craig, Lt.-Com. N. (Isle of Thanet)

Herbert, Col. Hon. A. (Yeovil)

Baldwin, Stanley

Craik, Right Hon. Sir Henry

Herbert, Denniss (Hertford)

Barnes, Rt. Hon. G. N. (Gorbals)

Curzon, Commander Viscount

Hewart, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

Barnston, Major Harry

Davies, Sir Joseph (Crewe)

Hinds, John

Barrand, A. R.

Davies, T. (Cirencester)

Hoare, Lt.-Col. Sir Samuel J. G.

Bellairs, Com. Carlyon W.

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

Hope, Harry (Stirling)

Benn, Sir Arthur S. (Plymouth)

Davies, M. Vaughan- (Cardigan)

Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

Bennett, T. J.

Dawes, J. A.

Hope, Lt.-Col. Sir J. (Midlothian)

Bentinck, Lt. Col. Lord H. Cavendish

Dennis, J. W.

Hopkins, J. W. W.

Betterton, H. B.

Doyle, N. Grattan

Hopkinson, Austin (Mossley)

Birchall, Major J. D.

Du Pre, Colonel W. B.

Houston, Robert Paterson

Bird, Alfred

Edge, Captain William

Hughes, Spencer Leigh

Blair, Major Reginald

Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

Hunter, Gen. Sir A. (Lancaster)

Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

Eyres-Monsell, Commander

Jameson, Major J. G.

Borwick, Major G. O.

Falcon, Captain M.

Jesson, C.

Boscawen, Sir Arthur Griffith-

Falle, Major Sir Bertram Godfray

Jodrell, N. P.

Bowles. Col. H. F.

Farquharson, Major A. C.

Johnstone, J.

Bowyer, Captain G. W. E.

Fisher, Rt. Hon. Herbert A. L.

Jones, G. W. H. (Stoke Newington)

Boyd-Carpenter, Major A.

FitzRoy, Capt. Hon. Edward A.

Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

Bridgeman, William Clive

Flannery, Sir J. Fortescue

Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen)

Buchanan, Lieut.-Col. A. L. H.

Forestier-Walker, L.

Jones, William Kennedy (Hornsey)

Burdon, Colonel Rowland

Forster, Rt. Hon. H. W.

Kelly, Major Fred (Rotherham)

Carr, W. T.

Foxcroft, Captain C.

Kidd, James

Carter, R. A. D. (Manchester)

France, Gerald Ashburner

Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

Casey, T. W.

Ganzoni, Captain F. C.

Knights, Captain H.

Cecil, Rt. Hon. Evelyn (Astor Manor)

George, Rt. Hon. David Lloyd

Lane-Fox, Major G. R.

Cecil, Rt. Hon. Lord Hugh (Oxford U.)

Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

Larmor, sir J.

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. J. A. (Birm., W.)

Gilmour, Lieut.-Colonel John.

Law, Right Hon. A. Bonar (Glasgow)

Chamberlain, N. (Birm., Ladywood)

Glyn, Major R.

Lewis, T. A. (Pontypridd, Glam.)

Child, Brig,-General Sir Hill

Goff, Sir R. Park

Lindsay, William Arthur

Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

Gray, Major E.

Locker-Lampson, Com. O. (Hunt'don)

Clay, Captain H. H. Spender

Green, J. F. (Leicester)

Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)

Cough, R.

Greenwood, Col. Sir Hamar

Loseby, Captain C. E.

Cobb, Sir Cyril

Greig, Colonel James William

M'Donald, Dr. B. F. P. (Wallasey)

Cohen, Major J. B. B.

Gretton, Colonel John

Macdonald, Rt. Hon. J. M. (Stirling)

Colvin, Brigadier-General R. II.

Guinness, Capt. Hon. (Southend)

M'Laren, R. (Lanark, N.)

Conway, Sir W, Martin

Guinness, Lt.-Col. Hon. W. E. (B. St. E.)

Macquisten, F. A.

Maddocks, Henry

Prescott, Major W. H.

Talbot, G. A. (Hemel Hempstead)

Magnus, Sir Philip

Pretyman, Rt. Hon. Ernest G.

Taylor, J. (Dumbarton)

Malone, Col. C. L. (Leyton, E.)

Purchase, H. G.

Terrell, G. (Chippenham, Wilts)

Mason, Robert

Rae, H. Norman

Terrell, Capt. R. (Henley, Oxford)

Matthews, David

Raeburn, Sir William

Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, S.)

Mildmay, Col. Rt. Hon. Francis B.

Raper, A. Baldwin

Thomson, T. (Middlesbrough, W.)

Moles, Thomas

Raw, Lieut.-Colonel Dr. N.

Tryon, Major George Clement

Moreing, Captain Algernon H.

Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

Vickers, D.

Mount, William Arthur

Rees, Sir J. D. (Nottingham, E.)

Waddington, R.

Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

Rendall, Athelstan

Wallace J.

Murchison, C. K.

Roberts, Rt. Hon. George H. (Norwich)

Ward, Colonel L. (Kingston-upon-Hull)

Murray, Lt.-Col. Hon. A. C. (Aberdeen)

Roberts, Sir S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

Wardle, George J.

Murray, Major C. D. (Edinburgh, S.)

Robinson, S. (Brecon and Radnor)

Waring, Major Walter

Murray, Hon. G. (St. Rollox)

Rodger, A. K.

Warren, Sir Alfred H.

Murray, William (Dumfries)

Roundell, Lieutenant-Colonel R. F.

Watson, Captain John Bertrand

Nall, Major Joseph

Rowlands, James

White, Col. G. D. (Southport)

Neal, Arthur

Samuel, A. M. (Farnham, Surrey)

Whitla, Sir William

Nelson, R. F. W. R.

Sanders, Colonel Robert Arthur

Whittaker, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas P.

Newman, Sir R. H. S. D. (Exeter)

Seddon, J. A.

Williams, Col. Sir R. (Dorset, W.)

Nicholl, Com. Sir Edward

Seely, Maj.-Gen. Rt. Hon. John

Wills, Lt.-Col. Sir Gilbert Alan H.

Nicholson, R. (Doncaster)

Shaw, Hon. A. (Kilmarnock)

Wilson, Capt. A. Stanley (Hold'ness)

Nicholson, W. (Petersfield)

Shaw, Captain W. T. (Forfar)

Wilson, Colonel Leslie (Reading)

O'Neill, Captain Hon. Robert W. H.

Shortt, Rt. Hon. E. (N'castle-on-T., W.)

Wilson, Col. M. (Richmond, Yorks.)

Ormsby-Gore, Hon. William

Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

Winterton, Major Earl

Palmer, Major G. M. (Jarrow)

Stanley, Colonel Hon. G. F. (Preston)

Wood, Major Hon. E. (Ripon)

Palmer, Brig.-Gen. G. (Wastbury)

Steel, Major S. Strang

Wood, Sir H. K. (Woolwich, W.)

Parker, James

Stephenson, Colonel H. K.

Yate, Colonel Charles Edward

Parry, Major Thomas Henry

Stevens, Marshall

Yeo, Sir Alfred William

Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

Stewart, Gershom

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—.Lord E.

Pollock, Sir Ernest Murray

Strauss, Edward Anthony

Talbot and Captain F. Guest.

Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton

Sugden, W. H.

Pratt, John William

Sutherland, Sir William

NOES.

Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis Dyke

Harbison, T. J. S

Royce, William Stapleton

Adamson, Rt. Hon. William

Hartshorn, V.

Short, A. (Wednesbury)

Ashley, Col. Wilfred W.

Hayward, Major Evan

Sitch, C. H.

Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

Hirst, G. H.

Spoor, B. G.

Benn, Capt. W. (Leith)

Holmes, J. S.

Swan, J. E. C.

Briant, F.

Jones, J. (Silvertown)

Thomas, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Derby)

Grown, J. (Ayr and Bute)

Kenworthy, Lieut.-Commander

Thome, G. R. (Wolverhampton, E)

Cairns, John

Kenyon, Barnet

Tootill, Robert

Carter, W. (Mansfield)

Lunn, William

Waterson, A. E.

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

Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)

Wedgwood, Colonel Josiah C.

Clynes, Right Hon. John R.

Maclean, Rt. Hon. Sir D. (Midlothian)

Williams, A. (Conset, Durham)

Crooks, Rt. Hon. William

MacVeagh, Jeremiah

Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

Davies, Alfred (Clitheroe)

Murray, Dr. D. (Western Isles)

Wood, Major Mackenzie (Aberdeen, C.)

Entwistle, Major C. F.

O'Connor, T. P.

Young, Robert (Newton, Lanes.)

Graham, D. M. (Hamilton)

Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr.

Griffiths, T. (Pontypool)

Richardson, R. (Houghton)

Hogge and Mr. Newbould.

Grundy, T. W.

Roberts, F. O. (W. Bromwich)

Hall, F. (Yorks. Normanton)

Robertson, J.

Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House, for To-morrow. —[Sir A. Boscawen.]

STANDING COMMITTEES (CHAIRMEN'S PANEL).
Sir SAMUEL ROBERTS reported from the Chairmen's Panel; That they had appointed Mr. William. Nicholson to act as Chairman of Standing Committee C (in respect of the Patents and Designs Bill and the Trade Marks Bill).
Report to lie upon the Table.

NAVAL AND MILITARY WAR SERVICES.
  MESSAGE FROM HIS MAJESTY.

    PROPOSED GRANTS BY PARLIAMENT.
    The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Lloyd George), at the Bar, acquainted the House
    184
    that he had a Message from His Majesty, signed by His Majesty's own hand, and he presented the same to the House.
    Mr. SPEAKER read the Message (all the Members of the House being uncovered),as followeth:
    "His Majesty taking tutu consideration the eminent service rendered during the late War by those officer who commanded and directed His forces by sea, on land, and in the air, and being desirous in recognition of such services to confer upon them some signal mark of His favour, recommends to His faithful Commons that He should be enabled to a runt to: —

    Navy—

    £

    Admiral of the fleet Sir David Beatty

    100,000

    Admiral of the Fleet Viscount Jellicoe

    50,000

    Navy—

    Admiral Sir Charles E. Madden

    10,000

    Admiral Sir F. G. Doveton Sturdee

    10,000

    Rear-Admiral Sir Roger J. B. Keyes

    10,000

    Vice-Admiral Sir John de Robec

    10,000

    Commodore Sir Reginald Y. Tyrwhitt

    10,000

    Army —

    Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig

    100,000

    Field Marshal Viscount French

    50,000

    Field Marshal Sir Edmund Allenby

    50,000

    Field Marshal Sir Herbert plumer

    30,000

    Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson

    10,000

    General Sir Henry Rawlinson

    30,000

    General the Hon. Sir Julian Byng

    30,000

    General Sir Henry Home.

    30,000

    General Sir William Robertson

    10,000

    General Sir William Birdwood

    10,000

    Lieut.-Colonel Sir Maurice Hankey

    25,000

    Air —

    Air Vice-Marshal Sir Hugh Trenchard

    10,000."

    Ordered,
    "That His Majesty's Most Gracious Message be referred to the Committee of Supply." — [The Prime. Minister.]

NEW MEMBER SWORN.
John Robertson, esquire, for the County of Lanark (Bothwell Division).

BILL PRESENTED.
WAR PENSIONS (ADMINISTRATIVE PROVISIONS) BILL, —"to make further provision for the administration of the enactments relating to naval, military, and Air Force war pensions, grants, and allowances; and for certain other purposes connected with such pensions, grants, and allowances," presented by Sir LAMING WOBTHINGTON-
EVANS; supported by Colonel Sir James Craig; to be read a second time To-morrow, and to be printed. [Bill 167.]

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
That they have agreed to,
National Health Insurance Bill,
Commons Regulation (Coity Wallia) Provisional Order Bill,
Pier and Harbour Provisional Orders Bill,
Electric Lighting Provisional Order Bill, without Amendment.
Checkweighing in Various Industries Bill,
Rotherham Corporation Bill, with an Amendment.
Gas and Water Provisional Orders Bill,
London County Council(Money) Bill, with Amendments.
Amendments to —
Merchant Shipping (Wireless Telegraphy) Bill [Lords],
Newark Gas Bill [Lords], without Amendment.

BOLAND'S DIVORCE BILL [Lords].
That they communicate the Minutes of Evidence and Proceedings taken uponthe Second Reading of Boland's Divorce Bill [Lords], as desired by the Commons, with a request that the same may be returned.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Dover Gas Bill [Lords],
Reported, with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table.
Gas and Water Provisional Orders Bill,
Lords Amendments to be considered To-morrow.

COAL MINES BILL
Reported, without Amendment, from Standing Committee A.
Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 153.]
Minutes of the Proceedings of the Standing Committee to be printed. [No. 158.]
Bill, not amended (in the Standing Committee), to be taken into consideration To-morrow.

SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).

  STANDING COMMITTEE D.
  SIR SAMUEL ROBERTS reported from the Committee of Selection; That they had discharged the following Member from Standing Committee D: Sir John Tudor Walters.
  SIR SAMUEL KOBERTS further reported from the Committee; That they had discharged the following Members from Standing Committee D: Major Boyd-Carpenter, Mr. James Brown, Colonel Burn, and Dr. Murray.

  STANDING COMMITTEE E.
  SIR SAMUEL ROBERTS further reported from the Committee; That they had discharged the following Member from Standing Committee E (added in respect of the Compensation for Subsidence Bill): Colonel Sir Hamar Greenwood; and had appointed in substitution (in respect of the Compensation for Subsidence Bill): the Solicitor-General.

  STANDING COMMITTEE C.
  Sir SAMUEL EOBERTS further reported from the Committee; That they had discharged the following Member from Standing Committee C (added in respect of the Patents and Designs Bill and the Trade Marks Bill): Major Lloyd Greame; and had appointed in substitution (in respect of the Patents and Designs Bill and the Trade Marks Bill): Mr. Grattan Doyle.
  Reports to lie upon the Table.

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA BILL.
Ordered,
"That Sir Donald Maclean be discharged from the Select Committee on the Government of India Bill. —[Colonel Gibbs.]
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Acland be added to the Committee." —[Colonel Gibbs.]
Colonel YATE: I think I should take this opportunity of protesting, not against the personality of the appointment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Camborne (Mr. Acland), but because the opportunity has not been taken to appoint some Member with a recent knowledge of India. There are a number of Members of this House who
188
have had experience in India, and I think the occasion should have been seised to appoint one of these rather than a right hon. Gentleman who has never been in India. Although, of course, I am delighted that the hon. Member for Cam-borne should join the Committee, I do feel that now that a vacancy has occurred the Prime Minister should take the matter into consideration and appoint someone with recent knowledge of India. I hope indeed, he will consider this matter before finally sanctioning this appointment.
Mr. BONAR LAW: No doubt there is a great deal of force in what my hon. and gallant Friend has said about the value of Indian experience, but he is a very old Member of the House of Commons, and he knows perfectly well the principle on which these Committees are appointed. The members are taken from different parties. My right hon. Friend opposite has resigned, and one of the oldest rules we have is that the party to which the retiring Member belongs should have the nomination of his successor. I think it would be a great mistake to depart from that practice.
Colonel YATE: May I ask —
Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has exhausted his right of speaking.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  FORESTRY BILL [Lords].
  Order for Second Heading read.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Sir Arthur Boscawen): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  This Bill has already passed through all its stages in another place, and it comes down to this House for Second Reading this afternoon. The object of the Bill is that we may at last make a real step forward with a very important matter, a matter in which it is true to say that we have as a country lagged behind the rest of Europe. In the past we have always prided ourselves that in most things we are in the van of progress, but it cannot truly be said that that is the case with regard to forestry. In fact, when we consider what is being done, and what has been done in other countries, we find that there is only one country in Europe so sparsely wooded as our own, and that is Portugal. I should like to give the House a few figures that were before the Reconstruction Committee which went into this subject quite lately. The amount of land under timber in this country—and I am speaking of the whole of the United Kingdom —is only 4 per cent. In Belgium it is 17 per cent.; in France, 18 per cent.; in Germany, 25 per cent. in Russia, 37 per cent.; and in Sweden no less than 47 per cent.; so that as regards the amount of timber in this country we occupy an exceedingly low position. But that is not all. Such woodland as we possess has not been cultivated in the best manner in the past, and I am informed that the wood yield is only one-third per acre of that of any other country in which the science of sylviculture has been properly developed. It is a melancholy fact to be considered that we are in times both of peace and of war very great consumers of timber, and yet although the consumption of timber per head of population is contantly growing, we supply only 8 per cent. of the timber consumed in this country from our own resources and no loss than 92 per cent. is imported. I feel sure the House will realise that that position is not at all satisfactory and it is made worse by this fact, that we have an immense acreage in this country which is very suitable for plant-
  218
  ing with timber, and therefore it is not a matter of our sacrificing something else in order that we may have a better supply of timber.
  There are here vast wastes of land devoted in some cases to sport and in other cases to rough grazing that carry a vary small head of sheep, or something of that sort. We have vast acres of land, estimated at something like 5,000,000 acres, which might with advantage be afforested and so enable us to supply that timber which we are importing from abroad at the present moment. Therefore, the Government feel that the time has come when this matter of afforestation should be seriously taken up and a real national effort made to develop those resources which are latent, but which have never been developed up to the present time. The state of affairs which was revealed by the War was most serious. We found, as I have said, we were importing most of our timber. We found that we had a very small timber reserve in this country. At the same time the consumption of timber during the War was enormous. It might have been thought that as building had come to a standstill and many of the uses for which timber was ordinarily required were no longer in operation it might have been thought that the amount of timber consumed would have largely decreased. It did decrease to some extent, but at the same time this fact emerged, that military operations in their present form require an immense amount of timber. Anybody who has served, either at home or abroad, knows perfectly well that for trenches, for huts, for packing cases, for munition boxes, and for every conceivable object which we had in view during the War, timber was absolutely necessary. We had to import immense quantities of timber. It was very irksome from a shipping point of view, because timber is almost the most bulky thing you can carry on board ship, and the amount of tonnage required was very great. The cost also was very great. During the years 1915 and 1916 we imported something like two-thirds or three-fourths of the timber used before the War, but the cost was no leas than £37,000,000 more than it cost during the two years before the War. Nearly the whole of that went to foreign producers and foreign shippers. After that we made a great effort here, and endeavoured, by felling a great many of our own trees, to set free the shipping that had been employed in carrying timber. To some extent we were successful—in-

  219
  deed, we had to do that, because we had not the shipping available. We had to do it in order even to supply ourselves with those pit-props without which coal-mining could not be carried on during the War. The result has been that we have still further depleted the reserves of timber which we had in this country, and we have to-day not only the pressing need of afforestating a great many acres that have not carried trees before, but we have the necessity of replanting those woods which were destroyed —usefully destroyed —for the sake of the nation during the War. The object of this Bill is to endeavour to make a really big, serious, national effort to cope with the situation. We do not think that we ought to lag behind any more. We think we ought to take the matter seriously in hand, and for that reason the Forestry Bill is brought in by the Government.
  I should like to make it perfectly clear at the outset that the credit for this Bill, and for the work that has preceded it, does not belong to the Board which I represent, nor in any way to myself personally. We have assisted, but the real credit is due to two bodies —firstly, to the very strong Subcommittee of the Reconstruction Committee, which investigated the whole matter and presented a most valuable and unanimous Report; and, secondly, to a body known as the Interim Forest Authority, which, since that Report was presented, has been carrying on the work and doing a very great deal of spade work which, I hope, will be found exceedingly useful to the forestry authority when it is constituted. I should like to add that, if credit is due to one individual more than another, it is due to my right hon. Friend the Member for Camborne (Mr. Acland), who, as chairman of the Interim Forest Authority, has shown a degree of energy, ability, and zeal in this work which is entirely beyond praise. When I say that he is responsible and that I, representing the Board, am not, I am in the position of a man representing a Government Department which proposes to give up some of its powers. I believe that that is an almost unique position. We very often hear that Government Departments are very acquisitive of new powers, and. at all events, they do not with pleasure yield up the powers that they already possess. I confess that, in some respects, I regret the separation of agriculture and forestry. I will mention one. I think it most desirable that, in the
  220
  matter of small holdings, the new forest authority and ourselves, and also, of course, the Scottish Board of Agriculture and the Irish Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction, should work closely together, and I think we can. There can be no doubt that when new forests are planted, and when many men are employed in the forests as woodcutters, woodmen, and so on, those men will fill in their spare time to great advantage by cultivating a bit of land as a small holding. For that reason I earnestly hope and believe that there will be no difficulty about the new forest authority and the Board of Agriculture working together perfectly amicably with that object in the future.
  I realise, however, that if we are really to get a move on, if this thing is really to be done in a businesslike manner, there must be one single forest authority for the whole of the United Kingdom which will deal in a comprehensive manner with this matter. We believe that, in handing over our powers to certain bodies, we are doing what is absolutely necessary, and we think we must have this single forest authority, which, in the words of the Bill, will be charged with the duty of promoting the interests of forestry, the development of afforeistation, and the production and supply of timber; and to this body the powers hitherto exercised by the Boards of Agriculture for England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland, and also the local Commissioners, are handed over. We believe that in that way alone we shall get a real comprehensive policy for the whole of the United Kingdom. I realise, of course, as much as any man, that there may be a difficulty here. I can already hear hon. Members from Scotland, and probably from Ireland, saying that we are proceeding on the wrong lines, that we are flying in the face of experience, that we are centralising instead of decentralising, that Scotland is to be run from Whitehall, and all the rest of it. I reply that that is really not the case. Although there must be a central authority for the direction of policy and for such important questions as research, experiment, training, and so forth, all of which must be done upon a uniform and concerted basis, I realise that there must be decentralisation of the actual administration. Accordingly the Bill proposes that, although there shall be a central forest authority, there shall also be three

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  Assistant Commissioners, one for Scotland, one for England and Wales, and one for Ireland; and not only so, but that there shall be also four consultative committees, who will be able to advise the Forestry Commission on various local aspects, and as far as possible assist the central authority in dealing with local authorities and local conditions. There is to be a consultative committee for England, another for Wales, another for Scotland, and another for Ireland. Great care is taken that these consultative committees shall have upon them men of thorough experience and knowledge of the local conditions of forestry in all its aspects, and with their help, and with the executive work carried out by the Assistant Commissioners, I can assure the House that there is no intention whatever of centralising the administration. On the contrary, the administration will be decentralised, with simply this controlling central authority to guide the operations as a whole.
  I would put one argument to any of my Scottish Friends who in principle object to this. It may be that you have a central authority. It may be that, notwithstanding the existence of an Assistant Commissioner, and a consultative committee for Scotland, the whole control is not vested in Edinburgh. Let me point out that there will be great financial advantages to Scotland from that. At the present moment we reckon that, of the 5,000,000 acres that may be afforested, more than half is in Scotland, and we expect and intend that a very considerable proportion of the money that is to be devoted to this purpose shall be expended in Scotland. Would that be the result if there were a separate Commission for Scotland? You would go back to that old principle of percentages, under which I think Scotland got eleven-eightieths. If you had a central authority for Scotland, the chances are that you would get only eleven-eightieths of the money. If you have one central forest authority with local administration, I venture to say that Scotland will get a great deal more than eleven-eightieths, and possibly the economic advantage from that point of view may outweigh the sentimental objection. At all events our view is that we should deal with the United Kingdom as a whole, and that the money should be expended and the work done in those parts of the United Kingdom, irrespective of
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  where they may happen to be, where the money can be expended to the best possible advantage.
  I would make one further remark as to the necessity for this one central forest authority. The Reconstruction Subcommittee, which investigated this question were absolutely unanimous on this point with two small exceptions. It is quite true that the Treasury representative had Treasury doubts, as of course he was bound to have, and the reservations he made were perfectly proper on his part. Lord Lovat, who after all is well known as an energetic champion of Scotland, also made a reservation; but what was the nature of his reservation? It was not an objection to a central authority: far from it. He underlined the necessity for a central authority much more than the rest of his colleagues. His words are these:
  "While I agree in all essential particulars with the Forestry Committee's Report which I have signed, I think it is my duty to insist, with perhaps more emphasis than my colleagues have seen fit to do, on the importance of a single Forest Authority for Great Britain."
  He goes on to say:
  "The creation of a single forest authority for the British Isles is required, firstly, and principally, to make a definite break with the past, to get out of the welter of conflicting authorities, and to escape from the arena or party politics, Royal Commissions, and amateur inquiries; secondly, to make it possible for an accredited authority not only to draw up a definite policy for the British Isles, but also to set in motion the machinery for carrying it into effect; thirdly, to constitute a body who can view the forestry situation in Great Britain as a whole, and decide on purely forest al grounds the conflicting claims of the various countries unbiassed by local or political pressure; fourthly, to constitute a body who, in time of war, could act with the military authorities to exploit both State and private forests for the benefit of the country."
  Therefore, we hold that the need for one authority has been absolutely proved, and the establishment of a single authority is the most important part of this Bill. I should like, in a very few more words, just to describe the powers which the central authority will have, and also to say one word about finance. I have already told the House that the general power of the central authority is to promote afforestation and the supply of timber. By Clause 3 they can take land by lease or purchase, they can buy or sell standing timber, and they can make advances by way of loan or grant, or both, to private individuals or to local authorities. A great many local authorities have pur-

  223
  chased large areas of land in connection with the water supply, and a great part of those areas can very well be afforested when, for sanitary reasons, they cannot be used for ordinary agricultural purposes. Then the central authority can undertake the management of woodlands, and can promote woodlands. By Clause 4 they have extensive powers to prevent damage, and by Clause 7 they can, through local Commissioners, acquire land compulsorily in cases where they cannot obtain it by agreement. When it becomes law, as it will in a few days time, the powers of the Acquisition of Land Bill, for the purpose of estimating the compensation to be paid in disputed cases, will be applicable in the case of forestry. Lastly, by Clause 9, they can enter upon any land they like for the purpose of survey. These are very wide powers, but they are not wider, in my opinion, than are necessary if forestry is really to be carried on on a businesslike footing in the future.
  It is estimated that we have something like 4,000,000 or 5,000,000 acres of land which is plan table with timber at present. The Report of the Reconstruction Committee does not propose that the whole of that should be planted. We have to take long views in forestry, and that is one thing that differentiates it from agriculture, where we have, comparatively speaking, quick returns and short rotation. You have to have longer returns in forestry, and your rotation is about eighty years. It is proposed that in the first eighty years 1,750,000 acres should be planted. That figure is arrived at by ascertaining how much reserve of timber we ought to have in this country if we had to subsist for three years without the possibility of foreign imports. I am not going to anticipate another war like the last, but we found during the last war that we had reached a point of national danger, and we are bound to have security in view of any possible emergency in the future. During the first eighty years it is proposed to plant 1,750,000 acres, and of that, during the first forty years, 1,180,000. The Bill itself, which starts the thing and puts it on a business basis and enables us to get on with the work, applies only, as far as the actual terms of the present Bill go, to ten years. During those ten years it is proposed that 150,000 acres should be planted by direct State action. In the case of 25,000 more acres

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  there will be a profit-sharing scheme between the owners and the State, roughly speaking, the owner supplying the land and the State supplying the necessary capital for the afforestation. In regard to 25,000 other acres, it is proposed that they should be planted, with the assistance of the State by way of loan or grant, by local authorities or by private individuals. In addition to that, there are something like 50,000 acres of woodland which require replanting, or, it may be, woodland that has been cleared during the War which will require replanting as soon as possible. That is a programme of altogether 200,000 new acres and 50,000 acres of replanting in the next ten years, and although, of course, the matter will have to be carried much farther, we consider that is a very good start. It is as much as can be made at the present moment. That is the proposal of the Reconstruction Sub-committee, and that is the proposal of the Bill.
  As to finance, it is proposed that during the next ten years there shall be paid out of the Consolidated Fund an amount of £3,500,000 for the purpose of afforestation. It is not proposed, by indicating this large sum to be spread over ten years, to withdraw the matter from the control of Parliament. It is intended that Estimates should be presented of the amount proposed to be expended in each year.
  Mr. HOGGE: By whom?
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: It will have to be done probably by the Financial Secretary to the Treasury. That is a point I am prepared to consider in Committee as to the best method of responsibility for the Estimates. It is proposed that Estimates should be presented each year, that the House and the Treasury should have a voice in controlling the amount to be expended each year, and that the accounts should be presented to the Controller and Auditor-General. It may be that the Clause dealing with finance in its present form will have to be redrafted. If so, that will certainly be considered in Committee; but we want to establish the two principles—first of all, that there is to be control by Parliament, and, secondly, that there is to be a general guarantee of a certain sum of money for a definite period of years in order that the Forestry Department may know where it is, and be able to forecast its policy and to put it on a thorough business basis. For that reason a guarantee is necessary for a certain

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  definite sum. That is really the scheme. I believe it is the best that can be devised to meet the present situation, which is a very serious one. I shall be only too glad to consider any suggestions or proposals for Amendments in Committee, but this is the scheme unanimously presented by the Reconstruction Sub-committee, supported, as I understand, by the Interim Forest Authority. No other schema that I can think of is likely to fill the Bill. We have had attempts in the past to deal with the question. Each of the three Boards of Agriculture has rights and duties with regard to forestry, but very little has been done, as can be seen by the present state of affairs. It is only natural that the Board of Agriculture, whether it be in England, Scotland or Ireland will look more to agriculture itself and to the quick return than to the long deferred hope of afforestation. Similarly something has been done by the Development Commissioners. I am not going to belittle the work they have done. On the whole they have done very well. But it is clear that these separate and inconclusive efforts up to the present have not been sufficient. Because we think a broad-minded scheme with a central authority and general control is necessary, I move the Second Reading and I commend the Bill to the House as the best manner in which to deal with a very important and urgent subject.
  Mr. HOGGE: I am afraid the hon. Gentleman had his eye on those who sit on this bench who are Scotsmen as well as members of the Opposition. Throughout his argument he made the suggestion that Scotsmen might after all consider this Bill from the point of view of the economic advantage which might result to Scotland on account of the fact that that country is probably the most suitable area for afforestation, and he ventured the view that that might outweigh our sentimental considerations in accepting the Bill. Scotsmen are not going to be influenced either by economies or by sentimental views in this matter. There is nothing which will contribute more to the repopulation of those districts in Scotland which have been depopulated than will the successful association of afforestation and land settlement, and we are not in the least worried about whether we are going to get many salaried officials or large machinery, but we are concerned,
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  and will continue to be concerned, in the repopulation of our own country, which is very much depopulated on account of economic conditions, and more so on account of the effects of the great War. So I address myself to this problem without any of those feelings which have been suggested by the hon. Gentleman. I am opposed radically to this measure. The only reason why I will not move its rejection at this stage is that I understand the Government is not prepared to force through the remaining stages before the Recess.
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: I can give no pledge of that sort.
  Mr. HOGGE: In that case some of us who feel strongly on this may reconsider our point of view before the close of the Debate. I certainly was under the impression, from what I have gathered—I do not say more than casually—that the Government did not intend to proceed with this before the Recess, because there is always the value of the opinions which can be obtained on a measure of this sort in the interval that elapses between our rising and our reassembly. The first point I want to make against the Bill is that it is setting up a centralised and extraordinarily extensive bureaucracy. We in Scotland have done something with regard to forestry, but on the general point we have had more than enough of this concentration of power in the hands of a few people who are outside the real control of Parliament. I interpolated a remark when my hon. Friend was referring to the financial arrangements with regard to who is to be responsible for the laying of the Estimates on this question of forestry. My hon. Friend said he thought it would be the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, but at the same time he referred to the fact that Clause 8, which deals with the question of finance, would probably require to be readjusted. As it stands cow there is no control by Parliament. My hon. Friend realises that it would be difficult to re-examine from year to year the expenditure upon forestry as the Financial Clause is now drafted. Everyone knows how the discussion on the Consolidated Fund Bill comes on, and how difficult it would be to find an opportunity for raising a discussion on a detailed estimate of that kind. Incidentally, therefore, I hope that whatever arrangement is made that the Estimates will be laid in a fashion so that if neces-

  227
  sary we can disease them from time to time. Something like £3,500,000 is proposed to be taken out of the Consolidated Fund and put into the Forestry Fund, which is to be controlled by seven Commissioners, three of whom are to be paid. They are to receive salaries of £1,500 a year each or, at any rate, £4,500 in all. That is only the beginning of the expense. The staff which it is proposed to set up will cost, from information I have been able to get, something between £40,000 and £50,000 a year. Therefore, what the House has to realise in assenting to this Bill is the creation of a new spending authority, over and above the spending authorities which exist, at a cost of some £50,000 a year to the State for this new service.
  My objection to this new centralised bureaucracy, at this time in particular, and especially from the point of view of the Scottish Member, is that it was only yesterday announced in the House that you, Mr. Speaker, were going to preside presently over a Committee of this House, or some other kind of Committee, not necessarily of Members of this House, for the purpose of dealing with the question of Devolution. Devolution is more in the air than any other political topic. Devolution, so far as Scotland is concerned, has frequently been argued and argued with great force from the point of view of afforestation and the repopulation of our derelict country and county districts in Scotland, and it seems the height of folly at the same moment that we are entering upon a discussion of how far we can devolute to the various nations which make up the United Kingdom their own domestic concerns, that at the same time you are forcing through this House, in the dog days of the Summer Session, a Bill which seeks to take away from Scotland in particular the control of one of its largest industries. Scotland, compared with any other forestry industry in the United Kingdom, has by far the largest proportion of that industry. All the conditions of to-day are making towards devolution. The conditions are very different in different parts of the United Kingdom, and it is pure folly on the part of those who represent English constituencies and Welsh constituencies to think of afforestation in the same category and in the same terms as those of us who are accustomed to think of afforestation in Scotland. The various reports which have been rendered from time to time by the Board of Agriculture
  228
  with regard to Scotland have emphasised the fact that below the thousand feet altitude which is the necessary altitude, I understand, for successful afforestation, there is a larger acreage in Scotland—the acreage in that respect in Scotland is over 1,000,000 acres—which can be afforested than in any other part of the Kingdom.
  The main objection to the separation of forestry into a separate Department so far as Scotland is concerned is that we believe—I do not know how far I can speak for other Scottish Members, but it is fair to say that the average Scottish Member does take this view— that afforestation so far as Scotland is concerned must be carried on in conjunction with land settlement and agricultural development. The whole problem in Scotland of land settlement is acute. Yesterday, for instance, when other Members were absent Scottish Members were discussing this very question of small holdings in its relation to afforestation. We have found, and I think the proof can easily be produced, that in Scotland our scheme of small holdings is largely impossible from the point of view of economic success unless these small holdings are associated with subsidiary industries, and the attempt has continually been made in Scotland, particularly in our Highland and Island districts, to associate the system of small holdings with a system of afforestation, so that a man placed upon a small holding may continue to work to the extent that farming operations are possible and still have a subsidiary occupation, that occupation being his connection with afforestation. This has been fully recognised by the Scottish Board of Agriculture in the past. Efforts in Scotland were made to associate afforestation with small holdings prior to the outbreak of war. I see hon. Members opposite who used to develop this topic on every possible occasion, and however little or however much was done they will agree that the Scottish Board of Agriculture was making some attempt to secure the association of afforestation with our scheme of small holdings. If I remember rightly, a special officer was appointed prior to the outbreak of war by the Scottish Board of Agriculture, and his whole work was to look after afforestation.
  By this Bill the Government take powers to purchase large estates, the bulk of which estates will not be suitable for afforestation. One of the difficulties in the past has always been that the landlords

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  have refused to come to terms for that part of their land which has been the object of afforestation. That may be a reasonable position from the point of view of the landlords, but it cuts both ways, and if you take large estates by the powers that are given you under this Bill you are obviously going to hand over to this new forestry authority land which will not be used for afforestation. I should like any occupant of the Front Bench to deal with that point. You are taking away from the Board of Agriculture large powers which they at present possess. One of the means by which you are doing it is to purchase whole estates in order to get that part of the estate which will be suitable for afforestation. That will obviously leave in the hands of the forestry authority large tracts of land which ought to be used by the Board of Agriculture for the purpose of enabling smallholders to get upon the land. Thereby you are going to create a certain amount of overlapping between the Board of Agriculture and this new forestry authority.
  Sir G. YOUNGER: Would they not be as entitled to take that land as any other under the law as it stands?
  Mr. HOGGE: They would be able to take that land for small holdings, but the Board of Agriculture is the proper body to take it.
  Sir G. YOUNGER: They can take it now, only they are ruled by the Forestry Commissioners. It makes no difference.
  Mr. HOGGE: I do not think you would get two authorities buying the same portion of land. You would not have two public authorities competing for the estate of one individual. There might be an arrangement. I do not know what the arrangement would be, but I put it as a question. When an estate of that kind was purchased could not that portion of the estate which could be used for smallholders be handed over to the administration of the Board of Agriculture for the purpose of small holdings? I want to make it quite clear that you, if you are to have purchases of large estates, and you have this separate authority, there ought to be a clear line of demarcation.
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: What my hon. Friend suggests is quite possible under the terms of the Bill, in Clause 3.
  Mr. HOGGE: So much the better. Then we do not need to discuss that point any
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  longer. If it is clear that this land can be divided between the two authorities then we will leave it. My further point is that this Bill gives power to grant bounties to private individuals to conduct experiments in afforestation and that the State is to take all the risks. I hope I do not do injustice to my hon. Friend if I say that the landlord is to get 4 per cent. on his expenditure, that the State is to get 4 per cent. on the money that it advances to the landlord for the experiment, and that the surplus profit after that is to go to the landlord. I think that is the scheme, and I do not think I have stated it unfairly.
  Sir F. BANBURY: Will there be any surplus?
  Mr. HOGGE: I should like to hear from the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London in which, of course, there are many forests, to give us his experience on the question of afforestation in the City of London. If there is any surplus profit under this Bill it goes to the landlords, but if there is no surplus profit the State is to bear the loss. The point I wish to make is that if the State is to suffer through advancing money for the purpose of these experiments, if there is any profit after the apportionment referred to surely the excess of that ought to go back to the State. If it does not go back to the State it ought to be divided between the landlord and the State in a bigger proportion than is suggested in the Bill Scottish Members will remember that we discussed this question on the Housing Bill in Scottish Grand Committee. [AN HON. MEMBER: "We did not agree upon it!"] I do not say that, but we discussed it, and some hon. Members suggested that we ought to give a bounty to private individuals to promote the extension of houses.
  Sir G. YOUNGER: They never suggested that. They suggested a payment in order to induce them to use their own money.
  5.0 P.M.
  Mr. HOGGE: If that is not a bounty, I do not know what it is. At any rate, they discussed the question of giving people an inducement to build houses. Houses are much more urgent than afforestation. The urgency for this Bill suggested by my hon. Friend is an urgency which is disappearing every day. Apart altogether from legitimate competition with other countries in the world, the urgency of this Bill is that, in the event of the outbreak of another great war, we should not again be left

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  without a proper supply of timber. I do not think, unless all our hopes are going to be falsified, that we need build up huge forests with the object of providing for another great European war. Therefore I think we may dismiss that and say that housing is far more urgent than afforestation, and if the Government refuse to give an inducement to private individuals to build houses, in addition to what is provided for the local authorities, why should they be willing to assist individuals in afforestation which is not so urgent as the question of houses? This Bill has been based far too much on the Report of the Committee presided over by my right hon. Friend (Mr. Acland). I think that the basis on which that Committee did its work and reported was entirely wrong, and that this problem ought to have been faced not from the point of view of making this country secure in the case of future needs, but that it ought to have been dealt with from one aspect as to the problem of reconstruction and in relation to the whole question of land settlement.
  It is not often, in the course of my political career, that I have been able to go to the" Scotsman "newspaper for support for my argument, but I find that the greatest Unionist newspaper in Scotland, writing editorially upon this question of afforestation so recently as June, agrees entirely with the point of view which I am putting now. Referring to the Boards of Agriculture in England and Scotland, the "Scotsman" says:
  "The Boards of Agriculture, whose duties will lie more and more in the direction of social development and the fostering of rural industry, would seem more likely to hold mutual confidence as administrators of the enterprise we have now to undertake than a Commission of specialists in forestry, whose set purpose would be to concentrate on the planting of a fixed acreage of land in a given time. The existing Forestry Departments of the Board should be strengthened as required for the work and given broader powers than now in settling landholders and workers. In this aspect of the case it is well to bear in mind the entire dependence of sylviculture on labour. Given the land, nearly every penny of capital cost can go out in wages.
  In the wise decision of the question now before us Scotland has special concern, as forestry interests and knowledge are much greater there than in any other part of the United Kingdom, and the areas readily available for planting are much larger, at least a million acres within plan table elevation lying hitherto entirely unproductive, apart from deer and sport."
  Sir G. YOUNGER: Is that a leading article?
  Mr. HOGGE: That is a leading article I will send my hon. Friend a copy of it with great pleasure, because I think that he can read it with advantage. An hon. Member has said that it is no credit to them. It is not much credit to the landowners. They have kept that land for the cultivation of grouse and deer and made Scotland the sporting place for people all over the United Kingdom.
  Sir PHILIP MAGNUS: Is not that all the more reason why this Bill should be brought into this House?
  Mr. HOGGE: No; it is all the more reason why Scotland should control its own affairs and its own policies with regard to land in Scotland from the point of view of Scotland. Taking, if you like, the pendulum of Tory successes and Liberal successes in recent years, we in Scotland could have forged a much better system for our own country than by having to come here year after year, and even now with the Coalition Government being compelled to accept a Bill which takes away from us what power we have had in Scotland and put us under a central power dominated from Whitehall. We object to that. We in Scotland do not want our forests controlled from Whitehall. That is my great objection to this Bill. Take the policy of the Government with regard to transport. They have had in this Government the greatest difficulty in transport. The greatest signs of revolution inside the Coalition have been on the subject of transport. There have been rumours of revolution both in this House and in another place with regard to transports? Why? Because the Government in that case have considered the question as a whole. They have considered on the question of transport, railway, roads, waterways, and harbours. Will anyone for a moment say that that is a smaller problem than the question of afforestation in this country? It is a much larger problem. If the Government can deal with that large problem in all its aspects, why should the Government deal with this problem only in one aspect! Why should the Government take from us in Scotland the power to deal with our own land settlement in conjunction with afforestation and concèntrate on a bureaucratic expensive centralised department in London? That power ought to reside with the people of Scotland.

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  The War has only emphasised the question of the difficulty of procuring timber in this country. This question existed before the War, but my hon. Friend will admit that probably more has been done in Scotland towards moving this question than in any other portion of the Kingdom. At any rate my hon. Friend knows of the effort made in Edinburgh University with its Chair of Forestry to train students in scientific afforestation. He will also know that more applications have been made to Edinburgh University for scientifically and technically trained men for positions all over the world than to any other place in this country, and because the Government denies opportunities to Scotsmen, the men who are being trained are leaving Edinburgh and going to all other parts of the world. So no one can accuse Scotland of not doing what it could, hampered as it is in this House by the fact that we are so few in numbers in making any real progress on this question. Having made those criticisms, it is only fair to say now what my alternative policy is. My alternative policy on this question is to strengthen the Board of Agriculture in such a way as to deal with afforestation. We want in Scotland our Board of Agriculture to be strengthened on its afforestation side. We want that afforestation to be carried through in conjunction with the scheme of land settlement. Afforestation in Scotland might be a remunerative industry for the people who put their money into it as an industry, but it is not going to help the question of the repopulation of Scotland.
  Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTT: The Scottish Board has had the power.
  Mr. HOGGE: Yes; but what power have the Scottish representatives and Scottish Boards had so long as we were controlled in this House as we are? My hon. Friend was here yesterday, and did not speak on the Scottish Estimates. He knows that for the discussion of the only question that we tried to raise on the Scottish Estimate we could not get more than a couple of hours on the last day of the Estimates. My hon. Friend knows perfectly well that if we had a scheme of devolution, such as may eventuate in the Committee over which Mr. Speaker is going presently to preside, and we had it in the face of public opinion in Scotland, not only our Board of Agriculture but all our other Boards would be very much more alive than they are. I am opposed radic-
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  ally to this Bill, because at a time when the whole tendency of our modern political development is towards devolution, and we are reaching a period when Scotland may control its own affairs, which is vital for securing our future prosperity, you are seeking in this House to take away those powers from the people of Scotland which they possess and centralise them in a Department in Whitehall far remote from the influences of Scottish public opinion from which experience has never led us in the past to expect any real reform.
  Colonel Sir A. SPROT: It gives me the greatest pleasure to support the Bill which has been so ably and clearly brought in by the hon. and gallant Member. This is the first attempt in this country to give us a real and proper afforestation Department on the continental model. I remember some years ago attending a lecture in Edinburgh by Herbert Maxwell, who is a great authority on the subject, and hearing him make a statement, which was repeated by the hon. and gallant Member this afternoon and which filled me with surprise when I first heard it, that our country is the most treeless country in Europe with the exception of Portugal. The reason is that forestry has not yet been really taken up officially by our country in the way in which it has been taken up in foreign countries. We have had, no doubt, large forests in England—the New Forest and the Forest of Dean—but we have never had any real and proper system of forestry. We have never had a proper Forestry Department, and we have never had a school of forestry in this country. I should like to allude to the experience of India, which I am rather surprised not to have heard mentioned before. About fifty years ago a relative of mine, who was an officer serving in the Indian Army, and who was known to have a good knowledge of botany, was summoned by the Viceroy, and was told to go and form an Indian Forest Department. He qualified himself for that by making a tour through the Himalayas and through all the districts where big forests were to be found. He wrote a most valuable report, and a book, which is still his standard work, and he was made the first Conservator of Forests in India. When he gave up his appointment and retired home, what happened? They looked round for a successor to him, and they were obliged to appoint a German. When that German's time was up as the second Conservator of

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  Forests, they appointed another German. That is tantamount to saying that there did not exist in our country a school of forestry at all, or any body of people to whom you might go and say, "Send us a good man to be our Conservator of Forests." Let me carry the story still further. I remember very well when the Franco-German War of 1870 occurred, the young men who passed in London in their literary examination for the Indian Forestry Department had to receive special technical training afterwards. That had to be done in those days either in Germany or in France, and my recollection is that those young men who were qualified to be sent out to India as forest officers, and who, in the ordinary course of events, would have gone to the Forestry School at Nancy, could not go to France because of the Franco-German War, and they were sent, some of them, to my own home in Scot-land, where they visited the forests in Perthshire and other parts of the country and carried on their instruction as a sort of makeshift. That was the pass to which we were reduced owing to the absence of a proper forest Department and forestry school in Great Britain.
  We know that the Indian Forest Department has been a great success. I think I am also justified in saying that it is a money-making institution. It brings revenue to that country, as do the Forest Departments of Germany and of France. We know also that since the day of which I am speaking a good deal has been done sporadically with regard to the improvement of forestry and forestry education. The Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge) was quite right when he said that the relative of whom I have been speaking, who was at one time president of the Royal Scottish Arboricultural Society, of which I am a member, was instrumental in getting a lectureship in Forestry in the University of Edinburgh. Here I may mention that the Scottish Aboricultural Society existed for a good many years before the English Arboricultural Society was formed. I join with him, therefore, in claiming for our country a foremost place in the advance of forestry. A great deal has been done in various ways; We know that other universities and institutions have followed it up to some extent, but we are still in want of a sound and properly organised Forestry Department and school of forestry in this
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  country. The hon. and gallant Member (Sir A. Boscawen) must be familiar—I know that he is—with some of the forests of France. He knows, for instance, the forest of Nieppe, where a great deal of fighting went on both at the beginning and at the end of the War; also the forest of Esquelbec, and that of Tournehem, and the large forest outside Boulogne. One saw during the War the splendid work done by the French foresters, and of how great a use the Forest Department was in the prosecution of the War. We saw British, French and Canadian soldiers cutting material for revetments which had to be sent up to the trenches, and, although the War lasted for over four years, an immense amount of such material still existed in reserve in the forests, a fact which showed that France made good use of her forests from a military point of view.
  I need not go much further in making the point which I have put forward. It is simply this, that we have neglected our forests as a nation up to now. It has been the much-abused landlord or landowner who has done all the tree-planting that has been done. I need hardly point out that a single individual has not got the opportunities for carrying on scientific forestry that is possessed by a State Department. Our landowners, no doubt, very often planted a great many trees. They did it for shelter, for ornament, and, perhaps, for the preservation of game, but they did it according to their own sweet will. They could not in many cases expect to survive long enough to see the results of their planting, and, therefore, they did not do it upon a recognised and scientific system in the same way as a Government Department would have done it. That is what is done in foreign countries. In France, in these forests I have mentioned, you do not see all sorts of trees planted together as you do in British woods. You come across a large area of oaks planted in a certain year and all of the same size. When they get to maturity they are reaped like a crop and the ground is replanted. In another place you will see a large area of beeches, and so on. That is scientific forestry. That is what we want to introduce in our country.
  Passing from that, I would desire to meet what has been said by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh. He has objected to this Bill on the ground of what I may describe as the Home Rule for Scotland

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  principle. He thinks there ought to be one Forestry Department for Scotland, another for England, another for Ireland, and so on. We are not discussing now a question of Home Rule for Scotland, or devolution, or anything else. I may say this: I am as thorough and as good a Scotsman as he is; I have not got a single drop of English blood in my veins. I am a Scotsman and I represent a Scottish constituency, and I am just as entitled as he is to speak for the generality of my thinking fellow countrymen in my own country. I would submit that this is not a point upon which one ought to insist upon a separate Scottish nationality. If there were any question of the ancient laws and customs, or even of the peculiarities of Scotland, I should be the very first to stand up for them, but this is not one of those points. I think it has been thoroughly well brought out by the hon. and gallant Gentleman who brought in this Bill, that it is to the advantage of Scotland that there shall be one Forestry Department for the whole of Great Britain. I think the shortest way of putting that is this: If you have one Department, supposing that you have a good man in the South, who is good, we will say, in the management of fir trees, and there is a vacancy in the North for such a person, you can at once send him out to the place for which he is best fitted; and, similarly, you can bring down from the North any man who may have shown great capabilities for managing different sorts of trees that prevail in the South. By having the one Department I think you will ensure a steady flow of intelligent and capable and hard-working public servants in your Forestry Department, to a much larger extent than if you had Departments limited to each of the three or four countries composing the United Kingdom. That is my opinion. I leave the hon. and gallant Gentleman who brought in the Bill to deal with the other objections which were urged by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh. I must say that I disagree entirely with him when he states that there is any sound objection to the Bill upon the ground of the interests of Scotland. From a pecuniary point of view, as has been pointed out, Scotland will be the gainer and not the loser by the proposals of the Bill. On the whole, I have great pleasure in supporting this Bill. It will go far to meet a want which has for
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  long been felt. We were dealing a short time ago with a Housing Bill, and we discovered in our Scottish Committee that although a good deal of public money is to be spent upon the houses which are about to be provided, there will be few, if any, provided for our rural districts. This is a Bill which does meet some of the wants of our rural districts in Scotland, and for that reason I support it. I support the Bill because it is going to give us an organised Forestry Department for our country, and State forests, which, I think, are required, and a forestry school, which will help us to raise up in certain country districts a healthy and strong and virile class of men, which is exactly the sort of people we want to raise in our country and not in our big towns.
  Major STEEL: I would ask the indulgence of the House in addressing it for the first time I desire to support this Bill and to say a word in regard to it from the point of view of Scotland, because, although I do not represent a Scottish constituency, I am a Scotsman and have lived in that country all my life. From that point of view I heartily support the Bill. I could not understand the argument of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge), who opposed on the ground that a central bureaucracy was going to be set up in Whitehall, while he wanted the Scottish Board of Agriculture to have a separate Forestry Department, in order that the matter might be run in Edinburgh instead of in London. Under the present suggestion of the setting up of a central authority, Scotland, as I understand it, will probably have expended in the country about half the total money that is to be spent on this question, whereas, if the matter were worked by the Scottish Board of Agriculture, Scotland would only get something like eleven-eightieths of the total amount. Most Scotsmen like to get all they can, and as one of those who like to get all I can I support a scheme which is going to give us a half instead of eleven-eightieths. Forestry, as has been pointed out by the Parliamentary Secretary, is at present in a very deplorable condition. The hon. Gentleman mentioned that we have only got a very small portion of woodlands in this country as compared with the Continent of Europe, and even that small portion only provides about a third of what it would do if it were under proper sylvicultural management. That is, to a

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  certain extent at all events, due to the fact that up to the present we have had so many Departments competing with one another in trying to run this question of forestry. You have the Development Commissioners, and the English and Scottish Boards of Agriculture, and the Irish Department of Agriculture, and, after all, what have we found? In Scotland, notwithstanding the efforts of the Scottish Board and of the Development Commission, all that has been done is a forestry survey in one county and the training of a few individual foresters. I think that that fact alone is clear proof that some central authority is needed.
  In forestry you have to look a very long time ahead, and you have to make plans for fifty or sixty years in advance, so as to ensure that during the time of your working you have got a proportion of the various ages of trees and also a proportion of the different sorts of trees and a proportion of hard woods and coniferous trees. If you are going to look at the matter, as I think you should, from a national point of view, it is, I think, absolutely necessary to have one central authority which shall make out one national working plan for the whole country, and which will decide how much hard wood and how much coniferous trees you should have, and which will be able to say in such and such a forest or in such and such a county coniferous trees grow best, while in some other districts hard wood is more suitable. Unless you have such a central authority you will have to deal with competing claims of different parts of the country. The other argument which the hon. Member for East Edinburgh brought forward against this Bill was the separation of the question of forestry from the Board of Agriculture. He wanted forestry to be run in future by some separate Department of the Board of Agriculture. I am a sheep farmer in Scotland, on one of those hill farms which might be considered suitable for afforestation, and therefore I am in a position to look at this topic not only from the point of view of the farmer but also from the point of view of the forester, and I say that the points of view of the farmer and of the forester are diametrically opposed to one another. If, as a farmer, I know trees are going to be planted on a farm, I will do my very best to have the land which is enclosed for that purpose selected from
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  the poorest and most exposed places, where hardly any tree can be grown at a profit. That is the point of view of the farmer. If I look at the matter from the point of view of the forester. I see at once how absolutely hopeless it would be to enclose such ground as that chosen by the farmer in order to try and grow trees at a proper profit. Personally I feel that it would be fatal to the future of forestry if it were to be controlled by an agricultural body.
  Lieut.-Colonel A. MURRAY: I am sure that the House listened with peculiar pleasure to the maiden effort of my hon. Friend who has just spoken, and will desire to congratulate him, not only on his eloquence, but on the knowledge of the subject which he exhibited. We have listened to three speeches, one violently opposed to the measure, and the other two in support of it. The three hon. Gentlemen who have addressed the House are Scotsmen, although one of them does not represent a Scottish constituency. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman the j Member for the Gorbals Division of Glasgow (Mr. Barnes) is in the House to-day as representing the Scottish side of the Government, and that he proposes to reply in this Debate as representing the view the Government takes upon this subject from the Scottish aspect. My principal reason for intervening is because the Constituency I represent (Kincardine and Western) comprises one of the largest timber-growing and potential timber-growing areas in Scotland. It is from that point of view I have given very careful consideration to the Bill now before the House. I will say at once quite frankly that the measure, in my judgment, contains some very grave defects, but I have to ask myself whether, in view of the long history of afforestation in this country, when, after many years of appeals from those interested in the subject, nothing has been done by successive Governments, I should be warranted in opposing this Bill on Second Reading. The conclusion I have come to is that, however grave may be the defects contained in the Bill, they do not warrant me in opposing it on Second Reading, but I reserve to myself the right, after this Bill has been through Committee, of opposing it on Third Reading, should the Amendments put into the Bill during its passage through Committee not be consistent with the views of nay Constituents on the measure. The hon.

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  and gallant Gentleman the Member for East Fife (Sir A. Sprot), speaking a few moments ago, suggested that the main op position of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh to this Bill was on the ground that it was not consistent with the demand for Scottish Home Rule. I do not think that is the case. I think, if the hon. and gallant Member had listened a little more closely to the speech of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh, he would have found that the main opposition of that hon. Member was based on the contention that under the provisions of this Bill there would be almost complete separation between agriculture and afforestation in Scotland. Those are the reasons why I desire to see included in the Bill in Committee provisions which will ensure co-operation between agriculture and afforestation in Scotland. That is all the more necessary if we are to have regard to the argument used by the hon. Member who has just spoken. He told us that the interests of the forester and farmer in Scotland are diametrically opposed. If that be so, it is all the more important that there should be laid down by Statute co-operation between the interests of agriculture and afforestation which in Scotland ought certainly to be developed side by side. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh very rightly drew attention to the article in the "Scotsman" newspaper which advocated the alternative policy which I shall hope to see incorporated in the Bill during its passage through Committee. There is nothing in the Bill at the present moment to ensure that co-operation which is so essential to the future social progress of the Scottish people. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh said, quite truly, that under this Bill it was possible for the Forestry Authority to acquire a whole estate, of which, according to the Report of the Reconstruction Committee, only amps; third would be afforested, and he asked what was to be done with the rest. The hon. and gallant Gentleman who represents the Government and the hon. Baronet the Member for the Ayr Burghs (Sir G. Younger) said it would be possible for the Board of Agriculture to acquire the rest of that estate for land settlement purposes. But what if the rest of that estate is not suitable for land settlement purposes? The hon. and gallant Gentleman need not smile so contemptuously.
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: I was not smiling contemptuously.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: I am glad that is so, because it is really quite a good point. Is the rest of that estate for which public money has been paid to go to waste T That is one of the particular reasons cited by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh why there should be the closest co-operation between the Board of Agriculture and the Forestry Authority, co-operation empowered by Statute in order that the case instanced by the hon. Member should not arise. I turn for a moment to another objection which has been raised against this Bill, and that is that it does not provide for sufficient supervision of the operations of the Forestry Authority on the part of the Scottish people. I am glad the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Camborne Division of Cornwall (Mr. Acland) is in his place to-day, because he has contributed to this particular aspect of the question some very interesting remarks. In the April number of the "Contemporary Review "the right hon. Gentleman wrote an article entitled" The Prospects of Starting State Forestry," and in that article the right hon. Gentleman said:
  "The Forestry Authority to be established will undoubtedly have a far more active and experienced representation in Scotland upon it than any body has hither to had which has been concerned with forestry. The whole of their administrative and executive work is to be carried out, as it is now being carried out, under the interim authority, by a wholly Scottish body sitting in Edinburgh."
  I ask the attention of the House to those words, "by a wholly Scottish body sitting in Edinburgh. "Then the right hon. Gentleman goes on to say, and necessarily his words carry great weight:
  "There will be set up by Statute a most representative consultative committee of Scotland, also wholly Scottish, and it seems likely that the central authority itself will probably meet quite as often in Scotland as in England. '
  What is actually in the Bill which is now under discussion? There are seven Forestry Commissioners, who form the Forestry Authority. There are three Assistant Commissioners, one for Scotland, one for England, and one for Ireland, and a consultative committee for each of the three countries and also, I think, for Wales, but there is not a word in this Bill, so far as I can see, about the wholly Scottish body sitting in Edinburgh to which the right hon. Gentleman referred

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  in his article, and the hon. and gallant Gentleman who introduced the Bill had nothing to say about that point at all. Perhaps he or the right hon. Member for Gorbals will be able to tell us the reason why the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Camborne, which was quite clearly in the minds of the Interim Forestry Authority, is not now contained in this Bill, or perhaps the writer of the article himself will be able to tell us. At any rate, let me say this. The fact that there is no such provision as a wholly Scottish body incorporated in the provisions of this Bill to administer the powers and the duties of the central authority on behalf of the Scottish people, and in the very closest co-operation with the Scottish Board of Agriculture, makes the Bill unsatisfactory, in my judgment, from the point of view of Scotland. I pass on to one other aspect of the Bill, and I propose to ask the Government whether they can answer a question that I desire to put. I turn to Clause 7 of the Bill, and there I see that if the Commissioners are unable to acquire by agreement and on reasonable terms any land which they consider it necessary to acquire, they may apply to the Development Commissioners for power to acquire the land compulsorily in accordance with the provisions of the Schedule, and in Sub-section (1) of the Schedule it states:
  "Where the Commissioners propose to purchase land compulsorily under this Act, they may submit to the Development Commissioners a draft order putting in force, as respects the lands specified in the order, the provisions of the Lands Clauses Acts with respect to the purchase and taking of land otherwise than by agreement."
  It therefore appears that any land that is required is to be acquired under the Lands Clauses Acts.
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: May I explain? This Schedule was drafted with a view to the fact that up to the present time the Acquisition of Land Bill has not become law, and, of course, it was necessary in the Bill to make provision for the acquisition of land, but I am advised that as soon as the Acquisition of Land Bill becomes law it will override anything which would be inconsistent with it in this Schedule, and the intention is that as regards any question of compensation it would be assessed in accordance with the provisions of the Acquisition of Land Bill. If there is any
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  doubt on that, I will take steps to remove the doubt in the Committee stage on this Bill.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: I am much obliged to the hon. and gallant Gentleman because it certainly was a point to my mind of very considerable substance, and the reason I raised it was this, that in the discussions on the Report stage of the Land Acquisition Bill the Government, to the best of my recollection, specifically stated—and it was not so very long ago—that land to be acquired for public purposes other than for afforestation was to be acquired under the Land Acquisition Bill, but I now gather from the hon. and gallant Gentleman that the land is to be acquired under, I conclude, Clause 7 of the Land Acquisition Bill, and that if there is any doubt in regard to that particular point he will see that it is made quite clear in Committee That is all I wish to say. As I said at the commencement of my remarks, this Bill is one which vitally affects the Constituency which I have the honour to represent. I do not think it was quite fair, if I may say so, of the hon. and gallant Gentleman to say that unless Scotland accepted this Bill she would not obtain under the Bill the same financial assistance as she would if she gave her approval to it. If there are in Scotland areas for afforestation purposes more favourable than in any other portion of the United Kingdom, then quite clearly those areas ought to be planted, irrespective of whether or not Scotsmen in this House have agreed with a particular Bill which the Government have brought forward; but so far as I am concerned, I desire to say that I shall support this Bill on the Second Beading, and I shall hope to see included in its provisions during its passage through the Committee stage some such Amendments as I have indicated as being necessary.
  6.0 P.M.
  Sir PHILIP MAGNUS: As an Englishman, I hope I may be allowed to say a few words in support of the Bill before the House. Anyone who has listened so far to the Debate would certainly think that this Bill has been introduced for the benefit of Scotland alone. I am ready to admit that Scotland contains almost half the number of acres that can be used for forest purposes in the United Kingdom, but that is no reason, so far as I can see, why poor England should be altogether neglected in the consideration of the advantages or disadvantages that would

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  result to the United Kingdom from the passage of this Bill. The only real opponent of the Second Reading of this Bill is my hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge), and, so far as I was able to gather from his speech, which was as lucid and as clear as his speeches always are, his objection to this Bill arises in the first place, because he thinks it inopportune that a Bill of this kind should be introduced at the present time, when there is a possibility—a strong possibility as some of us may hope; a faint possibility as others may hope—of a scheme of Devolution coming into operation very shortly, by means of which Scotland would have a Government and a Parliament of its own. So far as that argument goes, I do not think it is on the whole wise that we should postpone the passing of a Bill that might be of great advantage to the United Kingdom, because a system of Devolution has not yet been introduced into this country. It is not quite certain, whether such a system ever will be introduced, but, at any rate, what we are considering now is the question of introducing a Forestry Bill for the whole of the United Kingdom, and not the question of the advantage or disadvantage of Devolution. Then the other argument which was supported by the hon. and gallant Gentleman who has just Bat down, was that this Bill does not unite, or sufficiently co-ordinate, the Department of Agriculture and the newly-proposed Department of Forestry. That might be a valid objection, and the hon. and gallant Gentleman thinks that that objection might be removed when the Bill comes to Committee.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: From the point of view of Scotland.
  Sir P. MAGNUS:But we are discussing a Bill for the United Kingdom, I believe. Personally, I cannot say that I consider the separation of the Board of Agriculture from this new Department of Forestry altogether objectionable. Everybody must know that the conditions of the growth of timber are altogether different from the growth of those plants with which the Department of Agriculture have mainly to deal. The area to be used for the purposes of forestry is quite different, much larger, and the whole conditions of the planting of young trees is altogether distinct from the conditions governing the planting of any other plants or trees. For that reason I cannot say I consider it any disadvantage
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  that these two Departments should be separated. Then, as was pointed out by the hon. Member for East Fife (Sir A. Sprot), in an extremely interesting speech, there exists a separate Department for Forestry in every, or nearly every, Continental country, and one knows how vast are the improvements that have been made in France by having a Department of Forestry, which intervenes in all questions of afforestation in all parts of that large country, and the same is true of Germany to a less extent. I venture to think that this Bill has been long desired, and the necessity has been long recognised. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh pointed out that the difficulties under which we at present suffer, or under which we did suffer during the War, in consequence of the insufficient supply of timber in this country, were not likely to recur, because none of us looked forward to a war of that dimension, or, let us hope, of any dimension within the knowledge of those now living. But we suffered considerably from, want of timber even before the War. The War has emphasised this, very great want, and unless we do something for the organisation of our forestry we shall continue to suffer from the want of timber for very many years to come, and it is a very desirable thing that this country should be less dependent than it has been in the past on the importation, of timber from other countries. We have had pointed out the enormous cost of importing timber, the great space occupied in our vessels, and the immediate demand for timber in this country for the purposes for which timber is used—housing, for instance—and many other matters which render it absolutely necessary that we should, even at this late period, do what we can for the organisation of so important an industry on which the welfare of this country so largely depends.
  It is for that reason that I welcome this Bill as a Bill of great importance to the whole of the United Kingdom. But, whereas I consider that there may be certain advantages in the centralisation of the main authority, I recognise that this Bill does provide in no small degree for decentralisation, as was pointed out by my hon. and gallant Friend who introduced the Bill. It is not a small thing that there should be, in accordance with this Bill, separate Commissioners for England, Scotland, and Ireland, each of whom would be familiar with the particular requirements of those countries, although I

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  should point out that there are the same difficulties, though to a lesser extent, perhaps, in Scotland, than we find in England, the same necessity for recognising the importance of planting trees in the soil that is most suitable for their growth and development, in England, as there is in Scotland, or in Wales or in Ireland. But, at any rate, the Commissioners in those countries would have the opportunity of recognising and pointing out any distinct differences, any specialities, in those countries which require separate consideration, and to that I attach great importance. But, besides that, there are to be consultative committees, and those consultative committees, I believe, will exercise a very great influence on the administration and organisation. If I have any fault to find with this Bill—and I expect we may all desire to introduce some Amendments in Committee—it is in connection, not so much with the powers of the Commissioners proposed to be appointed in Clause 1, as with regard to the relation of those duties, to the ability with which the Commissioners will discharge those duties. I am very glad to see that among the duties which are to be discharged by these Commissioners there occur the duties to
  "make or aid in making such inquiries, experiments, and research, and collect or aid in collecting such information, as they may think important for the purpose of promoting forestry and the teaching of forestry, and publish or otherwise take steps to make known the results of such inquiries, experiments or research and to disseminate such information."
  It is in connection with science as applied to forestry that we have been more behindhand than possibly any other country in Europe, and not with standing the excellent work that has been done by the University of Edinburgh, it must be admitted that the application of the results of scientific investigation to the manifold problems which occur in connection with tree planting, has not hitherto had the attention bestowed upon it that is desired. It is not for me to point out how numerous those applications of science to forestry may be made. We have already derived considerable advantage from some of the results of scientific investigation as applied to forestry, but there is almost a virgin field open for investigation and research in connection with tree-planting, the investigation of the seeds to be employed in planting, and various other
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  matters connected with forestry, all of which, we hope, will be carefully considered.
  But I do want to point out—and it is on that matter that I shall ask leave to introduce some Amendment when the Bill comes into Committee—that I do not see there is any indication in this Bill that any one of the seven Commissioners who are to be appointed to superintend the whole of this administrative and scientific and educational work is required to have any knowledge of science whatever, and I shall certainly suggest in Committee that one at least of the paid Commissioners shall be a man who has been selected for his great scientific and technical knowledge of matters connected with forestry. It is not enough that these men should be familiar with the organisation of afforestation. It is also necessary that they should be able to realise the nature and value of the problems that may be submitted to them by the several consultative committees. It is in this respect that we have suffered in so many of our industries, not from the want of scientific men, but from the absence of any appreciation by those who control the scientific men of the scientific results of their investigations. Therefore, I do hope when this Bill comes into Committee some Amendment will be accepted by the Minister in charge with a view of taking care that of these Commissioners who are to be appointed, at least one—and I would suggest two— should have some considerable scientific knowledge. My only desire in intervening in this Debate was to indicate that I consider British interests, Welsh interests and Irish interests ought also to be considered by those who are taking part in the discussion, and to indicate practically the only Amendment that, personally, I felt very desirous of introducing in the Bill.
  Mr. F. C. THOMSON: I desire to intervene for only a few moments in this Debate in order to support this Bill, which I think on the whole is a Bill which will be of vast benefit to the whole of the United Kingdom, and especially to Scotland. In his interesting speech the hon. Member for East Fife (Sir A. Sprot) spoke of the enormous advantage that has accrued to Continental countries by a central forestry department. We know the condition of Scotland as regards woodlands. We had, not long ago, an interesting address by a forestry expert to a number of Scottish Members, and we were

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  told that Scotland was the best—it has been demonstrated byexperiment—tree-growing country in Europe, and that the trees for timber purposes grew at a more rapid rate in certain parts of Scotland than anywhere else. With these facts, it seems almost a disgrace that we should be in the position we are with regard to timber. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge), dealing with this matter from the point of view of Scottish devolution, deprecated this Bill as a retrograde measure. I, too, believe in Scottish devolution in such matters as education and local government, but I think we have to look at this from a larger point of view. I think this is an Imperial question. One will see in Clause 3
  "The Commissioners shall be charged with the general duty of promoting the interests of forestry, the development of afforestation, and the production and supply of timber, in the United Kingdom."
  That is, of course, an important Imperial duty, and the Commissioners have also the duty to
  "make or aid in making such inquiries as they think necessary for the purpose of securing an adequate supply of timber in the United Kingdom and promoting the production of timber in is Majesty's dominions."
  So that it is altogether a big Imperial scheme which is required. There is something which is most attractive to the mind of a Scotsman, very naturally, of managing things in his own way and on his own soil. We have now a Board of Agriculture like that of England and Ireland, and at first sight it may seem to Scotsmen to be a retrograde step to have a central authority in England. But may I point out that this is a big Imperial matter, and it must be looked at from the broadest standpoint. The last speaker and others have pointed out that this is a great matter of forestry. We want to get the maximum drive on. It is a matter which will brook no delay. If it is dealt with in a separate fashion in England, Scotland, and Ireland, the result will certainly be that Scotland will be very much the loser. The hon. Member opposite considered, I think, that it was rather mean that the point should be made that Scotland did not refuse to take this Bill.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: I did not say that; I said I thought it was a little unfair.
  Mr. THOMSON:I beg the hon. and gallant Gentleman's pardon for using a word he did not use. He indicated it would be unfair—
  Lieut.-Colonel URRAY: A "little" unfair.
  Mr. THOMSON:To take up the point of view that Scotland had not refused this Bill. In view of the fact that she is a large timber-bearing area, the suggestion was that she should be taken into account as a sort of special entity. We must look at this question in a practical way. The Treasury being what it is, if there were only the Board of Agriculture alone in charge of the forestry, we should only get that small amount which was due to Scotland, whereas under this Bill the terms will be more generous. There is something superficially attractive in the idea of our Board of Agriculture managing both woodlands and the small holdings adjacent. We have, however, to look at this question of woodland in the light of expert opinion, and this is unanimously to the effect—and I personally have been a great deal impressed by it—that this is a great Imperial work, and once it is set going we may look for further development in the future. If we get Government support we must have one central authority, otherwise the matter will never get going in a proper way. Therefore, while, no doubt, the Bill is capable of improvement—and this can be done in Committee—I warmly support it. It does provide for administrative devolution by the calling in of three Assistant Commissioners, and consultative committees, whose functions will be most important. For these different reasons I strongly support this measure. I think it is one of the biggest things we have had for Scotland for many years. As pointed out by the hon. Member for East Edinburgh, many of the holdings in our country are not economic, and unless it happens, as in France, that men can get work in woodlands they are not likely to be. Therefore, we want woodlands started on a bigger scale, and laid out in as economic a manner as possible. Surely the Board of Agriculture, working along with these Commissioners, can arrange for holdings in the neighbourhood of the forests? We have to look at this forestry matter as an Imperial question, and for the Board of Agriculture of Scotland to do its part in working together. If it does that, one has confidence that by this means, and possibly by this means alone, we shall see that real regeneration throughout Scotland that we look for with confidence in the immediate future.
  Captain C. CRAIG: I intervene for one moment to express to my hon. and gallant Friend who has introduced this Bill my personal pleasure, to tender my gratitude for its introduction, and to assure him of the support, not only of myself, but, I think, of all my colleagues. Now that the question has been raised as to whether a separate Department of Forestry should be set up, whether this question of afforestation should or should not be put into the hands of the agricultural authorities of England, Scotland, and Ireland, seems to me to be a very small matter, and of secondary importance compared with the fact that the Government have at last realised the necessity for dealing with this question on a large scale. So far as I am concerned, it would not make the slightest difference as to whether the authority in whose hands this matter is to be, or has been, confided were the Agricultural Board or anyone else. The important point to me is that this question is being tackled. With respect to my own country, possibly more than any other part of the Kingdom is it necessary to do something in this matter of afforestation. Certainly innumerable Land Acts have been passed for Ireland. While they have had beneficial effects in one respect they have done harm in another. The ordinary tenant farmer in Ireland, as soon as he got possession of a farm, if that farm had a tree upon it, probably cut it down. Many districts, which twenty or thirty years ago had a fairly wooded appearance, are now absolutely denuded of trees. There is the aesthetic point of view. Apart, however, from that the Bill will do good. In Ireland also, not to as great an extent as in Scotland, but to a very considerable extent, there are very many admirable tree-growing areas, which for years, for centuries even, have been lying idle, or have been put to very little use. I hope under this Bill, those areas will in the future prove of considerable benefit to the Kingdom. There are no doubt, as hon. Members have said, points in the Bill which will require to be amended in Committee. On the whole, however, the Bill, from my point of view, and the point of view of Ireland, I think, is a very valuable Bill, and my hon. and gallant Friend may assure himself of our heartiest support.
  Mr. REMER: As one who is commercially interested in the timber industry in this country, perhaps it may be of some
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  moment if I inform the House of my complete approval of this measure. It is one of the most important measures that have been introduced into this House for some considerable time. It relates to no new problem. The problem is a very old one. This is not the first attempt which has been made to solve it. But I am afraid that the attempts in days gone by have been spasmodic. They have been the result of scares. If we go back some considerable time in history we find there was a scare in this country because there was a shortage of yew for making bows and arrows. We find that in those days the people planted yew trees in their churchyards, and you will find a yew tree existing at the present time in a great many churchyard's. Later, there was a further scare because there was a shortage of oak with which to build battleships. There were a great many patriotic landowners in those days, and they did their duty in planting oaks in their hedge rows. As a result you find many oaks in the hedge rows of England at the present time.
  During the present War there was another scare owing to the shortage of ash which was required for making aeroplanes. Another scare was in connection with pit-props for mines, and yet another about the shortage of general timber in view of the importance of saving tonnage. While on the question of pit-props may I refer to some of the speeches which have been made as to the shortage of pit-props and the bad quality referred to by several hon. Members. The reason for that bad quality, of which complaint was made, was because it was impossible to secure foreign pit-props. The pit-props used during the War were very largely English, and the bad quality was due to the fact that timber in England was grown haphazard, without scientific method, and, indeed, without any thought as to how the timber was going to be used.
  I give complete approval to this measure. While doing so, however, there are one or two points on which I should like to give a word or two of criticism. In the Bill it states that in the constitution of those consultative committees regard shall be had to persons having practical experience relating to forestry, woodcraft, and woodland industry. It is of the greatest importance, too, that there should be someone on these committees who should have commercial experience of timber after it has been grown, and for

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  that reason I think that on the consultative committees there should be someone who has practical sawmill experience, and who is in the habit of sawing up timber, and knows what if is going to be made into afterwards. I should like to refer to the speech of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh, and his claims for Home Rule for Scotland. It is most important that the whole scheme should be under one central authority, because of the difficulty which would naturally exist if Englishmen, Irishmen, or Welshmen wanted to go and buy timber in Scotland. It is most important that they should be free to go throughout the country, to go into the four Kingdoms with their teams of men, felling the timber after it has been grown. It you have a central authority difficulties, naturally, would not arise.
  My second point of criticism against the Bill is that it is an attempt—it is no good blinking the fact—to subsidise another industry. Along with the great industries that have been subsidised, food, transport, and other industries, we are going to add the forestry industry. It is most important that we should do our utmost to place this industry on an economic basis. There is no doubt whatever that at the present moment trees cannot be properly grown in the United Kingdom. There is no doubt trees have been grown by landowners who have been philanthropists to the nation. Some undoubtedly have been grown for sporting reasons. Mainly, however, they have been grown for patriotic reasons, and without certainly any thought to secure any commercial profit. For that reason, I think it is most important that the Government should take steps to place this great industry— for it can be a very great industry—on a thoroughly sound economic basis. If the War has taught us anything about forestry, it has taught us one solid, salient fact, that when the War broke out this country was very rich in timber lands. It was particularly rich in Scotland, and the value of that timber had a very great effect on winning the War. Yet, in spite of the fact that when the War broke out we were rich in this country in timber land, we imported nine-tenths—I think I am correct in my figure—of our timber requirements. It may very pertinently be asked that, with the position we were in, why did we import such a large quantity of timber, when we were so rich in timber land? The reason is not far to seek.
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  The price of imported foreign deals was£6 to£8 per standard, whilst in England the same deals could not be produced under£20 to£30 per standard. It is not particularly necessary to inquire as to why there was that considerable difference in producing timber in this country in comparison with foreign lands. Some portion of it cannot be avoided, for the reason that we have not in this country any great rivers like the Mississippi and the St. Lawrence, where the timber can be rafted to the saw-mills, ports, and the railheads. There are other reasons. The first is the very high cost of rail charges, the second the absence of loading facilities on the railways, and the third the question of the extraordinary traffic on the roads. I propose to show how these difficulties can be removed. With regard to the high cost of rail charges on timber, the railways have undoubtedly done their utmost to drive this trade away. They said it was difficult to handle and inconvenient to their staffs, and they did their best to kill the industry, and more than one railway manager has deliberately told me that it was their policy to avoid carrying English timber as much as they could. To draw a comparison between the charges in this country as compared with other countries, I only need to mention that in pre-war days you could bring timber from a place 1,000 miles from the interior of the United States, and then 2,000 miles across the Atlantic, at a lower charge than you could convey that timber from Liverpool to Birmingham, and that proves that the rail charges killed this important industry, and made it impossible to run it upon an economic basis.
  Another point is the absence of loading facilities at country stations. There are at very few stations cranes by which timber can be lifted on to the trucks. Timber is very heavy, and you must have a crane in order to load it. What happens at country stations?
  Mr. SPEAKER: I do not think that is relevant to this Bill. This measure deals only with the earlier stages of planting trees
  Mr. REMER: If that is out of order I will not pursue it, but I thought it was important to show that the trees should be profitably sold after they were grown.
  Mr. SPEAKER: We have been told that these trees will take about eighty years to grow.
  Mr. REMER: I will not pursue that point further, but there is one further point dealing with extraordinary traffic. It trees are going to be grown on timber land it is necessary to provide roads. When the trees are carted away the people who are carting them are charged very excessive amounts for damage to the roads. I think this Bill is going to be of advantage to the country, quite apart from the utilitarian reasons that have been advanced. There is the point of view of our landscapes. I do not know whether hon. Members have been into North Wales during recent times, but there is there a well-known road between Dolgelly and Bar-mouth. If you go there you will find, instead of Sills covered with beautiful trees, that those trees are all bare and black. I think it is necessary that we should put our country back again to the beautiful landscapes of pre-war days. We are all familiar with the Prime Minister's references to beautiful Wales, and in one of his speeches he referred to the forestry resources of Wales. Personally, I can vouch for the valuable timber secured for the War from the Prime Minister's native village, and I appeal for support for this Bill, not only on account of national and economic reasons, but in order to restore Britain's beautiful landscapes and to make this country fit for heroes to live in.
  Mr. A. SHAW: I beg to move, to leave out the word "now," and, at the end of the Question, to add the words "upon this day three months."
  I yield to no hon. Member in my conviction as to the need of afforestation in this country, and particularly in Scotland. This Bill, if I may the permitted to use the expression, is rotten to the core, and I hope to give some reasons for making that statement. May I draw the attention of every hon. Member, in the first instance, to the provisions of Clause 8? Under Sub-section (2), paragraph (a), it is provided
  "There shall be paid into the Forestry Fund—

  (a) the sums issued oat of the Consolidated Fund under this Section; and

  (b) all sums received by the Commissioners in respect of the sale of any land or timber or otherwise received by the Commissioners in respect of any transactions carried out by them in toe exercise of their powers and duties under this Act."

  That means that there shall be paid into the Forestry Fund all the trading profits of this great Government Department, and over all those profits and transactions this House is not to have one single scrap of
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  control. There is no provision for an Estimate. There is a provision in Sub-section (3) of Clause 8, which says:
  "Provided that the amount to be so issued and paid in each year shall be such as Parliament may determine on an estimate to be presented by the Treasury."
  That applies to moneys issued out of the Consolidated Fund, but so far as the general control of the House of Commons over the acts of this important and expensive now Government Department goes, the only conclusion one can come to is that the House of Commons has been left out altogether, and no scrap of control in this respect has been provided for at all
  We had an example yesterday of the sort of treatment Scotland receives in an English Parliament. We had questions of this very kind discussed on a Bank Holiday when there were prominent attraction is outside, and when many Scottish Members absented themselves as a protest against the treatment Scotland is receiving. Here is a Bill which takes from the Secretary for Scotland and the Scottish Office large sections of peculiarly Scottish administration, and neither the Secretary for Scotland, the Lord Advocate, nor the Solicitor-General' are occupying their seats on the Treasury Bench, and, perhaps, like my humbler colleagues, they share the objections which I am putting forward to this measure.
  With all due respect to the hon. Member for Ayr Burghs (Sir G. Younger), some of us who represent rural as well as urban constituencies are brought in closer touch with the facts on this question than the hon. Member. What is the outstanding fact which this Bill ignores from A to Z? It is that if you would regenerate and re-people those great tracts of wilderness which exist, especially in the North of Scotland, you must have something beside small holdings. Where you are bordering on the sea you must have canning industries and fisheries, but inland you must Have forestry, because your small holdings and afforestation must work side by side, and just at the time when that is being appreciated by everybody you have introduced a Bill which divorces these two things and which take away the whole area of afforestation from the Board of Agriculture in Scotland and which sets up to effect this marriage between forestry and agriculture, two conflicting Departments, with results which will ensue here, as they always do, when conflicting De-

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  partments are in charge of matters which are really bound up with one another. You are bound to fall between two stools.
  Another aspect of this question in Scotland is that a divorce between agriculture and afforestation as 'being carried out when a marriage is something we should try to secure. This is what we ought to avoid, especially at the present critical time. Now we are creating a new Department when all that is wanted is to inspire new life and vigour into the existing Department. This reminds me of the gentleman who, instead of pouring new spirit into his motor car when the petrol ran out, bought a new car. We do not want new machinery for expending great capital sums. We do not want machinery inspired by landlords, or the buying out of landlords at their own prices. Some of us know a little of the personalities and of the machinations which the behind this Bill, and we shall not rest until the House of Commons is furnished with the facts. There has been a growing feeling in Scotland that the proper way to conduct afforestation is not by making huge payments to landowners. I do not agree with anyone who suggests that landowners have not done their duty by afforestation in the past. I know that now they have more slender resources than ever, and those who have done their duty deserve well of the State, but I object to the payment of large capital sums now, and we ought to adopt some other policy instead of putting in the forefront of Clause 3 schemes for buying land, apparently at prices to be fixed by reference to the Lands Clauses Acts.
  Sir A. BOSCAWEN: No.
  Mr. SHAW: You will find in Clause 3, Sub-section (3), it is provided, under paragraph (a), for the following
  "Purchase or take on lease and hold any land suitable for afforestation or required for purposes in connection with afforestation,"
  and under paragraph (b) it is provided that the Commissioners shall have power to
  "sell or lot any land which in their opinion is not needed or has proved unsuitable for the purpose for which it was acquired."
  These things are put in the forefront of the Bill, and the Board of Agriculture or the Forestry Commission may agree with the landlord and say to him, "If you will give us your land free of charge for seventy years, we shall have an actuarial calculation made and share with your successors on a just basis the profit accruing at the
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  end of that time. "I should have thought the advantage of that course was so apparent that it must commend itself to the Government. It would save the capital expenditure involved in the purchase of land, and it would be perfectly easy to have an actuarial calculation at the beginning of the term and to bring the landlord into an amicable arrangement by which, after you had occupied his land for seventy years for nothing, he would at the end of that time, or perhaps it might be his successor, have an equitable share of the profits realised by the transaction. But there is not one word about that in this Bill from beginning to end.
  I said something just now about small holdings in Scotland. There is not in this Bill a single clause or word which shows that the Government have realised that the great need is small holdings and that such a system can only be operated along with a scheme of afforestation. You are, it is true, setting up a Commission which may, perhaps, have a Scottish chairman—although there are some chairmen who, although not Scotsmen would be very excellent, and others who, although they are Scotsmen, might prove not so good. But we fear we are going to have a Commission dominated by English sentiment, a Commission largely operating in London, and a very expensive body out of touch with Scottish opinion, which is rapidly moving and hardening at the present moment. This Government, in taking away from the Scottish Office— in defiance, I would like to think, of the opinion of the Secretary for Scotland, who is soon to be made a Secretary of State, and of the Law Officers of the Crown for Scotland, and certainly in defiance of the great bulk of Scottish opinion— [An HON. MEMBER: "No, no!"] —which is, I fear, not represented by the hon. Member who dissents—in taking away this great tract of Scottish administration is not treating Scotland fairly, because it is accompanying its offer with a bribe, and that is a very poor tribute to the Scottish character. I object to that low estimate of Scottish opinion which apparently animates the Treasury Bench. Scottish opinion is moving in the direction of Scottish Home Rule. If you are going to take away many territories of Scottish administration, and you have filched a good many of them up to the present, "you may depend upon it that the day will come when you will have to give them back, accompanied, not by these niggardly

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  financial provisions, but you will have to bring in a Bill which will have to be presented by the Government, and we shall then have the spectacle possibly of the Prime Minister standing at that box and using arguments which will overthrow the very arguments now put up by the supporters of this Bill, and asking the then House of Commons to give a Second Reading to a Bill under which Scotland will be treated in accordance with her full rights as a nation.
  Sir F. BANBURY: I beg to second the Amendment, but not for the reasons advanced by the hon. Gentleman who moved the rejection of the Bill, because I do not share the view that Scotland or Scottish interests are neglected in this House. Ever since I entered the House I have regretted that I have not been a Scotsman, because had I been I might now be seated among the distinguished occupants of the Front Bench instead of occupying the position I do at the present moment. My reason for objecting to this Bill is that I do not think at the present moment we ought to embark on any further expenditure, however good the object may be. The expenditure which is provided for under this Bill may be excellent. I do not suggest that it is not. I do not believe it is going to be in any way a bribe to the landlords. I do not see how under the hon. Member's scheme of sharing the profits at the end of seventy years the landlord is going to live during those seventy years.
  Mr. SHAW: I said the profits would be shared with the landlord or his successor, and if there be no successor the position would be nil the better.
  Sir F. BANBURY: A man cannot live on his successors.
  Mr. SHAW: I am very grateful to the right hon. Baronet for seconding my Amendment, but may I remind him that the scheme which I advocate is one which is actually in operation at this moment in Scotland?
  Sir F. BANBURY: I suppose the reason for that is that the Scotsmen concerned have taken such good care of their possessions that they are able to live on other income than that which they would be likely to get under this afforestation proposal. My reason for objecting to this Bill is that the time has come when the
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  Government itself should set an example of economy. Every day we come down to this House and are brought face to face with Bills which increase our bureaucracy, and which increases the money that is to be spent in providing for new Ministries with big salaries. We have a Bill coming on after this which provides for higher salaries for Ministers, and yet at this time it is almost impossible to conceive how we can meet our existing liabilities. How can the Government think that the people in this country are going to exercise that economy which alone can save us from bankruptcy when they come down here continually and ask for more money! There are many things ail of us would like but we cannot get because we have not the money. When will the Government learn that, they are in such a position that their chief endeavour should be to curtail the appointments of Ministers, to reduce the number of Undersecretaries, to lessen the expenditure of the country, and not to increase it for whatever purpose, however good it may be? The hon. Gentleman who moved the rejection of this Bill said quite truly there was a peculiar Clause with regard to finance. Three and a half million sterling is to be spent in ten years, or an average of about £350,000 a year. The provision of the Financial Clause cannot at present be discussed, but there is a proviso that an Estimate shall be submitted and subjected to discussion. Of course one does not know what profits, if any, there are going to be under this scheme, but under the powers to be given it will be quite easy, supposing there is something being done to which certain Members of this House objects, to postpone the sum to be allotted for the year until the next year and in that way to avoid any discussion on the Estimate of the year. There will hi no difficulty whatever in doing that, and that is a provision which, in my opinion, requires very drastic alteration.
  7.0 P.M.
  Let us see what the powers of the Commissioners will be. They may purchase or take or lease and hold any land suitable for afforestation, and they may sell or let any land which, in their opinion, is not needed or which has proved unsuitable for afforestation. They have, in fact, a roving commission to go all over the country and buy land, and if they make a mistake they can sell it again. Under such circumstances how far will£3,500,000 carry them? It looks to me as though we are going to have a repetition of the Slough

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  fiasco, and at the end of ten years the Department will come to us and say, "We have already sunk the £3,500,000, and we have nothing to show for it. "Over and over again it has been proved that the Government has not been successful when entering into ventures of this kind. Although it may be very vital to Scotland to have more trees, I do not agree with the right hon. Gentleman opposite who said that the Government were going to do this thing well. I do not know of anything the Government have ever done well when they have assumed control of such an undertaking. It has always resulted in a serious deficit. The Government have never been successful in controlling commercial transactions. I happen myself to have planted trees, not with much success I admit, but I am sure I have been as successful as any Government official would be. May I point out that success in afforestation involves the expenditure of a great deal of money, time, and labour? There are all sorts of things to be fought. There are difficulties with regard to -weeds and to rabbits. I believe they do not grow many weeds in Scotland because the soil is so poor that even weeds will not grow there, but in England we have not only the difficulty with weeds, but we have also the difficulty with rabbits, and it is not an easy matter, therefore, to be successful in afforestation. I end as I began, with imploring the Government most earnestly to consider whether this is not the time for them to put a stop to expenditure. I do not care how good the object may be. I am quite prepared to admit that if we Here a rich country with a debt ofonly£500,000,000 or£600,300,000, such as we had at the commencement of the War, instead of being a poor country with a debt of£7,000,000,000 or£8,000,000,000 and an annual expenditure the extent of which no Member knows, it might be quite right to go in for this sort of thing. But as we are in that position the one thing we ought to do is to cut down all this expenditure and all this extravagance
  Mr. ACLAND: Perhaps the House will allow mo to intervene for a short time at this stage in the Debate. I want first of all to answer a question definitely asked me by the hon. and gallant Member for Kincardine and Western Aberdeen (Lieut.-Colonel Murray). He did me the honour of quoting an article which I wrote on the prospects of State forestry, and he referred to the sentence in which I
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  suggested that the central authority would not centralise all the work in itself, but that the local centres of administration would be in the offices of Assistant Commissioners in Edinburgh, Dublin, and London respectively. I can only speak for the plans of the Interim Forest Authority which would, I think, be carried out by the Forest Commissioners if, to some extent at any rate, the same persons who had been in charge of the work on that Interim Authority were entrusted with it when it was put on a permanent basis. If I have the honour to succeed in having brought this question of forestry under a permanent authority, I hope I shall be allowed to step aside, and that I shall not be one of the Commissioners under the Bill. I can speak with certainty as to what was intended by the Interim Forest Authority and what has been done by them. I shall not have any personal share in carrying that policy any further if this Forestry Commission is set up; but undoubtedly, as far as the decisions of the Government go, it is intended that the actual centres of administrative and executive work should be decentralised, and that there should not be a great bureaucratic centre of offices in London. The persons I refer to who would have, in the case of Scotland, a purely Scottish staff in charge of the Scottish portions, would be the Assistant Commissioner and the divisional and district officers under him, officers in charge of acquisition, estate officers, and so on. All the work in regard to the acquisition of land, in the leasing of land, in the management of the woods, in the actual planting, in the giving of advice in regard to forestry, in regard to woodland schools, and to providing training schemes and in the giving of assistance to local authorities—all that would be decentralised from the centre, and put in the hands of persons in the national centres, such as Edinurgh.
  I very much welcome what my hon. and gallant Friend said with regard to the need of the closest possible co-operation between the Forestry Commission and the Departments of Agriculture. I hope that if any Amendment is moved in Committee to make that more certain, if possible, than it is now, it will be favourably regarded by the Government. The hon. and gallant Member said, perfectly truly, that it would be necessary in some cases to acquire, either by lease or purchase, considerable tracts of land, and that the whole of those tracts would not be suitable for

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  afforestation; some would be too high to do practically anything with, and some would be more suitable for agriculture than for forestry. The Commission which would acquire those estates would, I think, in the first place, have some responsibility to the persons whom they were going to employ directly. There would be certain persons directly employed all the year round, first on the planting and afterwards in looking after the growing woods. Those persons must undoubtedly be equipped with small holdings, so that they shall have some definite interest in cultivation, and that shall be settlers in the truest sense of the word. Therefore, certain parts of the areas acquired would have to be set aside to provide them with small holdings and some subsidiary interest in the district besides that which they would have as being directly employed in forestry. But when they have set aside areas for these small holdings, undoubtedly the Forestry Commissioners would not consider themselves competent to undertake anything in the nature of a small-holdings policy. It is certainly their intention to keep in the closest touch with the Board of Agriculture in acquiring certain areas, and to agree with them, before they acquire them, what parts of those areas would remain under the direct management of the Forestry Commission and what parts could be better acquired by the Board of Agriculture for their smallholdings policy.
  I was very glad to hear that the Bill was so welcome in Ireland. I went to Ireland very recently with the other members of the Interim Forest Authority, and I was appalled at the state of things, where the country was being absolutely denuded of timber. I have been informed recently that there is a district in the West of Ireland which is now priding itself on the timbered appearance given to it by the erection of a line of telegraph poles stretching across from one side of it to the other. There arc parts of the country, very far from a rail way station, where, unless some measures of afforestation are taken, hand-in-hand I hope with the co-operation of the county councils, there will be an absolute dearth of timber even to mend a cart or a gate, or to put in an axe-head or the spoke of a wheel. No country can need regeneration in forestry more than parts of Ireland undoubtedly do. One could see in other districts that the foundation of forest nurseries or woodland schools had been
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  appreciated, because as soon as one came within a radius of some bit of planting that had been done by the Irish authorities one began to see, here and there, a forest tree or a little group of forest trees—not always, one feared, honestly came by by the farmers who put them in in the corners of their holdings—showing that the State nursery had been useful to the settlers, who put in a few seedlings here and there in the corners of their farms, and proving that they were quite interested in forestry if it could only be developed on proper lines in their part of the country.
  Turning to the Motion for the rejection of the Bill, which has been moved and seconded by the somewhat ill-assorted hon. Members who are responsible for the Motion, I think the argument which more than anything else appealed to me in trying to work this question through is that it is time that there should be one single authority responsible for producing adequate supplies of timber. At present it is always possible for every authority you go to to say that it is somebody else's fault that nothing is done. The production of an adequate amount of timber is almost as essential in defence service as the service of the Admiralty. Nobody would propose to split up the Admiralty so that you could say," Oh, it is true we have not provided many ships, but the other authority ought to do it. There must be some central persons who have influence and who govern and who can be had up, and if necessary hanged, for neglect of their duty. You will not get timber production dealt with very adequately in this country, even if the authority exercises a general supervisory control, unless there is somebody whom you can hold really responsible. If it were left to the Board of Agriculture, they might say, "We have not been able to make terms because the demands of the owners were too high." Another authority might say, "We cannot make progress because of the small holdings. "You would find yourselves in twenty years, in face of the steady progress of denudation of our timber, which was going on before the War and is now continuing, without any adequate provision for the production of timber in this country.
  Of course, I only come into this as an amateur, and I know nothing about it really from a professional point of view, but one of the things that impresses me about this forestry service is the difficulty of being certain that measures of afforesta-

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  tion will be really well carried out. In forestry you cannot afford to make a mistake. If you make a mistake in manuring a sugar-beet crop or in planting oats, you see it in a year, and you can do the right thing the next year with your crop. The worst is one rotation. You can put it right in the next rotation. In forestry your mistake will not be seen for forty years, and cannot be put right until then. Therefore the people in afforestation must have the very best experience. If Scotland gets it sown powers absolutely by itself, and all the persons employed in Scottish forests as divisional officers, foresters, foremen, and so on, will have to start from scratch. There are no State forests in Scotland except one of very small area. They will have to start from scratch, from establishing their nurseries, and growing up in the forests, and if they serve the State for thirty or forty years they will still not have got the forests up to the condition of producing proper crops of timber. That is not the best training for foresters or forest officers. If mistakes are to be avoided these men should have proper training in the forests, and if there is an interchange of service with one term in Scotland and then a term in one of the Crown woods in England, this difficulty will be avoided, because in England there will be, under one administration and under the general control of the forest authority, all the Crown woods, which means some 63,000 acres of existing forests of very largely matured timber. So that the forester or forest officer who has the chance of working as a servant of the Crown will have a chance of serving in an actual forest, whereas, if the Scottish service is separate, he will not, for forty years, have a chance of seeing a matured forest at all. It is as if a person going into the teaching service were condemned to be a nursery governess all the time, dealing only with the youngest possible children, and never seeing education developed as it ought to be.
  This Bill does provide a basis for making forestry a matter of Imperial concern. It is not too soon for that to be done. Hon. Members may have noticed recently the appalling losses that have been suffered in Canada and in the United States by forest fires during this summer. We read a few weeks ago of a forest fire in two or three of the States of America which is expected could not be put out until the
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  arrival of the snows of winter. To be able to concert Imperial measures with regard to dealing with the danger of forest fires is quite an urgent matter. It is a very remarkable thing, of which I had no idea until I began to look into the statistics, that during the fifteen years before the War the proportion of our timber that we obtained from the Empire had very considerably decreased, in comparison with the amount of timber we obtained from foreign countries. It does seem to be of the highest importance to try to concert measures with our great Dominions for establishing something in the nature of an Imperial forest service. The Interim Forest Authority has already begun in a small way on that basis. We are hoping to hold, in connection with an exhibition which is being organised by the Overseas Trade Department, an Imperial Forest Conference in December or January, at which the Dominions, India, and the Crown Colonies will be represented, and which will lay the foundations, we hope, of an Imperial bureau of information with regard to forestry, so that forestry statistics, methods of raising timber, methods of disposing of timber, and arrangements in regard to staff and administration, may be, compared, and different parts of the Dominions may be able to take advantage of the experience of other parts, which at present they cannot do. With all respect to what has been done by the Boards of Agriculture, it is inconceivable that the Boards of Agriculture should have said that it was their job to convene an Imperial conference about forestry. That sort of thing is not possible when the matter is split up between two or three different Departments. A single forestry authority is necessary in order that they may take a large view of the question, and make themselves useful to the whole Empire, as it is hoped that this authority will be able to do.
  With regard to the observations of the hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. A. Shaw), it is not really quite true to say, as I understand him to say, that no provision is made for Estimates being laid before this House. That certainly is not intended, and I am perfectly certain that it will be brought out quite clearly in the Clause which will be moved to take the place of the Clause which has come from the Lords. I think it is pretty definitely provided, in Sub-section (3) of Clause 8, that there

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  shall be just as definite annual Estimates for the Forestry service as for any other Department.
  Mr. SHAW: The particular Clause to which the right hon. Gentleman refers relates only to moneys issued out of the Consolidated Fund.
  Mr. ACLAND: That is so, and I listened with interest to the point made by the hon. Member as to what is going to happen if and when we come to the stage of getting proceeds by the sale of timber— which will not be for the first ten years or so. Such proceeds would, I think, be put against the estimate on the forestry fund as Appropriations-in-Aid, and questions could be asked about them in exactly the same way as about the moneys proposed to be voted. As is well known, when a public Department receives moneys, those are always brought in in aid of the Estimates by the system of Appropriations-in-Aid, and are just as much under control as the sum which it is proposed to expend.
  Sir F. BANBURY: This is an entirely new system of finance, as far as I remember. There need be no Estimates here of any sort.
  Mr. ACLAND: If there is any doubt, I feel pretty certain that it can be made definite. I have had the opportunity of discussing the matter carefully with the Home Affairs Committee of the Cabinet, and there is no doubt that it is the intention of the Government that, unless Parliament has approved of an annual Estimate, the proceedings of the Forestry Commission will come to an end. It will depend, just as any other Department will depend, upon getting money from Parliament annually by estimate. The point has been made several times in the Debate that in the probable operations of the Forest Commission there will not be sufficient care for small holdings and for settling men on the land. So far as what is proposed follows, as it does follow largely, the Report of the Reconstruction Sub-committee, I think there can be really no foundation for that suggestion. There was no question about it in the Committee. We went very closely into the question of how forestry could contribute to settling men on the land, and nothing that has been said in this Debate is more strong than what was said in that
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  sense in the Report of the Sub-committee. I will quote a few sentences from their Report:
  "The districts which would benefit most are those which are now poorest and most backward, such as the hilly regions of Northern England, Wales and Ireland, the border country and, most of all, the Highlands of Scotland. No ore disputes that large areas in these districts now devoted to sheep or deer ought, if possible, to be put to more productive uses. In these tracts, now almost uninhabited, the cost of reclamation and equipment is such that no agricultural development is economically possible unless some other industry is present to help to bear the preliminary outlay on roads, bridges, etc., and provide occupations to which the small farmer can turn in winter when he would otherwise be idle, and to which his family can look for employment. In certain favoured localities sea fishing, mines or quarries may supply this want, but in many districts sylviculture and the industries based on it arc the only agencies that can do so."
  I remember our getting some very interesting information from the Agricultural Commissioner for Wales, Mr. Bryner Jones, as the result of an inquiry which he made into the economic position of certain families of smallholders in Wales. He showed that over the whole of one large district, allowing for the value of farm produce consumed at home, the total incomes of the families ranged from 13s. 6d. to 21s. 6d. per week only, and in those districts, if anything like the right sort of subsistence is to be provided for the inhabitants, it is essential to provide forestry, so as to give the men steady winter work and bring them in money in the winter to supplement what they make out of their holdings in the summer. I do not think anyone could have been more profoundly impressed than we were with the necessity for running small holdings and forestry together, mutually dependent upon one another, and I can say with certainty that it is the deliberate intention of the colleagues with whom I have been working to co-operate in the most wholehearted way possible with the Board of Agriculture in schemes of settlement of that kind. We believe that in large districts there is at present no chance whatever of making economic holdings, but, when forestry has come, economic holdings can be quite readily and easily established.
  The Mover of the Amendment—I am sorry to see that he has left the House—took exception to the proposals to purchase large areas of land. There is this incidental point, that, if it comes to compulsory purchase, the provisions of the Bill recently passed through this House will be put into operation. In drafting this Bill I

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  merely used the best code that lay in my hands, namely, the code under which the Board of Agriculture proceeds to acquire its land, which, of course, is the Lands Clauses Act, with certain very definite modifications which are shown in the Schedule. But when the Acquisition of Lands Bill passes, the method of assessing compensation there worked out, and assented to by this House, will be substituted for the method suggested in the present Schedule. Apart from that, I believe we shall be able to proceed very largely, not by purchase, but by lease. It is a very complicated thing to work out, but with regard to one or two proposals which owners have made to us we have worked out systems which will be put into operation, if the Bill passes, of leasing the land (so as to avoid the heavy expense of out-and-out purchase) for, say, two seventy-five year rotations of 150 years. I believe that that system will be adopted to a considerable extent. In certain cases it really pays better to purchase out-and-out than to lease. There is some land now in Devonshire, the very finest kind of land for tree production, which has been offered to us for out-and-out purchase at 35s. per acre—not per annum, but the freehold out-and-out. When we get hold of such a possibility of purchasing the very best land at such a rate, it is surely better to purchase it out-and-out than to go on paying 2s. or 3s. per acre per annum.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: Is that the present agricultural value?
  Mr. ACLAND: Those are lands which, if used for agriculture, would, I think, carry a rent of 10s. or 12s. per acre per annum, so that to be able to acquire them at 35s. per acre is to get them for very much less than their agricultural value would be if they were used for agriculture. They are not, however, lands under agriculture, and you cannot say what the agricultural rent would have been. They were timbered and have been cleared, and as a matter of fact the Board of Agriculture suggested to us that they were better adapted for forestry than for agriculture, and they expressed the hope that we would acquire them for forestry purposes. With reference to proceeds-sharing, the hon. Member for Ayr fell into the somewhat natural mistake of saying that he cannot find in this Bill any provision under which proceeds-sharing schemes could be worked out with owners. I think that if he had studied the Bill rather more closely
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  he would have seen it. It is contained, of course, in paragraph (e) of Sub-section (3) of Clause 3, which says that the forestry authority may undertake the management and supervision upon such terms as may be agreed upon, or give assistance or advice in relation to the planting or managing of any woods. Proceeds-sharing schemes will be carried out under the provision for giving assistance in the planting or management of any woods. We have already taken the matter of proceeds-sharing very much further than any of the Boards of Agriculture or the Development Commissioners have ever taken it. It is not an easy matter. One has to work out alternative methods, and the actuarial calculations are not simple. I have spent thirty or forty hours in working it out with actuarial tables, to arrive at something which could be put before-owners as a workable scheme. We are now consulting representatives of forestry societies and others as to whether we have got it into the simplest and most workable form. But, undoubtedly, that idea of proceeds-sharing, which was adumbrated and, I believe, actually started in one case by the Development Commissioners in Scotland, is going to be one of the main ways in which we hope to be able to aid afforestation.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: Will the new authority take over that particular contract to which the right hon. Gentleman refers? There appears to be nothing in the Bill to say that they will take over current contracts of that nature.
  Mr. ACLAND: The Bill undoubtedly provides that where the Development Commission has made an existing contract with the consent of the Treasury the future financing of that contract shall rest with the Development Commissioners. I have not heard any suggestion from the Development Commissioners that they wish to give up the control of contracts which they have made, although they may involve the expenditure of money in the future. But undoubtedly—and I think I can speak for those with whom I have been in the habit of working in the Commission—that contract will be taken over and financial provision will be made for it. Really it would be a good deal simpler if we took over the definite obligations of the Development Commission than if there were two concurrent authorities, one helping schemes which happened to be put forward by the Development Commission

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  and approved by the Treasury before a certain date, and the other helping schemes put forward by the forestry authority alter a certain date. We did not think it right to suggest to the Development Commissioners in advance that they should give up certain powers which they have undertaken and are willing to continue to finance. Undoubtedly proceeds-sharing has init very considerable possibilities, particularly in the case where the land which you wish to assist in afforesting is considerably mixed up with other land. Land which will not be affected by any scheme has, of course, this advantage, that there will be two authorities, both of which will have a definite interest in the financial success of the scheme, and when the financial interest of both bodies is the same, it ought not to be impossible to devise useful schemes between them.
  I do not think it has been brought up in this Debate that there is a very definite and a very responsible opinion in Scotland in favour of this Bill. The course of the Debate has been rather battledore and shuttlecock between Scottish Members, and there has been about as much opposition to it as there has been support. But we ought not to forget altogether that all the societies interested in forestry have definitely preferred to pin their faith, in order to forward the interests that they have aft heart, to a central authority rather than in the continuance of the impossible expansion of the present position. The Royal Scottish Arboricultural Society, for instance, and all other bodies of that kind, are very strongly in favour of having a central authority to exercise general supervision and control. On the whole, this Bill has been very widely welcomed. The only at all large point about it has been the Scottish point, which is entirely intelligible and natural from the point of view of those who put the case of Scottish Home Rule very much in the foreground, and who, I hope, will not forget this point, which is always present in my mind, that there are parts of Scotland in which agriculture is absolutely impossible on an economic basis until forestry has been established, and this body, although it will exercise central control, is determined more than anything else to afforest in those districts where economic settlement but for forestry is really an impossibility. We have had the great advantages of Scotland brought before us both on the Forestry Sub-
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  committee and the Interim Authority very prominently, and I think it is the general opinion of those who have worked at it that at least a half, and possibly more, of the actual work to be done in future will be undertaken in Scotland, and there is absolute certainty that land settlement will be carried on in the very closest touch with the Scottish Board of Agriculture. If an Amendment is moved to secure more definitely the liaison between the forestry authority and the Scottish Board in all matters of settlement or utilisation of land suitable for agricultural purposes, I hope it will be favourably regarded by the Government.
  Mr. G. MURRAY: I had some sympathy with the views expressed by the hon. Member (Mr. Hogge) with regard to the question of Home Rule, but I had no sympathy whatsoever with the views of the hon. Member who moved the rejection. I do not think the people of Scotland would have thanked him if he had succeeded in getting the Bill rejected, because I know there is a large body of opinion in Scotland which recognises that something must be done for forestry as quickly as possible, and I believe they will accept the Bill as a very good measure towards that end. I did not agree further with the hon. Member (Mr. Hogge) when he said there was no urgency for this Bill. That was the ground upon which he based his reasons for deferring it until such time as we have Devolution in Scotland. I believe there is very great necessity for the Bill. Most hon. Members who have spoken have said it is necessary for forestry to run concurrently with land settlement. If it be the case that land settlement is urgent, forestry is just as urgent as land settlement. I observe that under the Bill there is nothing provided for Parliamentary control. The lion. Gentleman (Sir A. Boscawen) informed us that he was considering arrangements whereby some Member of the House would be made responsible for the Forestry Estimates, but we want something still more than that. We require someone in this House who is not only responsible for the Estimates, but who is continuously responsible to this House for the policy and for the actions of the Forestry Commission which is to be set up. I suggest that one of the unpaid Commissioners—because it would then be unnecessary to set up a further Department—should be appointed to be answerable to this House for

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  the actions, of the Forestry Commission. The Development Commission has continuous representation in this House through the Treasury representatives. I do not believe it would be sufficient to have a Member merely responsible for the Estimates, which only come before the House once a year. I would suggest that when the Estimates do come before the House they should not be brought in lump sums but that we should have placed before us details of the schemes as far as possible, together with the main Estimates.
  The next point I would refer to is with regard to the separation of the Agricultural and the Forestry Departments. The hon. Gentleman (Sir A. Boscawen) regretted the separation in some respects, and thought the Departments should work closely together. My experience of Departments is that unless they have some close contact with each other they are apt to run along in watertight compartment son parallel lines, and they very seldom meet. I think it is very important, from the point of view of the statements which have been made this afternoon, that there should be some close contact between the Agricultural Department and the Forestry Commission established in such a way that the contact is continuous. That might be achieved by the appointment upon the consultative committees, to foe set up in the different countries of individuals nominated by the different Boards of Agriculture to the different consultative committees. I believe the consultative committees, if they are used as they should be used, will form strong advisory bodies to the Forestry Commission, and If nominees of the different Boards of Agriculture are placed upon those committees I believe it may be possible to obtain that close link and contact between the Board and the Forestry Department which is so necessary for the good of both land settlement and of forestry. You cannot regard this Bill from the point of view of the United Kingdom without taking into consideration the strong views held in Scotland with regard to devolution. In order to meet that point of view, would the hon. Gentleman consider the desirability or limiting the period of the Bill to ten years? At the end of ten years it should be possible to reconsider the policy. By that time we may have Devolution in Scotland, England, and Wales, and so on, and then it would be possible to consider whether the time had not arrived when the central authority
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  could be split up and placed under the different Devolution Governments. I merely throw out that suggestion as a way of meeting that body of opinion in Scotland which believes that a separate Ministry ought to have been established there. I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on having brought forward the Bill. I should have preferred originally to see a Bill with more devolution. But it is necessary to have such a Bill, and we must get on with forestry just as we must get on with land settlement.
  Major COURTHOPE: The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Acland) has informed the House of the support which has been given to the Bill generally by the organised opinion in Scotland represented by the Royal Scottish Arboricultural Society. I have been authorised by the two English societies representing organised forestry— the Royal English Arboricultural Society and the English Forestry Association—to give the same support to the Second Reading. These societies, and everybody who has really studied forestry, have been anxious for a long time that there should be a body set up whose one and only concern should be to put forestry on sound lines, and they are very anxious that there should be one, and one authority only, for the United Kingdom. There has been such general unanimity in favour of the Bill that I will not weary the House by developing any of the additional arguments that might be brought forward in support of a central authority and against the suggestion made by several Scottish Members that the Agricultural Department should look after forestry. I want to deal with something which has hardly been referred to in the Debate, which has a bearing on the point made by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London, when he argued that the present was not the proper time to spend large capital sums on forestry.
  I doubt whether the House realises how serious is the position of the British woodlands at the present time. It is far more serious than can be seen from road or rail as one passes about the country. It is true that some of the Welsh valleys are obviously stripped, but in many districts the damage is not apparent. It was my duty, or misfortune, during the last two years of the war period, to be responsible for buying the standing timber for the Government in England and Wales, and I can assure the House that we have been very nearly at the end of our timber resources

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  so far as conifer timber was concerned. So recently as the spring of last year a flying census of timber was taken throughout the United Kingdom which, although it must contain inaccuracies, and was never intended to be more than an approximation, did give a close idea, as far as it could be tested, of what the timber was then. We know approximately what has gone on since. The House will be surprised to hear that of timber of convertible size, the United Kingdom contained according to that census just about one pre-war year's consumption. If every tree in the United Kingdom of sawing size was taken it would supply our needs at the 1913 rate for one year only. That gives some idea of the urgency of the matter, and it brings me to my last point. The House must recognise, and I hope the Government recognises, that if a forest policy is to be a success it must depend very largely upon the efforts of private enterprise, and upon the encouragement given to private enterprise. We have at the present time, or we had before the War, 3,000,000 acres of woodlands, of which 97½ per cent. were in private hands. The estimate on which the excellent Report of my right hon. Friend's (Mr. Acland's) Committee was based presupposes that in addition to the new planting which would be undertaken, the existing woodlands would be put, I will not say on a proper forestry basis, but on a sounder basis than they had been in pre-war days. The best of these pre-war woodlands have gone. Many of them have been felled altogether, and the best of the rest have been much reduced. The question is how best can these woodlands be restored. The success of our forest policy and the success of the forest authority itself will not depend on its own direct efforts on the land it acquires nearly so much as upon its success or failure in inducing private owners to replant their woodlands and to do it in a proper manner.
  Mr. BARNES (Minister without Portfolio): The subject-matter of this Bill has been under discussion for the last two years. The principle of it emerged from a Sub-committee of the Development Commissioners nearly two years ago, and the matter has been revived more than once. I have no hesitation in saying that the Bill is much belated. I can assure hon. Gentlemen who criticised the Bill this afternoon that most of what they
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  have said has been carefully, and I might almost say sympathetically, considered. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge) said that my hon. and gallant Friend (Sir A. Boscawen) had only put up one argument in favour of the Bill, and that was the possibility of another war. May I put forward two other reasons for the Bill, one human and psychological, and the other financial? This Bill proposes a new and healthy occupation and interest for the country. We have been growing lopsided for a good many years. We have been draining the countryside and heaping people into the towns, with dire results from the human point of view. I am not sure that the neurasthenia which is now so prevalent in the country, and which results in the stoppage of work and many other things, has not been due very largely to the increasing extent in which for the last generation people have been living in the unhealthy atmosphere of the towns rather than in the country. This Bill is intended, along with what is now being done in the way of agricultural settlement, to take that human stream back as far as possible into the healthy atmosphere of the country districts.
  The second reason is the money reason. If my hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh were present I would remind him that we have been importing timber for, I suppose, generations past, and that import of timber has adversely affected the international exchanges. I am told by those who know the position better than I do—I am told by experts, among whom I may include my hon. Friend (Major Courthope) —that the land of this country is just as capable of growing trees as the land in some of the other countries which have a great deal more woodlands than we have. If that be so, especially at a time when it is more than ever necessary, and will be progressively more than ever necessary, that we should affect the international exchanges in our favour, owing to the difficulty of exporting, why should we not try to make a better use of our land and grow this timber for ourselves? If the reason assigned by my hon. and gallant Friend had been the only reason, is it not a sufficiently cogent reason why we should produce this Bill and pass it? The country simply cannot afford to run the risk of going through the same experience which we have gone through during the last five years. My hon. and gallant Friend has already told the House how during the

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  War we had to import pit-props to keep the mining industry going, and that such was the pressure upon our ships we had to cut out the pit-props and produce them for ourselves. We had not only gone our last length so far as shipping was concerned, but we had got on our last legs so far as timber was concern-id. During the first two years of the War, before the end of 1916, we had expended in buying timber from abroad no less a sum than£37,000,000 over the price at which we could have got it before the War. Besides that, we have used 7,000,000 tons of shipping since then to import timber from abroad. If my hon. and gallant Friend bad given no other reason, that reason would be almost sufficient justification for this Bill.
  This Bill embodies the idea of separating afforestation from agriculture. There are many hon. Members who think, and think strongly, that that is not the course that ought to be followed, out we believe that afforestation is in itself sufficiently important to keep one body busy. Its consideration involves long views. My hon. and gallant Friend said that eighty years is the time required. Pit-props do not take so long, but other wood takes longer. Therefore, having regard to the fact that long years have to be taken, and there is no profit for a very long time, it is imperative to take these steps, which are absolutely necessary for the safety of the country. You cannot expect an individual to plant wood and wait eighty years for his profit. It is time to make this a separate matter and to set about improving the position so far as the country is concerned. Owing to the neglect of afforestation only 4 per cent. of our land is under wood, whereas in some countries not less than 47 per cent. is under wood. The crux of this Bill lies in the centralised authority, with which must be allied the most modern methods of production. Experts have to be employed if we are going into this matter in a scientific way. Research has to be carefully made, staffs have to be employed who know all about the matter, and these experts and scientific gentlemen upon the staff can just as well make all the inquiries in regard to the United Kingdom as a unit as they could in regard to Scotland, Ireland, Wales, or this country as separate units. To separate this question into two, three, or four districts is simply to do the work three or four times over.
  8.0 P.M.
  We have discussed and rediscussed this matter, and it happened to be my lot to be
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  upon a small Committee that had to consider the Report of the Sub-committee presided over by my hon. Friend (Mr. Acland). We were told of the need for centralisation. We were told that the other countries, including France, if my memory serves me right, which had had the best results in the way of afforestation, countries on which we were, to some extent, dependent, were the countries which had followed the course recommended in this Bill. While we have neglected the matter, and have become dependent upon other countries, we have found that those countries which have supplied us with wood up to a very recent date are now consuming most of the wood themselves, and to a progressive extent will not be exporting countries. The objections are sentimental. The hon. Member for East Edinburgh raised a question of Devolution, and reminded us that there was a project on foot to set up a Committee on Devolution on which, Mr. Speaker, you were good enough, I believe, to say you would serve. This matter can not wait until Devolution is established. That is a matter which is in the air. This is a matter which ought to be brought down to the arena of practical affairs. More over, Home Rule has nothing to do with the growing of trees. We are trying to set up under this Bill a central authority as a matter of business. My hon. Friend said that the Commissioners had to buy land in whole estates, but under Sub-section (3) of Clause 3 the Commissioners will have power to purchase or take on lease and hold any land suitable for afforestation, but they need not hold it all; they can sell or lease any land that, in their opinion, is not needed or is not suitable for the purposes for which it is required. Consequently, there is nothing in that argument. Having bought land the Commissioners have power to separate that land and hand over part of it to the previous local bodies or sell it to other people or exchange it whenever they find it convenient, or they can get rid of land not suitable and obtain land that is suitable. Then the hon. Member for Kincardine (Lieut.-Colonel Murray), who supported the Bill, for which we are grateful —
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: I said that I would support the Second Reading.
  Mr. BARNES: The hon. Gentleman promised Amendments in the Committee. He said that the Bill did not provide for supervision on the part of the Scottish

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  people and that there was no distinctive Scottish authority in Edinburgh, but I may remind the hon. Member for Kincardine that the Bill does provide in Clause 5 for Assistant Commissioners in Scotland, and, of course, the common-sense view would be—and I have no doubt that the common-sense view would be taken, and, if, not, I am sure that any Amendment necessary will be sympathetically considered—that the headquarters of those Commissioners would 'be in Edinburgh. Then under Clause 6 the Bill sets up consultative committees for England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. There again the common-sense interpretation is that the consultative committee for Scotland will have its headquarters in Edinburgh. Then the point was raised by an hon. Member that there might be a difficulty in the different bodies never coming together. But there is a provision in Sub-section (2) of Clause 3 that the Department from whom powers and duties are transferred as aforesaid to the Commissioners shall, if arrangements are made for the purpose, continue to exercise and perform on behalf of the Commissioners such of the transferred powers and duties as may from time to time be agreed between the Commissioners and the Departments concerned. That is intended to meet the point which was raised. We agree that there ought to be the closest possible contact between the old Commissioners and the new bodies. I have no hesitation here again in saying that any Amendment thought necessary to give more explicit effect to that idea would be sympathetically considered.
  Mr. G. MURRAY: Does my right hon. Friend think that this gives the necessary contact?
  Mr. BARNES: It is intended to give that contact, and if the Bill is not sufficiently explicit on this point I think that an Amendment to give effect to that idea would be sympathetically considered. The hon. Member for the University of London (Sir P. Magnus) referred to the need for scientific men among the Commissioners. I thoroughly sympathise with him in that view. That is the idea of the Bill that afforestation should be taken out of the region of amateurish effort and put into the hands of those who really know their job. Therefore I can assure the hon. Gentleman that there would be sympathetic consideration of this point. The hon.
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  Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. A. Shaw) made a full-blooded, rhetorical speech, and he talked about some machinations that had been going on in Scotland in regard to this Bill. He could not have made a stronger plea on behalf of the Bill, because we want to take afforestation out of the region of these personal political squabbles that have stood in its way in the past, and we hope that there will now be an end of these things. He was seconded in a characteristic speech by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury), who made a plea for economy. The £3,500,000 to be put into afforestation under this Bill wilt be one of the best investments which we have made for a long time. It has been said that it is arranged in such a way as to prevent proper Parliamentary control. There is no intention of doing anything of the kind, and if it is necessary to recast that particular Clause so as to see that no control is lost by Parliament, I think that that can be done. The only objection to the Bill is a sentimental objection—that is the objection of Home Rule. That is on unreal objection. Afforestation is a matter which has no connection with Home Rule, either for or against. It is a matter of Imperial concern and national safety, of public health and industrial reform, and for these reasons as well as for those already given, I hope that the House will give a Second Reading to the Bill.
  Amendment negatived.

  MINISTRIES AND SECRETARIES BILL.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: Are we to understand that a Bill of this importance is to be read a second time without any explanation on the part of a responsible Member of the Government or without any discussion? This Bill proposes to remove the statutory limitation of the salaries of certain Ministers, to increase the number of Secretaries of State and Under-Secretaries of State capable of sitting in the Commons House of Parliament, and to transfer the powers

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  of the Secretary for Scotland to one of His Majesty's principal Secretaries of State. It is a most important Bill, and I am very glad to see that the Leader of the House has come in now, because had he been here a few moments ago I feel sure that he would not have supported his collague on that bench in trying to get a Second Reading of this Bill without any discussion.
  Mr. BARNES Mr. BARNES dissented.
  Lieut.-Colonel MURRAY: If I am doing the right hon. Gentleman an injustice in that, I withdraw what I have said. I hope that the Leader of the House will be able to give us some explanation of this Bill. So far as Scotland is concerned, I agree whole-heartedly with Clause 3 of the Bill, which proposes to transfer all the powers and duties of the Secretary for Scotland to one of His Majesty's principal Secretaries of State. The day is long overdue when the Secretary for Scotland should cease to occupy that subordinate position in the Government of the United Kingdom which he holds at the present moment. I hope the Leader of the House will deal particularly with Clause 4 of the Bill, which seems to me to contain certain provisions that it is difficult for the layman to understand.
  Mr. BONAR LAW (Leader of the House): I can assure the House that there was no intention whatever of attempting to get the Second Reading of this Bill, the importance of which I thoroughly recognise, without some discussion. My hon. Friend has asked for an, explanation, but I do not think it necessary to take up time and explain it, as the object of the Bill is perfectly plain on the face of it. I hope also that it will not be necessary to say very much in justification of it. It has for a long time been recognised, to put it at the lowest, as distinctly inconvenient that officers, which through the lapse of time have come to be of importance equal to that of others, should occupy a different status, and should be accompanied by a different scale of remuneration so far as the heads of these offices are concerned. Perhaps it may Interest the House if I tell them that a good many years ago I attended as one of a small deputation from the Chambers of Commerce to the then Prime Minister, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, urging that the Board of Trade should be put on a level with the
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  other high offices of State. With that frankness which, as everyone who knew him was aware, wag one of the charms of the late Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, as the deputation was private he told us that he had himself found, in forming his Cabinet, that it was a great inconvenience inasmuch as it was not possible for him in any case to put into office the men best suited for the posts, because the standard made it necessary to put into higher offices the men who seemed to justify those offices. That difficulty has continued. I am inclined to think that there is no way in which I can make it plainer to the House that this change ought to be made than by telling them that within a comparatively short time, certainly within the last two years, two of the gentlemen who now fill two of the offices mentioned in this Bill—I do not think it would be right to mention their names—were selected by the Prime Minister for offices of the higher status, but when he came to look into it more closely the Prime Minister, and I myself, whom he was good enough to consult, came to the conclusion that the work which these men were doing in their Department was so important, and they were doing it so well, that we could not move them.
  I think if must be obvious that a system which keeps men in what are considered the lower offices because they are particularly good at them is a system which the House could not defend and is not in the interests of the State, I am quite sure it anyone looked at these offices he would recognise that they do require men of capacity equal to that possessed by those who fill the higher offices. I am sure, therefore, that on its merits there is no one who will doubt that this change is one which ought to be made. But while that in true, I recognise that the present is a very in opportune time for making proposals of this kind. I recognise that, and if it were not that we think it necessary to make it now, not in the interests of individuals but in the interests of the State, we certainly should not bring it before the House of Commons. It is an inopportune time, for this reason The financial position of this country is a very serious one. I know that it is the fashion for those who criticise the Government to say that we regard expenditure with indifference. As a matter of fact, that is a charge which is very frequently made against the Government of the day whatever it may be; but it is of far greater weight at this moment, because the expenditure is on

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  a scale which is alarming, and it must be reduced. Whether or not we have been as successful or shall be as successful as we wish. I can assure the House that among the many difficult problems—and there are many difficult problems—that we are called upon to face at this moment, there is not one which more preoccupies or as much preoccupies the attention not only of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but of the Prime Minister and the other members of the Government, as the absolute necessity of bringing our expenditure down to a scale which is more in keeping with what is possible for this country. I think, also, that there is no one in this House or out of it who has had any experience of the conduct of big undertakings of any kind who will not say that a particular kind of saving is not only not economical, but is in itself the most wasteful of any expenditure if it takes the form of attempting to underpay the man on whom you have to depend for the efficiency of the work. That is not economy.
  I venture to put this—it is the real reason for our bringing this Bill on now, in present circumstances and at this stage of the Session—the very conditions which called our attention to the expenditure of the country, which make it really vital, I think, that the Government themselves should set a good example in this matter and therefore make it undesirable to bring in such a Bill—it is these conditions which render it absolutely wrong and against the interests of the State to ask the men who are filling those high posts to do so at the small salaries they received before the War. Let the House think what it means. A salary of£2,000 before the War meant, after deduction of Income Tax, £l,925. It means now, after deducting Income Tax, £1,550. I do not need to remind the House that that is not by any means the highest difference. The value of money and what you can get for your money have changed so much that the salary of£2,000, which was certainly too small before the War, is absolutely inadequate for a man who fills these posts under the conditions which prevail at the present time. I wish the House to look at this not from the point of view of justice to individuals, in spite of the story I have told and the fact that some of these Ministers would have occupied higher offices but for the necessity to keep them in their present positions, but I wish the House to realise that this change is not
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  made in the interests of individuals; it is made in the interest of the State itself. Just think what it means. I do not suggest that in paying Ministers the country should be expected to pay them the full amount which it would be possible for them to obtain in other occupations. But think what the present position is. In the past, as the House well knows, it has been a rare thing for Ministers to be dependent upon their salaries. Ministers, I think I may safely say in nine cases out of ten, in the past have had independent means. Everything in our system was founded on that idea, but in this, as in everything else connected with the British Government, though we were never logical, we did get what was necessary according to the times in which we lived. Perhaps some Members have not noticed the very great difference in the salaries paid to Ministers and those paid to the legal officers under the Crown. What was the explanation? As I have said, Ministers belonged to a class which had private means. In the case of lawyers that was not so, and we gave—I must say that I was always inclined to look upon it as rather absurd, and I still do—we gave a salary to the Lord Chancellor twice as great as that of the Prime Minister; we gave him a pension of half his salary, to which he had a right, whereas the Prime Minister, I whatever his services, can obtain a pension of only £2,000, and then only by making a declaration of need
  Why was it? It was because the House of Commons knew that it was essential to get the best lawyers for these legal posts, and that you could not get them unless you paid them a salary in some degree commensurate with what they could obtain in private practice. Are we not come to a time when more and more these high posts are likely to be filled by men who have not private means? I am certain of this, that nothing could be worse for the State, worse for the efficiency of these offices, unless the men who fill them obtain ! a remuneration not, as I say, equal to what they could make outside, but a remuneration which is adequate in comparison with the work they do. It is not necessary to give the full amount which a man of that ability could get in other occupations. I do not think that would be possible. Nor is it necessary. After all, money is not the only thing even from the point of view of selfish interest. Perhaps the House will forgive me saying that I gave up a fairly

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  large income to become a Parliamentary Secretary at£1,200 a. year, and at the time I thought I was a very lucky man to be able to make the exchange. What men prize even more than the money is the position it gives them in the eyes of their fellows, and undoubtedly a Minister of the Crown has a great position which gives him a value far higher than anything in the way of money could do.
  But while that is true, I put it to hon. Members to consider the position now. Take the case of one of those who fills those offices as a man who has not got private means, and look at the sacrifice he makes from the monetary point of view. It is not merely that he gets a smaller income than he could get otherwise: it goes further. A man who is dependent on the salary and who, let us say, accepts some Ministerial office deliberately cuts himself off and diminishes the chance of getting posts of another kind. When people are inclined to say that the salaries we get, even the biggest salary of£5,000, are very large sums, I think the House ought toremember, and so ought the country, that a man who has been making political life his occupation, has got to look forward to being in office only part of the time, and to being out of office part of the time, and that he cannot hope to make, when out of office, anything like the same income, if he does his Parliamentary duties, as he might have if he had not been in office. I do really appeal to the House of Commons to look at this matter on its merits, and if I might appeal to my right hon. Friend (Sir D. Maclean), who has given notice of an Amendment, do not draw into this question other questions as to the extravagance of the Government. I am quite ready to have that debated, and I am quite ready to show that we realise its importance as much as anyone else, but this is not the time. If this is the right thing to do on its merits we ought to do it. I would like to say this in conclusion, we have a right to expect that men who are called upon to serve His Majesty should feel it a great honour and should be ready to make sacrifices in order to do that service to King and country, but the present position and the present value of money mean that a man who has no private means, and who is living on£2,000 a year, is forced either to get into debt or to live on a scale below that on which ho was living before, and on which he could live
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  to-morrow if it were open to him to take an outside position. I do not think that is right. They have the right, in the case of those who have the chance of being Ministers, to look upon their services as a great honour, but we have no right to, and cannot, expect them to fill those offices while they are at the same time hampered by, the carking cares of not having an adequate sum on which to live.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: The House is indebted to my right hon. Friend for the statement he has made, but, notwithstanding the suggestion which he has made to me, I beg to move to leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof the words
  "this House declines to give a Second Reading to a Bill which increases the salaries and alters the status of Ministers, until the Government declares its policy with regard to the reduction of Government Departments to a scale conducive to national efficiency and economy."
  One of the main reasons which the Leader of the House gave us for this Bill was that the men who are doing this heavy and responsible work should have, to paraphrase what he said, a living wage. That, of course, is a right and proper thing to do, but the right hon. Gentleman has also expressly pointed out that governing positions are different from the positions which men take with regard to the rewards which come to them in commercial life. He himself, with his usual frankness—a quality all too rare, but which has never been absent from his life—said that it wan inopportune time. It most certainly is. Coming back to the point of the distinction between governing men and the rewards of commercial life, we must not lose sight of the fact that the governing men are very closely watched by the people they are governing. While I was one of those who voted for salaries for Members of Parliament, and I see no reason at all to be ashamed of that fact, I frankly admit that throughout the country there was a great deal of a sense of disappointment that this House had for the first time departed from its hundreds of years of tradition, though Members of Parliament were formerly paid, and given the idea that the services which Members of Parliament rendered were not of the same public standard as they used to be. That might be right or it might be wrong, but undoubtedly that was the case. What is the time which my right hon. Friend has described as inopportune? It is a time when economy and efficiency should be so

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  closely linked that a shining example should be given to the whole community of the only way in which our financial position can commence to approach to a satisfactory basis. I do not hesitate at all to say that throughout the country there will be in many quarters very severe criticism of this measure, and through all classes much disappointment that it is linked up with a campaign for economy all round which has been urged from all parts of the House. I am sure, as far as my right hon. Friend is concerned, and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury, who has a special responsibility in these matters, that that campaign for economy has always been urged with their cordial assent, although they may not be able to do from their point of view the necessary acts and deeds to carry that policy into very effective operation. This proposal will have a real lowering effect on any campaign launched by any member of the Government, no matter who he may be, for national economy linked with efficiency. What is the proposal? I intend to examine it in some little detail in so far as one can at the quite unexpectedly short notice that one has had. Looking at the Bill, we see that in Section 1, which is the Financial Clause, it is intended to pay, out of moneys provided by Parliament, to the President of the Board of Agriculture, the President of the Board of Education, the Minister of Labour, and, so long as that office continues to exist, the Minister of Food, such annual amount as Parliament may determine. I suppose that means that it is intended to raise these offices from a status of£2,000 a year to one of£5,000 a year. First of all, what will happen? The increase will by no means cease at that£5,000 a year. That being the status of a Minister and that being his salary, there will follow, I suppose, corresponding increases in the salaries of the Civil servants in his Department.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I think that is not so.
  Sir D. MACLEAN:I do not know whether that is so or not, but, at any rate, I ask the question. My idea is—and I have some foundation for it—that if you raise an office to£5,000 a year the Undersecretary of State for that office will get probably £1,5OO to£1,800 a year.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: £l,500.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: And then the permanent staff—and, so far as I am concerned, I cannot say I have really as much objection to that as to the Minister himself—
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I have not looked into this specially, but I am of the opinion that we have already found it necessary to treat the Civil servants pretty much on the same level, whatever their status.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: I draw a real distinction between what I may call the governing man and the permanent staff in these matters. I do not think it can be fairly said that any of our Civil servants are overpaid. I think it may substantially be said with great justice that they are underpaid. But I make no special complaint of that. I only say that there will be some hundreds a year in each case additional to the£5,000 a year. I want at once to say one thing to make my own position clear with regard to Clauses 3 and 4 of the Bill, referring to Scotland. For a long time Scottish Members have asked that the Secretary for Scotland should be made a Secretary of State, and to that extent my right hon. Friend, so to speak, has me. I have pressed for that, but what I would say is this, that at the present time, until we get out of this morass in which we are, do not let us give this key to the public to say what they will say. My right hon. Friend said, "Let them say," but it is not good policy to do that. These are very dangerous times, and attitudes and positions which might be taken up with great safety in normal times should be carefully avoided in these days. In regard to the salary of the Minister of Food, I would like to ask a question. That is a temporary office, and I think it is barely six months ago since it was announced in this House that it was going to be wound up. Those are the sort of things which give rise to the case which I am trying to put of the unwisdom of doing these things. Circumstances might so alter in the course of the next six months—we cannot tell; we do not know what may happen—that the Ministry of Food might be unnecessary, but really we are raising this salary and treating it on the same basis as the Board of Education and the Ministry of Labour when it might very well have been left alone on its present basis and not brought into the rank, as it is here, of the£5,000 a year offices. Then I would ask, if these have

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  been selected in this way, what about the Ministry of Pensions? There is, at any rate for a generation, unhappily a permanent Department. I suppose it will run for, I should think, another twenty-five or thirty years, if not forty years. Why bring in the Ministry of Food? I am suggesting that the thing has not been thought out.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Yes, it has been.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: Well, it does not look like it. Why exclude a Ministry like that, a very important Ministry which is going to run for twenty-five or thirty or even forty years, and put in the Ministry of Food, which we hope will only be quite a temporary office and which ought to be easily demobilised by the end of the winter or the early spring? Then let me take another example. We have the Postmaster-General, with £2,500 a year. I suggest that the Postmaster-General's office is a very important one, but we select the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Ministry of Labour, and the Ministry of Food, and leave out the Postmaster-General. I am not complaining that he is left out. My point is that this has not been properly thought out, and I want to know the reason. I think, if you are going to have any Ministry raised in this way, the Board of Education clearly is one which is fully entitled to it at any proper time, but not, as my right hon. Friend said, at an inopportune time. One might go through the whole range of the Government offices and deal with them seriatim in this way, and doubtless some of my hon. Friends will draw the attention of the House to them; but I will come now to another point. It is one which is contained in the latter part of my Amendment, where it declares that the House declines to read the Bill a second time until the Government declares its policy with regard to the reduction of Government Departments to a scale conducive to national efficiency and economy. It is not possible for anybody to take up any daily or weekly paper without finding in some of its columns protests against unnecessary Government Departments and extravagance and inefficiency. Of course, I quite admit that this is always more or less inseparable from the end of a great war. You get the ad hoc Departments put up, and they are not quite so easily pulled down. That is the difficulty. But the Armistice was declared in November of last year, and we are now into the first week of August. About nine months have gone by. Everybody knows that the
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  number of unnecessary Government Departments which are strewn about London, and have their branches throughout the country, is shocking the public conscience with regard to national economy. Any business man who has anything like a wide range is constantly coining into touch with it. What ought to have been done was this: Someone should have been charged with the duty of winding-up these unnecessary Departments. Perhaps somebody has been, and this is only another instance of the inefficiency with which these things are done, and the general appalling slackness of the Government with regard to public expenditure, that, whoever that gentleman may be, he has not done his job.
  The moral effect of these things is as bad as the effect on the financial position of the country. Wherever you go, you find that the moral effect of the Government, who should show an example in this way, is eating into the municipalities, into all public bodies, and reacting through them on the individual. I agree that every individual ought to be strong enough to see his and her duly for themselves, but we have got to take human nature as it is, and if you get slackness, extravagance and inefficiency on the top, it gravitates to the bottom, and through all the intervening strata of society. That is one of the main arguments which we have against the Second Reading of this measure. I know my right hon. Friend opposite realises this, but the Government seem to be so helpless. He can make a speech with much better force and eloquence than I can, I know, but there they are, and it is their business to do this. I do not know how much better I should be if I were there, but, at any rate, the country is looking every day for signs of the Government being awake to the disaster which is overtaking us in the early days of this Parliament I was a voice crying in the wilderness. I remember I said on a Friday afternoon, when there were a few Members in the House, that we were heading straight for national bankruptcy. We are, there is no doubt about it at all. There is not a business man of responsibility and power in the City of London or in any of our great centres who is not; affrighted. It is the old story. There is no royal road to reform except through individuals—every man and every woman taking his or her share in it. The sermons which have been preached through the length and breadth of the land by the

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  Chancellor of the Exchequer and by the Leader of the House have had no effect. Turn where we like, it really appals one to go through the streets of London, or even into the smallest town in the Kingdom—there is no sign of the seriousness of the financial position. Things go on as if we had been treading "the primrose path of dalliance" during the last five years, and I often wonder whether it is not all a bad dream from which, somehow or other, we shall awake and realise it is not true. But there it goes on, and we leave this House to night with evidence of it all round. That is why I so much regret that the Government have chosen this time to bring in this Bill. I am quite certain that not one of these Gentlemen—all of whom, I say without hesitation, are men of fine public spirit—has pressed for this. I am quite certain, if the issue is put to them that this is a wrong time to do it, they will say, "Put it on one side. Let us show the right example." Whatever may be said about the merits of this, this is not the time to do it. Put it on one side, and any hardship that might come from it they would gladly put up with. I suppose it is too late to suggest that this might be deferred until the whole matter has been further considered, and the financial position is a little more sound than it is; but I can only say again, that it was with much regret I saw this Bill on the Paper, it was with alarm I saw its contents, and I feel, therefore, compelled to move the Amendment.
  Brigadier-General CROFT: The speech to which we have just listened, I think, will probably find sympathy in the minds of most Members present. There is only one regrettable statement that he made, namely, that with reference to the Secretary for Scotland, which I very much personally deplore that he introduced, because it is inclined to make one think that his argument was a party one, and not really based on those principles which he mentioned towards the end of his speech.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: The argument that T adduced was that, while I should be glad to see the official status of the (Secretary for Scotland raised to that of a Secretary for State, the same argument that I put forward with regard to the financial side applied equally to his case.
  Brigadier-General CROFT: I am very glad to hear what the right hon. Gentle-
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  man has said, because that immediately ranges me on his side. I misunderstood him. I thought he did not apply this argument to the Secretary for Scotland owing to some past promise that had been made. How ever, I am glad he agrees that we ought not at this time to allow any increase to take place. I know that the Leader of the House naturally feels on this question as strongly probably as anyone, from the personal point of view in regard to his colleagues, and thinking of them. We all are perfectly well aware of the fact that times are very hard even for the best-paid Ministers. They have their position to keep up. They have their greater duties. There are many other considerations, all of which we realise. But there are hard cases in every walk of life in this country; and my contention is that if we are going to deal with hard cases at this hour we simply are going straight ahead for bankruptcy. It is the same in every walk in life. One cannot fail possibly to be moved by the position, let us say, of those who are pensioners under pre-war schemes—Civil servants, Post Office servants, old age pensioners, the police, and our old soldiers and sailors who are in receipt of pre-war pensions. All these cases are terrible. Even worse than these cases, in my opinion, is the man or woman with small fixed income who had retired before the War, it might be, and now in their old age find it absolutely impossible to make ends meet. That being the fact, I do hope and pray that we may perhaps do something different to our custom here. I hope the right hon. Gentleman, before this Debate is finished, will indicate that in view of the fact that this measure has been before the House but for a very short time, he will take an unusual course, but one which will meet with the approval of the whole of the country, and say that the question will be delayed for at least a few months until the House meets again, when we can reconsider the question in the light, possibly, of changed circumstances.
  9.0 P.M.
  If we in this House are going to pass legislation of this character at this time it is, I believe, going to have a thoroughly serious effect right throughout the whole of the community. It is difficult enough to try to point out the complex reasons which are making life so difficult. Take the case of the profiteer, the man who is supposed to be guilty of profiteering. There are such people. On the other hand, every man in this House knows that what appears to be profiteering in one instance

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  may, in another, be caused by countless effects in other parts of the world, in raw materials and wages. So it is that we have this feeling going through the country. People, of course, do not understand the real situation. Is this, however, the time for this House to introduce legislation which is going to increase the salaries of any Member of this House, when the whole country is looking to us for guidance? I think it will be a fatal matter to pass this Bill now. It was mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman that he supported the Motion for the payment of Members. But that is a question of a time gone by, when we had different opinions, and when, the House was divided, but anyhow, for better or worse, that was carried, and we have payment of Members. But surely the one thing we want to try to convince our countrymen of is this: That our service in this House is different and in no way comparable to service in the commercial world. We come here, I take it, for the sake of service. The idea of salaries for Members was that they should be to cover those expenses incidental to being a Member of Parliament, not that the work should be made a profession. In the same way, in Ministers of this country in the past, we always believed that the men were making sacrifices, at all events we hoped so, and that they were serving their country in these honourable positions purely and simply for the sake of service. If we do not set an example in regard to this question how we can go. out into the country, as I feel we all ought to do, this autumn, and explain the situation 1 How can we implore the people to exercise economy, to cut down expenses, and try to help us through this terrible state of affairs? The right hon.' Gentleman also was wise to link up with his Motion the question of the reduction of staffs. It is perfectly true what he says. I speak from a different point of view, but I do know that throughout the length and breadth of the country there is the gravest anxiety on all hands in regard to the colossal staffs which are still kept on in all the Government Departments. Are we to raise the salaries of Ministers who have not succeeded in cutting down these surplus staffs. When they really have proved to the country their value by introducing efficiency and economy into their Departments, then it seems to me will be the
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  right time to come to this House, and for us to consider whether we should raise their salaries.
  There is just one other word. No one will agree—although I think it is most unfair in nine cases out of ten—but that this House has lost confidence in the country. I remember the Leader of the House himself made a speech to that effect. Perhaps, as the right hon. Gentleman reminds me, he was then in Opposition; but it does not matter whether the right hon. Gentleman sat on this or that side of the Table. He has always been equally sincere. I do not believe his opinions have changed merely by reason of such a very short march round the Table. So the fact remains that we do not at the present time, unfortunately, hold the confidence of the people as in the past. It is essential from every point of view that we should try to regain that confidence by letting them see that whatever we say we mean, that we are determined to be just, and that the thing we preach we are going to practice. For that reason I hope very much that the right hon. Gentleman will see his way to introduce some new machinery, even at this late hour, by which he can postpone a decision on this question, and not force us to go into the. Lobby against the Government, but carry the matter over for future consideration.
  Mr. J. H. THOMAS: The issue raised in this Debate affects something more than the mere question of the salaries of Ministers. I do not know whether the pool is now in existence.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: was understood to indicate the negative.
  Mr. THOMAS: My right hon. Friend answers at once and says "No." I was going to point out that this simply meant adding to the pool. Seeing that the pool is not in existence, and that each Minister is drawing the salary of his office, it still leaves this point: that the same people— and it is not a question of personalities—and the same offices that it is now proposed to increase the salary of were carrying on during the War even more strenuous work than some of them are doing now. To give one illustration—the Ministry of Food. No one can pretend that their labours to-day are more than during the period of the stress and struggle of the War. Surely, if it was not necessary, and if in the interests of the country, the Government felt that the only fair way

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  to deal with the salaries of Ministers was by a pooling arrangement, thereby sharing emoluments as well as responsibilities—at that time, and certainly the Leader of the House recognised the situation better than anybody—it is a bad time to come to Parliament and say, "Our example to the country is to preach economy, our advice to you is to economise in all things, but do not do as we do, because we think it wise for you, but not necessarily for ourselves. "That is exactly the kind of sentiment that will operate in the mind of the public.
  Let us try to discuss this matter from the standpoint of millions of people who are to-day nominally in the Government service, the men with fixed incomes; because whatever else may have resulted from the War the real people who have been hit probably harder than anybody else are the people with fixed incomes; men who at first had domestic responsibilities, the education of their children, and such like to attend to, they have been hit in that way; also with increased Income Tax, with increased cost of living, and they have had no opportunity to augment their income. I refer to people in the country, and there are hundreds of thousands of them, with fixed incomes. I do not mean the workers or those who have made war-profits, but I mean the large mass of people with fixed incomes. Take, first of all, that type of the community and then take the millions of people in the employment of the Government. Applications have been made for a few shillings increase as the case may be, but this amounts to a very large sum when it applies to a large number. What is the impression in the minds of these people? It is that the Government refuse an application for a couple of shillings a week and they say they do it because the Government have gone to the limit of their resources. Then these people reply, You refuse us a couple of shillings, but when it is a Cabinet Minister his salary can be increased£2,000 a year. "In this way you create a bad impression, and you have no right at this time to create the impression that the Government are indifferent to the need for economy. The only answer in regard to a proposal like this is that it must be an urgent matter, and that can be the only possible excuse. Does any hon. Member pretend that this is an urgent matter?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Yes.
  Mr. THOMAS: Is direct action threatened? Is that the urgency of it?
  Mr. BONARLAW: That really raises so interesting a point that I should like to interrupt the hon. Gentleman now. Is the suggestion that the Government are not actuated by what is fair and just, but that threats of resignation have been made?
  Mr. THOMAS: I might retort, "Is a lockout involved?"
  Sir F. BANBURY: There are plenty of blacklegs about.
  Mr. THOMAS: I hope the right hon. Gentleman did not speak feelingly, but in any case the Government are entitled to say what is fair. That does not answer the question which I put about doing it at this moment, because if it is fair now it was fair five years ago.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I gave the answer in my speech.
  Mr. THOMAS:That is not an answer the people will accept. My right hon. Friend knows there are a number of people who think the whole lot of us are not worth the amount involved in this particular Bill, whether Ministers or Members. The House will rise in the course of a few weeks, and surely this matter is not so urgent that it cannot be delayed until then. In the next few weeks Bills will be dropped wholesale, and some hon. Members will be disappointed to hear that certain of their pet schemes will be dropped because there is no Government time for them between now and the end of the Session. I ask the right hon. Gentleman how can he reconcile the dropping of any Bill whatever in which hon. Members are interested with the bringing of this measure forward which is not so urgent. It is because I believe that it would not be wise, and because I think that no danger can arise and there would be no injustice, and, above all, because I hope we shall be able on the reassembling of Parliament to find not only the House of Commons but the Government and the country in not so disturbed a state as it is to-day. It is because I believe that the authority of this Parliament must be maintained that I want to see nothing done that will shake the confidence of the people. I do not want to be accused of panic legislation, and I do not want the House of Commons to be accused of pushing measures through

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  which merely affect certain people's salaries, because I believe that this Parliament must always be the true reflex of the people of this country, and I do not think you will reflect the wishes of the people by any hasty action such as the measure now before the House.
  Mr. JOHNSTONE: I do not think any lion. Member will think that the sums involved in this Bill are of a serious nature, although one must guard against the vicious principle that because it is a small sum we can afford to spend it, and we shall never have economy until we realise the need for saving in the little as well as the much. I agree with what has been said with regard to the inopportune time for bringing forward this measure. There is a wave of extravagance and spending abroad throughout the whole land, and a great many people are looking to the Government to set an example and there ought to be a self-denying ordnance imposed on all classes in the country, and more especially on the Government itself, instead of bringing forward this proposal just now to increase the salaries of Ministers. What the country expects from the Government is that they should reduce the number of offices and exercise strict economy in every Department, and wherever there is a possibility of cutting down and saving that should be done.
  At no other time has there been such need for the Government of the day setting an example of economy and exercising strictness over the spending Departments than exists at the present moment. I am sure the Government realise that there is a great wave of unrest passing over us, and what has contributed to that state of things I Principally the high cost of living and the tremendous prices that are being charged for everything. There is a feeling that we are not being properly governed and that the Government does not realise its obligations to the country in the present condition of things, more especially in regard to spending and the need for economy. I hope the House and every Member who rises to-night will impress upon the Leader of the House and the members of the Government that no more unfortunate step could be taken than this comparatively small measure as it will be in their eyes, of bringing forward this Motion for increasing the salaries of Minister.
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  Reflect for a moment what effect it will have on the people. The feeling will go abroad throughout the land that instead of the Government being in earnest in supporting a campaign of economy in the Government itself and to set an example, they are proposing to spend money, and they waste the time of the House in bringing forward this measure to give more money to the Front Bench. There could be no more unfortunate impression created in the country than that, and I sincerely trust, before this Debate comes to an end, we shall have an admission by the Leader of the House that, in view of the expression of opinion which has taken place, this Bill should be withdrawn. Then good would come out of evil, and it would be an object lesson to the country if we could say that the Government, after introducing this Bill, had withdrawn it, and that would convince the country that this House is really in earnest and serious about the need for economy and of staving off the day of national bankruptcy, and they will think the Government have taken this matter in hand. For these reasons I hope the Leader of the House will withdraw the Bill in no half-hearted manner.
  Mr. MACQUISTEN: I listened with great interest to what was said by the last speaker, but I would put this question: How are economies effected? In a business concern you do not get economy by cutting down reasonable remuneration for the brains of the business or of any particular department. You reach economy by cutting off superfluous members of the staff. There are numerous Government employès who cannot be very busy now the War is over, and it is in that direction we want to see economy achieved. Would it be wise to economise in the case of the Minister of Education when he is dealing with great schemes of education? Can it be said that the Minister of Labour, who has the hardest and toughest of jobs, ought to be the subject of economy? Again, the Secretary for Scotland has had his burdens added to enormously during the last two or throe years, and no doubt the Gentleman, who occupies that post has had to make enormous sacrifices in taking over the office. Is it not invidious that he should be paid on a lower scale than other Ministers? Where we want economy is in getting rid of that enormous octopus of Government officials, and the best men to reduce the staffs are the Ministers,

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  who should exercise their best powers to diminish expenditure in that direction. If you are going to treat the men in your chief offices in a niggardly fashion, that is not setting a true example of economy to the country. If you are going to have Cabinet Ministers faced with enormous difficulties, you should see that the best men are encouraged to accept those offices. You should not treat them in a shabby and mean fashion. I do not think this big and generous country, which believes in its statesmen, whatever may be said outside, would wish them to be treated in a niggardly fashion, and it certainly would not desire to see this Bill postponed because of a cheap cry on public platforms or at street corners. I trust the Leader of the House will stick to the Bill.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: I am sorry to have heard the speech just delivered. The lion. Member certainly could not have listened to the arguments which were adduced in support of the Amendment, or he would have realised that those arguments were very much in sympathy with the points he put forward. I understand it is intended to raise the salary of the President of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries from£2,000 to£5,000 yearly. That is a retrograde step. At the present moment the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries is subject to very much criticism in regard to both branches of its work. I, for one, hope in the near future to see the Government realise that the two functions of the Board are not well performed by one Department, and divide the Board into two. But if you are going to raise the salary of the present head of the Department to£5,000, it will be much more difficult to make the division, because you will not be able to reduce the salary of the President once it has been raised. Reference has been made to the fact that this is a very unfortunate time at which to propose to raise the salaries of great officers of State. If this country is going to be saved it will be saved only by the self-sacrifices of the duty-loving economically-minded band of men who fill our public positions—men who will be willing to give up everything in order to try and save their country. I suggest that the raising of the salary of these four Ministers from£2,000 to£5,000 a year is the worst possible thing we can do at the present moment. It is not the
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  mere£12,000 a year which is involved, it is the principle which is at stake. Much better would it be for Ministers to accept reduced salaries—to put them all on to a level of£2,000. That would set a good example to the country. We shall have to to scrape and save in the future if we are going to win through at all, and therefore if every Minister had his salary reduced on the lines I have suggested he would offer a splendid example to the whole country, and would help to bring the people to their senses.
  As regards the reduction of the salaries of Members, which my hon. and gallant Friend below me suggested, that is a different thing altogether. The reason for those salaries is to enable poor men to enter into political life, and for that reason I should always vote against their being abolished. But here you have the case of Ministers. 1 gathered from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman that they found it very difficult to make both ends meet on £2,000 a year. I suppose that entertainment is expected of them. Well, they must give up entertaining. If a man cannot live in decency on£2,000 a year at the present time, how can you refuse to raise the salaries of all your permanent Civil servants and everyone else How can you refuse the old age- pensioner How can you refuse to raise the salary of the man who has lost his limbs in the War? Of course, they can live on£2,000 a year ! I come of a profession that has always been underpaid, and we have always been told that our reward lay in our service to our country. Many times more does that apply to Ministers of the Crown. I hope that this Amendment will be pressed, and that it will be carried if the Bill is not withdrawn.
  Colonel GRETTON: Many of us greatly regret that the Government should have placed the House in the difficult position of having to decide on this Bill at this time. We wish to support the Government; we do not wish to give them a rebuff; but this Bill is one of those strange examples of how the Ministry, living away in its offices and engaged in business., can misjudge and overlook the obvious feeling in the country in matters of this kind. All the arguments which have been, made about increases of salary are good. We can admit them at once. Bht the only argument that is valid at this moment in support of this Bill is that of urgency. There arc two or three considerations which, I think, have been stated, or partially stated, before, and which I will

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  endeavour to put quite clearly and baldly. Does the Government contend that it is impossible to fill these offices adequately and efficiently for the salaries which are now paid? It is not a question of reducing salaries. The salaries have been fixed in times past, and the holders of those offices accepted them knowing what salaries were able to be paid according to the law. The only other argument of urgency is that the four Ministers holding these offices, or some of them, could not afford to continue in them, and that their services are so valuable that they cannot be dispensed with, and therefore their salaries must be increased. That argument cannot be maintained.
  I wish to support the Government, but, greatly to my regret, I shall have to vote against the Second Reading of this Bill unless the Government can show that it is so urgent that it must be passed on this 1 day in this Session, or the efficiency of the Government will suffer. I do not think that that argument can be put forward. I do not wish to labour the arguments which have been advanced as to the effect on the country of Ministers coming down and asking for" larger salaries for them selves, when the country is plunged into a morass of overwhelming expenditure, and when economy is so necessary. Some of them will have to go to the country—they have been already—and tell the people that, they must cut down expenditure and economise, and this at the very moment when Ministers are asking for higher salaries for some of their number. This is not the time to deal with some old-standing arrangement—come to in time of peace— that the Ministry of Agriculture should be put on the basis of a first-class office, when the expenditure of this country is being drastically curtailed. On these grounds I shall be compelled to resist the Second Reading of this Bill, much as I should wish to support the Government.
  Sir F. BANBURY: This Bill does three things. It increases the salaries of four Ministers; it adds two Under-Secretaries; and it alters the law with regard to Ministers seeking re-election. This law we amended a short time ago, at the beginning of this Session; why we want to alter it again I really do not know. With regard to the first point, it has been said that the increase of the salaries of these four right hon. Gentlemen only means an addition to the expenditure of the country of something like£12,000 or£13,000. That, of course, is the ostensible addition
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  under Clause I of the Bill, but it really means a great deal more, because, as soon as those right hon. Gentlemen become Secretaries of State in receipt of£5,000 a year, everyone in their Department has a corresponding increase. I am informed, on what appears to me to be good authority, that, the moment the status of the Department is increased, all the Undersecretaries and secretaries and officials consider that their own status and salaries will tie increased.
  But even supposing that that is not so, on what grounds do we raise the salaries of these right hon. Gentlemen? It seems to me that there can be only two grounds upon which that increase can be justified. The first is that you cannot get anybody to do the work unless the salary is raised. I venture, however, to say that there is not a single Member in the House who would not agree with me that that argument is absurd. If the salaries are not raised, those right hon. Gentlemen will continue in their office, and will be very glad so to do. If by any unfortunte circumstances they should be compelled to relinquish their office, it is not the fact that the Prime Minister will be unable to replace them. The benches are full, and I doubt if there would be three men who would not be prepared to say they would come and do it for less. Under those circumstances, what is the justification for raising these right hon. Gentlemen's salaries? Let me point out that in the old days, which 1 hope are not gone never to return, it was always considered an honour to be a Member of this House, and it was considered to be a still greater honour to sit upon that Front Bench. The question of salary did not enter into the matter at all. It was that we were doing our duty to our country, and we were proud to be allowed to sit on that bench and to be allowed to do what we could in order to serve the interests of our country. Now all that is to be swept away, and it is to be resolved into a question of how much we can pay in order to get somebody to serve their country upon that bench. I venture to say that if that idea were to gain ground it would be a very serious matter for the House of Commons. It would lower the House in the estimation of the country. I am sorry to say that the estimation in which this House is held is not what it used to be. That is one of the arguments, and I think it is a very great argument, against this Bill. But there is another argument, which has

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  been advanced by practically every speaker, and i hope the House will excuse me If I venture to repeat it. It is that this is the worst possible moment for bringing forward such a-suggestion. I thing the Leader of the House will remember a meeting at the Guildhall about three years ago, at which I was present, when Mr. Asquith and the present Leader of the House made speeches, and 1 was asked tore turn a vote of thanks to the Lord Mayor. I listened, as I ought to have done, with very great interest and very great appreciation to the speeches of Mr. Asquith and the Leader of the House. They were very eloquent speeches, expressed in very weighty words, and they recommended the whole nation to practice economy. I was asked to move a vote of thanks to the Lord Mayor, which I did, and I followed it up with this remark, as Member for the City of London, that if the Government would set the example in economy we would follow. That remark was received with great cheering by all my Constituents who were present, and who would have been delighted to have followed that example if it had been set them by the Government, but which, I venture to say, has never been set them from that day to this. Now that matters are worse than they have ever been before, this opportunity is taken of asking right lion. Gentlemen, who would have been quite content to remain on in their offices at£2,500 a year, to receive double pay. I was reading an account in the paper, a day or two ago, of an interview between the Prime Minister and certain hon. Members of this House who represent agriculture. The Prime Minister is reported to have said; "I have attacked in my day the landowning class, but I wish to render a tribute to them. They have not doubled their rents." Can the right hon. Gentleman render the same tribute to his own colleagues, and say, "They have not double their salaries"? The next Clause, I think I am correct in saying, is one of those Clauses which deals with the subject by reference. I have been endeavouring to look this up in the ninety-seven Clauses in the War Emergencies Laws (Continuance) Bill, but I have not had the time to do so. I gather, however, that the Clause increases the number of Undersecretaries by two. I have a very great admiration for all the Under-Secretaries. We generally see them on the Front Bench more often than their superior officers. But why do you want any more? There is no
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  room for them on that Front Bench as it is at the present time. Why add any more, specially as we have already attempted to add another, and have come into conflict with another place when, to use a slang phrase, we had "the knock"? We had to withdraw that one Under-Secretary and now, apparently, by a side-wind, we are going to get two instead of one— that is, if the other place does not interfere. I come to the question of re-election, which is the last Clause. This is a very curious sort of muddled Bill, because it deals with Under-Secretaries and salaries and winds up by saying that if a certain person holds an office under the Crown he is not to stand the risk of re-election. I do not know if that is because the by-elections have not been very successful. It may be so; I do not say it is for a moment; but as it was only so short a time ago, I think, as February or March, that a Bill was introduced to deal with this very question you ought in common decency, at any rate, to let a few years go by before you begin again.
  I have endeavoured to deal with the different points which appear to me to tell against this Bill. I would conclude by saying that I was much struck with the speech of an hon. Member just now, who concluded by asking the Government to withdraw the Bill and acknowledge that they had made a mistake. After all, they are human, or we hope so. 1 am glad the Leader of the House has gone out. I presume he has done so, in order that some of the Under-Secretaries, or the Attorney-General, may rescue him from a false position, and announce to the House that, on further consideration, he intends to withdraw the Bill.
  Captain W. BENN: We have had many Debates in this House on the question of economy. Whenever any private Member rises and urges economy on the Government, the Government has a stereotyped reply, which is that it is the private Members who always urge expenditure. On this occasion I hope the Government will observe that the private Members and the unofficial Members are absolutely united, and think that this is not the time to promote this Bill, however excellent its object. What the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury) said seems to me very much to the point. In the matter of expenditure I think the hon. and gallant Member for Hull (Lieutenant-Commander Kenworthy) was mistaken. This Bill does not only involve an additional expenditure of£12,000

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  a year. I have looked at the salaries of three of the Ministries concerned. In the Ministry of Food the salaries are£900,00 a year; in the Ministry of Labour the salaries are£250,000 a year; in the Ministry of Education the salaries are£500,000 a year. I understood the right lion. Baronet to say, and I believe it is absolutely right, that if you raise the status of an office, although you do not multiply everybody's salary by the fraction by which you raise the Minister's salary, yet you give them a reasonable presumption that their salaries will be raised as has been the salary of their chief.
  Mr. BALDWIN (Joint Financial Secretary to the Treasury): I cannot let that go unchallenged, as my right hon. Friend has been called away from the House. That is not a statement of fact. It does not at all follow that the salaries of all the officials of a Department arc raised because the Minister's salary is raised. When the salary of the President of the Board of Trade was raised to£5,000, there was no corresponding increase in the salaries of the officials.
  Captain BENN: If the hon. Gentleman says so, I take his word for it, but it seems to me very unfair, if an office is considered big enough to increase the salary of the chief, that those who are at work in that office, and are carrying out the public service, should not have, an increase as well, and I shall be greatly surprised if they do not consider that they are entitled to it, whatever the intentions, of the Government may be. In the old days Thursdays used to be the Supply day, but now every day is a Supply day. No Bill is introduced which does not involve an enormous sum of money. This very day a Bill has been introduced involving, no doubt with very good reasons, an expenditure of£ 3,500,000 on forestry. This Bill also will involve a very great expenditure. Whatever the Government may think, the people outside this House only desire one thing, and that is a ruthless cutting down of expenditure. Here is a very peculiar thing: We set up to-day a Forestry Commission. It is to take over the duties of forestry from this very Board of Agriculture the salary of whose Minister we are raising. But do we observe any reduction in the money voted to the Board of Agriculture for carrying out its duties? On the contrary, we are voting an increase. Surely, if you are going to take away work from a Department, that is generally a
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  primàa facie reason for reducing the Estimate? This Bill seems to me a very unnecessary and badly-drawn measure, but I do not want to speak of that because it obscures the real point at issue. For example it says no more than six Secretaries shall sit in this House. It is quite unnecessary to insert that provision, which was put in to safeguard the other place, because there are only five Secretaries of State, there not being one for air. There are other things one might mention in connection with it, but I do not want to obscure what is really the main issue, which is this. Is this the moment for the Government to sot an example of personal increase of salary to its Members? We voted in this House£2,C00 a year for the Minister of National Service and£3,000 a year for the Minister of Reconstruction. What is going to become of the money?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The sums are not being paid.
  Captain BENN: Then we have voted£4,000 a year, which is a substantial part of what is asked for to-day, and the salaries are not being paid, and the taxpayer is being asked to pay£4,000 which is not required at all.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The War has ended since; perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman forgets.
  Captain BENN: I remember that the War has ended, but the Estimates were presented long after the War had ended, and it is an example of the slipshod reckless manner in which the Government produce their Estimates. Two Minister's salaries voted and not being drawn and here now we are asked to double the salary of five other Ministers. This Bill will create the very worst impression in the country. I wish to re-enforce all that my right hon. Friend and leader has said in reference to what should really be the reward of service. We are far too apt to make it a money reward. The real reward should be public esteem. I do not see why we should not go back to the practice of more Ministers without salary. If a man can live on the salary given to Members of the House he could be a Minister on the same salary. I am not aware that he is put to any additional expense at all.
  Sir F. BANBURY: And he gets a motor car.
  Captain BENN: The Government would do much to raise the status of Ministers of the Crown if they relied not so much on money taken from the Treasury, which is already empty, but more upon the public esteem which their public service merits.
  Mr. WALLACE: I am extremely reluctant to vote against the Government, but I cannot help saying that in my judgment the Government has been extremely ill-advised in introducing this Bill at the present juncture. The right hon. Gentleman who introduced it is a business man, and I take it that in transacting his own business affairs, if any expenditure comes about he always asks himself the question, "Can I afford it?" think the Government ought to ask that question themselves for this proposed expenditure. In times of financial stringency a business firm always looks round to see in what direction it can retrench, but that evidently is not the policy of His Majesty's Ministers. I consider that the present expenditure in which the Government is indulging is of a most appalling character, and I cannot look forward to the future with anything but the greatest possible concern. There is a distinct want of coordination in the spending Departments of the Government. Each one seems to go along the same line, and if the Government does not bring down this reckless expenditure the expenditure itself will bring the Government down. I wonder if Ministers know the feeling in the country about these matters. I go round occasionally to various business centres both in Scotland and in England, and if they knew the deep seated resentment, not only amongst the working classes but amongst business men, at the reckless extravagance that is going on, they would mend their ways. I suggest that the comparative failure of the Victory Loan was largely accounted for by the methods of extravagance which are shown in many Government Departments, and it is no use our having a propaganda of economy if the Government itself is not to set the example. I support every word which has been said by the right hon. Baronet (Sir F, Banbury), and I press on the Government that this is an inopportune time for the introduction of this measure, and 1 hope they will reconsider their idea of pressing it forward.
  I want to ask for information in regard to Clause 2. It says that the number of
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  principal Secretaries of State and Undersecretaries of State capable of sitting and voting and so on shall be increased to six. I want to ask if there is any intention of appointing an Under-Secretary of State for Scotland. The Clause says:
  "Provided nothing in this Section shall affect the status of any Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health appointed under the Scottish Board of Health Act, 1919."
  I regard that paragraph as being of a wholly gratuitous character, and I am quite at a loss to understand it. The duties of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary are concerned with the Ministry of Health in Scotland, and it seems to me, if I am reading the Clause aright, that the idea is possibly to appoint an Undersecretary of State for Scotland exclusive of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary. We were very strong in Scotland regarding the appointment of a separate Minister for Health, and we gave way on the point because the Committee agreed to the appointment of a Parliamentary Under-Secretary. We regarded the duties of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary as so important that we should resent very strongly, whoever holds the position, that he should be relegated in any sense to the position of a junior. In other words I should like to know whether the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health is to be the junior of the Secretary of State for Scotland and also the junior possibly of anyone who may be appointed to be Under-Secretary of State for Scotland. I think it is very necessary that that point should be cleared up.
  Mr. SEDDON: I am sure it will pass the wit of the ordinary man when he tries to find out what madness has led the Government to the action proposed in this Bill. It is not often that I have the privilege of supporting the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Banbury), but I endorse every word he has said. I remember some years ago when the right hon. John Burns was President of the Local Government Board, a proposal was brought forward to raise his salary from£2,000 to£5,000 a year. Although he had made himself famous by a remark in his pre-Parliamentary days that no man was worth more than£500 a year, he was informed by the spokesman of the Government of that day that the difference between£2,000 and£5,000 was an invidious distinction between one Department and another, and I believe on that score the

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  salary was raised for the Local Government Board. But to-day we are facing a situation unparalleled in the financial history of this country. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has asked every Member of the House to utilise his time and" what ability he has in inducing people to economise. It has gone forth as the policy of the Government that unless we economise as a people we are not only bankrupt but we shall be doomed in the race of nations for a first-class position. At this moment we are asked to increase the salaries of right hon. Gentlemen. Surely it cannot be because they are unable to live on£2,000 a year. As was well said by an hon. Member on the Front Opposition Bench there are a number of Members of this House who are compelled to live on£100 a year. Let me take the case of the right hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas). I hope he will excuse my reference to him. He has a position of responsibility compared with which a Cabinet Minister has a Sunday school picnic. The right hon. Gentleman has not only to be the financial guide, philosopher, and friend of his organisation and the guardian of its funds, but he has to be the statesman and almost the legislator. At least he has to interpret legislation for them. What is the position so far as he is concerned? He has a salary of considerably less than£1,000 a year. I hope the news that comes to me that his salary has been increased is true. If it is true, I know that his salary is considerably less than£1,000 a year. Here we have the position that in one of the greatest trade unions of this country, with enormous responsibility, the workers feel justified in giving less than£1,000 a year to their general secretary; and here we have the Government coming forward, after asking everybody else to economise, and saying that right hon. Gentlesmen cannot live on less than£5,000 a year. I hope that the answer given in former days in reference to the right hon. John Burns will be reversed on this occasion, and instead of the Cabinet coming down to the House and asking for increases of salary to the tune of £12,000 a year, representing individually increases of£3,000 a year to certain gentlemen, they would in fulfilment of their own theory, and to give a lead to the nation, say, "We£5,000a year men are coming down to£2,000 a year, so that we may give an exhibition to the country of what we mean by economy."
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  The Government during its short career has never done anything so impossible as that which is proposed in this Bill. They have never done anything so unwise, and much as I would hate to vote against them, I believe that in putting forward this proposal for increases of£3,000 a year to certain right hon. Gentlemen they are doing much to fan the unrest in the country; they are playing into the hands of the revolutionaries, and are giving point and substance to the oft-repeated statement that the Government are dishonest in making their statements to the country. If they want the country to believe that economy is the first and last word for this country, then in heaven's name let them give a lead to the country, and not come forward and ask for these extravagant increases.
  10.0 P.M.
  Sir A. WARREN: As representing a large industrial area, it appears to me that the matter which is before this House this evening is of the greatest and the gravest importance. There is a feeling throughout the industrial population of this country that the Government are the most spendthrift of all the authorities with which they have to do. We had it constantly before us throughout the Election. Men and women were having to live on less than£2 a week, and we were conscious of the burden that was being imposed upon them, and they were restless under the burden. I believe that a large amount of the unpopularity that the Government are suffering from throughout the. country, as shown in the by-elections we have had recently, is because the people in the main do not believe that the Government are in earnest on this question of economy. We know full well that it had a very considerable influence in respect of the Victory Loan. We were called upon to assist in places to work up enthusiasm amongst the people, but on the other side we were met with the taunt that we as representing the people were prodigal, indifferent, and spendthrift in the money that we were pouring out.
  If this country is ever to recover itself, and if ever we are to re-establish ourselves in the position we have a right to occupy, we have every reason for the strictest economy and the strictest retrenchment. As the representative of a vast number of people who hardly know how to make two ends meet, I would like hon. Members to look into the statistics of the constituency

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  I have the honour of representing, and they would readily conceive how indignant and how rebellious the people would feel in their hardship and in their poverty to know that this House is voting such large sums of money as are indicated in this Bill. I join in an earnest appeal to the Government that they will withdraw the Bill. Many of us have come here pledged to support them in all that is reasonable, and in all that is for the best in the country. But I say, very deliberately, that if they persist in this Bill to-night they are putting us to a very hard test, a test that we never anticipated we should have to experience. It would be a wise and reasonable action, and it would help to re-establish them in the eyes of the people if they withdrew the Bill. I beg them sincerely and earnestly as one who is pledged to do all I can to support them to withdraw the Bill, and let the matter stand where it is, at any rate until some better and more propitious time arrives.
  Captain WATSON: I rise to dissociate myself entirely from the bulk of those who have spoken on this question. What do those who have spoken against this Bill say? They have pointed out that it is unwise and unpopular, but not a single one of them has ventured to state that any particular Minister whose salary is to be increased is unworthy of it or that the responsibility which he has to bear is unworthy of the proposed increase. What is the next argument against it? Every hon. Member, without exception, who has spoken against the proposal has said that this is an inopportune time to make such an increase I Why is it inopportune I If it is good on its merits, how could there be a more opportune time than the present to give the increase? One right hon. Gentleman on the Front Opposition Bench referred to the £400 a year salaries of Members of Parliament. He is not in his place at the moment. Does he propose to revoke those salaries I If £400 was adequate in 1911 it is grossly and hopelessly inadequate now, and I, and I believe most hon. Members, would have the courage to vote for a proper increase being given. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO!"] That is my view. Wages have risen throughout the whole community. Is it said that it would be an unwise and an unpopular thing to do when the question is raised in this House to raise the wages of the wage earners. I appeal to hon.
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  Members to think clearly on this subject, I have the honour to represent what is an entirely industrial constituency, and if this matter goes to a Division I am going to vote for the Bill, because, in my conviction, it is a good Bill, and because those for whom the increase is proposed are entitled to it not merely because of themselves personally and their worth to this House and to the country, but because of the very great responsibilities which they have to bear. If this Bill goes to a Division, I trust sincerely that it will carry the great weight of this House with it.
  Mr. HOGGE: The first office dealt with here is that of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. To-day it has attached to it a salary of£2,000. The Secretary for Scotland, who represents the same Board in Scotland, has also a salary of£2,000 attached to that office. Those two offices together make up£4,000. This Bill proposes to raise the salary of those two combined offices to £10,000, or£6,000 more. The House will recollect that before nine o'clock to-night we passed the Second Reading of a Forestry Bill which took away from the English Board of Agriculture and from the Office of Secretary for Scotland, that was controlling the Scottish Board of Agriculture, their functions in reference to forestry and approved of the appointment of three new-Government officials, each of whom will have salary of£1,500 a year. So if the House agrees to this measure with regard to the first item of the Bill, the Boards of Agriculture, instead of a combined payment of£4,000, will have a payment of£14,500. When the Government attempt, as in other circumstances they might reasonably attempt, to make the salaries of Ministers equal, we must bear in mind what other measures are going through the House, what other officials are being created, and what their salaries will be. In addition to the £4,500 which you will agree Co if you pass the Forestry Bill, there will be attached an attendant salary list, as was admitted by the Minister in charge of the Bill, of between£45,000 and£50,000 a year. That is what the House is committing itself if it agrees to this proposal. I, therefore, will go with my right hon. Friend into the Lobby against this Bill. I hope that the position of Scottish Members will not be misunderstood with regard to the Secretary for Scotland. Those of us who are Scottish Members support the elevation

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  of the Secretary for Scotland to the position of a Secretary of State, but we do not ask in this instance the accompanying salary of£5,000. We are quite content that the Secretary for Scotland should draw the salary of£2,000 which he draws at present. The Secretary for Scotland presides over no fewer than fourteen separate Departments of Government in Scotland, and in asking that his status should be raised to that of Secretary of State we are making a fair offer when we say we are content with the salary which is paid now in order to fit in with the spirit of economy in all those matters which we want to encourage.
  Colonel GREIG: A vicarious sacrifice.
  Mr. HOGGE: I will take that challenge. After all, are not the members of the Opposition, who are out of office and who have no emoluments, as necessary a part of Government in this House and in the State as Ministers?
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: It depends on the Opposition.
  Mr. HOGGE: My hon. Friend who makes that interruption has taken care on many occasions to protest publicly for himself that he has not got promotion because of certain views which he held. Government cannot be conducted without opposition. It is true of the whole House of Commons that every man who comes here makes very great sacrifices in many other ways. Every Member of this House knows that, and the Government of the State could not be carried on unless this were so. My hon. and gallant Friend who talks about vicarious sacrifice must remember the long line of Secretaries for Scotland, public men in Scotland, who have given their services to Scotland without any reward. I am quite sure that the present occupant of the position is the last man in the world to urge on his own behalf that his salary should be increased. But as Scottish Members, when we put that point of economy from the point of view of the Government and the Opposition, we desire only that the provision of this Bill shall be adopted so far as the status of the Secretary for Scotland is concerned.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The experience which we have had to-night is not an unusual one. It is a very common thing to find in this House that when a subject is raised which gives room, as this undoubtedly does, for the kind of speech to
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  which we have listened, we hear nothing but condemnation, but we sometimes find that speeches do not altogether represent the considered judgment of the House of Commons as a whole. I am going, if possible, to put the case exactly as the Government see it. First of all, I wish to put aside an issue which has formed a large part of the speeches and which, in my opinion, is quite irrelevant to the subject which we are now discussing. That issue is the general question of economy. I say at once that there has been hardly a speech made on that subject with which I am not largely in agreement. As the House knows, I was until comparatively recently Chancellor of the Exchequer. While the War was going on, though, no doubt, I could have done, and though I believe the House thought I did, less than was actually the case, I was alarmed at the way in which expenditure was going on. Since the War has ended the whole country, and not less the Government, is absolutely alarmed at the extent to which expenditure is still being incurred. I am sure the House realises exactly what Parliamentary government means. At any rate—for I have had my share of Opposition—the question of extravagance is one of the easiest weapons which anyone who wishes to attack the Government can use, but the present time makes it a weapon which is exceptionally easy to use. First of all, I am not going to defend the existing position. To do that would seem to suggest that we did not realise the seriousness of making changes, and drastic changes. But I do wish the House to realise that they cannot have a great convulsion like the War without finding that, though the storm has ceased, the waves are still rolling, and that the effect is felt in every Department of State. I am sure the House will realise that. We look, for instance, at the amount of money still being voted for the Army, or for the Navy, or for other Departments. It seems monstrous in a time of peace. But if you consider that the demobilisation of the Army is a task, so far as the civil side is concerned, which takes, as much time and requires as many men as during the War, it will be realised that it is not an easy task to get it all put right at once.
  Let me say this: My successor, the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, has been as alarmed as any Member of the House on this subject. I should like to take this opportunity of saying that, knowing, as I do, how great a part the

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  psychological moment plays in a loan, knowing the pressure and the need for it, I do not think the loan was a failure. I am perfectly certain that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and those who helped him deserve to be congratulated on the efforts which they made to make it a success. We did realise that this question of extravagance was one of the things that militated against it. I cannot in this connection—it really is not relevant—pretend to tell the House everything we tried to do to cut down expenditure, for we realised that it is not a question of trying, but that it must be cut down. We are agreed about that. One of my right hon. Friends said that we ought to wind up Departments which are no longer needed. Some of them arc being wound up, and the winding up is nearly completed. We are now winding up branch departments of these others and putting an end to them. But what we have done is not enough. We have had Cabinet after Cabinet discussing this problem, and nobody realises more strongly than the Chancellor of the Exchequer that no Chancellor in circumstances like these is powerful enough to meet this difficulty by himself. He must have support in his efforts to cut down, the help not only of his colleagues taken generally, but he must, above all, have the whole weight of the Prime Minister thrown into the balance to put an end to expenditure which ought not to continue. And that we mean to do. Leaving that aside, for it is really not relevant to this discussion, let us consider this question on its merits. I wish, first of all, to ask the House to realise that many of us in the Government have been a long time in political life, and even the dullest of us understands the psychology of the country to some extent, and that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister may be considered to understand it almost as well as any of the Members who have spoken. If you take that as the preface, you will realise that we expected that what we are doing would be unpopular. That we knew, and yet we are doing it in spite of that knowledge and in spite of the time at which we are making this proposal; and remember that what was said about the inopportuneness of that time was made by me in my introductory speech. I said myself that you could not get a more inopportune time, and obviously we are not justified in doing it
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  unless there is urgent reason for it. I wish the House to consider what are the arguments which have been brought against it. What are they? Take, for instance, my hon. Friend who sits on the second bench below the Gangway opposite. He said that any business man, if he found that things were not going very well, would at once practice retrenchment. Like himself, I was in business for a considerable time, and I met a very large number of the most capable business men in this country, and I will tell him what my observation is as to what really a big business man would do. There are, of course, successful business men, who make money, and who would cut down everything, and who would cut down wages, but there is not a big business man, in the real sense of the words, who will not tell you that the real way to make business a success is to pay well the me non whom he depends to work his business.
  Mr. WALLACE: What I said was could we afford it?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: It is not a case of affording it. I say it pays to give proper rewards to the men who are doing the work, and that is the point. Let me look at it from another point of view. I say there is urgency in this matter, and the urgency is not, as hon. Members seem to think, that we should treat fairly the particular men in particular positions. I do not put it on that ground. I put it on this ground, that if you are going to get efficient work, you must give the men who are doing that work, not equivalent salaries to what they could make in commerce—for I am going to repeat now what I said in my opening remarks—but you must give them salaries which are in some degree commensurate with their ability and the importance of the work they are doing, and you must free them from any sense of anxiety in regard to monetary affairs. If you do not do that, then instead of really helping economy and helping the State there is no form of saving which, in my view, is so wasteful as to cut down below a reasonable figure the salaries of the men on whom you depend for the work of the country. Let us look at what is reasonable. Take, first of all, the speech of my right hon. Friend opposite (Sir D. Maclean). I listened to it, and, as usual he put the matter quite moderately, but what did it amount to? He did not say

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  to us what you are proposing to do, which is to put offices of similar standing with the others on the same position and to give them the same salaries is wrong. What he said was, it is unpopular, it is going to have a bad effect on the country, and if you go to those men and say, Do you insist on this? They will reply at once, No, we are ready to make the sacrifice. Is that right, for the House of Commons, representing a great nation? [An HON. MEMBER: "Certainly!"] I do not think so. I think it is right for us to make sacrifices for ourselves, but I think it is mean to ask the men who are serving you to make sacrifices. That is my view. Look at it from another point of view.
  An HON. MEMBER: Why has not this come forward before, then?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: If the hon. Member had taken the trouble to be here when the Bill was introduced he would have heard there a son. Let me put to the House another aspect of the case. My right hon. Friend behind me (Sir F. Banbury), in the course of an interruption, said there would be plenty of blacklegs, and in the course of his own speech he said the time was when the men who sat on this bench did not want a salary at all, and he would like to see us doing the work without a salary.
  Sir F. BANBURY: No. I said that the salary was a secondary object, and that they went there in order to get the honour.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: Oh, yes; but I think he said more than that, and I must say I was not surprised to hear it from him. I have no doubt he would like to see us back again in the position to which I referred when I introduced the Bill, when it was the rarest thing to have a Minister who had not private means, but I was surprised to see the same view expressed by my lion, and gallant Friend opposite (Captain W. Benn). I did not think it was one of the Liberal principles, even under the new conditions, that what you want is men who will do the work, not according to their merits but according to their private means.
  Captain BENN: I think the right hon. Gentleman should understand that the Liberal principle is to have men who will do the work, with self-sacrifice, for public honour.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: That is a very noble sentiment, but bring it down to practice. Does it mean that the work is to be done
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  by men who are without private means, and who depend on their salaries for what they live upon? If it does, will my hon. Friend say that they are not entitled to a salary which in some degree is commensurate with their responsibilities? It is said that no man can claim more if he gets£2,000 a year. Is not that really a question of what the value of his services is and what his responsibilities are? Is not that the test? I remember, when I was a candidate in Scotland in 1906, the question was put to me by a Scotch elector whether I would be in favour of putting an Income Tax of 100 per cent. upon all incomes above£500. It is the fact, and we have got to face it, that it is one of the weaknesses of democratic Government that there is a prejudice against paying men value for their services. Is it really worthy of a great country to say that we are not going to give salaries which, if any of our salaries are deserved, are deserved by the men who fill these offices, because public opinion will say it is against our interests? I quite agree that you cannot expect to give men who fill the rank of Ministers of the Crown a remuneration equal to what they could get in other walks of life, and, as I said before, even if you look at it from the point of view of selfishness, it is not reasonable that we should do that People always estimate money or anything else in proportion to the esteem to the position, which we hold in the eyes of our fellows. No one will doubt that it is a great honour to be a Minister of the Crown. Ho one will doubt that a man in that position does hold in the eyes of his fellows a position which no amount of money would give him, and that has to be taken into account as one of the inducements to get the best men to serve. But while that is true, is it really reasonable to ask them to serve as Ministers of the Crown—I am speaking of those who depend on their own exertions for their livelihood—when everyone knows that if they are to continue to do it they have got either to incur debt— that is the actual fact—or at once to live on a different scale from that on which they were living before they were asked to become a Minister of the Crown? Supposing they were willing to do it—and I do not deny that probably that is true, because, of course, it is not these Ministers who have made us bring in this Bill—is this House of Commons really going to say this: Because these Gentlemen do not.

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  press for this, because we know that we will get their services even at this remuneration and under these conditions, the sacrifice which is made by them is to be accepted by the House of Commons as if It were our sacrifice, and that a great nation like this is not at least prepared to free its Ministers from the carking care that is induced by such a position as this? It is all very well to say that£2,000 is plenty to live on. We know that there are many men—I might say millions of men—who have to live on harder conditions. We all know, as my right hon. Friend says, that people with fixed incomes are those who are suffering worst under present conditions. That is perfectly true, but you have to consider fairness to those whom you ask to perform its service, and I do not think it would be out of place to tell the House again what I said to begin with, that in the case of two of these Ministers they were actually selected by the Prime Minister for offices on the higher scale, but when we began to look into it we came to the conclusion that the work of their own Departments was so important that they could not be spared from those Departments. Is it reasonable because a man is doing 'his work so well that you should keep him, owing to this arrangement, out of an office open to him?
  It is not reasonable. £2,000 a year now— and this is the urgency of it—is nothing like the equivalent of the same salary before the War. Of course, I quite agree that that is true of other people also, but it is nothing like the equivalent of the same amount before the War. The Income Tax alone reduces it from£1,925 to£l,550. The point is not whether other people are suffering the same hardship, but whether the State can hope to continue to get the best men to serve it unless it gives them remuneration in some degree commensurate with the responsibilities of the posts which they occupy. Some of my hon. Friends have pointed out, quite erroneously, that the raising of the salaries of the heads of these offices means that the salaries of all the Civil Service are raised also. That is not the case. We realise the necessity of being reasonable with our Civil servants, but even now they are paid far less than men doing the same work in commercial pursuits. And let me say here, again, that I think the same applies to them as to Ministers. They do occupy a position which commands greater
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  respect than the ordinary mercantile man, and for that reason I have no doubt we shall get plenty of applicants. But the Government, in the interests of the State, has had to raise their salaries. We have done that not merely out of sympathy for them—though I think we have that sympathy—but for the reason that we cannot possibly hope to see the State well served unless we give something like a reasonable reward. Everyone knows that, if we are to get men without private means who are the best fitted to serve the State, we must give them something which is at all events comparable to the remuneration which they would receive else-where.
  I confess I feel strongly on this matter. It certainly does not concern we, as the House knows, but I feel strongly on it, and I will tell the House why. My right hon. Friend below the Gangway said that there had been three applicants for every one of these posts. Although the House may be inclined to question it, and it is one of the things which have been very much criticised, I say, quite sincerely, that we have honestly tried to get the most efficient men we could. And I will say, in addition, that, strange as it may seem, it is not easy to find men who are fit for these great posts. It is however, one of the curious facts of human nature that none of us are able to judge our own relative positions, and that applies to members of the Government as much as to other Members of the House of Commons. I have had some experience of the views of different hon. Members as to the suitability of people for particular offices, and I can assure the House that there is a very large number of Members of this House who have not the smallest doubt that they are quite capable of taking the place of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. It really is difficult to get good enough men for these posts. I am sure the House could not make a, greater mistake than to treat as unimportant the question of what particular man fills a particular post, and I am sure also—although personally I do not regret it—thatmore and more of these offices are being filled by men who have no private means. But I do say that under the conditions of democracy which now prevails, unless we make arrangements, whatever they are, which give a remuneration in some degree adequate to the responsibility, we shall, for the sake of meeting a little popular disapproval, for the sake of bowing to what is

  321
  undoubtedly one of the weaknesses of democracy—their unwillingness to pay adequate salaries to those who serve them—we shall for that purpose be doing a great disservice to the real interests of the community.
  Let me put one other point. I was very interested in the speeches of certain Scottish Members condemning this. They condemned it root and branch, but a memorial was presented to the Prime Minister this year urging that what has been done for the others should be done for the Secretary of Scotland, and two of them who condemn root and branch this proposal signed that memorial. [HON. MEMBERS: "Name!'] My hon. and gallant Friend opposite (Captain Benn) was one of them.
  Captain BENN: I am sure the right hon. Gentleman wishes to do me justice. Certainly I signed the memorial, but it did not suggest an increase of salary, but that the Secretary for Scotland should be a member of the Government.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I am surprised at that. I know my hon. and gallant Friend is as straightforward as any Member of the House, but does he really mean to suggest that he meant in signing that memorial that he did not mean the salary of the Secretary for Scotland to be increased?
  Captain BENN: My object was to secure an increase in the status of the office, but no question of salary arose.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I can assure my hon. Friend that when the Prime Minister got that memorial he had no doubt on the point, and I am surprised that any of those who signed it had any doubt. This point I am going to put. Does anyone doubt that these offices are relatively of smaller importance to those in the higher service? IE so, is it not quite unreasonable not to treat them in the same way? I cannot understand how anyone can pretend that if we seek for efficiency in our administration and realise that it depends upon these Ministers, I cannot see why we should not give to one man doing the same work the same scale of remuneration as we give to another.
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby and my hon. Friend behind me said that the life of a Cabinet Minister was a picnic compared with the life of the Member for Derby. If that is true, then I am
  322
  sorry for the Member for Derby. The right hon. Gentleman suggested that we might set the matter right by "pooling" salaries. I will tell him why that was not done. The House has forgotten apparently that when the "pool" was announced it led to great criticism, although I think it was fairer than the present arrangement. It was criticised, and we stated that it was only a war arrangement. When the Government was reconstituted after the Armistice the Prime Minister did not think that he was justified in continuing that arrangement, and I agreed with him, for this reason. I think the House of Commons ought not to be afraid to pay openly whatever reward it thinks is reasonable to the men who serve it. That is my opinion. I have said all 1 am going to say. I agree with my right hon. Friend opposite what we have to do is to be just. This is just, and whatever is said about the outcry in the country, believe me, if the Government is going to be discredited, if there is one thing that will discredit it more than any other it is waiting for a gust of public opinion, and not being prepared to do what the Government or the House of Commons thinks is right, whatever may be popular opinion. That is the view of the Government. I quite admit that for one reason or another there is a larger amount of hostility—[HON. MEMBERS: "No, no!"]—I am not going to give it up—a larger amount of hostility than I had expected. If those who are opposed choose to fight the Bill at every stage it is quite evident they can compel us either to keep the House sitting an indefinite time or to postpone it till the autumn. I do not think it would be reasonable for the Government to keep the House sitting indefinitely for this purpose. We will not abandon the Bill, but, as some hon. Members suggest we are rushing the Bill, we are prepared to show that we are not. We will insist on the Second Reading being taken now, but, in view of the hostility, I will not say we will press it until we come back in the autumn.
  Colonel WEDGWOOD: The Leader of the House in an unfortunate moment said this Bill was being opposed because it was unpopular. He will admit that I would not be likely to object to the Government bringing in a Bill which is unpopular. The more unpopular it was the better I should be pleased. I would not be likely either to oppose a Bill because it was unpopular if I thought it was just.

  323
  But this Bill has not even the merit of being just. The real reason why it is inopportune at the present moment is not because it is unpopular, but because it will create a wrong impression throughout the country. It will also increase the Labour unrest which everyone knows is now so much on the surface, and so very anxious to pick up little things of this sort with which to beat not only the Government, but all civilisation. It will not only increase Labour unrest, but it will make subordinate members of the Government think that they have a good claim to get their salaries increased.
  The right hon. Gentleman was very eloquent about paying men according to their worth, but he admitted that people were willing to serve the State for a less sum than they were prepared to work for in private business. That is perfectly true, and we get many Cabinet Ministers for less than they would get in private employment. But we also get Permanent Secretaries of State for far less than they would get if they were in private employment. We realise, in paying the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury—perhaps the most important official in England—or the Secretary to the Post Office, a salary of from perhaps£1,000 to£3,000 a year, that we are getting them far below their real worth in the market, and we continue to pay them salaries which are below their worth in the market. Is it not then wrong that we should go to the Cabinet Ministers concerned, and say, "We have been paying you below your worth in the market. It is true you were willing to come at the price, just as the Permanent Secretary, but now we will pay you more in future"?
  If you are going at once to say that anybody who serves the public is to be paid his full market value, you ought to begin with the permanent officials, who have no vote in this House. [An HON. MEMBER: "They have!"] They have not. The permanent officials at the Treasury, at the
  Post Office, and at the Board of Trade, are all paid far below their worth in the market to-day, as can be seen when they leave, and get bank directorships, and so on. If any increase is made in the payment for the public service, to bring the remuneration up to what is their worth in private employment, let it begin with the permanent officials, and not with the members of the Government, who have votes here and Private Secretaries to back them up. About ten years ago we had a Bill introduced to raise the salaries of the Presidents of the Board of Trade and Local Government Board to£5,000. It was introduced in collusion between the two Front Benches; the Government had the support of the Front Bench opposite. I think it is to the honour of the Opposition Front Bench that they oppose this, in spite of the probability of their reversion to the office. [An HON.MEMBER: "It is remote!"] It is not a bit remote the way the Government is going on. The fact is that ex-Ministers realise that they must oppose this not only in the interest of party politics, but in the interest of national politics. This example will run throughout the country, and everybody will know tomorrow that we have raised the salaries of Cabinet Ministers. Everybody, from the manager of the factory down to the unskilled labourer there, will urge that, as Cabinet Ministers have raised their salaries, they have a perfect right to press for a rise in their own salaries also. This thing is like a cancer which spreads indefinitely. Once you start it, with the Cabinet at the top, squandering the public money on themselves, you will find that the country will immediately follow in their footsteps, and try in the same way, not to make both ends meet, but to make hay while the sun shines, and to get what they can out of a country which is rapidly going towards bankruptcy.
  Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  The House divided: Ayes, 176; Noes, 83.

  Division No. 84.]

  AYES.

  [10.55 P.M.

  Adair, Rear-Admiral

  Barnes, Rt. Hon. G. N. (Gorbals)

  Buchanan, Lieut.-Col. A. L. H.

  Addison, Rt. Hon. Dr. Christopher

  Barnes, Major H. (Newcastle, E.)

  Bull, Rt. Hon. Sir William James

  Agg-Gardner, sir James Tynte

  Barnett, Captain Richard W.

  Burn, Colonel C. R. (Torquay)

  Ainsworth, Captain C.

  Barnston, Major Harry

  Campion, Colonel W. R.

  Amery, Lieut.-Colonel U. C. M. S.

  Benn, Sir Arthur S. (Plymouth)

  Carew, Charles R. S. (Tiverton)

  Archer-Shee, Lieut.-Colonel Martin

  Benn, Com. Ian Hamilton (Greenwich)

  Carr, W. T.

  Astor, Major Hon. Waldorf

  Birchall, Major J. D.

  Casey, T. W.

  Baird, John Lawrence

  Bridgeman, William dive

  Chamberlain, N. (Birm., Ladywood)

  Baldwin, Stanley

  Broad, Thomas Tucker

  Child, Brig.-General Sir Hill

  Barlow, Sir Montague (Salford, S.)

  Brown, J. (Ayr and Bute)

  Clay, Captain H. H. Spender

  Coates, Major Sir Edward F.

  Hope, Harry (Stirling)

  Pratt, John William

  Coats, Sir Stuart

  Hope, James Fitzalan (Sheffield)

  Prescott, Major W. H.

  Cobb, Sir Cyril

  Horne, Edgar (Guildford)

  Pulley, Charles Thornton

  Conway, Sir W. Martin

  Howard, Major S. G.

  Purchase, H. G.

  Cope, Major W. (Glamorgan)

  Hudson, R. M.

  Raper, A. Baldwin

  Courthope, Major George Loyd

  Hughes, Spencer Leigh

  Raw, Lieut.-Colonel Dr. N.

  Cowan, Sir H. (Aberdeen and Kinc.)

  Hunter, Gen. Sir A. (Lancaster)

  Rees Sir J. O. (Nottingham, E.)

  Craig, Col. Sir James (Down, Mid.)

  Illingworth, Rt. Hon. Albert H.

  Ried, D. D.

  Craig, Lt.-Com. N. (Isle of Thanet)

  Jameson, Major J. G.

  Roberts, Sir S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

  Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

  Johnson, L. S.

  Robinson, T. (Stretford, Lanes.)

  Dalziel, Sir Davison (Brixton)

  Jones, Sir Edgar R. (Merthyr Tydvil)

  Rodger, A. K.

  Davies, Alfred (Clitheroe)

  Jones, G. W. H. (Stoke Newington)

  Royds, Lt.-Col. Edmund

  Davies, T. (Cirencester)

  Jones, J. Towyn (Carmarthen)

  Rutherford, Sir W. W. (Edge Hill)

  Dennis, J. W.

  Kidd, James

  Samuel, S. (Wandsworth, Putney)

  Doyle, N. Grattan

  Knights, Captain H.

  Sanders, Colonel Robert Arthur

  Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

  Law, Right Hon. A. Bonar (Glasgow)

  Seager, Sir William

  Edwards, J. H. (Glam., Neath)

  Lindsay, William Arthur

  Seely, Maj.-Gen. Rt. Hon. John

  Elliot, Capt. W. E. (Lanark)

  Lort-Williams, J.

  Shaw, Hon. A. (Kilmarnock)

  Elliott, Lt.-Col. Sir G. (Islington, W.)

  Loseby, Captain C. E.

  Shaw, Captain W. T. (Forfar)

  Eyres-Monsell, Commander

  M'Laren, R. (Lanark, N.)

  Shortt, Rt. Hon. E. (N'castle-on-T., W.)

  Falcon, Captain M.

  Macquisten, F. A.

  Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

  Farquharson, Major A. C.

  Maddocks, Henry

  Stanley, Colonel Hon. G. F. (Preston)

  FitzRoy, Capt. Hon. Edward A.

  Malone, Major P. (Tottenham, S.)

  Stephenson, Colonel H. K.

  Foreman, H.

  Manville, Edward

  Stewart, Gershom

  Forestier-Walker, L.

  Mason, Robert

  Strauss, Edward Anthony

  Fraser, Major Sir Keith

  Matthews, David

  Sugden, W. H.

  Ganzoni, Captain F. C.

  Middlebrook, Sir William

  Sutherland, Sir William

  Geddes, Rt. Hen. Sir A. C. (Basingstoke)

  Mitchell, William Lane-

  Talbot, G. A. (Hemel Hempstead)

  Geddes, Rt. Hon. Sir E. (Cambridge)

  Moles, Thomas

  Taylor, J. (Dumbarton)

  George, Rt. Hon. David Lloyd

  Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred Moritz

  Terrell, G. (Chippenham, Wilts)

  Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

  Montagu, Rt. Hon. E. S.

  Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, S.)

  Gilmour, Lieut.-Colonel John.

  Moore-Brabazon, Lt.-Col. J. T. C.

  Thomson, Sir W. Mitchell- (M'yhl)

  Graham, D. M. (Hamilton)

  Morden, Col. H. Grant

  Vickers, D.

  Gray, Major E.

  Morrison-Bell, Major A. C.

  Walters, Sir John Tudor

  Green, J. F. (Leicester)

  Mosley, Oswald

  Ward, W. Dudley (Southampton)

  Greene, Lt.-Col. W. (Hackney, N.)

  Mount, William Arthur

  Waring, Major Walter

  Greenwood, Col. Sir Hamar

  Murchison, C. K.

  Watson, Captain John Bertrand

  Gregory, Holman

  Murray, Major C. D. (Edinburgh, s.)

  Weston, Colonel John W.

  Greig, Colonel James William

  Murray, Hon. G. (St. Rollox)

  Wigan, Brig.-General John Tyson

  Gritten, W. G. Howard

  Murray, William (Dumfries)

  Wild, Sir Ernest Edward

  Guinness, Lt.-Col. Hon. W. E. (B. St. E.)

  Neal, Arthur

  Williams, Lt.-Col. Sir R. (Banbury)

  Hall, Capt. D. B. (Isle of Wight)

  Nelson, R. F. W. R.

  Williams, Col. Sir R. (Dorset, W.)

  Hamilton, Major C. G. C. (Altrincham)

  Newman, Sir R. H. S. D. (Exeter)

  Wilson, Colonel Leslie (Reading)

  Harris, Sir H. P. (Paddington, S.)

  Nicholson, W. (Petersfield)

  Worsfold, T. Cato

  Henderson, Major V. L.

  O'Neill, Captain Hon. Robert W. H,

  Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.

  Henry, Denis S. (Londonderry, S.)

  Parker, James

  Younger, Sir George

  Herbert, Denniss (Hertford)

  Parry, Major Thomas Henry

  Hewart, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

  Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Lord E.

  Hilder, Lieut.-Col. F.

  Pollock, Sir Ernest Murray

  Talbot and Captain F. Guest.

  Hood, Joseph

  Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton

  NOES.

  Acland, Rt. Hon. Francis Dyke

  Hall, F. (Yorks, Normanton)

  Richardson, R. (Houghton)

  Atkey, A. R.

  Hartshorn, V.

  Robinson, S. (Houghton and Radnor)

  Balfour, George (Hampstead)

  Hennessy, Major G.

  Royce, William Stapleton

  Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir F. G.

  Hills, Major J. W. (Durham)

  Seddon, J. A.

  Barker, Major R.

  Hopkinson, Austin (Mossley)

  Sexton, James

  Bell, Lieut.-Col. W. C. H. (Devizes)

  In skip, T. W. H.

  Sitch, C. H.

  Benn, Capt. W. (Leith)

  Johnstone, J,

  Smith, W. (Wellingborough)

  Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

  Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

  Spencer, George A.

  Borwick, Major G. O.

  Jones, J. (Silvertown)

  Spoor, B. G.

  Bowerman, Right Hon. C. W.

  Kenworthy, Lieut.-Commander

  Surtees, Brig.-General H. C.

  Brace, Rt. Hon. William

  Kenyon, Barnet

  Swan, J. E. C.

  Briant, F.

  King, Commander Douglas

  Thomas, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Derby)

  Buckley, Lt.-Col. A.

  Lane-Fox, Major G. R.

  Thomson, T. (Middlesbrough, W.)

  Cairns, John

  Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)

  Tootill, Robert

  Cape, Tom

  Lunn, William

  Wallace, J.

  Carter, W. (Mansfield)

  Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)

  Ward, Colonel L. (Kingston-upon-Hull)

  Clough, R.

  Maclean, Rt. Hon. Sir D. (Midlothian)

  Waterson, A. E.

  Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.

  Mallalieu, Frederick William

  Wedgwood, Colonel Josiah C.

  Colfox, Major W. P.

  Morrison, H. (Salisbury)

  White, Col. G. D. (Southport)

  Croft, Brig.-General Henry Page

  Murray, Dr. D. (Western Isles)

  Williams, A. (Conset, Durham)

  Davies, Sir W. Howell (Bristol, SO

  Nail, Major Joseph

  Williams, Col. P. (Middlesbrough)

  Entwistle, Major C. F.

  Newbould, A. E.

  Willoughby, Lt.-Col. Hon. Claud

  Finney, Samuel

  Oman, C. W. C.

  Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

  Foxcroft, Captain C.

  Palmer, Brig-Gen. G. (Westbury)

  Winterton, Major Earl

  Gretton, Colonel John

  Parkinson, John' Allen (Wigan)

  Wood, Major Mackenzie (Aberdeen, C.)

  Griffiths, T. (Pontypool)

  Perring, William George

  Griggs, Sir Peter

  Rae, H. Norman

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr.

  Grundy, T. W.

  Rattan, Peter Wilson

  Hogge and Mr. G. Thorne.

  Guest, J. (Hemsworth, York)

  Rom or, J. B.

  Question put, and agreed to.

  Bill read a second time, and committed to a Standing Committee.

  FORESTRY [EXPENSES].
  Committee to consider of authorising the payment, out of moneys provided by Parliament, of a sum not exceeding£3,500,000 into a Forestry Fund established by any Act of the present Session for establishing a Forestry Commission for the United Kingdom, and promoting afforestation, and the production and supply of timber therein—(King's Recommendation signified)—To-morrow.—[Lord Edmund Talbot.]
  The remaining Orders were read, and. postponed.
  ADJOURNMENT,—"That this House do now adjourn."—[Lord E. Talbot.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Seven minutes after Eleven o'clock.

  GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS (PAYMENT BASIS).
  GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS (PAYMENT BASIS).
  IMPERIAL WAR CABINET.
  IMPERIAL WAR CABINET.
  LEASEHOLD ENFRANCHISEMENT.
  LEASEHOLD ENFRANCHISEMENT.
  DERBYSHIRE OIL (ROYALTIES).
  DERBYSHIRE OIL (ROYALTIES).
  ENTERTAINMENTS DUTY.
  ENTERTAINMENTS DUTY.
  INCOME TAX (QUARTERLY COLLECTION).
  INCOME TAX (QUARTERLY COLLECTION).
FOOD SUPPLIES.
  SUGAR.
  SUGAR.
  MEAT.
  MEAT.
  CALVES (SLAUGHTER).
  CALVES (SLAUGHTER).
IRELAND.
  CORK ASSIZES (LORD JUSTICE'S STATEMENT).
  CORK ASSIZES (LORD JUSTICE'S STATEMENT).
  POLICE PROTECTION (DOGS).
  POLICE PROTECTION (DOGS).
  ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY (INCOME TAX).
  ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY (INCOME TAX).
DEMOBILISATION.
  ROYAL ARMY MEDICAL CORPS.
  ROYAL ARMY MEDICAL CORPS.
  OFFICERS SERVING ABROAD (WIVES AND FAMILIES).
  OFFICERS SERVING ABROAD (WIVES AND FAMILIES).
  BRITISH TROOPS IN ITALY.
  BRITISH TROOPS IN ITALY.
  OXFORD PREMISES (MILITARY OCCUPATION).
  OXFORD PREMISES (MILITARY OCCUPATION).
  MILITARY HEADQUARTERS, CONSTANTINOPLE.
  MILITARY HEADQUARTERS, CONSTANTINOPLE.
  WAR DECORATIONS (TERRITORIAL FORCES).
  WAR DECORATIONS (TERRITORIAL FORCES).
  AEMY PAY CORPS (WOMEN CLERKS).
  AEMY PAY CORPS (WOMEN CLERKS).
  LABOUR CORPS, RIPON (PAY).
  LABOUR CORPS, RIPON (PAY).
  ROYAL ARMY CLOTHING DEPARTMENT (VIEWERS).
  ROYAL ARMY CLOTHING DEPARTMENT (VIEWERS).
  WOOL (PRICES).
  WOOL (PRICES).
NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  CIVIL LIABILITIES (GRANTS).
  CIVIL LIABILITIES (GRANTS).
  STOPPAGE OF PAYMENT.
  STOPPAGE OF PAYMENT.
  WAR GRATUITIES.
  WAR GRATUITIES.
ROYAL AIR, FORCE.
  CIVIL AVIATION DEPARTMENT.
  CIVIL AVIATION DEPARTMENT.
  RED DEEr GARAGE, CROYDON.
  RED DEEr GARAGE, CROYDON.
  AIR REGULATIONS (ENFORCEMENT).
  AIR REGULATIONS (ENFORCEMENT).
MUNITIONS.
  CHEMISTS' SALARIES.
  CHEMISTS' SALARIES.
INDIA.
  NORTH-WEST FRONTIER (MEDICAL ARRANGEMENTS).
  NORTH-WEST FRONTIER (MEDICAL ARRANGEMENTS).
HOUSING.
  SELECTED TENANTS.
  SELECTED TENANTS.
  CARDIFF SCHEME.
  CARDIFF SCHEME.
  SOUTHAMPTON CORPORATION.
  SOUTHAMPTON CORPORATION.
  UNCERTIFIABLE MENTAL CASES (TREATMENT).
  UNCERTIFIABLE MENTAL CASES (TREATMENT).
  STATE MEDICAL SERVICE.
  STATE MEDICAL SERVICE.
  CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
  CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
  MR. F. L. KEHRHAHN (INTERNMENT).
  MR. F. L. KEHRHAHN (INTERNMENT).
COAL.
  PIT-HEAD PRICES.
  PIT-HEAD PRICES.
  WHOLESALE AND RETAIL PRICES.
  WHOLESALE AND RETAIL PRICES.
RAILWAY ADMINISTRATION.
  POTATOES (FREIGHT CHARGES).
  POTATOES (FREIGHT CHARGES).
  LONG-TEEM CREDIT FACILITIES.
  LONG-TEEM CREDIT FACILITIES.
  GATTIE SCHEME (COMMITTEE).
  GATTIE SCHEME (COMMITTEE).
  IMPORT RESTRICTIONS (WOODEN HANDLES).
  IMPORT RESTRICTIONS (WOODEN HANDLES).
POST OFFICE.
  EUSTON SQUAEE PREMISES.
  EUSTON SQUAEE PREMISES.
  SUB-OFFICES (WAGES).
  SUB-OFFICES (WAGES).
  GLASGOW TELEPHONIST (JOHN NELSON).
  GLASGOW TELEPHONIST (JOHN NELSON).
  TELEPHONE CHARGES.
  TELEPHONE CHARGES.
  TELEGRAPH MESSENGERS.
  TELEGRAPH MESSENGERS.
  MAIL SERVICE, NEW ENGLAND.
  MAIL SERVICE, NEW ENGLAND.
  EX-SERVICE MEN (EMPLOYMENT).
  EX-SERVICE MEN (EMPLOYMENT).
  SHIP REPAIRERS, BRISTOL CHANNEL.
  SHIP REPAIRERS, BRISTOL CHANNEL.
  RAILWAY MATERIALS IN WAR AREA.
  RAILWAY MATERIALS IN WAR AREA.
  RURAL TRANSPORT (SCOTLAND) COMMITTEE.
  RURAL TRANSPORT (SCOTLAND) COMMITTEE.
  RIVER CARRON.
  RIVER CARRON.
  ROYAL COMMISSION ON AGRICULTURE.
  ROYAL COMMISSION ON AGRICULTURE.
  BRITISH PROPAGANDA, CHINA.
  BRITISH PROPAGANDA, CHINA.
Preamble
The House met at three of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
BOURNEMOUTH GAS AND WATER BILL.
Read 3a with the Amendments and passed, and returned to the Commons.
SHEFFIELD CORPORATION BILL.
Read 3a with the Amendment and passed, and returned to the Commons.

MINISTRY OF WAYS AND COMMUNICATIONS BILL.
House again in Committee (according to Order).
Clause 3:
Power to control temporarily railways, etc.
3.—(1) With a view to affording time for the consideration and formulation of the policy to be pursued as to the future position of undertakings to which this section applies, the following provisions shall, unless Parliament otherwise determines, have effect for a period of two years after the passing of this Act, or where as respects any particular provision a longer period is expressly provided, for such longer period:—

(a) Where at the passing of this Act possession has been taken of any railroad undertaking or part thereof in pursuance of section sixteen of the Regulation of the Forces Act, 1871, or otherwise, possession thereof shall be retained without any renewal of the warrant granted by the Secretary of State in pursuance of that section, upon the same terms as to compensation as those heretofore in force, and the Minister may exercise over all such undertakings all such powers as have hitherto been exercised by the Board of Trade under the said Act or with the consent of the owners of the undertakings or otherwise, and such other powers as may be conferred by this section or agreed to by the railway companies concerned:

(b) The Minister may, after giving not less than one month's notice in writing, take possession, in the name or on behalf of His Majesty, of the whole or any part of any other railway undertaking or of any light railway or tramway (other than a tramway or a light railway used as a tramway belonging to a local authority), canal, inland navigation undertaking, and subject
320
as hereinafter mentioned any harbour, dock or pier undertaking, or of any plant belonging thereto or used thereon (exclusive of privately owned railway wagons), and of any barges, tugs, and other craft owned or held by the undertaking of which possession has been taken:

(c) The directors and other persons concerned with the management, and officers and servants of any undertaking of the whole or part of which, or of the plant whereof, possession is retained or taken shall obey the directions of the Minister as to the user thereof, and any directions of the Minister in relation to any undertaking or part or plant thereof of which possession is retained or taken—

(i) as to the rates, fares, tolls, dues, and charges to be charged; subject, however, to the provisions hereinafter contained respecting references to the advisory committee established for advising as to directions on the matters aforesaid;

(ii) as to the salaries, wages, and remuneration and conditions of employment of persons employed on or in connexion with the undertaking;

(iii) as to the working or discontinuance of the working of the undertaking or any part thereof including directions as to keeping open or closing of any stations;

(iv) for securing that the permanent way, rolling stock, plant, appliances, or equipment, whether fixed or moveable, are satisfactory in type and design;

(v) as to the carrying out of alterations, improvements, and additions which the Minister considers necessary for the public safety or for the more efficient and economic working of the undertaking;

(vi) for securing co-operation between undertakings and for securing the common user of facilities, rolling stock and equipment whether fixed or moveable;

(vii) for affording running powers over their system, or any part thereof, to the owners of any other undertaking;

(viii) for securing that manufacturing and repairing facilities and auxiliary and ancillary services shall be used, and the purchase and distribution of stores shall be conducted in such manner as may be most conducive to economy and efficiency:

(d) For enabling any directions given by the Minister under subsection (c) of this section as to alterations, and improvements and additions to be carried into effect the Minister may, by order, authorise the owners of any undertaking to acquire any land (including easements) and to construct any works

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and the order may incorporate the Lands Clauses Acts, subject to such modifications as may be specified in the order, being modifications of those Acts made or authorised to be made by the Development and Road Improvement Funds Acts, 1909, or any other enactment, and may incorporate or apply any of the provisions of any enactment relating to the construction, maintenance, or working of railways, light railways, tramways, canals, harbours, docks, and piers, and any such order shall have effect as if enacted in this Act: Provided that nothing herein contained shall be deemed to empower the Mister to authorise the acquisition, otherwise than by agreement, of any land belonging to the owners of another undertaking to which this section applies, or of it local authority, or of harbour dock or pier undertaking, but the Minister may anthorise the acquisition of an casement or right of using such land for the purposes of any works the construction of which he May authorise under this section:

(e) In the case of any undertaking of which possession is retained or taken by the Minister as aforesaid any rates, fares, tolls, dues and other charges directed by the Minister shall be deemed to be reasonable, and may notwithstanding any agreement or statutory provisions limiting the amount of such charges or increases therein, but without prejudice to claims or complaints in respect of undue preference under the provisions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts, 1854 to 1913, be charged in respect of any undertaking during the period for which the Minister retains possession of such undertaking and for a further period of eighteen months after the expiration of the said period, or until fresh provision shall be made by Parliament with regard to the amount of any such rates, fares, tolls, dues, and other charges, whichever shall first happen.

(2) Subject as aforesaid, any agreement made between the owners of any undertaking, of the whole or part of which possession has been retained or taken under this section, and any other person shall continue in force in like manner as if such possession had not been so retained or taken, unless the Minister considers that such agreement is contrary to the public interest, and in that case he may suspend or modify the operation of such agreement during the period of such possession and for a period not exceeding eighteen months thereafter, and any party to the agreement who suffers loss or injury by reason of such suspension or modification, and any person who, by virtue of arty special statutory provision or agreement, is entitled to the benefit of any special rate, fare, toll, duo, or other charge, and whose position relatively to other persons is prejudiced by any direction of the Minister altering such special charge, shall be entitled to receive such compensation as, in default of agreement, may be determined by the Railway and Canal Commission, regard being had to any change in circumstances.
(3)—(a) For the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Minister with respect to and for safeguarding any interests affected by any directions as to rates, fares, tolls, dues, and other charges or special services, a committee shall be appointed consisting of five persons, one being a person of experience in the law (who shall be chairman) nominated by the Lord Chancellor, two being representatives of the tracing interest nominated by the Board of Trade, one being a representative of transportation interests nominated by the Minister, one being a representative of labour interests nominated by the Minister of Labour, together with, if deemed advisable, one additional member who may at the discretion of the Minister be nominated from time to time by him.
(b) Before directing any revision of arty rater, fares, tolls, dues, or other charges, or of any special services, the Minister shall refer the matter to the committee for their and they shall report thereon to him, and where such revision is for the purpose of an increase in the net revenue of any undertakings which the Minister determines to be necessary, the committee shall also advise as to the best methods of obtaining such increase from the different classes of traffic, having due regard to existing contracts and the fairness and adequacy of the methods proposed to be adopted.
(c) The committee, before reporting or advising on any matters referred to them under this section, shall, unless in their discretion they consider it unnecessary or undesirable to do so, give such public notice as they think best adapted for informing persons affected of the date when and the place where they will inquire into the matter, and any persons affected may make representations to the committee, and apply to be heard at such inquiry, and if the committee in their discretion think fit, the whole or any part of the proceedings at such inquiry may be open to the public:
Provided that, for the purpose of this provision, any city, borough, county, or district council shall be deemed to be persons affected in any case where such council or arty persons represented by them may be affected by any proposed revision as aforesaid.
(d) The committee shall hear such witnesses and call for such documents and accounts as they think fit, and shall have power to take evidence on oath, and for that purpose any member of the committee may administer oaths.
(e) There shall be paid out of moneys provided by Parliament to all or any of the members of the committee such salaries or other remuneration as the Minister, with the consent of the Treasury, may determine.
(f) For the purposes of this section, special services means the services mentioned in section five of the schedule to the orders relating to railway rates and charges, and in the corresponding sections of the schedules to the orders relating to canal tolls, rates and charges confirmed by various Acts passed in the years eighteen hundred and ninety-one to eighteen hundred and ninety-four.
(4) Section twenty of the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) Act, 1916 (which relates to the establishment of new routes for omnibuses), shall continue in force until the expiration of

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two years after the passing of this Act, and shall have effect as if—

(a) the following provision was substituted for subsection (2) of the section (that is to say):—

(2) Except as provided in subsection (4) this section shall not be deemed to detract from any existing powers of highway authorities in regard to omnibuses: and

(b) the following subsection was added to the section (that is to say):—

(4) Where, upon application for a licence to ply for hire with an omnibus, the licensing authority either refuses to grant a licence or grants a licence subject to conditions, in either case the applicant shall have a right of appeal to the Minister of Ways and Communications from the decision of the licensing authority, and the Minister shall have power to make such order thereon as he may think fit, and such order shall be binding upon the licensing authority.

(5) The exercise by the Minister of any of his powers under this section as respects any tramway or light railway used as a tramway which a local authority, or two or more local authorities, have power to purchase under any Act of Parliament or order having the effect of an Act of Parliament shall not affect such right of the local authority, or authorities, and upon the purchase thereof such tramway or light railway shall cease to be in the possession of the Minister.
(6) Nothing in this section shall be deemed to exempt from any rate any undertaking to which this section applies.
EARL BRASSEY EARL BRASSEY moved, in subsection (1) (e), after "Minister" where that word secondly occurs, to insert "if approved by the Committee to be appointed under subsection 3 (a) of Clause 3." The noble Earl said: My reason for putting this Amendment on the Paper is that the clause as it stands appears to give the Minister power to fix the rates and fares as he pleases, and that is another reason why I object to the Bill. Passengers and traders will, in my judgment, receive far more consideration from boards of directors well acquainted with the districts which the companies serve, than from a central authority.
Clause 3, subsection (3) (a), provides for the appointment of a committee for the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Minister with respect to and for safeguarding any interests affected by any directions as to rates, etc. The composition and the method of appointment of the committee will be discussed on Lord Midleton's Amendment to that particular subsection. Subsection (3)(b) provides that before directing any revision of any fares,
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etc., the Minister "shall refer the matter to the committee for their advice." It seems to me quite clear that the establishment of this committee is no check whatever on any decision of the Minister, and does not limit in any way the arbitrary powers conferred upon the Minister by the Bill. There is nothing in this clause which prevents the Minister from entirely ignoring any recommendation of his committee.
The object of my Amendment is to prevent the Minister from fixing rates and fares without the approval of a competent committee, and I think the insertion of these words is absolutely necessary for the protection of the users of railways, whether passengers or traders.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 35, after ("Minister") insert ("if approved by the Committee to be appointed under subsection 3 (a) of Clause 3").—(Earl Brassey.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The effect of this Amendment is to remove from the Minister the responsibility for variation in the rates, and to place that responsibility upon the advisory committee which is set up in the Bill. This, of course, as the noble Earl has pointed out, raises a very large question of principle which will arise more directly when we come later to deal with the composition and powers of the various committees set up in the Bill. It is a little inconvenient now to consider this question before we come to the clause which constitutes the committee, but since the division that we shall take on this Amendment will determine this question of principle, perhaps it will be convenient if I now state to your Lordships the attitude of the Government upon this matter.
There are three committees set up in the Bill to advise the Minister in the exercise of his duty. In every case the committees are advisory committees. The performance of the duties is left in the hands of the Minister. This Amendment would make the committee responsible, but the committee is not answerable to Parliament. It is not appointed by Parliament nor by the Minister, and cannot be removed by Parliament. I submit, therefore, that if responsibility for carrying out the powers which have been entrusted by Parliament to the Minister is placed in the hands of the committee, that will be constitutionally quite inadmissible. There are three com-

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mittees in the Bill. The first is to advise the Minister in the matter of rates, the second to advise him in the matter of roads, and the third to advise him generally before he is to exercise any of his powers under Clause 3 of taking over new undertakings.
In the case of the Rates Committee, which we are discussing at this moment, the procedure would be as follows. The Minister, in carrying out his responsibilities, will decide that it is necessary to get a certain increased revenue from the various transport undertakings, in order by that means to reduce the obligation to pay public moneys in pursuance of the guarantee to die railway companies. Having made up his mind that increased revenue is necessary, he will then go to the. Rates Committee and ask them to advise him how he may get this increased revenue from the railways with the least possible injury to the undertaking affected or to the trade of the country generally. It will be the committee's business to advise the Minister now this money can be obtained with as little injury as possible to the Various interests. The Minister will either accept the report made to him by his committee, or he will vary it at hit, discretion.
The point which I want to make is this—that even if he accept the report of the committee, that will in no way absolve him from responsibility in the matter. He cannot shield himself behind the committee, and say "I have done this because I was advised by my committee to do it." Whatever the committee advise him to do, he will be eventually responsible for the action which he takes; and similarly, if he decides to act, contrary to their advice, he will do so on his own responsibility and will be answerable to Parliament for his action.
If we were to accept the Amendment of the noble Earl we should be in fact giving to the committee power to force the Minister to resign, because if he found himself in this position that he disapproved of the advice given him by the committee, and decided to act in a different sense, he would be unable to do so because the obligation would be put upon him not to act contrary to the wishes of the committee. He would be in a position of being unable to carry out his policy as a Minister of the Crown, and would have no alternative but to resign. That is, I submit, constitutionally impossible. I know that I
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am speaking in an Assembly which contains many learned Lords who are authorities upon the practice and theory of the Constitution, and I speak, therefore, with diffidence, but that is how the matter appears to me. If Parliament gives to any I person powers to act, then that person must be responsible to Parliament and to Parliament alone for the way in which he uses those powers.
There are only two possibilities—either to do what we have done in this Bill, namely, give powers to a Minister who will be responsible for carrying them out, or, if you think the matter is of such importance that you are not prepared to trust a single man, then you must give the responsibility to a corporate body, and that corporate body would have to be responsible in its corporate capacity to Parliament. That is not the position which we should reach if this Amendment were accepted, and I know of no body in the Constitution which, in its corporate capacity, is responsible to Parliament. There is no choice between those two alternatives, unless you are to have a procedure which would cover up responsibility altogether. Either the Minister to whom these powers are entrusted must be responsible for using them, or else they must be entrusted to some other body who in its turn must be responsible. For these reasons the Government cannot accept the Amendment.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I am a little disappointed that the noble Earl did not take this opportunity—the first opportunity that he has had—of making a full statement of the line that the Government intend to take in respect of these advisory committees. He seemed to show in the way that he dealt with it—the perfectly legitimate way—a great want, if I may say so, of appreciation of the terrific proposals which the Government are making in this clause. It is nothing less than this, to place the whole commerce and trading interests of the country at the mercy of this new Ministry. These rates are to be deemed to be reasonable if the Minister says they are reasonable. His ipse dixit is to control the whole fortunes of the trading community of this country.
Let your Lordships contrast for a moment how great is this new departure. What has been the protection which the subject has had up to now? What are

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the protections which in this light-hearted way the Government are proposing to obliterate? First of all there is the Railway and Canal Commission. That no doubt is to some extent maintained in the Bill, but by no means completely. As regards undue preference it is maintained to some extent, but as regards the whole question of the reasonableness of rates the jurisdiction of the Railway and Canal Commission is abolished. That is the first great protection. Of course your Lordships know that there is a much greater protection than that. The real protection of the traders of this country, lies in Parliament itself, because you may not make great changes without the authority of Parliament. If you want to make them you have to go to Parliament in the form of a Private Bill or a Provisional Order, and you have to justify all that is necessary before you are allowed to make time changes. All that is to go. The Government are going to do this for two years—they say only for two years, but we know that it will be continued long after two years. They say in effect: "have such a splendid Minister; he is such a wonderfully great man, that we can trust him with the fortunes of the whole trading community of this country." I have never said in the course of these debates a single word derogatory of time ability of Sir Erie Geddes—he is man of great ability, and of great public spirit—but I do not believe that any man is fit to be trusted with authority of that kind. When they realise it I do not think that the trading community will accept such a revolutionary change in the protection afforded to them.
The noble Earl bad nothing very much to say as to any modifications in their plan which the Government would be prepared to consider. This Amendment refers to the Advisory Committee, and it proposes to give the Advisory Committee real power. At present the Advisory Committee has no real power. I do not want to anticipate the discussion on other Amendments, but merely to point out first of all that the Advisory Committee is not really a representative committee at all, but is a committee of mere nominees of the Government—a committee of the several Departments of the Government acting by nominees. In the second place, the committee has no power. They have power to consider and to advise, but nothing happens if their advice is ignored. Not
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only that, but it is not even known if they have given advice. The whole thing is secret. It is a hole-and-corner affair. The trade of the country is to be decided by a secret committee, deliberating in secret and making representations in secret to the Minister, the import of which is never revealed. If the Minister overrides them they are to be under an obligation, in the terms of the Act of Parliament (if it passes into law) to treat everything that passes as confidential, so that what they have said and what the Minister has refused will never be known. That is the proposal of the Government.
I had hoped that the noble Earl would have said, if he thinks that the Amendment of my noble friend goes too far—possibly it does—" My Lords, we cannot go as far as this, but we recognise that the criticism which has been made on this proposal is well-founded, and we are prepared to make a certain concession." The noble Earl sail nothing of the kind. He merely said, "You cannot allow any infringement of the responsibility of the Ministry." I can only anticipate one line of answer to the criticism which I venture to make, and that is that after all the Minister is responsible to Parliament. That might have been a good answer in old days. I want to speak with due moderation. Does the noble Earl really contend that time responsibility of the House of Commons would in those crowded days, in the present condition of politics, be a real protection to the traders of this country? How can the little relatively small grievances—legiti mate grievances—of traders, even important traders, be brought before Parliament perpetually in the working of this Bill? Everybody knows that that would be quite impossible.
If Parliament had the opportunity of considering the careful advice of a representative committee, there would be a chance then that the grievances might be properly weighed, but they have nothing before them except, of course, the ex parte statement of the trade in question or the trader in question. Everything else will be secret. I submit that to ask your Lordships to pass such a provision as is contained in the whole of this clause without Amendment is a tremendously strong measure, and I invite the noble Earl, if he wishes us to debate this Bill with any approach to coming to a conclusion, to take an early opportunity of telling us

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what concessions the Government are going to make upon this very important proposal.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I have no desire to cover any of the ground which noble Marquess has occupied in the very serious pretest which he has addressed to His Majesty's Government in regard to this proposal for the creation of a Minister who is able, as he said, to bring forward changes affecting the whole trading interests of the country with no safeguard except that which is provided by the compulsion placed upon him to consult a small nominated committee. That is a very serious proposition in itself, when yon think what it means and what the possibilities are. At present rates are fixed according to statutory maxima, framed with the greatest care and attention Parliament after hearing hosts of witnesses directly affected by possible changes, through an Inquiry or series of Inquiries occupying weeks, months and even years of Parliamentary examination. There is nothing, so far as I am aware, to prevent the Minister from abolishing all those maxima and fixing scales of railway rates of his own, after taking the advice which I have mentioned. That is a most gigantic proposal, and it is, as the noble Earl very well knows, exciting public opinion to a degree which no parallel proposal has, so far as I can recollect, produced of recent years.
Take, for instance, the industry of agriculture. Farmers are in a state of profound apprehension as to what the future rates for the carriage of agricultural produce may become under this new régime. They feel that their interests are not likely to be, I will not say fully represented, but to be represented at all under the proposals of the Bill as they stand. As the noble Earl will have observed, some Amendments on the Paper are designed to give a special representation to agriculture when we come to consider the composition of this nominated body. But, as the Bill stands, it, is very difficult to suppose that the two representatives of trading interests nominated by the Board of Trade are likely to prove satisfactory to this particular industry. It is the apprehension of the agricultural community as a whole that their particular interests are likely to be crowded out and ignored in a body of this kind in favour of more powerful interests, partly those of the consumers of produce, partly the interests of more formidable and
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more highly organised bodies of traders, and that they are therefore, to suffer severely.
But there is a further consideration which it is altogether impossible to ignore. You leave the whole settlement of these matters to a Minister who, of course, as a public man, considers, as we are bound to assume, the interests of the public generally, but who is his almost certain to consider the position of the Government to which he belongs; and, like all members of all Governments, he is certain to become the subject of the pressure applied by particular interests. He is likely to be placed in a position of extreme difficulty in this regard. He will find, when some propositions are made for the raising of rates on a particular line in order to supply a sufficient sum of money to meet the possible deficit of transport, that he will be told by the party managers with whom he is concerned, "It is a very dangerous thing to touch this and that interest; yon will finch that the North of England, or the South of England, will not stand this particular interference with their interests." The temptation placed upon him to act, I will not say unfairly, but unequally in such matters will be exceedingly strong.
And, as the noble Earl has told us, the Minister is not permitted to shelter himself behind any advice which he receives. He remains solely responsible, and he may find that if he acts according to what appear to be the obvious dictates of justice and fairness he is inflicting a severe political blow upon the Government of which he will be one of the most prominent and important members. That is a very serious position in which to place any man. I do not myself believe that it is possible to relieve him of that responsibility by turning this Advisory Committee, as the noble Earl who has moved this Amendment proposes, into a responsible Committee. I do not think there is any answer to the arguments which the noble Earl used, that you cannot a body of this kind and make it directly responsible to Parliament unless it is really an official body and part of the Government of the day. I confess I see no answer to that proposition, and therefore I could not support the Amendment proposed by the noble Earl.
But you will have to do, as I venture to think, one of two things. You will either have to remodel your Advisory

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Committee completely by making it thoroughly representative of the different interests involved, by election or selection by the particular interests concerned, of you will have to revert to the practice or obtaining the direct consent of Parliament, though a Committee or otherwise, to the particular charges that are made. That second process, which has been the rule of the past, is, I suppose we shall be told, a long-winded process—that the settlement of railway rates by a Parliamentary Committee is a long affair, and that it is important to proceed with lightning speed; but it is no use proceeding with lightning speed if the result is injustice and discontent. I trust, therefore, that if His Majesty's Government desire the progress of this Bill to be smooth here, they will seriously consider whether there are any further courses beyond those two which I have named, and if not whether they will not at once at any rate proceed upon one of them.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD BIRKENHEAD): I will add only a word because of the speeches that have been made. It is undoubtedly the wish of the Government that this Bill should have a smooth, and, as far as may be, rapid progress through your Lordships' House, and there is hardly anything which they could reasonably be asked to do that would secure that result which they are not willing to do. I cannot think that my noble friend in charge of the Bill would have adopted a course which in the long result would have been thought either to be useful or economical of your Lordships' time, if he had anticipated debates which are inevitable on later Amendments standing upon the Paper. My noble friend will take an early opportunity of indicating the extent to which it is possible willingly to make the change which is suggested by some of your Lordships who have been among the critics of the Bill.
On this Amendment one can only usefully and, indeed, in all orderly manner consider the particular proposal. I confess I think that the final observations of Lord Crewe are quite conclusive when considered together with the careful arguments of the noble Earl in charge of the Bill. Thy proposal contained in this particular Amendment, is one which so far as I know would produce a state of affairs wholly without parallel in any department of our Government if it were adopted by this House. It is true that one can get, up
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and say, as noble Lords have said, "Here is a Minister who in his sole power and discretion is given tins power, that power, and the other power." Suppose that we were making the Constitution of this country for the first time. Suppose we were constituting the offices of the President of the Board of Trade and of the Home Secretary, and were proposing to set them up with the very powers that they exercise to day, and a list of those powers were read out. I can imagine the apparent force and weight with which one critic after another would rise and say, "Are you really going to give the Home Secretary this power and that power?"—and enumerate the terrific powers in the aggregate which that Minister discharges. The same would be at least as true—in this connection, probably, even truer—of the President of the Board of Trade.
Surely some observations may be made on the other side. In the first place it must never be forgotten that the powers given can be exercised only for two years (or whatever the period may be) and for ten years afterwards—the noble Earl (Lord Brassey) laughs, but I think he will find that my statements are quite accurate—and for eighteen months after that period is concluded. That makes a very considerable modification of the sweeping claim for supremacy that has been put forward. But another consideration will, of course, occur to every one's mind. This Minister is not only responsible to Parliament, bat he is also a member of a Cabinet, and he has colleagues.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: He is not a member of the Cabinet.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The noble Marquess says that he is not a member of the Cabinet. I do not think I shall be betraying any secrets when I say that by the time these matters arise for action there will be a Cabinet of which it seems to me unlikely that a Minister so important will not be a member. I shall not have the forming of that Cabinet, and I do not know; at any rate I do not put it any higher than that. Anyhow, there is a Cabinet, which is a considerable check. The noble Marquess (Lord Salisbury) spoke—not indeed in disparagement,—of the degree of control likely to be exercised by the House of Commons, as if in these matters it was almost negligible I cannot believe that this is really true

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In the last six months we have passed through a period which everyone must hope is wholly exceptional. During that period the most influential Ministers have been periodically absent from this country, in circumstances the like of which have never before been experienced. That has been reflected, of course, on the House of Commons to which they belong; but if a really grave matter arose which affected the traders of this country—the language used in this debate has not been on small Amendments but on the risk of grave mischief—surely it is inconceivable that in the case of such a mischief as that the echoes of it, if a Minister were arriving at a wrong and irrational conclusion, would not be able to make themselves heard in the House of Commons. Every form of articulate and formal protest would be made.
I will add only this in conclusion, and I am certain the noble Marquees will think it is a point of some importance. No answer has been made—I am persuaded that no answer has been made because none could be made—to the fairly constitutional objection taken by my noble friend Lord Lytton. This committee is to be elected, partly by myself—I have to nominate the chairman—two by the Board of Trade, and one by the Minister of Labour, and so forth. The proposal contained in this Amendment is actually that a body constituted in that way shall be able to take a decision which overrides the Minister and puts the Minister in the position that he may go to the House of Commons and say, "I disapprove entirely of what has been done; this committee has forced a decision on me in which I do not concur and for which I will not take responsibility." Government cannot be carried on in those ways. It may be that. later Amendments may afford a more plausible and arguable proposal, but I shall be reluctant to believe that your Lordships, in a very thin House, would revise a decision of the House of Commons in favour of proposals for which so far as I know no precedent in our whole system of government, can be found.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: I do not think that the speech of the noble and learned Lord has appreciated the depths of our feeling on this matter. The noble Earl spoke very strongly about the powers that Parliament could exercise, and the noble and learned Lord spoke to some extent about the power of the Cabinet. But
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surely neither of them has reflected what they have taken out of the hands of Parliament and how impossible it would be, in the present situation of the clause, to get the matter again into the hands of Parliament. With regard to that last point, there is no publicity. If the Minister is disagreeing entirely with his committee there is no means by which Parliament becomes seized of it except by the action of individual traders.
On the other hand, look at what the measure is knocking over. The great majority of the railway fares in the past have been laid down by agreements and bargains sanctioned by Statute. The sort of thing which the Minister can tear up the day after the Bill is passed are agreements such as these: The agreements made in 1865–1866, still on the Statute Book, for the fares to be charged between Edinburgh and Glasgow; the agreements fixed in 1859 for the train service between London, Portsmouth, and Southampton; the ½d. a mile fares on the London, Tilbury, & Southend Railway; the Great Southern & Western purchase of 1899. All these have been defined by Statute; yet by a few words in this clause you tear up the whole thing and allow the Minister to fix what fares he pleases and do what he thinks right, subject to advice from a committee, which advice is never to be made public and which the Minister keeps in his own desk. It is asking too much.
Look at the way the Government, have treated Parliamentary Inquiries in the present session. We found what we believed to be a very bad case on the part of the Minister of Supplies. It was condemned by a Joint Committee, but although it was condemned the Minister in charge merely observed that the Government could go on with it as they did before. Supposing, for the sake of argument, some trader manages to get the rates before Parliament and Parliament condemns them, the Minister would have power to go on as before. The noble Earl rebuked me the other night, because he said I had read into the Bill things which were not there. I assure him that if he had seen my letter-bag since he made that statement he would feel that I was thoroughly justified.
I said that it was in the power of the Minister to divert traffic from one port to another. The noble Earl said there was nothing of the kind in the Bill. No, not

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in terms, of course; but take the case of wool. The Minister himself, though the noble Earl had forgotten it at the moment, admitted that the control by the Government of the rates on the railways had had the effect of killing 70,000,000 tons of coastwise traffic. Wool which went coast-wise so long as it paid was crushed by the Government subsidising rates at a price at which they do not pay. Very well, the Minister has only to continue that system, or, if he chooses to do the reverse, raise the rates for wool from London to Yorkshire, to force the delivery of wool into the port of Hull or any other port he desires. I submit that the powers given by this Bill are too large to be placed in the hands of any one man.
Several NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: They tend not to democratic control but to autocratic and bureaucratic control. So long as this House does its duty, it is, I think, bound to see that in the desire to co-ordinate all these functions we do not put the matter beyond the reach of Parliament. I really think—although perhaps my noble friend has gone a little too far—if you give the thing into the hands of a Minister the utmost we can do is to give him a committee which is independent of the Government, which he has not got at present, and to give publicity to the points on which he differs from that committee. At present there is no publicity at all. If in giving up those two safeguards we give him a committee which he can disregard at will and leave it to private subsequent action of individual traders or committees of traders in Parliament, I say you at once camouflage the committee and say that the Minister is autocratic and intends in future to fix all rates throughout the United Kingdom. For that reason, although I cannot support Lord Brassey's Amendment in its present condition, I hope the Government will consider that it is absolutely necessary that the checks we have indicated should be accepted.
EARL BRASSEY: After what has been said by the noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, and by the noble Viscount who has just spoken, I will not press this Amendment to a Division. I would like, however, to observe in reference to what has been said by the noble and learned Lord opposite as well as by the noble and learned Lord in
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charge of the Bill, that their arguments seem to be in favour of the appointment of a, Parliamentary Committee to check the decisions of the Minister, and so put the matter right on constitutional lines.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: Do you mean Members of Parliament?
EARL BRASSEY: Yes. I am not experienced in constitutional law, but that seems to me to be the direction in which the argument of the noble and learned Lord and of the noble Earl in charge of the Bill tended. I should like to say again what has already been said by my noble friend Lord Salisbury, that I sincerely hope that those in charge of the Bill will appreciate the strong feeling which many of us hold as regards this Bill putting too arbitrary powers into the hands of a single individual. I happen to have served for a time as the representative of Sir Eric Geddes. No one has a higher opinion of his ability than I have. I think he will be of immense service as adviser with a small staff in co-ordinating the various transport services of the country; but to put him at the head of a big Ministry with the arbitrary powers proposed under the Bill would, I think, be a very great mistake, and would be fatal to the trade of this country.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (1)(e), after "reasonable," to insert "subject to the power of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission." The noble Lord said: This raises to a large extend the point we were discussing on the last, Amendment, and I venture to think that the noble Earl in charge of the Bill will consider that it renders it perhaps in a more reasonable way. I suggest, that after the word "reasonable" should be inserted "subject to the power of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission." Perhaps this would be a convenient opportunity for the noble Earl to tell the House exactly the powers which he says should be given to the Railway and Canal Commission and what would be their functions under this Bill.
This Amendment of mine is again raised on page 6, line 6, where I propose a new paragraph. The whole point is, Is the Minister to have undisputed power to raise rates without any check at all upon him, or is he not? That is the important

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point. Although I admit fully the Ministerial responsibility, I think there ought to be something to protect the trader and the great trading communities throughout the country, such as agriculture, from injustice which might mean their ruin. This subject received a great deal of attention in the House of Commons, and in several eases, although Divisions ware not taken, it was obvious that it had a great deal of support.
I take this opportunity of answering the noble Earl as to what he said the other day in regard to something I said in my Second Reading speech about London, Southampton, and Bristol, which I took as an illustration. I did not interrupt the noble Earl when he contradicted assertions I made then, because it was not convenient in the debate. He will perhaps excuse me if I answer him to-day. I understand that the Minister can by preferential rates divert traffic from one port to any other port. The illustration I used was therefore a perfectly correct one. The Minister can make rates low or high according to his will, and though he cannot, as the noble Earl said, divert shipping, I never suggested he would divert the actual shipping; I said he could divert trade. I have not the words by me, but that was what was in my mind and is what I still maintain he can do. That is, I think, a very serious power to give uncontrolled to the Minister.
I think it would be quite harmless if the Government saw their way to accept, after the word "reasonable," the words "subject to the power of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission." That would at least give the trailer some security and some power of appeal. Then, of course, comes the clause later on, which I will not discuss at the moment. I hope the noble Earl will make a statement as to the position of the Railway and Canal Commission and of the trader under this Bill. It might help to elucidate the point.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 35, after ("reasonable") insert ("subject to the power of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I was in a little difficulty in replying to the last Amendment, because, as I pointed out to your Lordships, it was impossible to range over the whole field and deal with the composition of the various committees with
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which we shall have to deal presently. I must plead that as my excuse if I was unable to give the noble Marquess the assurance which he thought I should have given on that occasion. I hope even now to keep strictly to the terms of this Amendment; but still I should like to say, in view of what was said on the last Amendment with regard to these Committees in the Bill, that the position of the Government is this. They have been inserted in the Bill as Advisory Committees and, provided are obtained as Advisory Committees, we are perfectly prepared to discuss with your Lordships any proposal for making them more representative of the interests which they are intended to represent. What we are not prepared to discuss is the question of turning an Advisory Committee into an Executive Committee. That, I hold, would have been the effect of the last Amendment and I was obliged therefore to oppose it as strongly as I could. When we come to deal with the composition of the Committees I am perfectly prepared to discuss with your Lordships any Amendment that may make them mare representative of the various interests that we desire to sac represented.
The noble Lord who moved the Amendment said it was more reasonable than the last. I think your Lordships will see, when I point out what the effect will be, that, whether it be more reasonable or not, it is far more destructive than the last. It would, in fact, make it impossible for any rates whatever to be raised during the next two years. I am sure that is not the intention of the noble Lord, but that would be the effect, and I will endeavour to show your Lordships why. If the power of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission is retained in the Bill by this Amendment it will leave us in exactly the position we are in to-day. I painted out to your Lordships on the Second Raiding that the railway companies, although they imposed a 4 per cent. increase of rates in 1913, have not to-day, in 1919, obtained the full benefit of that increase. Such are the delays inherent in appeals to the Railway and Canal Commission that after five years an increase of 4 per cent., imposed in 1913, is not yet operative.
That is the position in which we should be again placed if the Amendment were carried. There are on the books of the railway companies to-day something like 30,000,000 to 40,000,000 rates, and if you

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are going to give an appeal—I will not say "give" because it is true that traders have it to-day—if you are going to retain, as you will by this Amendment, the right of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission on all these rates, it would be perfectly impossible for any rates to become operative during the next two years. However much we may differ about the advantages or the disadvantages of the various clauses in the Bill, one thing upon which all speakers appear to be unanimous is that there must be an increase of rates during the next two years. The Government have even been criticised because they did not use their powers under the Defence of the Realm Act to put up the railway rates during the war, without an appeal to anybody and without an Advisory Committee. We have been told that this killed the coastwise trade. Let me point out to the noble Viscount, Lord Midleton, that, so far from forgetting that fact, I mentioned it in my Second Reading speech as an illustration of the necessity for putting up rates in the immediate future. I did not forget it at all. It was one of the chief points of my argument.
If the appeal to the Railway Commission is retained, there can be no increase Operative during the next two years. It is precisely to meet that situation that we propose, for the next two years, to substitute the Minister for the Railway and Canal Commission. I admit perfectly frankly to the noble Marquess that that is a very strong order. At least, it would be a very strong order if we were proposing to do it permanently, but perhaps your Lordships are hardly aware of the fact that this power is taken for two years, and two years only. At the end of that time all the rates so raised will automatically revert. The noble Marquess shakes his head. Unless Parliament in the meantime otherwise determines they will automatically revert to the present rate, always subject to the fact that a period of eighteen months is given, after the two years, to enable the railway companies to come to Parliament and obtain statutory powers to charge the rates which will have been charged in the meantime. Unless Parliament otherwise decides in the next two years, or unless powers from Parliament are obtained by the railway companies during the eighteen months, all the rates which have been increased during the two years by the action of the Minister will automatically revert. I agree that the action proposed is auto-
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cratic, but it is an autocratic action rendered necessary by the emergency in which we are placed. I do not think that either in this House, or in the House of Commons, anybody has disputed the necessity for action of this kind. I say it is modified by the fact that the powers are temporary, but it is true that even in two years you can do a great deal of injury by unwise action, and it is necessary during that time that some safeguard should be retained against the action of the Minister in regard to rates.
I would ask your Lordships to consider what the safeguards are. First of all there is the Committee which we have already discussed. The Committee will advise the Minister as to how he is to get his money with the least possible injury either to particular traders or to the trade of the country generally. But it is quite possible that, inadvertently, the Minister and the Committee who advise him may so arrange the rates as to create a prejudice or an injury as between one trader and another. Obviously that is not a matter you can bring to Parliament. It is not appropriate that a subject of that sort should be brought to Parliament to consider or decide upon. Therefore, we have retained in the Bill the right of traders on questions of undue preference to go to the Railway and Canal Commission and state their case. That power with regard to undue preference is retained in the Bill to-day. As I am on this point let me deal with the question to which Lord Montagu has referred. He suggests that the Minister may so arrange his rates that he will transfer trade from Southampton to Liverpool. This was the instance he quoted.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I never mentioned Liverpool.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Yes; Southampton and Liverpool were the two places the noble Lord quoted. If the noble Lord will allow me I will refer him to the matter.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I meant London, but it is not material to the argument.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is material. Is it conceivable that a Minister, whom the noble Lord calls a "Railway Minister," who, by virtue of having in his possession the London and South-Western Railway,

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will own the port of Southampton, will so manœuvre his rates as to force the trade of Southampton to Liverpool with which he would have noting whatever to do? That is the sort of argument the noble Lord employs as to the way in which the Minister will use his power.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: You may put it just the other way and the noble Earls' argument would break down.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Indeed, no. I am saying that, in order to prove the Minister unreasonable in the way he will use his power, the noble Lord suggests that by the operation of rates he will divert traffic from Southampton to Liverpool. I say the suggestion is altogether fantastic. So far as undue preference is concerned the rights of the trader to go to the Railway and Canal Commission are retained; and let me say here that when we come to the Amendment of the noble Lord further down [to add a new paragraph at the end of subsection (1)] I propose, with the exception of the reference to "reasonable facilities," with which I will deal when I come to the Amendment, to accept it.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The new paragraph beginning "Notwithstanding"?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Yes. I do not propose to enter into the argument now, but that retains the rights of the traders to go to the Railway and Canal Commission. On matters which obviously cannot be brought before Parliament I feel that it is perfectly right and reasonable.
There is another safeguard retained in the Bill, of which perhaps your Lordships are not aware. Under Section 31 of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1888, a trader who has a grievance against increased railway rates on the ground that the increase will ruin trade generally, not that it will give an undue preference to one trader against another, has a right to go to the Board of Trade and represent his case to that Department, who will then act at conciliator in the matter. That right is not interfered with in this Bill. The only difference will be that the Board of Trade will negotiate with another Government Department and not with the railway company. The right of the trader to represent that trade generally is injured will be retained.
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Lastly, there will be a reference of the matter to Parliament if it is a case which cannot be dealt with as a matter of undue preference but is held to be seriously injurious to trade generally. Every constituency has its Member of Parliament; the matter can be brought to the notice of the Member, raised in the newspapers, and all the ordinary measures utilised of bringing forward the grievance of any constituency. That is the position in which we stand to-day, and if your Lordships will consider the enormously increased cost of running the railways (due to the increased cost of labour, and to the fact that the Government have guaranteed to the railways their net revenue for 1913) and the consequent necessity for raising the rates in order to transfer the burden to a large extent from the shoulders of the taxpayer, together with the necessity for doing it without delay, I hope you will see that, although the powers which we ask for in this Bill may be autocratic, the necessity for asking for them is justified, and you will not accept an Amendment which would render these powers nugatory.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I just reply to the noble Earl on the question as to the power of the Minister to transfer traffic. I had the case most carefully worked out by an expert, and this is what he said—
"Lord Lytton has stated that it is absolutely untrue to say that the Minister would be able to divert traffic from one port, e.g. Southampton, to another, e.g. Cardiff, but unless the rights of the traders of the dock companies to appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission in respect of undue disadvantage are preserved the Minister will, by so fixing railway rates for the docks, be able to attract what traffic he pleases to any docks he pleases. The following instance might easily be quoted. Bristol docks at present obtain a very large share of the banana traffic from the West Indies. The Minister might wish to transfer this traffic to Southampton. What does he do? He just places a prohibitive rate on banana traffic from Bristol to all ports of the country, and at the same time reduces the rates from Southampton in the same proportion. It will necessarily follow that the shipping company will be compelled to transfer its service from Bristol to Southampton."
If I mentioned Liverpool in my speech I do not think it makes any material difference. I hold that the Minister can, by his own ipse dixit, transfer trade from one port to another.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: May I point out to the noble Lord that in his speech on the Second Reading he said "Suppose it is

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said that ships bringing a certain commodity shall not go in future to Southampton but to Liverpool," it implied that it was in the power of the Minister to say that ships should go from one port to another. I said that no such power was given. He suggests that it is possible, by manipulating rates, to bring that transfer about, although admits that the Minister has no power to direct that any such thing should be done. It is, of course, possible for railway rates to be raised by one railway company and diminished by another. Obviously trade would be affected, but there would be no appeal. No trader would have any right of appeal. On the other hand, supposing the rates upon the same railway were differentiated as between one trader and another, there would be a right of appeal on the question of undue preference. That is retained in the Bill to-day. The reason why these things are not done is not because they are impossible but because they would be bad business.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Let me thank the noble Earl for the extremely conciliatory character of his reply, but he must see the weakness of an argument which depends for its cogency on the fact that my noble friend selected Southampton and Liverpool, instead of Liverpool and Southampton.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It shows how little he thought the matter out.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I cannot believe that the noble Earl thinks that an important contribution to the debate. I think it is not worthy of him. It is a very trivial matter. The point is, that it is possible for the Minister (as the noble Earl admitted), unless some remedy is provided, to give preferential treatment to one road over another or to one port over another port. The noble Earl says it is not likely this will be done because it is bud business. We have to treat this point with great delicacy, and all the more so because the present advisers of His Majesty are men of high honour and reputation, including, of course, the Minister-designate. But in this matter you are legislating not in respect of particular individuals who may hold office for the moment. If we glance, as we are entitled to glance, at the experience of other countries we find that. Ministers there do use their Ministerial power in order to give
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preference to one locality over another. That is quite clear.
The noble Earl says it is bad business. Is he sure that the Minister will always be looking out for good business? It depends on what he means by "business." If he means the proper commercial industrial prosperity of the country, he may be quite right. But there are other kinds of "business." We have to treat this matter with great delicacy because it might be said we were bringing some obscure charge against the present Minister-designate. It is nothing of the kind. It may be perfectly possible for a future Minister to prefer a constituency in which one political Party was in the ascendant, or a port in which another political Party was in the ascendant. It would be possible, and it would be the kind of "business" he may be looking for. I think that is so, and I do not think it is necessary for me to dwell upon it.
I know the noble Earl would say that these provisions are only for two years. He said so just now Does anybody believe that they are to last for only two years? I think it is perfectly obvious that they will last for more than two years, and that at the end of that time there will have to be some provision made in Parliament for prolonging the Bill. You cannot have a revolution such as the noble Earl is now passing through Parliament lasting for two years. It is perfectly absurd. Of course it will go on. I am quite sure the noble Earl spoke what he believed to be true, but there is no such self-deception on the part of the Minister as to believe that legislation of this kind, though temporary in actual terms, is likely to be of a temporary character.
If your Lordships legislate on the assumption that it is only going to last for two years, I am certain you are preparing for yourselves a great disappointment. You must look at this as a measure which is likely, in some form or other, to be of a permanent character. I have no doubt about it whatever, and therefore we have to think, not of the present Ministers and Minister-designate; but of the possibility which such a power in a Minister holds out for the future. But, my Lords, I do wish to recognise, as I said at the beginning, the conciliatory character of my noble friend's speech. He has, as I think very wisely, said that he is perfectly prepared to accept with a certain modification

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the further Amendment standing in my noble friend's name, and no doubt my noble friend will consider himself very fortunate in having secured the support of the Government in that respect, and will probably not wish to press his present Amendment. I hope when we reach the second Amendment that we shall be able charge satisfy my noble friend in chare of the Bill that even the words to which he takes exception should be inserted.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: After what has been said by the noble Earl opposite, I do not wish to press this Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (1) (e), to leave out "but without prejudice to claims or complaints in respect of undue preference under the provisions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts, 1854 to 1913." The noble Lord said: This Amendment is necessary in order to prepare the way for the Amendment which follows.
Amendment smoved—
Page 5, line 38, leave out ("therein") to ("be") in line 41.—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, at the end of subsection (1), to insert the following new paragraph:
"(f) Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act the rights of a consignor or consignee of goods or minerals, any trailer or class of traders, or any port or harbour authority or dock company to complain to the Railway and Canal Commission under the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts in respect of the provision of reasonable facilities undue preference or undue disadvantage or allowances or rebates in relation to the provision of station accommodation or terminal services shall not be deemed to be affected, and it shall be no answer to any, such complaint that the railway company in respect of which the complaint is made was acting under the directions of the Minister."
The noble Lord said: I do not think I need labour this Amendment, because I think it explains itself. An Amendment to this effect received a good deal of support in the House of Commons. It is supported by all traders. Its object is to secure the three great advantages which every trader
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values—namely, the provision of reasonable facilities, an appeal against undue preference and against undue disadvantage, and allowances or rebates in relation to the provision of station accommodation or terminal services it is a long and complicate, question to argue, which I will not detain the House by doing, but there is a good deal of difference between undue preference and undue disadvantage, the latter applying chiefly to docks. As the noble Earl in charge of the Bill has accepted this Amendment, and I desire to facilitate business, I will content myself by formally moving this new paragraph (f)
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 6, at end insert the said new paragraph (f).—-(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I need not detain your Lord hips, except to explain one point on which I am unable to meet my noble friend, and that is with regard to the words "the provision of reasonable facilities." If your Lordships will turn to Clause 3, subsection (1) (c) (iii), you will see that we have already passed that part of the clause which gives the Minister power to issue directions, which includes the power of closing any station. If these words "reasonable facilties" were put in they would nullify that power, because it might be necessary where a piece of line was practically die-used, or a station out of use, for the Minister to issue directions under subsection (1) (c) (iii), and the words "reasonable facilities" might be used in order to prevent him front exercising that power. If the noble Lord is willing to leave out those words I am prepared to accept the Amendment.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I think that before the Report stage my noble friend will have to consider this point, because there are certain things which might be done which would unfairly prejudice the trader, and which are not comprised in the words "undue preference." For instance, a railway company under the directions of the Minister might refuse to carry a certain class of goods, or only carry them at a very inconvenient time, or matters of that kind. These are, I believe, well known difficulties, and matters upon which at present there is a proper appeal. I think my noble friend will have to think of these matters before the Report Stage. It is true that he is in some difficulty with

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regard to the previous words to which the noble Earl has referred, but it will be for him to reconcile the two and I think he will before the Report Stage see that some such words are necessary in order to cover the cases which I have mentioned.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: In addition to special traders like those in china clay, which I have been asked to mention, there are also the cases of small stations which are immensely valuable to small communities but which are not paying; but the duty of maintaining which is put upon the railways by Parliament. It is very important for those scattered communities that they should have these railway facilities. If those small stations or branch lines were shut up a great deal of real hardship and grievance would arise, and I hope that on the Report sage the Government will see their way to give us some phrase like "reasonable facilities" which will be in accordance with the previous subsection. If he did I am sure it would ease the mind of a great many of us, who are afraid that under the autocratic powers of this Bill the Minister will be able to shut up branch lines and small stations without any power of appeal.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: We have already given power to the Minister to close a station or branch line which is found to be unnecessary or unprofitable to work, but I will, between now and the Report stage, certainly consider the matter which has been raised, in order to see whether words can be put in. At the same time I do not make any promise.
LORD EMMOTT: Is it not a fact that the directions given by the Minister would have to be carried out during the time when the appeal was being made, whether on undue preference or undue disadvantage, or even on a point of the provision of reasonable facilities. If that is the case I do not quite see why these words "the provision of reasonable facilities" should be omitted from the proposed new paragraph.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I will move the now paragraph in the form in which the Government are willing to accept it. On the Report stage we might have a discussion on the previous subsection, or I might move to re-insert the words "the provision of reasonable facili-
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ties" in order to learn the Government's intentions.
On Question, the said new paragraph, amended by the omission of the words "the provision of reasonable facilities," agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON THE EARL OF LYTTON rose to move to leave out subsection (3). The noble Earl said: I am proposing to leave out this subsection for the purpose of inserting it after Clause 19. As the Clause is at present printed, this clause is very long and complicated, with a great many subsections, and I think it would be more convenient to put all the sections relating to Committees together.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: If the noble Earl moves this Amendment now it will rule out the Amendment standing in the name of Lord Midleton on which an important discussion is anticipated. But if my noble friend the Minister in charge were to postpone this till the Report stage there would be no difficulty.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am, of course, in the hands of the House. I only move it in order to make the Bill read better. Of course, the Amendments of the noble Viscount and others to this clause will go on. When we come to the clause later on I can move to re-insert it. It does not get rid of any of the Amendments.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: There is this to be said about that course. We have been engaged on this very subject for nearly an hour, and it would involve beginning all over again the whole subject at a later stage, possibly at a late hour of the night, and I suggest that it would be much more convenient to take the discussion now.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Then I will not move my Amendment now.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON VISCOUNT MIDLETON moved, in subsection (3) (a), to omit all words after "a committee shall be appointed consisting of" to the end of paragraph (a) and to insert "six persons, one being an impartial person (who shall be chairman) nominated by the Railway and Canal Commission, two being representatives of trading interests nominated by the Chairman for the time being of the Associated Chambers of Commerce, one being a representative of agricultural interests nominated by the

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Chairman for the time being of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, and two being representatives of labour interests nominated by the Chairman for the time being of the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress."
The noble Viscount said: The reason for the change in the committee that we suggest has been already explained to the House at full length, but I confess, when I compare the committee as proposed by the noble Earl on page 15 of the Amendments with the Amendment which I have ventured to put down, I cannot but feel that if there is to be anything real in the committee at all the Government ought to give serious consideration to the Amendment which we propose. Take first Government Amendment. The noble Earl proposes to have a gentleman learned in the law appointed by the Lord Chancellor. That might be very desirable if they were going to settle questions, but they are going to hold an Inquiry if they chose, and the Minister is in no way bound by their decision. Therefore a judicial body is surely out of place, for it has not to decide but merely to make a recommendation. Then it is proposed that two representatives of the trading interests should be nominated by the Board of Trade. Why should they not be independent persons? Why should they not be nominated by those whose interests they have to consider? Again the representation of the transport interests is to be nominated by the Minister. That seems to be doubly faulty, for it means a representative of the railways who is not to be nominated by the railways but is to be the nominee of the Minister, and Is to represent, as I understand, his interests on the Committee instead of those interests which we want represented—the independent interests of the railways. Furthermore, the representation of labour interests is to be nominated by the Minister of Labour. In every case care is taken that the Government shall have the whole control of the Committee.
All these things really conflict with the words which the Government have put into the Act. Those who advise the Minister are to be purely advisory, and they are to be selected in such a way that they shall not be independent but shall be dependent on the Government Departments who select them. I submit to the Government that this course of action
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goes to the root of all the professions that they have made about the Bill. I am sorry to say that the noble Earl, who conducts the Bill so admirably, says in every speech something which shows quite clearly that he views the whole matter from a different point of view to that of Sir Eric Geddes, the Minister-elect. Sir Eric Geddes professes intentions exactly opposite to those which the noble Earl explained a few moments ago. The noble Earl poured scorn on the idea of diverting traffic from Southampton to Liverpool. Sir Eric Geddes, however, spoke some very eloquent passages on his determination to stop "the long haul." Yet that is precisely what the noble Earl says he is not to do.
Having regard to the fact that Mr. Bonar Law has declared that the desire of the Government is that they should have a Minister who should be advisory rather than an autocrat—which we are now finding out they intend him to be—I think they ought to meet us at any rate a quarter of the way, and allow the committee which advises the Minister to be independently nominated, and to give them access to publicity—the only means by which they can get access to the authority of Parliament. For that reason I propose that the Committee should be nominated as follows. The Chairman should be nominated by the Railway and Canal Commission, the two representatives of the trading interests by the Chairman of the Associated Chambers of Commerce, the agricultural representative by the Chairman for the time being of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, and the two representatives of labour interests by the Chairman for the time being of the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress. All these are well known bodies, and each will have to a large degree the confidence of the interests which they represent. I desire if we can to avoid controversy at every stage of this Bill. The noble Earl in the speech he made on Second Reading, and again on going into committee, warned us that drastic alterations of the Bill would cause a serious collision with the House of Commons. If he meant by that that every justifiable Amendment which would bring this Bill into harmony with the professions of the Ministers who introduced it is to be ruled out, then he will have dealt a very severe blow at the interests and at the proper functions of this House.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 29, leave out from the first ("of") to the end of line 37, and insert ("six persons, one being an impartial person (who shall be chairman) nominated by the Railway and Canal Commission, two being representatives of trading interests nominated by the Chairman for the time being of the Associated Chambers of Commerce, one being a representative of agricultural interest nominated by the Chairman for the time being of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, and two being representatives of labour interests nominated by the Chairman for the time being of the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress")—(Viscount Midleton).
LORD WITTENHAM: I venture to hope that the noble Earl may see his way to accept this Amendment. The iron hand is manifest all through the Bill. I have voted so far with the Government because I feel that during the next two years at any rate they must have big powers in order to co-ordinate this business, but if the noble Earl refuses this quite moderate Amendment it will look as if from beginning to end we are going to be bound and not free. This Amendment after all is only for the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Minister. The iron hand is still retained. You are changing the personnel of the Committee no doubt, but the iron Minister can still say:" However expert you may be, however independent you may be, I will have none of you." Really it is only an act only of grace and of courtesy, and does not change the fundamental position of the Bill. I hope very much that the noble Earl may find himself able to accept this Amendment. It will at any rate show to the public outside that there is a manifest desire, wherever possible and without affecting the structure of the Bill, to give way, and also a genuine desire to meet the opponents who are only trying to do their best for the good of the country. There are two sides to the matter here as in all human affairs. I will not assume for a moment that any noble Lord opposite is doing this merely to press the Government unduly, but surely they have a right to their point of view, and a right, at any rate up to the point of this Amendment, of asking the Government to accept it.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: If I ask your Lordships to examine this Amendment of the noble Viscount in a critical spirit I hope my motives will not be misunderstood. I fully recognise that there is nothing obstructive in this Amendment, that it is intended to be helpful. I approach it
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entirely in that spirit. If I ask your Lordships to consider my objections to it, they are objections not of principle but of a practical nature. I think there is no difference of opinion between the noble Viscount and myself. He desires to have the best possible committee and we desire to have a committee which will be most representative of the interests concerned. That is common ground. The only question is, which of the two proposals will best achieve that object, and I approach the Amendment solely from that point of view.
I take the first question, the question of the chairman. The noble Viscount thinks that it is unnecessary that a lawyer should be chairman. We attach considerable importance to having a high legal authority as chairman of the committee for this reason, that the question of arranging these rates necessitates an intimate knowledge of complicated railway law. A great number of legal questions are involved in them, and we think it is very important therefore that a high legal authority, a Judge if possible, should be chairman of the committee in order to able to understand these legal technicalities which must arise.
Then there is one fatal objection to the noble Viscount's committee from our point of view. It is that he leaves out altogether any representation of transportation interests. We have provided one representative to be nominated by the Minister. That is an interest which surely deserves to be represented on this Committee, and I could not accept a Committee which ignored that representation altogether. Then upon the other points we are agreed: there must be representation of trading interests and representation of labour.
With regard to agriculture let me say this, that we always intended to include agriculture in the trading interests, but I have no objection to meeting Amendments which are proposed further on by Lord Bledisloe in either one of two ways—either by saying that one of these representatives shall be a representative of agriculture appointed by the Board of Agriculture, or adopting Lord Montagu's words and saying there shall be two representatives appointed by the Board of Trade "in consultation with the principal trade and agricultural associations." In any case I am quite prepared in one of these two ways to provide direct agricultural representation.

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I come, therefore, to the question of who shall be the nominated bodies. The Government have not inserted the various Government Departments in order to ensure that the Government as a whole may nominate the committee. We have done so because we feel that these are the best bodies to speak for these industries and interests as a whole. I mention that to show that I do not attach importance to the fact of its being a Government Department. With regard to the chairman there is this difficulty about the Railway and Canal Commission. There are, in fact, three Commissions for the three parts of the United Kingdom, and, as only one nominee is to be appointed, I am not quite sure which of these three Commissions you could go to to get the Chairman appointed. For that reason and for the reason that we attach great importance to having a lawyer we prefer the nomination by the Lord Chancellor.
With regard to the Associated Chambers of Commerce and the Central Chamber of Agriculture, apart from the fact that the Associated Chambers of Commerce cannot, I think, by any one be claimed to speak for the trading interests of the country as a whole—there are a great many trading interests in the country which are not represented at all by the Associated Chambers of Commerce—there is this further objection to both those bodies, that they are neither of them statutory bodies. They may at any moment disappear and be wound up and replaced by some other body; and if you are going to give in an Act of Parliament nomination of members to a committee I think you should choose some body upon whose existence and character you can permanently count.
Lastly, when you come to the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress I repudiate altogether the suggestion that that body can speak for the labour world as a whole. That body represents only trade union Labour to begin with, and what we want represented on this committee is Labour consumers. Then I would point out that when the composition of this committee was under discussion in the House of Commons the Labour members there fully accepted the proposal that the Labour representative should be appointed by the Minister of Labour, and I think we are entitled to claim that the Labour members are well qualified to say who shall be the
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person who will best represent their interests.
My objections, therefore, are objections in detail of a practical nature to the particular form of representation which the noble Viscount proposes. There is one further objection which I ought to mention, and that is this, that we attach great importance to what I will call the floating member. As your Lordships will see, the Bill provides for a permanent committee of five, and then an additional member, whom I call the floating member, who may at the discretion of the Minister be nominated from time to time by him. The necessity for this sixth additional member is this. These inquiries will vary greatly in different parts of the country, and they will vary as to the character of the rates into which the committee will inquire, and it is very important therefore, that there shall be some provision for putting on an ad hoc member who will be expert in the particular character of rates into which the committee will inquire. If they are inquiring into a dock rate you should have an expert in docks. It may be a rate which will affect passenger traffic, and you will require an expert who can speak from that point of view. Or it may be into a particular kind of rates dealing with iron, or steel, or other commodities, and you will want a mar who will give particularly valuable advice upon that matter. And therefore that is a matter which, I hope, whatever your Lordships do with the rest of the committee, you will not strike out of the clause. We should not be willing to part with the provision that there should be one additional member who can be nominated to deal with specific cases which will vary from time to time.
I hope I made it clear in what I said just now that I regard this matter merely as a question of what is really the best form of representation you can have. I am obliged to state our justification for our clause, and I naturally prefer the clause in the Bill to the clause of the noble Viscount for the reason which I have explained. But as I stated just now, I am perfectly prepared to discuss any proposals which may be put forward as regards representation on any of these committees, and my opposition is therefore confined to the reasons that I have expressed. But there are certain features of our committee which I must in any case press to retain. The first is that the chairman should be a lawyer,

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the second is that transportation should find some representation, and the third is that the floating member should be retained. I hope, therefore, that whatever else your Lordships do you will not accept an Amendment which would not make provision fur those points.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: We shall all feel that the noble Earl has desired to meet, so far as is possible my noble friend and those who agree with him. He has made two or three distinct reservations, however, in the qualified acceptance which he appeared to be willing to give, if necessary, to my noble friend's proposal. He did not make it quite clear to myself—I do not know whether he did to the House—how the particular representative of transportation interests nominated by the Minister serves the purpose of giving advice. One assumes that the Minister himself is that person in the extremest degree. He is advised by the Permanent Officials who will all be experts in transport, largely and mainly no doubt in railway transport—as I should have supposed absolutely competent to state the case and decide upon it from the point of view of transportation without the addition of this advisory person, and the noble Earl did not develop the reasons to which he appeared to attach great importance for the rather unexpected appearance of this gentleman in the small body for which the clause provides.
The proposal to include a direct representative of agriculture will no doubt be welcomed by that industry. But I cannot help feeling that the noble Earl has somewhat missed the point of my noble friend's Amendment, in this sense, that he has simply regarded the appointment of this Committee as a matter of efficiency, that thoroughly competent people can be, and we shall all hope will be, nominated, and, therefore, what more do you want? The noble Earl seemed to forget that the one thing you want is to inspire public confidence in this body, and you will not inspire it in the same degree by nominating a body however skilfully composed and however admirable the individuals who serve on it may be. I do not hesitate to say that it will be worth while to get a series of less positively efficient men in one sense if thereby you could gain enhanced confidence in their representative character felt by the communities for whom they would be entitled to speak. Since there is no question of giving any executive power
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to this body, I ask His Majesty's Government to consider whether it is not worth their while, by adopting the system of representation, to gain that confidence of which I have been speaking. I confess that it does not appear to me to be a paramount consideration that those bodies, who by my noble friend's Amendment would be the nominating bodies, should be of a permanent character because they have a Statutory existence. The nominating bodies that he has named are, as I think your Lordships will all agree, the most representative of any concerned with the particular industries that can be found at the moment. If at any time any of them should disappear and be replaced by others it would not be difficult to transfer the nomination to them. But I hope that His Majesty's Government will seriously consider the importance of giving this body a representative character and not stick so closely to the principle of nomination.
As regards the chairman, I can quite understand that a man of the peculiar legal qualifications and experience which would make him competent to preside over a body of this kind might well be chosen; but there again, on this matter of the inspiring of confidence, I feel certain that His Majesty's Government will do better to select some form of nomination other than by the Lord Chancellor, who is a member of the Government. They will be told that the probability is that some competent barrister is likely to be appointed for this post, some man who has had the special experience but who is also not unlikely to be chosen for some political service in the other House or elsewhere. The noble Earl might say that this is not the principle of which the appointment will be made. Perhaps not. But the fact that the imputation can be made makes it worth while, I think, to approach these really very important appointments without any suggestion of favour or prejudice.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I put one case before the House? Supposing that some day nationalisation takes place—I do not say that it will, but it might possibly take place before the expiration of two years. In the White Paper which has been presented to your Lordships, giving the powers taken over from the Board of Trade, you will find seven and a-half pages of those powers. If my view is correct, the Board of Trade under this clause will mean the Minister

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himself as he takes over all these powers from the Board of Trade. The noble Earl smiles. I may be wrong, but if I am correct he practically becomes the Board of Trade for these purposes. Now, is there not a risk that some future Minister may nominate the people from the Board of Trade almost entirely in order to get carried through a particular policy Then you have the Labour representative, who would naturally be in favour of nationalisation; and the Lord Chancellor, as a member of the Government of the day, would also be in favour. Against that you have two trading interests. Consequently I think that something in the nature of the committee proposed by the noble Viscount is essential if it is to command confidence. I assume that the Government want these committees to command confidence; and if so we should try to make them properly representative. If we could give wider powers for these committees in the first plance, and if, in the second place, they were composed in such a way as to command public confidence, it would meet the demand for the smooth working of this Bill.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I understand that the noble Earl has admitted that this Committee ought to be an independent one and not the mouthpiece of His Majesty's Government in any shape or form. That speaks very well for the noble Earl's intentions; but the Bill as it stands does not achieve that end, and it is clear that when it comes to the appointment of this Committee there might be, and probably would be, a meeting between the Ministers concerned who would arrange amongst themselves the personnel of the Committee. That would be in fact a Committee nominated by His Majesty's Government and representing His Majesty's Government. No doubt they might make an effort to make it as fair and impartial as they could; but it is almost impossible to expect human nature—even this Ministerial human nature—to avoid a desire to have members on the committee who would be likely to subserve that which the Minister-designate would wish. Therefore I take it as accepted by your Lordships that this ought to be, if possible, a representative Committee.
Then the noble Earl makes certain criticisms of the particular kind of representation which my noble friend has suggested. I will not go over the ground
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which has just been covered by the noble Marquess. I think he disposed of a good many of the objections of the noble Earl. The only objection which made a considerable impression upon me, if I may say so, was his plea for what he called the floating member. I think there is a good deal to be said for the floating member. I am sure my noble friend who sits beside me thinks that is so. I do not think any of us quite appreciated what was intended by the floating member until the noble Earl spoke. If, therefore, it was thought fit at a future stage of the Bill to add a floating member, I am sure none of us on this bench would resist it. The simple course which seems to be indicated, however, is that we should put this Amendment into the Bill. That would establish, as it were, the desire of the House to have a representative committee independent of the Government. If afterwards, on the Report stage, modifications ought to be introduced, your Lordships would have an opportunity then of considering them. I venture to suggest that as the best course.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It seems to me that I am rather in the position of pleading with the noble Marquess as to what he is prepared to give to me. I represented, when I was defending the clause as it stands in the Bill, certain features which I considered were indispensable. I am not aware from the speeches of either of the noble Marquesses that either of my points, with the exception of that of the floating member, is to be considered in the Amendment of the noble Viscount. I really do not understand what is meant by the noble Lord and others who say that this Committee does not inspire confidence. This Committee, as drafted in the Bill, was inserted in the House of Commons after a great deal of very careful consideration by the members of that House. It certainly inspired confidence there; it is the Committee which they themselves chose.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It was all they could get.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Not at all; this is what they proposed. I would ask your Lordships once more before we go to a Division to consider what is the purpose that this Committee has to fulfil. A great deal of trouble was taken in the House of Commons to make the Committee as helpful as possible to the Minister. It was in-

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tended to help him to carry out his duty; not to check or restrain him, but to give him the maximum of assistance in carrying out an extremely difficult task. The noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, said that it was not necessary to have a legal chairman or to have transportation interests represented, because they existed already in the person of the Minister. I say again that the object is to assist the Minister by putting on to the Committee persons who, and who alone, can give him expert technical advice.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: His own Department might to be able to do that. I mentioned "Department" explicitly.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: That is what the Government thought when they introduced the Bill. The House of Commons thought that in addition to his expert advisers he should have advisers from outside; the Government accepted that view, and the Committee was appointed, therefore, to provide him with the most expert advisers outside. I think I ought, in answer to the noble Marquess, Lord Crewe, to say that this is why we want special transportation interests. The business of the Committee is to advise the Minister as to how he can secure larger revenue from these undertakings.
I am sure your Lordships will appreciate the fact that it is quite possible to put up rates and lose revenue. What he requires, therefore, from the transportation member is advice as to the effect of any rate upon a, particular undertaking from a net revenue point of view so that he may be advised how, if he is going to put a rate upon a particular undertaking, it is likely to affect its revenue. It would be disastrous from his point of view to impose a rate upon a particular class of traffic the result of which was that the revenue was less and not greater. The object of the Minister is to secure more revenue, and we require on that Committee one member at least who shall be able to look at the matter from the net revenue point of view of the undertaking. That is what we mean by the transportation interest. I certainly could accept no Committee which did not make provision for the representation of that interest.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Does the noble Earl mean "railway" by the term "transportation."
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Quite. You may put up a rate upon a particular line of railway, and the traffic on that railway may decrease to such an extent that instead of getting more revenue you would get less. It really does require an expert to say what the effect of a rate upon a particular line of railway might be.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I must apologise to the noble Earl for my density, but I had suppposed that the whole Department was for the purpose of ascertaining those facts. If the Minister cannot ascertain the facts, he being in charge of all the railways and having all the experts attached to his Department, I cannot imagine how the presence of some transportation experts on this Advisory Committee would help him with regard to, say, the particular effect of raising a rate upon the Great Western Railway, for instance, from Bristol to London.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I ask if the noble Earl would use the word "railway" instead of ''transportation," because transportation in the real sense means all kinds of transport.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am sorry if I have not made myself clear, but my point is that it is no use creating a committee unless it is going to be of value to the Minister. If it is only going to send in a report which he from his expert technical knowledge would always turn down, the Committee would be useless. We do not want a Committee to send up advice which the Minister would know was nonsense. We want a Committee to send him advice which he believes represents the best technical outside advice he can obtain. Our desire, therefore, is to ensure that when the advice of the Committee comes to the Minister it shall be in a form which will supplement his own officials' advice and his own personal knowledge and therefore be of real use and assistance to him.
There is only one other point I want to mention in answer to the noble Marquess, and that is with regard to the chairman. This Committee will have to deal with some of the most intricate legal questions. These questions of railway law are extremely complicated and technical, and if the advice is to be of any use whatever to

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the Minister it must come from a Committee on which real legal knowledge is represented. That is absolutely essential. If the Committee has no legal knowledge and no expert knowledge on the points to which I have referred, then the advice which it will give will be perfectly useless. For those reasons, unless I can secure some representation for the interests that I have pleaded are essential, I am afraid it would be quite impossible for me to accept the noble Viscount's Amendment.
LORD ISLINGTON: I have no doubt that my noble friend Lord Midleton will be prepared to add some of the proposals of the noble Earl to his Amendment, especially that which concerns the floating member, but I am sure that this discussion has shown more and more the necessity, in an Advisory Committee of this character, to represent two aspects—not merely the closely legal aspect upon which emphasis was laid by the noble Earl, but also that aspect which relates to the interest of concerns that are being affected by the proposal. The second one, to my mind, in its way is as important as the first. It, therefore, strikes me as being of the utmost importance that the gentleman who is to preside over this Advisory Committee should be nominated in as detached a manner as possible.
I can quite understand that legal and technical knowledge in railway matters is of great importance, and I cannot but feel that if such a gentleman is to be found there is no body more likely to find him than the body which is proposed by the noble Viscount in his A mendlnent—namely, the Railway and Canal Commission. In fact, I very much suspect that if the nomination rests in the hands of the Lord Chancellor, it will be to that body first and foremost that the Lord Chancellor will go for advice. The Railway and Canal Commission consists of a Judge from each country for each branch of the Commission and two gentlemen who have become experts in railway matters. A body so composed is, to my mind, the very best body that could be conceived to obtain for the post of Chairman a gentleman who possesses legal and technical railway knowledge. Therefore, I hope that this body will be the one Which will be retained for the nomination of the Chairman of this Advisory Committee.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: As regards the question of details in the Amendment I do not think there is the slightest difficulty in our coming to terms with the noble Earl opposite. Whether it is more desirable to have as Chairman a man simply of legal attainments rather than a man who has been nominated by the Railway and Canal Commission is a matter which I would not myself contest. Whether it is desirable to add a member ad hoc on behalf of the Minister or whether there should be some member who is seised of transportation—these are matters of detail. The real difficulty between the noble Earl and myself is the question of principle and ideal. His ideal is a Committee which is named by the Minister and is there simply to assist him. That is to say, the Minister says, "My policy is to do so-and-so; you find the way of doing it. Find a way out and you will be helping me, but make any objection on the ground that it will interfere with this trade or that trade, and you are not assisting me in the same way." We want an independent Committee as compared with a Committee tied to the Minister.
I think, if the noble Earl will allow me to say so, that his constant references to what has been thought out clearly in the House of Commons do not assist us with regard to this particular Bill, because, at the outset, both Ministers in charge of the Bill announced that they were not going to take any Amendment at all which limited the power of time Minister. They were determined to press for every power of the Minister that was in the Bill. That is the first point. The second point is that a number of so-called compromises were carried under great pressure by a majority of one or two. These are not decisions which are really binding on this House if there is a good case against them. For that reason, I hope your Lordships will consent to take a decision on the main question of all—Shall the Committee be an independent Committee nominated by bodies outside, or shall it be nominated by various Departments of the Government? On that point I hope you will now decide.
On Question, whether the words proposed to be left out shall stand part of the clause?—
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 30; Not-contents, 42.

CONTENTS.

Ancaster, E.

Finlay, V.

Hylton, L. [Teller.]

Bradford, E.

Peel, V.

Inverforth, L.

Chesterfield, E.

Lambourne, L.

Doncaster, E. (D. Baccleuch and Queensberry.)

Clinton, L.

Lee of Fareham, L.

Cochrane of Cults, L.

Ludlow, L.

Howe, E.

Colebrooke, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Lytton, E.

Elgin, L. (E. Elgin and Kincardine.)

Ranksborough, L.

Rosslyn, E.

Shandon, L.

Faringdon, L.

Sinha, L.

Sandhurst, V.(L. Chamberlain.)

Gisborough, L.

Somerleyton, L. [Teller.|

Churchill, V.

Hindlip, L.

Wigan, L. (E. Crawford.)

NOT-CONTENTS.

Northumberland, D.

Hampden, V.

Kintore, L. (K. Kintore.)

Hood, V.

MacDonnell, L.

Crewe, M.

Monkswell, L.

Salisbury, M

Askwith, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Avebury, L.

Parmoor, L.

Brassey, E.

Bledisloe, L.

Redesdale, L.

Lindsay, E.

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Chalmers, L.

Sanderson, L.

Mayo, E.

Charnwood, L.

Sandys, L.

Morton, E.

Clanwilliam, L. (E. Clanwilliam.)

Saye and Sele, L.

Selborne, E.

Denman, L.

Southwark, L.

Stanhope, E. [Teller.]

Ebury, L.

Sydenham, L.

Wicklow, E.

Erskine, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L. [Teller.]

Farrer, L.

Chaplin, V.

Forester, L.

Wittenham, L.

Goschen, V.

Islington, L.

Resolved in the negative, and Amendment agreed to accordingly.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON VISCOUNT MIDLETON moved, in subsection (3)(c), to leave out "unless in their discretion they consider it unnecessary or undesirable to do so." The noble Viscount said: It seems absolutely necessary that public notice should be given before reporting on such an important matter as railway rates. I have put down another Amendment requiring the Committee to hear the evidence of those who wish to be heard.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, lines 9 to 11, leave out ("unless in their discretion they consider it unnecessary or undesirable to do so").—(Viscount Midleton.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I think there is a complete misunderstanding in some of your Lordships' minds as to the reason for what is called the secrecy of the operations of this Committee. The fact that a discretion is let to the Committee in this matter is because it may be necessary, in the interests of the traders themselves, that matters which will be discussed between them and the Committee should be discussed privately. I do not want to forestall a question which will arise on a later Amendment of the noble Viscount's, but I would point out that there may be cases in which the mere fact of giving public notice of the intention to deal with a particular class of
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rates may seriously interfere with trade and lead to long contracts which might largely forestall the effect of the rise in rates. It is the same thing as if the Chancellor of the Exchequer, before making any additional taxes in his Budget, gave public notice of his intention to consider the matter. The same consequences which would accrue in that case might accrue in the case of public notice given with regard to the consideration of matters dealing with rates.
The exercise of this power will probably in the main be in connection with a general percentage rise in rates; but the revision may only affect one particular rate in one particular trade, and if the Committee consider it would be undesirable to give any chance of forestalling the operations of that rate by giving public notice, it is right and proper they should have discretion in the matter. There is also another point, but here again I am forestalling a later Amendment. No trader has an absolute right to be heard before any rate is put up. He does not enjoy that right to-day, and it would be impossible to give him that right under this Bill. The discretionary power left to the Committee is really absolutely necessary, and I hope the noble Viscount will not press the Amendment.
LORD PARMOOR: May I point out one important matter? At the present time,

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and for the protection of traders, no rate can be raised unless there is public notice. As a matter of fact public notice has been introduced into all the Acts in order that all traders may have knowledge and not particular traders only. May I also point out another matter on which I think the noble Earl is under a misapprehension. Every rate is bound to be in the rating book at the present time. In other words, it is bound to be made a matter of publicity. I think it would be wrong to allow anything like secrecy in dealing with rates on the ground that a particular rate only affected one trader. The contrary has always been the principle of our law. Rates are matters of public interest, and if they are confined to one trader it is then there is a possibility of undue preference.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It is impossible to see how the person affected Can make representations unless public notice is given, as it is impossible for the Committee to know all the persons affected. How can they possibly know? The persons who are affected are largely the public, and I really do not see the kind of case which the noble Earl points out as a possible exception. If he could show that there was a substantial number of cases where publicity would do a great deal of public damage it would be a strong point, and of course inconsistent with the whole tenour of the clause. The whole point of the clause is that the persons affected should have an opportunity of being heard; and how can they know unless public notice is given.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: I hope, after the arguments which have been addressed to him, that the noble Earl will accept the Amendment.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am instructed that very great objections would result from giving public notice, not of an intention to increase a rate but of an intention to consider the matter. It is unnecessary that you should inform all the traders of your intention to consider what steps you are going to take with regard to rates. If you did that, you would be inviting the persons who might think they would be ultimately affected to take action in advance, which would forestall the operation of the rate. If the Amendment were carried there would be very grave objections to giving public notice before the
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Committee can even take a rate into consideration.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: Might I ask whether the noble Earl means that he is afraid traders might raise prices in anticipation of railway rates being raised, if it was known that the particular subject was coming under consideration. Is that the point which he had in view? Because it is hard to see how the public interests which the noble Earl mentioned, and of the traders themselves, could be affected by publicity. When the noble Earl spoke of the interest of the traders themselves being in conceivable cases prejudicially affected, I thought perhaps he was alluding to special rates. Apparently he was not, but was dealing with general rates. I am not quite sure what the supposed damage to the traders or the public could be.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I mean that the giving of public notice that the Committee intended to take into consideration an alteration in rates in regard to particular goods might create such an uncertainty, in the trade which would be affected by such changes, as seriously to interfere with the trade, and might result in long distance contracts being made in order to forestall the operation of the rates, in the sense in which the traders might think the Committee might ultimately decide to change them. For these reasons I am instructed that it would be seriously damaging to accept the Amendment of the noble Viscount.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Is not this a question in which we should remember that transport is the servant of the trade and not the trade the servant of transport?
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Lord Parmoor, who is learned in the law, tells us that it is the law now, and therefore the Amendment would not lead to any inconvenience.
LORD PARMOOR: Rates are not fixed for the individual, but for the trade, because when you come to take them as a question for the individual you get undue preference, which all railway legislation is directed against. Therefore I think you should have publicity.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: There is all the difference in the world between giving

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public notice of your intention to take into consideration a rate, and notice that a rate has been made. What exists to-day is that notice is given that within fourteen days it is proposed to alter a rate. That will remain unchanged by this Bill. If the Minister decides, after consulting the Committee, to increase the rate, then of course notice of his intention to do so will be given.
Several NOBLE LORDS: That is too late.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is not incumbent upon a company, before considering whether to increase a rate, to hear all the arguments of the persons affected. If a company could only put up a rate after giving everybody concerned an opportunity of coming and stating their case, it is quite obvious that no increase could ever take place at all. The railway company, after deciding to increase a rate, has got to give fourteen days' notice of its intention to do so, and after that it would not be possible for contracts to be formed to forestall that increase. They would not be legal. But if the company gave notice that it was going to consider an increase, it is obvious that contracts could and would be made which would forestall the increase.
LORD PARMOOR: I think the noble Earl is wrong. There is no question of forestalling rates, but a question of a rate coming into operation or not. Forward contracts would not be affected in the slightest.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: If it is a question of a rate corning into operation fourteen days after notice has been given, that is not affected, because notice would be given in the same way. What is here suggested is that there should be fourteen days' notice of the intention of the Minister to refer the matter to the Committee.
LORD WITTENHAM: Is the notice which now has to be given merely a formal notice that the railway company has decided a general policy, or does it give notice so as to enable people who will be affected to make their representation either in favour of or against? Of course, if it is merely formal now, there seems to be a good deal in what the noble Earl said, but I understood from Lord Parmoor that at present it is a notice which gives the trader an opportunity of making his representation before the company has made up its mind.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: It is a rather difficult point and I quite see what the noble Earl means, but I suggest that I might be allowed to treat the matter in this way, that if the House has frankly affirmed that the Committee is to be an independent Committee, which is a most important matter, as regards the traders whom it represents, even if we are unable to persuade the Government to give publicity we shall have a security for the rates which will make it unnecessary to publish the fact that they are going to be considered before they are considered. We are as interested as the noble Earl in helping the Minister to get the best return possible, and I therefore ask leave to withdraw my Amendment and I will re-introduce it on Report after we see how this clause emerges from Committee.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (3)(c) after "they" ["they consider"], to insert "unanimously." The noble Lord said: I desire to insert the word "unanimously,'' because I think publicity is very desirable. The point I want to make about this is that hitherto traders have had alternative means of forwarding their goods, but it seems to me that in future, railway companies being practically one great company, there will be no remedy if the rates are put up, and it appears to me that the insertion of "unanimously" will strengthen the public protection.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 10, after ("they") insert ("unanimously").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I do not know whether the noble Lord realises that this Amendment would have the effect of giving one member of the Committee the power of overriding the whole Committee.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I did not appreciate that that would be the effect.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON VISCOUNT MIDLETON moved, in subsection (3)(c), to leave out "apply" ["apply to be heard"] and to insert "unless in their discretion the Committee consider it unnecessary, shall be entitled". The noble Viscount said: In order not to give an absolute right to a frivolous appli-

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cant to appeal before the Committee, I have added to the words appearing on the Paper—namely, "shall be entitled"—the words "unless in their discretion the Committee consider it; unnecessary." I think there is no doubt that traders who are genuinely affected ought to have a right to appear before the Committee.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 14, leave out ("apply to") and insert ("unless in their discretion the Committee consider it unnecessary shall be entitled").—(Viscount Midleton).
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Here, again, I doubt if the noble Viscount has realised what the effect of this Amendment would be. I have already informed your Lordships that there are something like 30,000,000 to 40,000,000 rates on docks and railways. I will deal in a moment with the reservation which the noble Viscount has now handed in. But let me first explain what would be the effect of the noble Viscount's Amendment if he had moved it as it appears on the Paper. It would have given the right to any trader who might be affected by any one of these 40,000,000 rates to appear before the committee and have his case gone into before the committee could come to a decision. If that were done no rate could be effected within the lifetime of any member of the Commission, let alone in the two years with which we have to deal. Now the noble Viscount suggests that, although this right which does not exist to-day should be given to traders to be heard before the rate is altered, a reservation should nevertheless be made that the committee should be given a discretion. The thing would be perfectly meaningless. The committee could not possibly do its work if anybody could claim to have a right to be heard by them before they came to any decision. To-day traders have no right to be heard before a railway company prior to a rate being raised. It is perfectly true that they have a right of appeal to the Railway and Canal Commission on certain points after the rate has been put up. Some of those points have been retained by the Amendments which I accepted earlier in this Sitting. In these respects that right of appeal has gone. To say that no rate can be increased before any person who is affected by it—even subject to the discretion of the committee—may be heard would simply mean that you could never take into consideration at all the question of raising the rates.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The argument of the noble Earl has the great misfortune of proving rather too much. How many millions of people did he say that he was afraid of—thirty millions? He is quite prepared that 30,000,000 persons should make representations to the committee. I suppose he does not intend those representations to be waste paper. They will all have to be considered if he does not mean that the representations are to be a mere form. Surely he does not merely mean, when the test comes, that the committee shall say: "Oh, here is another representation, put it into the waste-paper basket." I presume, therefore, they will all have to be considered. Not only may they make representations, but they may also apply to be heard. This committee is a judicial committee.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I did not speak of 30,000,000 people; I spoke of 30,000,000 rates.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: These people may apply to be heard. This committee is a judicial body. As the Government Bill stands, if an application be granted each application will have to be judicially decided. There will have to be some kind of judicial discretion in deciding whether applications should be granted, and according to the noble Earl the whole thing will be unworkable. I am sorry for the noble Earl and his Bill that he should have proposed a clause which he himself says is quite unworkable. I think he will come to the conclusion upon reflection that that argument will not do. He must face the fact that if you apply a very drastic remedy to a number of persons they must be entitled to be heard, subject, of course, to a discretion of the committee where it is obviously impracticable to hear them, or where it is not feasible to do so, or where the application to be heard is frivolous. But unless you give these people some title to be heard, surely their applications are in vain.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: With all deference, it is not the clause in the Bill which is unworkable. What I said was unworkable was the procedure which would be imposed by the noble Viscount. Let me explain what the procedure in the Bill is in cases where the committee decides that before giving any advice to the Minister

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they shall give public notice and hold a local Inquiry. Having announced their intention to do that, obviously persons affected will be able to be heard beforehand, and the committee thus, in their discretion, will hear such persons as they think desirable in order to assist them in coming to a decision. It is a perfectly possible arrangement. What is quite impossible is to say that before any rate is increased, or before any advice to increase a rate is given to the Minister, any person who may be affected by the rate shall be entitled to be heard. If you give persons a right to be heard you must also give them a right to be informed of the fact that they will be affected by the rate, and in the clause the right of persons to be heard is limited to cases where the committee decide to hold an Inquiry into the matter. If you give a right to any individual in the country who may be affected by any railway rate to be heard before the committee, that would simply make waste paper of the whole clause, and would make it quite impossible for the committee to do any work at all.
LORD EMMOTT: Is it not the case that the words are now very much qualified? I have not the actual Amendment proposed before me. The question I should like to put is, whether there is any material difference between the Amendment proposed and the words as they now stand? The words now are that "any person may apply to be heard at such an Inquiry." If they apply to be heard the committee must consider whether they ought to be heard. The Amendment which is proposed says that if the committee, after considering whether they ought to be heard, decide that it is unnecessary that they should be heard, they need not hear them. I really cannot see that there is any material difference.
LORD PARMOOR: These difficulties about the 30,000,000 or 40,000,000 rates is a sort of bogey that is sometimes trotted out in this connection. As a matter of fact, there is not the least difficulty in dealing with these questions, as any one who has had any experience knows. At the present time persons affected are heard by the Board of Trade. I have been present at a great many inquiries of that kind, and there has never been any difficulty about it. It appears to me that persons affected, in ordinary legal language "persons interested," ought to be heard unless
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there is some special reason against it when their commercial or trading interests are likely to be affected. Why in an Act of this kind you should disentitle persons affected to be heard before the critical committee I cannot imagine. I am bound to say that I think that the difficulty suggested by the noble Earl about the 40,000,000 or 1,000,000,000 rates is really without substance. In actual practice these difficulties have never occurred.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: My objection to the Amendment as it is now proposed is to the word "entitled." Of course, if you say that the committee shall only hear any representations which, in their discretion, they decide to hear, you leave the matter entirely in the hands of the committee, and if they do not choose to receive any of the applications they will simply put them in the waste paper basket. But that is not what the noble Viscount's Amendment says. It says that any persons affected may make representations to the committee, and, unless in their discretion the committee consider it unnecessary, shall be entitled to be heard. Persons are either entitled to be heard or are not entitled to be heard and the question whether they are to be heard or not is a matter for the committee to decide. If you say in the Act that they are entitled to be heard, then they are also entitled to receive beforehand the information which will enable them to decide whether or not they shall apply to be heard. My objection is to giving persons a right which they do not possess to-day. I could not accept the Amendment even in its present form.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: It seems to me that the difference is whether there is to be a prima facie case for hearing a man when he makes his application, or whether the presumption is that he is quite as likely not to be heard as to be heard, as is the case under the Bill. If the word "entitled" is particularly offensive to the noble Earl, I should think that it might be possible to amend the Amendment by saying that "he shall be heard unless the committee decides otherwise."
VICOUNT MIDLETON: I do not think the case has been met. You cannot get out of it. As Lord Salisbury said, either these people have no right there at all, and the application means nothing, or you may say that a man who is affected is entitled

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to be heard. The committee have already the discretion of not publishing their proposed action if they do not wish to do so, and if you leave them also the discretion whether they should hear the man, after they have advertised that they are going probably to take action and that he may apply, really I think that it is merely putting a little more strongly the rights of the public to some consideration by the committee. The committee will have to make up their minds that they would rather not hear him, and that there is a list of witnesses that they do not think it necessary to call. I think I must press it.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Will the noble Viscount allow the Amendment to be put in the new form?
VISCOUNT MIDLETONindicated assent.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: The Amendment now is—Page 7, line 14, leave out ("apply to"), and insert ("unless in their discretion the committee consider it unnecessary, shall").
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD BLEDISLOE LORD BLEDISLOE moved, in subsection (3)(c), after "district council" in the proviso, to insert "or industrial organisation." The noble Lord said: I wish to move this Amendment, if it is only to elicit from the noble Earl whether the words "persons affected" do or do not include organisations of individuals, as well as individuals themselves. I suggest that in any case it would be not only fair to the industrial interests affected, but also helpful to the Minister or the Advisory Committee if this organisation and others were allowed to be heard when such an inquiry takes place.
I may illustrate what I mean in regard to the agricultural industry, and I should like in passing to thank the noble Earl for his expressed willingness to give some representation on the Advisory Committee to the agricultural interest but, as he said truly just now, it is quite possible to put up rates and lose revenue. That, has very often happened in years gone by in respect to agricultural produce, notably milk under owners' risk rate contracts, and it is obviously desirable, where an industry as a. whole is very seriously affected. For instance, the dairy farmers' interest might be to have someone who is able to speak
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as an expert on behalf of the organised dairy farmers, let us say, or any other organisation of a particular industry, in order to state the case clearly to the Advisory Committee and in order fairly to represent the claim of that particular industry or interest. For these reasons I beg to move this Amendment but, of course, if the noble Earl is able to assure me that "persons affected" does include organisations of persons as well as individuals I should not feel it necessary to move it.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 19, after ("council") insert ("or industrial organisation").—(Lord Bledisloe.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Our view was that the councils of these cities would represent industrial organisations as well as individuals. I am advised that these words are not necessary, but I shall offer no opposition.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I am very much obliged to the noble Earl. I feel sure these councils will not consider themselves as being fully representative of the particular interests I have in mind.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD BLEDISLOE: The next amendment is consequential.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 20, after ("council") insert ("or organization").—(Lord Bledisloe.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON THE EARL OF LYTTON had an Amendment on the Paper to leave out subsection (4). The noble Earl said: Here, again, I was proposing to transfer a clause to another part of the Bill. Perhaps your Lordships would prefer to take the subsection, as there are Amendments to it, in its place, and I will move to transfer it to a later stage of the Bill on Report?
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: As far as I am concerned, as I have an Amendment which affects this, I would rather take it at a later stage, if it does not inconvenience the noble Earl.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Then I will move to leave out subsection (4).
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 38, to page 8, line 20, leave out subsection (4).—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The next is a purely drafting Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 30, leave out ("rate") and insert ("local rate or assessment").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 4:
Saving for statutory harbour, dock and pier authorities.
4 Nothing in section three of this Act shall apply to any harbour, dock or pier undertaking established by Act of Parliament, including the Manchester Ship Canal, but not including any harbour, dock or pier forming part of a railway undertaking, or to the owners of any such undertaking without the consent of such owners, but if at any time during the two years after the passing of this Act the Minister shall consider that it is desirable in the national interest that the transport facilities and accommodation at the harbour, or at any dock or pier of the owners, should be improved or extended, or that the method of working should be altered, the Minister may by order, for the purposes aforesaid, require the owners to execute or do, within a reasonable time, such improvement or extension or alteration in the method of working as the order may prescribe, and may for that purpose confer on the owners any such powers of acquiring land or easements or constructing works as are mentioned in paragraph (d) of subsection (1) of that section:
Provided that if the owners of such undertaking consider that any such requirements are likely to be seriously injurious to the undertaking, or to the trade of the port, they may, within thirty days of receiving notice of such requirements from the Minister, appeal, in the case of an undertaking situate in England or Wales, to the Lord Chief Justice of England, or, in the case of an undertaking situate in Scotland, to the Lord President of the Court of Session, or, in the case of an undertaking situate in Ireland, to the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, and if it appears to such Lord Chief Justice or Lord President that a primâ facie case is made out that the requirements of the Minister would be so injurious as aforesaid he shall forthwith appoint an arbitrator to hold an immediate inquiry, and if the arbitrator reports that the carrying out of the requirements of the Minister will be so injurious as aforesaid the Minister shall revoke his requirements, without prejudice to the power of the Minister to issue a new order.
LORD ISLINGTON LORD ISLINGTON had an Amendment to leave out front the beginning of the clause down to "forming part of a railway undertaking, "and to insert "With the exception of any harbour, dock, or pier forming part of a railway undertaking, nothing in section three of this Act shall apply to any harbour, dock, or pier undertaking established by Act of Parliament, including the Manchester Ship Canal."
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The noble Lord said: This is a purely drafting Amendment which, no doubt, my noble friend will accept. I think it makes more clear what the intention of the Bill is.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I think the beginning of Clause 4, as it stands, is a little difficult to follow, and I should be prepared either to accept the noble Lord's Amendment, or to suggest that in Clause 4 the words "but not including any harbour, dock, or pier forming part of a railway undertaking or to the owners of any such undertaking" should be put in a bracket. Either, I think, would make the clause clearer. If, however, the noble Lord prefers his own Amendment, I would ask him whether he would amend it in this way, so as to read: "except where any harbour, dock, or pier forms part of a railway undertaking," and so on.
LORD ISLINGTONindicated assent.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 31, leave out, from the beginning of the line to ("or") in line 35, and insert ("Except where any harbour, dock, or pier forms part of a railway undertaking, nothing in section three of this Act shall apply to any harbour, dock, or pier undertaking established by Act of Parliament, including the Manchester Ship Canal").—(Lord Islington.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 5 and 6 agreed to.
Clause 7:
Provisions as to officers and servants.
7—(1) The following provisions shall apply with respect to officers or servants of any undertaking of which, or of any part or plant of which possession has been retained or taken under this Act (all of which officers and servants are in this Act hereinafter referred to as "existing officers and servants"):—

(i) Where the Minister requires the services of any existing officer or servant, that officer or servant may be transferred to the Minister—

(a) either permanently with the consent of the officer or servant; or

(b) temporarily with the consent (which shall not unreasonably be withheld) of the officer or servant, and of the owners of the undertaking;

(ii) No existing officer or servant so transferred, whether temporarily or permanently, shall, without his consent be, by reason of such transfer or anything done under this Act, in any

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worse position in respect to the conditions of his service (including tenure of office, remuneration, gratuities, pension, superannuation, sick fund or any benefits or allowances, whether obtaining legally or by customary practice), as compared with the conditions of service obtaining with respect to him at the passing of this Act, and if any question arises as to whether the provisions of this paragraph have been complied with the question shall be referred to a standing arbitrator or board of arbitration appointed by the Lord Chancellor for the purposes of this section, and if the arbitrator or board consider that those provisions have not been complied with and that the officer or servant has thereby suffered loss or injury, they shall award him such sum as they think sufficient to compensate him for such lout or injury;

(iii) Where an existing officer or servant has been transferred either temporarily or permanently to the Minister under this section then so long as the Minister remains in possession of that undertaking that officer or servant may remain a full member of any pension or superannuation fund established in connection with the undertaking with all the rights to which he would be entitled had he continued in the service of the owners of the undertaking, and any contributions payable under the rules of the pension or superannuation furl or by customary practice by the owners of the undertaking may be paid by the Treasury out of moneys provided by Parliament, and he shall be entitled to receive such reasonable allowances for temporary disturbance as the Minister with the consent of the Treasury may determine (including direct pecuniary loss sustained in consequence of the transfer):

(iv) Every existing officer or servant not transferred to the Minister in pursuance of this Act shall, notwithstanding the powers conferred upon the Minister by this Act, continue to hold his office or situation under the owners of the undertaking under the same tenure and upon the same terms and conditions (including all conditions regarding gratuities, pension, superannuation, sick fund, or any benefits or allowances), whether obtaining legally or by customary practice as he held it on the date of the passing of this Act, and while performing the same duties shall receive not less salary, wages, or remuneration than under existing regulations, agreements, or established customs of the service he would have been entitled to if this Act hid not been passed:

(v) The Minister may direct that the office or situation of any existing officer or servant which he deems unnecessary shall be abolished:

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(vi) If by or in consequence of a direction of the Minister any existing officer or servant is, during the period of possession, required to perform duties such as are not analogous or which are an unreasonable addition to those which he has, prior to the date of the passing of this Act, been required to perform, such officer or servant may relinquish his office or service:

(vii) Every such officer or servant who so relinquishes his office or service as aforesaid, and every such officer or servant whose services by or in consequence of any such direction are dispensed with on the ground that his services are not required, or for any reason not being on account of any misconduct or incapacity, or whose salary, wages, or remuneration are reduced on the ground that his duties have been diminished by or in consequence of any such direction, or who' otherwise suffers any direct pecuniary loss in consequence of this Act (including any loss of prospective superannuation or other retiring or death allowances, whether obtaining legally or by customary practice), shall be entitled to be paid by the Minister compensation for such pecuniary loss, to be determined by the Treasury subject to appeal to such standing arbitrator or board of arbitration as aforesaid, in accordance with the provisions contained in section one hundred and twenty of the Local Government Act, 1888, relating to compensation to existing officers, and those provisions shall apply accordingly as if they were herein re-enacted with the necessary modifications:

Provided that in the case of any officer or servant who was appointed to his office as a specially qualified person at an age exceeding that at which public service usually begins, or of any officer or servant who suffers any loss of prospective superannuation or other retiring or death allowances as aforesaid, such addition may be made to the amount of compensation authorised under the said provisions as may seem just, having regard to the particular circumstances of such case.
(2) Any person formerly in the employment of the owners of an undertaking of which or of any part or plant of which possession is retained or taken under this Act, who on the date of the passing of this Act is, though not legally entitled thereto, in receipt of a pension or other superannuation allowance, shall continue to receive from the owners of such undertaking the same pension or allowance on the same terms and conditions as if this Act had not been passed.
(3) Any person who, at the date of the passing of this Act, was in the employment of the owners of an undertaking of which or of any part or plant of which possession is retained or taken under this Act and who, during the period of such possession, would, though not legally entitled thereto, in accordance with customary practice

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be granted a pension or superannuation allowance by the owners of such undertaking, shall not be in any worse posit ion in regard thereto by reason of the passing of this Act.
(4) This section shall apply to persons who are, or have been, numbers of the staff of the Railway Clearing House, or the Irish Railway Clearing House, or any railway conference, in like manner as if they were, or had been, officers or servants of an undertaking of which possession had been taken and the period of possession thereof had been the same as that of a railway undertaking, and to the Railway Clearing System Superannuation Fund, as if it was a pension or superannuation fund established in connection with an undertaking of which possession has been taken, and as if payments and contributions heretofore made by railway companies thereto were contributions payable by the owners of the undertaking.
EARL BRASSEY EARL BRASSEY moved (on behalf of Lord GAINFORD), in subsection (1), after "undertaking" where that word first occurs, to insert "including businesses of building, financing or repairing railway wagons carried on at the date of the passing of this Act."
The noble Earl said: I have been asked by my noble friend to move this Amendment on his behalf. I may explain to those of your Lordships who do not understand the term in this connection that "financing" refers to those companies who are building wagons and handing them over to railway companies on the hire-purchase system. It is clear from Clause 13 that the purchase of private wagons on a large scale is recognised. One of the main arguments for the Bill is that these private wagons will be used more effectively under central control than when privately owned. It is rather curious that the average tonnage carried by a private wagon in 1913 was 350 tons, while it was stated a short time ago that the average tonnage carried by all wagons including' private wagons is only 258 tons. I think it is clear from this that private wagons are on the whole efficiently used, and that the companies who build and repair them are giving effective assistance to the transport system. If these private wagons are taken over it is probable that central establishments will be set up by the Ministry at which they will be repaired, and the companies who have hitherto repaired them may lose their businesses. The object of the noble Lord in putting down the Amendment is to provide that these companies and their servants should receive similar compensation to the officers and servants of the railway companies who suffer loss through the action of the Ministry.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 13, after ("undertaking") insert ("including businesses of building, financing or repairing railway wagons carried on at the date of the passing of this Act").—(Earl Brassey.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: This clause makes certain provisions with respect to the officers and servants of railway panies who will lose their occupation in consequence of the operation of this Act, and the noble Lord desires to place in the same category the servants of wagon building and wagon financing companies. First with regard to wagon building or wagon repairing companies. There is no need, I think, for considering in any way the servants of such companies. I do not anticipate that the business of such companies will be in any way curtailed by the fact that existing privately-owned wagons have been taken over by the Minister; because at the present time the railway wagon building and repairing shops cannot deal with all the repairing and building work required for the needs of the companies themselves who even now have to go outside to the wagon building and repairing concerns.
When you come to wagon financing companies you have a different matter to consider. It is true that some wagon financing companies—those, in fact, that depend solely upon supplying capital to traders to enable them to buy wagons—will have to wind up their businesses. I have an Amendment on the Paper later which meets one of the points such companies have placed before us; but here it is stated that compensation should be paid to the officers or servants of such a company by virtue of the fact that the business would be wound up. I do not think we can admit ally such claim on the part of the officers and servants of these particular companies any more than you could admit the claim of any business which, in the course of developments of one kind or another, may find its business interfered with or even destroyed. There have been many times when one class of business has been superseded by another class, sometimes in consequence of the ordinary operation of inventions or the introduction of machinery, and sometimes by the operations of the Government itself. It would be as reasonable to say that the officers and servants of these companies should require special compensation as to say that the persons, for instance, who were employed

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by jobbing companies or hotels in the stage-coach days should have been compensated when stage coaches were superseded by railways, or any other operations of that kind. We cannot admit that the servants of these companies are in any way in the same position as the servants of the railway companies and, therefore, are unable to accept the Amendment.
EARL BRASSEY: I think the last point raised by the noble Earl was not quite on all fours with the cash of the super-session of road traffic by railways. The thing was not done by the State. It seems to me that those engaged in this private wagon industry are directly contributing to the working of our railways as the things are at present, and they are going to lose their businesses through the action of the State. I am of opinion that the men employed those businesses are entitled to as reasonable compensation as the staff employed in the wagon repairing departments of any great railway company. I would make an earnest appeal to the noble Earl to consider the matter further and to deal with it at a later stage of the Bill.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The next Amendment is purely drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 10, line 35, after ("undertaking") insert ("or any part or plant thereof").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY LORD STUART OF WORTLEY moved, in subsection (1), at the end of paragraph (v), to insert: "Provided that the Minister shall not require the abolition of any office or situation which will, in the opinion of the owners of the undertaking, be essential to them in their conduct of the undertaking at the end of the period of possession."
The noble Lord said: I believe that this Amendment may possibly find some favour on the Front Bench opposite. The clause provides for the case of the railways which are probably going to be returned to their previous owners, and although a particular function or office or officer may not be necessary to the Minister—who by the very nature of his functions may be conducting an operation more or less of unification—still, if and when the railways
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are handed back, the necessity for that office may revive, and it is not desirable that it should have been in the meantime formally or otherwise abolished.
Amendment moved
Page 11, line 25, at end, insert the said words.—(Lord Stuart of Wortley.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The subsection to which the noble Lord refers deals only with any existing officer or servant. If the noble Lord will alter his Amendment in such a way as to make it also apply to existing officers I should be prepared to accept it. I would ask the noble Lord if he would insert the word "such" between "any" and "office so that it shall read" the abolition of any such office," and if he will consent to the striking out of the words "or situation"? "Or situation" would apply also to servants, and I think it is inconceivable that any servants of the railway company who might be dismissed in consequence of the action of the Minister would be held to be essential to them in the conduct of the undertaking at the end of the period of possession. If the noble Lord will confine the Amendment to office and to existing officers I should be prepared to accept it. The Amendment would run—
"Provided that the Minister shall not require the abolition of any such office which will, in the opinion," and so on.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY: I must conform to the noble Earl's requirements, but I confess I do not see how he can abolish an office which does not exist.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The railway company could create an office between now and the end of the two years.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY: I will move the Amendment in the amended form.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Before it is put, may I ask the noble Earl if he will answer one specific point? We will take the case of the locomotive superintendent on a small railway. In a scheme for the unification of small railways you amalgamate that railway or do away with it altogether. If you abolish the office of locomotive superintendent on that line, has he compensation or has he not as the clause is amended?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: This question does not raise a matter of compensation at all. All that we are concerned with is that the Minister may direct that the office or situation of any existing officer or servant which he deems unncessary shall be abolished, provided the Minister shall not require the abolition of any such office which will, in the opinion of the owners of the undertaking, be essential to them in their conduct of the undertaking at the end of the period of possession. It is in order to ensure that no servant of the company shall be dismissed by the Minister whom the company will require when the undertaking is once more in their possession.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I take it he would be protected.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: If the Company take that view of his services.
On Question, Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 7, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 8:
Claims against and by the Minister in respect of exercise of powers.
8.—(1) Where at the end of the period of possession by the Government of any undertaking or of any part or plant of an undertaking the value of the undertaking on a revenue-earning basis has been reduced or enhanced as compared with the value at the commencement of such period, or where during that period the income thereof has been reduced or enhanced, after taking into account in either case—

(a) any capital expenditure by the owners of the undertaking on any works brought into use in the interval; and

(b) where the undertaking has not before possession was taken by the Government paid a dividend out of revenue of four per cent. on its ordinary capital the natural growth of traffic on the undertaking."

then, if and so far as such reduction or enhancement is due to the exercise by the Minister during that period upon the undertaking in question of the powers under section three of this Act (including such powers as have been hitherto exercised by the Board of Trade as mentioned in paragraph (1) (a) of that section) the owners of the undertaking shall, unless such reduction or enhancement is otherwise provided for by the payments mentioned in paragraph (1) (a) of that section, be entitled to be recouped, or liable to pay, the amount by which that value has been so reduced or enhanced, and if any question arises as to such amount or the liability to pay the same, or otherwise with respect to the financial relations between the Minister and any person affected by the exercise by the Minister of any of
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his powers under the said section, the question shall be determined by the Railway and Canal Commission having regard to all the circumstances of the case:
Provided that—

(i) no claim in respect of any loss alleged to be due to any direction issued by the Minister shall be entertained if the direction was issued with the concurrence of the owners of the undertaking; and

(ii) if, whilst an undertaking of which or of any part or plant of which possession has been taken remains in the possession of the Government, the State is authorised by Parliament to acquire the undertaking, nothing in this subsection restricting claims for enhancement attributable to the exercise by the Minister of such powers as aforesaid to cases where the value of the undertaking has been enhanced as compared with the value thereof at the commencement of the period of possession shall be held to affect, one way or the other, any question as to the principle on which the price to be paid on such acquisition is to be based.

(2) Without prejudice to any other form of payment or satisfaction, the Treasury, on the recommendation of the Minister, may, as or as part of the consideration for exercising any powers of control under the said section, guarantee the payment of any dividends or interest on any stock or other securities issued by the owners of an undertaking up to such amount as may be agreed, or the payment of any working expenses of the undertaking, and any sums required to fulfil any such guarantee shall be paid out of moneys provided by Parliament.
(3) Wherever the Minister has expended any sum in the capital improvement of any undertaking the owners of the undertaking shall be liable to pay to the Minister the unexhausted value of such expenditure at the end of the before-mentioned period, if and so far as such expenditure is not covered by the payments to be made by the owners under the preceding provisions of this section and that value shall, in default of agreement., be determined by the Railway and Canal Commission.
(4) The owners of the undertaking may satisfy any payment due from them under this section by creating a charge in favour of the Treasury upon the undertaking to such amount and in such form and with such priority as may be agreed, or, in case of difference, may be settled by the Railway and Canal Commission, who shall have due regard to the rights and interests of all parties concerned, but the charge so created shall in no case take priority to any capital raised by loan or debenture stock issued by the owners of the undertaking.
(5) Any claim by a railway company against the Government for compensation in respect of the exercise by the Board of Trade of any powers over or in respect of the undertaking in pursuance of section sixteen of the Regulation of the Forces Act, 1831, or with the consent of the railway company, or otherwise, may be determined by the Railway and Canal Commission in like manner as if it were a claim arising under this section, and the Minister was the person liable to satisfy the claim.
(6) The Minister shall indemnify, and keep indemnified, the owners of any undertaking of which or of any part of which, or of any plant of which possession has been retained or taken against all actions, claims, and demands made in respect of loss or injury alleged to be caused by the carrying out of any directions given by the Minister under section three of this Act:
Provided that where the loss or injury is clue to the breach of any contractual obligation the Minister shall not be liable under this provision unless before carrying out the directions the owners of the undertaking have given written notice to the Minister of the existence of the obligation.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY LORD STUART OF WORTLEY moved, in subsection (1), to leave out from the beginning of paragraph (b) to "the" ["the natural growth"]. The noble Lord said: I move the omission of these words, as I do not see any usefulness in the distinction which the paragraph as it stands proposes to draw. In fact I think it might, by the operation of the maxim expressio unius exclusio alterius, have an unfair effect.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 23, leave out from the beginning of paragraph (b) to ("the") in line 25.—(Lord Stuart of Wortley.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The words proposed to be left out confine the advantage of the natural growth of traffic to those companies which before possession was taken by the Government had not paid a dividend of 4 per cent. By striking out the words you will give the natural growth of the undertaking to all railway companies That is the effect of the noble Lord's Amendment; I think it; is quite reasonable, and I am prepared to accept it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKE LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKE moved, in subsection (1),at the end of paragraph (b), to insert: "including in the case of any undertaking which had not before possession was taken by the Government paid a dividend out of revenue of 4 per cent. on its ordinary capital, any traffic which has been transferred to such company during the period of possession by the Government by reason of the natural advantages of its route."
The noble Lord said: On behalf of the smaller railway companies, I beg to move the Amendment which stands in my name. As the Amendment of Lord Stuart of Wortley has been accepted, the smaller railway companies will lose the identity
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which was given to them in the House of Commons under this subsection—that is to say, when it becomes a question of compensation there will be no direct instruction to the arbitrator to take into consideration the case of a small struggling, but at the same time necessary, railway. I understand that the Amendment which I move receives the assent of the larger railway companies, and I urge it upon the noble Earl in charge of the Bill because it will bring to the special notice of the arbitrator the position of the smaller companies who were not earning a 4 per cent. dividend before the Bill. It is evident from the debates in the House of Commons that it was their intention that the position of these companies should receive consideration. The words which Lord Stuart has succeeded in getting your Lordships to strike out were inserted in the House of Commons in order that that special consideration might be given by the arbitrator to the smaller companies.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 26, after ("undertaking"), insert the said words.—(Lord Willoughby de Broke.)
THE EARL OF BESSBOROUGH: Perhaps I may be permitted to say that those whom I represent have no objection to the Amendment as moved by my noble friend Lord Willoughby de Broke.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am sorry I cannot accept this Amendment. I am not quite clear, from the noble Lord's speech, why he has moved it. He seems to me to be under seine misapprehension. He stated that by accepting just now an Amendment by Lord Stuart of Wortley I was taking something away from the smaller railway companies. I was not doing that. I was merely giving to the larger railway companies the same concession as was asked for in the House of Commons by the smaller railway companies. There is no advantage to the smaller companies in being distinct from the larger companies, except so far as a certain concession has been given to them. That concession remains.
Now we are asked to go further and say that if a company can prove that it had not been able to obtain the natural advantages of its route, that matter should be taken into consideration when compensation is being considered. Apart from the fact that these words would be ex-

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tremely difficult to define, I would point out that if the company had any special advantage in its route before it was taken over by the Minister, that of course is not interfered with by anything which may subsequently follow.
It would appear, however, that what is asked for here is compensation for special advantages of the route which were shown to exist during the period when the undertaking was worked by the Minister. If it was an advantage which did not appear before the undertaking was taken over by the Minister, then it is something for which no compensation should be paid. To say that a certain advantage which was discovered during the period when the undertaking was being worked by the Minister should entitle the undertaking to compensation when the railway is handed back, is to ask for something for which I do not think the companies for which the noble Lord speaks are really entitled to ask. For these masons I cannot accept the Amendment.
LORD WILLOUGHBY DE BROKE: I do not propose to press the Amendment now, but I may bring it up again upon Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The next Amendment, standing in my name, is drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 34, leave out ("payments") and insert ("compensation").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY LORD STUART OF WORTLEY moved, at the end of subsection (5), to insert: "Where as the result of any direction of the Minister under section 3, paragraph 1 (c) any undertaking, whether coming within the scope of that section or not, is prejudicially affected by such direction, fair and reasonable compensation shall be paid by the Minister to the owner of such undertaking, and the amount of such compensation failing agreement shall be determined by the Railway and Canal Commission having regard to all the circumstances of the case."
The noble Lord said: I move this Amendment in the interests of non-controlled undertakings and the non-controlled undertakings, of course, in the cases contemplated by my Amendment, are
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third parties, outsiders to the transaction. Your Lordships are perfectly aware that a long course of Parliamentary practice and procedure—which, whatever else may be said of it, is considered to be the justest and most incorruptible of any administration that is known—has decided that parties affected injuriously, or whose property is damaged, by the Private Bill legislation of either House for the purpose of giving powers to undertakings, have a locus standi and a right to claim compensation. Now, here we have a Minister—with Parliamentary authority it is true, but still a Minister who is nothing but a Minister—who is going to be put in the place, in a great many cases, of Parliamentary Committees who decide private Bills. My Amendment merely claims the same sort of right to compensation or payment or indemnification for injurious affection, or severance of property, or the like results and that parties should have the right to appear and claim against being injured in that sort of way.
In order that I may give an example of what might happen to the non-controlled undertakings, suppose the Minister gives some direction as regards the controlled undertakings with reference to wages, and says that they must pay more wages, or with reference to hours, it necessarily follows as a consequence that the uncontrolled undertakings may have to raise their wages and curtail their hours. In the case of the controlled undertakings they get compensation from the Government but the uncontrolled undertakings are not in the same fortunate position. It may be that the noble Earl will say that my Amendment provides nothing corresponding to the Standing Orders of Parliament for regulating the rules of locus standi or defining cases in which locus standi should be given to claimants for injurious affection, but I think I am entitled to say that that is not my fault. It is not I who am making this arbitrary proposal to substitute the uncontrolled will of a Minister for the elaborately devised procedure of private Bill legislation, and I respectfully submit., if injury is likely to be caused to third parties, that the procedure for preventing that injury should be devised by those who propose to set up the machinery by which it is likely to be caused.
Therefore, I think that where the uncontrolled undertaking is obliged, by the analogy of the action taken by the Minister, to put itself in a worse position pecuniarily

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than it was before, without receiving that compensation from the State which the controlled undertakings have been receiving, that case ought to be taken into consideration. I mentioned wages and hours. I should have mentioned also that fares might very well be reduced with a like consequence or that the policy of the Minister might, on a certain controlled undertaking, be to raise the rates of goods and not to raise them on passengers, in order to direct goods traffic on to one line and passengers on to another. All this might have a reflected effect on the finance of the uncontrolled undertaking with, as I venture to submit to your Lordships, very great unfairness to them. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, after line 14, insert the said words.—(Lord Stuart of Wortley.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I do not think the noble Lord can have appreciated the effect of the Amendment he is moving. He is asking that a right to claim compensation shall be given to any undertaking in any part of the country, whether coming within the scope of this Bill or not, if they can put; forward a claim of being prejudically affected by any direction which the Minister may give under his powers in this Bill. The noble Lord himself has given one illustration. Supposing, as the result of the control of the Minister, the wages of railway employees are increased, the noble Lord has suggested that any undertaking of the country should have a claim for compensation on the ground that the rate of labour has been increased and consequently they have to pay more for labour in their undertaking. But I will give another instance which is absolutely certain to arise. There is not a single undertaking in this country which will not be affected by an increase in rates. Does the noble Lord really suggest that, if railway rates are increased through the action of the Minister, any undertaking has a right to come forward and claim compensation because their costs have been increased by the increased railway rates. That is what the Amendment says. It is really an impossible suggestion and I do not believe your Lordships will accept it. Clause 8, dealing with the whole question of compensation, has been thoroughly considered between the Treasury, the railway companies, and the Government, and has been inserted in the Bill as an agreed clause.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY: Agreed with the controlled undertakings.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Quite so. I am not willing to consider any alterations to the scale of compensation to those undertakings which will be affected. When the noble Lord says that the Government is to compensate any undertaking in the country which may claim to be affected by any action the Minister has taken he is really asking for something which I do not think your Lordships will agree to.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE moved, immediately before the proviso in subsection (6), to insert "The Minister shall also indemnify and keep indemnified the owners of any harbour, dock or pier undertaking against all actions, claims and demands made in respect of loss or injury alleged to be caused by the carrying out of any requirements contained in any Order made by the Minister under section four of this Act." The noble Lord said: The object of this Amendment is to give to docks and harbours which may be acting under an Order of the Minister the same indemnity against claims as is given to undertakings which are taken possession of. If it is fair to give this indemnity in the one case; I submit it is fair to give it in the other.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 20, at end insert the said words.—(Lord Ritchie of Dundee.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I accept the Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 8, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 9:
Power to establish transport services.
9.—(1) It shall be lawful for the Minister to establish and work transport services by land or water, and to acquire either by agreement or compulsorily such land or easements or rights in or over land, to construct such works, and to do all such other things as may be necessary for the purpose:
Provided that—

(i) no new transport undertaking shall be established by the Ministry until an estimate of the capital expenditure required to complete it has been approved by the Treasury;

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(ii) If such estimate as in the preceding paragraph provided in connection with the establishment of any such service is likely to involve a total capital expenditure exceeding half a million pounds, or the acquisition of land compulsorily, or the breaking up of any roads, the Minister shall not exercise his powers unless authorised to do so by Order in Council a draft whereof has been approved by a resolution passed by both Houses of Parliament, and the Order may incorporate the provisions of the Lands Clauses Acts, subject to such modifications as may be specified in the Order, being modifications of those Acts made or authorised to be made by the Development and Road Improvements Funds Act, 1909, or any other enactment, and the Order may also incorporate or apply any enactments relating to the construction and maintenance of the works in question

(iii) where it appears to the Minister that the establishment of any such service could properly be undertaken by the owners of ally existing undertaking, the Minister shall not himself establish the service without first giving to such owners an opportunity of establishing the service, and where such an opportunity is given to the owner of an undertaking of which possession has been retained or taken under section three of this Act and those owners prefer that the establishment of the service should be undertaken by themselves rather than by the Minister, they may require the Minister to give them directions under that section to that effect, but shall not be deemed to have thereby concurred in those directions; and

(iv) the Minister shall not after two years from the passing of this Act, unless Parliament otherwise determines, commence the construction of any new works, or provide equipment for ally transport service not established before that date.

(2) The expenses of working services established by the Minister under this section, shall be paid out of the revenues derived therefrom, and the Minister shall keep such accounts of the receipts from and expenditure on the undertakings and in such form, and those accounts shall be audited in such manner as the Treasury may prescribe.
THE EARL OF LYTTON THE EARL OF LYTTON moved, in subsection (1), after "It shall be lawful for the Minister to establish and" to insert "either by himself or through any other person to." The noble Earl said: I propose to insert these words to enable the Minister to work through the agency of an existing undertaking. I have already explained that where it is possible to work through an existing undertaking the Minister does not wish to work the undertaking
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himself. The insertion of these words are to give him power to work through the agency of other bodies.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 26, after ("and") insert ("either by himself or through any other person to").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (1), after "transport services by land or water," to insert "subject to a Provisional Order to be laid on the Table of the House for thirty days during the session of Parliament." The noble Lord said: This clause gives the Minister power to establish new services by land and water, and it gives such wide powers that it is conceivable, if you take into consideration the sum of money which he is enabled to spend on any one service, he may do anything in the nature of establishing competitive services to existing undertakings. Parliament has always proceeded in these matters by Provisional Order, or Private Bill legislation. If this clause is passed in its present form the Minister can start any number of services without the knowledge of Parliament and without previous enquiry to the great detriment of existing undertakings. I see no reason why Parliament should be deprived of its present rights of control over new projects of great magnitude. Vast schemes may be undertaken before Parliament, or the public, is aware of them, and before you can ascertain public opinion or consult the interests affected. The safeguard which some people find in subsection (2) is, in my opinion, not effective. The Minister can start a number of new services and only make a slight difference between each. He might start a series of companies running into many millions of pounds without any effective check, so long as they do not exceed £500,000 each.
I should be glad if the Government will give us some indication of their views on this important clause. It is the first time the Government has had the power of initiating and starting new services in opposition to existing services. They have the power of the tax payer behind them and can run any services they like. They could start a road transport service at lower fares, bearing the loss out of the Consolidated Fund, and kill private enterprise altogether. It is a dangerous clause and

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I hope some amendment will be made. It would meet some objection if the Government would agree that these new services should be subject to Provisional Order. It would give a little time for the scheme to be examined. I raise the point here in order that we may obtain from the Government some declaration on the clause.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 27, after ("water") insert ("subject to a Provisional Order to be laid on the Table of the House for thirty days during the session of Parliament").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I do not know Whether the noble Lord really means Provisional Order, because his speech rather suggested that he was speaking of an Order to lie on the Table of the House, and Provisional Order means a Bill.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: That is what I should like, if I could get it.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is quite obvious that I cannot accept the Amendment. Perhaps the noble Lord is not aware of the limitations which already exist in this clause upon new services which the Minister may start. Before he can start any service, if the total cost of it will exceed £500,000, or if it involves the acquisition of land and the breaking up of roads, he has first to obtain a Resolution passed by both Houses of Parliament authorising him to do so. The only services, therefore, which do not come under that would be services upon the roads, or a barge service on a canal. The effect of the Amendment (if it were an Order to lie on the table of the House) would be to say that in every service, whether it is subject to those limitations or not, a Provisional Order would have to be obtained, and procedure by Bill. It would mean that the Minister would be unable to start an omnibus service on the roads; unable to start an experimental motor lorry service; unable to start a barge service upon a canal, without obtaining a Provisonal Order. I hope that your Lordships will feel that the safeguards already in the Bill are sufficient to protect the public interest, and that the Private Bill Procedure which the noble Lord proposes to apply to these very small and moderate services is really not required.
LORD EMMOTT: I do not know whether, after what the noble Earl has said, the noble Lord desires to press his Amendment. I merely rise for the, purpose of suggesting that later on there are Amendments, in the shape of new clauses, standing in the names of Lord Oranmore and Browne and of myself, which raise an alternative method of giving careful consideration to any large scheme which, in the opinion of what I might call a judicial authority, ought to be brought forward as a Bill before Parliament and not go on simply administratively under the hand of the Minister. I do not want to discuss the matter now, but the proposals which Lord Oranmore and Browne and I are making are that, where objection is raised on account of the magnitude of the measure proposed by the Minister, consideration should be given to the objections by the Lord Chairman and the Chairman of Ways and Means in another place, and that they should decide, somewhat on the basis of decisions in the case of Provisional Orders in Scottish legislation, whether the matter should go on as a Bill or be dealt with by the Minister.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I think the Amendments to which Lord Emmott refers deal with the acquisition of land under existing undertakings by order of the Minister, and do not apply to acquisition by the Minister himself under Clause 9.
LORD EMMOTT: The Amendment I mean applies to Clauses 9 and 3 (1) (d).
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I think there is something in what the noble Earl has said in answer to this Amendment, but I should like him to realise upon what extraordinary ground the Government is going. I do not know whether my noble friend intends to press his Amendment, but I hope that when we reach the Amendment of the noble Lord below the gangway it will be pressed. The noble Earl said that in any large undertaking which the Minister starts you will have the protection of a Resolution of both Houses of Parliament, and he seemed to think he had really smashed the whole argument by that. Why, my Lords, the noble Earl seems to have wiped out of his mind all the traditional procedure which in this country has been thought necessary in order to protect the public and private

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rights. Of course the whole of our procedure has been this, that Parliament in its wisdom has prescribed that everything of this kind is to go before a committee, that the committee is to have witnesses and the assistance of counsel, and, acting in a judicial capacity, it is to arrive at a conclusion. The noble Earl substitutes for that a resolution of both House of Parliament. In the first place Parliament hears no evidence, it knows little about the matter, and it has no counsel to put the matter clearly before it, and only has ordinary parliamentary speakers like ourselves. Lastly, instead of deciding in a judicial spirit, when the Division comes the bells will ring, all the members will come in from the Terrace, where they have been having tea, and they will come into the House of Commons and say to the Government Whips, "Which side?" They will then vote the Resolution.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: What will they do in your Lordships' House?
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I do not think it is becoming for me to speak in too high terms of ourselves, but I think that we certainly are a more judicial body than the House of Commons, and at any rate we do not stream in from tea on the Terrace. I should think that most of your Lordships who are attending are present listening to the debate; but in the House of Commons what happens is notorious. My point is that the Resolution of the House of Commons will not be in any sense a judicial decision, but an ordinary voto, and if the Minister-Designate is interested he will see that the Government Whips are put on, and there is no doubt which way the Division will go. I want the Government to realise how utterly they are departing from the old British sense of fair play and judicial decision in promoting this Bill. As regards the particular Amendment, there is no doubt that if carried it will be so much in the teeth of the Government proposal that perhaps it would be 'impossible to expect the Government to accept it. I do not ask my noble friend to press his Amendment, but I do say that when we come to the Amendment to which Lord Emmett referred, unless the Government can make a concession there I think we shall have departed from the last shred of our regard for the good old English practice.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I add this point? The noble Earl in answering me talked about "comparatively small undertakings." It shows how we have lost our sense of financial proportion. Small undertakings up to half a million were not thought to be small, but rather large, when I went to Westminster twenty-eight years ago.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: There is another limitation. It must be an undertaking which does not involve the acquisition of land or the breaking up of roads.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: There is another thing which I have in mind. First of all transport services by road may be started in opposition to existing undertakings. I will assume that a new omnibus service is started in London. He can put on a service of 500 vehicles for half a million of money, and a subsidiary company can be started with another half million in another area. It gives very wide financial powers. Then there is another point. At present the Road Board has power to make a new road and take a space each side of the road of 220 yards. Does that power pass to the Minister? That is a point which requires an answer, because it affects largely the acquisition of land. Another point is that there is nobody to represent the interest of road transport at all, and therefore 'bus services or road services, or whatever they are, might be started entirely in the railway interest and might entirely conflict with private enterprise and in fact entirely kill it. I think we might have an answer from the Government on those two points.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: We are dealing here with the starting of new services, and I do not think the noble Lord suggests that the Road Board has power to put any new service on the roads. The making of a new road is another matter, and any such powers will pass to the Minister, but that will not enable him to start any new service except under Clause 9 and subject to the limitation I have mentioned.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: As I understand that this comes on later, I will not press the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendments moved—
Page 15, lines 28 and 29, leave out ("or rights in or over land")
Page 15, line 32, leave out ("undertaking") and insert ("service").
Page 15, line 33, leave out ("Ministry") and insert ("Minister")
Page 15, lines 38 and 39, leave out ("is likely to involve a total capital expenditure exceeding") and insert ("exceeds").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (1) (ii), to leave out "half a million" and insert "fifty thousand." The noble Lord said: I do not know how far this raises the question of privilege of the other House, but I would ask whether it is not wise to limit the power to start a new service to the extent to which that could be done by the expenditure of £50,000. For any rural service which could be started is it likely that you would want a sum exceeding £50,000? I am frightened by the sum of £500,000. I think that it would lead the Minister on to extravagance. It is a very large sum of money to give to a Minister, and to leave its expenditure by him uncontrolled. There is no protection. I do not say that the Minister would make a wasteful use of the money, but this uncontrolled expenditure is a serious thing in the state in which the country's finances now are. It is mainly on the ground of economy that I move that the sum be reduced from £500,000 to £50,000.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 39, leave out ("half a million") and insert ("fifty thousand").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am glad of the opportunity which this Amendment gives of explaining a matter that I think is not yet appreciated by your Lordships, and certainly is not appreciated outside this House. This limitation of £500,000 which is imposed on the Minister has, I think, been the cause of more misunderstanding than anything else in the Bill. It is generally assumed and argued, because a limitation of £500,000 is imposed upon the Minister, that therefore any expenditure of money up to that sum is withdrawn from Parliamentary control. That is the point which the noble Marquess Lord Salisbury dealt with on Second Reading, and I ventured to correct him then. I am not sure even now that I have made it clear that no sum
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of money which, the Minister may spend is withdrawn from Parliamentary control With regard to all the expenditure under Clause 9, the Minister is subject to precisely the same Parliamentary control as any other Minister—that is to say, he cannot spend any money until he has submitted his estimates to Parliament, and they have been approved by Parliament.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: He very often spends it before.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: He can spend it before if he gets the leave of the Treasury, but he is in the same position as any other Minister. We are not putting the Minister in this Bill in any better position than any other Minister from the point of view of the control of his finance. On the contrary, we are placing a limitation upon him which is not placed upon any other Minister, because we are saying that he is not even to include in his estimates, and come to Parliament for leave to spend, money exceeding £500,000 on any one service. It is as if you were to say to the First Lord of the Admiralty to-day, "You shall not spend more than three million pounds upon a battleship without getting special authorisation from the House of Commons to do so." That would not mean that you were withdrawing the control of the House of Commons over any expenditure up to that sum. It simply would mean that if he has to spend store, than that sum upon a particular ship he has to be authorised by Parliament to do so. What is stated here is that if the Minister proposes to start a new service of such magnitude that it shall involve expenditure of more than £500,000 he has to go to Parliament and obtain a Resolution from both Houses authorising him to do so. I do not know if I have now made the point clear, but I think your Lordships will understand that far from this having the effect of withdrawing Parliamentary control it gives much more Parliamentary control over this Minister than Parliament to-day possesses over any other Minister.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I frankly admit that the noble Earl was quite right to correct me when I made my first statement, which was quite inaccurate. I make that admission fully to the noble Earl, but I think he is pressing his point much too far. It is true, of course, that

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no Minister can spend any money which is not voted by Parliament. That is to say, if he does spend it he spends it with the possibility that the House of Commons may afterwards differ from him, and then there will have to be some arrangement made whereby at any rate that particular sum will be got from the country and he will not be allowed to spend any more afterwards on the same object. As a matter of fact I have never heard of a Minister being surcharged the amount of money he has spent without leave of Parliament. The real truth is that the power of this financial control is immensely exaggerated. The old theory of the House of Commons having control over it is by modern practice a great deal infringed. Not only does the Minister very often spend the money on the chance that it will be approved, but also a great part of the estimates—this was so in my time in the House of Commons—are not discussed in Parliament at all, but are closured in the end in a great mass. I believe there is some arrangement in the present Session under which the estimates go to a Committee, and no doubt that is a great improvement.
The other point that I want to make is this. The real distinction of this Bill and this Minister from other Bills and other Ministers is that the Government have created for the first time a new spending Department which is not a spending Department belonging to the great Public Service. Here the Government is for the first time entering into a trading system on their own account by which they are going to spend public money. That makes a great difference. If anything of the kind had been in the mind of Parliament before, each separate action of the Minister would have been the subject of a separate Parliamentary Bill. So far from the Resolution being a very special form of control, it is very much less than would have been the case in analogous cases up to now, because there would have been not only a special Resolution in Ways and Means, but there would also have been a special Bill, which would have had to pass through Parliament before the money could be spent. For that is substituted this one Resolution. It is not incorrect to say that this means a tremendous relaxation of Parliamentary control over finance, and it is a precedent which I believe your Lordships will see reason very much to regret in the future.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I point out that the Minister can start any service so long as its cost does not exceed £500,000, and if he is a Minister with a powerful Government. behind him he would be certain of getting Parliamentary sanction. The whole difference between the Admiralty and this Ministry is this. This is to set up a huge trading concern which is going to sell the facilities of transport. So far as it applies to railways it is reasonable, because the Government are providing the dividends to the shareholders of the railway companies on the basis of 1913, but as regards the other kind of transport service—the transport service of local omnibus companies, and similar undertakings—they have not got any security whatever, and he may absolutely kill all these undertakings. Even if I do not press this Amendment I want the House to understand that a Minister who is supported by the Government may set up services to compete with private services up to the extent of £500,000. The Bill enables him to do that practically without control, and it enables him to have £500,000 for the purposes of State trading just as if the State were going to take up any other form of service, such as steamships. If the Legislature as a whole decides that that is a wise thing to do, I have nothing more to say, but we should realise that in doing this we are allowing the Minister to set up a huge system of State trading in transport, which will inevitably kill all private enterprise.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I desire to move what I think the noble Earl will agree is a mere drafting Amendment—to insert after "land" the words "or easements," easements being for many purposes of equal value.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I accept the Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 1, after ("land") insert ("or easements").—(Lord Bledisloe.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURY THE EARL OF MALMESBURY moved to insert, as a new paragraph:
"(v) It shall be the duty of the Minister in respect of any service established and worked by him, or of which he has

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taken possession to provide all such due and reasonable facilities for the receiving and forwarding, and delivery of traffic as under the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts a railway and canal company is bound to provide; and for the purpose of enforcing this duty the Railway and Canal Commission shall have power to award damages and determine all other questions relating to such facilities."
The noble Earl said: Under this Bill, as far as I can see, there is no guarantee that the Minister of Transport must give a good service to the public, and when this clause was discussed in the House of Commons it was considered one of very great importance. The hon. Member who moved this Amendment is not only a very active Member of the House of Commons but is also a lawyer, and in his speech he said they could not allow the Bill to leave the House of Commons, giving the Minister power to control the transport services by land or by water, without his having any statutory obligation to deal with the problem. I have looked through this Bill and I have been unable to discover any clause by which the Minister of Transport would have to provide an efficient service. Although I have not any fear of the efficiency and the good intentions of the Minister-designate, nevertheless we know perfectly well that the life of an official is somewhat circumscribed, and it is quite possible that in the re-adjustment of offices we might have a Minister who would not have the same experience of railways as Sir Eric Geddes.
The Bill leaves too much discretion to the Minister and not enough obligation. In a private contract you generally insist upon having some clause which will protect you, even though it may never be put into operation, and I hope the noble Earl in charge of the Bill will be willing to make this concession. In the House of Commons it had very considerable support, and ninety-one Members voted for it and only 208 against it. If this subsection is added it will in no way destroy the power of the Minister of Transport; on the contrary, it will to a certain extent compensate for what a very large number of the public feel and think, that the Government's action in taking over the whole of the transport of the country by this Bill was unnecessary.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 34, at end, insert the said new paragraph.—(The Earl of Malmesbury.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: This Amendment gives me an opportunity of replying to one or two of the points made by the noble Marquess Lord Salisbury on the last Amendment. It enables me to point out to your Lordships what is the difference between the Government in regard to the services which will be started under this clause and any private undertaking trading for profit. The noble Marquess pointed out that for a great many years Parliament has laid down the provisions which should apply to any company which desires to start a service, whether a railway or a tramway or any other undertaking of the kind and he showed that the Government was going to be free front those conditions which Parliament has imposed upon trading companies.
The subject raised in this Amendment is another difference between the Government in its transport undertaking and, say, a railway company. If a railway company comes to Parliament and obtains statutory rights to acquire land and lay down a railway, then Parliament places upon that company an obligation to provide such due reasonable services to traders as the noble Earl wants to insert by this Amendment. But there is all the difference in the world between the services which will be undertaken by the Government under this clause and the services of a railway company to-day.
In the first place the Minister will only start a new service under Clause 9 if it has first been offered to an existing undertaking, and the existing undertaking has refused. That is to say, he will only start a service where an existing undertaking has shown that it would not be profitable for them to do it as a trading company. Secondly, a trading company, coming to Parliament and obtaining powers to start a transport service, obtains a monopoly, and it is only right and proper that, if a railway company obtains these powers to the exclusion of anybody else, Parliament should put upon them the obligation of continuing reasonable facilities. But in this case the Minister will be undertaking this service, not to the exclusion of anybody else, but in default of anybody else, and it will only be because a service is necessary—let us say, a light railway for the purpose of developing a district from an agricultural point of view, or for carrying out some housing scheme. Say the Ministry of Health approaches the Minister of Trans-

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port and asks for a new service in order to assist an urgent housing scheme. The Minister of Transport will then endeavour to get that service established by some existing undertaking, and if the existing undertaking says, "It will not be profitable for us to start such an undertaking," then and then only would the Minister come in and start the service. Therefore he would not be working as a company would be working which had obtained a monopoly from Parliament; he would be operating the service only in the default of any other undertaking. For those reasons I think it is desirable that the Government should resist this Amendment; and it is unreasonable to say that, when the Government is only undertaking a non-profitable service for public objects in default of any other undertaking, it is to be subject to all the obligations of providing reasonable facilities, and so forth.
Let me point out to the noble Earl that if this is inserted in the Bill the following situation might arise. The Minister might only have asked permission from Parliament to make provision for establishing, say, a tramway or light railway system. If hereafter the Railway and Canal Commission were to impose further obligations upon the Minister in the matter of reasonable facilities, as the noble Earl suggests, then the Minister might be in the position that he would be called upon by the Railway and Canal Commission to do something for which Parliament had made no provision and for which, therefore, he would have no funds. I hope I have explained to your Lordships that the difference between the conditions under which the Minister will operate such a service and the conditions under which an existing undertaking does so to-day are sufficient to justify the difference between the two which is provided for in the Bill.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: I do not know whether the two noble Lords who have put this Amendment on the Paper will desire to press it. I think possibly not. But the particular arguments which have been used by the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, impel me to make this comment. It appears to me that all the arguments used by Lord Lytton would be very sound if the railways are being permanently taken over and nationalised. It is true that where a national service is carried on private individuals are not in a position to make representations compelling the provision
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of particular advantages to them. Where the Post Office does not seem to provide sufficient postal or telegraphic facilities to a particular neighbourhood, those who consider that they are not adequately served may make frantic private representations, or they may make the Member of Parliament for their constituency put pressure upon the Postmaster-General; but they have no grievance which can be sustained in a Court of law or elsewhere.
No doubt if all these services are going to be definitely national the same state of things will exist. But we are perpetually being told that this is a two-years measure. Personally I am in agreement with the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury; and it seems to me quite as unlikely that at the end of two years the railway position will revert to what it was before the war as I should ever have supposed that the county councils were likely to be abolished in favour of a return to government by Quarter Sessions. But still we have to take the terms of the Bill as they are. The terms of the Bill being what they are, it seems to me that if the provisions of the measure are to be regarded as in that sense transient there is surely something to be said for continuing for the time being with the Government Department the same kind of obligations which are now imposed upon the private trading concerns, of the statutory returns from which the noble Earl has given an accurate description. Therefore the Amendment which has been moved by the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury, is, I think—for the reasons I have tried to give—somewhat more reasonable in character than the noble Earl. Lord Lytton, has endeavoured to show.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I think this is an Amendment upon which the Government should be prepared to give way. I do not know whether they have been advised as to the position which might arise. The Amendment is designed to give to private and commercial users of railway and canal services set up by the Minister the same rights as those that they have in connection with the existing rail ways and canals under the Railway and Canal Traffic Acts. Under proviso (iii), if an existing undertaking is taken over it will be bound to provide certain facilities and to undertake certain liabilities. The important point is this. If the Ministers establishes a totally new service he has no duties to provide any facilities and the

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user of the new service has no rights. Any redress, as the law stands to-day, will be an act of grace and not a matter of right. If the Minister establishes a new service either by land or water (or whatever it is) he should be in exactly the same position as with an existing undertaking. Is the Minister going to say that people can sue him only as an act of grace?
Then it is said that these services may be only temporary. Lots of services are only temporary. But if the service is temporary, why should that prevent the Minister from undertaking his proper liabilities. Sir Edward Carson, whose authority can hardly be disputed, said that if the Minister took over an existing railway he was liable to the Railway Acts, but that if he started a new railway he was not. If the Minister takes over the London and North Western Railway he has to take over their liabilities and duties, but if he starts a new railway company he has no powers and no duties, which seems to be manifestly unfair.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Some of us have had experience of what it is like to be in the hands of the Government when they have control of the railways, and unless this Amendment is passed some of us will suffer severely. When the Government were obliged to control railways they acted most unequally in certain cases. I remember the whole of one district being absolutely denuded of coal in the middle of winter for three or four weeks, yet other supplies which seemed not nearly so necessary were forwarded. If the Minister substitutes one service for another, surely he ought to be bound to give all due facilities in the new service which he does in the old. The very fact that he has got the whole control of the old service seems to me to make it incumbent upon him to put the new one in the same position. I think the noble Earl is foreseeing difficulties which are not likely to arise if the thing is fairly worked. We hold that the Minister should be in all respects the locum tenens of those whom he at present represents, and that the Department should be subject to the same pressure as has been found necessary in regard to existing railway companies. I hope that my noble friend will insist on his Amendment.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am afraid the noble Viscount did not hear the arguments I used just now, because he has stated that the Government ought to be
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in all respects in exactly the same position as the existing railway companies. My argument went to show that the Government is in an entirely different position from the railway companies, and that is how we justified the different treatment. I pointed out that a railway company coming to Parliament asks for a monopoly. It is obviously necessary and desirable that if you give to a trading company a monopoly to trade in a particular district you should place it under this obligation. The Government will be in a totally different position. It will not act to the exclusion of any trading company because before the Minister can start a transport service he must be satisfied that no existing undertaking is willing to do so. That places him in a totally different category. Then again he is not doing this for profit; he is undertaking a service on public grounds, it may be for the purpose of developing housing or developing an agricultural district. These services will be started only where no existing company can be found to undertake them. The fact that the Minister is in a totally different position, I think, justifies the different procedure which we ask for. I think it would be altogether unreasonable to say that the Minister who starts a non-profitable service on public grounds is to be placed in exactly the same position as a company that has obtained a monopoly right from Parliament and is working for its own profit. I am sure that if the noble Viscount had heard those arguments he would have felt there was justification for the attitude of the Government.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Surely the noble Earl does not contend that the Government are not going to create a monopoly. They will have a monopoly exactly the same as the railway company have. What I am afraid of is that the Minister will establish services on the roads and otherwise which might have been taken up by private companies and he is not to be subject to the same disabilities. I do not think it is fair.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: He cannot start them, under the words of the Bill until existing undertakings have had an opportunity to do so. It is only when they refuse that he will start them at all.
On Question, whether the proposed new paragraph shall stand part of the clause?—
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 27; Not-Contents, 31.

CONTENTS

Northumberland, D.

Chaplin, V.

Forester, L.

Hood, V.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Crewe, M.

Salisbury, M.

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

O'Hagan, L.

Clanwilliam, L. (E. Clanwilliam.)

Redesdale, L.

Brassey, E.

Crawshaw, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Lindsay, E.

Denman, L.

Rotherham, L.

Malmesbury, E. [Teller.]

Elgin, L. (E. Elgin and Kincardine.)

Sandys, L.

Morton, E.

Sydenham, L.

Stanhope, E.

Erskine, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L. [Teller.]

Wicklow, E.

Farrer, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Bradford, E.

Milner, V.

Hylton, L. [Teller.]

Chesterfield, E.

Peel, V.

Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)

Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

Lee of Fareham, L.

Ludlow, L.

Eldon, E.

Annesley, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Jersey, E.

Bledisloe, L.

Queenborough, L.

Lytton, E.

Chalmers, L.

Ranksborough, L.

Cochrane of Cults, L.

Shandon, L.

Colebrooke, L.

Somerleyton, L. [Teller.]

Sandhurst, V. (L. Chamberlain.)

Fairfax of Cameron, L.

Stuart of Wortley, L.

Churchill, V.

Faringdon, L.

Wigan, L. (E. Crawford.)

Goschen, V.

Gisborough, L.

Wittenham, L.

Resolved in the negative, and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
THE EARL OF LYTTON THE EARL OF LYTTON moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "The expenses of working services established by the Minister under this section," and to insert "The Minister or other person working a service established under this section may charge such rates, fares, tolls, and charges in connection therewith as may be prescribed by the Minister, and the expenses of working such services."
The noble Earl said: This is little more than a drafting Amendment, but it requires a word of explanation. It is not quite clear in the Bill whether the power to work also gives the power to charge. I think it is obvious that the power to charge is inherent in the power to work, but in case there should be any doubt on the subject, these words are inserted to show that the Minister shall have the power to charge as well as the power to work.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, lines 35 and 36, leave out ("The expenses of working services established by the Minister under this section") and insert the proposed words.—(The Earl of Lytton.)
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: As I understand, what the Government seek to do is to make the Minister quite independent of any check in respect of any services started by the Government. Is that so? Does my noble friend intend
that there should be no check upon the tolls, fares, rates, and so on, which the Minister establishes in respect of the particular undertakings which he initiates? I should certainly have thought that the right thing would be that these rates, fares, tolls and charges should be subject to the advice of the Committee, just as they are in the case of any other undertaking. I do not understand why the noble Earl draws a distinction between the two. Perhaps he will explain.
I might have misinterpreted his Amendment but, as I understand it, the effect would be that, whereas any change in the fares, rates and tolls in respect of undertakings controlled by the Government would have to come before the Advisory Committee, these would not have to come before the Committee. That appears to me very anomalous. Why should that distinction be drawn? It is rather an important matter because it is quite easy to see that by changes in the rates the Minister might compel other people to follow him. By changing rates on lines which he himself has started, he might, by competition, force others to accept his decision although, in normal circumstances, the matter would have had to go before the Advisory Committee. I should have thought that the proposal was not quite so simple as the Government perhaps think. If I am wrong I hope the noble Earl will interrupt me and I will sit down at once.
If I am right in saying that the effect is to withdraw from the cognisance of the Advisory Committee fares and tolls in respect of these particular transport services, I think it is an unfairness, and also I think the public will have some right to protest. Here we have an Advisory Committee about which your Lordships have taken a great deal of trouble. It is not a mere colourable Advisory Committee. It is a real Committee, representative of all the interests involved, and it does seem to me that such a body as that ought to have cognisance not merely of the fares and rates in the controlled undertakings but also in the Government-owned undertakings. If the Government would promise to reconsider it before the next; stage I would not press the matter any further, but if not I shall ask the Government to explain how they defend this discrimination.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Perhaps I had better make it quite clear why the Amendment is moved. If your Lordships will look on page 16, line n, you will see in subsection (2) that—
"The expenses of working services established by the Minister under this section shall be paid out of the revenue derived therefrom,"
but it is not clear that there will be any revenue derived therefrom. There can be no revenue unless the Minister has a right to charge rates, tolls and dues. Therefore, this is merely put in to ensure that the Minister shall be able to get revenue from the undertakings which he establishes. I did not think it necessary to explain that the rates on the services started by the Ministry would not come under the Committee who advised the Minister on the rates of existing undertakings, because the whole of my remarks on the previous Amendment were devoted to showing that the services of the Minister and the services of competing undertakings for profit are in entirely different positions. The Minister here will not be undertaking a competing service at all, but will be merely undertaking a service in default of any other, and all that this clause says is that he shall have the right to charge rates on the services so established. To say that he should also submit to a Committee, which is appointed for a totally different purpose, to advise him whether the rates he proposes are right or not, is to fail to appreciate the difference (which I endeavoured to explain on the last Amendment) between these services and
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those of competing railway companies for profit.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The two following Amendments are consequential.
Amendments proposed—
Page 16, line 37, after ("keep") insert ("or cause to be kept")
Page 16, line 38, leave out ("undertakings") and insert ("services").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 9, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 10 agreed to.
Clause 11.
Appeal as to bridges.
11. An appeal shall lie to the Minister in respect of any restriction upon any traffic passing over or seeking to cross any bridge or culvert, and the Minister shall have power notwithstanding any provision in any other statute to make such order as he may think fit concerning the strengthening, standard of maintenance, and maintenance of any bridge or culvert, the traffic using it, or seeking to use it, and apportionment of any expenditure involved.
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY LORD STUART OF WORTLEY moved, at the end of Clause 11, to insert "but no Order made by the Minister under this section shall enlarge the pecuniary liability of any railway or canal company or impose any new liability upon any such company." The noble Lord said: The liabilities of railway companies as regards bridges are well established by statute and have received definition from the Courts of Law, and I think the Government must see that, unless some such words are put in, their liabilities might be unfairly extended under the operation of this clause.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 14, to insert the said words.—(Lord Stuart of Wortley.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: This clause was inserted in the House of Commons at the instance of those who spoke on behalf of the road interest. No opposition was expressed to the clause and it was consequently accepted by the Minister. The Amendment proposed by Lord Stuart of Wortley would completely nullify the clause so far as it affected railways and, therefore, I am in this position. I could not possibly accept an Amendment which would stultify the whole purpose of a clause which the Government accepted in the

411
House of Commons, but as the clause was not a Government clause but merely one which was proposed independently and accepted by them, I can only leave it to the House to decide. I cannot accept the Amendment, but if the noble Lord divides upon it I shall not resist it.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: Does the noble Lord press it?
LORD STUART OF WORTLEY: Yes.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 11, as amended, agreed to.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 11, insert the following new clause:
"Provisions as to new routes for omnibuses.
". Section twenty of the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) Act, 1916 (which relates to the establishment of new routes for omnibuses), shall continue in force until the expiration of two years after the passing of this Act, and shall have effect as if—

"(a) the following provision was substituted for subsection (2) of the section (that is to say)—

"(2) Except as provided in subsection (4) this section shall not be deemed to detract from any existing powers of highway authorities in regard to comnibuses; and

"(b) the following subsection was added to the section (that is to say):—

"(4) Where, upon application for a licence to ply for hire with an omnibus, the licensing authority either refuses to grant a licence or grants a licence subject to conditions, in either case the applicant shall have a right of appeal to the Minister of Ways and Communications from the decision of the licensing authority, and the Minister shall have power to make such order thereon as he may think fit, and such order shall be binding upon the licensing authority."—(The Earl of Lytton.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 12:
Powers as to railway wagons.
12.—(1) It shall be lawful for the Minister to purchase privately-owned railway wagons required for use on any railway on such terms and conditions as may be authorised by or ruder an Order in Council, a draft whereof has been approved by a Resolution passed by both Houses of Parliament, and to work or lease any such wagons when so purchased, or to apportion them among the several railway undertakings in such manner, on such terms, and subject to such conditions as may be provided by or under the Order:
Provided that the Minister shall not be entitled to purchase in England and Wales or Scotland or Ireland, respectively, wagons used for the conveyance of any particular class of traffic unless he purchases all privately-owned wagons so used which belong to or are used by persons carrying on business therein and which comply with the regulations with respect to such wagons in force at the date of such purchase.
(2) Where in the case of any wagon which has been in use on or before the fifteenth day of May, nineteen hundred and nineteen, the wagon has since that date been the subject of a purchase agreement the price paid on such purchase shall not be evidence of the value of the wagon in determining the price to be paid by the Minister.
(3) Where the Minister has, in pursuance of his powers under this section, purchased any wagon, any contract then in force for the repair of the wagon shall upon the purchase be determined, unless otherwise agreed with the Minister.
(4) Where the Minister exercises his powers of purchasing wagons under this section, or of prohibiting or restricting the use of privately-owned wagons, or of limiting the number of wagons to be so used, the following provisions shall have effect:—

(a) The reasonable facilities which every railway company is required to afford under section two of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1854, as amended or explained by any other Act, shall where the railway wagons of traders of any class have been purchased include the provision of suitable railway wagons for the use of traders of that class:

(b) Where the provision of wagons is not included in the authorised maximum rates of conveyance, a railway company may charge for the use of such wagons such sums as may be directed by the Minister under section three of this Act, and if and so far as no such directions are in force any sums not exceeding those prescribed for the use of such wagons by any Railway Rates and Charges Order applicable thereto:

(c) Notwithstanding the provisions of any other Act or any decision thereunder, in determining what sum may be charged under the provisions of any Railway Rates and Charges Order for the detention of wagons at the premises of any trader, regard shall be had to the requirements and reasonable usages of the trade at those premises carried on in connection with which such wagons are used.

(5) Notwithstanding any statutory or other provision to the contrary it shall be lawful for the Minister to make regulations prohibiting or restricting the use on railways of privately-owned wagons or restricting the number of wagons to be so used and prescribing the type and capacity thereof:
Provided that nothing in this Act shall authorise the prohibition of the use on railways of such wagons as comply with regulations for the time being in force made in pursuance of the Railways Clauses Consolidation Act., 1845, or any other enactment in force at the date of time passing of this Act and as are in use, under repair, or in course of construction at that date.
LORD BLEDISLOE LORD BLEDISLOE moved, in subsection (4) (a), before "provision," to insert "adequate." The noble Lord said: I move this Amendment in order to ascertain what will be the exact position of traders who own wagons and use them in connection with their business after all their wagons have been taken over by the Minister and are operating for the general use of the public. I regard this particular clause with greater apprehension than any clause in the Bill. Unless some adequate safeguard is given to a company such as a mining or quarrying company that they shall have, after their wagons have been compulsorily taken by the Minister, an adequate supply of wagons to carry on their business serious injustice may result. I do not desire to press the Amendment against the views of the Government if they can assure me that, in fact, these companies or businesses (which are to-day adequately provided with wagons and have spent capital in providing them) will, after the acquisition by the Government, be adequately provided with wagons for the purposes of their business. This is particularly the case in quarrying companies and mining companies, whose business involves the carriage to long distances of commodities of considerable bulk, for upon that carriage depends the failure or success of the business.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 10, after ("the") insert ("adequate").—(Lord Bledisloe.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am glad to hear that the noble Lord does not press the Amendment, and I hope I shall be able to satisfy him as to the position. The position is this. After the Government has acquired the privately owned wagons the Bill says that the supply of wagons to those traders who previously had their own wagons shall be regarded as a reasonable facility which the company will have to fulfil. The noble Lord moves to insert before "provision" the words "adequate." The effect of that would be to restrict The Railway and Canal Commission, when they hear the case, to a mere consideration as to whether the provision was adequate or not. If the word "adequate" is not inserted what the Railway and Canal Commission will have to decide is whether the provision which the railway company has made is, or is not, reasonable in all the circumstances of the case—namely, the
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number of wagons which the Minister has acquired, and the allocation he has made of them. The Minister, or rather the railway company in the possession of the Minister, will be in exactly the same position as are the railway companies to-day on whose lines there are any privately-owned wagons but who are under an obligation to provide wagons. Any trader may go to the Railway and Canal Commission and ask that a reasonable provision of wagons should be made, in the same way as they can go to the railway companies which are under an obligation to provide wagons for traders.
LORD BLEDISLOE: It depends very much on the meaning to be attached to the word "reasonable." May I ask the noble Earl this? Is it conceivable, under the new régime, that a company which has owned 200 wagons for the purpose of its business may find itself with 100 wagons only allocated by the Minister as being a reasonable proportion of the number which should be allocated to them?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: That will be a question for the Railway and Canal Commission to decide. If you insert the word "adequate" you will leave out from their consideration the possibility of looking into the number of wagons which are at the disposal of the Minister to allocate.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU had an Amendment cm the Paper, in subsection (4), at the end of paragraph (a), to insert "and it shall be the duty of the Minister or of the railway company working such wagons, as the case may be, to afford such facilities, and the power of the Railway and Canal Commission to award damages under section twelve of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1888, and any provision amending the same, shall extend to any neglect or default in respect of such facilities."
The noble Lord said: This relates to an Amendment which received considerable support in the House of Commons, as you will see from the debate on July 7 in Hansard, column 970. It was moved by Mr. Leslie Scott, and the Solicitor-General undertook that the matter should be reconsidered in the Lords. I am told that it is considered to be an important point by certain interests affected, and perhaps the noble Earl will tell me if he thinks any words could be found acceptable which would meet the case.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I have words here which perhaps will meet the noble Lord's point. It is an important one, and the Government certainly undertook to meet it. The point is this. These privately-owned wagons will have been acquired by the Minister. The Bill says he may allocate these wagons in such a way that they shall be used by the various railway companies. It is obvious that the Minister must allocate them, unless he is to destroy them or throw them into the sea. He does not require wagons except for the purpose of their being used. And if the railway companies are to fulfil the obligation which is placed upon them in the Bill, it is necessary that the Minister shall allocate them in such a way as to enable them to carry out their obligations. I propose, instead of his Amendment, to carry out his intention by moving the insertion of the following words: "It shall be the duty of the Minister so to exercise his power of working or disposing of the wagons purchased by him as to enable railway companies to fulfil their obligations under the provision as fully as may be practicable." I hope the noble Lord will accept those words.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: It is impossible for me to grasp how far they go, but I will accept them provisionally and shall be able to consider them on Report.
Amendment moved—
Clause 12, page 18, line 12, after ("clause") insert ("and it shall be the duty of the Minister so to exercise his power of working or disposing of the wagons purchased by him as to enable railway companies to fulfil their obligations under the provision as fully as may be practicable").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendments moved—
Page 18, line 32, leave out ("restricting") and insert ("limiting")
Page 18, line 37, after ("1845") insert ("the Railways Clauses Consolidation (Scotland) Act, 1843").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 12, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 13:
Amendments moved—
Page 19, line 8, leave out from ("securities") to ("which") in line 17
Page 19, line 20, at end insert ("the interest on any such securities as aforesaid shall—
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"(a) in the case of securities issued for the purchase of railway wagons be charged an the revenues derived from the wagons so acquired after payment thereout of working expenses, and, if and so far as such revenues are insufficient, on the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom or the growing produce thereof; and

"(b) in the case of other securities be charged on the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom or the growing produce thereof").—(The Earl of Lytton.)

On Question, Amendments agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON THE EARL OF LYTTON moved to insert as a new subsection—
"(2) Where the whole or any part of the purchase money for the interest in railway wagons belonging to a wagon finance company is discharged by the issue to the company of such securities as aforesaid, and the company in consequence of the exercise by the Minister of his powers under this Act of purchasing railway wagons is wound up voluntarily, the liquidator may present to the court having jurisdiction to wind up the company a scheme for the discharge in whole or in part of the liabilities of the company to the holders of debentures or debenture stock of the company by means of the transfer to them of an amount of the securities so issued to the company, and if the court sanctions the scheme those liabilities may be discharged accordingly.
"For the purpose of this subsection 'wagon finance company' means a company whose principal business is the advance of money to colliery companies and other persons for the purpose of the acquisition by them of railway wagons."
The noble Earl said: There are a number of wagon finance companies whose business will probably cease when the privately-owned wagons are taken over by the Ministry. It has been pointed out to us on behalf of these companies that in winding up their business they will be placed in a great difficulty if they are paid in stock, as is provided under the Bill, and have to realise that stock in order to pay off their debenture holders. This Amendment is therefore proposed in order to enable the companies to pay off their debenture holders, in the event of their going into liquidation, without the necessity of realising their stock.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 20, at end, insert the said new subsection.—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 13, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 14:
THE EARL OF LYTTON: These are drafting Amendments.
Amendments moved—
Page 19, line 21 leave out ("where any order is") and insert ("an order")
Page 19, line 23, leave out ("where any") and insert ("an")
Page 19, line 25, leave out from ("railway") to ("shall") in line 27.—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 14, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 15 agreed to.
[The sitting was suspended at five minutes before eight o'clock and resumed at a quarter past nine.]
Clause 16:
Power to make advances for certain purposes.
16.—(1) The Minister may, subject to the approval of the Treasury, make advances out of the moneys provided by Parliament to any authority, company or person, either by way of grant or by way of loan, or partly in one way and partly in another, and upon such terms and conditions as he thinks fit for any of the following purposes:—

(a)The construction, improvement or maintenance of railways, light railways, or tramways:

(b) The construction, improvement or maintenance of roads, bridges, or ferries:

(c) The construction, improvement or maintenance of harbours, docks or piers:

(d) The construction, improvement or maintenance of canals or inland navigations:

(e) The promotion and improvement of transport services by land or water:

And the power of the Treasury on the recommendation of the Development Commissioners to make advances for any of the purposes aforesaid shall cease and determine, except as respects advances for the construction, improvement, or maintenance of harbours in connection with the improvement and development of fisheries, in which case the Development Commissioners shall consult with the Minister before reporting on any application referred to them:
Provided that the Minister shall not make an advance exceeding one million pounds at any one time for the purpose of any work, unless specially authorised to do so by a resolution of the House of Commons.
(2) For the purpose of advances for the construction, improvement, or maintenance of roads the Minister may, after consultation with the local authorities affected, classify roads in such manner as he thinks fit, and may by agreement with the local authority defray half the salary and establishment charges of the engineer or surveyor to a local authority responsible for the maintenance of such roads, subject to the condition that the appointment, retention, and dismissal of such engineer or surveyor, and the amount of such establishment charges, shall be subject to the approval of the Minister.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in the proviso at the end of subsection (1), to leave out "one million," and insert "one hundred thousand." The noble Lord said: This Amendment proposes to limit the power of the Minister to advance for certain purposes the sum of £1,000,000, and to substitute for that figure £100,000. Not only do I put this forward on its merits, but I do so also in order to protest once more against the tremendous financial responsibility which, if this Bill passes unaltered, we are incurring. With all the many merits that the Minister-designate may have, he is not, so far as my experience went in France, particularly keen on economy. Nobody denies that he carried out a certain amount of very useful work there, but economy was not supposed then to be his strong point.
A further important point arises on this. On the previous clause which we were discussing before dinner, I proposed to limit the Minister's power to spending £50,000. Your Lordships will see that he cannot spend more than £500,000 in establishing any particular transport service by land or water. But that applies to a service established by himself. When it is a matter of advancing money to other people for certain other forms of construction, he is allowed to advance up to £1,000,000. I am deeply concerned about subsections (b) and (e) in Clause 16, and I invite the noble Earl in charge of the Bill to tell me whether subsection (e), with the powers under this particular clause to advance £1,000,000 to any person promoting a service by land or water, does not allow the Minister to advance £1,000,000 for that purpose?
On the other hand it will be seen that in Clause 9 the Minister is tied down by a proviso stating that "if such estimate as in the preceding paragraph provided in connection with the establishment of any such service is likely to involve a total capital expenditure exceeding half a million pounds," the Minister shall not exercise his powers unless authorised to do so by Order in Council. If we go back to this Clause we find that he can advance £1,000,000 to a company. In other words, a private company may be started to which he advances £1;000,000, whereas he is tied to £500,000 if he is working the undertaking himself. It seems to me those two things are rather conflicting. There may be some reason for it.
On the general question of this clause, I do not know where the money is to come from for all these enormous powers. The Minister will have power to buy up all the private wagons, and that will cost £70,000,000. If he is going to be allowed to advance £1,000,000 for all kinds of purposes to a private company it opens up a vista of unlimited extravagance—I do not say by the present Minister-designate but by other Ministers who may possibly follow. There may be other Ministers who are very keen on nationalising everything. They may advance million after million for this purpose, and, as far as I can make out, the Government and Parliament will have no control over it. I may of course be wrong, and there may be a distinction between this Clause and Clause 9, but on careful examination I cannot see the distinction, except that in the one case he proposes to lend the money and in the other case to do it himself.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 22, leave out ("one million") and insert ("one hundred thousand").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: What we are concerned with in this Clause is the power given to the Minister to advance money to existing undertakings to do any of the things contained in subsections (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e). These advances are made by the Government to existing undertakings. It has nothing to do with the services started by the Minister himself. It is, of course, a very difficult thing to argue on a particular figure, or to justify the exact sum of £1,000,000 in preference to anything else. But the reason why the sum is larger in this case is that railway companies, or any other undertaking, would only come to the Minister and ask for his assistance for the construction for some really large works, and if the limitation in the Amendment were inserted it would practically mean that the Minister would have to obtain a Resolution from the House of Commons in nearly every case. It would only be to start large works or to provide large amounts of rolling stock that railway or other transport companies would require the assistance of the Minister in the way he has suggested; and, of course, the remarks I made with regard to the limitation of £500,000 apply equally here. The Minister cannot advance any money without the approval of the Treasury and of Par-
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liament for the sum inserted in his Estimates. Some point was made by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, on the previous clause to the effect that a Minister might forestall the approval of his Estimates by Parliament; but I think the noble Marquess will agree that this is done only with the consent of the Treasury in the first instance. Certainly in the Department with which I have been connected no forestalment has ever taken place without the approval of the Treasury.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I do not think that the Treasury exercise much control now.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: That has not been my experience. The position, however, is that before any advances are made by the Minister he has to obtain Treasury approval and place the sum in his Estimates which have to go before Parliament. The noble Lord says that there is some inconsistency between our figure of £500,000 for the service which the Minister himself may start and the limit here. This is a matter which was specially considered by the House of Commons, and the view they took—I think it is a sound one—that it was desirable to put a greater limitation upon the Minister in respect of services which he himself was going to start and which, as has been pointed out in this debate, is a new departure; that it was desirable to put a stricter limit upon those services than in the case of advances made to existing companies. When we were dealing with existing companies the Government made out the case that it was reasonable that advances should be made to the limit of £1,000,000, which limit was considered satisfactory by the House of Commons and accepted by them. It is impossible to argue the merit of any particular figure, but the limit of £1,000,000 is in our opinion necessary in view of the kind of demands that will be made by the existing undertakings for advances from the Minister. If we are restricted by the smaller limit which the noble Lord proposes to insert it would practically mean that no advances could ever be made, even though submitted in Estimates and approved by Parliament, without a special Resolution of the House of Commons authorising it.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I have no wish to detain your Lordships, but I should like to be allowed to point out to

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the noble Earl that when he says that this clause is confined to existing undertakings I am not; sure that; I know where he finds the word "existing." I may have overlooked it, but as I see it all that it says is that the Minister "may make advances to any authority, company, or person." Those are very wide words. Then the noble Earl says that there is a great distinction to be made between the kind of beneficiary (if I may use such a phrase) under Clause 16 and the kind of beneficiary under Clause 9. He said that under Clause 9 it was right to be more rigid. But I think he has forgotten that he himself has inserted an Amendment in Clause 9 which allows the Minister to start in the transport service not only by himself but through any other person.
Observe how the two clauses then work together. The Minister desiring to start a new line of steamers in connection with a railway which he has taken possession of—that would be one of these transport services under Clause 9—would do it through some other person—namely, the railway company. Having got this enormous new work in operation he would proceed to advance them £1,000,000 under Clause 16; indeed, I think he would probably be able to advance them £1,500,000 without cheek of the kind which is contemplated in the Bill. That would be £500,000 under Clause 9 and £1.000,000 more under Clause 16. If, therefore, you take the two clauses together it will be seen what immense liberty the Minister has. In point of fact, as far as I can see—though I may be quite wrong—the whole of the financial facilities which are granted under Clause 16 will be available for any new transport work or service under Clause 9. Taking the two together the facilities will be quite complete.
In those circumstances I cannot refrain from having a moment of wonder why Clause 9 should require a Resolution of both Houses of Parliament for £500,000, and Clause 16 should require a Resolution of only one House of Parliament for double that amount. The noble Earl says this has been very carefully considered in the House of Commons. I should have said it bore all the marks of a compromise arrived at in some haste. I do not think it is very easy to defend the provisions of these clauses. It is not very material to my purpose to make a distinction between the two in this respect; I only want to mark
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the want of care with which this Bill has been sent up to your Lordships' House. It is for the Government to make their Bill four-square and shipshape. The point of substance is the drawing of a distinction between Clause 9 and Clause 16. I think it would be perfectly easy to work both the clauses together.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I confess the point raised by the noble Marquess is new to me. It has never occurred to me that advantage could be taken of the wording of this clause to enable the Minister to make advances to himself.
THE MANQUESS OF SALISBURY: No.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I mean, working through some other person. I do not believe for a moment that such a thing is possible. I am quite convinced that it was never intended, and I do not believe that the words would give that power. The effect of the Amendment which I inserted in an earlier clause is to enable the Minister, having started a service, to work it through some other body or persons. The noble Marquess suggests that, having done that, he may still make advances up to £1,000,000 through that person to enable him to run the service which he has himself started, and by that means to transfer the benefits of this Clause 16 to the undertaking which he has started under Clause 9. That certainly has never been intended. I will inquire into the matter between now and Report to see whether it is in fact possible, and whether words can be inserted to deal with that point.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I quite realise that an advance of £1,000,000, say, for making a new railway or for the adaptation of a shipping line in connection with a railway may not be too large a sum. I would, however, like to point out that when the Minister has let a private individual make the line, he runs it and it becomes part of the system already taken over. It is therefore virtually getting a service established which he then takes over.
There are two points in this subsection, in paragraphs (b) and (e). I cannot conceive that he would advance to a person other than a county council money for time construction, improvement or maintenance of roads, bridges or ferries. These are matters only concerned with the local

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authorities. If the noble Lord will put in something in the case of roads, bridges and ferries to the effect that advances should be to the local authority that would meet my point there. As to the "promotion and improvement of transport services by land or water" I do not know whether it is intended, for example, that the Minister can advance £1,000,000 to the London General Omnibus Company to build more motor cars. If so, would be become a shareholder? In what way would be advance it? Would he take debentures of the company or shares? I do not understand how he could do it unless he took possession of the undertaking. The money, I assume, would be advanced by the Treasury. These are questions of considerable importance and perhaps the noble Earl will give us an idea of his views upon them.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: I think the noble Earl admits that the construction which my noble friend has put on the clause is a very serious one, and I would like to ask him what is meant by a Resolution of the House of Commons in this case. We are all familiar with a Financial Resolution of the House of Commons which is passed previous to the carrying of a particular measure involving finance. Apparently, this is not a Resolution of that character. Unless I am mistaken, this Resolution is a means, or may be used as a means, of avoiding any Bill on this subject coming through to this House at all. Is that not so? The noble Earl will perhaps clear up the point. In the ordinary sense it is true that our power to deal with money Bills has been greatly clipped, but we can discuss them. A Resolution on which no Bill is going to be founded, however, will be passed by the House of Commons and the matter cannot be discussed here, where there is a large number of people with special information. That is one point.
The other point is this. The noble Lord will notice that the whole language of Clause 16 is much looser than the language of Clause 9. In Clause 9 the Minister is to establish and work certain services under certain definite provisos. In Clause 16 he is enabled to advance £1,000,000 "upon such terms and conditions as he thinks fit for any of the following purposes "—which are set out. This is to be done and made good by a Resolution of the House of Commons. It really is an absolute novelty and I do not think it has been in any Bill
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before. I rather hope that when we reach the Report stage the noble Earl will look into it and see whether he is not establishing a procedure rather foreign to that which he thinks he is establishing.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I think I can remove the difficulty at once if your Lordships will look at Clause 9 you will see that the Minister is to be authorised by Order in Council. That Order in Council, of course, has to be approved by both Houses of Parliament, and there a large new question of policy is involved. What we are concerned with here is simply a Financial Resolution. The noble Viscount thinks that it may be utilised to prevent a Bill to provide the money from coming to this House at all. That will not take place. Your Lordships at this moment have no opportunity of discussing the Estimates of any one of the spending Departments of the Government. You have an opportunity of criticising any one of them when the Finance Bill come before your Lordships, and the only way in which any spending Department can obtain this money is by an amount provided for in the Finance Bill. That, of course, conies before your Lordships and can be criticised. The question of authorising the Minister to spend public money is a matter which concerns the House of Commons, and therefore a Resolution to authorise the amount is provided by the House of Commons. It does not take away from your Lordships any right of criticism which you would possess if this clause were not inserted.
The point I have undertaken to consider is whether there really is any ground for fearing that the words of the Bill as they stand, read in conjunction with the Amendment which I inserted at an earlier stage, would enable the Minister to utilise this clause for the purpose of advancing money to his own undertaking, worked by a deputy. I need not point out that in that case his action would be criticised by the Treasury and by the House of Commons. It would have to go before the Treasury; he would have to justify it, and I cannot believe that in the circumstances the Treasury would agree. I admit it is a new point and I have undertaken to look into it.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: On the undertaking given by the noble Earl, I will not press the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEUmoved, in subsection (2), after "in such a manner as," to insert "subject to the approval of the Roads Committee hereinafter referred to." The noble Lord said: This is an important question from a highway point of view, and its importance may not have occurred to the noble Earl in charge of the Bill. Grants given to these roads will, in future, depend on classification. It is erroneous to think that no classification exists now. The Road Board has for some time been engaged in classification. If you are going to pay about 50 per cent. of the expenses of main roads, and 25 per cent. on secondary roads, classification will be very important to localities and great pressure will be brought to bear on the Minister to classify as many roads as possible in the first classification, and not in the second. Great counties like Lancashire and Yorkshire will desire that all their main roads shall be classified as first class. In Lancashire alone there are seventy members of Parliament, and it is obvious that the Minister must be exposed to a good deal of political pressure. In my opinion, and I speak from many years experience on the Road Board, some impartial tribunal is desirable to settle classification; a tribunal not subject to political pressure. If you have a Minister not protected by some impartial tribunal he will be subject to this political pressure. I suggest this is one of the subjects which should be referred to the Roads Committee. I want the Roads Committee to have a say, and to be consulted, before roads are classified. If the noble Earl agrees that it would be desirable for the Roads Committee to be consulted I should like to make it a statutory obligation that the Minister, before classifying roads, should take the advice of the Roads Committee. He would then be able to shelter himself behind it in the case of political pressure.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 28, after ("as") insert ("(subject to the approval of the Roads Committee hereinafter referred to)").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I have some difficulty in discussing this Amendment without going into the further Amendment of the noble Lord's with regard the powers of the Roads Committee, which arises in the subsequent clause. I cannot accept this Amendment for the reasons which I stated early in the discussion this afternoon. The Government is not prepared to put any
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of these Committees into the position of being executive bodies. The responsibility for the Minister's action we hold must remain with the Minister in this case as in the other cases, and therefore I could not agree that the Minister may not carry out the classification of the roads without the approval of the Roads Committee. I think it is obvious, as the noble Lord has pointed Out, that such classification must be undertaken in consultation with the Roads Committee.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Will you say that?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Certainly, I have no objection to that.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: If the noble Lord gives me the word "consultation"—
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I have no objection to accepting the Amendment in a form which would make it an obligation upon the Minister to consult the Roads Committee, so long as "approval" is withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I shall be quite prepared to accept the word "consultation" instead of "approval," although it is not so strong a word.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I suggest that the words to be inserted should be "Roads Committee hereinafter referred to and the," and should go in line 27. The clause will then read "after consultation with the Roads Committee hereinafter referred to and the local authorities affected."
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I accept that.
On Question, Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Will the noble Earl tell us what is the advantage of classifying the roads, unless you are going to do something afterwards. In order that the noble Earl may tell us what is the policy of the Government I will formally move to omit the word "classify." So far as the Bill is concerned, it is merely a paper arrangement.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 27, leave out ("classify").—(The Marquess of Salisbury.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I think the noble Lord opposite can probably give a fuller answer to the noble Marquess than I can. I understand that this matter of classifying roads has been one of the duties of the Road Board for many years. I speak subject to the noble Lord's correction, but I think he will agree that the classification of roads is a very important preliminary to any future road policy. The roads will be placed under this classification in various categories of first-class, second-class and so forth. This policy of classifying roads has been promised for a very long time. It was pressed for, I think, originally in 1914, and a promise was given at that time that it would be introduced into the Budget of that year. That was interrupted by the war and the matter has hung over. Everybody interested in roads has for many years pressed that there should be a complete classification of roads so that any road policy may be based upon the classification so provided. It is not in itself a policy, but it is a necessary preliminary to any proper treatment of roads by the Ministry.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I am quite aware of what the noble Earl has said; indeed, I tried to classify the roads myself in an abortive legislative project many years ago. But the noble Earl went on to say that something was to happen when the classification was complete. I presume that he is going to give a different measure of assistance to roads according to their classification. All I wanted to know was, What is the policy of the Government? Are they going to give more money to class I than to class II, and if so can the noble Earl tell us to what extent he is going to help the roads? The reason I put this question to the noble Earl is, that in an earlier debate some days ago the noble Lord who sits opposite, Lord Harris, said that he had taken the line he had because he valued so much the road policy of the Government. I do not know what that policy is. There has been no statement of it in your Lordships' House. If the noble Earl will say that the classification will result in a relief to the rates that will be popular with the road authorities, but if he is not going to relieve the rates this will be no good to them.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is quite true that the reason for classification is because upon that classification the grants given by the Government will be differentiated. There will be given to the first-class roads 75 per cent. of the grant. We have to get a standard upon which the grants towards maintenance will be contributed.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: We anticipated on the Road Board getting £3,000,000 to £3,500,000 from the carriage taxes and the motor spirit duties, and that we understand is to be restored to the Ministry of Communications. It would have been restored to the Road Board and would have been distributed not for improvement but in future towards maintenance.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 16, as amended, agreed to
Clause 17:
Accounts, statistics and returns.
17. For the period of two years after the passing of this Act it shall be the duty of the owners of any railway, light railway, tramway, canal, inland navigation, dock, harbour, or pier undertaking, and the authority or person liable to maintain any road or bridge, to furnish to the Minister, in such manner and form as he may direct, such accounts, statistics, and returns as he may require for the purpose of his powers and duties under this Act.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, after "any road or bridge," to insert "maintained out of public moneys or rates." The noble Lord said: This is a point upon which I desire to ask a question of the Government, because it affects a great many more people than would be at first thought. As far as I am aware, in all the definitions of Acts of Parliament there has never been any exact definition of the word "road." Many of us have miles of roads on the land that we own. A road may be a farm road, and I understand a road may be a road through a wood. A road may certainly not be a gravel road which carries any form of traffic. I think that what the Government intend is that this word "road" should only mean roads maintained out of public moneys, and roads over which the public have a right of access. There may be other rights of way in other places, but in other rights of way the onus of repair does not lay very often on the owner of the road. It might operate very strongly against private owners who at

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present allow the public to use their roads. They might say they were going to be subject to some future liability, and they might try to stop the right of way. I think the Government really mean that they want a return of roads made out of public moneys, not of private roads on estates and of farm reads.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 39, after ("bridge") insert ("maintained out of public moneys or rates").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I quite agree that this requires explanation. We are now dealing with statistics which the Minister may ask for with regard to these various undertakings, and the noble Lord says that he imagines he only wishes to obtain these statistics in regard to public highways. In the main that is so. But there are a certain number of roads which are public highways, but nevertheless are maintained by private individuals, from whom it will be necessary to obtain statistics, and perhaps it will be convenient if I just gave a few instances of the kind of roads and bridges about which we want the statistical information which would be cut out by the noble Lord's Amendment.
The first are roads leading to docks or industrial sites as, for instance, roads now in the possession of the Trafford Park Company or the Manchester Ship Canal Company; secondly, extensive roads which are public highways but privately owned. The Middlesbro' owners have many miles of public road on Tees-side. That is with regard to roads. Then with regard to bridges. There are two important bridges over the Tyne, privately owned, for use of road traffic. The High Level Bridge owned by the North Eastern Railway, and the Redheugh Bridge owned by a limited liability company. They form most important links between the densely populated districts on the north and south banks of the Tyne.
Lastly—and this is the best instance of all—there are small bridges privately owned, forming important links in main road connections. Selby Bridge is an example. That is a small, narrow bridge which is the main outlet of traffic to the North, and upon that bridge at the present moment, there is a heavy toll. It may be a question for the Minister to consider whether
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that toll should be continued or removed, and, if removed, what compensation should be paid. In order to judge of that, as well as in the other cases I have mentioned, it is very desirable that we should have statistical information which is now in possession of the owners of the roads or bridges concerned. If they are not obliged to give that information to him, he would have to place watchers upon the bridges or the roads to obtain it for himself—statistics as to the amount of use which was made of them, perhaps over many weeks or many months.
LORD FARRER: I hope the noble Earl will be able to give us a little more definition of a road under this clause. I am sere your Lordships must know that there are many roads over private estates—rationetenurœ and others. As far as I can make out, it would enable the Minister in charge to direct persons to state what is and what is not a private road or a public way. All over the south of England there are heaps of cases where persons are allowed to go along these roads and have been for ages, but there is no definition of whether there is a right or not. I think our English highway law is much better in that respect than the French law which this copies, and I hope we shall be able to make it perfectly clear before the Report stage that it does not apply to those roads which are doubtful—that is to say, that the Minister has not the power to call upon a private owner to say what is or what is not a right of way.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I suggest a compromise to the noble Earl Will he be willing to accept some qualifying adjective like "metalled" road, or "over which there is a public right of way"? As it stands it really is extraordinarily indefinite. Many farm lanes are roads in the sense that they are roads to a farm, but it would be almost impossible to give particulars of every kind of private road. There must be some kind of definition.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I will certainly consider the matter. As far as I can see at the moment, I do not think it is possible to produce a definition which would include the roads and bridges which, as I have suggested, it is necessary to include for our purposes, without at the same time making it applicable to private roads generally. As Lord Farrer has

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pointed out, it is true that in all parts of the country there are private roads. It is not at all the intention of the Minister to call upon the owners of those private roads to supply him with this kind of statistical information; he requires that information only about roads where any action on his part might be required. If it is possible to introduce words which would at any rate exclude small farm roads, I will consider the matter and bring it up again at a later stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 17 agreed to.
Clause 18:
Provisions as to the Railway and Canal Commission.
18. The provisions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1888, as amended by any subsequent enactment, relating to the procedure for the determination of questions by the Commission under that Act, including the provisions relating to appeals, shall apply to the determination of questions referred to the Commission under this Act, as if they were herein re-enacted and in terms made applicable to this Act:
Provided that—

(a) the Commission may, in any case in which they think it expedient to do so, call in the aid of one or more assessors, specially qualified, and hear the case wholly or partially with the assistance of such assessors;

(b) the Commission may hold a local inquiry for the purposes of this section by any one of their members, or by any officer of the Commission or other person whom they may direct to hold the same, and the said provisions of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1888, except the provisions relating to appeals, shall, so far as applicable, apply to such inquiries, and any officer or person directed to hold an inquiry shall have power to administer oaths and shall report the result of the inquiry to the Commission;

(c) the discretion of the Commission with respect to costs shall not be limited in the manner provided by section two of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1894.

LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved to leave out paragraph (c). The noble Lord said: I have been asked to move this Amendment on behalf of several traders who think this is adverse to them when they are pressing questions of arbitration.
Amendment moved—
Page 21, lines 27 to 30, leave out paragraph (c)—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The effect of this Amendment would be to remove the discretion given in the Bill to the Railway and Canal Commission in the matter of awarding costs. Under the law as it is to-day the Railway and Canal Commission cannot award costs unless in their opinion the application is frivolous or vexatious. That provision was inserted for the protection of small traders in their negotiations with the railway companies. Under the Bill we are very largely extending the character of the cases with which the Railway and Canal Commission will have to deal. Most of the cases under this Bill would be between the Government and the railway companies. There would be no occasion there for protecting small traders, and we think in view of this extension and of the fact that the Railway and Canal Commission will have to deal with large questions between big undertakings that the ordinary procedure with regard to the allowing of costs should be retained. We therefore propose to give to the Railway and Canal Commission the same option as is given in most legal cases in a. Court of law of awarding costs if in their opinion it is desirable to do so, and not to restrict them, as to-day they are restricted, to giving costs only in cases which they regard as frivolous and vexatious.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 18 agreed to.
Clause 19 agreed to.
Clause 20:
Roads advisory committee.
20.—(1) For the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Minister with respect to and for safeguarding any interests affected by the exercise of the powers and the performance of his duties under this Act in relation to roads and bridges and vehicles and traffic thereon, a committee (hereinafter referred to as the roads committee) shall be appointed.
(2) The roads committee shall consist of not less than ten members, of whom five shall be representative of highway authorities, appointed after consultation with such authorities, and five shall be representative of the users of road traffic, appointed after consultation with the interests concerned, together with a chairman and secretary.
(3) The chairman and the secretary of the roads committee shall be appointed by the Minister.
(4) The roads committee may make regulations as to their procedure and method of voting, and may at their discretion consider anti report to the Minister upon any matters affecting the construction, improvement, or maintenance of roads or bridges or the regulation of traffic thereon.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (1), after "in relation to roads and," to insert "ferries and." The noble Lord said: With regard to this, I only suggest as a matter of drafting that the word "ferries" should come in. Throughout the Bill ferries are included. I do not know whether the Government have any particular reason for excluding ferries here. They are of road concern, and as we have got it in the rest of the Bill I suggest the word could be inserted here with advantage.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 15, after the first ("and") insert ("ferries and").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is not a mere matter of drafting, and the word "ferries" has not been excluded by inadvertence. It has been excluded expressly, because we contend that ferries are not matters about which the Roads Committee will have expert knowledge. Ferries are questions of much more expert engineering. There may be cases, for instance, of ferries over the river Mersey—a very large engineering and mechanical problem upon which the Roads Committee would not be qualified to deal. If you were to insert "ferries" here it might put upon the Minister the obligation of referring all questions connected with ferries to the Roads Committee. In most cases there will be other officials in his Department who will be much better qualified to advise him from an engineering point of view on questions regarding ferries than would be the Roads Committee.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: withdraw my Amendment. I was thinking of ordinary ferries such as we have in Scotland.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU had on the Paper an Amendment, in subsection (2), to leave out "ten" and insert "twenty." The noble Lord said: I suggest to the Government that "not less than ten" is rather a low figure. If there are to be five representatives of highway authorities and five representatives of users of roads appointed, it seems to me that you have not got room in the number ten to include all those interested, especially as I have suggested that you should have a representative of labour.
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The noble Earl may say, with justice, that not less than ten would enable you to go up to any amount. If he thinks we can have more than ten in that way I should be prepared not to press my Amendment. As regards the whole of this clause, I have got the clause in another form on the Paper for the noble Earl to consider, and I will not move this at this point.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (2), before "road traffic," to insert "horse and mechanical." The noble Lord said: I have been asked by my noble friend Lord Bledisloe to move this Amendment for him. I think it is only fair that you should have a representative of horse as well as of mechanical traffic. I do not know whether the noble Earl will accept this.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 21, after the second ("of") insert ("horse and mechanical").—(Lord Montagu o Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I agree to that.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved to insert the following new subsections:
"(3) The Minister shall refer to the Roads Committee all matters relating to roads, bridges, and ferries, and to the powers and duties transferred from the Road Beard.
"(4) Any moneys or loans raised or charged or derived from Imperial or local taxation allocated by Parliament for the purpose of works in connection with roads and bridges and ferries shall be administered by the Roads Committee.
"(5) The Roads Committee may be specially represented in the Houses of Parliament by one of its members being a member of either House, or failing any particular member being a member of one of the Houses of Parliament, by any member of either Houses of Parliament selected by the Government after consultation with the Roads Committee."
The noble Lord said: Now we come to what is to me as the representative of the road interest, the most important clause in the Bill. After a good deal of discussion in the House of Commons and a great many consultations, this Roads Committee was granted by the Minister-designate and was incorporated in the Bill. From our point of view this Committee is one—I will not insult it by saving it is mere camouflage—

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which I am sure would not be strong enough to do what I think the Government wants it to do and would not be regarded as competent by the interests it is supposed to represent. I have the authority of Mr. Joynson-Hicks, who negotiated, to say that, while he obtained all he could at the moment from the Government, he is by no means satisfied, and I understand that the interests With which he is identified—which is not necessarily the interests with which I am identified—are not satisfied either.
What we would like this Roads Committee to be is a Committee as far as possible analogous to the Road Board, but more representative of the interests involved. The fault of the Road Board has always been that it has consisted of too few members, not altogether representative in their corporate capacity, and that its work has been largely carried out by a Chairman, upon whose conduct I do not wish to reflect to-night but, to say the least of it, he has been rather autocratic in his management. It may be that circumstances have caused him to be autocratic. If the Committee is to be of assistance to the Government, and I hope it will be, there should be a representative of road transport who will try to make this part of the Bill a success. I think that the Committee should be given more powers. I suggest, first of all, that the Minister should refer to the Roads Committee all matters relating to roads and bridges—if the noble Lord objects to ferries, I do not push ferries—and to the powers and duties transferred from the Road Board.
I do not know who is going to act on the Committee but there may be people on it who are acquainted with highway administration and road transport. As I have told your Lordships before, there is not there one single person that we know of who is connected in any way with that very important branch of our national life, road transport. I think there is not one of your Lordships who will not admit that there should be some representative of road transport. I am not thinking of the luxurious car, but of every kind of vehicle from the bicycle to the lorry. They have no representation so far. There is the Cyclists' Union, 200,000 motor cyclists, and I think by now 200,000 owners of motor cars, as well as 50,000 or 60,000 lorries which have no representation. In subsection (4) it is suggested that the monies, to which we have already alluded
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as coming from the produce of the motor spirit and carriage tax, should be administered by this Roads Committee, of course under the superintendence of the Minister.
The next subsection deals with a question which arose some four or five years ago in the case of Sir Charles Rose, who was a member of the Road Board and was asked on one occasion to reply for that Board in the House of Commons, but the Speaker held that he could not reply because he was not a paid servant of the Crown. Occasionally Lord St Davids and myself have replied in this House for the Road Board, and I suggest that it might be convenient to have a member of the Roads Committee who happened to be a member of this House to answer occasionally here. He might be a person with a certain amount of technical knowledge and he might be of assistance to the Government. I hope the noble Lord will assist me in strengthening the Committee. I can assure him that it has not been an easy task to defend road interests in this House. They are growing interests. We are on the eve of great developments in road transport. Since I spoke on the Second Reading I have seen a report on the adaptation of gas suction plant to road transport which makes it probable that a large number of motor lorries will be worked much more economically in the future. The price comes out so cheap that I anticipate an enormous increase in road transport. I think this interest ought to be distinctly represented on this Committee, and if the noble Lord could make a statement on Clause 20 it might facilitate the progress of the debate.
Amendment moved—
page 22, line 23, at end of subsection (2), insert the said new subsection.—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I should like to remind your Lordships of the history of this clause. As your Lordships know, there was a good deal of opposition to the Bill during the Committee stage in the House of Commons from those who represented road interests in that House. When the Bill came down from Committee to be considered on Report in the House of Commons this clause was put forward by those who championed the interests of roads, and it was intimated to the Government that, so far as their position was concerned, they would be satisfied if this

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clause put forward by them was accepted. I know the noble Lord says he is not bound by any arrangement come to by those who represent roads in another place. That is quite true. Roads are not a body like railway companies for whom any one person can claim to speak. I only think it necessary your Lordships should understand that this clause was accepted by the Government in the form in which it was suggested to us by those who speak for road interests in the house of Commons.
I come to consider the terms of the Amendment itself. It really seems to me to be one of the most astonishing proposals I have ever considered. The noble Lord proposes to turn this Advisory Committee, which has been set up for the purpose of advising the Minister as to the performance of his duties with regard to roads, into a small independent Government, which shall administer public funds although not responsible to Parliament; have its own spokesman in Parliament, independent of the Minister; and report to the Minister once a year. That is not an Advisory Committee at all. It would set up a small Government for the purpose of dealing with matters of road administration. I think I might call it a, regular "Soviet" which the noble Lord is asking us to accept in place of the Advisory Committee now in the Bill. I cannot hold out any hope at all of being able to accept the Amendment in this form.
With regard to the first new subsection, "the Minister shall refer to the Roads Committee," that is a matter with which we have already dealt, and I have undertaken to consult with the noble Lord between now and Report as to the insertion of words which will place on the Minister a statutory obligation to set up a Roads Department to whom these matters connected with roads shall be referred. If he is not satisfied with the words we shall submit he will of course retain his right to bring up the matter again on Report stage. With regard to the subsequent subsections of the Amendment I repeat that any Amendment which your Lordships may suggest as to the representation of interests on this Committee we shall be prepared to consider. This would not only make the Committee executive, but it is a proposal to set up a Committee which would act in all respects in the administration of funds and representation to Parliament, altogether independent of the Minister.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I admit that I framed these Amendments with my friends on the assumption that the Minister and the Government were anxious that at any rate a portion of the power of the Road Board should pass to this committee. Otherwise it is not a real committee. It is nominated by the Minister, and it might be in future a creature of the Minister. The Minister, supposing a particular person were selected by outside bodies to sit upon this committee, might refuse to have him. It is not like the Port of London Authority where members are elected by particular interests. The Minister appoints the committee and can refuse the appoint went of any particular person, and therefore in the last resort the committee becomes the creature of the Minister. I do not think the Government can expect that such a committee will command much confidence. In fact I have heard a great deal of criticism of the committee, and the Government if they are to re-establish confidence in the country with regard to their road policy; should disabuse people's minds of the growing conviction that interests concerned are not represented. I must tell them quite frankly that the committee as constituted does not command the confidence of the Road interests.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, after subsection (1), to insert the following new subsections:
"() Not less than one member of the Roads Committee shall be representative of labour interests concerned with road transport.
"() The Roads Committee shall present to the Minister not less than once a year a Report of their proceedings, and this Report shall be laid before Parliament.
"() The Roads Committee shall elect their own chairman and appoint their own secretary."
The noble Lord said: As the noble Earl; said he was prepared to consider the composition of the committee, I hope I may get some satisfaction from him. I suggest as a start that not less than one member of the Roads Committee should be representative of labour interests concerned with road transport. That would be advisable in the interests of the working of the measure, because everybody must wish to take into our confidence the great labour interest, and to ask them to work with us in this matter. The transport interest in

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regard to labour is now very large, and I am informed that something like 300,000 men are engaged in driving motor lorries.
The next recommendation is that the Roads Committee shall present a report of their proceedings not less than once a year. I think that is a reasonable suggestion. The Roads Board laid an Annual Report before Parliament, and I cannot conceive that there can be any objection to that course. The Roads Committee can present their Report to the Minister, who will lay it before Parliament. Then, with regard to the Roads Committee, I suggest that they should select their own chairman and appoint their own secretary. Not only is the Minister going to appoint the committee, but he has power to refuse the appointment as chairman of any member selected by the committee. Of those three unnumbered sections I think that the most important is the second. I think that is a reasonable request to make.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 30, after subsection (4), insert the proposed new subsections.—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I should like to be sure that I understand accurately the meaning of the first of the noble Lord's three Amendments. Is it that out of the tell members, five of whom are to be representative of highway authorities, and five representative of users of road traffic, one shall be deemed to be representative of labour interest?
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Not less than ten; it is not tied down to ten.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: But out of that number there is to be a representative of labour interests? I have no objection at all to a representative of labour interest being put upon the committee. So far as that part of the noble Lord's Amendment is concerned I accept in principle that there should be a labour representative. With regard to the second subsection, for reasons which I have already mentioned I cannot accept it because it would completely subvert the whole departmental management of the Ministry. Here it is suggested that this committee with which the Minister will confer continuously all through the year, and with which he will be in daily consultation, is to make an annual report of their proceedings. That is simply to say that one
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section of a Department is to make an annual report to the head of the Department and that the report is to be published as a Parliamentary Paper. That is wholly inconsistent with the principles of the management of a Department. It has no precedent in any other Government Department and it must be obvious that the Government cannot accept it. With regard to the final point of the noble Lord, as I understand, at present the Chairman and secretary are to be additional to the general members.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Not less than ten.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Therefore the clause would read that the Committee would have to consist of not less than eleven members. Ten would be appointed as provided for in subsection (2). The Secretary would not be a member of the Committee. I am not prepared to accept the position that the five representatives of the highway authorities and the five representatives of users should without consultation with the Ministry elect an outside chairman, but if the noble Lord wishes to put it that the Committee should elect a Chairman from among its members then I think I can meet him on that point.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: That is what I intend.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: The noble Earl has been extremely conciliatory. I want to be clear what he has consented to. I understand that he has consented to one member being a representative of labour. That would involve making the number eleven instead of ten.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Not less than eleven.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: That would have to be put right on Report. Then the noble Earl demurs to the second paragraph about an annual report, but he accepts the third point on the understanding that the Chairman is elected by the Committee from amongst their own number. Is that so?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Yes.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I think that is a reasonable arrangement, and I advise my noble friend to accept it.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I am prepared to accept it, but I should press on Report for some definition of annual report. Can the noble Earl give me any information as to whether the report on the roads will be annually produced? Originally we used to have the report from the Local Government Board, then we had it from the Road Board for ten years, and it has really been of immense value to local authorities, and in the International Road Congresses for the purposes of scientific investigation. Will the noble Earl promise, as a Parliamentary undertaking, that the Minister of Transport will produce an annual report on roads? It is of the utmost value from every point of view, national and international.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The noble Lord would not expect me to give an undertaking which would bind the Minister, without having consulted him on the matter. I could not say on my own responsibility what the Minister would say. I will let the noble Lord have a reply before Report. Let me make it quite clear upon the remaining points. I agree that there shall be a representative of Labour on the Committee. I also agree that the chairman of the Committee should be elected by the Committee front its own numbers, but I do not accept the noble Lord's Amendment as it stands, because that refers to the appointment of their own secretary.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I will withdraw now, and draft a further clause for the Report stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 20 agreed to.
Clause 21:
Advisory committees.
21.(1) For the purpose of giving advice and assistance to the Minister in connection with the exercise and performance of his powers and duties, the Minister shall set up a panel of experts, and of impartial persons of wide commercial and trading experience appointed from nominees, after consultation with the various undertakings and interests concerned, of the various classes of undertakings affected by this Act, and of labour, trading interests, local authorities, and such other interests as he may deem desirable.
(2) Before exercising any of the powers under subsection (1) (b) of section three of this Act, to the exercise of which the owners of the undertaking concerned object or directing the establishment of new, transport services by land or water, the Minister shall refer the matter to a committee selected by him front the said panel.
(3) The advisory panel or any committee to whom any matter is referred under this section shall, before reporting or advising, if they see fit, give public notice and permit any person affected or likely to be affected to place their views before them either orally or in writing.
(4) Any member of the advisory panel, or any committee thereof, or of any other committee established under this Act, for giving advice and assistance to the Minister, shall be considered to be acting entirely in a confidential capacity.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in subsection (2), to delete the words "to the exercise of which the owners of the undertaking concerned, object." The noble Lord said: Certain traders and associations wish to exclude those words, in order that, before exercising the powers, it should be referred to the Committee whether or not they object, and there should be a report on the whole situation, even though the owners of the undertaking may not object.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 2, leave out from ("Act") to ("or") in line 3.—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The clause as it stands says that before exercising any of the powers under subsection (1)—that is, the powers of taking over a new service to the exercise of which the owners of the undertaking object—the Minister will refer the matter to the Committee. The effect of the Amendment will be that the Minister would be obliged to refer to the Committee before taking over an undertaking the owners of which would be willing to be taken over. I think that would be very unreasonable. The necessity of referring the matter to the Committee is where the owners of the undertaking object to being taken over, and that is a matter which should go before the Committee for further consideration, but obviously, if the owners of the undertaking are quite prepared for these powers to be exercised, there would be no reason for going to the Committee at all.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Does it also apply to the establishment of new transport services?
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The words which the noble Lord is proposing to leave out do not apply to that. They only apply to exercising the powers under subsection (1) (b), to the exercise of which the owners of the undertaking concerned object.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I do not dispute the contention which the noble Earl has put forward, but I want to enter a caveat that I do not think that this Advisory Committee is a very satisfactory body. They are a panel selected by the Minister from nominees made by himself; they have no element of independence about them; and I think it is possible that we shall have to revert to this point again on Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The next Amendment is purely drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, lines 3 and 4, leave out ("directing the establishment of") and insert ("establishing").—(The Earl of Lytton.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON VISCOUNT MIDLETON moved to leave out subsection (4). The noble Viscount said: I do not know what the intention of this subsection is. If it is meant that no member who sits on the Road Board, supposing he happens to be a member of this House, can possibly address the House on any question which has arisen with regard to the Road Board—
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It is not the Road Board at all.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It is all committees under the Act, not merely the Road Board.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Yes; but I was speaking with regard to this particular committee. It is obvious that there must be occasions on which there will be public discussion. Is it intended that anything with which any member of the committee has had to do he must abstain from discussing in public, that he is, in fact, regarded as a member of the Department and must not take part in any discussion
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in Parliament or elsewhere? When you come to a committee of ten persons, and the other committees under the Act, you are covering a large number of people. I should have thought that this was an unusual thing to put in an Act of Parliament, and. hardly necessary.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, lines 12 to 15, leave out subsection (4).—(Viscount Midleton.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Let us first of all be clear as to what we are discussing. There is no question here of a Roads Committee merely. The necessity of keeping the proceedings of these committees confidential is entirely in the interests of the traders themselves. There will be a number of questions inquired into where it will be necessary to have all the cards on the table, which would be impossible if the matter were to be investigated in a Court of law. When these committees are making their investigations we want to know exactly what the position of the business and trade of a particular trader might be. He would be jealous of competition unless he could feel that he was disclosing facts to persons who would not make use of the information; and unless you retain this subsection and ensure that the proceedings will be of a private and confidential character, we shall not get the information from these traders, which they would certainly be reluctant to give if they thought any use would be afterwards made of them.
It is generally thought this was put in to screen the Minister from publicity. That is not so. It is in order to enable the information obtained by these Committees to be of a really valuable kind, and to ensure protection for those who come before the Committee and give information which is to them of great importance, and which they would not desire to have brought to the notice of their competitors in trade.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It is said that it is not intended to screen the Minister. I think the noble Earl forgets the Minister really intended a much more severe proposal; he intended that everything which passed in these Committees should be under the Official Secrets Act.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: It was for the same reason.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: In other words, he proposed to lay down a criminal prosecution for anyone who revealed anything which passed in these Committees. It may not have been the intention of the Minister, but anyone would assume that he did mean to protect the proceedings of the Ministry from anything like revelation to the public.
The only way to make the administration of this Ministry sweet is to have it in public. We want the full light and air of public opinion to be upon the Ministry and its working. The noble Earl says, "What an astonishing thing to have the proceeding of these Committees in public. How can we arrange, say, the rates and fares and tolls of an undertaking if it is not confidential?" Are the Private Bills Committees of your Lordships' House Confidential? Is that what the noble Lord has learnt in the course of his Parliamentary career? Every single one of these things which we are providing for in this Bill is debated before Public Committees of both Houses of Parliament. That is the true protection of all individuals and companies whose rights are involved in these proceedings.
These Advisory Coinmittees—and the noble Earl was perfectly right in reminding your Lordships that these subsections apply to all the Advisory Committees under this Bill, not merely to the Roads Committee—have been inserted at the instance of the House of Commons in order to act as a quid pro quo for the loss of the protection of Parliament which is taken away under this Bill. All the things we have hitherto relied upon to protect private rights in all these matters are abolished by the Bill. The House of Commons said, "At any rate give us Advisory Committees which can be referred to." "Yes," says the noble Earl, "but let them debate in secret." The great mass of these things will pass under the immediate superintendence of the Minister. What guarantee have we that all sorts of sinister and underhand things will not creep in—things which, if not corrupt, are tending in that direction. Those are the great evils of modern times against which we have to protect ourselves.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: Lord Salisbury says that this is sinister and underhand and tending to corruption.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I said it might become so. I did not say it was.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: Lord Lytton said in specific terms that this was put in for the protection of the trader and not to shield the Minister. The Minister has nothing to be shielded from; it is the trader who requires protection. I have had a good deal of experience on this point. The group of traders who would correspond to the Advisory Committee who must be largely concerned in these matters have to inquire into the control of business of the great bulk of traders in that particular department of public business. One trader is most reluctant that his rivals, or even his potential rivals, should see his figures—most reluctant. Not merely are traders reluctant that the figures should be examined but they are desperately afraid lest their particular methods of trading, built up by their own particular firm, should become public property, and where, owing to the stress of war, the Government have been forced to take over obligations which hitherto had been adequately conducted by the ordinary private firms, traders combine in saying this—"Take over the business, work the business as the needs of the nation demand, but at least protect us and do not allow our rivals to see our figures and examine our methods and machinery." I have had very much experience on this particular point and I lay that down to your Lordships as axiomatic.
Lord Salisbury wants public opinion on the Ministry. I do not mind that in the very least, but as the Amendment goes, this is public opinion on the private trading figures of private individuals and private firms; that is the point. This is public opinion on industry. It means that a particular firm has got to lay the whole of its cards on the table before this Advisory Committee which, ex hypothesi, will include persons who are either themselves, from their experience or through their positions, connected with similar or perhaps with rival firms. This committee, again, will consist of representatives of labour, and I do not know who else. A committee of that sort differs entirely from a committee of your Lordships' House upstairs or a Private Bill Committee of the House of Commons. There, an industry which comes

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forward, according to my experience, in nine cases out of ten, is able, if it so desires, to prevent the disclosure of its private trading figures. Where it is forced to disclose them is where it brings an action or a measure against the interests of somebody else, but where it is the attacked, or the party to be absorbed, it certainly would not have to lay documents, figures and trading methods, as will be the case before this Advisory Committee.
Further, Lord Salisbury says, "Let us go back to the old English idea of publicity." By all means as regards public affairs, but it has never been a British principle that in business matters private firms should court publicity, and I do not see that in this case there is any adequate ground for saying that everything that passes before these bodies is in fact to be made public.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: No doubt the noble Earl's remarks are applicable to traders, but they do not apply to the Roads Committee at all. May I point this out? Suppose, for the sake of argument some great question of road policy
Resolved in the affirmative, and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON VISCOUNT MIDLETON moved, after subsection (4), to insert as a new subsection:—"(5) Every report to the Minister of the advisory panel, or any committee thereof, or of any other committee estab-
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is being discussed and the Ministry and the Committee differ, is it intended that any member of this House is thereby debarred front raising the question here? I can hardly think that is the intention of the Government. The Roads Committee is not concerned with private interests at all and I suggest that if the Government carry the clause as it is it should be understood that the Roads Committee is not in the same position. They would of course, regard as confidential, as any honourable man would, anything which is under discussion as a subject of delicate negotiation. It cannot be intended to apply these drastic restrictions to members of a Committee which will really be in the same position as members of the Highway Board.
EARL BRASSEY: In spite of what has been said by the noble Earl opposite I fully agree with the noble Marquess and I hope the noble Viscount will press his Amendment to a Division.
On Question, whether subsection (4) shall stand part of the clause?—
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 25; Not-Contents, 23.

CONTENTS.

Birkenhead, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Goschen, V.

Hylton, L. [Teller.]

Bradford, E.

Hood, V.

Lee of Fareham, L.

Chesterfield, E.

Peel, V.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Jersey, E.

Queenborough, L.

Lytton, E.

Annesley, L.

Ranksborough, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Clinton, L.

Shandon, L.

Cochrane of Cults, L.

Somerleyton, L. [Teller.]

Sandhurst, V. (L. Chamberlain.)

Colebrooke, L.

Wigan, L. (E. Crawford.)

Churchill, V.

Faringdon, L.

Wittenham, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Salisbury, M.

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton)

Kintore, L. (E. Kintore)

Chalmers, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Brassey, E.

Clanwilliam, L. (E. Clanwilliam.)

O'Hagan, L.

Doncaster, E. (D. Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

Denman, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Elgin, L. (E. Elgin and Kincardine.)

Sandys, L.

Grey, E.

Saye and Sele, L.

Selborne, E.

Erskine, L.

Southwark, L.

Stanhope, E. [Teller.]

Fairfax of Cameron, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L. [Teller.]

Wicklow, E.

Forester, L.

lished under this Act, shall, if the Committee so direct, be laid before Parliament."
The noble Viscount said:—It seems to me too clear that if a committee is to be of any advantage at all to advise on roads, where necessary it should be allowed to report to Parliament the advice which it gives. If it is not it would be inconsistent

449
with the Committee as adopted by your Lordships to-night, which is to be an independent committee. If, on the other hand, we are to go back to a simple Advisory Committee appointed by the Minister, that is a purely departmental concern, and I trust the Bill will not pass in those terms.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 11, after subsection (4) insert the following new subsection:
"(5) Every report to the Minister of the advisory panel, or any committee thereof, or of any other committee established under this Act, shall, if the Committee so direct, be laid before Parliament."—(Viscount Midleton.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: The Government cannot accept the Amendment. To say that any committee set up under this Bill is to make a report to Parliament upon the matters upon which it has advised the Minister would be wholly inconsistent with the view which I have held all through that these committees are to be Advisory Committees, appointed for the purpose of advising the Minister. Of course, if noble Lords think the committees are set up to control and hamper the Minister, then it is obvious that; they will be encourage to publish broadcast their opinions. That is not the view which the Government hold.
VISCOUNT MIDLETON: Considering the lateness of the hour and the fact that your Lordships divided a few moments ago, I would rather not press this to a Division now, but I frankly tell the noble Earl that I shall renew this matter on the Report stage, and advise your Lordships then to take a Division upon it, because I regard the point of view adopted by the Government with regard to these committees as being destructive of the position which they have taken up as to the status of the Minister.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD ERSKINE LORD ERSKINE moved, after subsection (4), to insert the following new subsection:—"(5) The Minister, after receiving the advice of a report from any committee established under this Act, shall not take action in conflict with such advice or report without a resolution of both Houses of Parliament." The noble Lord said:—I beg to move this Amendment, and I hope the Government will give it favourable consideration.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 15, after subsection (4) insert the following new subsection:
"(5) The Minister, after receiving the advice of a report from any committee established under this Act, shall not take action in conflict with such advice or report without a resolution of both Houses of Parliament."—(Lord Erskine.)
THE EARL OF LYTTON: I am not surprised that the noble Lord has nothing to say in defence of his Amendment. It is really the strangest Amendment that I can possibly imagine, to suggest that a Committee shall have power, if the Minister does not accept its advice, to force the Minister to go to Parliament and get a Resolution before he can take any action.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I do not think the matter is so easily set aside as the noble Earl supposes. Why should it be so very astonishing that if the Committee report against the action of the Minister the conflict of opinion should be settled by Parliament? In the course of this discussion we have to assume that the old authority of Parliament, is to be eliminated and the noble Earl is positively astonished that an appeal should be made to Parliament in a matter of this kind. I do not think it is at all surprising. I do not consider that it is obviously an unwise proposal when there is a profound difference of opinion with the Minister that the matter should be submitted to Parliament. On the contrary it seems to me reasonable. The truth is that the Government are afraid to submit things to the public. They are afraid of Parliament. They are afraid of the light of public opinion, that is the real secret. I do not know whether my noble friend will press this, but I cannot see that it is absurd.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I think the noble Marquess has pushed his indictment rather far. If the noble Marquess will forgive my saying so it is not a question of whether we are afraid of public opinion or afraid of Parliament. We can survive, like all other Governments, only so long as we are able to command the necessary support from Parliament. At any moment that support may be withdrawn from us. This particular proposal hardly supports the foundation which the noble Marquess has attempted to erect upon it. What is this proposal? It is that the Minister, after receiving the advice and the report

451
from any parliamentary committee established under this Act—and there are three Committees—shall not take action contrary to such advise without a Resolution of both Houses of Parliament. I would ask the noble Marquess and others who may have been attracted by this Amendment to think what that means. There are three Committees set up under this Bill. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that there may be ten reports in a week, especially in the early stages of carrying out this Bill, and if those reports are not in harmony with the view the Minister has taken he—a responsible Minister—cannot act on his own view unless he obtains a Resolution of both Houses of Parliament. It might easily be that your Lordships in this House and the House of Commons would be asked seven or eight times in a week to pass Resolutions in order to determine the domestic differences which had arisen between the Minister and a Committee. Take as an illustration the case of the Army Council. The Army Council occupies in relation to the Secretary of State for War a position which is not wholly incomparable to that which is set up under this Bill. Conceive if the rule had been laid down that whenever the Secretary of State for War found himself unable to agree with the view taken by the Army Council, whom he quite properly consults, that it is not possible to act upon the conclusion he has formed unless he obtains a vote from the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Surely we must treat this Minister, who is sometimes spoken of it seems to me in a tone of undue suspicion, not, indeed, in a more favourable position, not, indeed, place him upon a pedestal upon which no other Minister is placed, but let us treat him as favourably as other Ministers. Do not because we are creating a new Minister treat him with greater suspicion than we do every other Minister. Do not let us commit ourselves to what I venture to say with the greatest possible respect would really be a constitutional absurdity—namely, that wherever there is a domestic difference between the Minister and the Committee that is given to him for consultation he cannot act over their head like every other Minister can act over the head of his Committee unless he gets a Resolution of both Houses of Parliament.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Though I had not prepared to support the Amendment brought forward by my
452
noble friend, I think there is a great deal in it. When I was asked to support it I came to the conclusion that something of this kind was needed. Could we have on Report some words like these—"Should any Committee established under this Act take action in conflict with the Minister it shall present to Parliament the reasons for its decision." In case of such a difference the Committee might surely make a report to Parliament on the grounds of the difference with the Minister. There might be many important cases in which it might be highly desirable for Parliament to know what the reasons for difference are.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 21, as amended, agreed to.
THE EARL OF LYTTON: Perhaps it would be convenient if we were to adjourn at this point. The Amendments down for inserting new clauses after Clause 21 raise very important questions which, I think, should be discussed when we are all rather fresher than we are at this moment. Moreover, I have every hope that I may be able to meet at ally rate the more essential points of these later Amendments, and I have asked Lord Emmott to confer with me with a view, if possible, to bringing up an agreed clause.
House resumed, and to be again in Committee to-morrow.

MESSAGE FROM THE KING.
Delivered by the Lord Wigan (E. Crawford), and read by his Lordship as follows:
GEORGE REX.
His Majesty, taking into consideration the eminent services rendered during the late war by those Officers who commanded and directed His forces by sea, on land, and in the air, and being desirous in recognition of such services to confer upon them some signal mark of His favour, recommends to the House of Lords that they should concur in making the following grants:—

NAVY:

£

Admiral of the Fleet, Sir David Beatty

100,000

Admiral of the Fleet, Viscount Jellicoe

50,000

£

Admiral Sir Charles E. Madden

10,000

Admiral Sir F. C. Doveton Sturdee

10,000

Rear-Admiral Sir John de Robeck

10,000

Vice-Admiral Sir Roger J. B. Keyes

10,000

Commodore Sir Reginald J. Tyrwhitt

10,000

ARMY:

Field-Marshal Sir Douglas Haig

100,000

Field-Marshal Viscount French

50,000

Field-Marshal Sir Edmund Allenby

50,000

Field-Marshal Sir H. Plumer

30,000

Field-Marshal Sir Henry Wilson

10,000

General Sir Henry Rawlinson

30,000

General The Hon. Sir Julian Byng

30,000

General Sir Henry Horne

30,000

General Sir William Robertson

10,000

General Sir William Bird-wood

10,000

Lieut.-Col. Sir Maurice Hankey

25,000

AIR:

Air Vice-Marshal Sir Hugh Trenchard

10,000

Ordered that the said Message be taken into consideration to-morrow.

TRAMWAYS PROVISIONAL ORDERS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
HUDDERSFIELD CORPORATION GAS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
STOCKTON-ON-TEES CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments: The said Amendments considered and agreed to.

STOCKSBRIDGE GAS BILL.
WATERFORD HARBOUR BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments, agreed to.

BOLAND'S DIVORCE BILL. [H.L.]
Message from the Commons for copy of the Minutes of Evidence taken before this House, together with the proceedings and the documents deposited in the case: Ordered to be communicated with a request that they may be returned.
GLASGOW CORPORATION ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.]
A Bill to confirm a Provisional Order relating to Glasgow Corporation—Was presented by the Lord Hylton for the Lord Stanmore (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, sections 8 and 9); read 1a, and to be printed.
FRASERBURGH HARBOUR (RATES) ORDER CONFIRMATION BILL. [H.L.]
A Bill to confirm a Provisional Order relating to Fraserburgh Harbour Rates—Was presented by the Lord Hylton for the Lord Stanmore; read 1a; to be printed; and (pursuant to the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1899, section 7) deemed to have been read 2a, and reported from the Committee.
CITY OF LONDON POLICE BILL.
To be read 3a to-morrow.
STRETFORD URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
Reported, with Amendments.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (NO. 1) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (NO. 2) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (NO. 3) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (NO. 5) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDER (NO. 6) BILL.
Reported, without Amendment, and recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISIONAL ORDERS (NO. 7) BILL.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDERS BILL.
Reported, with Amendments, and recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.

WELLS PARTICULAR BAPTIST AND CONGREGATIONAL CHAPELS CHARITIES BILL.
NATIONAL TRUST CHARITY BILL.
BROOKE ROBINSON MUSEUM CHARITY BILL.
CONGREGATIONAL CHAPELS CHARITIES BILL.
EATINGTON WESLEYAN METHODIST CHAPEL PROPERTY BILL.
PLUMPTRE HOSPITAL CHARITY BILL.
HEADCORN BAPTIST CHAPEL CHARITY BILL.
Order of Tuesday last referring the said Bills to the Examiners discharged: Bills to be read 2a tomorrow (The Viscount Sandhurst)

GOVERNMENT OF SOUDAN LOAN BILL.
GOVERNMENT WAR OBLIGATIONS BILL.
WEST INDIAN COURT OF APPEAL BILL.
Second Reading (which stands appointed for to-morrow) put off to Thursday next.

NUNEATON CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
POOLE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Commons Amendments considered and agreed to.

EDUCATION (COMPLIANCE WITH CONDITIONS OF GRANTS) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: My Lords, this Bill, with which I think many of your Lordships are acquainted, is designed to meet a difficulty which now exists in the case of schools which act under trusts or instruments of such a character as to disqualify them from qualifying for regulations under the Board of Education. The application for these grants cannot be entertained unless their trust deeds are altered. This Bill entitles the authorities of the school to make changes in their deeds and instru-
456
ments, but the present procedure involves much delay and inconvenience. This follows the precedent set in the Education Act of 1870 in respect of elementary schools, and in the Scottish Education Act of 1882. I submit the Bill to your Lordships for Second Reading.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Crawford.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House tomorrow.

HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES (IRELAND) BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order) Amendments and passed, and to the Commons.
EXPIRING LAWS CONTINUANCE BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment, and to be read 3a to-morrow.
RETIRED OFFICERS (CIVIL EMPLOYMENT) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment, and to be read 3a to-morrow.
SEX DISQUALIFICATION (REMOVAL) BILL. [H.L.]
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.
WAR LOAN BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.

POLICE BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF JERSEY: My Lords, in asking your Lordships to give a Second Reading to this Bill I may, perhaps, preface my remarks by saying that recent events, not contemplated when the Bill was drafted, have amply proved the necessity for this measure, and have also emphasised the urgency for passing it into law at the

457
earliest possible date. I may, perhaps, also be permitted to express the gratification of the Government, and, indeed, of the country, at the way in which the police generally have withstood the sudden onslaughts upon their loyalty made within the last few days by the officials of the Police Union, supported by a very limited number of extremists amongst the police themselves. This assault has been supported by every kind of misstatement, even of falsehood, particularly in relation to the terms and objects of the Bill itself. It is to be hoped that some of the misapprehensions thus created may now be cleared away.
It is very satisfactory to note that the great majority of the police forces of this country have stood firm. Only seven out of 250 forces in Great Britain have been affected; of the others not a single man has been withdrawn from or has refused duty. In the Metropolitan Police 1,075 men have struck out of the total present strength of 19,000, and altogether 2,360 out of a total present strength of about 54,000 in all forces in England and Wales and 21,000 in the particular forces affected by the strike. I venture to think that in one respect this strike is significant and has had what I might almost describe as beneficial results. The failure of the strike has shown that the police realise the value of the high traditions which have been handed down to them and which they themselves are proud to maintain. They have shown that they will not lightly do anything to discredit or to tarnish their high reputation.
It is further shown that they appreciate that the Government are anxious to redress any legitimate grievances which may be brought to their notice, and that when they are satisfied that these grievances will be fairly considered they prefer to trust the responsible authorities rather than to be misled by professional agitators. It is very very much to be hoped that the example set by the police in this respect will have a good and a permanent influence on many others who at the present time, when, as we know, there is a spirit of unrest abroad, might otherwise he inclined to act somewhat hastily and to proceed to extreme measures which they would most undoubtedly ultimately regret. I would suggest that no more effective check could be given to the influence of extremists, who are not only the enemies of this country but are the worst friends of those whose interest they
458
profess to safeguard, than their repudiation by the members of the police force. It is indeed gratifying that by their good sense and loyalty the members of the police force have restored the confidence and won back the admiration of their fellow-countrymen which was perhaps temporarily imperilled by events a few months ago. By their refusal to respond to evil counsels they have once again proved that they are a force of which this country may indeed be proud.
To turn to this Bill, I would very briefly outline the three principal objects which it seeks to attain. First it seeks to enable the Government to give effect to the Report of Lord Desborough's Committee with regard to the revision and standardisation of police pay and conditions of service; secondly, to deal with the intolerable situation created by the action of the body calling itself the Police and Prison Officers' Union and to prevent attempts by any body or person to cause disaffection in the police; and, thirdly, to provide and place on a statutory basis machinery for enabling the police to make collective representations to the local police authorities and to bring matters affecting the Service as a whole before the Home Office or the Scottish Office as the case may be.
Before referring more fully to the Report of the Committee and the manner in which its recommendations have been carried out by the Bill, reference should be made to the very great debt of gratitude which the Government and the police owe to the Chairman and members of the Committee. Considering the difficulty of the subject and the wide range of evidence that had to be taken, their first report was issued in a remarkably short time as a result of indefatigable work, and their recommendations met generally with warm approval both from the rank and file of the police force and from the police authorities. The Committee have not yet finished their work and have still to deal with general questions of police organisation; but this Bill contains all that is necessary to enable the carrying into effect of the recommendations of Lord Desborough's Committee. The greater number of those recommendations refer to the pay of the police and the provisions of Clauses 4, 6, and 7 are directed, among other things, to enable the Government to carry out these recommendations. Clause 4 will enable the Secretary of State to standardise the pay, allowances, pensions, clothing, expenses and conditions of service of the police forces throughout the country

459
—a point on which the Committee lay considerable stress.
The most controversial provisions of the Bill are those of Clause 2, which prohibit the police from belonging to any trade union or any association having for its object, or one of its objects, to control and influence the pay, pensions or conditions of service of any police force. This has been construed as being an attack by the Government upon trade unions as such; but it is, of course, nothing of the kind. Policemen are not industrial workers and institutions which are natural to, and indeed a necessary part of, the industrial system of the present day, are impossible in a disciplined body such as the Police. The essential part of a trade union is the power and the right to strike; but in the police, where discipline is vital, the right to strike would mean the ruin of discipline and complete disintegration. The difference between the industrial worker and the policeman has been aptly expressed in a recent article in a newspaper in which it is pointed out that the ordinary industrial worker goes to work, while the policeman goes on duty.
If, however, the policeman is to be prohibited from belonging to a trade union, it is necessary that he should have an inalienable right freely to bring his grievances, if any, to the notice of the highest authority, and this is provided, and made statutory, by the creation of the Federation which is referred to in Clause 1 and in greater detail in the Schedule to the Bill. The question of a representative body for the police was not included in the terms of reference of the Committee, but the Committee came to the conclusion that the establishment of some system for the purpose would be necessary as a corollary to the application of the principle of standardisation of pay; and they sketched the general lines of an organization which corresponds very closely to that which the Government had already decided to adopt.
It has been suggested that this Federation will be under the control of the Police Authorities, but this is not the case. It is limited only in one respect—namely, that it is precluded by Clause 1 from considering questions of discipline and promotion affecting individuals, although it may of course freely consider the general principles of discipline and promotion. This is in accordance with the recommendations of the Committee.
460
By Clause 1 subsection (2), of the Bill it is provided that the Police Federation shall be entirely independent of, and unassociated with, any body or person outside the police service. This is in accordance with, but perhaps goes rather further than, the recommendation in paragraph 82 of the Committee's Report, that the Representative Body suggested by them should be "confined to serving members of the Police." The reasons for this provision of the Bill will be apparent to every thinking man, and are emphasised by the events of the past week.
There remains one further point in the Bill to which attention should be drawn, and that is the provision in Clause 3 imposing penalties upon any person who causes, or attempts to cause, disaffection among the members of any police force or induces, or attempts to induce, any member of a police force to withhold his services. The evils resulting from a police strike, even from a strike on so small a scale as that which has recently taken place, must be apparent to everyone. Those evils have been deliberately created, and are now being fostered, by a campaign of wilful misrepresentation and falsehood. Deliberate misstatements, not only regarding the number of men who have forsaken their duty, but also regarding the objects of this Bill, are being made daily with the express object of seducing men from their obligations to the State. It is necessary that such practices should be stopped.
There is only one other point to which it is necessary to allude. It is being freely stated that this Bill is the "thin end of the wedge," the beginning of an attempt to crush trade unionism altogether. It is amazing that such a statement should be believed. It is doubtful whether there is a single member of either House of Parliament who in the present day would wish, even if it were possible, to put an end to trade unions. It can be stated with the utmost possible emphasis that in introducing this Bill the Government had no intention whatsoever to make an attack upon trades unions. With these few remarks I will ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading to this Bill.
Moved, that the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Jersey.)
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House to-morrow.

HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICES.
Order of the Day read for the consideration of the Fourth Report from the Select Committee.
The Committee reported—
1. WAR BONUS FOR PENSIONERS.
The Committee considered the application to the pensioners of the House of Lords Offices of the war bonus sanctioned by the Treasury for the Civil Service, and approved its application to the pensions of the staff of the House of Lords.
2. ADDITIONAL ACCOMMODATION FOR CROWN OFFICE.
Paragraph 2 of the Third Report from the Committee was reconsidered. The Lord Great Chamberlain's proposals for providing additional accommodation to the Clerk of the Crown and Permanent Secretary to the Lord Chancellor, as set forth in paragraph 2 [sub-paragraph (1)] of the Third Report, were approved as a temporary arrangement until the construction of the lift to the third floor was completed.
3. BOX FOR SECRETARIES OF CABINET MINISTERS.
The Lord Great Chamberlain submitted a proposal for the re-erection of the box which was removed from the space on the right of the Throne. This proposal was not approved by the Committee.
4. GRATUITY TO A REPRESENTATIVE OF A COAL PORTER (DECEASED).
The Lord Great Chamberlain proposed that a gratuity should be paid to the representative of John Panter, principal coal porter, lately deceased, after thirty-three years and four months' faithful service. The Committee recommend that a payment of £82 10 s., being at the rate of one week's pay for each year of employment (plus 25 per cent. representing the allowance for war bonus on the scale sanctioned by the Treasury) be made to his representative in accordance with the provisions of the Superannuation Acts.
5. GRATUITY TO HOUSEKEEPER ON RETIREMENT.
The Lord Great Chamberlain reported that Miss A. de Laney, housekeeper, had retired on account of ill-health after seventeen years and one month's valuable service, and submitted that a compassionate gratuity should be granted to her.
The Committee recommend that a payment of £49 0s 8d., being at the rate of one week's pay for each year of employment (plus an allowance of 7s. 8¼d. as war bonus on the scale sanctioned by the Treasury) be made to Miss de Laney in accordance with the provisions of the Superannuation Acts.
6. FEE FUND.
Paragraph 6 of the Third Report from the Committee was reconsidered. The amended account of the Fee Fund of the House of Lords for the year ended 31st March, 1919, was laid before the Committee by the Clerk of the Parliaments.
THE ACTING CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF KINTORE): My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now considered and agreed to.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

THE ROYAL COMMISSION ON AGRICULTURE.
LORD CLINTON: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord BLEDISLOE I beg to ask His Majesty's Government whether it has been decided that the Royal Commission on the Economic Condition of Agriculture shall held its meetings in secret, and how it is possible to justify such a course as being in the public interest.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORD: It is outside the province of the Government to control the admission of the public or the Press at meetings held by Royal Commissions. These bodies settle their own procedure, and the Government, so far as I am able to ascertain, has no right to intervene. I am informed, however, that this particular Royal Commission propose to issue periodical reports to the Press immediately after their sittings.

PRIVATE BILLS, ETC.
[From Minutes of August 4.]
CANNOCK URBAN:DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL.
WALSALL CORPORATION BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and referred to the Examiners.
INTESTATE MOVEABLE SUCCESSION (SCOTLAND) BILL. [H.L.]
Returned front the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments: The said Amendments to be printed.

NEWARK GAS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments: The said Amendments considered, and agreed to.

NUNEATON CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
POOLE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.

LAND SETTLEMENT (FACILITIES) BILL.
Committee of the Whole House (which stands appointed for to-morrow) put off to Wednesday next.

MILK PRODUCTION.
Report from the Select Committee (with the proceedings of the Committee) made, and to be printed. Minutes of Evidence laid upon the Table, and to be delivered out.
House adjourned at twenty-five minutes past eleven o'clock until three o'clock to-morrow.