Sitting of 14 April 1921

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Private Bill Petitions [Lords] (Standing Orders not 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 Petition for the following Bill, originating in the Lords, the Standing Orders have not been complied with, namely:
Lymington Rural District Council [Lords].
Ordered, That the Report be referred to the Select Committee on Standing Orders.
Provisional Order Bills (No Standing Orders applicable),—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, referred on the First Reading thereof, no Standing Orders are applicable, namely:—
Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (No. 2) Bill.
Bill to be read a Second time Tomorrow.
Provisional Order Bills (Standing Orders applicable thereto 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, referred on the First Reading thereof, the Standing Orders which are applicable thereto have been complied with, namely:
Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (No. 1) Bill.
Bill to be read a Second time Tomorrow.

WATER (CHARGES) BILLS.
Resolution of the House [7th April] relative to the Metropolitan Water Board
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(Charges) Bill, the Thames Conservancy Bill, and the Lee Conservancy Bill, which was ordered to be communicated to the Lords, and Lords Message [13th April] signifying their concurrence in the said Resolution, read;
Orders [7th April] that the Metropolitan Water Board (Charges) Bill, the Thames Conservancy Bill, and the Lee Conservancy Bill be committed read, and discharged.
Ordered, That the said Bills be committed to a Select Committee of Four Members, to be joined with a Committee of Four Lords.—[The Chairman of Ways and Means.]
Message to the Lords to acquaint them therewith.
Ordered, That the Committee be nominated by the Committee of Selection.
Ordered, That all Petitions in favour of or against the Bills, respectively, presented on or before the 28th April, 1921, be referred to the Committee; that the Petitioners praying to be heard against the Bills by themselves, their counsel, agents, or witnesses, be heard and counsel be heard in support of the Bills.
Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records.
Ordered, That Three be the quorum.— [The Chairman of Ways and Means.]

GAS AND WATER BILLS.
Ordered, That the Lords Message [13th. April] relating to the appointment of a Joint Committee on the Taf Fechan Valley Water Board Bill [Lords], Taf Fechan Water Supply Bill [Lords], Rhymney Valley Water Board Bill [Lords], and the Rhymney and Aber Valleys Gas and Water Bill [Lords] be now considered.—(The Chairman of Ways and Means.)
Lords Message considered accordingly.
Ordered, That a Select Committee of Four Members be appointed to join with the Committee of the Lords to consider the Taf Fechan Valley Water Board Bill [Lords], Taf Fechan Water Supply Bill [Lords], Rhymney Valley Water Board Bill [Lords], and the Rhymney and Aber Valleys Gas and Water Bill [Lords], as requested by their Lordships.
Message to the Lords to acquaint them therewith.
Ordered, That the Committee be nominated by the Committee of Selection.
Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records.
Ordered, That Three be the quorum.— [The Chairman of Ways and Means.]

PERTH CORPORATION PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL,
"to confirm a Provisional Order under the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act, 1892, relating to Perth Burgh General Assessment," presented by Mr. MUNRO; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 69.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  IRELAND.

    MURDERS AND OUTRAGES.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland if his attention has been drawn to statements in the Press by the Archbishop of Tuam concerning the murder of a man 60 years of age named Horan, of Partly, County Mayo, on 7th March, in his own house by members of the Crown forces; whether this was a so-called reprisal for an ambush at Partry; and whether any persons have been arrested in connection with the ambush or the murder of the late Mr. Horan?
    The ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND (Mr. Denis Henry): Perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman will postpone this question, as we have not yet got the information.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I shall be very glad to postpone it, but I should like to ask how it is in regard to a question put down a fortnight ago—a very long notice!—about a matter that occurred over a month ago, why the Department of the right hon. Gentleman has not yet got the information?
    Mr. HENRY: The delay is not in our Department.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Chief Secretary whether he is
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    now aware that John O'Connor, of Gloundaegh, Tarranfore, County Kerry, was arrested on 15th December last whilst on his way to church and driven away in a motor lorry; that he was beaten while in the lorry, thrown from the lorry into the road, fired on, and wounded; that civilians then carried him into the house of Thomas Brosnan, Threegneves, Currow, Tarranfore, where he was tended by the Rev. J. J. O'Sullivan, of Killentierna, Tarranfore; that' four officers returned from Tarranfore, to which place the lorry had proceeded, in a motor-car, and on ascertaining from the Rev. J. J. O'Sullivan where O'Connor lay wounded, entered Brosnan's house and murdered O'Connor by firing three revolver bullets into his head; whether he is aware that the Rev. J. J. O'Sullivan, Mr. Brosnan, and other eye witnesses are prepared to testify to the foregoing facts on oath; whether an inquiry has been held; whether these witnesses were called; what was the finding; what action, if any, has been taken; and whether any compensation is to be paid to the widow and seven children of the murdered man?
    Mr. HENRY: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the reply which I gave to his similar question on the 6th instant. No report has yet been received by me.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: The reply to which the right hon. Gentleman referred to said that the inquiry had not been completed? This is a fortnight later. Is the inquiry still sitting, and is the right hon. Gentleman really trying to get the information in this case?
    Mr. HENRY: Certainly, but I am not in a position to say exactly whether it is sitting at the moment. It is extremely difficult in these matters to communicate with those concerned, seeing that the roads, telegraph wires, and railways are all cut.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Three months ago!
    Sir J. BUTCHERasked the Chief Secretary whether he can give any information as to the circumstances attending the recent murder of Hugh Duffy, Rockcorry, County Monaghan, a Protestant Army pensioner, who was found shot dead at Moylemuck, two miles from

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    Rockcorry; what reason can be suggested for this murder; and whether anyone has been arrested in connection with this crime?
    Mr. HENRY: A little girl found the dead body of Duffy lying in a country lane on the afternoon of the 1st instant. The police were informed and removed the body to their barracks. There were four bullet marks on the head, one near the shoulder and one near the wrist. Duffy was an ex-service man aged 65 years. He was acting as auxiliary postman and was delivering a telegram which turned out to be bogus and which was undoubtedly sent to bring him along the road where his assassins were lying in wait. He was on friendly terms with the police. A slip with the words in type, "Spies and informers beware," was found pinned to his breast. I regret to say no one has yet been arrested for the brutal murder of this old soldier.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: How is it that the right hon. Gentleman can get these details at once when a question is put down by the hon. and learned Member for York, but that he cannot get the information when I repeat a question weekly and monthly?
    Mr. HENRY: Because this particular question deals with the County of Monaghan, with which it is comparatively easy to communicate, while the question of the hon. and gallant Gentleman deals with County Kerry, which is in quite a different position.
    Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTT: Has the right hon. Gentleman found out any more particulars in regard to this case than he has found out in regard to the other case of the hon. and gallant Gentleman?
    Sir J. BUTCHERasked the Chief Secretary whether he can give any information as to the circumstances attending the murder, on Saturday, 2nd April, of Thomas Morris, aged 68, a pensioner of the Royal Irish Constabulary, who served in the Royal Irish Fusiliers during the War, and who was taken from his house in the Thurles district by three armed masked men and was shot dead on the roadside near his house and was found with a notice pinned to his breast with the words Convicted Spy; and whether any arrests have been made?
    Mr. HENRY: The circumstances attending the murder of Thomas Morris are as follow: He was on a visit to his sister, and was forcibly taken from her house by three armed and masked men on the night of the 2nd instant. The police found his mutilated body on the road about noon the following day. There was a dirty white handkerchief tied across his eyes. There were three gunshot wounds on the body—one in the left breast, one on the left side in the neck, and one in the stomach, through which the bowels were protruding. A card was pinned to the body, and on it was written: "Convicted spy, tried, found guilty, and executed by I.R.A." I regret that no arrests have yet been made.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Is there any reason suggested why he should have been murdered, except that he was a pensioner of the Royal Irish Constabulary?
    Mr. HENRY: There is no suggestion, save that.
    Colonel ASHLEY: Are these unfortunate ex-service men and ex-members of the Royal Irish Constabulary given any arms whereby they may defend themselves, and, at any rate, have a chance of their lives? [Mr. LYNN: "No!"]
    Mr. HENRY: I think not, except on active service.
    Colonel ASHLEY: Will not the right hon. Gentleman represent to the Chief Secretary the desirability of giving these men some chance of life?
    Mr. HENRY: The question of giving them arms is considered by the competent military and constabulary authorities on application made to them.
    Colonel ASHLEY: Then may I ask the right hon. Gentleman if these men are allowed to apply for arms, and is each case considered on its merits?
    Mr. HENRY: That is so.
    Mr. LYNN: Is it not a fact that no one can really get a permit for arms in Ireland ac the present time?
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Except your party!
    Mr. MOSLEYasked the Chief Secretary whether the three men arrested on the charge of murdering Patrick Kennedy

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    and James Murphy have yet been brought to trial; and what action is being taken with reference to those members of the forces of the Crown who formed the remainder of the escort on the occasion of this murder?
    Mr. HENRY: The trial of the three men arrested in connection with this murder began on Monday of this week, and is still proceeding. Pending the result of this trial, it is obviously impossible for me to discuss the matter raised in the latter part of the question.
    Mr. MOSLEY: As these men have not beeu arrested and the case is not sub judice, can the right hon. Gentleman say what action has been taken with regard to the remainder?
    Mr. LYNN: Is it in order to ask a question with regard to men who have been charged with murder, and have not yet been convicted?
    Mr. SPEAKER: I understand that this question refers to those who have not been convicted.
    Mr. HENRY: I may mention that every effort has been made to secure evidence against any other persons, and even in the case of the three persons before the court-martial one has been acquitted.
    Earl WINTERTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman refuse to answer any questions on this matter until these men have been either acquitted or convicted?
    Mr. MOSLEY: In view of the fact that the men to whom this question relates have not been tried or even arrested, will the hon. and learned Gentleman state how many men formed this escort, and does he contend that the Department is not aware of the composition of this escort and how many went out? Is the right hon. Gentleman so occupied with his other duties that he does not even know the composition of this escort?
    Mr. G. THORNEasked the Chief Secretary whether, in view of the statement made at Dublin Castle on 3rd March that advances of compensation money are made to policemen or their dependants who have suffered personal injuries or damage to their property out of grants which normally went to local authorities,
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    he will authorise similar advances to be made to the innocent victims of outrages by members of the forces of the Crown; and whether, in view of his own admission as to the murder of Timothy Crowley by Cadet Harte, he will order an immediate advance to be made to this man's dependants?
    Mr. HENRY: In the particular case mentioned, which was one of murder, the County Court Judge has, I am informed, dismissed the claim for compensation, presumably on legal grounds. The arrangement referred to by which advances may be made out of diverted grants on account of awards made against a local authority is therefore inapplicable. On the general question I am not at present in a position to add anything to the reply given by my right hon. Friend to a similar question by the hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull on 9th of March.
    Mr. GALBRAITHasked the Chief Secretary what is the result of the inquiries into the death of Mr. John Geoghegan, who was shot by uniformed men at Moycullen; what action has been taken in the case of two policemen, who are stated to have brutally assaulted Mr. T. Fox, of Donegal, on 22nd February; what is the result of the inquiry into the murders of William Loughnane and Laurence Hickey and the attempted murder of four other men on the same occasion at Thurles; and what is the result of the court-martial on the soldier charged with disgraceful conduct in a woman's house at Thurles?
    Mr. HENRY: The investigation into the circumstances of Mr. Geoghegan's death are still proceeding. A careful official inquiry has been held into the allegation that the assault upon Mr. Fox of Donegal on the 22nd February was committed by policemen and it has not been found possible to obtain any evidence in support of this charge. The records of the movement of each member of the local police on the evening in question have been examined and the movements of each man have been satisfactorily accounted for. In regard to the murders and attempted murders at Thurles on the 9th ultimo, I would refer the hon. Member to my reply to a question on this subject by the hon. Member for the Pontypool Division (Mr. Griffiths)

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    yesterday. The soldier referred to in the last part of the question has now been tried by court-martial and has been awarded 91 days' field punishment No. 2.

    ATTACK ON BARRACKS, ABBEYLEIX.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Chief Secretary whether Crown forces bombed eight houses and shops at Abbeyleix, Queen's County, and destroyed the shops of Thomas Kearney and T. O'Farrell, at Ballyporeen, county Tipperary, on 23rd March last; whether houses and shops were wrecked by bombs at Westport, county Mayo, on 26th March last, also by Crown forces; whether these were official or unofficial reprisals; who ordered the destruction; and on what principle these houses and shops were selected for damage?
    Mr. HENRY: The Constabulary barrack at Abbeyleix was attacked by armed rebels on the night of the 19th ultimo. The attack was beaten off and the police pursued their assailants through the town, firing several volleys and throwing a number of hand grenades in the course of the pursuit. A certain amount of damage was caused to buildings, but whether by the fire of the rebels or that of the police is not known. Any damage due to the police fire was unintentional, and in the circumstances unavoidable. The burning of the two shops at Ballyporeen on the 23rd ultimo appears to have taken place about 2 a.m. while an attack on the police barrack of that town was proceeding, and the whole of the police force were in the barrack at the time. The police have been unable to obtain any information as to the origin of these fires. In regard to the last part of the question, my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary has directed an inquiry to be made into the occurrence at West-port on the 26th ultimo; and as that inquiry is still proceeding, I am not yet in a position to make any statement on the matter.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: In regard to the latter part of the question, may I take it that these reprisals at Westport were not official reprisals, that they were not ordered by any competent military authority, and therefore unofficial; and will the House be informed of the result of the inquiry?
    Mr. HENRY: I have already told the hon. and gallant Gentleman that an
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    inquiry has been directed and is still proceeding; and, therefore, pending its finish, I am not in a position to reply to, the question.

    INTERNED PRISONERS.
    Mr. JOHNasked the Chief Secretary the total number of uncharged and untried prisoners now in custody in Ireland, giving the number in each internment camp and prison?
    Mr. HENRY: The number of persons against whom internment orders have been made and who are now confined in the various internment camps is 2,208. The number of persons untried, including persons in civil and military custody against whom no charge has as yet been made and also persons awaiting release, is at present 1,250. This figure includes 438 persons against whom internment orders have been made who are awaiting transfer to internment camps.
    Captain W. BENN: How many of these, can the right hon. Gentleman say, are women and young persons?
    Mr. HENRY: I cannot say without notice.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Has the right hon. Gentleman had any complaints of the conditions of these internment camps, and will steps be taken to improve them in view of the fact that these men have not been tried?
    Mr. HENRY: No, Sir; judging by the reports published in the Press that I have seen, and the descriptions, the prisoners seem to be having the time of their lives.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Shocking, shocking!
    Colonel ASHLEY: How many of these prisoners are aliens?
    Mr. HENRY: I cannot say without notice.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is, the right hon. Gentleman aware that the same thing, that they were having the time of their lives, was said about the Boer women in the internment camps in South Africa?
    Mr. LYNN: Is it not a fact that the bulk of these prisoners in the internment camps are really much better off than people earning an honest living?

    AUXILIARY DIVISION (MEDICAL EQUIPMENT).
    Lieut.-Colonel W. GUINNESSasked the Chief Secretary whether the Auxiliary Division have the same quota of the Royal Army Medical Service attached to them as would be provided in the case of a corresponding number of troops employed in active military operations; and whether they have special ambulance cars allotted to them for the conveyance of wounded men?
    Mr. HENRY: The Auxiliary Division is not provided with its own special medical transports. Ambulances and other necessaries of medical equipment are borrowed from the regular forces as and when required, and this arrangement has been found to answer satisfactorily.
    Lieut.-Colonel GUINNESS: Has the attention of the Attorney-General been drawn to the terrible sufferings of many of the Auxiliaries who have been wounded in the Longford Camp; will he make further inquiries and consult the Director of the Royal Army Medical Service in Ireland as to what steps have been taken to prevent a recurrence of these terrible occurrences to men suffering from grievous wounds who have often been left lying in the open without proper attention?
    Mr. HENRY: I will certainly bring this matter to the attention of the authorities.
    Earl WINTERTON: In the case of the Longford Camp there is a gross scandal in connection with the wounded servants of the Crown who have been left lying about for 24 hours, open to being mutilated by Sinn Feiners because no proper provision was made for them, and because it was not the duty of the Army authorities to convey them to the hospital
    Mr. HENRY: The matter is receiving the attention of the authorities.

    CROWN FORCES (ARRESTS).
    Mr. MOSLEYasked the Chief Secretary the number of members of the forces of the Crown in Ireland who have been arrested for offences against the criminal law since 1st January last, and how many have been brought to trial; what the results of the trials have been, and how many remain in custody awaiting trial; the number of members of the forces of the Crown who have been killed and
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    wounded, respectively, and the number of civilians, men, women, and children, who have been killed and wounded in Ireland since 1st January last; whether the Report of the military Court of Inquiry into the murders of Alderman Clancy and Councillor O'Callaghan, of Limerick, on the 7th March last, has yet been received; and, if so, what is the nature of the report?
    Mr. HENRY: The numbers of members of the Forces of the Crown in Ireland who have been arrested for offences against the criminal law since the 1st January last is 221. Of this number 165 have been brought to trial, of whom 124 have been convicted and 41 acquitted. The sentences imposed in the cases of conviction were as follow:

    12 sentences of penal servitude for periods from 3 to 10 years.

    96 sentences of imprisonment for periods from 1 month to 2 years.

    5 sentences of reduction to the ranks.

    1 discharge under Probation of Offenders Act.

    1 bound over to keep the peace.

    7 sentences not yet promulgated.

    The number of men at present in custody is 51. Two were kidnapped by rebels while being conveyed in military custody, and 3 have been allowed bail. The number of members of the forces of the Crown who have been killed during this period is 140, and the number wounded is 266. It is not possible to give the number of civilian casualties, owing to the fact that those which have been sustained by armed civilians in attacks on the Crown forces are carefully concealed. I dealt with the last part of this question in a reply to a question by the hon. Member for the Silvertown Division on the 24th ultimo.
    Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR: Has any member of the armed forces of the Crown been subjected to the extreme penalty of the law?
    Mr. HENRY: No, Sir; but at present a number of trials for murder are proceeding.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Has the report of the inquiry into the murder of Councillor O'Callaghan been received, and will it be laid before the House?
    Mr. HENRY: I have already referred to this in my answer given on the 7th of March to the hon. Member for Silver-town (Mr. J. Jones), and if my hon. and gallant Friend will refer to that reply, he will find the particulars he asks for.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: What percentage do these convictions bear to the total number of the forces of the Crown employed in Ireland?
    Mr. HENRY: I could not give them offhand. The number of soldiers serving in Ireland is 50,000, and the police force numbers 18,000. That makes a total of 68,000, and the total convictions are 165. The hon. and gallant Gentleman can calculate the percentage for himself.
    Mr. WATERSON: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether those, members of the force charged with murder will have the advantage of defending counsel to cross-examine the witnesses for the prosecution?
    Mr. HENRY: They will have exactly the same privileges as any prisoner who is tried for anything before a court-martial.
    Mr. BRIANT: Were any of these convictions actually for murder?
    Mr. HENRY: No, Sir. I said in my answer that the maximum punishment is ten years' penal servitude.

    ARREST (MR. P. COLIVET).
    Mr. NEWBOULDasked the Chief Secretary on what charge, if any, P. Colivet, Member of Parliament for Limerick City, was arrested; whether and for what reason Mr. Colivet has been kept for over a fortnight in a cell under the courthouse at Rathkeale, with a damp nagged floor, no means of heating, and lighted only by an unglazed grating which faces a blank wall, the cell being consequently so dark that reading is hardly possible except by candle-light; whether, these cells, of which Mr. Colivet's is the best, are quite unfit for human habitation; whether he will have the use of them discontinued; and whether Mr. Colivet, Member of Parliament for Limerick City, has been taken round on a lorry as a hostage?
    Mr. HENRY: Mr. Colivet was arrested in the martial law area as an officer in
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    the so-called Irish Republican Army, and an internment order will be made against him. The cell mentioned in the question was the only accommodation available, and while it is true that it is not well lighted, it is perfectly fit for habitation, and is at least as good as many of the billets locally occupied by troops. I do not therefore propose to direct that its use shall be discontinued. The answer to the last part of the question is in the affirmative.
    Mr. NEWBOULD: Is it not a fact that the previous prisoner who occupied this cell had to be sent to the hospital to be treated for sores owing to the unhealthy conditions?
    Mr. HENRY: The cell is provided by the Town Council of Limerick, and it has been in use for many years.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Does this mean that men awaiting trial are being taken round as hostages on a motor lorry, and is that part of the Government's policy?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Member always seems to adopt a threatening or a bullying attitude, and that is not the way, if he wants to get an answer, to make it likely that he will succeed.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I beg your pardon, Mr. Speaker, if my action was not parliamentary, but circumstances like this rather stir many of us. Can I have an answer to my question?

    HOUSING.
    Mr. PENNEFATHERasked the Chief Secretary what number of houses are estimated to be required by the local authorities in the area of Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland, respectively; what is the amount of the loans applied for for housing under the Housing Act, 1919, in these two areas; what amount has been advanced; and what amount is still awaiting the urban councils' assent to the statutory conditions as to audit?
    Mr. HENRY: The number of houses estimated to be required in the Ulster area is 11,233; and in the remainder of Ireland, 41,800. In the area of Northern Ireland £2,250,065 has been applied for

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    and of this £705,765 has already been Sanctioned, and the remainder can be sanctioned when required. In Southern Ireland the amount of the loans applied for, up to date, is £2,180,223. Of this, £58,086 has been sanctioned, and the amount held over awaiting the assent of the urban councils to audit is £2,119,859.
    Mr. PENNEFATHER: Am I to understand that houses to the value of £2,000,000 will be erected, and that employment to that extent will be given?
    Mr. HENRY: At any rate, the Local Government Board will be quite willing to advance the sums required for the erection of these houses.

    COURTS OF INQUIRY.
    Major MACKENZIE WOODasked the Prime Minister whether the tribunal which inquired into the death of ex-Mayor O'Callaghan included a member with legal knowledge and experience; and whether in all similar inquiries such a member will be included?
    The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Lloyd George): The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. Every court trying capital offences has at least one member certified to be a person of legal knowledge and experience, but it is not possible to have such a member on every Court of Inquiry.
    Major WOOD: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this particular Court of Inquiry did not try a man for his life? It was a Court of Inquiry, and my question is directed to Courts of Inquiry and not to courts-martial.
    The PRIME MINISTER: I think the hon. and gallant Member has not quite understood my answer. There was a legal member of this Court.
    Major WOOD: Will there be a legal member on all such inquiries?
    The PRIME MINISTER: No, we cannot possibly provide a legal member for every Court of Inquiry; but on this particular Court of Inquiry there was a legal member.
    Major WOOD: On every Court of Inquiry which inquires into the death of a soldier of the Crown forces?
    Mr. O'CONNOR(by Private Notice) asked why the inquiry into the death of Christopher Reynolds has been suspended; when it will be resumed; and whether the proceedings will take place in an open Court?
    Mr. HENRY: The inquiry is at present adjourned, owing to the fact that several of the witnesses are also witnesses in another case which is now proceeding, but it will be re-opened at the earliest possible date. Subject to the power of the Court to sit in camera for the protection of witnesses, the answer to the last part of the question is in the affirmative.

    AUXILIARY CADETS (LOOTING CHARGES).
    Mr. GALBRAITHasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether it is still intended to bring to trial the 26 cadets discharged by General Crozier in connection with the Trim looting?
    Mr. HENRY: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given by me to a question asked on this subject by the hon. Member for Central Aberdeen on the 7th instant.
    Major M. WOOD: Are these 26 cadets still doing no duty, and what are they doing?
    Mr. HENRY: I have already informed the hon. Member that seven of the cadets, against whom there is evidence, are to be brought to trial. As regards the other 19, they are at present not doing any duty, but are not being brought to trial for the simple reason that there is no evidence against them.
    Major M. WOOD: If there is no evidence against them, are they to be allowed indefinitely going on doing no duty and drawing pay?
    Mr. HENRY: We are making the fullest enquiries for the purpose of trying to bring them to trial, if there is evidence against them.
    Mr. O'CONNOR: Is the right hon. Gentleman forgetful of the fact that General Crozier, their Commanding Officer at the time, thought there was sufficient evidence to drive them out of the force and send them to England?
    Mr. HENRY: No, I am aware of the exact opposite. General Crozier came to the conclusion that there was evidence against seven of them, and directed them to be tried. He came to the conclusion, as regards 19, that there was no evidence against them.
    Mr. O'CONNOR: Why, if there is no evidence against them, did he drive them out of the force, and send them over to England until they were recalled by General Tudor?
    Mr. HENRY: That is one of the things which was discussed in the course of the Debate, and no one could explain it.

    HOUSE DESTRUCTION, KILFINANE.
    Mr. G. THORNEasked the Chief Secretary whether the house of Mr. David Clancy, of Kilfinane, county Cork, was destroyed in the month of February by military or police as a reprisal for the burning of an aeroplane which had descended close by; and whether, in view of the admission by the police that the house was burnt without authority, the £900 compensation awarded by Judge Lawsmith at the Limerick Quarter Sessions will be paid by the Treasury?
    Mr. HENRY: The particular incident referred to is at present the subject of inquiry. In regard to the payment of the compensation awarded, I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given by me to the hon. Member for Central Hull on the 9th March last on the subject of compensation awards generally.

    CASUALTIES.
    Captain Viscount CURZONasked the Chief Secretary whether the total casualties to the forces of the Crown and the rebels in Ireland since the 1st January are known; and, if not, whether any approximate estimate can be given?
    Mr. HENRY: The total casualties sustained by the Crown forces in Ireland since the 1st January last number 406, made up as follows:—

    Police killed

    95

    Police wounded

    173

    Military killed

    45

    Military wounded

    93

    The casualties sustained by the rebels in ambushes and other attacks upon the Crown forces are carefully concealed, and
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    it is not possible to furnish an approximate estimate for this period. The number, however, is believed to have been considerable.
    Captain W. BENN: Will the right hon. Gentleman assure the House in the terms of the Chief Secretary that the policy is succeeding and is succeeding rapidly?
    Viscount CURZONasked the Chief Secretary how many farmers and other civilians have lost their lives through acts of violence in Ireland since 1st January; how many of these men were ex-service men; whether the religious denominations to which they belonged are known; and in how many of these cases is it known whether these murders were due to Sinn Fein and how many to the forces of the Crown?
    Mr. HENRY: If the Noble Lord will repeat this question (of which I received notice only yesterday), on Thursday of next week I shall endeavour to furnish him with the desired information.

  PEACE TREATIES.

    EX-AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN VESSELS.
    Sir HOWELL DAVIESasked the Prime Minister what is the total tonnage handed over to the Allies and Associated Powers of the Austro-Hungarian commercial fleet; and in what proportions and to what countries it has been distributed?
    Sir P. LLOYD-GREAME (Secretary, Overseas Trade Department): I have been asked to reply. I have no complete information in regard to the total tonnage of the smaller ex-Austro-Hungarian vessels, but I am informed that the total tonnage of ex-Austrian and ex-Hungarian vessels over 2,000 tons gross amounts to about 700,000 tons, and that the whole of this tonnage is under Italian management, with the exception of about 61,000 tons, which is under the temporary management of France. Up to the present the Reparation Commission have only allotted 21 ex-Austrian vessels of 104,449 tons for final ownership, the whole of this amount being allotted to Italy.
    Sir H. DAVIES: Considering the great loss we sustained through the Austro-Hungarian submarines, will not some claim be made on behalf of this country?
    Sir P. LLOYD-GREAME: The Austrian vessels would not by any means comprise the whole of the vessels which have been given up, and it has been arranged amongst the Allies that the various claims should be met in the most convenient way. The Italians get the Austro-Hungarian vessels, and, of course, that reduces proportionately any claim they would have upon German vessels.

    UNITED STATES (NOTE).
    Major C. LOWTHERasked the Prime Minister whether the Government has considered a Note from the Government of the United States of America; whether the Note affirmed that America is not bound by any decision contained in the Treaty of Versailles or adopted by the Supreme Council of the League of Nations; whether he is aware that such an affirmation implies that nothing that has been concluded in Europe since 1918 is in any way binding on America; and, if so, what action he proposes to take?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The Note which deals with the disposal of the Island of Yap and the general question of the oversea territories surrender by Germany has been published in the United States and reproduced in the English Press. It is now under consideration by His Majesty's Government, in consultation with the other Allied Governments, to whom similar Notes have been addressed.
    Colonel C. LOWTHER: Does not the refusal of the United States Government to join the League nullify the raison d'être of the League. Is it possible, when 70,000,000 people of the most enlightened community in the world refuse to join this new institution, that it can be successfully carried on?
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUEL: May I ask the Prime Minister if he will indicate to the House how far the refusal of the United States to remain loyal to the signatories of the Peace of Versailles affects that peace as relating to ourselves?
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the question going to be re-opened? Will there be another conference?

    YAP ISLAND.
    Mr. A. HERBERTasked the Prime Minister whether the disposition of the
    1280
    Island of Yap was provisionally decided upon with the assent of American representatives at Paris in the year 1919; at which meeting and on what date the Supreme Allied Council selected Japan as mandatory for the island; whether the first protest against this decision was received from the American Government in November, 1920; and whether this protest was communicated to the Council of the League of Nations before they finally approved the Japanese mandate on 20th December, 1920?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The subject referred to in the question is under friendly discussion between the United States of America and the Allied Powers. I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree with me in thinking that nothing could be gained, and much might be lost, by dragging the controversy into the Parliamentary arena, whether by question and answer or otherwise.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUEL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that when he refers to dragging the controversy into the publicity of Parliament, he is touching the very point of interest to the masses of the people of this country, who wish these international questions to be brought before Parliament, in order that they may understand where they are? In view of the fact that the Treaty of Versailles required the four signatures of the four representatives of the four great countries, and that one signature has now not been honoured, will the right hon. Gentleman consider at an early date placing the people of this country, through this House of Commons, in a position to understand exactly where we are at the present moment with reference to international affairs?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I am perfectly certain that the last thing the people of this country desire is any misunderstanding with the people of the United States. Anything which will conduce to or provoke discussions which may lead to any such misunderstanding will be deprecated by everyone.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUEL: Will not the right hon. Gentleman agree that the chief cause of misunderstanding is the reticence of the executives of the various Governments, and that the best means of disposing of all misunderstanding is a plain statement, understanded of the common people, to the House of Commons?

    GERMAN REPARATION.
    Major M. WOODasked the Prime Minister which of the Allied countries and which of the Dominions have passed legislation similar to the German Reparation (Recovery) Act?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the answers which I gave on the 4th April last to questions by the hon. Members for East Edinburgh (Mr. Hogge) and West Derbyshire (Mr. C. White), to which there is nothing to add.
    Mr. HOGGE: Can the right hon. Gentleman say if the matter has got any further?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I cannot say.
    Major WOODasked the Prime Minister whether any agreement has been made with France as to the sanctions to be applied to Germany in the event of Germany's default in respect of reparation on 1st May?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The answer is in the negative.
    Major WOOD: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking that no further occupation of any part of Germany will take place until this House has been consulted?

    COMMITMENTS TO ALLIES.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUELasked the Prime Minister if he will give an assurance on behalf of the Government that no further financial or military or other commitments will be incurred or loans granted to any Ally by Great Britain, whether arising out of the Treaty of Versailles or not, without first obtaining the sanction of Parliament?
    The PRIME MINISTER: We shall follow the regular practice by informing Parliament at once of any action proposed by the Allies which involves the co-operation of this country, and where Parliamentary sanction is required it will be sought as early as possible.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUEL: May I ask whether, following the regular practice, it would not be the custom to require the sanction of Parliament first, and not merely to ask Parliament afterwards to support and approve of that which has already been decided by the War Cabinet?
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: In the event of no agreement being reached with Germany before the end of this month, will the right hon. Gentleman make a statement in this House explaining the situation before any fresh steps are taken?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I shall follow the ordinary practice, and I do not see how it is possible to conduct international business except on those lines. We shall first of all consult with our Allies. The moment we come to a provisional agreement, I shall announce it to the House of Commons, and the House of Commons will have the opportunity of debating it. That is the course I have always followed.
    Captain W. BENN: May we take it that Parliamentary approval will be sought before this country co-operates in any further occupation of German territory?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I think I made it quite clear that I shall state to the House of Commons what the arrangements are which are made at the International Conference.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUEL: As this is a matter involving our nation in a continuous expense of many millions, may I ask if I have understood the right hon. Gentleman properly as saying that before he commits this country, as the head of the Government, to expenditure of any sort whatsoever, he will seek first the approval of this Parliament, in view of the fact that the tradition of this House is always to support the decision of the head of the Executive if possible?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member's question is of the nature of argument.

    TURKISH PRISONERS (RAHMY BEY).
    Mr. A. HERBERTasked the Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether His Majesty's Government have made any progress towards the liberation of Rahmy Bey; and why, after the thanks accorded to him by His Majesty's Government in Smyrna, this has not taken place long ago?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Cecil Harmsworth): I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer given to the hon. and gallant Member for the Wrekin Division on Thursday last.
    Mr. HERBERT: Can the hon. Gentleman say when this House is really going to be told the true reason of this scandalous piece of ingratitude to a man who befriended many British subjects during the War?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: I hope it will be possible to give an answer in regard to the Turkish prisoners at a comparatively early date.
    Mr. HERBERT: May I remind my hon. Friend that the same answer was given last year?

    PROFITEERING ACT.
    Captain W. BENNasked the Prime Minister whether it is the intention of the Government to renew the Profiteering Act when it expires in May next?
    Sir P. LLOYD-GREAME: I have been asked to reply. The answer is in the negative.
    Major BARNES: Will the hon. Gentleman say whether the Government is going to consider the renewal of that portion of the Profiteering Act which provides for the investigation of the action of trusts and combines?
    Sir P. LLOYD-GREAME: No, Sir; I do not think so. Hon. Members will recollect that in the Debate on the Board of Trade Vote I stated what was the intention of the Government with reference to legislation of this character. I think it would be much more satisfactory to allow the Profiteering Act to lapse, and to introduce, at the time when it will be required, legislation of a permanent nature.

    KEY INDUSTRIES BILL.
    Captain W. BENNasked the Prime Minister when it is intended that the House shall discuss the Ways and Means Resolutions relating to the Safeguarding of Industries Bill?
    The PRIME MINISTER: In view of the present industrial situation, I regret that it is not possible for me to name a date.
    Captain BENNasked the Prime Minister whether, in order that Members
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    may have a clearer view of the intended application of the Ways and Means Resolutions (Safeguarding of Industries Bill), he will circulate as a White Paper the draft of the Bill before the Resolutions are discussed in the Committee?
    Sir P. LLOYD-GREAME: I have been asked to reply. No, Sir. Such a course would be altogether unusual, and would, in my opinion, offer no advantages.
    Captain BENN: May I ask the Prime Minister, arising out of that, whether the full powers granted under the Ways and Means Resolutions will be embodied in the Bill when it is introduced?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I think we will follow the usual course in that respect. As my hon. and gallant Friend knows very well, we may take full powers under the Resolutions, but it does not necessarily follow that the Bill will adhere strictly to the lines indicated by the wording of the Resolutions.
    Mr. LAMBERT: May I ask the Leader of the House why the Bill should not be printed and circulated before the Resolutions are taken?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN (Leader of the House): I do not know of any occasion on which such a procedure as that has been followed.
    Major BARNES: If the Bill cannot be printed and circulated, could not a Memorandum be printed and circulated, giving us some information about these industries, the number of people employed in them, the wages paid, and the capital invested, in order that the House might have some real idea about the effect of the Bill?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I think the hon. Member had better wait for the discussion on the Resolutions, when information on these matters can be given. Many Bills—noticeably Finance Bills—have been founded on Resolutions before now, but no such Bill has ever been produced before the House has considered the Resolutions The framing of the Bill is dependent upon the decision which the House reaches on the Resolutions.
    Captain BENN: May we take it that the powers conferred by the Resolutions are not wider than the Bill will require?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: When you introduce Resolutions on which to found a Bill, the Resolutions may be as wide as you may conceivably wish to make the Bill, but the Bill may be much narrower than the Resolutions. In the imposition of a charge the Bill cannot extend further than the Resolutions, but the Resolutions habitually do extend further than the Bill.

    MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO.
    Mr. LANE-FOXasked the Prime Minister whether any provision is made in the Estimates of this year for the salary of £5,000 for the Minister without Portfolio; if so, under what Vote it will come; and whether an undertaking was given to the House that no such salary would be payable.
    The PRIME MINISTER: An opportunity will occur this afternoon for the discussion of this subject on the Vote for the Cabinet Offices.
    Mr. LANE-FOX: May I ask if the right hon. Gentleman is aware that very grave dissatisfaction exists among a great many of his supporters in the House over the whole arrangement?
    The PRIME MINISTER: My hon. Friend will be able to express that dissatisfaction.
    Colonel C. LOWTHER: Will the Prime Minister consider the advisability of allowing the salary of the Minister without Portfolio to be balloted upon by back benchers, several hundreds of whom are very anxious that their views should be pronounced?

    BUSINESS PREMISES (RENTS).
    Captain BAGLEYasked the Prime Minister whether it is the definite intention of the Government to carry out the promise given during the passing of the last Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (Restrictions) Act and introduce legislation in respect of business premises before 24th June next?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I am not aware of any such promise, and the Government do not contemplate legislation on this subject during the present Session.
    Captain BAGLEY: Is the Prime Minister aware that when this modification was urged on the House by the late Minister for Health, he stated that by the time the year was up the Government would have other proposals, and that he actually used these words:
    "If at the end of that time our other proposals be not sufficiently advanced, it would be quite a simple matter to prolong the Statute."
    Will the Prime Minister give consideration to that statement with a view to prolonging the Statute in regard to business premises.
    The PRIME MINISTER: We have given some consideration to this subject. We certainly cannot introduce legislation this year.
    Colonel Sir C. YATE: Will the Prime Minister have inquiry made from those who are administering the Act as to how it is working throughout the country, considering the great dissatisfaction which exists generally?
    The PRIME MINISTER: We have had a great deal of inquiry made. There is always a danger if you have a restriction of this kind that it discourages building operations.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Will the Prime Minister consult the county court judges and other persons who have been administering the Act as to how far and in what respect it has failed?
    The PRIME MINISTER: Yes, but I am not at all sure that their opinion would be final in this respect. A special class of people comes before them. There are two sides to the question, and one side does not always come before the county court judge.

    UNEMPLOYMENT (ALLOTMENTS).
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government will consider the advisability, in view of the serious unemployment, of facilitating, as they did during the War, the temporary acquisition of allotments in and round towns by persons who are unemployed?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The Government are strongly in favour of the development of the allotment movement.

    1287
    As was explained in the answer to the hon. and gallant Member's question on the 11th instant, compulsory powers have been conferred on local authorities enabling them to acquire land for allotments on 14 days' notice, and the Ministry of Agriculture is urging local authorities to exercise their powers where-ever necessary. The emergency powers under the Defence of the Realm Act which were exercised during the War have been repealed, and could not be restored without fresh legislation.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that, under the Emergency Powers Act, the Government has again taken powers to acquire land, and could not that Act be used to facilitate the acquisition of land, not in permanency, but during the crisis in this country?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I should like notice of that question. I am not sure that we shall have those powers. It is obviously desirable, in view of the unemployment in the country, that healthy employment of this kind should be provided. If the local authorities can see their way, I earnestly trust that they will do their best, as it will undoubtedly help to improve the general conditions.
    Mr. W. CARTER: Is the Prime Minister aware that there would be thousands more applicants for these allotments if they were given some security of tenure?
    Mr. WATERSON: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that some people today are demanding the necessary small holdings and allotments, and that parish councils and county councils have refused the applications, and in those cases will the Ministry of Agriculture be prepared to override such a decision?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I am not sure that that is desirable. The best way, undoubtedly, of dealing with this situation would be to interest the local authorities in the subject. They understand the local conditions. It is very difficult for a central department to override the authority of the people who know the conditions. Besides, they would be able to get the consent and co-operation of the authorities concerned if they take the thing in hand. What is really
    1288
    wanted is local pressure in order to induce, the same movement that we had during the War, which provided a good deal of useful employment and increased the food supplies of the country.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that just the land that is wanted for these allotments is extremely expensive, and that the only way to get that land used is to allow people to use it temporarily, without forcing the local authorities to buy it at its very high price? Could not steps be taken under the Emergency Powers Act to inform local authorities that they were entitled to take up this land temporarily for the purposes of allotments?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I agree that we could get it cheaply if it is wanted for temporary purposes, and that, I should have thought, they could do. Whether it is desirable to send a communication to them I will consider.

  GREECE.

    BRITISH DEBT.
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Prime Minister whether His Majesty's Government have considered the possibility of intimating to the Government of Greece that they are prepared, in conjunction with the Government of India, to accept as security for the moneys owed to His Majesty's Government by Greece the districts of Smyrna and Thrace?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The reply is in the negative.

    ASIA MINOR OPERATIONS.
    Viscount CURZONasked the Prime Minister whether anything is known as to the exact state of affairs arising out of the hostilities between the Turks and Greeks in Asia Minor?
    The PRIME MINISTER: On the northern sector the Greeks have fallen back to their original position east of Brussa. On the southern sector, the Greeks have evacuated Afuin-Kara-Hissar, to which they advanced early in the operation. As to the losses on either side, we have no definite information, and the rival claims are most conflicting.
    Viscount CURZON: Is it a fact that a Greek fleet is now menacing the Dardanelles?
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Can we be quite sure that no British troops will be involved in helping the Greeks?

    POLAND.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUELasked the Prime Minister whether Great Britain has agreed to take over any French obligations in Poland; and, if so, for what reasons?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: The answer is in the negative.
    Mr. LYLE-SAMUELasked the Prime Minister what was the French guarantee to Poland in support of the Allied policy in Poland; what forces the French have employed; and how far are we committed in the event of France finding herself unable to continue to carry out her undertaking?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: I have no information with regard to the guarantee referred to nor as to the forces employed by the French. In reply to the third part of the question, His Majesty's Government are not in any way committed.

  RUSSIA.

    PEACE TREATY.
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEEasked the Prime Minister whether any steps have been taken to formulate the general peace treaty alluded to in the preamble of the Russian Trade Agreement; and, if so, as no state of war exists between any part of Russia and this country, he can state what is the object of drawing up a peace treaty?
    The PRIME MINISTER: With regard to the first part of the question, I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the reply which I returned to the hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy) on the 11th inst. In regard to the last part of the question, I would refer him to the preamble of the Trade Agreement, which states in general terms the purpose of a general peace
    1290
    treaty, and to the declaration of recognition of claims which is appended to the Agreement.

    TRADE AGENTS.
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER - SHEEasked the Prime Minister how many Russian Bolsheviks have been allowed passports to this country under Article 4 of the Russian Trade Agreement since it was signed; and whether these persons are being carefully watched by the police to see that they do not indulge in propaganda in this country, in view of the instructions recently issued by Messrs. Bukharin, Berezin, and Pavlov Veltmau that trade delegations were to use every effort to spread discontent and cause strikes and disturbances?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Shortt): The Prime Minister has asked me to reply to this question. Permission has been given, so far, for three Russians to come to this country under the Article referred to. As regards the latter part of the question, I beg to refer to answers given in the last few days by the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House, to the effect that the instructions in question were stated by Krassin to be a forgery, and that in any case all due precautions against inflammatory propaganda would be taken.
    Lieut.-Colonel ARCHER-SHEE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these categorical denials by Bolsheviks are generally categorical falsehoods, and will he therefore see that the police watch these people, especially at this time?
    Mr. SHORTT: All precautions will be taken.
    Mr. HOWARD GRITTEN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, apart from the undertakings of the Soviet Government, the Moscow International, holding itself to be quite free and independent of that Government, is pushing its propaganda, and, of course, Lenin knows nothing about it?
    Mr. RAPER: Can the right hon. Gentleman give us the names of the three Russians to whom permission has been granted to come to England?
    Mr. SHORTT: I cannot do that at the moment. I will get them.

    BRITISH REFUGEES.
    Mr. BRIANTasked the Under secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he is aware that a large number of British refugees from Russia are now in England and are absolutely penniless though possessing large amounts in Russian roubles, and that they have had to apply for and receive Poor Law relief; and if he can see that such assistance as is required should be provided by the State and not be a charge on the rates?
    The MINISTER of HEALTH (Sir A. Mond): I have been asked to reply. I can only refer the hon. Member to the reply given recently to a similar question by the Leader of the House.
    Mr. BRIANT: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether funds are still available for the relief of these refugees, and if he thinks it is fair that these unfortunate people should be compelled to apply for Poor Law Belief, and that the ratepayers should be saddled with the burden of maintaining these people?
    Sir A. MOND: I think, if my hon. Friend will refer to the answer given by the Leader of the House, he will find that those points were dealt with.
    Mr. BRIANT: Did the previous answer state whether any means were still available for these refugees, and did it state whether it was thought advisable that they should apply to the Poor Law? If the right hon. Gentleman will look at the answer he will see that those questions are not answered.
    Sir A. MOND: I have referred to it, and I find those points answered.
    Mr. RARER: If the Russian Soviet Government are willing to recognise the debts of the Allies why should not these people be given certain monetary consideration for their rouble notes?
    Sir A. MOND: I think notice must be given of that question.

    INDUSTRIAL POLICY.
    Captain BAGLEYasked the Under secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether in view of the importance of the recent action of the Russian Soviet Government in generally adopting piecework and discarding certain fundamental
    1292
    principles of Socialism, and having regard to the difficulty of securing full and reliable accounts of these matters in the Press, he will provide the House with translations of the recent resolutions and decisions of the council of the people's commissars?
    Mr. HARMSWORTH: My only information on these subjects is drawn from announcements made from Moscow by wireless telegraphy. I will see that copies of relevant announcements—which are of considerable length—are placed in the library of the House.

    MILITARY FORCES (INCREASE).
    Mr. HOGGEasked the Prime Minister whether he can state the estimated increased expenditure in respect of the 300,000 additional men in the Army and the 10,000 additional men in the Air Force for which Supplementary Estimates have been presented?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Lieut.-Commander Hilton Young): The figures referred to are maxima. Owing to the existing uncertainty as to the numbers to be actually employed and the duration of their employment, it is impossible at the present moment to give any reliable estimate of the expenditure involved.
    Mr. HOGGE: In view of the fact that the 310,000 men mentioned in the question, and other 25,000 men in the Navy, are to be engaged for nine weeks at a known daily pay, with separation allowances, why cannot the Treasury let us have some estimate?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: It depends on the duration of the employment as well as the number, and also on the nature of the maximum.
    Mr. HOGGE: What will be the maximum expenditure?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: The maximum expenditure will depend upon the number actually taken.
    Mr HOGGE: If the maximum number is 310,000 plus 25,000, and the maximum number of weeks is nine, what estimate has the Treasury made with regard to this expenditure?
    Colonel C. LOWTHER: Does the hon. Member who put down this question mean that the only safeguard between this country and red ruin—
    Mr. SPEAKER called upon Lieut.-Colonel Archer-Shee to put the next question (No. 44)—[see col. 1290].

    NEAR AND MIDDLE EAST (BRITISH OCCUPATIONS).
    Mr. LAMBERTasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the total estimated cost of Army, Air and all other services for the coming financial year, rendered necessary by the British occupation of Mesopotamia, Palestine, Constantinople, and Egypt, respectively?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: As regards Mesopotamia and Palestine, I would prefer not to anticipate the statement that will shortly be made on the whole question by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, for the Colonies. The approximate estimated cost of the various services in connection with the occupation of Constantinople and Egypt is as follows: Constantinople, Army Services £3,000,000, Air services £40,000, services falling on the Foreign Office Vote £10,000. Egypt, Army services £5,000,000, Air services £1,576,000. So far as Army services are concerned, these figures include all charges except non-effective cost of British troops, and in the case of Air services they are exclusive of the cost of raising and training the personnel, of non-effective charges and of expenditure on civil aviation.
    Mr. LAMBERT: May I ask the Leader of the House when may we expect the Estimate of the Colonial Secretary giving us an idea of the expenditure on Mesopotamia and Palestine?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will give me notice of his question.
    Mr. LAMBERT: I have it here. I have asked the cost.
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Not in a question to me. If he will give me notice I will try to give him an answer.

    EXCESS PROFITS DUTY.
    Mr. LAMBERTasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the
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    estimated amount of arrears of Excess Profits Duty remaining to be collected after the 31st March, 1921, and what is the estimated value of war stores that remain to be sold after the expiration of the financial year 1920–21?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: I must ask my right hon. Friend to await the Budget statement.

    CIVIL SERVANTS (SALARIES).
    Sir J. BUTCHERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will state the number of civil servants in receipt of salaries of £500 a year and upwards who have, in the course of the last 12 months, received increases of their permanent salaries, apart from War bonus, distinguishing those in receipt of salaries from £500 to £1,000, from £1,000 to £1,500, from £1,500 to £2,000, and over £2,000, respectively; and the respective amounts of increase of these salaries?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: I have circulated, to the various Departments a request to let me have the desired information at the earliest possible date, but my hon. and learned Friend will understand that the collection and collation of statistics from so many different sources necessarily takes some time.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: It is three weeks since I asked the question. Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman be able to get it for me in a week?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: I will certainly expedite the matter.
    Mr. CLYNES: In furnishing the information will the hon. and gallant Gentleman supply figures showing the increase in the War bonuses as well as the increase HI the salaries?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: I have already sent out the request for the information. It will no doubt be undesirable to delay it, but I will obtain that also if possible.
    Sir M. DOCKRELL: Are not the bonuses only for one year or does the bonus become a permanent addition to the salary?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: The bonus varies with the cost of living.
    Sir M. DOCKRELL: But is it only for the current year or does it become a permanent addition to the salary?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: The bonus varying with the cost of living, its disappearance will depend on the course of the rate of the cost of living.
    Colonel ASHLEY: At what point, if the cost of living falls, will the bonus disappear?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: I should like notice of that question.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Is it not the case that the bonus, in the case of highly paid officials receiving £3,000 a year, will never he reduced under any circumstances until the cost of living has almost reached that of 1914?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: In this case, as in any others, the variations of bonus will follow the ordinary rule.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Is it not the case that it-is a fixed sum of £500 or £750, which represents only about 20 or 25 per cent, of their salaries, and therefore will never come down?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: In the cases to which the right hon. Baronet is referring the bonus is an addition to salary. The bonus in their case will be variable as in any other.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Will it appear in the return or will it be left out of the return and left to the imagination of Members?

    BRITISH DEBT (UNITED STATES).
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether that part of the $4,197,000,000 advanced by America to this country which was used for purposes of strengthening the exchange was all used to strengthen the exchange for purchases by His Majesty's Government or subjects, or was used also to facilitate purchases by other Allied Governments or peoples from America?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: Exchange between London and New York was maintained throughout the greater part of the War at approximately $4·76½ to £l through the action of His Majesty's Government in using its dollars in New York when necessary to maintain that
    1296
    rate. It is not possible within the limits of an answer to a Parliamentary question to explain all the effects of this action, but it certainly enabled anyone who possessed or was able to secure sterling, if he was not prevented from remitting abroad by any of the War time restrictions in force, some of which were specially directed to this end, to direct his sterling into dollars at about the fixed rate, a facility which was undoubtedly made use of by other than the British Government and British nationals.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Then may we say that this debt of ours to the United States was incurred for the benefit of Italy and France, to enable them to purchase more cheaply in America than they otherwise would have been able to do?
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG: No, I think my hon. and gallant Friend's view of the matter is mistaken. The maintaining of the exchange was done for the direct benefit of ourselves—
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: And it benefited others.
    Lieut.-Commander YOUNG:—but, owing to the manner in which we had to secure that for ourselves, it was impossible wholly to avoid its being made use of by others.

    BOY SCOUTS (SCHOOL PREMISES).
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir J. NORTON-GRIFFITHSasked the President of the Board of Education if his Department will get in touch with the various educational authorities controlling seaside schools with a view to the grounds of such schools being loaned for the encampment of scouts during the months of July and August when the schools are on holiday and closed?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Herbert Fisher): The question of lending school premises for the use of boy scouts and similar juvenile organisations is a matter for the local education authorities and school governing bodies controlling the schools, and applications from the organisations desiring to use the premises should be addressed to them. I sympathise with the object which the hon. and gallant Member has in view, but I do not think the intervention of the Board is required.

    CENSUS (POSTPONEMENT).
    Mr. HOWARD GRITTEN(by Private Notice) asked the Minister of Health whether, having regard to the present situation, it is still intended to commence the distribution of census schedules next Saturday, the 16th instant, with a view to taking the census on the 24th instant?
    Sir A. MOND: In view of the national emergency, it has been decided to postpone the census until a later date, to be announced in due course.

  COAL INDUSTRY DISPUTE.

    ARRESTS, FIFESHIRE.
    Mr. T. KENNEDY(by Private Notice) asked the Secretary for Scotland if he is aware of the intense public indignation aroused in the mining districts of Fife-shire by the arrest and imprisonment of a number of persons who have been taking, part in meetings held in connection with the mining dispute; whether, as the action of the authorities is likely to provoke further civil disturbance, he will consider the expediency of releasing the men in question.
    The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Mr. Munro): I have no information regarding the arrest of persons who have taken part in meetings held in connection with the mining dispute referred to. I am, however, satisfied that arrests would not take place unless there was reasonable ground for believing that the persons arrested had been guilty of a breach of the law. Such action cannot be regarded by law-abiding citizens as in any way provocative, and I see no reason to intervene.
    Mr. KENNEDY: Have any of the persons arrested been brought to trial?
    Mr. MUNRO: I am afraid that I must ask for notice of that question.
    Major GLYN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether it is not a fact that a large proportion of those who are creating strife in Fife are Sinn Feiners who have been previously convicted for producing explosives for the destruction of property?
    Mr. MUNRO: Notice must also be given of that question.
    Lieut.-Colonel GUINNESS: Is not this a matter entirely for the local police and in no way within the competence of the right hon. Gentleman?
    Mr. MUNRO: I have no power to intervene while these prisoners are untried, but from long experience of criminal administration in Scotland I have complete confidence in the police.
    Mr. SPENCER: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether it is legal and right for these men to be arrested if they are merely addressing meetings and not doing any act of violence?
    Mr. MUNRO: That depends first of all upon the object of the meeting, and, secondly, upon the character of the speeches.
    Mr. CLYNES: How can the right hon. Gentleman say that he has no right to intervene when he has intervened to the extent of expressing the opinion that the men must be in the wrong?
    Mr. MUNRO: I have expressed no opinion. I said, and I repeat, that I am satisfied that they would not have been arrested unless there was reasonable cause for supposing that there was a breach of the criminal law. Whether there was or not is a matter for the judge.
    Mr. CLYNES: Is it not within the legal experience of the right hon. Gentleman that men have frequently been arrested without reasonable cause?
    Mr. MUNRO: More often with reasonable cause.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: Is there any other country in which the law is more fairly administered than here?

    ARMY RESERVE (EXEMPTIONS).
    Colonel BURN(by Private Notice) asked the Secretary of State for War whether Reservists engaged in equitable retail distribution of groceries will on public grounds be granted exemption in the present crisis?
    Mr. WATERSON: Before the right hon. Gentleman replies may I ask whether exemption has already been granted to those engaged in the wholesale trades?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Sir Laming Worthington-Evans): The answer is in the negative. Exemptions have been allowed in certain wholesale trades and pivotal industries, but if they are extended the value of the Army Reserve will be destroyed. While I regret the inconvenience to the retail traders, I hope they will find that the work can be done by substitutes during the crisis.
    Mr. NEWBOULD: Is it not more a question of inconvenience to the consumers than to the retail traders?

    DEFENCE FORCE.
    Mr. C. WHITE(by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister what are the actual purposes for which the Defence Force is formed; what are the exact terms of enlistment; whether men so enlisting can be called upon to serve in Ireland or abroad; whether some special form of attestation is being used for the enlistment of these men; whether on enlistment they are asked, verbally or in any cither way, to volunteer for service in Ireland or abroad, and whether the exact form of attestation used for the enlistment of these men can be at once submitted to the House?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The Defence Force has been formed to help maintain law and order, and to render any necessary assistance in protecting those employed on carrying on the essential services of the country, without which the people 9f the country might starve.
    The terms of enlistment are for 90 days, or such less period as their services may be required. As stated in the attestation form and in the notice which is handed to the man at the time of his offering to enlist, he will only be required to serve in England, Scotland, or Wales, and statements to the contrary are absolutely without foundation. Special forms of attestation are being used, and I am arranging for copies to be made available in the library for the information of Members.
    Mr. WHITE: Were these special forms of attestation used by all the men who presented themselves for enlistment last Monday, or were the old ones preferred?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: They were used so far as I know in every single case. If the hon. Gentleman can give me a single case in which any other form has been used I shall be glad to know of it. But if he will look at the form which is in the library he will see that it is made quite clear that the men are for service only in England, Scotland and Wales.
    Mr. WHITE: Does that apply to all men irrespectively of whether they were attested on the new form, or on some makeshift form?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: It applies to every man enlisting in the Defence Force. I do not believe that any other form has been used in any case.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: When the right hon. Gentleman says that these men are protecting volunteers, does that mean that they are only to be used for protecting people who are working and cannot be used for carrying on the work of distribution and essential services?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: They are used for precisely the same purpose as any of the military forces of the Crown may be used for.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Can they be put on transport work—that is what I mean—or are they only for the preservation of order?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Mr. CLYNES: May I ask the Leader of the House for a statement of the business which he intends to take next week?
Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Assuming, as I hope I may assume, that the House will not think it necessary to insist upon debating the industrial situation to-day, then I would propose on Monday to put down as first Order, to be taken if so desired, the adjourned Debate on the reply to His Majesty's Message to the House. If time permits, we should go on with the Housing Bill and other Orders on the Paper.
On Tuesday we propose to take Supply —Vote for the Ministry of Agriculture.

1301
On Wednesday the Treaty of Peace (Hungary) Bill, and the Revenue Bill.
On Thursday Supply—Vote for the Ministry of Health.
I must reserve, however, the right to alter the order of business should it be necessary to take Supplementary Estimates.
Ordered, "That the Proceedings in Committee on Public Health (Tuberculosis) [Expenses] be exempted at this day's Sitting from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House), and may, notwithstanding anything in Standing Order No. 15, be considered before Eleven o'clock."—[Mr. Chamberlain.]

COAL INDUSTRY DISPUTE.
Mr. ASQUITH: May I ask the Prime Minister whether he will now make a statement to the House, so that the House may be in possession of the exact situation in regard to the coal dispute, and if—as I think it not improbable—there be a desire to discuss that statement, whether he will move the adjournment of the House for the purpose of enabling us to do so1?
The PRIME MINISTER: The reply which I sent on behalf of the Government to the Transport Workers last night, asking them for the grounds on which they had come to so serious a decision, appeared in the papers this morning. Early this morning I received a letter from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) and Mr. Robert Williams, representing the Transport Workers, stating that they were quite prepared to come over to Downing Street to give their reasons in person. I thereupon invited them to come there, and named 11 o'clock. A small delegation representing the railway unions and the other transport unions came at 11 o'clock, and stated their case very fully. I gave the reasons why the Government took a different view. There was a long discussion. There will be a very full report in the Press I hope this afternoon, certainly this evening. It was agreed that it was desirable that there should be a full statement of the whole of the proceedings sent to the Press. I assume that this delegation, which was a small one, will report to their constituent bodies.
Mr. HENDERSON: They are reporting this afternoon.
The PRIME MINISTER: That is what I understood. I think that it would be very undesirable to have a discussion at present in those circumstances. I should have thought it better that the delegates should consider what passed this morning between the Government and their representatives, and whatever their decision be, that undoubtedly will be a very grave matter. But to have a discussion in the House at this moment would, I should think, rather interfere with that. The Government are entirely in the hands of the House of Commons in that respect, but that is our emphatic opinion.
Mr. ASQUITH: This is a very grave situation. I am assured that the right hon. Gentleman wishes to do whatever he can to promote any possible peace, and I should be the last person in the world to put any obstacle in that direction. I think that the House of Commons ought to be kept fully informed in these matters. [HON. MEMBERS: "We are!"] After all, we are responsible—
The PRIME MINISTER: Hear, hear!
Mr. ASQUITH:—and we ought to be kept fully informed. We are now within measurable distance—less than 48 hours—of the threat of a general strike, and, if the right hon. Gentleman says, on his responsibility, that he thinks that a discussion this afternoon will be prejudicial to the prospects of peace, I need not say that I should acquiesce. But I think, as the House is meeting to-morrow, that it would be well if the Government were to tell us that a statement on the subject will be made at the meeting of the House to-morrow and that then there will be an opportunity for a discussion.
The PRIME MINISTER: I will find out from Mr. Speaker if that be possible.
Mr. ASQUITH: You can always move the Adjournment.
The PRIME MINISTER: I am not sure that I can. It is a private Members day. Certainly, I think it is very reasonable. I understand now that it would be in accordance with the rules of the House. It is not merely the view of the Government, but, unless I am mistaken—from the way in which my statement was. Received—it is the view of representatives

1303
of labour as well, that it might be prejudicial to have a discussion this afternoon. I would not profess to dogmatise upon the subject—it is very difficult to know—but on the whole I should have thought that a discussion this afternoon, while negotiations are pending between the parties more directly concerned, might be unhelpful. I will comply with the suggestion of my right hon. Friend, and, as I understand from Mr. Speaker that it will be quite in order, I shall make a statement at 12 o'clock to-morrow, and, if it be then thought desirable, move the Adjournment.
Mr. ASQUITH: I am very glad to hear that. Let me point out that it is not a question between labour and the Government alone. It concerns the whole of the community—it is not really a matter of negotiation between one person, or set of persons, and another. The interests of the whole country are involved. On that understanding, that to-morrow, at 12 o'clock, when the House meets, the right hon. Gentleman will make a full statement, and, if necessary, move the Adjournment, I will not press the matter to-day.
Mr. CLYNES: May I be allowed to say that I agree with what my right hon. Friend the Member for the Paisley Division (Mr. Asquith) has said as to the gravity of the situation, but, in the circumstances, I think the Prime Minister has expressed the most helpful view, as far as the House of Commons is concerned. Seeing that negotiations to some degree are not altogether suspended or broken off, and seeing that we have the assurance that some more complete story will be given to the House of Commons to-morrow, my own view is that it would be undesirable to proceed to any discussion to-day.

STANDING COMMITTEES (CHAIRMEN'S PANEL).
Mr. JOHN WILLIAM WILSONreported from the Chairmen's Panel: That they had appointed Sir William Watson Rutherford to act as Chairman of Standing Committee B (in respect of the Public Health (Tuberculosis) Bill.
Report to lie upon the Table.

HEALTH RESORTS AND WATERING PLACES BILL.
Reported, without Amendment, from Standing Committee D.
Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
Minutes of the Proceedings of the Standing Committee to be printed.
Bill, not amended (in the Standing Committee), to be taken into consideration upon Monday next.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
That they have passed a Bill, intituled, "An Act to enable the Ear by Urban District Council to acquire the undertakings of the Earby Water Company, Limited, and the Kelbrook Water Company, Limited, and to make further provision in regard to the water supply of the district; and for other purposes." [Earby Urban District Council Bill [Lords.]
And also, a Bill, intituled, "An Act to confer additional powers upon the North Eastern Railway Company for the construction of new railways and other works and the acquisition of lands; to authorise the said company and the Hull and Barnsley Railway Company to acquire lands and property and a portion of the undertaking of the Hedon Haven Commissioners; to extend the time limited by certain Acts for the completion of works and for the compulsory purchase of lands; and for other purposes." [North Eastern Railway Bill [Lords].
Earby Urban District Council Bill [Lords],
North Eastern Railway Bill [Lords],
Read the first time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

CORPORATION OF LONDON (BRIDGE) BILL [Lords].
Reported, without Amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
Bill to be read the Third time.

SOUTH METROPOLITAN GAS BILL [Lords].
Reported, with Amendments; Report to lie upon the Table.
CHATHAM AND DISTRICT LIGHT RAILWAYS COMPANY BILL [Lords].
Reported, without Amendment; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.

PRIVATE BILLS (GROUP B).
Colonel JACKSON reported from the Committee on Group B of Private Bills; That the parties opposing the Croydon Corporation Water Bill had stated that the evidence of Mr. H. E. Stilgoe, Chief Engineer to the Metropolitan Water Board, was essential to their case; and, it having been proved that his attendance could not be procured without the intervention of the House, he had been instructed to move that the said Mr. H. E. Stilgoe do attend the said Committee during the further proceedings on the Croydon Corporation Water Bill.
Ordered, That Mr. H. E. Stilgoe do attend the said Committee during the further proceedings on the Croydon Corporation Water Bill.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.
  [FOURTH ALLOTTED DAY.]
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir E. CORNWALL in the Chair.]
  CIVIL SERVICES ESTIMATES, 1921–22

  SUPPLY.

    CLASS II.
    OFFICE OF WORKS AND PUBLIC BUILDINGS.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a sum, not exceeding £307,900, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1922, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Commissioners of His Majesty's Works and Public Buildings." [Vote.£275,000 has been voted on account.]
    4.0 P.M.
    The MINISTER of HEALTH (Sir Alfred Mond): As there is no one in this House to represent my successor at the Office of Works I have been requested, and I am pleased, to take on myself the presentation of these Estimates to the Committee. The Estimates deal with the establishment of the Office of Works. I do not think that they require very long explanation from me. As a matter of fact, the Committee may be glad to know that there is a net decrease on this Vote over last year of £30,000. The Vote may be roughly divided into two sections: one part, which I call A, providing for the staff for carrying out the normal functions of the Department, and the other part, B, providing for the headquarter staff for the supervision and preparation of drawings in connection with the erection of houses at the request of the Ministry of Health on behalf of the local authorities. The Estimate for the normal services for the year 1920–21 was £427,000, to which has to be added £32,000 Supplementary Estimates, £66,000 transferred from classified services, and £6,400 transferred from unclassified services, making £582,000 in all. The Estimate for 1921–22, £626,000, shows an increase for the year of £44,000."
    Colonel ASHLEY: Do I understand that the right hon. Gentleman is referring to page 165 of the Estimates?
    Sir A. MOND: I am dividing the Vote into two parts. It is not divided on page
    1332
    165. You have merely the total amount. The total amount for 1920–21 is £630,600 with an Appropriation-in-Aid of £17,000. The gross amount for 1921–22 is £732,900 with Appropriations-in-Aid of £150,000. Deducting the Appropriations-in-Aid the amount for 1921–22, £582,900 is £30,700 less than the Vote for 1920–21. I was trying to explain how this figure arose, and in order to make that intelligible I was dividing the gross amount into two factors, namely, expenditure on normal staff and expenditure on the provision of staff dealing with the erection of houses on behalf of the Ministry of Health, which is a very considerable temporary service, more than covered by the Appropriations-in-Aid of £150,000. I have had the figures analysed in order to enable the Committee to follow them. The normal services in 1920–21 cost £582,000 and the Estimate for 1921–22, £626,000, is an increase of £44,000.
    Mr. LORDEN: Where can we find those figures?
    Sir A. MOND: You cannot find them. I am trying to make the figures intelligible. It is really a sub-division of the figures on page 125, where totals only are given. If you take the estimated cost of the staff for housing, the Supplementary Estimate for 1920–21 was £48,000, and the Appropriations-in-Aid were £17,000. The Estimate for 1921–22 is £106,000 and the Appropriations-in-Aid £150,000. The estimated excess of the Appropriations-in-Aid over the estimated expenditure on salaries in the two years is £13,000. Members of the Committee who take some interest in this matter will remember that when I presented the Supplementary Estimate I pointed out that these were merely pro forma figures and that the money would be recovered from the local authorities as the housing schemes went on. Apparently, more money has been recovered than has been spent, and the Department has a small balance in hand. Having divided up these two factors, I will deal with the normal and more permanent establishment of the office. I might say that a very drastic and careful survey of the establishment of the Department has been going on by the Treasury, and I think anyone who has followed the thing in' detail will agree that the Treasury has made as big reductions as are possible if the Department is to continue to

    1333
    function at all efficiently. As a matter of fact, the reductions which have been made compel the Department to curtail some of the work which it has been in the habit of doing and reduce, I will not say disadvantageously, some of its activities.
    There is one point which I wish to make clear to the Committee. The Department, while it was under my charge, underwent a very considerable re-organisation. When I first went to the Department, I felt that the organisation, particularly on the technical side, was by no means what I considered it ought to be to make it an efficient working machine. While during the War it was obviously impossible to carry out any change, an after-the-war scheme was prepared and approved by the Treasury, in which the whole of the Department's work was largely re organised on a very much better basis. That makes it difficult for hon. Members to compare exactly the figures of this year and previous years, partly because different officers now appear. Many changes of that kind have been made, and it is difficult to compare the personnel point by point with the previous figures. This re-organisation is not yet quite complete. I am certain that it will lead to further improvement in the working of the Department. Already I think the result is beginning to show itself in greater economy. I do not think it can be fully realised what a large amount of extra work has been laid on the Department in the last few years. The percentage of staff to expenditure on work for the current year works out at approximately 5.5 per cent., which no one can say is a high figure considering the large amount of work that is done. In 1913–14 the figure was approximately 6 per cent., so that although the number of the staff and the amount of the money spent on the staff has increased, the proportion of overhead charges to the work done has actually diminished. That is very satisfactory, because the remuneration received by the staff by way of war bonus has naturally increased the individual amount of the salaries, and although it may be argued that the rise in the cost of building material has been appreciable, the result is satisfactory. The cost of the staff in relation to the expenditure on work shows a decrease compared with 1913–14.
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    Although I have undertaken to introduce these Estimates, I would like the Committee to understand that I am no longer responsible for the Estimates or for the future policy of the Department I would like, however, to take this last opportunity of paying a personal tribute to the loyalty and devotion of the staff whose salaries I am asking the Committee to vote. I do not think that any Minister could have had a more devoted, a harder working, or a more zealous set of public officials to undertake the difficult and various duties that have fallen on the Department—duties which have been undertaken with a desire to benefit the country and with a wish to effect all possible economy. Certainly no Minister has ever been assisted during a long and strenuous period of hard work by a more loyal set of co-operators than the staff over which I had the honour to preside for a number of years.
    Sir P. PILDITCH: I am sure the Committee will be grateful to the Minister of Health for the efforts he has made during the last few minutes to elucidate further the figures that we are considering. Speaking for myself, I cannot say that I have been able to follow him. I am therefore compelled to deal with the figures more or less as they stand on the papers before us. I am exceedingly glad to see the right hon. Gentleman still in his place dealing with this matter with his usual businesslike savoir faire, but at the same time I should very much have liked to have seen his successor and to have known with whom we are to deal for the remainder of the year. When I mean the right hon. Gentleman's successor, I mean his successor in this House. I do not know whether he can tell us who it is to be. There is a certain amount of interest developing on that point. I wish to draw attention to certain figures because from them some little idea can be gained of the increase of the activities of the Department. I am not about to make a general attack on the activities of the Department, because in many ways I know from experience what good work it did in the great emergency of the War, when its duties were doubled and trebled. The work then done by the Department was magnificent. But I suggest that the Minister and the Committee might well consider the tendencies which some of these figures show. The figure to which

    1335
    I draw attention particularly is the number of the staff. On page 169 it will be seen that the staff has increased from 581 in 1920 to 997 this year. There is a note at the bottom of the page stating that the two figures are hardly comparable because of some temporary men having been engaged in one of the years. It would have been desirable if some attempt had been made to make the figures comparable. At any rate, I hope the Minister will be prepared to give us some further explanation so that we can make a comparison. I would compare these two figures with the figure for the last complete year before the War, when this staff, which is largely a professional staff, reached a total of 384.
    I shall not attempt to make comparisons between expenditures. That would be exceedingly difficult to do in a Department of this kind, when the cost of the staff has developed and is mixed up with the cost of carrying out works. But these three figures are in themselves an indication that in some way or other the activities of the Department must have been very largely increased during the period mentioned. We know, of course, some reasons why they have increased. There was a Debate in the House a few months ago regarding the new work placed upon the Department in reference to housing. I am not going to make an attack upon the Department for having, in circumstances of great emergency and crisis, undertaken the duty of building 10,000 houses. I think it is quite likely that in many cases the local authorities were unable to do this work, and that the aid of some special institution like the Office of Works was desirable; but I would like to point out that there are serious dangers in a public Department undertaking in any large way the provision of houses, even in the present crisis, because, quite apart from all the other points that were raised when this matter was previously discussed, apart from the difficulty of getting proper comparisons between works executed by the Department and works executed by private effort, or as to the procedure adopted by public Departments and so forth, quite apart from that class of consideration, there is this broad consideration to be home in mind, namely, that if you once set up a big central State Department to do housing, the tendency will be, unless
    1336
    it is very carefully watched, for the Department gradually to absorb all the housing, or as much of the housing as it can secure. For this reason the tendency will be for the Department to dispossess the local authorities, and in some measure also to dispossess the element of private enterprise. Why should a local authority take all the trouble and run the gauntlet of all the local differences of opinion in order to carry out this difficult undertaking if there is a Government Department which is prepared to do it and it is known that, whatever the loss may be, it will come out of the pocket of the State?
    While I am not urging that we should ask the Minister to stop the building of these 10,000 houses, I hope he will tell us that this is meant to be the limit. We do not want to see a great bureaucratic, architectural building works Department set up at the centre to absorb the duty, or any considerable part of the duty, of undertaking the housing of the people, which it was originally intended should be carried out either by fair partnership between the localities and the central authority or in a limited way by private enterprise.
    There is another respect in which the activities of the Department in regard to building have developed very much, and it is no doubt partly responsible for the increase both in the cost of the Department and in its personnel. That is the fact that, whereas the Office of Works was originally started mainly as a Department for managing, repairing, and looking after existing public buildings, royal buildings, etc., by degrees it has gradually come to be an architectural and building Department. I believe that a short time since there was a Cabinet Minute to the effect that no public buildings required by the War Office, the Admiralty or the Air Force should be carried out by the Office of Works. As I understand it, it was intended by that Cabinet Minute that such large public buildings should be designed by architects in open competition whereby you could get the advantage of whatever artistic elements there are in the country. Now I am given to understand that the Cabinet Minute has been ignored by the Office of Works, and that at present a building is in progress for the Royal Air Force, one of the prohibited Departments under the Cabinet

    1337
    order, that there is a large building being carried out by the Office of Works for the Ministry of Pensions at Acton, and also that the building which is to increase the size of Somerset House is being carried out by the Department. I think it would be exceedingly undesirable if the activities of the Department were allowed to develop themselves along either of those two lines, as they are apparently developing.
    So far as housing is concerned, we ought to have a distinct assurance from the Minister that unless some new circumstances occur his Department will limit itself to the authority which it has already obtained from the House. So far as the other buildings are concerned, I hope my right hon. Friend will be able to give an assurance that this tendency to infringe upon the province of the independent builder and of the independent architect will be checked, and that it will not go any further than, apparently, it is going at the present moment. I have nothing but praise for the admirable way in which the Department carried out the emergency duties laid upon it during the War in building things which were required in a hurry in this country, and for its work in France in the reinstatement of buildings which were destroyed in the German operations at the beginning of 1918. I am not desirous of entering into any campaign against the activities of the Department in such emergenices, but I say that as a matter of principle the Department should, generally, confine itself to its original duties, the maintenance of public buildings that are in existence, and that, except for a nucleus held in hand for emergencies, should not, either in the domain of design as architects, or in the domain of construction as builders, or by acting as contractors by the employment of workmen direct, proceed to aggrandise itself further than it has done. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will be able to give us some assurance on the lines I have put before the House.
    Colonel ASHLEY: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman in charge of this Vote for an explanation of an item on page 169? Under the heading, "Appropriations-in-Aid," there is an entry of £150,000. It is not quite clear to me whether that means that the £150,000 will eventually be recovered from the authorities for whom this Department is building houses, or not.
    Sir A. MOND: This Appropriation-in-Aid is money which will be recovered, and is being recovered, from the local authorities, as it is received. All the overhead charges are charged to the building schemes of the local authorities concerned, and this money comes back as the building schemes proceed, and appears as an Appropriation-in-Aid.
    Colonel ASHLEY: May I take it, therefore, that the right hon. Gentleman hopes that eventually, when this money is repaid, the work which his Department is now doing for the local authorities will not have cost the nation anything?
    Mr. A. L. PARKINSON: It cannot come out of the local authorities, as all they can charge is a penny rate, and it is impossible to get anything back for the Appropriations-in-Aid from the penny rate.
    Colonel ASHLEY: That is my very point. That is what I want to get out for the information of the Committee.
    Sir A. MOND: Perhaps my hon. and gallant Friend will allow me to explain. The interruption about this grant is irrelevant to the point at issue. The question of the penny rate has nothing to do with this matter at all. We are building as agents for the local authorities. The whole of the money will be repaid by the local authorities, as far as my Department is concerned. The cost of the staff is charged as an overhead charge, and all this money is being recovered, and, as a matter of fact, I believe at the present moment we have got rather more money in hand than we have been spending, but we are proceeding on very definite lines as to being secure about the advance before we begin a scheme at all, and therefore this is merely a transferred charge. The whole cost of this operation is merely a transferred charge, and will cost the taxpayer nothing at all.
    Colonel ASHLEY: I am very glad to get this explanation, because, so far as I am concerned, this very much modifies my former hostility to the Department undertaking this work. If there is going to be a charge upon the public for this supervision of the work, which should fall upon the local authority, I am absolutely against it. But if they are going to pay the Exchequer the cost of building, I cannot see that there is very much objec-

    1339
    tion to these undertakings, as there is apparently no private individual to do the work, and no local authority sufficiently energetic to carry out the business.
    What I really want to say a few words about is the extraordinary amount that the Exchequer has to find for war bonuses. I think the Committee ought seriously to consider whether at the present moment the nation can afford war Bonuses on the scale which is indicated on pages 165 to 169 of these Estimates. Let me take the first item which comes under my notice, namely, the bonus of the Secretary. I have no doubt he is an excellent public servant, who carries out his duties in a most efficient manner. In the financial year 1920–21 he received a salary of £1,500, and for the financial year which we are now entering on he is going to receive £2,200, a rise of £700. If you go through every one of these items you find exactly the same tale. The three inspectors of ancient monuments cost £600 last year, and this year they are going to cost £1,080. I cannot understand how the nation can possibly afford these enormous bonuses for civil servants when everybody else's salary is being cut down, when we are faced with a national crisis owing to the absolute necessity of cutting down the miners' wages and cutting down the profits of the mine owners, when everybody has to submit to a reduction in his income, and when the cost of living is falling. It is in these circumstances that we are asked to vote to civil servants an increase of 50, 60 or 70 per cent, over what they received in 1920–21. It really is not sane policy. Why should they be the only class who are to receive these additions of salary, whereas nearly every private person has got a smaller salary and the working classes are having either less wages or will shortly have to receive less wages. Why should their salaries go up for, at any rate, the next six months, and probably the next 12 months? I think the House of Commons would not be doing its duty if it did not make a very serious protest, and some practical protest, against the kind of salaries which are being paid to civil servants. I sympathise with them; they have had hard times, the same as everybody else, but I do not see why there should be one privileged class in this country when all other people are suffering, and I think it is time some practical
    1340
    step should be taken whereby the burden of taxation can be reduced. We are always talking in this House of economy, but when there is a chance of doing something for economy these salaries are always voted practically without any protest, and these professions of economy really mean nothing. Let us really do something.
    Mr. LORDEN: The hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has raised some question with regard to those Appropriations-in-Aid. In my opinion these Appropriations-in-Aid are simply eyewash, and nothing else. Local authorities, when they have paid the proceeds of a penny rate per annum into the housing funds, have no more liability whatever. The right hon. Gentleman's late Department say, "We will carry out this and we will make an overhead charge." But that overhead charge is not put on the local authorities at all. They do not pay it. It comes out of the Treasury, under the arrangements they made for housing, and therefore it is purely eyewash, and merely a book entry in these accounts. The hon. Member for one of the Divisions of Middlesex (Sir P. Pilditch) raised a point with regard to the number of staff, but he did not deal with the increases in the Department from year to year. Some time ago, in December, I think, the right hon. Gentleman gave me, in answer to a question, the cost of his Department in 1912–13 and in 1920. In 1912–13 the total cost was £188,700, in 1919–20 is was £488,100, last year it was £630,600, and this year it is to be £732,900. That is not even the gross amount. When you go down a little further in the accounts you see it says here, in addition to these amounts, the total expenditure will be £863,708. This is a case in which we are asked to vote very considerable and unnecessary sums. In each of these housing schemes that are being carried out for a local authority, first of all they have the volume that was delivered to them by the Ministry of Health. That is their text, as you may say, which they propose to follow to a certain extent—more or less. Then they have to appoint their architect. On page 167 you will see that, entirely used for housing, there are one superintendent architect, two senior architects, seven architects, and 16 assistant architects. Then it says "draughtsmen." There is no note at the bottom which shows how many of

    1341
    these draughtsmen are employed, but the expenditure is £75,000, and if you put them down at £500 each that provides for 150. I do not suppose all these are necessary for the purposes of housing. I take it that there is about a third of them who would be used for housing. If they have got the superintendent architects and senior architects they will want these other gentlemen to wait upon them, and therefore the draughtsmen for getting out sketches would probably be about a third of this number. These are entirely unnecessary. When he is carrying out housing by direct labour the right hon. Gentleman may want a superintendent of works, but not all these architects. Although the right hon. Gentleman has stated that the overhead charges only amount to 2.75 per cent that is very largely wasted on the duplication of architects.
    We have had a paper issued by the right hon. Gentleman with regard to the number of houses he has got in hand, and he gives the date when they were commenced, the number completed, and the number roofed in. He points out that one scheme was started in January, 1920, and yet by the end of February or March, of the 120 houses in the scheme, only 32 were completed. It seems to me' that if it had been dealt with by a private contractor, the contractor would have had a great many penalties to pay if he could only produce 32 houses in 15 months. In another district, although further schemes were started in May, 1920, a very small proportion of the houses have been completed. As one of those who is a great believer in private enterprise, I am strongly opposed to this endeavour to nationalise the building industry by this back-door method. That is the view that I take, and I take it very strongly. I do not think we ought to let it go on, and it is essential that some limitation should be put upon it. I feel that we are not doing our duty if we do not press for a considerable diminution. We are asked to spend over £100,000 more in this Department than last year. I am not dealing with the appropriations-in-aid, because they are, in my opinion, of no value. They come to the right hon. Gentleman's Department, and he goes to the Treasury, and they honour a cheque for it, and that is what they are bound to do. There is no other method, and therefore I strongly protest against that.
    1342
    I also wish to deal with the question of War bonuses. After we have dealt with all these rises in salaries, which are consistent almost throughout, there is an item of £210,000 for bonus. It used to be War bonus, but now they have dropped the "War." Is there any method by which these bonuses rise and fall with the cost of living If it is good for the goose, it should be good for the gander, and I do not see why civil servants should not be under the same arrangement as others and have their salaries reduced as the cost of living goes down. In these Estimates there has also been delivered a paper called "House Building." The figure we have got in these pages 165–169 of the Estimates does not represent the whole of the money that the right hon. Gentleman has, as he has got a consider able sum in hand with which he is carrying out this work for the local authorities. Who is paying the interest? Each one of these local authorities are obtaining some advantage, although probably, when you come back to the true point that the Treasury have got to pay, it does not matter whether the Treasury pay out of one pocket or out of another, but there must come, and there ought to come soon, some determination on the part of the Treasury to stop this expenditure to the extent to which it is going on. Can we afford it? I think I might be in Order in quoting what some of the housing schemes have cost. In one scheme, I understand, the houses are being put up and the roads and sewers are being constructed, that the tenants are asked to pay 25s. per week, that they are then asked to pay approximately 7s.—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member may refer to any administrative act of the Office of Works during the year, but he cannot go into the question of the general housing policy. That would come under another Vote. Here we are only concerned with how far the Office of Works has any jurisdiction in the matter.
    Mr. LORDEN: I thought I was poaching a little, and I will not pursue that point, but I feel that the whole question of the Office of Works carrying out this work wants thoroughly reconsidering. I am the last person to put any difficulties in the way of the Government at the present time. I am not prepared probably to go into the lobby and vote against

    1343
    them in the present state of the country, but I feel it would not be right of me to go through a stage such as this and to see such extravagance and unnecessary expenditure without raising my voice against it, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman will give us some hope that this expenditure is going to be curtailed.
    Sir HENRY CRAIK: I wish very briefly to call attention, in even more pointed terms, to the point raised by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Fylde Division (Colonel Ashley). He referred to this increasing charge for the higher posts in the Civil Service. From what he said, I gather that the hon. Member for North St. Pancras (Mr. Lorden) has not yet grasped, and I am certain the House generally has not yet grasped, what is the real meaning of this change in the whole pay of the higher civil servants, against which I, as an old civil servant, have repeatedly raised my voice, and in doing so I am certain that I have the sympathy of many existing members of the Civil Service. What is it that we are doing in this House, day after day? I cannot now refer to another Vote, but two days ago we debated the Education Estimates. Did the House know that it was voting then to the Permanent Secretary of the Board of Education a salary nearly double that received by the President himself, that the salary of the Permanent Secretary is £3,700, while that of the President is only £2,000? I am certain the House generally has not recognised it, and the hon. Member for North St. Pancras showed that he has not. I am quite ready to admit that in certain cases a certain increase of salary to these higher officials, such as is indicated in this Vote, was necessary, but take the case of this particular Department. For years and years in my recollection the salary of the higher-paid posts was £1,200 a year. A few years ago it was raised to £1,500, and last year it was raised to £2,200. Possibly, it may be an expedient thing, but what I do object to, and what I am certain the House has not fully realised—and it was not helped to realise it by the answers which the Financial Secretary to the Treasury gave to me and others on the point—is, that in addition *o that increase of £700 a year in salaries, a further bonus was paid of £750. Is that
    1344
    fair or reasonable? Is it an economic proceeding?—Does it really rest on any sound ground whatever?
    5.0 P.M.
    I am quite ready to agree, as I have repeatedly stated, that the lower paid branches of the Civil Service, men who, I know, are paid a limited amount and who have felt the pinch of the times, should have this bonus proportionate to the increase of expenditure, but I do say that the man who reaches a standard of £2,000 or even £3,000 a year should, with the rest of the community, share the burden of taxation. Can any man honestly stand up and deny that? Are we, not all living on half the incomes that we did before, and are we not doing so by denying ourselves small luxuries to which we had become accustomed, but which we have learned to do without? Why cannot the higher paid civil servants do the same? I am quite ready to say that a certain increase of salary was necessary in the lower posts, but let me point out that there has been almost no increase of salary in the lower posts. The increase of salary, apart from bonus, haw been in the higher posts. The lower paid officers have got, what I think is a very fair thing, a bonus, but they have not, like the higher paid posts, got both an increase of salary and a bonus. One or two hon. Members asked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury yesterday, "Will these bonuses go down as the cost of living goes down?" "Yes," the right hon. Gentleman said, "of course they will." "But," I asked, "will it be effective in the case of those higher officials?" "Oh, yes," he said, "the whole bonus is affected by the cost of living." But what is the fact? A man gets a percentage of increase proportionate to the rise in prices. The percentage of £750 to a man whose salary is £2,000 or £3,000 a year is very small. No human being ever expects that in the times in which we are now living the cost of living will approach that of 1914 by anything like 30, 25, or 15 per cent. Supposing the increased expense of living were halved, still it would not touch this monstrous bonus of £500 or £750 paid to those higher officials. That, I think, is wrong. Give your higher officials a fair salary, as you have done in every case by increasing salary, sometimes by 50 per cent., but do not let them share in a bonus which will go on

    1345
    evidently until the cost of living comes to within 15 or 20 per cent, of what it was in 1914. I say, give your bonus as liberally as you like, and be generous with the bonus to the lower paid civil Servants. In the case of the higher civil servants, let them have an increase of salary or a bonus, but do not give them both, and I do not see on what argument you can rest this double pay. It is very easy for any Member of the House to look at these Estimates and think he has the full salaries before him, but he must pursue his investigations much more closely. You have to look at a totally different part of the Estimates—to another Vote altogether—to see the explanation of this bonus. I confess that I have not yet heard from the Treasury Bench a justification or even an explanation of the ground upon which they give these lavish increases, rising in some cases to 50 per cent., and, in addition, a large bonus—a bonus so high that it has raised the salary of many of these permanent officials to something like 30 or even 50 per cent, in excess of the Ministers' salaries under whom they serve. Until the Treasury gives us a better explanation of this extravagance, we cannot think that they are performing properly their function of parsimonious management of the revenue, and until that is done I trust the House in Supply will continue to object to what I consider a very unjust expense.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I might tell the right hon. Gentleman who has just sat down, in case he was not here at the time, that that very question of bonus for the higher civil servants was raised very late at night by myself, and was answered by Mr. Stanley Baldwin.
    Sir H. CRAIK: And I raised it myself.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Yes, the right hon. Gentleman did, and the explanation, which was very inadequate, was that it was necessary to give the some bonus to the higher grade civil servants as to a charwoman. The explanation given by Mr. Baldwin at that time was that it was necessary for these higher grade civil servants to educate their children in the way they had been educated. I hope I carry some hon. Members with me when I say that exactly the same problem is assailing the harassed taxpayer of the same class of
    1346
    people who wish to educate their children —I mean members of the professional classes, Navy and Army officers and other people, who are very hard put, because so much of their income is taken by taxation. It was late at night when Mr. Baldwin made that inadequate explanation, and it was hopeless to try to press the matter. I do not know that we can raise the matter very fully on this parcular Vote, but I would like to point out that this bonus of £210,000 for 1921–22 as compared with £160,400 for 1920–21, applies not only to the coal porters and hall porters, whose wages vary from 27s: to 32s., and to charwomen and caretaker, but it also applies to the chief quantity surveyor, whose salary is between £900 and £1,000 a year, to the chief architect, with his £1,200 a year, to the chief surveyor, with his £925 a year, and to the comptroller of accounts, with his £1,000 a year. I think we ought to have an explanation from the right hon. Gentleman, who is very kindly taking charge of this Estimate for the First Commissioner of Works in another place. I think when he comes to reply he might tell us to what the bonus will work out to those persons. At the present moment the country is distraught by a question of reduction of wages, and, before the matter is settled, we are going to have, I am afraid, a good deal of trouble, apprehension and distress caused in this country. Now we are asked to vote an increase of wages to admittedly well-paid people, and we ought to know how much the bonus will be to the chief architect, with his £1,200 a year.
    Sir H. CRAIK: The bonus applies to every officer, even with a salary far above £1,000 a year.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: That is so, and I object to it very strongly. I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman, but all I am asking now is, to how much this will work out? If, for example, the chief surveyor with his £925 gets an extra bonus of £300 on top of that, we ought to be told.
    Sir H. CRAIK: The real point is as to those cases where there has been an enormous increase of salary and also a bonus given.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: I know there is a great deal in that. I do not think there are any cases of that kind in this Estimate.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Yes, there are.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: I daresay the right hon. Gentleman is perfectly right, and if he goes to a Division, I will support him on that point; in the meantime, I am pointing out that I do not think these people are badly paid at £900 a year, and in these times, when one remembers the financial stringency, I do not think we are justified in voting a bonus to them. At the same time, I am sure hon. Members on this side were glad to hear the tribute paid to these people to the right hon. Gentleman for their efficient and whole-hearted services, and so on. We quite appreciate that. We are not making any attack on them or their efficiency. We wish them well in every way. We have a very excellent Civil Service in this country, and I, personally, have no hostility to them, but when things are so serious financially, and when we are harping on reductions of wages in every class of the community, I think it is wrong to give these bonuses to these people, especially as they may last for another 12 months, and the cost of living may come down very considerably in the present year.
    I would like to draw attention to the fact that the Office of Works proposes to pay some of its humbler members what I consider an inadequate salary. Hon. Members will see in the Estimate an unspecified number of coal porters, hall porters, etc., to whom it is intended to pay wages ranging from 27s. to 32s. a week. Now a coal porter has to be an able-bodied man, obviously. A hall porter has to be a man of good character, and is usually a man of mature years, and very often is married and has a family, and wages of this sort are altogether inadequate. These humble people, I consider, are being offered wages that good employers ought not to pay for the same class of work, and I desire to enter, very briefly, my protest against these wages, Then there is an unspecified number of charwomen for whom the sum of £2,500 is asked. I am sorry we are not told the number, and what each is being paid. The principle, I think, ought to be adopted by the Office of Works in regard to both charwomen and the junior clerical staff of adequately paying them, but not having more than are absolutely necessary. There is in the Secretariat what appears to be altogether a disproportion-
    1348
    ate number of junior clerical people who are very lowly paid. You have there ten superintendents of female typists for this year, as compared with two last year; 52 shorthand-typists, as compared with 13 last year; and 74 typists, as compared with 13 last year. I daresay the increase is due to the building of the 10,000 houses, but even then it seems to me that, simply for the secretariat alone, and remembering the fact that there are many other clerks and junior clerical workers included in other Departments of the Office of Works, the number is excessive. The explanation can be found when we look at the salaries. For the typists, the salaries are from 22s. to 36s. a week, which, I think, is well below the wages offered for typists in the City. The shorthand-typists are paid from 28s. to 46s. a week. I think 28s. a week for shorthand-typists is altogether too low. You have a vast number of underpaid clerical workers. It would be preferable to have a smaller number of better paid clerical workers, who were thoroughly efficient, and see you got the best work out of them. I think the policy there revealed deserves attention. Might I ask a question with regard to the architects abroad? Why is it that we require architects in China and Japan, two in number, and an assistant architect, in addition, stationed in China? Is it in connection with the dockyard at Hong Kong?
    Sir A. MOND: Their business is to look after the Embassies and all the Consular buildings, which, as the hon. and gallant Gentleman knows, are very numerous.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I should have thought it would have been much better to have employed local architects. There are English architects in Hong Kong, and I should have thought local assistance could have been got. There are English architects in Shanghai, and I think I am right in saying there are a certain number of English architects in the chief Treaty Ports in Japan. I do not know if that matter has been considered, and whether we get a saving by this system.
    Sir A. MOND: I have considered it myself, and I finally came to the conclusion that it was more economical than to employ outside architects, who can exercise practically no control, and who,

    1349
    naturally, would be more inclined to favour the local wishes of the people who attend to these buildings than architects who are directly responsible to us.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman. I think that explanation is very satisfactory. I am quite aware how important it is that our Consular buildings in China should be kepi up to the mark, but why is it necessary to keep an architect employed in Constantinople? Is not that rather a luxury, and one that we could do without? Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will tell us why it is necessary to have this man, if only temporarily, at Constantinople? We have only one Embassy there. We have not any Consulates at Anatolia, for our writ, or even the writ of the State forces, does not run in the Highlands of Anatolia, or, for the matter of that, at the sea coast. May I also ask a question in connection with the inspectorate of ancient monuments? I note that we pay a chief inspector, three inspectors, and a clerk, which, I daresay, is very right and proper. I, for one, welcome the policy of seeing that ancient monuments are properly preserved, but I should like to ask Sir Edwin, first of all, who decides on the expenditure that these people may advise? Is it the Office of Works? Is this on another Vote Is the expenditure undertaken by local authorities, and is the advice of the inspectorate given? The matter is one of some interest to me, and, I imagine, to other hon. Members as well. I think we might be told a little about it. In any case, is it for the whole of Great Britain, or are there separate Departments for Scotland?
    Sir A. MOND: The whole of Great Britain.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: And Ireland?
    Sir A. MOND: No.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Then in that case the number is not too great. The work is quite an important work. It would be of interest to the right hon. Gentleman to tell us about the expenditure on this Vote. Furthermore, who looks after monuments which are not ancient—in other words, the new monuments What is the procedure with regard to setting up war memorials, for example, in the City of London, in White-
    1350
    hall, Westminster, and the neighbourhood? Is there anyone in the Department of the right hon. Gentleman who is consulted or who advises on this subject? I do not want to enter into controversy, but there has been great criticism on the part of some of the public as to memorials which have been put up recently. In particular—I do not want to express an opinion upon the matter—there has been great public criticism of the monument to Nurse Cavell. Is there anyone in the right hon. Gentleman's Department who is paid for supervising the new monuments put up, because if we have to vote a sum of money for the preservation of ancient monuments I personally think it is just as well and important that we should have someone to supervise the taste, suitability, situation and durability of the new monuments.
    London is at present, in some cases at all events, disfigured by some extremely hideous monuments of past warriors, nobles, and monarchs. I trust the generations to come will not blame us for putting up new monstrosities. Important as it is to preserve ancient monuments, I personally think it is just as important to see that the new monuments are suitable, in good taste, and will be accounted to our credit in the years to come. The number of officials has increased very largely, as some hon. Member have pointed out, the number actually being from 581 to 997. I accept, of course, the footnote which says that a real comparison is not possible because of the number of temporary appointments that there were last year, but I would like to point out that apparently there is no decrease. We ought to have some explanation of this.
    During the War the Office of Works, as has been referred to before, was very busily engaged in very important national work. That work is in abeyance now. The Office of Works has undertaken housing schemes for 10,000 houses, which I personally welcome. I, like the hon. Member for North St. Pancras (Mr. Lorden), think it is an excellent thing, and I wish they had started sooner and were building more. Although I welcome this, I would like to ask why the officials, architects, surveyors, typists, clerks, and so on, who were employed on the very heavy work

    1351
    undertaken by the Office of Works during the War, are not available for the housing schemes, and why it is possible to come here year by year and ask for credits for more and more personnel for the Office of Works? The hon. Member for North St. Pancras just now hinted that he would have liked to vote against this Estimate, or, at any rate, move a reduction, but would not do so because there was a national crisis. But may I point out that we have always a national crisis with this Government? If it is not abroad we have it at home. There is always some terrible danger overhanging us, and there always will be so long as my hon. Friend and others maintain the present Government in office. If he wants to secure economy, he can only do it, I would respectfully suggest to him, by voting against the Estimates, and if he is going to take any excuse not to do so, of course, the number of officials will go on increasing this year, and if this Government is unhappily in power we will have another increase next year of 2,000 or 3,000 officials and £200,000 or £300,000 expenditure, and it will serve my hon. Friend perfectly right!
    Not only is there this expenditure, but the public is hit in another way. We all know the serious situation of the taxpayer to-day and of the public and visitors to London, the strangers within our gates, who are penalised by the enormous number of huts required to house these officials. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir A. Mond), who is answering to-day for the Office of Works, has aesthetic tastes. I am sure he is as much distressed as any of us by the huts and wooden buildings disfiguring our parks, and, in particular, the Embankment along the Thames, and particularly that beautiful vista which is debauched by these horrible wooden atrocities. If the right hon. Gentleman still finds it necessary to houses these hundreds of extra officials, against whom my hon. Friend the Member for North St. Pancras will not vote because it is a national crisis, then I suppose we cannot get further. But not only is this a matter of expense but of the amenities of our public spaces which are kept from the public in order to provide accommodation for those employed. It does not sound very much when I read
    1352
    out 74 typists, 10 superintendents of female typists, one chief superintendent, and so on, but these people who are—
    Sir H. CRAIK: Making tea for one another!
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I do not want to criticise them, for they are underpaid people, and I do not expect them to work very hard for 22s. per week. This is underpaid and sweated labour. There ought to be fewer of them, and those ought to be better paid. After all, why should all these officials not be housed in the cheaper suburbs? Why should the right hon. Gentleman, in his capacity as Head of the Board of Works, purchase houses, as we know from the Supplementary Estimates, where they are most expensive, in the neighbourhood of this House and the West End of London, and so on, when he could get them much cheaper in the suburbs of Hoxton, Hounsditch, and so on. [Laughter] Yes, where millions of people live and bring up large families quite happily. There is no reason why the typists, clerks, assistant architects, and the rest of them should not go there, and then perhaps the amenities of the place would be the better for it! The right hon. Gentleman the other day, in reply to a question of an hon. Friend of mine, said that he was keeping the huts and taking them over for the officials, clerks and typists when they left the hotels and public buildings. That is a wrong policy. If we cannot get rid of all these officials, then empty buildings ought to be taken in the cheaper outskirts. It is all nonsense, I submit, to say that all these people must be in the very heart of official London. You can have the Heads of Departments at Whitehall, but the junior people and the clerks, typists, and so on are just as well doing their work outside, and I am not sure they would not be the healthier for it. In the meantime, for Heaven's sake, let us hear that these wooden huts are going to be cleared out of our parks, for at present they are depriving the people of their pleasures and children of their recreations, and even lovers of their legitimate trysting places. I do appeal to the right hon. Gentlemen, on the grounds of economy and on the grounds of the artistic

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    appearance of London, which I know he has so much at heart, to hasten the demolition of these awful places.
    Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: There are three very short points that I should like to refer to, but it is rather difficult to know what one can discuss on this Vote. One is not apparently allowed to go into details of the public buildings which really come under the Office of Works. I suppose we shall have to discuss the actual policy of the building of these houses if the thing is discussed at all, and the way in which the business has gone about.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: Whatever comes under the duties and responsibilities of the Office of Works is now open for discussion.
    Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: The first point I wanted to ask the right hon. Gentleman about is this: I still do not understand what he means by this Appropriation-in-Aid of £150,000. I gather from my right hon. Friend that this does not come into the question at all of the penny rate. In his first speech the right hon. Gentleman pointed out how the matter stood, and, as I understood, said that that £150,000 will be handed back to the local authorities if some of them have expenditure that comes over a penny rate. Therefore, so far as I can see, this Appropriation-in-Aid of £150,000 is merely a matter of accounting, for it does not really mean we are going to save £150,000 in the long run.
    Sir A. MOND: You neither save nor lose it. Its is obvious to carry out these services you have to have your architect, clerk of works, surveyors, and so on, and I do not see how the question of the penny rate comes in at all.
    Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: As far as I can see, it actually means a saving as far as the Department is concerned, although the Treasury may have to hand over the whole of that money in the future. Although there is an appropriation-in-aid of £150,000, I understand that there is £200,000 still outstanding from the local authorities owing at the present moment to the right hon. Gentleman's Department. If that is the case there is a deficit of £50,000 at the present moment My second point is in regard to the question of assimilation. Various speakers have touched upon the question of the
    1354
    bonus, but in addition to that you have on page 165 £6,400 for Civil Service assimilation. Assimilation was agreed upon by the Treasury on the understanding that there should be equivalent savings in each Department so far as the increase in the salaries was concerned. Supposing a Department got an increase of salary in addition to the bonus of £10,000, the Treasury laid it down that there should be an equivalent saving of £10,000 in the Department to meet the increase, Instead of a decrease in the Office of Works Department there is a heavy increase, and although the assimilation has raised the salaries of all these people in addition to the bonus for this year by £6,400, there is very nearly an addition of £100,000 to the salaries of the Department, and they have not taken into account the possibility of economy. Consequently they have really got the increase contrary to the condition laid down by the Treasury.
    I am very disappointed to find such a large increase in the number of officials. I have been looking through the Estimates for 1914–15, and it is quite clear that there is an increase of staff over last year, and there is a very large increase over the Estimates for the year before the War. Before the War we find that the officials numbered 417, and to-day they number 997, so that in the right hon. Gentleman's Department there are 580 more officials than there were before the War. I notice that last year there were two superintendents of female typists, and this year there are 10. Last year there were 13 shorthand typists, and now there are 52. If you take the heading, "Ancient Monuments Inspectorate," you find that before the War there were four inspectors and clerks, and we have now added another clerk. You find all through the list in nearly every case there has been an increase since the year before the War. Before the War there were 3 pensioner messengers, and now there are 46. I hope that in future there will be some attempt on the part of the Government to reduce the staff of this Department. It is really time we did something to economise. I would like the right hon. Gentleman to explain why it is that in the case of assimilation apparently there has been no attempt to reduce the figure in accordance with the conditions categorically laid down by the Treasury.
    Mr. CHARLES EDWARDS: I consider that the Office of Works is a very impor-

    1355
    tant Department, and for that reason I want to say a word about the First Commissioner of Works. I consider that official ought to be a Member of this House. I look upon this House as being much more important than the other Chamber, and I think it is right to say that we are more intimately acquainted with the different departments of work that come under the Office of Works than the Members of the other House can be, and for that reason I think the First Commissioner should have been a Member of this House. I am not saying anything against the Noble Lord who is at present First Commissioner of Works, for no doubt he is a very excellent and able man, but I still consider that the holder of that Office should be a Member of this House, and not the other House.
    We have been dealing with the question of housing, and there has been some criticism about the Office of Works taking up the building of houses. I think they have done a good thing for the nation in this respect. When the Minister of Health made his statement in December last, he showed that the Office of Works were building houses £200 and £300 cheaper than the private contractors had tendered for. That is a very considerable reduction and a very excellent thing for the nation as a whole, because the nation is responsible for the amount over and above what is brought in by the rents and the penny rate in addition. If houses can be built for £200 less it is a saving of that amount to the nation as a whole, and from that point of view this Department has done a very valuable work. I am pleased that the Office of Works has taken on house building. It may not be in order to compare their work with that of the private builder, but I wish to point out that there are many housing schemes now being held up because the tenders are too high, and the Ministry of Health will not sanction them. I think it is fortunate that the Office of Works has done this work, and they have done it so much cheaper than the private builder.
    I want to refer now to the question of restoring buildings commandeered during the War for different purposes. I do not know who orders the renovations that have taken place when the use of these buildings has been discarded by the Office of Works. I know you can go through
    1356
    any town in this country, and looking at the different buildings you can almost point out those which at one time belonged to the Government. It would be interesting to know how much more valuable such properties are to-day since they were handed back, repaired, and redecorated. I should say some of those buildings are hundreds and thousands of pounds more valuable than ever they were before. I want to know what control we have over these matters. I know these buildings are being done up very well, and it is a very good thing for the people who own them that they were taken over.
    I intended to refer to the low salaries which were being paid to certain classes, but my hon. and gallant Friend (Lieut. - Commander Kenworthy) has dealt so well with them that I only need to refer to them very briefly. There are messengers, coal porters, typists, and different people getting from 22s. to 36s. per week, and some of them go up to 46s. and 48s. per week. That is simply a wage that no one can live upon, and, although we are talking a good deal about economy to-day, it should not be practised until a proper standard of living is assured. I assume that these typists at 22s. a week are girls, but no girl to-day can live upon that, and no messenger or coal porter can live upon the wages I have mentioned.
    I notice that the salary of the Secretary in 1920–21 was £1,500, and it has now been raised to £2,200, or an advance of £700. I understand that there is a bonus in addition to that. That represents a very substantial advance, and I do not know how you make these things fit in. You are asking miners to go far below the cost of living to 46 as against 101, and yet we find the Secretary's salary has been raised from £1,500 to £2,200 per annum. I do not know how this is going to be justified, but I suppose we shall hear some justification. How it is going to be justified to our satisfaction I fail to see. It seems to me that both ends of the programme ought to be considered, and I think there is very great room for improvement. I think the lower salaries ought to be raised, and the wage of 22s. a week ought to be wiped out altogether. If the nation is to economise by keeping down to that standard it is about time we finished as a nation. We are not in that state yet, and there is no fear of getting into that position. I hope the Minister will seriously consider the very low amounts we find in these Estimates.

    1357
    I would like a reply from the Minister on these different points: first as to the buildings which have been renovated out of all proportion to the damage done, and out of which the owners must have made very good bargains; secondly, the question of the salary of the Secretary; and, thirdly, the question of the lower-paid officials.
    Mr. A. L. PARKINSON: I wish to draw attention to the fact that the amount of the appropriations-in-aid for 1921–22 is £150,000, whereas in 1920–21 the amount was £17,000, thus representing a decrease in the Estimate of this year of £133,000. Are we to take it that an Estimate or a Supplementary Estimate was made for £150,000 and that only £17,000 was spent, and that the remainder is being carried forward? I also wish to draw attention to the proportion which the appropriations-in-aid bear to the total sum for salaries, wages, travelling expenses, and so forth. The previous speaker has made reference to the fact that the Office of Works is building houses. I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether the Office of Works have completed any of these houses, and, if so, what is the cost? Where the Office of Works comes into competition with contractors or with guilds which are engaged in building, it tends to make the position of those who are trying to carry out the work very difficult indeed. I can give you instances where the Minister of Health has sanctioned schemes for 500 houses in one, district, and where on that site one cannot get more than three or four brick setters to try to carry out the work. It seems to me a fallacy for the Office of Works to get into competition when other people, who are trying to complete building schemes cannot obtain the necessary men. It is not a case of not having a sufficient staff, but of not having sufficient workmen. When the Office of Works starts in opposition you immediately find men taken off one particular job, which is then only able to proceed at half the speed that could have been maintained if the Office of Works had kept out of the way.
    I suggest that the cost mentioned by the previous speaker as that at which the Office of Works can build these houses is almost impossible, and I will give you reasons. In past years, when the Office of Works had always difficulty in getting
    1358
    contractors to tender, I was connected with a firm which submitted tenders, and it was then said that if you wanted to tender for the Office of Works you should work out your tender on the usual lines and then double it and add half again, and you might make a profit, because the red tape made it almost impossible for a contractor to carry out the work. I do not know if the right hon. Gentleman was at the Office of Works then, or if the same thing exists to-day which prevailed at the office then. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh, oh!"] It is the first time I have trespassed on the time of the House, and I know the House, which is always ready to sympathise with a young Member, will give me indulgence. When the Office of Works was carrying out a particular building about which there were many controversies, namely, that at Slough, the Committee which formerly sat under the presidency of Lord Goschen decided they would take it out of their hands and put a contractor in to complete it. If things were carried out on those lines in those days by the Office of Works, I can only surmise that they will have a much bigger cost on this housing scheme than has been indicated.
    Sir A. MOND: I think the hon. Member is wrong. The Office of Works had nothing whatever to do with Slough at any time.
    Mr. PARKINSON: I think you will find that what I say is correct. What I wish to point out is, that if the building trade had provided all the men which the Cabinet asked for to give us the greater production necessary, then it might have been all right for the Office of Works to take up this scheme, but when all the people who are carrying out building are trying to do their best with an insufficient number of workers and cannot get the workers, then it is quite wrong for them to intervene. Every Member of this House knows how much more costly it is to carry on building when you have to keep a staff there with very few workmen.
    Sir A. MOND: Admitted.
    Mr. PARKINSON: Then why should the Office of Works want to put on a bigger staff when there are so few men? I find in these estimates a sum of £75,000 set down in respect of draughtsmen, and I find the total of salaries, wages and

    1359
    allowances is £694,000, and then I further find a sum of £210,000 set down for bonus, or nearly one-third of the wages. I would like to know exactly what is going to be the cost of these houses to the Office of Works and I say again that it would be far better if the Office of Works did not interfere while there is such a shortage of men, but allow the schemes which are going on to proceed until they get nearer completion.
    Sir A. MOND: We have now been dealing with this matter for a considerable time and I imagine it would convenience the members of the Committee if I replied to some of the many points which have been raised. I would like to assure the hon. Member who spoke last that I was perfectly correct when I said that the Office of Works never at any time had anything whatever to do with Slough. I was astonished to hear him make the allegation, so well acquainted am I with all the large building operations carried out by this Department during the period of the War and so well aware am I that Slough did not form a part of them. We never had anything to do with it and therefore, so far as the criticisms regarding Slough are concerned, my withers are unwrung. I am not going to deal with the general question of the Office of Works undertaking the building of houses however. That is a question which has been settled by this House a long time ago and it would be entirely out of order for me to re-open it to-day. I would like to refer to a misunderstanding which has arisen—very naturally—and which has been made a great deal of by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Hull (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy), and also by the hon. Member for Monmouth (Mr. Charles Edwards). That is in regard to the lower rate of salaries. I can quite understand hon. Members being surprised and even indignant to find a girl employed at 22s. per week, but if hon. Members reflected they should have realised that there must be some explanation of this low figure. The explanation is a very simple one and it is that the war bonus is excluded from these figures. In the case of the coal porter referred to, the war bonus is 45s. 10d. per week.
    Mr. CHARLES EDWARDS: More than the salary.
    Sir A. MOND: If you add that to the 27s. a week the total is £3 12s. 10d. The charwoman is paid 15s. 6d. a week, but there is a bonus of 41s. Id., which brings the total up to £2 16s. 7d. The typists' War bonus is also added to the salary returned here, and that explains these figures. It is obvious that no person would work at the figures in the Estimates when they can secure better wages elsewhere. But I think, with the bonus added, the figures are approximately similar to those which obtain in the open market.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Does the Government by these figures mean that they expect one day to be paying coal porters 27s. and typists 22s. when the cost of living goes down?
    Sir A. MOND: As a matter of fact, I do not think the question of the consolidation of the War bonus and the basic salary has ever yet been finally taken in hand by the Treasury. I think the Government is to-day in a position similar to that of many private firms in regard to this. I do not suppose that anyone anticipates that wages will ever come down again to the basis which existed before the War, but as to what extent they will come down, or as to what will be the standard ised figure, it is difficult to say at the moment. The Government, like private employers, would naturally prefer arriving at a stabilised figure, but in order to do that we must first see the course which will be taken over a very considerable further period in regard to the cost of living and the general industrial position. I was asked something about the architect stationed at Constantinople, and I might point out the works which it is necessary the Department should look after in such places as Bucharest, Sofia, Athens, and also the Consulates in the Balkans and Government buildings in the 'Balkans generally. There are also cemeteries, one of which remains from the Crimean War, and one at the Dardanelles. It is always a difficult question to decide how far it is better to have an architect who knows your own methods and requirements than to have some person possibly quite unacquainted with these requirements. Personally, I think it is better that we should have our own architect there.
    6.0 P.M.
    Ancient monuments, about which the hon. Member asked, are an important

    1361
    part of the work of the Department. A large and continually growing number of ancient monuments are being handed over to the Crown by owners who, while not in a position to keep them up themselves, naturally do not wish them to fall into ruin. In the course of my tenure of office a large number of important national monuments, like Melrose, Stonehenge, and Wyburn Abbey, have been transferred under the Ancient Monuments Act to the Department. The number of inspectors is not at all excessive, considering the responsible nature of the work. The expenditure is borne on the Vote of the Office of Works. Of course, we have had to cut it down, like most expenditure, to the lowest point compatible with the buildings being kept from absolute destruction. The inspectors supervise the buildings and all the work in connection with them, and they have the further duty of inspecting buildings scheduled under the Ancient Monuments Act which belong, not to the State, but to private owners, who are not permitted under the Act to make alterations or repairs without referring the matter back to the Ancient Monuments Board for expert advice.
    Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHYDoes Westminster Abbey come under that?
    Sir A. MOND: No, that is an ecclesiastical building. Reference has been made to commandeered buildings which are being restored. The restoration of such buildings may take place in one of two ways. The procedure is that a bill of dilapidations is sent in, and the Office of Works surveyor examines it and endeavours to the best of his ability to cut it down. If agreement is not arrived at, the matter goes to the Defence of the Realm Losses Commission, and then the owner can either restore the building himself or he may ask the Department to do so, and they may undertake it if they consider that to be the cheaper course. If the owner prefers to take the sum allotted to him, he may, perhaps, improve and increase the premises, and, particularly if he is doing up a hotel, bring them up to date. In that case, some of the money may come out of Government funds and some out of the pocket of the owner himself. With regard to war bonuses, a good deal of discussion has
    1362
    taken place on war bonuses in general, and on the Civil Service war bonus, but that is not really a question with which I can deal, as the question of war bonuses, and, in fact, the whole question of salaries in the Civil Service, is regulated by the Treasury for the whole of the service. No Minister or Department has any discretion in the matter; they simply have to carry out the Treasury regulations.
    Sir H. CRAIK: I quite agree that it is not fair to ask the right hon. Gentleman to deal with war bonuses, but I am afraid that the only way in which we can get information about them is on the particular portion of a Vote which relates to particular salaries. I would much rather raise it as a general question.
    Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: Does that apply to assimilation as well as to bonus?
    Sir A. MOND: Yes, it applies to assimilation in the way that it applies to the whole scale of salaries. The war bonus does go up and down, and, as it has been arranged, it has a curious effect. The war bonus in the Civil Service has always been postponed, and, instead of people getting the bonus at the time when the cost of living was high, they have, in reality, got it about six months later, so that you now have the curious phenomenon, which has rather astonished some hon. Members, that, although the cost of living is going down, the war bonus is still there and not likely to diminish. Hon. Members must, however, in fairness remember that the war bonus is for the purpose of making good the high cost of living during a time when the Civil Service had no war bonus, whereas in private life people in similar positions had their war bonus at the time.
    Sir H. CRAIK: No.
    Sir A. MOND: I beg my right hon. Friend's pardon. I do not know of any office or any important firm or even unimportant firm in this country that has not given a war bonus to their managers, clerks, and other members of their staff during the War; and I know that that has been the practice, not only in regard to that class of staff, but in regard to workmen as well. As a result, we have systems in our most important industries,

    1363
    such as the railways, in which the wages fluctuate according to the cost of living, and the war bonus is added.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Many of us are not in that fortunate position.
    Sir A. MOND: I can only speak of firms that I know, and I do not know a single firm of any repute which has not given a war bonus to its clerks and managers.
    Earl WINTERTON: Is not the difference between the right hon. Gentleman (Sir H. Craik) and the Minister this, that what the Minister means is that everyone in employment has a bonus, and that it is those who have not got employment who have suffered? Is not that the whole point?
    Mr. E. HARMSWORTH: They get a bonus, it is true, but they get, besides the bonus, a very large increase. The point at issue is not that they get a bonus only. In the case of the Secretary, for instance, he gets an increase of £700 in salary, and on the top of that he also has a very large war bonus.
    Sir A. MOND: That is a question of the salary of a higher officer. As hon. Members know, the question of the salaries of higher officers in the Civil Service was the subject of an inquiry by a Committee over which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith) presided. That Committee, which investigated the whole question at very great length, was an independent Committee presided over by an ex-Prime Minister, who has had a life-long experience in the administration of the country and has served as Chancellor of the Exchequer. They deliberately came to the conclusion, and I think rightly, that the higher officials of the Civil Service were under-paid. One knows, indeed, that in consequence quite a considerable number of very able civil servants left the service and went into the City, where they were able to make much greater salaries—considerably more even than the increased salaries which are now offered. Speaking with some considerable experience of business matters, I must say it seems to me an extraordinary idea that, in a huge Department of State, which is responsible for an expenditure of £11,000,000, £2,220 a year should be con-
    1364
    sidered too large a salary for a man who is really the managing director of a business of that character. If the hon. Member (Mr. Harmsworth) will go to any of the large journalistic offices with which his family is concerned, and ask what is the relation of salaries to turnover, I think he will find that that would not be considered a large, salary for a person having such great responsibility. Government work has immensely increased, and, for good or for evil, we cannot get away from the fact that the responsibility of permanent officials is now very much greater, as is also the amount of work that they have to get through. In the Office of Works, the work is at least 200 per cent, more than it was before the War. If you want to get men to do this work who are worth anything—of course you can always find some kind of man who will fill any job at any price, but, if you want men of any worth, it will pay you to pay sufficiently high salaries to keep good men in the service and to attract good men to it. When I was in America an American magnate said to me, "I am looking for two men, one at a salary of £10,000 and another at a salary of £20,000, and I cannot find them. I can find hundreds of men at £5,000 a year, but they are no good to me."
    Major Sir BERTRAM FALLE: Which did you take?
    Sir A. MOND: I was not under the necessity of taking either; I am merely using that as an illustration. This point has been before the House more than once. If you have in the Service officials who are not worth a reasonable salary for the work they have to do, you will in the long run have a very second-rate staff in your Government offices, and you will have real losses occurring, not merely in money, but in the prestige of Government Departments.
    Sir P. PILDITCH: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman where the bonuses to which he is referring are shown? Are they included in these figures, or, if not, where are they shown?
    Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: The bonus is not actually included in the figures on page 165 of the Estimates; the bonus must be added.
    Sir A. MOND: Yes, the bonus must be added.
    Sir H. CRAIK: The bonus is explained on page 5 of the Estimates. It is not explained under each Vote, but we are always referred back to page 5. You do not add the bonus in giving the salaries on page 165. In the case, for instance, of the Permanent Secretary's salary, the bonus, although it is paid, is not added. It ought to be printed there, so that we may see clearly how it stands.
    Sir A. MOND: I was hoping that I had made it clear that the bonus is not calculated with the salaries, but is only shown in a lump sum. The bonus is shown on page 169 as a lump sum of £210,000. An hon. Member at the beginning of the Debate asked a question as to the policy of the Department, and was good enough to pay a high tribute to what had been done by the Department during the War. Like many people, however, he appears to have come to the conclusion that people who did very fine work during the War in connection with the erection of buildings, and other work of that kind, are, now that the War is over, incapable of again doing anything useful for the State. I cannot follow that argument. These people were capable of doing good work for the State in war time, and surely it is reasonable to employ their services for the State in peace time. My own view is that there is nothing more wasteful than to have a number of Government Departments carrying on building separately. It is a much more businesslike thing to concentrate your building on one Department and have it adequately staffed and adequately worked. It cannot be the best economy to carry out four building Departments instead of one, and that is the view the Treasury took with regard to buildings for the Air Board.
    Sir P. PILDITCH: I do not think it was ever contemplated that there should be four different Government Building Departments. I understood the Cabinet order to be that the arrangement which has subsisted up to the present, that the Admiralty, War Office and Air Force buildings should be erected by private enterprise, should be maintained.
    Sir A. MOND: The hon. Member is well aware that the War Office always had a Building Department to build barracks and all kinds of things all over the country.
    Sir P. PILDITCH: On a small scale.
    Sir A. MOND: It does not matter if the scale is small. The question is whether it is wasteful. I think the hon. Gentleman rather confuses two things. A building Department, with the direct employment of an architect, is different from building by private contractors. Someone has to issue tenders and someone has to supervise and to measure up. Let me take the case of the building the Office of Works is housed in now. Like all the other great Government buildings, it was designed by a private architect, and it was carried out by a contractor, but it was carried out under the control of the management of the Office of Works as a building Department, and the War Office in exactly the same way It does not follow that because the Office is a building Department it employs the architectural talent it possesses. It may be better to get an outside architect, but someone has to look after the outside architect and pay him his money, and someone has to look after the contractor and his accounts, and that is the real function of the Office of Works. Whether it likes to employ its own architectural staff or not must be a matter for the First Commissioner to make up his mind on. The building at Acton is very important from the point of view of office accommodation. The problem was to put up the cheapest form of office accommodation that could be devised, of which the Department had a great deal of experience during the War. It makes no pretence of being a great public building, but the result, from what I was told before I left the Department, will be very satisfactory. That is one solution of the problem the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy) so vehemently spoke about. He accused me of not trying to get people to leave the centre of the town for the salubrious suburbs when I was First Commissioner of Works. I can assure him I spent days, weeks and months in trying to induce people to do so. I moved people from the National Gallery to the Alexandra Palace. I moved them from the British Museum to Earl's Court. I had a terrible struggle with gentlemen who naturally very much disliked leaving the comfortable club area of London in order to go out into the wilderness. It is a very unfair accusation to bring

    1367
    against me or my administration, when I have battled for three years, day and night, sometimes successfully and sometimes unsuccessfully, that I did nothing in this direction. I did all that was humanly possible. Acton was designed to accommodate a very large number of people who are now partly housed in Regent's Park and partly in St. James's Park. It is a very large scheme, and it has taken a long time to get going on account of the shortage of material and of labour. Part of it will come into operation in a few months. The rest, I hope, will be completed towards the end of the year. I only hope my successors will see that they get people to go there. But moving the Hindenburg line is a relatively easy task compared with inducing people to go where they do not want to go. I am glad to say a Committee is now sitting considering the question who is to be moved to Acton. I am in very full sympathy with the removal of the temporary buildings. I made the greatest act of self-sacrifice during the War that almost anyone was called upon to make in consenting to the erection of a hideous building outside my own office and my own window, which I have had to look at ever since.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Give them no reasons. Turn them out.
    Sir A. MOND: I am glad to say my functions in that capacity have now ceased. I hope that when this comes along it will ease the situation and that a system will be begun by which the parks will be restored, and my successor will obtain the applause of this House and a grateful nation when it returns the beautiful parks which it has been the unfortunate lot of my administration to disfigure.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I want to raise the question of salaries. That is a Treasury matter, and the Financial Secretary to the Treasury is not here. Ought we not to have him here?
    Sir A. MOND: I should like to say a few words on the question of the staff of the Office generally. Naturally, the increase has been very considerable. The staff, of course, depends upon the work, and the work of the Office depends very much on policy outside the Department. The Department is the maid-of-
    1368
    all-work, and has to take on all kinds of problems which are handed over to it. For instance, we had to take over about 80,000 houses which were erected, or were in course of erection, by the Ministry of Munitions during the War for housing mution workers. Branches had to be started for managing and letting the houses or disposing of them. No Department desires to manage cottage property about the country.
    Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTT: Under what section is that?
    Sir A. MOND: Sub-head A: Salaries and Wages. An increase of £6,000 had to be incurred in order to take over and manage the business, of course, with the intention at the earliest opportunity of disposing of the property. The Government have no wish to go on owning cottage property. But there it was. Someone had to take it over, and the Office of Works was looked on as the most suitable Department, and they have had to take it over and entirely re-organise it. It is under the charge of a very competent man, and they are handling it as well as they can. That is a typical example of new duties. A great deal of additional work has been thrown on the Office of Works by the Pensions Ministry. Hospitals had to be equipped and work of all kinds in connection with these hospitals had to be carried out. The same with the Ministry of Labour. All the work of providing tools and apparatus to enable the men to work has fallen on the Office of Works. These are only symptomatic. The provision of Labour Exchanges, the building of Labour Exchanges, the hiring of premises for Labour Exchanges was all carried out by the Office of Works, which, from being what it was originally, a quiet family party to maintain a few royal palaces, has become a very large Department, spending about £12,000,000 a year and carrying out a very large amount of responsible duties which cannot be carried out by the same number of people who carried them out in 1913–14. The only fair thing to ask is, are the duties being carried out proportionately, at the same rate and not more expensively? The amount of overhead charges of the Department is actually less. That is rather a good achievement. It is 5–5 instead of 6 per cent. It may be argued that a lot of the work ought not

    1369
    to be done, but that is quite a different question, which does not relate to the Office of Works, but relates really to the Votes of the different Departments. The question whether we ought to have Labour Exchanges or not, whether we ought to have post offices or not, whether we ought to have hospitals for pensioners, or whether we ought to have training factories, arise on the Votes of those Departments. The Office of Works as a Department is not consulted on them. It has to make the best of them. I contend that in view of the amount of work done the staff is not unreasonable.
    One hon. Member could not understand why when we are carrying out building schemes we require architects to look after them. The Office of Works were called in because the efforts of the local authorities had broken down. If the local authorities had had sufficient competent people they could very well have carried out the schemes themselves, but because they could not get on we had to come in and take over the work. The first thing that happened was that we had to send architects to the local authorities to study schemes, to make out schemes, to prepare the lay-out, and to do all the work for which architects are required. That cannot be done without a staff, and I think, having regard to the amount of work undertaken all over the country, the staff is not excessive.
    One hon. Member asked for some undertaking to be given that this work was not to be indefinitely extended. I can no longer speak as head of the Office of Works; I have to speak on housing as Minister of Health. I am certain that it is not the intention to extend this policy, and it never was the intention. It was done because of a kind of S.O.S., which produced very useful results. The Office of Works have given very definite instructions for the getting of lump-sum contracts for the work as far as possible, and I am glad to say that very much more reasonable lump-sum contracts are now beginning to come in. The position has changed very much in the last six months, and when tenders are really meant to be tenders on a reasonable basis, I have no doubt the Office of Works will go back to the performance of its usual departmental work. It is impossible to expect anyone to define exactly the functions of a Department, but I can give an undertaking that these temporary schemes are not
    1370
    going to form part of the permanent undertaking of the Office of Works. I agree in the main with what has been said, and I do not think that it is advisable that any Government Department should be responsible for the only building schemes in the country. You cannot nationalise building, and I do not think anybody would attempt to do so. There must be a happy medium, and I hope that the happy medium which has been observed between the official architects and the contractors will be continued in future, and that the harmonious relations which have existed between the technical staff at the Office of Works and the profession outside, which are very essential and important, will go on unimpaired.
    An hon. Member asked me a question about monuments. This is a very difficult problem. It raises the question of art in our everyday life. It is very fortunate that my successor in office (the Earl of Crawford) is one of the most qualified people in the country to speak with regard to art, and especially in matters of sculptural art, and I have no doubt that he will give a great deal of time and attention to questions relating to monuments which are brought before him. It is not an easy position. The jurisdiction over Crown property is very absolute, but the jurisdiction over other property is not so easy to enforce. When I was at the Office of Works I did manage to establish a Sites Committee to assist me on the question of sites. This Committee included eminent architects, who were of assistance to me in discussing designs as well as sites. This whole problem is not an easy one. I hope that we shall proceed on very different lines in the future and follow the American model, where at Washington they appoint official Committees of Fine Arts, which include the heads of artistic institutions in the country, to advise the Government on matters of art. The question of art is largely one of controversy. What is beautiful and what is not is a matter of personal taste. Experts have different opinions on it. It is very difficult to get people to agree on what is beautiful and what is not beautiful when it is so much a matter of individual taste. I hope that my suggestion, or something of the kind, will be adopted and that there will be established a Commission of Fine Arts which may provide a solution in regard to these matters of artistic taste.

    1371
    My successor is well qualified to deal with these matters. If he does not admire the last production of the last school of the satirists or cataclysts he will be dubbed "old-fashioned"; if, on the other hand, he is not enthusiastic about some reproduction of bad early Victorian art he will be considered "revolutionary." It is difficult to steer between the Scylla of ancient tradition and the Charybdis of modern art. I have no doubt that his tact will enable him to perform that delicate function with all success.
    I have endeavoured to reply to a large number of points raised in the Debate, and I hope satisfactorily. One point was raised with regard to typists. The figures in regard to typists show a nominal rather than an actual increase. The increase is due to the fact that a large number of temporary typists whose salaries were paid last year out of a lump sum for temporary clerical staff has now come on to the Established List. Therefore, the increase over last year is more nominal than actual. Unexplained the increase seems rather staggering. I hope that the Committee will now agree to let us have the Vote.
    Sir F. BANBURY: The Committee is very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for the very exhaustive way in which he has replied to the criticisms which have been made or which were not made, but might have been made if other hon. Members had spoken before the right hon. Gentleman. Some suspicious Members might have thought that the right hon. Gentleman was obstructing his own Vote, but we know that that is quite an impossible thing for him. Before I come to the question of salaries I should like to say a few words upon the question of architects. I was chairman of the Select Committee on National Expenditure which went very exhaustively into this question as to whether it was more economical to employ at the Office of Works a considerable number of permanent architects or to go to private architects. I think the majority of the Members were of the opinion that it would be better if private architects were employed. However, we did not report on that; we came to the conclusion that the system pursued by the Office of Works was the best one and the more economical in the long run, although we
    1372
    were not prejudiced in favour of the system.
    The right hon. Gentleman in answering criticisms in regard to the increasing of the salary of the Secretary of the Department from £1,500 last year to £2,200 this year, together with a bonus of £750, said that the salaries were matters for the Treasury and that he was not responsible. I believe that is correct, but, as was pointed out by my right hon. Friend (Sir H. Craik), this is one of the few opportunities that we have for raising these questions, and perhaps the Financial Secretary to the Treasury will be able to report what I am almost inclined to think is the unanimous opinion of the House that these higher salaries should not be raised in the way they have been raised. The salary of the Secretary has been raised from £1,500 to £3,000 this year. I am not certain whether he had a bonus last year, but assuming that he did not have the bonus his salary has been doubled. To double a salary of £l,500 a year at the present time is a very great mistake. The right hon. Gentleman said that unless we give high salaries we shall lose these officials, who will go into the City. I have had some experience of the City, and I say that that is a delusion. There may be a few—I believe there have been one or two—eminent civil servants who have been taken into the City and put upon boards of directors. What they get upon those boards I do not know, but my experience of the City is that it is a very difficult thing for the vast majority of people to make £1,500.
    The idea that all that you have to do is to take an office in the City, hang your hat up, and make a large fortune, is quite erroneous. There are very few large com panies or firms in the City who would take people at anything like a salary of £2,000 or £3,000 a year. That being so, we can dismiss from our minds the idea that we are going to lose these Civil servants if we do not give them these very high salaries. It must be borne in mind that in the City you are subject to very varying conditions. A man may make a considerable sum of money, but, on the other hand, he may lose a great deal of money. Even if you are fortunate enough to be taken into one of the large firms or companies, and paid a large salary, if the firm has a bad time you are likely to lose your posi-

    1373
    tion, whereas in the Civil Service, unless you commit a very flagrant dereliction of duty, you have a permanent position, and a pension at the end of it, to say nothing of the social status. All that is very different in the City. They do not have their lives cast in the pleasant paths which as a rule those have who happen to be officials. Then we may dismiss that idea from our minds.
    Then as to large business firms having raised the salaries of their high officials. You cannot say for certain what has been done, because it is different in so many cases. It may have occurred in some cases, but it certainly has not occurred in others. I do not know of any instance of a man in receipt of a salary of £2,000 a year who has had his salary doubled. There are very few instances I know—I am not sure of the North Eastern Rail-way, but we will leave that out—where that has occurred. But I would have said it is much more likely that a man in receipt of £2,000 a year may have had a rise of, say, £500 between 1914 and now, but not between 1920 and now. I believe it to be absolutely necessary for the prosperity of the country that the wages of the working classes should come down. I do not believe that that can be done honestly or justly unless those people who are in receipt of higher salaries set the example and show that they are willing to participate in the sacrifice which they are going to ask the working classes to accept. Therefore it is very unfortunate just at this moment that these large increases should be made, and I ask the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, as I understand that they are the ultimate tribunal in these matters, to consider this point.
    Mr. INSKIP: There are one or two points on which I should like information. One is with regard to the maintenance and inspection of ancient monuments. The sum in the Estimates, about £2,000, is comparatively small, but I would like to know exactly what the policy of the right hon. Gentleman is with regard to these matters, because this is an item, of which I think a great many can be found in the Estimate, which should be rigorously ruled out. I have a horror of finding in these Estimates the germs of future expenditure, and though £2,000 may be a small sum it may be the basis of what will mount
    1374
    up to be considerable expenditure in years to come. I think that we lately had a number of impecunious owners of ruined castles on the borders anxious that a Government Department should take over these castles. There are three inspectors going about the country. Suppose they inspect and find that some outlay is necessary in order to preserve the monuments in a decent state of, shall I say, decay, to have all the appearance of an interesting relic of a bygone age; is the Office of Works going to put up money necessary to preserve these monuments? What exactly do these inspectors do? I cannot see that it is essential in these days that they should be employed, I was recently handed a letter to the chairman of what is called an advisory committee in the West of England in connection with ecclesiastical monuments, churches, and other buildings. It was addressed from the Office of Works, and asked the name of the committee, what were its duties, of what monuments or churches it took charge, and generally it asked a great deal of information which concerned the Bishop and Chancellor of the diocese and the advisory committee, but had nothing on earth to do with the Office of Works. I think that it has been suggested that the Office of Works should take over responsibility for the upkeep of some churches, and I think that the authorities of the Church of England are satisfied that there is no necessity for the Office of Works, because these buildings are being looked after properly. Then what is the necessity for this inquisitive letter?
    I am afraid that this expenditure will develop into a much larger expenditure. I take the view, which has already been put "forward, that it would be much better that such matters should be left to private enterprise, and if the country is not sufficiently interested in its ancient monuments, the country should not be expected to pay for a couple of inspectors or people engaged in preserving these monuments. I would like to see these items in these days of necessity struck out and an appeal made by the appropriate societies or individuals interested for the money that is required. The right hon. Gentleman has referred to the fact that the Office of Works is responsible at present for something like £ll,000,000. So far as I can estimate, there is a sum of something like £600,000,

    1375
    expenditure for the staff which is engaged in carrying out this outlay of £11,000,000. The staff appears to have risen from 674 to 1,800. It may be said that this is necessary in consequence of very much extended duties which the Office of Works has taken upon itself. If that increase goes on from year to year, the Office of Works, which the right hon. Gentleman described at one time as being a happy quiet family party, which is now swollen into a very large Department, may, in the course of a few years, become an octopus which will lay its tentacles on every activity of public life from one-end of the United Kingdom to another. It is the old fallacy of the heap over again; some limit should be put. £600,000 strikes me as an enormous expenditure for a staff to carry out work which costs £11,000,000. I should like to see some definite line drawn in these Government Departments in order that it may be made plain that they are not going to swell and expand through the beneficent desires of the right hon. Gentleman. Anxious as the Office may be to preserve and improve the amenities of Government Departments and preserve ancient monuments, it should not be permitted to swell its outlay on the staff year after year.
    I have always thought that one of the great objections to nationalisation is that, time being limited, there being but 24 hours in the day and 365 days in the year, it is not possible for this House to discuss the whole of the activities of the Government Departments, if Government Departments extend in the direction and at the pace at which they are extending. It may be very desirable that the Office of Works should build houses, and act as a sort of agent for housing properties, inspect ancient monuments, and do a hundred and one things which it does. But life will not be long enough, our time here will not be long enough, properly to control these activities if the process goes on indefinitely. It is the same with a great many other Government Departments. It is said that the Department has taken over 8,000 houses from the Ministry of Munitions. If 8,000, why not 80,000 I suppose it will be used as an argument that as it has proved successful with this small amount of house property, its activities in this direction should be extended. Why are not these houses sold? This is an opportune moment.
    1376
    Probably they could be sold now at a very suitable price. How long is the Office of Works going to practise this method of dealing with the housing problem? There will be items for the cost of collection of rents, and no doubt repairs. The work will require supervisors and architects. I do not like to see this item, because it is the sort of thing which may become a great deal bigger, and which should be cut off at the earliest moment.
    I do not want to say anything about the cost of building houses, because it is very desirable that a house should be built, but more ought to be done by local effort. More should be left to local authorities in connection even with the houses built by the Office of Works. We find a superintendent architect, two assistant architects, travelling agents, measuring surveyors, and a whole hierarchy of officials who travel round the country while the great bulk of the work could be done by the local authorities, and people acting in an honorary capacity. Everything done in a Government office has to be paid for. A great many of the expenses are eventually to be recovered, we are told, from the local authorities. The local authorities object to having to pay expenditure which they cannot control. If this work were done locally I am satisfied that a portion of it would be done by local gentlemen who are interested in these matters, and would be done without expense to the State or the local authorities. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, in connection with any houses which he takes upon himself to build in future, will do everything he can to encourage the delegation of duties of this kind to local authorities who are so eminently capable of managing their own affairs, and are much more likely to become interested in them if they are encouraged to manage their own local affairs.
    7.0 P.M.
    I want to refer to a question which perhaps does not wholly concern the Office of Works. The right hon. Gentleman said something about the necessity for finding premises for pensions officials. I do not know whether the Office of Works chooses the buildings or whether the Pensions Department does so. I rather suppose, from what he said, that the Office of Works chooses them. I deplore one particular choice which they have

    1377
    made, if that is so, in my own city of Bristol, which has always been ill-equipped with hotels. The Office of Works has selected a large hotel in one of the most beautiful situations in the whole city of Bristol, overlooking the famous Avon Valley and the Suspension Bridge, an hotel to which visitors to Clifton and Bristol resort. They have taken that enormous building in this magnificent position for the purpose of the officials of the Pensions Department. It is a considerable distance from the railway station, people can get up and down by using trams and omnibuses, but it deprives Bristol and Clifton of the only hotel really which there is to accommodate visitors except those right in the very business heart of the ancient business city. That is a deplorable choice, if the Office of Works were responsible for it, as I understand they were. I hardly like to encourage them to go out of it, because the innumerable young women and young men whom I see escaping from the building at five o'clock punctually every day would have to be accommodated in another building.
    I hope that the Office of Works will not make a choice of that character in future. Indeed, I trust the time may come when they will not have to choose buildings in London or elsewhere to house Departments, which will then decrease in size and number rather than increase. I hope the Office of Works will return to that happy condition, to which we look back, when it was quite a family party. I am sure the country will find itself as happy and as prosperous and as well able to do without this very large Government Department as it was in the past. We are all apt to think we are indispensable and that we fulfil a function which nobody else can fulfil, and which it is difficult to think that someone did not perform in the past before we came on the scene. If, however, the Office of Works will have a little more faith in the capacity of the citizen to carry on his own business we shall be encouraged to revert to that time when it was a happy family party.
    Mr. E. HARMSWORTH: I should like to bring the discussion back to the real point, in order that the Financial Secretary to the Treasury may reply to the various points concerning salaries which have been put to him. The point at issue is the salary of the Secretary to the Office of Works. In the higher
    1378
    salaries, where they get a war bonus of from £500 to £750, I think it will be practically a permanent war bonus. It will be many years before the cost of living goes back to the position in which it was in 1914. Until it goes back to a point very near that, the larger war bonuses will not decrease. The lesser ones, for the smaller civil servants with very small salaries will do so, but, so far as I can see, from a calculation, the larger ones will not. Therefore these bonuses will practically be a permanent thing. If the only thing was an increase on these war bonuses, I would have no criticism. It is obvious that in the present cost of living there must be an increase of some sort on these salaries, but what does incense me is that, besides the war bonus, which, by itself, is perfectly justifiable, there is also, just taking this one case, a very large increase of £700. Whether it is caused through assimilation or some other arrangement in the Civil Service, I do not know. In this case, the salary for the Secretary to the Office of Works rises from £1,500 to £2,200, plus the war bonus, which is not shown here. One has to find out by calculation what it is. Therefore, as the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury) pointed out, this is really doubling the original salary of £1,500 for the Secretary. At a time like this, when we are in the midst of a crisis which intimately concerns the wages of an industry, and when it is quite obvious that all industries will have to reduce their wages, it seems a very bad example that a highly paid civil servant should have an increase of this amount. The strike we are undergoing will make the necessity for economy far greater than it even was before. The position in industry as regards money was bad enough before, but it is practically impossible to realise what it must be if we have, as it appears we shall have, this very bad strike, which, from the news we have at present, seems to be coming about at the end of the week. With this strike, which will cripple industry still further, we ought to be even more careful in regard to our expenditure. I have not calculated the exact amount that this in-crease for war bonus will come to, but it must be very large, and it has a larger influence than the mere expenditure of the amount. It has an influence on the

    1379
    Government and on the whole of the salaries outside the Government Nothing so infuriates the taxpayer in the country than to read in the newspapers that these highly-paid civil servants are getting enormous increases.
    I would urge the hon. Gentleman, when he replies, to consider this fact, because the Committee has really had no opportunity of discussing the matter. I admit that some blame was thrown on the right hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith), who presided over a Committee which recommended the increase, but I do not think the Government should take into consideration the report of every Committee. The Government really must look at the point from the view of the taxpayer. The Committee probably looked at it purely from the point of whether they earned the extra salary. Perhaps the officials did earn the extra salary: they may have earned £5,000 a year for the excellent work that they do— I am sure they do excellent work, and I do not criticise it for a moment—but when the Government are considering these increases to civil servants, or are considering only a scheme and not an increase, they ought to keep in mind the impoverished taxpayer, who is going to be far more impoverished after the strike. The first essential, if we are going to get back to the prosperity which existed before the War, is a reduction of taxation. Therefore it is imperative that all these increases, even though they may be small, must be pointed out to the Government so that they may reduce expenditure and enable taxation to be lowered.
    The right hon. Gentleman who introduced these Estimates contended that work made the Department. I might add that the Department very often makes the work. The more officials you have the more work you must have, and certainly they are more expensive in stationery and in other things they use. I would like to make one protest, and that is that there are two different Estimates presented to the House apart from other Departments. They are for Works and Public Buildings and for Stationery. In both cases the Estimates are presented to the House separately from the Departments which actually* use them and spend the money. That is to say, the stationery bills for the War Office or the Ministry of Health are not
    1380
    presented with their Estimates, but in one Estimate, so that you cannot tell which Ministry is being extravagant. You can merely say that the whole bill is extravagant; you cannot point to one Department and say that is spending more money than it should do. I hope if the hon. Gentleman replies, he will say whether it is not possible for the stationery bill to be included under the different Departments, so that we can trace the expenditure.
    The principal point of attack on these Estimates is the cost of the salaries of the higher civil servants. I would ask for a reply that will contain proper reasons, and not the ordinary reasons that the men are worth it and that they would get more in the City or elsewhere. The country cannot afford to pay this enormous increase, which has practically doubled this salary, at a time when such a wave in favour of lesser salaries and wages is sweeping through it.
    Mr. SUGDEN: I have listened to the whole of the speeches made on these Estimates. There are six points which I desire to bring to the notice of the Minister, and on which I wish a reply from him, as to how certain monies are estimated in regard to this Vote. The first point—and perhaps the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London will listen to what I have to say on this matter, because I can certainly join issue with him on what he said—is how does the cost of the technical and clerical staff of the First Commissioner of Works in respect to the building of houses compare with the technical and clerical staff which a private builder would employ in erecting those houses? I want to make this definite statement, that the cost of the technical and clerical staff which the First Commissioner of Works employs is at least 40 per cent, more than it would be if a private contractor did the work of building these houses. That is very serious and a matter of grave concern when we consider the state of the finances of the country and the heavy burden of taxation on the working people. We were told by the Office of Works, in the White Paper they issued a few weeks ago, that they had under construction 6,700 houses. They were good enough to give to us particulars of 3,048 of these houses, showing what they would cost, and details which enabled us to calculate what were

    1381
    the overhead charges in regard to the technical and clerical staffs. I have very carefully made a calculation which proves to me that it will work out at 3·75 per cent. of the cost, first upon the central office of London; but on the top of this we must include a certain proportion of overhead charges for the localities in different parts of England. I have tried, with the assistance of certain expert advisers, to make an average calculation on this heading. For the country as a whole the overhead charges, over and above that which would be required by a private contractor, are no less than 6·25 per cent. I give fair warning to the Government that those of us who come from heavily taxed areas will vote against this Estimate unless we are promised definitely that there will be a reduction in these overhead charges for technical and clerical staff. We, who have a knowledge of building, can do the work and find the staff to do it efficiently, and we can deliver the goods now. I suggest to the First Commissioner of Works that he should go very carefully through the whole of his staff and see how he can eliminate any unnecessary section of it in respect of the work he has undertaken. The technical and clerical staff dealing with housing must be materially reduced and must be made of such dimensions that it will not prove a greater burden upon the taxes of the country than if the same work was in the hands of private contractors, as it should be now. It might be suggested by the Minister that at present a saving is made by the employment of this staff in London. I suggest that over and above what is required for the execution of the work locally, there is an extra connecting link of technical and clerical staff between the local authority and the authority in London, which would not be required if retrogressive local authorities were compelled to accept their full responsibilities Secondly I presume that the civil servants who have been included in this Vote and who deal particularly with the housing question will be engaged temporarily. Are they to have the right of pension? If so, have the pensions been included in the cost of the overhead charges on these building schemes? These staffs must be temporary, unless the First Commissioner of Works intends to embark on further undertakings after the housing schemes are finished. Again, what system is there for the treatment of these ser-
    1382
    vants? All of us who have any understanding of this kind of professional labour know that we cannot obtain the greatest efficiency and the best results, either from men or women, unless there is a definite outlook and opportunity for promotion. As far as I can see this staff must have been obtained from the professional ranks outside. I cannot see how its members can have a chance of promotion or how they can escape a cul de sac.
    I notice that houses are being built in Wales, Yorkshire, Lancashire, the South of England, and all over the country. Those of us who have any knowledge of the architectural or surveying profession know that to handle bodies of men, whether they are brick-setters, or carpenters, or plumbers, or joiners, it is vital that the men of the territory in which the work is to be done should be guided and supervised by and must be chosen from the people who live in that locality. I want to know, for example, whether the men. dealing with housing in Wales have been chosen from Welsh localities. Have they full information as to the customs and trade methods in the building trades in the principality? I should like to be assured that those chosen for the task are really able to deal with the type of labour obtainable in different parts of the country. The memory of the public is very short. In this time of extreme pressure and competition ex-service men are very soon forgotten. In the staffs chosen by the Office of Works has a large and predominating proportion of the men been composed of ex-service men? I shall not be prepared to support this Vote unless I am assured that that is so. There is another point I wish particularly to emphasise. We who have studied the work of the Civil Service—I should be remiss in my duty did I not pay my tribute to the Civil Service in all its ramifications—know that in many cases after an announcement that a Department was to close, much lethargy has been displayed in the conclusion of the Department's work. Can we have a definite promise that there will be no lethargy in the work connected with the supply of houses? If I can have my six questions suitably answered I shall support the Minister, but I say definitely that economy must be practised as well as preached. We must have definite proof, first that this professional work

    1383
    of the Department is to be competitive with professional work utilised in private contracts; second, that the temporary civil servants shall have proper opportunities, but shall not have pension rights if they have been taken from the ranks of the professional class, and will return once again into ordinary private life; third, that there shall be adequate schemes for promotion, for it is only thus that you can get the highest efficiency; fourth, that the staffs shall be chosen from the localities in which they are to operate; fifth, that ex-service men shall be chosen rather than any other type; and sixth, that on the conclusion of the housing scheme these men shall go back into private practice and work, and shall not become a permanent incubus upon the State.
    Mr. D. HERBERT: I trust that the late occupant of the office of First Commissioner is not trembling too much in his shoes because of the threats as to the reduction of his salary. The hon. and learned Member for Bristol (Mr. Inskip) spoke of the possibility of honorary work in connection particularly with the Department of Ancient Monuments. As an occasional student of the correspondence in the evening newspapers, it occurs to me that that Department might find a certain number of gentlemen of education and great knowledge and experience in regard to antiquities who presumably have sufficient private means to live in comfort and sufficient leisure to give up a great deal of it to the writing of letters to the newspapers, particularly on the subject of tombstones and other monuments of more or less antiquity. I do suggest that that is a Department in which a very great deal of use might be made of gentlemen who would be not only ready, but pleased, to give their services in connection with work which would be of definite interest to them, and in regard to which it is quite possible, if we were careful to avoid eccentrics, we might have very valuable assistance, assistance far more valuable than that which is paid for by the comparatively low salaries which, in these days, the Government feel bound to give to the Inspectors of Ancient Monuments.
    To pass from suggestion to inquiry, I would like some information in regard to the work of the rebuilding of Regent-street. There have been, I believe, a number of questions asked in the House from
    1384
    time to time in regard to that. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has dealt with it, but the rebuilding of Regent-street is a thing of much interest to Londoners and to others who care for London very much indeed. It is also of interest to the business world in London, in regard to the terms which are being made by the Office of Works with their lessees. It would be interesting to know whether and to what extent the Office of Works has found any difficulty in arranging building agreements at the prices offered. The Office of Works must necessarily obtain the best prices it can get, but my experience is that in some cases firms of large standing who have been in Regent-street for a great number of years, and have always contemplated a new building agreement there, have felt that the expense was one which they could not undertake. I hope it may not be the case that the Office of Works, by maintaining the very large rents, in some cases are perhaps losing tenants and in other cases are finding difficulty in obtaining tenants or lessees who will undertake the building agreements; because it would surely be bad business for the Office of Works if they got a considerable part of Regent-street rebuilt and then found it practically impossible to obtain building agreements for the other portion of the street, or if they had to enter into those building agreements on much less profitable terms than those which were first granted.
    On turning to the Estimates I notice there is an item "Appropriations-in-Aid," but I do not then find a reference, which I rather expected to discover, to the fees which are charged by the Office of Works, or some of the officials, in connection with work done in relation to Crown property. One could not do otherwise than imagine that there are very considerable sums received by the Office of Works in that way, and I would like to hear what the amount is and where it can be found in the Estimates. There has been a great deal of discussion about architects. I question whether the Office of Works is pursuing the most economical course. I am not going over the ground touched upon by previous speakers, but I think I am right in saying that certain architects and surveyors who are employed by the Office of Works, and are presumably well paid for what they do, are not merely

    1385
    allowed to do other work, but because of the work which they do for the Office of Works, and with the full permission of that Office, are put into such a position that business drops into their mouths like ripe plums, and they get business from other quarters and perhaps from persons entering into building agreements with the Office of Works which brings them in very large fees indeed.
    Sir A. MOND: Is the hon. Gentleman referring to the members of the staff on salary in the Office of Works?
    Mr. HERBERT: No. I was referring to architects or surveyors in private practice who are employed by the Office of Works. I am not making allegations against anybody, but what I say is that architects and surveyors and lawyers also, may do work through which, from other employers, they earn more money; and thus, by reason of the work which they are doing for the Office of Works, they are afforded an opportunity of making large profits in other directions. I do not think that it is unfair, particularly in these days, to take these things into consideration, and I hold that a Government Department, when it is fixing the remuneration of people it employs in that way, should bear these things in mind. How far I am right in suggesting that a great deal might be done in that way I do not know, but it is a matter which might be considered by the Department in the future with a view to reducing to some extent one item of public expenditure. I do not know whether it is permissible to discuss another matter on this Estimate, but I want to draw attention to the extension of the sphere of action of the Office of Works with regard to ancient monuments. From what has been said it would appear that the feeling of the House is against making the Department of the Office of Works a veritable octopus. But I venture to think that the very good work which is done by that Department in regard to the preservation of ancient monuments is hampered very much by the limitations as to the scope of action, and if that could be increased it would perhaps be able to pay attention to ancient monuments which are at present outside the purview of the Office, and the preservation of which is at least as important as some of those which do come within the scope of the Office at the present time.
    Dr. MURRAY: I wish to make some remarks about that branch of the Department which deals with ancient monuments. I do not agree with some of the criticisms made this afternoon. I say this branch of the Department has done most excellent work. I do not think the protection of ancient monuments should be left to voluntary effort, because some of the most ancient monuments, and some of the most interesting, are situated in very poor localities where there is no rich man who will take it upon himself to see that they are kept in proper repair and protected from the depredations of those who are so anxious to carry away relics of this kind. In my own constituency we have some very interesting monuments which show that we were in a state of civilisation when the rest of the country was in a condition of barbarism. But it is a poor locality, and therefore I suggest that this branch of the activities of the Office of Works should not be handed over to voluntary organisations, which might overlook monuments in poor parts of the land. I come next to the question of the rebuilding of Regent Street. I am not particularly acquainted with that subject, but I have some questions to ask with regard to the falling in of leases. I suggested on one occasion that the best way of dealing with this question was that laid down by the Prime Minister in his speech at Limehouse, and I urge that the principle the right hon. Gentleman then advocated should be applied to leases falling in at the present time, because, if they were so applied I do not think people would be as dissatisfied as they appear to be.
    I want particularly to draw attention to a comparatively small point. I have heard praise bestowed on the administration of the right hon. Gentleman who was lately at the head of the Office of Works. But there is one dark spot in that administration. It may be somewhat microscopic, but it has regard to the temporary buildings of the Ministry of Pensions at Cheltenham Terrace. The surroundings of these offices are really an eyesore to any person whose business takes him there. It is an important part of London, it is the part which has an artistic atmosphere, and I do think there should be some reasonable care exercised to prevent such an eyesore existing. In the ground occupied there and surrounded by

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    temporary buildings last summer the place was a howling wilderness. It is a piece of excellent land that might easily be used as allotments, but it was overgrown with the finest crop of thistles I ever saw in my life. The Minister of Pensions is a good Highlander, and it is a nice thing on the part of the Office of Works to pay a compliment to the right hon. Gentleman by having some thistles in connection with the Ministry of Pensions buildings, but you can get too much of a good thing, and really that ground was simply a forest of thistles, and I see evidence that we are going to have just as big a crop this year. Every outgoing tenant is supposed to leave the premises in a tidy way, and now I have brought this little blot to the attention of the right hon. Gentleman, I have no doubt he will drop a hint in the ear of his successor to employ one or two of the unemployed to turn up this ground and to sow something in it—potatoes, or cabbages, or something of that sort, or even flowers. I think the right hon. Gentleman might find much better use for the ground and yet cost the State hardly a penny.
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Lieut.-Commander Hilton Young): In view of the course that a certain part of the Debate has taken, the Committee will not unnaturally expect, and feel itself entitled, to have some effort at least at a reply from me upon those aspects of this question which relate, in particular, to salaries and bonuses. In the first place, these criticisms have centred, in particular, around the salary which appears on the Estimates for the principal Secretary of the Office of Works, and it is to that that I should like to direct my attention, but I should wish to attempt to remove an impression which I think may unfortunately be conveyed by the speech of the hon. Member for Thanet (Mr. E. Harmsworth), that what he has selected as this particular increase in the base line of salary is in the least typical of other cases in the rest of the service of the Department. That, of course, is not so. It is a particular case due to the special recommendations of a Committee presided over by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Paisley (Mr. Asquith), and to which I shall have to
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    make a very brief reference. The question was asked by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury) as to whether the bonus which appears, of course, on the Estimates this year in respect of that salary was also paid last year. The answer to that question is: Yes, the bonus was paid last year, and runs on on the normal basis.
    In general, on that matter of the bonus and the large salary, let me seek to remove what I have found on previous occasions to be a current misconception. It is a misconception one might almost say of a gross nature, and that is that the bonus paid is to the extent of 130 per cent. in all cases of the salary. Of course, the most careless inquirer is well acquainted with the circumstance that it is not so. The bonus starts on the lowest scale of salary, the salary which may be said to be near to the industrial level, on the basis of 130 per cent.; but, as Members are no doubt aware, though some outside perhaps may not be so well aware, that basis of 130 per cent. is very rapidly reduced to as low a level as 45 per cent. on the base line of salary in the case of the larger salaries. Here let me point out this circumstance in connection with the bonus scheme, because it sometimes escapes observation. It may be contended that taking the figure as a basis for calculation of 130 per cent. does actually amount to something in the nature of a term of the bargain, which is by no means bad from the point of view of the taxpayer and of the State, because that is not as high as the present actual figure of the retail index figure of the rise in the cost of living, and, as it has been no doubt observed by those who have carefully studied the Estimates from this aspect this year, it has been thought prudent to estimate the amount to be allowed for war bonus in the course of the year upon the figure of 140 per cent., so that in this circumstance of the fixing of the base figure for the calculation at 130 per cent. there is undoubtedly an advantage to the Exchequer, though it is equally not open to doubt that that advantage is set off by other circumstances on the other side in the working out of the scheme of bonuses which are not so advantageous in the interests of the Exchequer.
    Let me take the point which was taken earlier in the Debate, I believe, by the

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    right hon. Baronet the Member for the Scottish Universities (Sir H. Craik) and also by the hon. Member for Thanet. As I understand their argument, it is this, that owing to the circumstance that the maximum is fixed upon a bonus payable on these high salaries, the reduction in the bonus, which will come with the fall in the price of living, which we all hope and expect to see does not come into operation so as to reduce the total salary paid until there has been a very substantial reduction in that price of living. That contention, if I have rightly understood it, is no doubt, as I have put it, an accurate contention. It is so, that owing to the fixing of the maximum there will be no reduction in the total salary paid in the case of some of the higher salaries until there has been a very substantial fall in the cost of living. That is a part of the general balance of the bonus scheme, but I think it would be unfair to lay stress on that without looking at what it is that keeps the balance on the other side, which is the fixing of the maximum. The initial arrangement is the 45 per cent. on the total salary over the minimum, and then the weight is put in against the recipient of the salary of imposing the maximum in order to prevent him getting what would otherwise be the full benefit of the scheme, and thus preserving the interests of the Exchequer. That being so, obviously you have a counterpoise. You have the maximum, and in compensation for that he has this circumstance, that there must undoubtedly be a substantial fall in the cost of living, as shown by the index number of the Board of Trade, before there is an actual reduction in the amount of his globular salary for the year.
    8.0 P.M.
    Having attempted to remove, and I trust succeeded in removing, what I believe to be a very current misapprehension on that point, let me direct myself rather more closely to the argument which was strongly advanced by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London. There again let me make it very clear that in dealing with his contention we are dealing with a very limited area of the increase of salary. He has pointed to the single increase in the salary of the principal permanent official of the Office of Works. Let us be quite clear that this increase is not widespread over large classes of officials, but is confined to very few, to those, in fact, enumerated in the
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    very weighty report made upon this subject by the right hon. Member for Paisley. As regards that report, before coming to the arguments directed by the right hon. Gentleman, let me point out that, in addition to the right hon. Member for Paisley, upon that Committee there were sitting two other Members, and the only two other Members of the Committee, who are themselves gentlemen of the greatest experience, entitled to the utmost weight in all matters of business organisation in what might be called the spheres of the larger forms of business, so that in some of the considerations which I have to take it is not to be expected that a Committee so composed would not have been able to hold a just proportion between salaries paid in Government service and salaries paid in business circles. The argument of the right hon. Gentleman really amounts to this, as I appreciate it, that it is unnecessary to increase the salaries of these high permanent officials in order to keep them in touch with the general scale of what might be called the labour market in this particular sphere. As the Committee may well suppose, it is not a point of view which I am likely to advance with what might be described as any strong inclination to argue in favour of the increase of salaries which are a charge upon the Exchequer—very far indeed from it. The natural inclinations and predispositions which must affect anybody who stands in my place are very much the reverse, but it is to be admitted that, taking a wider outlook and viewing this matter in a reasonable light, the contentions advanced by the Committee presided over by the right hon. Member for Paisley are scarcely open to any successful answer. I think the right hon. Baronet very greatly underestimated the enormous increase there has been in the scale of remuneration in the City and in circles of what is commonly called big business. Although I am far less entitled to speak with any authority on the subject, I was nevertheless somewhat surprised to hear him describe the scale of remuneration which could be commanded by men of leading ability at the present time in the world of finance. Salaries very greatly in excess of the level of £2,000 a year that he mentioned are, I believe, very much more common now in those circles than some of his

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    observations would have led the Committee to suppose. Indeed, a scale of remuneration more approaching the £10,000 level than the £1,000 level is the sort of scale with which you have to reckon when you are dealing with men of leading ability. I do not mean to say that £10,000 salary is a common thing in the City; certainly it is not, but it is very much commoner than it was before the War. Whereas before the War, it may be said to have been a rarity, at the present time it is by no means a rarity. Let us look, then, at the position in which the State is as regards the men to fill the most responsible, the most arduous and the most important places in the Civil Service. I would like to direct particular attention to the circumstances that you are dealing here with what may very well be termed the prizes of the profession—those fruits, as it were, which are found at the top of the tree, only for those whose abilities enable them to climb to that summit. You have got to think of the frame of mind of the young man who is contemplating going into the Civil Service, who has confidence in himself, believes himself to be the sort of man that possibly may not unfairly hope to attain a station in his profession. What he will naturally think about is what is the best he can hope to gain by way of reward in the service which he contemplates.
    It is a very just argument that, in order to be able to tempt into this service, or any other, the very finest brains, you must give some special attention to the particular prizes to be gained at the head of a profession. Of course, it does not at all follow that you ought not to maintain a very careful balance between the degree of reward which you hold out to those seeking entry into this particular service and any other service. Anybody who will regard the groups on which the recommendations are based, will find that that is exactly what has been most carefully considered by the right hon. Gentleman and his extremely authoritative colleagues upon that Committee. It will be found that the principle reason on which they base their recommendations for these advances is the comparison between the rewards at the head of the Civil Service, and these three callings—the commercial and professional worker, the fighting services,
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    and the remuneration for technical officers. The conclusion to which I believe any impartial observer must come is that, even although his point of view is necessarily that of approaching any increase in salaries—I will not say in a hostile spirit, but in a spirit of the most vigilant criticism—yet here so strong a case does exist for the actual increases in question that there is no possibility, in the interests of the service itself and the maintenance of the public service, at the high state of efficiency to which the nation is entitled, of rejecting that particular claim. I believe that that was referred to as "a certain amount of hostile criticism" which the proposal had excited, both within this House and outside, is due very largely to what, I think, also entered in some small degree into the manner in which the matter was approached by the hon. Member for Thanet, and that is, for not carefully limiting the field of criticism to the very few appointments in which the two has been increased, and, perhaps, a not very perfect apprehension of exactly how the bonus scheme does work in this matter.
    May I make a single reference to a matter of very great interest, which was raised—and, I imagine, rather raised for my benefit—by the hon. Member for Thanet? It is a matter which, I think, very frequently turns up in these discussions both on the Office of Works Vote and on the Vote for the Stationery Department. It is the unfortunate indirect responsibility for expenditure by those two Departments. That is a matter which is always likely to cause a certain amount of lack of cohesion in the perfect working, as it were, of the constitutional machine as regards those two Departments. One Department spends the money, and the other Department—that presided over by my right hon. Friend—has to accept responsibility for the expenditure, although it may not itself be responsible for the policy to which the expenditure is directed. It is, perhaps, in the nature of the case, and I will express myself, if I may do so becomingly, in agreement with the criticism which has been advanced, that that is a direction in which the wheel of the constitutional machinery of finance requires much vigilance.
    Mr. MOSLEY: I wish to repudiate altogether the pernicious doctrine that a

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    mere comparison of Civil Service salaries with the salaries paid in the higher positions of the business world in any way is justified in considering this matter. The hon. and gallant Gentleman entirely ignored the very great difference in position, and the many amenities that accrue from service in the Civil Service. It really cannot be the standard by which we approach this matter, to consider the position of the Civil Service merely from the point of view of the monetary remuneration. The State can never compete with the big business, especially in these days. The State must rely upon the attraction which public service always presents to men of ability and ambition. The young man whom my hon. and gallant Friend describes as preparing for a career in the Civil Service, or in any walk of public life, would not be actuated by considerations of the salary which he was likely to attain, but rather, one hopes, by thoughts of the influence he might ultimately possess in conducting the affairs of his country, and perhaps by some idea as to the prestige and influence which always attach to a high position in the Civil Service. We cannot judge this matter purely from the standpoint of a comparison with the salaries of business men. But it really does impress me, at this moment of all others, as a most disastrous policy, and a policy which is incalculable in its moral effect upon the country, to come down to this House with an Estimate that proposes, virtually, to double the salaries of highly-paid civil servants at a moment when you are asking the mining community, men who live by the daily toil of their hands, to accept a reduction in wages which, in many cases, compared with figures with which we are confronted, amounts to a margin very little, if at all, above the subsistence level.
    It is not a matter of effecting a petty economy. The danger of this situation does not merely lie in a few hundreds extra that we vote to these men. It lies in the psychological effect produced on the minds of a vast number of workers of this country at a moment when there is a demand for a reduction of wages, in many cases to a low standard of life. It has always been a principle of the Government, and a principle which I, for my part, deplore, that the one class of the community which is sheltered from the effect of present-day conditions is that
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    very class which is largely responsible for those conditions by their excessive expenditure of the public money. It always impresses me as being highly unbecoming that it should be the very last class in the community to feel the economic effects for which they are, in a certain degree, responsible. But I do protest, with whatever strength I can command, against doubling the salaries at this particular moment of highly paid civil servants, and raising the salaries of many of the subordinates. As I have said, it is not a question of the money involved. It is a question of the moral effect, and I urge upon the Government that they are very ill-advised at this particular moment to persist in a proposal to raise these salaries to the point proposed in these Estimates.
    Question put, and agreed to.
    It being a quarter past Eight of the Clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed without Question put.

  PRIVATE BUSINESS.

    DURHAM COUNTY TRANSPORT BILL (BY ORDER).
    Order for Second Reading read.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
    Captain BOWYER: I beg to move, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."
    This Bill seeks to empower the County Council of the administrative county of Durham to construct and work tramways, to provide and work trolley vehicles and motor omnibuses, to construct street improvements, and to acquire lands for the improvement of highways, and other purposes. The main objects of the Bill are three. In the first place, to construct 15 tramways and tram roads of a total length of about 27 miles; in the second place, to provide and work trolley motor vehicles on nine specified routes of a total length of some 60 miles; and, thirdly, to run omnibuses along any road within the county.

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    It was on 10th November, 1920, that the Durham County Council decided to promote this Bill. I am going to submit to the House that they came to that conclusion without having first of all properly considered the cost of the undertaking; and, secondly, without having given due consideration to the question as to whether or not this undertaking was likely to prove a financial success. The expense as shown in the estimate referred to in the Bill is £1,641,393, about which I shall have something to say in a minute or two. Lastly, before I begin my objections to the Bill let me say that there have been, I believe, overy forty objections lodged against it. Of these four come from municipal corporations, eight from urban district councils, and four from rural district councils in the neighbourhood. I want to bring forward in the short time that I propose to speak the following objections, which I think are serious objections to this Bill. I will briefly name them and then say a few words about each.
    In the first place there is no precedent for placing road passenger transport in the hands of a county council; secondly, very heavy capital commitments are being undertaken at a time when, above all others, the greatest economy in public expenditure is necessary; thirdly the scheme is bound to mean financial loss; fourthly, that loss will be borne, not only by the ratepayers who may expect to enjoy some of the amenities of the scheme, but by the ratepayers throughout the administrative County of Durham; fifthly, the Bill is superfluous because already private enterprise provides motor omnibuses which are running over the whole length and breadth of this scheme with the exception of a four miles' length; sixthly, there is the ground of public opposition; seventhly, the scheme is so speculative in its character that it lies outside the legitimate functions of a county council; eighthly, the Bill involves no obligation upon the county council to carry out the scheme contained in the Bill within any near approximate date; they may, if they like, take up to seven years about it; and, lastly, there is a technical objection that a certain paragraph in the Local Government Act of 1888 has been rudely brushed aside and made null and of no effect by Section 87 of the Bill.
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    Take the first objection, that there is no precedent for placing road transport in the hands of a county council. The London County Council alone, I believe, amongst such authorities, owns and operates tramways. But I submit to the House that the conditions under which the London County Council runs its trams are totally different from those of the scattered area in the County of Durham through which the scheme proposed in the Bill acts. The London County Council tramways are now a source of heavy loss, and, therefore, in an area much more sparsely populated, as is Durham, surely the scheme under the Bill is liable to financial loss? No county council has, I believe, at present the power to run omnibuses. The Bill seeks enormous powers, unlimited powers, to run omnibuses at, so far as I can make out, unlimited expense. The second objection is that this Bill involves very heavy capital commitments at a time when the greatest public economy is vitally necessary. The Estimate in the Bill is £1,641,393, but in a document which, I suppose, all Members of Parliament received this morning, that seems to be going to be reduced to a sum of £1,027,751, a reduction of some £600,000. I would point out to hon. Members that in the Estimate contained in the Bill there is not one item or penny put down as against the expenditure on omnibuses. Yet the preamble of the Bill clearly says the Bill is to empower the County Council to provide and work trolley vehicles and motor omnibuses, so that we may take it that this reduced sum of just over £1,000,000 is likely to be an under-estimate of the sum which it will be necessary to raise from the rates in order to put the scheme into effect. Another point: The only limit to the borrowing powers of the County Council under the Bill is the consent of the Minister of Transport and the Minister of Health. Provided the Council gets their consent the power to borrow is unlimited.
    On what is this huge sum to be spent? It is to be spent in duplicating services which already exist, thus rendering the capital which has been expended on private enterprise and on vast schemes of motor-bus services utterly futile. I said duplication, but surely the obvious sequence of events in this, that in order that this Bill should succeed, first of all there has to be a fight, and if the Bill goes through private enterprise has got

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    to be threatened and defeated; for only so can the grandiloquent scheme under the Bill become a successful undertaking. Thirdly, the transport system in this scheme is absolutely certain to be an unmitigated financial failure. There are 27 miles of tramways to be constructed in comparatively thinly-populated districts. What is the experience of tramways throughout the rest of the country? The municipal tramway system of Great Britain, although serving some of the most densely-populated districts, are incurring an annual loss of three and one-third million pounds. What then is the prospect of this scheme when it has first of all to defeat the private enterprise companies already operating there.
    As regards the 57 miles of trackless trolly, I believe that in no cases are such lines working at a profit in Great Britain. At a recent inquiry into the wages of tramway employés, evidence was given by Mr. Hamilton, the General Manager of the Leeds Tramway undertaking, in which he said that the actual revenue at the present time falls short of the expenditure by just over 3½d. for every car mile run, and there is a deficiency of 3s. 2½d. for every £1 of traffic receipts. Therefore, I do not think that I exaggerate when I claim that the transport scheme of this Bill is doomed to failure. If it does fail, on whom is the loss going to fall. The financial loss will be borne not only by those who hope to share in the amenities of the better tramways and motor buses, but upon the whole of the ratepayers of the administrative County of Durham. Again, may I take the figures of the promoters of the Bill. They say, that, approximately, 294,000 people will be served by the tramways, but they go on to say that the population of the administrative county is 1,031,000, so that only one-third of the population will enjoy the benefits, whereas the whole of them will be mulcted in their rates for the enjoyment of that one-third, and the loss will fall upon the whole of the ratepayers. What chance has private enterprise against competition backed by the rates of the county?
    My fifth point is that the Bill is superfluous. Already along every route upon which the Bill contemplates action omnibuses run by private enterprise companies are running with the exception of a length of about four miles. The Northern
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    General Transport Company, the United Automobile Company, the Invincible Motor Bus Service and the North Eastern Railway Company have got now a service which they claim is adequate and is improving every day. I may add that on many of the principal routes a 15-minute service is now being provided, but the improvement which is taking place in these private enterprise Companies must be crippled if they are to have this competition with a rate-aided organisation like the county council.
    Mr. R. RICHARDSON: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman tell us where they are running the service every 15 minutes?
    Captain BOWYER: I cannot say for the moment, but that is my information and I am certain it is accurate. I will satisfy myself again on that point and communicate with my hon. Friend. This Durham County Transport Bill cannot succeed until it has smashed these private enterprise companies. It cannot continue in competition with them. There is the very strongest public opposition to this Bill. No less than 40 petitions are already lodged against it, and of these four come from municipal corporations, eight from urban district councils, and four from rural district councils. What the promoters mean by telling hon. Members that this Bill is backed by practically all the local authorities in the County of Durham I do not know, because it is not true.
    On the 13th December, 1920, there was a crowded meeting of ratepayers in Durham City, at which this Bill was discussed, and a resolution was carried, I am told, by a large majority condemning the proposed expenditure as unnecessary and extravagant; and Mr. Peter Lee, the chairman of the Durham County Council, stated that the Labour party—which has a majority on the Council of something like two-thirds—are not afraid of high rates. Is that the secret of the activity and enterprise foreshadowed in this Bill? Is it true that the Labour party are not afraid of high rates, and is it not on that score that they are now seeking power to levy something over £1,600,000 upon the wretched ratepayers of this county of Durham at a time when, above all others, economy in public expenditure is absolutely necessary? I will put a specific question and challenge to the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Richardson): Is it or is it

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    not true, as stated in a cutting of the "Times" dated 19th February, 1921, that 55 of the Labour Councillors on the County Council of Durham do not pay rates, as they live in colliery houses?
    Mr. RICHARDSON: It is not true.
    Captain BOWYER: Then how many do live in colliery houses and do not pay rates? Here is a Bill which seeks to put into force a grandiloquent scheme all founded on the rates, and on the other hand there is the assertion that 55 of the Labour Councillors do not themselves pay rates. The Bill contains a scheme of a highly speculative character. That being so, it lies absolutely outside the legitimate functions of a county council at all. Is it the case of the promoters of this Bill that private enterprise has failed, and, if so, why do they not say so? In the preamble it merely states that "whereas the provision of further grants for facilities in the County of Durham is urgently necessary" and then their scheme is set forth. They do no say, "Whereas private enterprise has failed, now let us try nationalisation." That is the true interpretation of the activity which they are seeking leave from Parliament to put into effect. The rapid improvement in transport which is taking place, and which private enterprise is far more likely to utilise to the full, will 'be absolutely killed if this competition is allowed to continue by the rate-aided county council. The Bill involves no obligation upon the County Council to carry out the work at an early date. Clause 10 gives no less than seven years as the period for the compulsory purchase of land, and Clause 16 gives seven years for the completion of the tramways. Therefore for.seven years the ratepayers of the country would have this enormous expenditure hanging over their heads. As regards the motor omnibuses, there is no time limit imposed at all. My last point is a rather technical one, but one which I think is very important in these days of overburdened rates. Section 69, Sub-section (2), of the Local Government Act, 1888, dealing with the borrowing powers of county councils, states:
    "Provided that where the total debt of the County Council, after deducting the amount of any sinking fund, exceeds, or if the proposed loan is borrowed, will exceed, the amount of one-tenth of the annual rateable value of the rateable property in the
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    county ascertained according to the standard or basis for the county rate, the amount shall not be borrowed, except in pursuance of a Provisional Order made by the Local Government Board and confirmed by Parliament."
    In the Bill we are now considering Clause 87 states:
    "The powers of borrowing money given by this Act shall not be restricted by any of the Regulations contained in Section 69 (Borrowing by County Councils) of the Local Government Act, 1888."
    That is the section which I have just read. The Clause goes on:
    "In calculating the amount which the County Council may borrow under that Act or under other enactments any sums which they may borrow under this Act shall not be reckoned."
    Thus the one safeguard given by the Local Government Act of 1888 is rendered absolutely null and void. Hon. Members opposite may tell me that this is a common form in private Bills. If that is so, it is high time this House took notice of it and stopped a procedure which, I maintain, is absolutely criminal in its failure to safeguard the ratepayers of the country. I appeal to my hon. Friend who represents the Government in this matter whether this is not a question of principle. Is private enterprise going to live, or is it going to be superseded by nationalisation? I hope my hon. Friend will address himself to that point, and say if the Government is going to sanction this grandiloquent scheme of transport when private enterprise is serving practically the whole of the contemplated area. I feel certain he will hesitate before he commends this Bill to the House.
    Brigadier-General SURTEES: I rise to second the Amendment. My primary objection to the Bill is that it is an ill-conceived measure in every respect, as it will involve the County of Durham in heavy capital expenditure at a moment when all available money is required for reconstruction and the re-establishment of industry. The County Council of Durham is asking for powers to run omnibuses on every road in the county. The expenditure is estimated, I understand, at something like a million and a half, and we have already two large companies at least providing excellent services on the principal roads. In the opinion of those qualified to judge there is no need to supersede these, and it is fairly certain that under county council management the services would be run at

    1401
    a considerable loss, besides imposing a further burden upon the already overtaxed ratepayers. The main power which seems to be sought, is to establish a tramway from Gateshead, passing through Grantham to Spennymoor. This connection alone, I understand, would cost about £1,000,000. It traverses a route in which the population is highly concentrated into one or two small areas which already possess excellent train services. I may here mention that the North Eastern Railway Company is already preparing to electrify that section of its system which serves this district, and this will admit of a still further improved train service with which the tramways would have to compete. It is reasonable to assume that the result of running to tramways would be disastrous.
    In support of this view I would quote the case of the Sunderland District Tramways Company, which although its system covers a far better district and taps a number of largely populated villages remote from train services, nevertheless could not pay a dividend on its ordinary shares and has reduced its capital to about one-third of the original figure. I would also call attention generally to the effect which the passing of the Bill would have upon the North Eastern Railway Company. That company would have to encounter new and serious competition, all the more serious from the fact that the Bill proposes that the trams may be used for the carriage of goods, minerals, animals and heavy traffic. The North Eastern Railway has been put to huge expense providing for heavy traffic which is well accommodated by the existing lines, and it would be a monstrous thing if the county council were allowed to compete with the railway as proposed in the Bill. I have already referred to the improbability of the powers sought ever resulting in financial success. If they result in disastrous failure, as I imagine would be the case, the loss would have to be made good out of the county rate, to which the North Eastern Railway Company contributes 12 or 12½ per cent. of the whole.
    In conclusion, I should like to draw attention to the fact—I am informed it is a fact—that at the special meeting of the county council on the 10th November, 1920, when it was decided to promote this Bill, proper estimates of the cost of proposed works were not submitted. So the
    1402
    county council actually decided to promote the Bill without considering the cost of the several undertakings or the probability of their becoming profitable. It was also found necessary to hold two meetings of the county council to obtain consent to the Bill as required by the Borough Funds Act, and on this account alone I submit that the proposals are not adequately supported by the members of the county council and still less by the ratepayers of this already overburdened county. To summarise, I protest against the Second Reading of this Bill, first, because it involves enormous outlay at a time when strict economy is necessary in the national interest, and, second, because the scheme is unnecessary and affords merely a duplication of a well-established and adequate system of transport already worked by private companies. It would seem that this is an opportunity to prove to the nation that the House of Commons is sincere in its promise that it will effect economies whenever possible and safeguard the ratepayers and taxpayers.
    Mr. R. RICHARDSON: I should like to remind the House of what the Chairman of Ways and Means said on a recent occasion in connection with some other Bills. The right hon. Gentleman said:
    "May I once again say that in regard to a private Bill that the Second Reading is not the same as in respect to a public Bill In the case of a private Bill it means sending it to a Committee, and the duty of that Committee is to find the preamble proved, or not proved. That is really the effective Second Reading stage, which can only be taken after the parties have been heard."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th April, 1921, cols. 602 and 603.]
    The Durham County Council ask for nothing more than that at this stage. We have a large volume of evidence to submit in proof of our case to the hon. Members who may constitute the Committee dealing with this Bill. A good deal has been said about what has led up to the Bill. Let me say that I am a member of the Durham County Council, and have been for twenty years. I know its work, and I know that behind its energies is a keen desire for the well being of the people of the County of Durham. In framing this Bill the Council knows that it is absolutely essential that some method of transport should be provided for people resident in the county. Up to now it has been denied to them. We have heard of agricultural labourers in villages being cut off from

    1403
    civilisation, and even the Government itself, in order to prevent depletion of the rural areas, has had to give assistance in providing transport for these people. It seems to be forgotten that there are many mining villages in the county of Durham which are in the same position as regards means of transport as are the agricultural labourers in some of the most rural parts of the country. I probably know the county of Durham better than anyone else who has spoken on this matter. I was born and reared in it, have lived in it all my life, and have constantly been going to and fro through the county.
    Captain BOWYER: May I interrupt the hon. Member for one moment? He asked me a definite question. I made inquiry, and I now have the answer, which I think will show him that on one point I was better informed than he was. He denied that there was a 15-minute service.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: No, I asked you where.
    Captain BOWYER: I will tell the hon. Member. It is on the road from Chester-le-Street to Gateshead; and that becomes a 10-minute service on Saturday.
    Mr. LAWSON: It is sometimes a 15-hour service.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: My hon Friend below me lives nearer to Chester-le-Street than I do. I will deal with the part of the county with which I am best acquainted. With regard to the meetings of the Durham County Council, the meeting of the 11th November, to which allusion was made by hon. Members who are opposing the Bill, was held on account of the breakdown of the transport, which resulted in people not being able to get there on the first occasion. That is the difficulty; we are not even given facilities to get to a county council meeting. I admit that since this Bill was promoted there has been some speeding up of private enterprise, but we know that if this Bill goes down we shall simply get the same sort of treatment that we have always had. Have hon. Members been in Durham and seen the transport that is provided? We know it. We have, as a rule, motor omnibuses on some parts of the county roads, and it is a 30-minute service. That is in the best area, from
    1404
    Durham to Houghton-le-Spring and from there on to Sunderland, running in competition with the service already mentioned, which has never paid—the Sunderland District Tramways Company. If, therefore, private enterprise is competing against itself, there can be no fault found if we come in and do the same thing.
    Captain BOWYER: Backed by the rates.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Some of the charges that are made are exorbitant, and after getting off the motor omnibus I have felt a good deal worse in health than after a trip across the North Sea to Hamburg or Rotterdam, or some such place. That is the sort of thing that is being given. Anything that is on four wheels and can be propelled is being put into operation to try to meet the difficulty and give us some sort of help in getting from one place to another in the county. May I draw attention to the fact that Durham is the third largest administrative county outside the Metropolis, with a population of 1,032,000? We have within the county area but one tramway company running into the rural area, and that is the one to which the hon. and gallant Member for Gateshead (Brigadier-General Surtees) referred, and which, he said, has never paid a dividend to its shareholders. I was informed, on what I thought was good authority, that last year it did pay, but if it never had paid a dividend, I should not be at all surprised. Let me give the facts of its commencement, and show what private enterprise does to help people. It was, I believe, commenced by the British Electrical Traction Company, who sought powers from the various authorities; and they, having no idea of methods of transportation, granted their sanction to these people. It cost them, say, £10,000. It was then sold again to another company—these people never have any intention, after getting powers, of putting down a rail—and the company that actually commenced running was the fourth or fifth company that had it before any tramways were run at all. Of course, it was sold at an increased price on every occasion, and now we wonder why that company does not pay a dividend. The facts are there, and can be proved, and to expect companies like that to pay is to

    1405
    expect the public to pay through the nose. That is the position with regard to that company. But we in our Bill have not in any way infringed their rights. We do not touch them at all. Indeed, we propose to bring people to their doorsteps so that they may get a chance of making their tramways pay. Mention has been made of the North-Eastern Railway Company serving us very well. Let us see how the North-Eastern Railway Company serves us. Take my own case. I live practically in the heart of the county. If I want to go to Newcastle-on-Tyne, the largest city in the North of England, I must leave Newcastle at 8.5 to reach my home. People may have very important business and yet the railway company refuses to give us a later train than 8.5. I have appealed to them again and again for some, extended service. Again take the case of Durham City. Unless I am coming from south of York the North-Eastern Railway Company refuses to carry me home from Durham after 8.20. They refuse to bring me home from Sunderland after 9 p.m. That is the sort of service that private enterprise is building up a case to defeat our object.
    I want to call attention to one or two other matters. I suppose we are a spendthrift county council. A circular issued by the Middle Class Union has fallen into my hands—
    "Dear Sir,
    DURHAM TRANSPORT BILL.
    This Branch, representing 682 direct ratepayers and taxpayers, appeals to you for your vote against the Durham Transport Bill, which we understand will come before the House of Commons."
    Six hundred and eighty-two so-called ratepayers and taxpayers! I say "so-called" advisedly. Six hundred and eighty-two out of a population of 1,032,000!
    Captain BOWYER: I spoke for the rest of them.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: I am afraid you do not know. Its county rate last year was 5s. 9d. Its total outstanding debt was £776,000, nearly all schools and places of education. I wonder how many authorities, county or otherwise, there are in this country which can show such a Bill. Do you know of one which can compare with the Durham County Council in this matter? I challenge you to find another county council with that population with a less outstanding debt.
    Mr. GRANT: Can you tell us what the average of the total rates of local authorities is in Durham?
    Mr. RICHARDSON: I could not say.
    Mr. GRANT: I am informed it is 17s.
    9.0 P.M.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: No, not so high as that by any means. The hon. Member is probably adding the rates of the small local authorities to this 5s. 9d., but the 5s. 9d. is included in all the local authorities. We get our local rates through the other local authorities. We do not get it direct from the county council. You must not add 5s. 9d. to 12s. and something, if it is 17s.
    Mr. GRANT: I am referring to the total burden of the ratepayer.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Private enterprise, in our opinion, has had a tremendous revenue from county council work. We know what omnibuses are doing for the roads on which they are running. In my own area, and because of this very Bill, probably both the Northern Company and the Automobile Company commenced to run omnibuses, and the road for some mile and a half had been relaid from one end to the other, not to take this traffic, but to take ordinary traffic, and in two months the whole thing had of necessity to be relaid. Go where you will these omnibuses are ploughing up the roads, and the amount paid to the county authorities is not by any means commensurate with the amount of damage they are doing and their rateable value, except the tramway the hon. Member has referred to, is probably nil. That is about the measure in which we are dealt with by private enterprise in Durham. We do not propose to spend the whole £1,000,000. Our proposal is for the moment to spend £637,727, holding over the sum of £390,000. We will not spend that £390,000 in any case at the moment and we will give a pledge to the House that we will not spend it until we have the sanction of the Ministry of Transport. We want to do what we are asking permission to do. It has been said that it is a poor route on which we propose to construct our tramways. That will not bear the light of day. Its population is vastly larger than many other paying concerns run through in other parts of the country. We are only asking

    1407
    what other people have always had given to them, that our case should go before a Committee which shall deal with it and hear the evidence. Durham County Council is quite content either to win or lose this Bill on the evidence it can submit to any Committee this House may set up. So that we are asking for no favour. My hon. and gallant Friend (Captain Bowyer) referred to the opposition. May I tell him that we have, and we will prove it if you allow this Bill to go upstairs, the sanction of practically every local authority in the county through whose area the trams are proposed to be run? We do not say that we have the sanction of the authorities that are not to be touched. We do not claim that, but we claim that we have the sanction of the other authorities; I do not know that there is one exception. Even Durham City, in which the meeting was held, is not opposing the Bill.
    Captain BOWYER: It may be that the 16 local authorities which I have mentioned as opposing this Bill, and as having filed objections against it, may be outside the area, but my point is that although they are outside the area they have to contribute to the rates.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: On the other hand, if we make this a paying concern, they will reap their share of the benefit, so that they will have compensation on the other side. I hope that my hon. and gallant Friend will keep that in mind. The population of the area through which the trams are to run is 294,000, equal to 12,700 per route mile. Many private people would be only too willing to risk their all on such a tramway. I feel sure that the experiences of municipal authorities who own trams in the north of England have not been so disastrous as my hon. Friend would have us believe. The Newcastle authority run trams outside their own boundaries, and every year money has been provided from that undertaking in relief of the rates. Sunder-land borough, which runs in two or three directions in the county, have also paid large sums of money to the relief of the rates from their tramway undertaking.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Are they paying now?
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Yes.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Both of them?
    Mr. RICHARDS0N: Yes. After setting aside all that is required for redemption, etc., they are still giving money in relief of the rates. Therefore, on the whole, we need have no fear as to the success of our undertaking. It is true that the London County Council have lost money on their tramways, but I want to remind the House that what they have lost on the swings the people of London have gained on the roundabouts. Because of the large amount of rates that the London County Council have to pay, there has. been no loss so far as the ratepayers are concerned. What they have lost on the trams they have been paid back in rates, so that the ratepapers have been nothing out of pocket in consequence of the trams being run in London. After all, there is something more than the making of money; there is the public utility always to be considered. There are isolated colliery villages where there is little chance of education, no amenities, where the community simply exist amongst themselves, without a chance of intercourse with people who live outside their parish boundaries. Does it not appeal to hon. Members that at least something should be done to give these people a chance of seeing things as they are, even in parts of their own county? All that I plead for is that this Bill should be allowed to go upstairs, and that you should hear our evidence. If our evidence is not conclusive, turn it down, but if it is conclusive, and we can prove that our scheme will be a paying concern, we ask that it should be allowed to go through. I hope my hon. Friends will reconsider their Motion to negative this Bill, that they will hear what we have to say in Committee, and that we shall act as Britons towards one another, giving everybody a chance and holding them guiltless until they are proved guilty.
    Mr. GRANT: No one will doubt the sincerity of the hon. Member who has just spoken or his knowledge of the county which he so admirably represents. In his opening remarks he referred to the statement which was recently made by the Chairman of Ways and Means as to the desirability of private Bills going upstairs, and the House of Commons not interfering on Second Reading with such measures. I am sure that that statement is largely correct, but there may be

    1409
    occasions when it is the duty of this Chamber to express its opinion on Second Reading when questions of principle are involved, and also questions of vast expense. Undoubtedly there could be no private Bill more directly affecting questions of principle and, especially at this time, the question of extravagance and expense than the Bill which we are now considering. I should like to refer to a statement which we received this morning from the Durham County Council, accompanied by a diagram of the routes where these operations are proposed to be introduced. With great respect to the Member of the Durham County Council who has just spoken I may say that, so far as I can gather from any knowledge that I have been able to gain, this statement of the Durham County Council is very misleading, and especially the diagram. I do not think that anyone with the smallest knowledge of the situation would say that it is a true picture of what actually exists. It does not show in this diagram the large amount of transport work which is being done at the present time by public utility companies. It would lead one to believe that this is a derelict district so far as transport is concerned. The facts of the case are that the whole district is supplied at the present time with transport facilities. The routes where these new tramways are to be established are now served by motor omnibus companies. There are only four miles in the whole district in respect to which the new proposals are put forward which are not supplied with transport facilities at the present time. Side by side with the proposed tramway routes are railway facilities of which the diagram shows nothing. I protest against the House of Commons being given a document of this sort, which is calculated to mislead it unless hon. Members took the trouble to find out the facts for themselves. My hon. Friend (Mr. Richardson) complained that the district was not properly served. He is probably not aware that these public utility companies, who have lent vast sums and done all they can to serve the public in these districts so far as economic conditions allow, have tried to do more, and have not been allowed to do more because the Durham County Council will not give permission.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Because these people never offered to give any help until this Bill was prepared.
    Mr. GRANT: During the War these public utility companies were at a great disability. Their 'buses were taken away, they had enormous difficulties to contend with, and it is only now that they are being enabled to complete the actual service which they have taken in hand.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: There were more buses running during the five years of the War than in any other five years of the history of the country.
    Mr. GRANT: There have been many applications made by these public utility companies which have done good work in these districts which the county council of Durham have refused. I believe that this Bill is brought forward not so much in the interests of the travelling public as to foist socialistic schemes on the public— [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"]—and to defeat if possible private enterprise by public companies. A greater interference with the liberty of the individual I cannot conceive. If these trackless trolly routes are necessary, why would these public utility companies who have undertaken transport service not undertake them themselves? They are business men who are out for money, and if there is anything in this, why would they not undertake it? The fact is that such schemes have always been a disastrous failure. There is no money in them. They are uneconomic. In paragraph 4 of the statement of the Durham County Council we are told that their proposal is supported practically by all public authorities Already that has been contradicted. No public authority should make a statement of this sort, which is an endeavour to mislead us. There are 16 public authorities who have petitioned against this, and I believe that the number would be substantially increased if it were not for the expense involved. Hon. Members know the enormous expense entailed on local authorities in coming up to this House and bringing up evidence against a proposal.
    Paragraph 5 deals with the money part of the question. Originally we were told that £1,600,000 was involved in the undertaking. In the statement received this morning the amount is cut down to a little over £1,000,000 and we are told, as the reason, that the engineers have been able to reduce the estimate because the cost of materials has decreased and will further decrease. I question that reason.

    1411
    I am informed on authority which I cannot doubt that the decrease in the amount of the estimates is largely due to the number of local authorities who will not give the county council the wayleaves which they desire, so that the amount has been compulsorily cut down. I believe further that it has been cut down to a large extent in order to endeavour to get this House to accept this measure. Experts cannot believe for one moment that even the undertakings which are proposed can be carried out for the figure which is put down. They believe that they will cost a great deal more and that these figures are entirely illusory. In these estimates there is no mention of the cost of motor omnibuses and there is no estimate for garages and much other detail which add enormously to the expense of motor omnibuses. A very small estimate would be another £1,000,000 to undertake any sort of motor omnibus service over these roads.
    My hon. Friend opposite believes that the undertaking will be self-supporting, and his county council believes so. I would like to know on what authority they are induced to hold this view. If I had any money to invest in an undertaking, I would, if I could, find out what similar undertakings paid in other places. These undertakings have all been a disastrous failure. Municipal trading of this sort at present is costing the ratepayers £3,300,000, and that is dealing with money borrowed at the low rates which prevailed before the War, but the present cost of any such undertaking would be infinitely more. From all the knowledge which we have it will be futile to suggest that such an undertaking would be self-supporting, as the interest on the borrowed money will be so much higher. I think, in spite of what has been said by my hon. Friend, the county councils really anticipate that any such undertaking will be only run at a failure. The chairman of the county council has been quoted to-night as saying: "We are not afraid of high rates." They are very lucky not to be afraid of high rates, but I think that sounds likes an expression of opinion which comes from a man who does not pay rates himself. My hon. Friend opposite questioned the statement that a great many members of the county council are not ratepayers. I can tell
    1412
    him that some 55 members are not ratepayers at all.
    Mr. RICHARDSON indicated dissent.
    Mr. GRANT: My hon. Friend shakes his head, but I put forward that statement again, because I have had it on very good authority. It is really monstrous, if there is any approximation of truth in it, that men who have no obligation whatever in spending money should involve other ratepayers in the county who do not in any way benefit by such a service.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: May I assure my hon. Friend that most of the mining members—and that is the body he is hitting—either live in their own houses or own property in the county.
    Mr. GRANT: Of course, I accept his statement at once, but it does not make any difference to that part of my argument, namely, that in certain districts you will go in for a speculation, and a very gambling speculation, which will involve ratepayers in other parts of the county who will gain no benefit whatsoever from such an undertaking. As I say, it is a gamble, and I submit that the case in detail is overwhelming against the Bill. I do not think hon. Members have any mandate whatsoever to support a measure frankly socialistic in its ideas, which, in its action, will be a drag upon private enterprise, and which will allow public authorities to interfere with the free play and liberty of the private individual. I hope hon. Members will prevent this measure from going upstairs where enormous expenses will be put on the county of Durham.
    Major BARNES: The issue before the House is whether this Bill is to be allowed to go upstairs or not. I quite agree with the hon. Member who has just resumed his seat that there may be occasions on which this House may very properly refuse to allow a Bill to go to a Committee. I can quite understand, if a Bill did involve a real matter of principle on which there was a very great difference of opinion, that such a course might be taken, but to suggest that there is anything in this Bill which at the present time raises a matter which is novel is out of all keeping with the facts of the case. An attempt has been made to appeal to all kinds of prejudices, fears and passions by representing the Bill as

    1413
    introducing something of a revolutionary and socialistic character. It is very late in the day to suggest that the owning and running of tramways by a public authority is a thing of so novel a character that when a Bill is presented to this House that is good ground for the House refusing permission for it to go to a Committee. The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken knows perfectly well that, so far from any novel proposition being embodied in the Bill, all that is asked is that the county council of Durham may be allowed to do what almost every local authority of importance in this country is at present doing.
    Mr. GBITTEN: What other county council is doing it?
    Major BARNES: The London County Council.
    Mr. GRITTEN: That is the only one.
    Major BARNES: What more important one could be mentioned? Here we are dealing with a body which is third or fourth in the country after the London County Council. No ground of principle at all is involved. All that is present on this occasion is a conflict of evidence. On the other side of the House it is suggested that all the needs of Durham County are at present well served by private enterprise; on this side that view is not held. That is a conflict of evidence, and is just the matter to come before a Committee. I am quite sure that this House, taking an impartial and an unbiased view of this question, as it ought to do, would never feel competent to consider a question on which detailed evidence should be given. That is the very purpose for which Committees are set up and Bills sent to them. I submit, therefore, that the ground of principle raised by the hon. Member is one which has no substance at all
    I suggest further that it would really be a very serious matter to refuse to allow this Bill to go before a Committee in view of its origin. It does not come from some responsible body, but from a county council, and in the government of this country, after Parliament, the county councils are the most important bodies. The position is that a county council, elected upon a popular franchise, after the most careful consideration, has come to the conclusion that in the interests and for the welfare of those persons with whose welfare they are concerned this Bill
    1414
    should be promoted, and it comes to this House for permission. Unless there is some very grave and substantial reason for refusing that permission we should consent to allow the Bill to go before the Committee in order that all the evidence may be heard and the facts thrashed out. If there is really anything of substance in the points raised, the Committee will appreciate and deal with them, and will prevent any hardship being done. It is suggested that there is very real opposition in the County of Durham against the Bill. If that is so, it is an extraordinary thing that not a single name of a county Member for Durham is put to this Motion for rejection. Here is a Bill, we are told, which is arousing intense opposition in Durham, yet the opponents of the Bill have to come down to Buckingham to get an hon. Member to speak against it. Up to the present time, with the exception of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gateshead (Brigadier-General Surtees)—and he is not a Member for the County of Durham, but for a county borough—not a single Member for the administrative county who is acquainted with the local situation has spoken. Instead of that we have opposition from Gentlemen like the hon. Member for Whitehaven (Mr. Grant) and the hon. and gallant Member for Finchley (Colonel Newman). From the County of Durham, from the people who know the conditions there, who know what is wanted, who live in the county, who traverse its roads, and who are hampered by lack of transport, no voice is raised.
    I do not wish to deal with this in great detail, because this is not the proper place for detail to be brought forward. It is quite a simple matter for hon. Members opposite to get up with a great mass of figures and give them to the House, as it is equally possible for us to do so. This is not the place. What we ask the House to consider is that the County Council of Durham, one of the most important county councils in the country, has come to the conclusion, after the most careful consideration, that this is the proper course to pursue. We ask the House to give them an opportunity of proving before a Committee of the House that they were right in their conclusion. There is no ground of principle at all on which their request can be refused. The House will be only following out its traditions of impartiality and fair-

    1415
    ness by giving the Bill a Second Reading and allowing it to go before a Committee, on which all the opponents can be heard, their case against the Bill considered, and every opportunity given for arriving at a proper conclusion.
    Mr. GRITTEN: The hon. Member who has just spoken has gone to much trouble in labouring an interpretation of one of your rulings or perhaps it was an obiter dictum. I was somewhat puzzled by that ruling, but my confusion may be due to the newness of my membership to this House. When I read your words that the Private Bill Committee provides the really effective Second Reading stage, it occurs to me to inquire what is the precise object of the Debate in which we are now engaged and what is the utility of the procedure at all? The hon. Gentleman has been at some pains to show that no question of principle is involved, but side by side and following on that argument he directly contradicted himself by another because he twitted the opponents of this Bill by saying that no Member from the county of Durham, with the exception of my hon. and gallant Friend (Brigadier-General Surtees) had spoken in support of those who oppose the Bill. Surely one statement is a direct negation of the other in the matter of logic and argument. First he says that this is not a question of principle and then he switches off from the particular to the general and says that no member from the county of Durham supports this opposition. I take that to be the greatest proof of the generality of principle involved in this Bill—that Members from other parts of England have spoken against it. If the hon. Member for Finchley (Colonel Newman) or the hon. Member for the White-haven Division of Cumberland (Mr Grant) or the Member for Buckingham (Captain Bowyer) have found it necessary to come to the House and speak against the principle, surely that is proof in itself of the general principle involved in this Bill. I at any rate happen to be a Member for a constituency in the county of Durham.
    Mr. LAWSON: You are not in the administrative area.
    Mr. GRITTEN: For the purposes of this Bill, taking up this objection made from the other side, which I will meet at once, my constituency is divided into two
    1416
    parts. An hon. Member has just informed me that I am not in the administrative area. It so happens that West Hartlepool is not a contributing authority, and is not in the administrative area, but the borough of Hartlepool is. When it is said that the bodies which are petitioning against this Bill are only insignificant, I should like to mention the fact that I represent a constituency which embraces every known industry except the textile industry and pottery. Therefore, if you get a petition from a neighbourhood of that importance, you may be sure that it is well grounded.
    Reference has been made to a statement sent to hon. Members by those who are promoting this measure. In direct connection with what I am now saying, I should like to point out one instance of the fallacies and misrepresentations of this particular document. With regard to that very subject of whether my constituency is in the administrative county or not, I should like hon. Members who have this document in their possession to refer to the map, which is geographically inaccurate, and they will observe that Hartlepool is not mentioned. But the county borough of West Hartlepool is mentioned, and it does not come within the scope of this Bill at all. There you see the mala fides of the promoters of this Bill. It is said that I am not in the administrative area. I am, with regard to the borough of Hartlepool, but the compilers of this map have purposely omitted Hartlepool. The hon. Member perhaps may be misled by this map when he says that I am not in the administrative area. In order to emphasise the misrepresentation it takes care to put the population as 65,247. The population of my constituency is over 90,000. So much for such a document. I am not quite sure how much detail or particularity is allowed at the present stage of discussion, but I would take my constituency as an example to prove the main thesis put forward by the opponents of this Bill. Hartlepool, which does come under the scope of the Bill, is a very ancient borough. It received its charter from King John, and it is proud of its antiquity and traditions. Therefore, it is rightly jealous of any infringement of its rights and privileges. If this Bill is passed Hartlepool maintains that its rights and its jurisdiction will be seriously invaded. I have here a petition from the

    1417
    borough of Hartlepool, and in that petition the petitioners allege that the borough and the inhabitants will be injuriously affected by the Bill, and they strongly object to it. They maintain that there are transport facilities already provided between Hartlepool and West Hartlepool, and through West Hartlepool to the neighbouring industrial area, that they are provided by trams, belonging to the Hartlepool Tramways Company, and the municipal trams of West Hartlepool.
    Mr. WATERSON: Is that petition from the inhabitants or from the borough council?
    Mr. GRITTEN: It is the humble petition of the mayor, alderman and burgesses of the Borough of Hartlepool. With regard to Hartlepool, there is no road traffic between the borough and the remainder of the administrative county sufficient to justify the county council running 'buses into the borough. If one looks at the route delineated in this document, those of us who know the county of Durham—I have known it for 40 years intimately and I can controvert some of the assertions made from the other side — know that that route goes through sparsely populated districts, but that at any point along that proposed route the North-Eastern Railway is easily accessible, as it runs parallel to it. The proposed routes run nowhere near Hartlepool, the main approach to which is through West Hartlepool; so the county council would have no right to go through West Hartlepool. There are no main roads to Hartlepool itself. Hence, for the purposes of this Bill, no approach either way is practicable. The next stage of my argument should be sufficiently obvious. It is that, although Hartlepool is to receive no benefit, yet by Clause 86 of this Bill it is proposed to authorise the county council to charge the county fund and county rate with security for this great sum, to which reference has been made, to make good any deficiency in the running of this tram undertaking, let alone the deficiency that would probably arise on the 'bus undertaking. There is another point which has not been mentioned. It is stated in the petition which has been referred to that the petitioners are liable, under the Bill, for many of the roads which might be damaged by the running of omnibuses by the county council, or which might otherwise be
    1418
    obstructed or interfered with by the exercise of the powers obtained under this Bill, and yet no provision is inserted in the Bill requiring the county council to contribute towards the cost of adapting the roads on which the omnibuses are to run, or for safeguarding the rights and jurisdiction of the inhabitants.
    Reference has been made, and there has been no contradiction, to the losses on tramway undertakings in other parts of the country. I am not going into details on that matter, as full figures have been given, but there was a point which might have been made in that connection. It is this, that undoubtedly losses on tramway undertakings have been made by municipal authorities although the capital for them was obtained at pre-War low rates of interest, and the tramways were constructed at pre-War cost in densely populated districts. Yet in spite of these facts the tramways are run at a loss. I maintain that it is the barest equity that the decrease in the revenue of such undertakings should be made good out of the rates levied in the districts which have the advantages of the facilities that are afforded, and it surely would be most unjust that inhabitants of a borough should be subjected to increased rates for any deficiency on a transport service, the advantage of which they are neither to obtain nor to share. No advocate of this Bill surely will contradict that proposition. The hon. Member for Houghton-le-Spring said that private enterprise, which he seemed to deprecate—and I am not surprised that he does, as sitting on those Benches—had been speeded up since the agitation on behalf of this Bill. Although he protests that he has considerable acquaintance with the County of Durham, he appears strangely ignorant of certain concrete facts. In my constituency we have a service of motor buses lately instituted between ourselves and Middlesbrough, and that was suggested and supported long before this Bill was brought in. Therefore it cannot be urged that that enterprise was speeded up in anticipation of this Bill. I should like to say a few words with regard to the figure of £1,640,000. There is no estimate given in the preamble of the Bill, or in the Bill itself, for the cost of providing vehicles, and guaranteeing a bus service. We must remember that, because it leaves a large margin for un-estimated expenditure. The hon. Member for Houghton-le-Spring says the estimates

    1419
    will be reduced, but that contention is negatived when we come to a later Clause which enables the county council to borrow to an unlimited extent with the consent and sanction of the Ministry of Transport. From what we know of that Ministry, it is not likely it will act as a check on expenditure, because it is the most prodigal spending Department in the State, and its own expenditure has become a by-word throughout the country. With regard to the question of principle which has been raised, I may refer my hon. Friend to another vicious principle involved in this Bill. It is no part of the duty of a county council to provide transport facilities. No local authority can do that without a special statutory enactment, and no county council has hitherto been authorised to run an omnibus service. Therefore this proposal would constitute a dangerous precedent. It involves a menace to national economy and no more objectionable measure could be advocated by a public body at the present time. We hear on all hands protests from our constituents and from all sections of the community against what is called waste and squandermania, yet here it is sought to introduce a Bill which represents waste to a most profligate extent. At no time is it wise to confer such wide financial freedom on any public authority. But in this case it is particularly to be deprecated, inasmuch as the majority of the Durham County Council is composed of the Labour party, and the chairman has openly boasted: "We are not afraid of high rates." Why are they not afraid? It is because they are spending other people's money. That is the case in all councils where there is a Labour majority. This is only another attempt to get nationalisation in by the thin edge of the wedge and by devious methods, and when at this crisis, as we know, the forces of disruption and disorder are using the weapon of nationalisation in their war against the community, I am strongly of opinion that the House should refuse a Second Reading to this Bill
    Mr. LAWSON: I have been wondering how it was possible for municipalities or county administrative authorities to nationalise anything. As far as I can gather, the statement has been repeatedly made that we are seeking to promote some nationalisation stunt in this matter, and
    1420
    the hon. Gentleman would give the House of Commons the impression that, because this county council happens to have a Labour majority, therefore it is composed of the type of wild man extremist out for some particular fad or idea, regardless of those who have to pay.
    Mr. GRITTEN: There are no wild men in Durham.
    Mr. LAWSON: I am very pleased the hon. Gentleman is so proud of his county as to say that, but as a member of that Council I should be prepared to set that Council as a businesslike body and as a body expressing a civic spirit and anxiety for the welfare of the county beside almost any similar authority in this country, I care not how many business men it may have upon it. The point has been made by the hon. and gallant Member for Buckingham (Captain Bowyer) that there are 55 members of the County Council who are not ratepayers and that therefore we were going to play ducks and drakes with other people's money. I should like the hon. Gentleman to note this, that the strongest, outstanding opponent in the Council to this measure did not take that line at all. He took the line that it was a poor measure because everybody were ratepayers, all the workers themselves, and that therefore all persons in the county would have to bear the loss if it were a financial failure. I think the day has long gone by when we can segregate people who pay rates and people who do not pay rates, because everyone, directly or indirectly feels the weight of these matters, and therefore is alive to his own particular welfare in the long run.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No.
    Mr. LAWSON: That was the line that was taken by the representative of the employers in the county council, that the weight of this matter, if it was a financial failure, was going to be borne by the bulk of the people, who are all ratepayers. The hon. Member for the Hartlepools (Mr. Gritten) took exception to the Bill because they were going to be left out of it in the Hartlepool area. That was the impression conveyed to me, at any rate. I wonder how he can complain on those lines when he says that his Council is protesting against the Bill itself, but I would suggest to the hon. Member that at least the Durham County Council does

    1421
    not leave even them out of consideration. We are at the present time making a road into Hartlepool, and a very expensive road at that, right along the coast, for at the present time it is an utterly detached part of the county and is a very difficult area to deal with from a geographical point of view, as the Hartlepool people themselves will admit. One of the points that was raised was that Mr. Hamilton, giving evidence before a Select Committee, had stated that, on the whole, at the present time tramways did not pay, and his authority has been fortified by the hon. Member for Hartlepool. That is a very serious statement, and I know Mr. Hamilton is a very great authority upon these matters. I am prepared to take his authority, because he happens to be the expert that we engaged to investigate this matter, and he told us that these tramways particularly, and this venture, will easily be a paying venture. Therefore, if his authority is worth acknowledging in these matters on that side of the House, it is also worth acknowledging when it is given on our side.
    10.0 P.M.
    We as a county council have very great difficulties in a great county like Durham. There have been quite a number of other problems that have been engaging our time and attention, and we did not go out of our way to launch this venture at all, but were faced with a very real need. It is an area in which the population has largely followed the coal measures. As an hon. Member opposite said, very large numbers,of people are concentrated on small spaces, and we have collieries round which are living as many as 20,000 people that are in some cases five miles from the nearest railway station. That cannot be challenged, and if the Bill goes upstairs it can be proved. We have areas large in numbers of people, such as on the north-west side of the county, in which I myself live, for which the last train leaves Newcastle at 25 minutes past 8. We have tried repeatedly with the North-Eastern Railway Company to supply the very large population in that area with a train later than that, but after trying for years we have not been able to get the consent of the company. There you have a population that is largely cut off from the rest of the county, a large mining population in the main, where the buses do run, and it is quite
    1422
    true that the transport arrangements have been speeded up since this Bill was introduced. If they speed up at the same rate during the consideration of this Bill in Committee as they have done since it was introduced, we are going to get some little improvement in some senses. What is the situation? I will take Chester-le-Street, which is the centre of the omnibus system for the north-west of Durham and for Durham and Chester-le-Street. There are sights at that place—and I am pleased to have the opportunity of stating it publicly in the House of Commons—which are a disgrace to the community. The people are fighting on Friday and Saturday nights like tigers in order to get places. There is no arrangement for regularising these people and putting them into queues, there are no shelters, and there are disgraceful sights in which men women, and children are engaged, and if the result of this Bill being brought before the House was that I should get the opportunity of making that statement publicly and it had some effect, then I say our efforts in that direction are not going to have been wasted.
    The same applies to the county as a whole. A I have said, there is a large population on small areas, and from the health point of view we say that it is about time that that matter was faced and dealt with, and that we have to take a wide and a long view of the needs of the county as a whole. We desire to extend the population, and therefore we want to lay down a system which is regular, a good service, at a decent price, upon which the people can rely. At the present time no one can say that the system that operates in Durham is reliable. I know that to my sorrow. I submit there is no reliance on the present system. There has been an attempt to speed up, but that an omnibus arrives in a quarter of an hour's time, or anything of that nature, is untrue. Then, take the tramway system. Most thoughtful men considered long years ago there was great need for a connection between Gateshead and Durham and Spennymoor. It is true there is a railway system which runs between, but even now, in the chaotic system of omnibuses, and so on, that operates, the crowd prefer to use the road, and we prefer, instead of paying endless money for the repairing of the road, to lay down a tramway system

    1423
    which can provide facilities, particularly from Durham to Spennymoor, which is a widely detached neighbourhood. One hon. Member has referred to Clause 87 as a particularly atrocious Clause. I would draw his attention to the fact that that is a Clause in every private Bill of a similar nature, as he will find if he looks at Bills promoted by the Middlesex County Council and other county councils.
    I appeal to this House to give us this Bill, or, at any rate, to let it go to a Committee in order that the statements we make may be examined and also the representations made on the other side. If the County Council could have avoided dealing with this matter in view of education and other great matters with which we have to deal, we certainly would have preferred to have let it alone. But, in the interests of transport in the county and the giving of facilities to people to move from one place to another, children to get to schools under our secondary school system, and a whole mass of causes that could be stated, I ask this House to let this Bill go to a Committee.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The hon. Member for Chester-le-Street (Mr. Lawson) is one whose name is on the back of the Bill, and, therefore, I take it that any statements he makes are statements which have the authority of the promoters. He made an attack on the omnibus company, and a paper has been given to me, on which I can rely, containing the statement that the Northern Transport Company had 54 omnibuses operating in this district prior to the War. The Government impressed 28 of these vehicles during the War. The company has now, within two years from the end of the War, increased that number from 26 to 100, and there are 100 omnibuses operating now by this one company, and they are prepared to put on more as soon as the County Council, which is promoting this Bill, will sanction routes on which they ask to run them. Of course, the County Council will not sanction a company putting omnibuses on roads when they have a rival scheme of their own. My hon. Friend also tells us that he is going to produce, as the technical expert in support of this Bill, the gentleman who has assured the County Council
    1424
    that this scheme is going to pay. He is Mr. Hamilton, the manager of the Leeds Tramways. Now, the monthly returns of the Leeds Corporation show that Mr. Hamilton's own tramways are losing money every month, and have been doing so for some time. I would like to say that a great deal of the opposition to the Bill comes from the hon. Member's own particular district. Practically the whole of the frontagers on the route the tramway is going to run from Chester-le-Street to Newcastle have signed a petition against this Bill. The Chester-le-Street Rural District Council has also protested against the Bill.
    When an hon. Member comes to the House to ask for the Second Reading of a Bill, the House is entitled to know the whole of the facts, and I think there is a responsibility upon hon. Members who put their names on the back of a Bill to tell the House the whole of the facts both for and against. My hon. Friend who has just spoken did not tell us also that the Chamber of Commerce of Chester-le-Street has presented a petition against the Bill. That does not look as if his constituency is quite as unanimous in favour of the Bill as he would have us believe. When statements are put before the House by great authorities like county councils, they ought to be—to put it plainly—perfectly true statements. Now, the Durham County Council has favoured us this morning with a statement containing a plan on which are marked, in red ink, tramways and trollyways proposed by the Bill. I have a plan here on which are marked the tramways and trollyways proposed by the Bill. I have gone through these two plans with the Bill itself, and I say that the plan attached to the statement of the Durham County Council is absolutely and totally untrue. They put a plan before the House asking us to believe that the proposals in this Bill are contained on certain red lines. I have myself gone through the Bill with this plan. I have marked in pencil six tramways or trollyways which are not marked in the plan which has been put before us by the Durham County Council. This was not issued a month or two ago, but it was issued yesterday, or, at all events, it was received by Members of Parliament this morning, and we were asked to assume that these were the only proposals contained in the Bill. Then we have a

    1425
    further remarkable statement showing that the original estimate for carrying out the works was £1,600,000, and for certain reasons the engineers have been able to reduce it to £1,027,000. Either the engineers must be frightful fools or they are going to drop some of the schemes. Is it that they are going to drop some of these grandiose schemes because the localities do not want them? Either the engineers grossly overestimated by nearly 50 per cent.—
    Sir F. BANBURY: Sixty per cent.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: So much the worse for the engineers. I say that, either the engineers grossly overestimated, or else certain parts are being dropped. I hope somebody from the County of Durham will answer the questions I have put with regard to keeping this information from the House of Commons, why it is we are only given a plan containing half the scheme, and why these estimates are reduced by this enormous amount. I want to deal really with the point as to whether this House should dismiss the Bill or send it upstairs, and I should imagine that almost certainly it would be kicked downstairs by the Committee. The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Major Barnes) told us that the Durham County Council was so very important a body that the House of Commons ought not to refuse to give a Second Reading to this Bill which has been printed by so important a body. Surely if this body is so important it would be better for the House of Commons itself to consider the Bill than that a Private Bill Committee, consisting of four Members, should turn down the Bill of so important a council. For imagine what would be said at the next meeting of this Durham County Council if the Bill were turned down by Committee upstairs! Imagine the Socialist members making speeches of the most violent character to the effect that five Members of the House of Commons —[An HON. MEMBER: "Four Members!"] —Yes, four Members, have dared to throw out this wonderful scheme over which the whole county council has been pondering for some years past! I wonder what the members of the Durham County Council would say to that? No, this is one of those occasions on which I think the House of Commons should have the courage of its own opinions, and deal with this Bill on matter of
    1426
    principle rather than send it upstairs to one of its own Committees and put upon that Committee the onus of placing upon the county council and the local authorities who are opposing it the very great expense of appearing by agents, counsel, and witnesses before that particular Committee.
    Further, let me look at the matter for a little while from the road point of view. I have the honour to be a member of the Roads Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Transport. I think the Bill should have been sent to that Committee for its opinion. I do not know that I ought to go into details, but an amount has been submitted to the Ministry lately by the Committee for allocation from the proceeds of the motor tax, which, as the House knows, amounts to about £8,500,000 per year. This will be spent on the first and second class roads of the country. A considerable amount of that fund will go to the roads of the county of Durham.
    Mr. WATERSON: What is the amount?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I do not know that I ought to give it, because the figures have not yet been officially passed by the Ministry.
    Mr. WATERSON: Well, then, leave it alone!
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: But I am, I think, entitled to tell the House that the Committee has approved a considerable amount which will be allocated to the county of Durham for its roads. This money is provided by the users of the roads in order that the roads may be brought up to the standard of efficiency for the people who use them. I put it to this House that without the assent of that Committee which has to look after this fund, and, as a matter of principle, it is undesirable that large portions of these newly-constructed roads brought up to the level for the necessary of motor traffic should be monopolised by 27 to 33 miles of new tramways. The tramway system of this county, as has been practically admitted in this House to-night, is not paying its way even on the old prices and the old rates of money.
    Mr. LAWSON: Is anything paying its way?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: My hon. Friend wants to know whether anything is paying its way. That is a very difficult

    1427
    question to answer. But it is quite clear that if the system of transport could not pay its way when money could be borrowed at 4 per cent., and the cost of construction was half what it is now, is it likely to pay its way when the promoters will have to borrow this enormous sum of £1,500,000 at 7 or 6½ per cent., and when the cost of construction will be twice as much as in the pre-War period?
    I will not stand much longer between the House and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport, but I am going to ask him quite frankly to leave the decision on this Bill to the House as a whole. I ask the hon. Gentleman that whatever line he may take on this measure, that he should not put on the Government Whips, but should allow the House of Commons on this occasion, free and unfettered, to give a decision as to whether they consider this scheme, this very grandiose scheme, of State Socialism—I do not hesitate to say it is that—in the County of Durham should have a Second Reading. It is not fair to put a great question of this kind to a Private Bill Committee upstairs. If the Durham County Council is to be allowed to spend these millions on Socialistic road schemes, every county council, which holds the same views will be coming along and imposing enormous charges in the future on the ratepayers. An hon. Member who supports the Bill tells us that the bulk of the people who will use these tramways and so on are already ratepayers. He knows, of course, and we all know, that vast numbers of people who live in the county of Durham to-day are living in colliery cottages and pay no rent at all. That is perfectly true. There is no county in England where there is so large a proportion of non-ratepayers than in the county of Durham. There is no county in England which has so large a proportion of inhabitants who do not pay any rates at all, and it is in respect of those people that we are asked to send this Bill upstairs. That is a matter of principle and it is one in which the House ought to have the courage of its opinion. I ask the representative of the Ministry of Transport to leave the decision of this Bill to the unfettered judgment of the House.
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of TRANSPORT (Mr. Neal): I hope it will be convenient to
    1428
    the House that I should now state briefly the decision of the Government in regard to this Bill. Speaking generally, I understand that it is the practice of the House to give a Second Heading to Private Bills, and the grounds for so doing were expressed by one of the highest possible authorities the other day—I refer to the Chairman of Ways and Means—who indicated that it is usual to leave the decision as to the proof of the preamble in the hands of the Select Committee to whom the Bill is referred. It seems to me that a Bill which is promoted by a duly elected democratic body, whatever its political complexion may happen to be, is not less entitled to the same consideration as if it was being promoted by some private individual. I do not wish, however, to suggest in any way that this House has not the right and the duty in suitable and proper cases of rejecting upon the Second Reading a Bill to which it thinks it ought not to give even a preliminary sanction.
    Here I would mention some reasons which might operate in that direction which occur to me. If the.Bill is a violation in its terms of some public policy or principle, or if a private Bill oversteps the limits appropriate to private Bill legislation, and proposes an alteration in the general laws without adequate special reason; or if, upon the full consideration of a measure, the House should come to the conclusion that it involves some hopeless adventure or some proceeding which is not calculated in its essence to promote public objects and benefits, or involves expenditure which at the time is inappropriate; or if for other reasons the House thinks the moment is not opportune for dealing with that particular topic, then it would seem to me, if I may say PO with very great diffidence, that in cases of that kind, and it may be in many others, the House will consider whether or not it is wise to put the promoters to the expense of proceeding before the Select Committee. In that connection, and in this case, it should be noted that we are told, there are already some 40 petitions against the Bill, so that Committee procedure would involve a substantial amount of cost both to the promoters and the opponents, and the House, no doubt, will desire to consider whether or not the promoters make out a case, strong enough to justify the incurring of that expense. May I say at once that the Minister of

    1429
    Transport is advised that at the present moment the transport facilities in the County of Durham are insufficient, but that is a state of things which is not uncommon throughout the country, and one has to view it in the light of the circumstance that we are just after emerging from a great war and transport undertaking have not yet had the opportunity of fully adjusting themselves to the new conditions. I wish at once to enter a disclaimer—
    Earl WINTERTON: Will the hon. Gentleman say what he means by the very wide term he has just used to the effect that transport facilities are insufficient? Does he mean tramway facilities, railway facilities or motor facilities?
    Mr. NEAL: I mean exactly what I said. Along some of the roads which are indicated in the Bill there are not reasonable facilities for persons and their goods being moved from place to place at a reasonable cost. I do not by that necessarily suggest that the remedy proposed by the Bill is the best or the most proper remedy. I was saying that times are such that it may be argued fairly that the private enterprises which control some of these roads have not yet had a full opportunity of adjusting themselves to present day conditions. The point I am making at the moment is this, that I do not wish to be understood at all on behalf of the Government as suggesting that there may not be many cases in which it is right for local authorities to promote transport schemes. My hon. and gallant Friend who moved the rejection of the Bill asked me to answer a question as to whether the Government stood for the extinction of private enterprise and favoured public enterprise only. My answer is that they stand for neither. The Ministry of Transport stands for the promotion of efficient and economic transport facilities throughout the land, whether they be promoted by public authorities or by private enterprise. What we are anxious for is to secure all the advantages to the country which can be obtained by transport facilities.
    Captain BOWYER: May I ask does the hon. Gentleman agree with the statement I made that before this Bill can succeed, private enterprise in the county of Durham must fail and be smashed?
    Mr. NEAL: I do not know that that is precisely a question that I could answer, but I certainly should take it that no Select Committee of this House would give assent to a Bill which they thought had for its object, or, indeed, for its result, the extinction of private enterprise, if private enterprise either was giving or promised within a reasonable time to give the facilities that were required.
    Captain BOWYER: What is the view of the Government?
    Mr. NEAL: I have already dealt fairly clearly with that matter. I am sorry if I do not satisfy my hon. and gallant Friend, but I hope that, when he reads what I have said, he will see that it is not obscure, and not opposed to the view which he has put forward. The Bill itself deals with three forms of transport. It deals with tramways—and here I think it right to say that it deals with them on a larger scale than in the case of any county council except that of the Metropolis, indeed I doubt if there is any other precedent for a county council undertaking transport facilities by tramways at all. It deals, secondly, with trolley vehicles, and there is a great deal to be said from the point of view that trolley vehicles have not, up to now, justified themselves financially. It deals, thirdly, with what, so far as I am aware, is a completely new principle in legislation, that is to say, it suggests that the county council should have an unlimited right to run motor omnibuses throughout the area of the administrative county, subject only to getting Departmental sanction from the Ministry of Transport. I believe that that is a totally new suggestion in Private Bill legislation, and I should not be in the least surprised if the promoters found it somewhat difficult to justify a proposal of that description. It seems to me, therefore, that, although this Bill does offer some transport facilities which are desired and needed, although it has the sanction of the county council, which is responsible to the ratepayers of the district, and although that county council may be of a political colour and complexion which may not be fully favoured in this House, yet, on the whole, it seems to me that this Bill raises issues of the highest controversy, and that it does involve

    1431
    very substantial expenditure at a time when it is desirable to restrict capital expenditure within the limits of our present financial stringency; and it seems to me, therefore, that it is precisely one of those cases in which this House would desire to exercise an absolutely free and unfettered judgment.
    Mr. WATERSON: Would it not provide employment whilst unemployment is rampant?
    Mr. NEAL: My hon. Friend invites me into a discussion on economics larger than can be covered by a simple answer to his question. If the work that has to be done is done at extravagant cost and at an inappropriate time, although it may find employment at the moment for numbers of men, it may, in the long run, be one of those factors which tend to keep up costs, and, therefore, to prevent the recovery which the country desires. I was saying that the Government conceives it to be its duty on this occasion to invite the House to express an absolutely free and unfettered judgment on this matter, remembering always the principle with which I started my speech, that it is, primâ facie, right to give a Second Reading to a measure so that it may be investigated by a Select Committee. If other reasons overweigh and outbalance that, if the House should come to the conclusion that the county council in this case has spread its net somewhat too widely, if—to borrow a phrase which is now used, I think, only as a term of affection—the scheme is somewhat grandiose in its scope, and if the House comes to the conclusion that the expenditure involved before the Select Committee would be larger than the circumstances call for at the present time, the Government certainly will not desire to interfere with the free and unfettered expression of those conclusions.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I think on nearly every occasion I have supported private Bills the Second Reading of which has been moved in this House, but there have been occasions when it has been necessary to oppose the Second Reading. Those occasions are when it is perfectly evident that the principle of the Bill is wrong and ought not to be accepted. The principle of this Bill is entirely wrong and ought not to be accepted, and sending it up-
    1432
    stairs would only involve a higher amount of expenditure and would ultimately lead to its rejection. The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Major Barnes) said other county councils ran tramways, and when that statement was challenged he said the London County Council. Last year or the year before the London County Council asked for the suspension of the Standing Orders of the House in order that they might bring in a Bill to extend their tramway system The Committee that deals with the Standing Orders thought the issue was so important that it ought to be dealt with by the House itself, and consequently the question was raised in the House as to whether the Standing Orders should be suspended. The acceptance or rejection of the suspension of the Standing Orders was equivalent to the rejection or acceptance of the Second Reading of the Bill. It was held by a very large majority that the day of the tramway had gone, and consequently leave was refused for the suspension of the Standing Orders. If this House has recently refused the London County Council, which already has a system of tramways, power to extend it, a fortiori it ought to refuse a county council which has no tramways the power to initiate them. The London County Council is not a county council in the sense that the Durham County Council is. London is a conglomeration of what were originally separate towns which have merged into one. It is a totally different thing from an ordinary county council which is going to run tramways along 27 miles of road, and trollys and motor buses for 57 miles. I believe there is not a single county or borough council in the United Kingdom which has power to run motor omnibuses, and if that is so, with the strong feeling that exists at present, against nationalisation and against the interference of local authorities with private enterprise, a Bill to give power to a county council to run motor omnibuses should be rejected.
    One hon. Member who is a member of the Durham County Council (Mr. Richardson) has been expatiating on the merits of the Bill, and his chief argument was that this would be a profitable undertaking and would relieve the ratepayers of certain burdens. On the other hand the hon. Member for Chester-le-

    1433
    Street (Mr. Lawson) spoke of the housing conditions in some parts of Durham as bad. He said that large numbers of people in these areas ought to be spread more over the country. Therefore they are going to run this undertaking, not because it is going to be profitable, but because it is going to spread the inhabitants who are in certain congested areas of Durham over the country districts. It is a semi-philanthropic object, which is going to give better houses or more fresh air for people. That may be a very estimable object, but it is not at all likely to be profitable. The hon. Member also said the trains were late.
    Mr. LAWSON: Too early.
    Sir F. BANBURY: At any rate, he complained about the trains.
    Mr. LAWSON: The expert has given it as his opinion that the proposed system would be a success.
    Sir F. BANBURY: I have heard that expert before. I sat in this House and heard Mr. John Burns, speaking at length and with considerable force of language, telling me that I was utterly wrong because the London County Council experts said that steamboats on the Thames would be a paying concern. I said that they would not. Very few people in those days opposed Mr. Burns on that subject—I think I divided the House against it, or I should have done so if I could get a teller against it—and the consequence was that the steamboats were started, but they were withdrawn after a short time. The loss was, I believe, £300,000, if not more. Therefore I do not pay much attention to experts. It is to the interest of the expert to have an undertaking carried out because he gets his commission. If it is successful, he is a great man, and if it is unsuccessful, he says that various things have arisen which have made his estimate wrong, and that he never thought certain things would arise. In this case he might say, if the scheme fails: "The Durham County Council have not taken my advice on a particular point." I remember the old Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway coming to London and asking for £8,000,000 in order to bring their railway to London. In the prospectus it was said that it was going to be a most remunerative undertaking. I am glad to
    1434
    say that I did not put any of my money into the undertaking, because instead of costing £8,000,000 it cost £14,000,000, and the result was that its Preference stock which had paid ceased to pay any dividend. It says that the figures at the head of the diagram will show how low is the existing indebtedness. Just because the county happens to have been run economically, and they happen not to owe very much money at present, they are prepared to enter into vast expenditure. How such an argument could be used, especially at a time like this, when money is very difficult to obtain, is beyond my comprehension. I earnestly hope that the House will reject the Bill.
    Colonel NEWMAN: One of the strongest points of the Ministry of Transport which has not been answered is that here is the Durham County Council, a democratically-elected body, and by an enormous majority it approved of the principle of spending £1,600,000 of the ratepayers' money on this system of trollys, trams, and omnibuses, and therefore we ought to give this Bill a Second Reading, and send it upstairs. That is a fairly strong argument. I happened to be up in Durham at this famous meeting on 16th December, which was a very snowy, inclement evening. I went up to speak for the Middle Class Union. I should not have been surprised if on that evening I had a sparsely-filled hall. To my surprise, the hall was filled to overflowing. They listened to my speech, but I could see that I was not the big man of the evening, and I found out afterwards why. With the true sporting Northern spirit, the Durham branch of the Middle Class Union had asked the chairman of the Durham County Council to come and state their case at this meeting, representing a majority of the ratepayers of the city of Durham. They also asked Bishop Welldon, Dean of Durham, to state the case against the Bill. These two gentlemen had a mighty set-to. The Chairman of the County Council told us frankly that he was a Socialist, and wanted to see the rates high. He was opposed to private enterprise as such. He made one of the best Socialistic speeches I ever heard. He was answered by Bishop Welldon, and then the meeting, by an overwhelming majority, decided that the County of Durham should do without these trams. That being the case why was not a poll taken of the ratepayers of

    1435
    the County Durham to ascertain their views two years ago or one year ago? When the ratepayers were asked to elect the county council, and the borough councils, and urban districtt councils, was it put to them that the county council desired to spend £1,600,000 of their money?
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Fifteen years ago this thing was talked about by the Durham County Council as one of their objects.
    Colonel NEWMAN: Fifteen years ago there was not a 6s. Income Tax, and local rates were much lower. The hon. Member for Houghton-le-Spring does not know what his own rates are. The keenest member of this efficient Durham County Council does not know what his rates are. These are the rates for 1920, mark you, not this year, compared with 1914. In 1914, the rates in Durham were 6s. 6d. in the £ in 1920 they had gone up to 17s. in the £.
    Mr. R. RICHARDSON: Durham City.
    Colonel NEWMAN: Durham City. A rise of 161·5 per cent.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: That is not under the County Council at all.
    Colonel NEWMAN: I think the hon. Member for Houghton-le-Spring would like to know something about his own rates. In 1914 his rates were 8s. 2d.; in 1920 they were 16s. 7d., a rise of 104·1 per cent.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: Compare that with the present value of money.
    Colonel NEWMAN: That is the old value of money. The rates have risen very substantially. Rates are a serious factor in Durham and in Houghton-le-Spring. Here is a scheme which is going to cost money. The Chairman of the County Council knows it is going to cost money, and he wants it to cost money. It is not fair to put that on these ratepayers without their consent, until they have been specifically asked the question. Therefore, I beg the House to vote against the Second Reading.
    Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
    The House divided: Ayes, 46; Noes, 112.

    Division No. 74.]

    AYES.

    [10.55 p.m.

    Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)

    Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Widnes)

    Smith, W. R. (Wellingborough)

    Barnes, Major H. (Newcastle, E.)

    Hirst, G. H.

    Spencer, George A.

    Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)

    Irving, Dan

    Spoor, B. G.

    Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.

    John, William (Rhondda, West)

    Sturrock, J. Leng

    Cape, Thomas

    Jones, J. T. (Carmarthen, Lianelly)

    Swan, J. E.

    Carter, W. (Nottingham, Mansfield)

    Kenyon, Barnet

    Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)

    Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)

    Lunn, William

    Tootill, Robert

    Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

    Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)

    Waterson, A. E.

    Edwards, G. (Norfolk, South)

    Matthews, David

    Wedgwood, Colonel J. C.

    Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

    Mills, John Edmund

    Williams, Aneurin (Durham, Consett)

    Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

    Morgan, Major D. Watts

    Wilson, W. Tyson (Westhoughton)

    Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)

    Myers, Thomas

    Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)

    Grundy, T. W.

    Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

    Guest, J. (York, W. R., Hemsworth)

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

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Hall, F. (York, W.R., Normanton)

    Robertson, John

    Mr. R. Richardson and Mr.

    Hayday, Arthur

    Rose, Frank H.

    Lawson.

    Hayward, Major Evan

    Sexton, James

    NOES.

    Atkey, A. R.

    Colvin, Brig.-General Richard Beale

    Grant, James A.

    Banbury, Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick G.

    Conway, Sir W. Martin

    Gretton, Colonel John

    Barnett, Major R. W.

    Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

    Gritten, W. G. Howard

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

    Curzon, Captain Viscount

    Guest, Major O. (Leic., Loughboro')

    Birchall, Major J. Dearman

    Dean, Lieut.-Commander P. T.

    Hacking, Captain Douglas H.

    Blair, Sir Reginald

    Doyle, N. Grattan

    Hamilton, Major C. G. C.

    Boscawen, Rt. Hon. Sir A. Griffith-

    Edwards, Hugh (Glam., Neath)

    Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry

    Borwick, Major G. O.

    Farquharson, Major A. C.

    Harmsworth, Hon. E. C. (Kent)

    Boyd-Carpenter, Major A.

    Ford, Patrick Johnston

    Henderson, Major V. L. (Tradeston)

    Brassey, Major H. L. C.

    Forestier-Walker, L.

    Herbert, Dennis (Hertford, Watford)

    Bruton, Sir James

    Forrest, Walter

    Hinds, John

    Buckley, Lieut.-Colonel A.

    Foxcroft, Captain Charles Talbot

    Hohler, Gerald Fitzroy

    Burdon, Colonel Rowland

    Fraser, Major Sir Keith

    Hood, Joseph

    Burn, Col. C. R. (Devon, Torquay)

    Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.

    Hume-Williams, Sir W. Ellis

    Carr, W. Theodore

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Jackson, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. F. S.

    Cautley, Henry S.

    Ganzoni, Captain Sir F. J. C.

    James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert

    Child, Brigadier-General Sir Hill

    Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

    Jephcott, A. R.

    Clay, Lieut.-Colonel H. H. Spender

    Gilbert, James Daniel

    Jodrell, Neville Paul

    Cobb, Sir Cyril

    Gould, James C.

    Joynson-Hicks, Sir William

    King, Captain Henry Douglas

    Parkinson, Albert L. (Blackpool)

    Thomas, Brig.-Gen. Sir O. (Anglesey)

    Knights, Capt. H. N. (C'berwell, N.)

    Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

    Warner, Sir T. Courtenay T.

    Locker-Lampson, Com. O. (H'tingd'n)

    Purchase, H. G.

    Wheler, Lieut.-Colonel C. H.

    Lorden, John William

    Raw, Lieutenant-Colonel N.

    White, Lieut.-Col. G. D. (Southport)

    Lowtner, Major C. (Cumberland, N.)

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

    Whitla, Sir William

    McLaren, Robert (Lanark, Northern)

    Roberts, Sir S. (Sheffield, Ecclesall)

    Wigan, Brig. -Gen. John Tyson

    M'Lean, Lieut.-Col. Charles W. W.

    Robinson, Sir T. (Lanes, Stretford)

    Wild, Sir Ernest Edward

    Macpherson, Rt. Hon. James I.

    Roundell, Colonel R. F.

    Williams, Lt.-Com. C. (Tavistock)

    Macquisten, F. A.

    Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)

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

    Mason, Robert

    Samuel, Samuel (W'dsworth, Putney)

    Willoughby, Lieut.-Col. Hon. Claud

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

    Sanders, Colonel Sir Robert A.

    Wills, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Gilbert

    Morden, Lieut.-Col. W. Grant

    Shaw, William T. (Forfar)

    Wilson, Colonel Leslie O. (Reading)

    Moreing, Captain Algernon H.

    Smith, Sir Allan M. (Croydon, South)

    Wise, Frederick

    Morison, Rt. Hon. Thomas Brash

    Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

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

    Morrison, Hugh

    Stanier, Captain Sir Beville

    Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.

    Murchison, C. K.

    Steel, Major S. Strang

    Newman, Colonel J. R. P. (Finchley)

    Strauss, Edward Anthony

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

    Nicholson, Reginald (Doncaster)

    Sugden, W. H.

    Captain Bowyer and Brigadier-

    Nicholson, William G. (Petersfield)

    Sutherland, Sir William

    General Surtees.

    Ormsby-Gore, Hon. W.

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. Lord E. (Chich'st'r)

    Question put, and agreed to.

    Words added.
    Second Reading put off for six months.

  SUPPLY.
  Again considered in Committee.
  [Sir E. CORNWALL in the chair.]
  CIVIL SERVICES ESTIMATES AND SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1921–22.

  SUPPLY.

    CLASS II.
    CABINET OFFICES.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    11.0 P.M.
    "That a sum, not exceeding £42,589 (including a Supplementary sum of £6,050), be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1922, for the Salary of the Minister without portfolio, and Salaries and Expenses of the Cabinet Offices and of the Committee of Imperial Defence, including the cost of preparation of War Histories." [Note.— £25,000 has been voted on account.]
    Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to. —[Colonel Leslie Wilson.]
    Resolution to be reported To-morrow; Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.

  PUBLIC HEALTH (TUBERCULOSIS) [EXPENSES].
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir E. CORNWALL in the Chair.]
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That it is expedient to make provision for the payment, in the first instance, out
  1438
  of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Minister of Health in arranging for the treatment of tuberculosis under any Act of the present Session, to make further provision with respect to arrangements by local authorities for the treatment of tuberculosis, subject, however, to power being conferred on the Minister to recover any amounts so paid from local authorities failing to make such arrangements."—[Sir A. Mond.]
  Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: I have not the least objection to the expenditure of this sum, or to the Bill for which this Resolution is necessary, but I feel it incumbent upon me to protest against the growing practice of the Government of taking these Money Resolutions as a formal stage at a time when they cannot be subjected to the criticism of the House of Commons. That practice has become almost universal, and, in consequence, the Committee stage is reduced to a mere formality, thereby depriving the House of its proper control over public expenditure.
  Colonel GRETTON: This procedure is very much in the hands of the Committee itself. If the Committee wishes to make an examination of the Resolution, now is the time to do it. In this particular case, I think there is no serious opposition to the proposed expenditure, but I would like to enter the caveat that we should be well advised to examine these Resolutions more carefully in general than we propose to do on this occasion.
  Resolution to be reported to-morrow.

  MINISTRY OF HEALTH ACT, 1919.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Ministry of Health (Factories and Workshops, Transfer of Powers) Draft Order, presented the 28th day of February, 1921, be approved."—[Sir A. Mond.]
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: I wish to call attention to this extremely important Draft Order which gees to the root of the formation of the Ministry of Health. The formation of the Ministry of Health was heralded with great words as regards the prospects of the custody of the health of the nation and to it were referred certain powers, while certain other powers were reserved that might be added afterwards. Thirdly, there was a general power of taking over other powers that might conduce to the national health. Amongst the powers that were mostly excluded were those that are vital to the health of the community at present administered by the Home Office, and it was a very serious and sound criticism of the Ministry of Health in its original constitution and conception that the whole question of health in the factories as administered by the Home Office should have been excluded from the functions of the Ministry. However, we have some very small contribution in the right direction by this draft Order. I may say, incidentally, that it is extremely difficult to keep watch on what goes on in this way in this House. It was with the greatest difficulty that I obtained a copy of this Order. I was told it was not to be had in the Vote Office, and I fished it out in the Library with the help of the Librarian, and I was then able to get a copy of it in the Vote Office. This Order transfers to the Ministry of Health certain powers and duties of certain sections of the Factory and Workshops Act, 1901, and these are the powers transferred, namely: Section 61 (Prohibition of employment of women after childbirth), Sections 97 to 100 (Provisions relating to bakehouses), Section 109 (Making of wearing apparel where there is scarlet fever or smallpox), and Section 110 (Prohibition of home work where there is infectious disease). There will be no doubt that those are all pertinent to the Ministry of Health, and we should like the Ministry to have these powers. But I feel sure the House will agree with me that they are small details entirely out of relation to any comprehensive conception of the duties of the Ministry of Health as regards the health of the people in their working hours. I hope therefore this may be a prelude only, by slow but steady steps, to the gradual transference to the Ministry of Health
  1440
  as and when it may be convenient and possible, of the whole general conception and survey of health matters in factories and workshops. I think this is a step in the right direction, but I would only warn the House as to how these matters are taken as a matter of course and routine, and they require a great deal more understanding and inquiry than is given to them, but I hope when the right hon. Gentleman has got well into the saddle at the Ministry he will not consider it necessary simply to rise in his place and bow his head, but will explain an Order which I think is quite unintelligible to any Member of the House.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That the Ministry of Health (Registration and Elections, Transfer of Powers) Draft Order, presented the 9th day of March, 1921, be approved."—[Sir A. Mond.]
  Captain W. BENN: I think it would have been more considerate to the House if the Minister of Health had been so good as to explain what these Orders are. I have secured copies, and, so far as I can judge, there is no objection to them, but I think he might have explained them, notwithstanding the fatiguing day he has had. Can he assure us that the transference of these powers does not mean that he will come to the House for additional staff or additional money? What seems to me likely to happen is that the Department relinquishing the powers will go on with the old staff and expenditure according to the Estimate presented, and the Minister of Health, finding these new powers presented to him, will come for more staff and more money.
  Sir A. MOND: I can assure my hon. and gallant Friend that it was from no want of courtesy that I did not explain these details, but the hour being late I thought Members desired to get home. It is not intended or considered necessary to appoint any additional staff to take over these duties; in fact, the intention is to endeavour to entrust certain duties to the Home Office who will be better able to deal with them, and, in the meantime, no additional staff will be required.
  Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE: I would only like to add what I have said before, that this is no ordinary matter that should be glossed over in a few minutes. Here we are, constituting what may in the future be one of the most vital

  1441
  Ministries of the State. We are taking to-day certain powers, and transferring certain other powers, and are doing it in the way customary to our Constitution, by degrees, as we are able to arrange for the transference of duties. Yet the Minister thinks that this is a trivial matter, which can be dealt with by a shake of the head. I think it is vital to recognise here that we are helping in the hatching out of the egg of the Ministry of Health from the old egg of the Local Government Board. It is only right that we should do so by degrees. I hope that process will continue, but I hope that in doing so the House will recognise that they are not simply changing duties from one Department to another, but giving an opportunity to assist, enlarge, and strengthen the work of the Ministry of Health.

  PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE.
  Ordered, "That Lieut.-Colonel Walter Guinness be added to the Committee."—[Colonel Gibbs.]

  PUBLIC HEALTH (OFFICERS) (NO. 2) BILL.
  Read a Second time, and committed to a Standing Committee.
  The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

  ADJOURNMENT.
  Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Colonel Leslie Wilson.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Seventeen Minutes after Eleven o'clock.

NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  APPEAL TRIBUNAL DECISIONS.
  APPEAL TRIBUNAL DECISIONS.
  DISABLED MEN (PERMANENT PENSIONS).
  DISABLED MEN (PERMANENT PENSIONS).
  ARREARS OF PENSION (MR. W. A. MILLER, GLASGOW).
  ARREARS OF PENSION (MR. W. A. MILLER, GLASGOW).
  DEPENDANT'S ALLOWANCE (W. STARK).
  DEPENDANT'S ALLOWANCE (W. STARK).
  WIDOWS' APPEALS.
  WIDOWS' APPEALS.
  BELLAHOUSTON HOSPITAL, GLASGOW (ADMINISTRATION).
  BELLAHOUSTON HOSPITAL, GLASGOW (ADMINISTRATION).
  MENTAL CASES (DEPENDANTS' ALLOWANCES).
  MENTAL CASES (DEPENDANTS' ALLOWANCES).
  HASTINGS CASES.
  HASTINGS CASES.
BRITISH ARMY.
  ARMY OF OCCUPATION (UNIFORMS AND EQUIPMENT).
  ARMY OF OCCUPATION (UNIFORMS AND EQUIPMENT).
  RECIPIENTS.
  RECIPIENTS.
  BRITISH GRAVES, GERMANY AND AUSTRIA.
  BRITISH GRAVES, GERMANY AND AUSTRIA.
  ROYAL ENGINEERS (C. C. GIBSON).
  ROYAL ENGINEERS (C. C. GIBSON).
COAL INDUSTRY DISPUTE.
  DEFENCE FORCE.
  DEFENCE FORCE.
ROYAL NAVY.
  H.M.S. "BITTERN" (CREW'S SERVICE RECORDS).
  H.M.S. "BITTERN" (CREW'S SERVICE RECORDS).
IRELAND.
  MOTOR TRAFFIC RESTRICTIONS (MR. CALVERT).
  MOTOR TRAFFIC RESTRICTIONS (MR. CALVERT).
  FIRES, WESTPORT.
  FIRES, WESTPORT.
  ARREST.
  ARREST.
  COURTS OF INQUIRY.
  COURTS OF INQUIRY.
  PEMBROKE FIRE BRIGADE STATION, DUBLIN (POLICE RAID).
  PEMBROKE FIRE BRIGADE STATION, DUBLIN (POLICE RAID).
  ALLEGED OUTRAGES.
  ALLEGED OUTRAGES.
  MURDER (MR. S. O'BRIEN).
  MURDER (MR. S. O'BRIEN).
  VACCINATION (PROSECUTION AND ARREST).
  VACCINATION (PROSECUTION AND ARREST).
INDIA.
  ROYAL ARMY MEDICAL CORPS OFFICERS (PAY).
  ROYAL ARMY MEDICAL CORPS OFFICERS (PAY).
SCOTLAND.
  CENSUS ENUMERATORS, KIRKCALDY.
  CENSUS ENUMERATORS, KIRKCALDY.
  CRIMINAL PROSECUTION, GLASGOW.
  CRIMINAL PROSECUTION, GLASGOW.
  HEATHER BURNING.
  HEATHER BURNING.
  FISHING INDUSTRY (WAR WRECK).
  FISHING INDUSTRY (WAR WRECK).
  JAPANESE AIR SERVICE (BRITISH OFFICERS).
  JAPANESE AIR SERVICE (BRITISH OFFICERS).
UNEMPLOYMENT.
  INSURANCE ACT.
  INSURANCE ACT.
  RELIEF SCHEME (STOKE-ON-TRENT).
  RELIEF SCHEME (STOKE-ON-TRENT).
  TRADE BOARDS ACT.
  TRADE BOARDS ACT.
HOUSING.
  MUNICIPAL HOUSES, BLACKBURN.
  MUNICIPAL HOUSES, BLACKBURN.
  LIGHT CASTINGS.
  LIGHT CASTINGS.
  BOUNDARY EXTENSIONS, LEEDS AND BRADFORD.
  BOUNDARY EXTENSIONS, LEEDS AND BRADFORD.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE.
TRADE AND COMMERCE.
  PETROLEUM (UNITED STATES EXPORTS).
  PETROLEUM (UNITED STATES EXPORTS).
  KEY INDUSTRIES BILL.
  KEY INDUSTRIES BILL.
  MANUFACTURED GOODS (IMPORTS).
  MANUFACTURED GOODS (IMPORTS).
  RUSSIAN TRADE AGREEMENT.
  RUSSIAN TRADE AGREEMENT.
POST OFFICE.
  SUB-OFFICES (MID-DAY CLOSING).
  SUB-OFFICES (MID-DAY CLOSING).
  MOTOR CARS (QUARTERLY LICENCES).
  MOTOR CARS (QUARTERLY LICENCES).
EDUCATION.
  ST. GEORGE'S DAY.
  ST. GEORGE'S DAY.
  OLD AGE PENSIONS.
  OLD AGE PENSIONS.
  INCOME TAX.
  INCOME TAX.
  ENTERTAINMENT DUTY.
  ENTERTAINMENT DUTY.
  SUMMER TIME
  SUMMER TIME
  EAST AFRICA.
  EAST AFRICA.
  MINISTRY OF MUNITIONS (INQUIRY COMMITTEE).
  MINISTRY OF MUNITIONS (INQUIRY COMMITTEE).