Sitting of 4 March 1921

Preamble
The House met at Twelve of the Clock.
The CLERK AT THE TABLE informed the House of the unavoidable absence of Mr. SPEAKER from this day's Sitting.
Whereupon Mr. WHITLEY, the Chairman of Ways and Means, proceeded to the Table and, after Prayers, took the Chair as Deputy-Speaker, pursuant to the Standing Order.

STREET ACCIDENTS CAUSED BY VEHICLES.
Address for Return "showing the number of Accidents resulting in death or personal injury known by the police to have been caused by Vehicles in Streets, Roads, or Public Places during the year ending the 31st day of December, 1920 (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 40, of Session 1920)."—[Sir John Baird.]

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Pilotage Provisional Orders (No. 1) Bill,
Read a Second time, and committed.

RAILWAY AGREEMENTS (PERSONAL STATEMENT).
Major DAVID DAVIES: I desire to make a personal statement with reference to a speech made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) in Monday's Debate on Supply, when, owing to a long-standing engagement in my constituency, I was unable to be present. My right hon. Friend, as reported in the OFFICIAL REPORT, said that in a speech at the annual meeting of the Cambrian Railway Company I informed the shareholders that
"A signal box man who earned 21s. in 1914, now obtained 134s. 6d. per week, and in another case a man who earned 17s. a week, now received 133s. a week."
He also said, in reply to a question put by the right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London (Sir F. Banbury):
"I say it is simply not true. If that is the explanation, why was not that said?"—
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[OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th February, 1920; col. 1484, Vol. 138.]
May I be allowed to quote what I actually did say in the speech to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby referred? I said:
"The result to us"—
that is to say, the Company—
"has been that whilst our wages bill for 1913 amounted to some £120,000, for last year the amount paid was nearly half a million. It may be interesting perhaps to have a few instances given to you showing how far-reaching these changes have been. We estimate that the eight-hours days alone has cost us some £70,000 per annum. A signal box which cost us 21s. per week to work in 1914 now costs us 134s. 6d. per week. Another signal box which cost 17s. per week now costs 133s. per week. At another station wages amounting to 73s. per week have risen to 311s. 6d. per week."
The House will observe that I gave specific instances of the present cost of working signal boxes as compared with the cost in 1914, whereas my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby told the House that these figures referred to wages paid to individual signalmen. I made it quite clear that the increased costs were due not only to the increases in wages, but also to the operation of the eight-hours day. As the accuracy of this statement has been challenged and my veracity has been impugned, and as I have not had an opportunity of refuting the charges brought against me, I thought it only right that I should ask the indulgence of the House to allow me to make this statement. Had I been informed by my right hon. Friend that he intended to raise these points, I should have been very happy to have placed all the facts and figures at his disposal, and I feel sure he would not wish to mislead the House and the public with regard to this matter. I regret that he is not in his place. I informed him on the 2nd March that I intended to raise the matter to-day, and understood that this was the first available day on which he could be present.

BILLS PRESENTED.

  COAL MINES (DECONTROL) BILL,
  "to curtail the duration of and amend The Coal Mines (Emergency) Act, 1920; and for purposes connected therewith," presented by Mr. BRIDGEMAN; supported by Sir Robert Home, Mr. Baldwin, and Sir Philip Lloyd-Greame; to be read a

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  Second time upon Tuesday next, and to be printed. [Bill 33.]

  TRIBUNALS OF INQUIRY (EVIDENCE) BILL,
  "to make provision with respect to the taking of evidence before and the procedure and powers of certain tribunals of inquiry," presented by Sir GORDON HEWAKT; supported by Mr. James Hope; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 34.]
SELECTION (STANDING COM- MITTEES).

  STANDING COMMITTEE A.
  Sir SAMUEL ROBERTS reported from the Committee of Selection; That they had discharged the following Members from Standing Committee A: Sir Arthur Churchman; and had appointed in substitution: Mr. Lynn.
  Report to lie upon the Table.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

  (GOVERNMENT BUSINESS).
  Mr. BONAR LAW (Leader of the House): I beg to move,
  "That, until the end of the financial year, Government Business be not interrupted under the provisions of any Standing Order relating to the Sittings of the House, and may be entered upon at any hour, although opposed."
  In moving this Motion I wish to assure the House, in the first place, that we are not putting it down from any feeling that there has been undue discussion so far during the Session. On the contrary, the Government have no complaint of any kind to make in that respect. I put down the Motion because I feel sure that it is in the interests of getting through the business, and for the convenience of the House. It is not put down with any idea of having all-night Sittings; on the contrary, my object in putting it down is to prevent all-night Sittings. The House knows perfectly well that very often a short time after eleven will enable us to get through a subject with adequate discussion, obviating the necessity for its being re-opened the next day, and in that way to save a great deal of time without any loss of the efficiency of the House. As the House knows, the business must be got through by the 6th April, and it is not in our power to alter it There might easily, of course, be a discussion as to whether our being in that position was
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  due to bad management, but the fact remains that we are in that position, and that the business has to be got through. As regards the possibility of a charge of bad management, I can only repeat what I said at the opening of the Session. Nobody dislikes this congestion and the feeling that we are working against time, more than I do, but the only possible alternative was to ask the House to meet earlier. It was a choice of evils, and even now I am still convinced that I took the course which at the time commended itself to the House, and which, I think, would now commend itself to the House. I hope, therefore, that the House, without undue discussion, will give us this Resolution, and I assure the House that we do not intend to make any unfair use of it. I hope there will be no late sittings at all, and certainly nothing approaching all-night sittings. The only possibility of that will be at the very end of the time, but if we pass this Resolution I hope it may be avoided altogether.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: I am very glad that my right hon. Friend, with his usual fairness and courtesy, has admitted that the discussions which have taken place hitherto since the Session began have not been even tinged with any degree of obstruction. My right hon. Friend claims that, whatever may be the faults of the past with regard to the management of Government business, it is no use discussing that now, but that we must make the best of things as they are. That is quite a practical position to take, but at the same time I think I am justified in pointing out that the real reason for the Motion now before the House is the number of Supplementary Estimates, namely, 35. I do not suppose that my right hon. Friend is responsible for that, although I suppose he is responsible for most things that happen here. The real responsibility rests with the chiefs of the various Departments and their Parliamentary representatives here. I think that the House is entitled to say, as I certainly do on behalf of those who act with me, that there has been this gross miscalculation of the financial expenditure of the year. There are a number of most important Supplementary Estimates yet to be dealt with. We have dealt with ten of them, and one is being withdrawn, but I do not suppose that that involves any real loss of time, because, no doubt,

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  it will be included on the day which has been allocated to the remainder of the Supplementary Estimates relating to Ireland. I would suggest to my right hon. Friend, however, that he should tell the House what are his proposals with regard to the rest of the Session after the 31st March. There are twelve or fourteen Parliamentary days left, including Fridays, before the 31st March, and I think it is not too much to claim that the whole of those days should be devoted to financial business—Supplementary Estimates and the Votes on Account. It is really all too little time in which to deal with them. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman should tell us what Bills he proposes to introduce. First of all, we have the decontrol of the Mines. That is a day which will certainly be fully occupied. There is not the slightest chance of that Debate concluding before eleven o'clock. Is he going to allow any Department or its persistent Parliamentary chief to push him into granting any one of these remaining days, or even a portion of the day, to any of their little Bills? We know what happens in these circumstances. All last Session, with the best intentions, my right hon. Friend got up and made the statement he made yesterday, but as soon as the days begin to run we find so-called little proposals made, legislative and otherwise. As soon as we begin to debate them we realise often the immense importance of them. The position I put very strongly is that the right hon. Gentleman should be rigid in his determination in the days between now and 31st March that he will not give way nor allow any of his colleagues to give way on these matters. It is a primary duty to the nation in the very limited time allotted to us to discharge as fully as we can a reasonable, business-like, examination of the financial business before the House.
  Mr. T. GRIFFITHS: We oppose this Motion. The Leader of the House has told us that he was not asking for the suspension of the Eleven o'clock Rule on account of undue discussion. I can assure him that the undue discussion has not been on this side of the House this Session. It has been among the supporters of the Government. It was very pathetic yesterday to see the Minister of Labour having to get up time and again, covering the same ground as he had covered in pre-
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  vious speeches on account of Members spending most of their time in the Smoke Room instead of listening to the discussion. I should like to appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to try to keep the supporters of the Government in hand in exactly the same way as we keep our people in hand. Whenever any of our speakers get up they have always something material to impart. I really now speak sincerely. I think too much of the time of the House is wasted, especially by the supporters of the Government, who make obstructive speeches, and after making them are afraid to go into the Lobby. If the Leader of the House will keep his own Members in hand and, when they ask Ministers to repeat over and over again, tell them "the question has been replied to, do not waste the time of the House," we shall not want this suspension. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to take his Members in hand the same as we do.
  Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I beg to move, at the end of the Question, to add the words "provided that discussion upon Supplementary Estimates shall not, on any day, be continued after 1 a.m. or on any Friday after 6 p.m."
  I regret that my right hon. Friend has had to make this Motion. He is so conciliatory in manner and is such a master of debate that it is very difficult for private Members to deal with his speeches. He weaves the net round us so delightfully that one finds oneself entangled and the liberties of the House slipping away before one knows where one is, but I feel that this Motion is not justified. It can only be justified on two grounds, either that there really is no time, or that there has been obstruction. I do not feel that the Government is really justified on the first ground. If there is no time it is really their own fault. After all, they must have been aware, before the House met, that looking at the condition of Ireland, there would be several Motions for the Adjournment at 8.15 which would be granted by the Speaker. They ought to have taken that into account. They know perfectly well that in every Session there is a series of Motions for the Adjournment which take up half a day. Did they take that into consideration when they wore mapping out their time? I do not feel that on the question of time they are justified. If they had met three or four days earlier

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  this Motion would not have been necessary at all. The right hon. Gentleman himself has agreed that there has practically been no obstruction at all I have attended the Debates practically nearly all the time, and I am sure hon. Members will agree that there has been no obstruction. Therefore, I feel that a certain amount of fairness is due to back benchers in this matter. The Leader of the House must know from experience that a Motion of this kind means late sittings. I have seen him put Motions on the Paper like this before, and have heard him make the same reasonable speech, that there was no intention on the part of the Government to sit late. I am sure my right hon. Friend will not deny that he has said that over and over Again.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I do not remember it.
  Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I am really not misrepresenting him. We have heard him say it before, and in nearly every case we have had all-night Sittings. It stands to reason that it leads much more to obstruction than to let the discussion go on perfectly freely. These late Sittings are most demoralising. If we have to come at 11 o'clock in the morning to a Committee and then sit through the night and all night it is really only people of the very strongest physique who can stand it. Quite apart from that, I believe it really leads to this House being brought into contempt by the public outside. You cannot possibly discuss Legislation with any good results at all at these late hours of the morning. So that from that point of view I feel that this Motion ought to be very much modified. I counted up the amount of money this morning and I find that there remain between £8,000,000 and £9,000,000 of public money in these Supplementary Estimates. Certain points in them appear to be extremely controversial, though they can probably be cleared up by the Government when the time comes. I know a good many of my hon. Friends will be very dissatisfied because my Amendment does not go far enough. A great many people think midnight is quite late enough. I am sure that midnight is quite late enough, but I put the Amendment in this form in order to show that I do not want to restrict the Government more than is absolutely necessary. Un-
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  less there is some paramount, vital reason, which I cannot see, against the Amendment, I beg the Government to accept it, and let us get to bed after one o'clock in the morning.
  Sir H. CRAIK: I beg to second the Amendment. To pass these very important Estimates, many of them involving principles of the highest importance, which will require discussion, in the small hours of the morning, is unfair not only to the Committee but to the taxpayer generally. I am glad that the Leader of the House admitted that there is no obstruction. I do not believe there is any obstruction. We know what happened before our Adjournment at Christmas. Some of the most important Votes were hurried through, Votes involving the most disputatious matter, at three or four o'clock in the morning. We were told that it was very unlikely that we should sit long after eleven o'clock, but we know from experience what happened. In previous years many of us were ready to stand these long Sittings, but such prolonged Sittings are now becoming a very serious drain upon our strength. At such late hours, even if our strength will sustain the strain, we are not really fit to criticise Votes, and it is impossible to get any real effective attention and criticism, or any serious attempt to curtail expenditure. In spite of our remonstrances, these important Votes are passed in the early hours of the morning, and they are scarcely reported in the newspapers, and pass unnoticed by the taxpayer. We are anxious, as far as possible, to show the utmost loyalty to this Government, and it is only in extreme measures that I have voted against them, but I feel sure that the Leader of the House will not find it very successful to attempt methods which the hon. Member who spoke from the Labour Benches suggested would be adopted in his party. We are constituted in a different way, and we would not be subject to that drastic discipline which he would impose upon his party.
  Mr. W. THORNE: I am opposed to the Motion and to the Amendment. It is perfectly evident that whether it is this Government or any other Government, time must be found in which to do the business of the House. I disagree with the methods adopted by the Government

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  for doing their business. During the whole time that I have been in this House, I have been absolutely opposed to doing business after 11 o'clock at night. I have brought the question before the members of our party on more than one occasion, and I have told my constituents that I absolutely refuse to sit in this House or in other houses after 11 o'clock at night. [Laughter.] Perhaps I ought to insert a qualification and say, except my own house. The Amendment gives the Government two hours after 11 o'clock. I have suggested that the House should meet at 12 o'clock each day. If that suggestion is accepted the Government would have an additional two and three-quarter hours every day at their disposal. I know that the serious objection that is raised in regard to that suggestion by business men, and especially those gentlemen who belong to the legal profession, is that they cannot get their business done before 2 or 3 o'clock in the afternoon. It seems to me it is very much better to agree to meet at 12 o'clock every day instead of meeting at 3 o'clock and sitting until 1 o'clock. Some years ago I read the history of the life of Cobden, and it was stated that late sittings in this House practically broke him up. Late sittings do nobody any good, they break up our health, and impose a good deal of hardship upon the officials of the House. If every hon. Member expressed his own views, I think the majority would say they were in favour of meeting at 12 o'clock. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I gather from those observations that hon. Members are not in favour of that proposition. The time will arrive, however, when you will treat this as a business assembly, and meet at 10 o'clock in the morning, and finish at a reasonable hour at night. If I am in order, I should like, when we have dealt with this Amendment, to propose to leave out all the words after the word "That" and to insert the words "the House shall meet at 12 o'clock."
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: I have accepted the only Amendment that has been put forward, to add words at the end of the Question, and I cannot now go back.
  Lieut.-Colonel J. WARD: If I had not been a Member of this House for 16 years, I should feel inclined to vote for the Amendment, but I know that if you make a limit of time, whether you make
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  it one, two, three or four o'clock in the morning, it is quite an easy matter for those who are determined to obstruct business to defeat the object in view. There are always half a dozen or so Members on one side or the other who are prepared to save their fire until all the others have fired their shots, and then to start operations. I shall vote against the Amendment, because if you fix such a limit you have defeated the object which the Motion has in view. When Motions of this kind have been made before there has been some latitude with reference to possible emergencies. For instance, the situation in reference to the Conference with the German representatives may result in definite action being taken which may involve us in a serious position. I should like a statement from the Leader of the House that should such a serious emergency arise this Resolution would not bar us from considering the matter, and that, if private Members generally thought that there was a case for a Motion for Adjournment to discuss some special national emergency, that could be done.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: The Motion for Adjournment remains.
  Lieut.-Colonel WARD: If this Motion does not prevent the Irish Members from moving an Adjournment every day on a "definite matter of urgent public importance," and they can get every day from 8.15 to 11 o'clock, I think that the Resolution is not sufficiently stringent. When a discussion on a Supplementary Estimate has lasted for about an hour there is no reason for continuing the discussion. It is not worth a pail full of cold water. It is mere party tactics on one side or the other and of no real benefit to the nation. If, therefore, the Resolution is so drafted that these extraneous matters can be moved day after day the whole object of the Resolution is defeated. You will be obliged to have all-night Sittings if you are to discuss your Supplementary Estimates at all. In reference to the suggestion of the hon. Member for West Ham, my experience is that we have more often got home at something like 9 or 10 when it has been understood that the whole time is at the disposal of the Government. We have been able to many hours at home which otherwise we should not have got through such Motions as this. This is a Motion for shortening the working day of Parliament, and if matters

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  relating to a real emergency cannot be excluded by this Motion I shall vote in favour of it.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: This Motion does not interfere with the Motion for Adjournment. If the House should not desire such a Motion, then if a sufficient number of Members keep their seats the Adjournment is not given. In addition we can rely on Mr. Speaker not to give it unless there are reasonable grounds. If such contingencies as my hon. Friend suggests arise, then the House would have to consider a change in reference to Motions for Adjournment, and would find some other way of dealing with the matter. My right hon. Friend referred to the introduction of Bills up to the end of the financial year. No Bill will be introduced or pushed forward in which there is the smallest controversy, unless in the ease of the coal emergency, which has to be dealt with before Easter. I can give that promise definitely. I was charmed by the compliments paid by the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. G. Locker-Lampson), but I would have appreciated them more did they not take the form of wishing to alter our proposal. I am willing, for the sake of argument, to admit his contention that it is our fault business is not more advanced, but that does not alter the fact that we are in this position, and that the business has to be done before the end of the financial year. The time is limited. The suggestion of the hon. Member as to the hours seems a reasonable one, and I should be disappointed if we have to sit beyond the hours which he indicates. There has been no obstruction on the Estimates. But we cannot be certain that something may not cause a certain appearance of ill-temper in one section or the other which might produce obstruction and, suppose coming near the end of the financial year we found that business could not be got through except by giving a longer time, then if we accept such an Amendment it would drive the Government to ask the House to pass a Resolution to get rid of the whole business.
  I was greatly interested in what was said by my hon. Friend (Mr. Griffiths). I listened one day for several hours to a debate on the Unemployment Insurance Bill, which was conducted entirely by hon. Members opposite. My hon. Friend tells me that not one of them
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  gets up to say something which is not relevant or which has been said by somebody else. I think that he is mistaken. He asks from me an undertaking that I will get as good behaviour from my supporters as he has got from his in that respect. I am not fond of giving pledges which I cannot keep, but I will give this one, that unless the supporters of our party are as reasonable as those I see opposite, I will certainly not attempt to lead the House.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: I would like to make a suggestion. I think it is quite possible, by an arrangement between what are called the Front Benches, to provide that Members who are interested in any particular Supplementary Estimate should meet, and those of us who are called the usual channels would know what they really desire to discuss. If we have that information I am sure that the Labour party and ourselves can arrange with the Leader of the House and the Patronage Secretary that those Estimates shall come on first and that the Estimates which are not of very great importance—there are some which do not raise any point of vital consequence—shall be taken without unnecessary discussion. I think that could be done by a system of grouping and then it would be quite certain that none of the important Estimates would come on after 12 o'clock at night. That is rather a change from the usual party procedure, but I suggest it in the interests of business and economy. Certainly all on this side of the House will do all they can to facilitate the working of such art arrangement.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I say at once that any arrangement of that kind will be gladly welcomed by the Government, and we shall do everything we can to facilitate it. I do not mean an arrangement merely with the official Opposition, but with the whole House.
  Earl WINTERTON: I have seen many of these arrangements, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir D. Maclean) will agree that often when such arrangements are made across the floor of the House some Member or Members want to raise questions which to them seem very important, but which do not seem important to the majority of the House, and that then they have been accused of a breach of faith in discussing the

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  subject. I think the Leader of the House was a little premature in agreeing to the suggestion. I do not think it would facilitate what we all want to see, namely, that due attention shall be given to every aspect of the subject of Estimates. Frequently what appears on the face of it to be a most innocent Estimate veils a most important question of policy or principle. I agree largely with what was said by the hon. Member for Stoke (Lieut.-Colonel J. Ward). If you have in the Amendment the definite hour of 1 a.m. or 2 a.m., the result will be that the Government, not from any necessary badness on their part, but owing to the facts of the situation, will regard that as the ordinary hour for the House to rise, and we shall on every occasion be sitting until that hour. On the other hand, much as I regret the whole principle of the abolition of the Eleven o'clock Rule, there is no doubt that when it is abolished and the House has to face the possibility of an all-night sitting, coming to a decision is facilitated. I am sorry that some of my hon. Friends on this side appear to disagree with the point put forward by the hon. Member for West Ham (Mr. W. Thorne). I thought it was a good point. I do not think it is feasible to sit as early as he suggested. Let me suggest an alternative to the Amendment. In the altered conditions of the composition of this House, compared with fifteen years ago, the House might well meet an hour or so earlier. I would like to suggest to the Leader of the House the practical advantages from the private Member's point of view of such a proposal. Where a Government is in power with such a large nominal majority as this Government possesses, it is the case, but was not so in the old days, that when the House sits late a large number of Ministers do not attend the sittings at all.
  I have a comparatively short recollection, dating back 10 years. In the old days when there was an all-night Sitting practically every Minister was present. I believe it is true that both Gladstone and Disraeli asked an explanation of any Ministers who were not present. We have left those days. What happens now? There is an important question before the House, let us assume. Only the Minister concerned and the Leader of the House, and possibly an Under-Secretary or two, are present in addition to those Members
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  of the House who are interested in the question. It is therefore possible for the Government the next day to bring forward an equally important principle, to have another set of Ministers sitting up, and so on. The House would thus have before it really important business two or three nights running and it would be got through the House in the early hours of the morning. When the Government had necessarily to take longer time from the House and they were compelled to sit an hour earlier, it would mean a certain amount of inconvenience to them and that a large number of Ministers, all who had questions down, would have to be present. That would make them far more careful than they are now about taking extra time from the House. I was rather surprised to see that in some sections of the House a laugh was raised against the hon. Member for West Ham in quoting the case of the late Mr. Cobbett. I do not think it was an excuse for laughter. I have seen some old and valuable Members of this House who sat up night after night dealing with matters in which they were interested. I think it is extremely serious to expect some Members of the House of a certain age to sit up night after night. The only alternative to their doing so is for them to absent themselves. I hope the Leader of the House will again consider whether it is possible in times of emergency for the House to meet at two o'clock instead of at 2.45.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I would ask my hon. Friend to withdraw his Amendment for I think the House has been convinced that we must give the Government the time if they are to get through the financial business. I wish to protest against the speeches of the hon. Member for West Ham and the last speaker in their advocacy of an earlier Sitting. I think the House should take the first opportunity of saying that it is not in the public interest that that change should take place. We want business men to be Members of the House. We want men who are in touch with law, banking, commerce, the stock exchange and merchandise, men who can afford to give part of their time to the House, but cannot give the whole of it. If you have earlier Sittings you will have two classes of Members only—one, the very rich man who has no need to go to business, and the other the professional politician, who

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  has nothing whatever to do except House of Commons work, and who makes professional politics his life's task. That is the very class we do not want in this House.
  Mr. SWAN: Should the Motion in the name of the Leader of the House be carried, would that result in taking away the privilege of Members to raise an important matter at Question Time and, in the event of the reply being unsatisfactory, raising the matter again on the Adjournment at eleven o'clock?
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Does the hon. Member ask me that question?
  Mr. SWAN: Yes, Sir.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: The House could no doubt cut short its Debate on the ordinary business, if such matter arose, and then there would be the time up to 11.30 p.m.
  Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I handed in this Amendment because I believed the Government would accept it, and I also hoped it would receive more favour in the House, but it has not received the favour that would justify one in going to a Division upon it, and therefore I would propose to withdraw it. I feel, however, that I must vote against the main Resolution as a protest against what I believe to be the mismanagement of Parliamentary time.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Question put,
  "That, until the end of the financial year, Government Business be not interrupted under the provisions of any Standing Order relating to the Sittings of the House, and may be entered upon at any hour, although opposed."
  The House divided: Ayes, 151; Noes, 28.

  NOES.

  Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)

  Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Widnes)

  Sexton, James

  Barnes, Major H. (Newcastle, E.)

  Holmes, J. Stanley

  Swan, J. E.

  Bell, James (Lancaster, Ormskirk)

  John, William (Rhondda, West)

  Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)

  Briant, Frank

  Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)

  Walsh, Stephen (Lancaster, Ince)

  Davies, Major D. (Montgomery)

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

  Waterson, A. E.

  Edwards, C (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

  Morgan, Major D. Watts

  Wignall, James

  Finney, Samuel

  Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

  Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Stourbrdge)

  Galbraith, Samuel

  Redmond, Captain William Archer

  Wilson, W. Tyson (Westhoughton)

  Glanville, Harold James

  Rose, Frank H.

  Hartshorn, Vernon

  Royce, William Stapleton

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

  Mr. T. Griffiths and Mr. G. Thorne.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 1) BILL.
  Considered in Committee, and reported, without Amendment.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the Third time."
  Major BARNES: When the Debate took place on the Supplementary Estimates, on which this Bill is founded, the Leader of the House made an appeal to one of my hon. Friends on this side that the discussion might be closed, as there would be two further opportunities of discussing this Bill—one on the Report stage, and one on the Consolidated Fund Bill. The Report stage, I think, was taken rather unexpectedly, and the Consolidated Fund Bill was introduced without a word. There was some misunderstanding between myself and the right hon. Gentleman, and I did not anticipate he was going to speak with such brevity that he was not going to speak at all, and the Bill passed the Second Reading without any comment. This is the last opportunity, therefore, of raising one or two very substantial points on a Bill affecting a very substantial sum. We are passing a Bill this afternoon which takes a sum of £21,000,000 out of funds raised by a levy upon the general body of taxpayers in this country, and we are doing that for the purpose of passing it over to a comparatively small number of persons who are the owners of the railways in this country. A transaction of that kind must always, and very properly, meet with comment and with consideration in this House, and there is no body of opinion in this House which is more critical of anything in the nature of a subsidy or a dole than the hon. Members who form the body of supporters of this Government. So I am quite sure they will not feel I am in any way departing from what is their normal practice by directing the attention of the House on this, the last possible opportunity, to what is taking place.
  The Debate on the Supplementary Estimates concluded with a concurrence of opinion on the part of the right hon. Member for Peebles (Sir D. Maclean) and the Leader of the House that this question was one which should not be
  2190
  approached in a party spirit or under any personal prejudice, and it is entirely in that spirit that I want to couch the observations that I am about to make. I think it would be very difficult, indeed, to approach this matter in a party spirit. I cannot really see that anybody can make party capital out of it, except perhaps the party which is slowly aggregating upon the Benches on my left. So far as I know anything about the Railway Agreement, all parties—the Liberal party, the Labour party and the Coalition party—are implicated, or, if that is not the proper word, are involved in these agreements, and it does appear to me that if I were making the railway case, which I am not, I should lay stress upon the fact that these agreements are not only agreements on which all these three parties are involved, but which have run the gauntlet of four Governments, because while there may be many people in this country who might imagine that this claim is based upon an agreement, it is really based upon a whole series of agreements which have grown up with the passage of time, and with the passage of Governments. The whole structure, therefore, upon which the railway companies have built their claim is a foundation which has been laid over a period of years, and in which every Government since 1914 has been more or less concerned. So that it would indeed be difficult, if it were desirable, to attempt to meet this question in a party spirit.
  I have been feeling very strongly, however, that this Bill should not pass through this House without making some observations on the connection of Mr. Walter Runciman with the agreements. In some quarters there is a certain amount of odium attached to agreements upon which the claim is based which we are meeting under this Bill, and as Mr. Runciman is no longer a Member of this House, and is not able to state his own position, it does seem to me to be incumbent upon anyone who is conversant with the facts that they should be put before the House and the country, and, of course, the original agreement, or the action of the Government then in power, and, in so far as the doctrine of collective responsibility applies, Mr. Runciman must take his share of that responsibility. But those who have studied the facts that are now open to the public will know that the terms of the original agreement were really settled

  2191
  between the 29th July and the 5th August, and they may also know that Mr. Runciman was not appointed President of the Board of Trade until 6th August, so that the original agreement was settled in its terms before the date of his appointment. It was submitted as finally settled at a meeting which took place on the 6th August, at which Mr. Runciman, then the President of the Board of Trade, was present, and at which was also present the Chancellor of the Exchequer. So that these agreements are, as I shall indicate a little later, really ultimately based upon Treasury sanction. The Board of Trade has been merely an instrument used by the Treasury for negotiation, so that in so far as any responsibility has been fixed upon any particular Department or any particular Minister, the responsibility, not only for the original Agreement, but the whole series of agreements, must be taken particularly by the Treasury.
  We are really in the position to-day of being involved by administrative acts of the Treasury, and this first agreement from which all the rest of the agreements flow is not different in that respect. It was an agreement, the terms of which were settled before Mr. Runciman went to the Board of Trade, and were agreed at a meeting at which the Chancellor of the Exchequer was present, the Chancellor of the Exchequer of that day being, of course, the Prime Minister of this. I do not make this explanation with a view of any party advantage at all, but it does seem right and proper that the House and the country should be fully informed as to the nature of the personal responsibility, if any, for the original agreement. We are dealing with a large sum of money which is passing from the general body of taxpayers into the pockets of the shareholders of the companies. I want to say, as distinctly as I am able to say it, that, in my opinion, the shareholders of the railway companies are entitled to full compensation for any loss which they have sustained by the exercise of the powers of the Government during the War. They are clearly and fully entitled to that, and I would go further and say that, if there is any doubt as between the shareholders and the State as to any matter of compensation, I would give them the benefit of the doubt. After all, if it comes to a question of allocating burdens the shoulders of the State are
  2192
  broader than the shoulders of the individual, and where there is real doubt as to the side towards which the balance should be, I would be quite prepared to agree that the balance should be taken towards the side of the shareholder.
  I should like to say a word or two about the representatives of the shareholders in their dealings with the Government, the chairmen of the railway companies and the general managers. There is some confusion on the point of the negotiations which led up to these agreements and also as to the instruments of negotiation. It is, perhaps, not clearly recognised that the chairmen of the railway companies were not compelled to join m these negotiations. They were associated together in the Railway Association. They were in the background. The people who were negotiating were the general managers. So you have really a picture of this kind: In the far distance you have the general body of the shareholders of the companies, in the middle distance the Railway Association, composed of the chairmen of the various companies, and in the foreground the general managers of the various railways making the Agreement and carrying on the administration. I should be sorry if anything I said in this House were held to be a reflection upon any of the chairmen of the railway companies or the general managers of the railway companies as individuals in regard to the matter of these railway agreements. In so far as I have been brought into touch with either general managers or chairmen of railway companies, either inside or outside this House, I have been left with the greatest admiration for their capacity and with great respect for their character. I realise that they were in an extraordinarily difficult position As chairmen of the railway companies they were not dealing with their own property, but with a body of property placed in their hands by the shareholders to be safeguarded. The general managers are still more in that position. If the chairmen were responsible to the shareholders, the general managers were responsible to the chairmen and the shareholders as well.
  Any man is entitled to be generous in the disposal of his own property, but we feel and should feel that those are not qualities which he should display in the handling of the property of other people, If their property is entrusted to his care

  2193
  it is not that he should be generous with it, but that he should safeguard it and keep it. Any great detail of criticism of the action of the general managers of the railways would be blunted by coming against a defence of that kind. As individuals I am perfectly sure that all those who were concerned on the railway side with negotiations are entitled to claim just as much regard for their country and its interests as any other individual. What you had here in building up these agreements was not an individual instrument but a collective instrument on the railway side. It has very well been said that a company has neither a body to be kicked nor a soul to be damned. I think that means that when men act collectively the qualities of humanity fall away from them and you are really dealing with an administration. What followed, in my opinion, was that the bargains that were driven with the Government were hard bargains, very hard bargains indeed, and that in the bargaining full advantage was taken of the position, and that the agreements under which the claims are alleged, to meet which this Bill is passing, were agreements obtained under great pressure. In making that statement I am not making a statement which does not find precedent in the claims of the railway companies themselves, because they make an entirely similar claim with regard to the arrangement which was made in respect of war bonus. War bonus forms a part of the claim which the Minister has now to his charge. It is an item in the sum of £21,000,000 and the railway companies claim that the arrangement applying to war bonus was an arrangement to which they only agreed under very considerable pressure, and I am quite open to say that they honestly felt pressure was put upon them to which they had to accede. I am not going to say for the Treasury, as against the railway company, that there was any real differentiation in spirit in making these bargains. I think that those who were acting for the Government did the best they could to employ all the means that, were at their disposal, and, if they had leverage, used that leverage. So I am not makingg any distinction between the two parties to the bargain in that respect. What really was the case was that the railway companies were in a stronger position, and consequently able
  2194
  to make the better bargain. They had more prevision of what was coming so far ahead. That is not unexpected in view of the fact that they had special experience, and Treasury officials had not. Of course, they were not in the position in which they are to-day, confronted on the side of the Government with a body of such special experience as now exists in the Ministry of Transport. The interests of the State at the present time are decidedly advantaged by the existence of the Ministry of Transport, in so far as it is dealing with the question of the railway claims. I am not going to commit myself to any approval of any other proposal of the Ministry, for that would be outside the question we are here to discuss this afternoon.
  The Ministry of Transport at first, if it was an advantage to anybody, was likely to be an advantage to the railway companies rather than to the State. I am not going to give my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport any credit for having set up this Ministry to deal with these agreements. I look upon him as like Christopher Columbus who set off to find India and bumped into America. The Ministry of Transport was set up for one purpose and after a while it bumped up against these railway agreements. It was a useful discovery and the country is going to be advantaged in the negotiations that are going to continue on these agreements owing to the existence of the Ministry. My main point is that I think that the negotiations are bound to go on, and, after all, what we are really dealing with here this afternoon is a running claim.
  This £21,000,000 is only a payment on account, and, in dealing with it, we have to bear in mind that we have payments to make in future, and that the extent of those payments will very largely depend upon the success of the negotiations between the railway companies and my right hon. Friend. A day is to be set aside for the discussion of the Colwyn Report, and obviously it would be unwise of me to attempt to deal with it in any way this afternoon, but there have been statements in the Press to the effect that something in the nature of a settlement may be reached before that discussion, and in any negotiations that may be made, the Minister of Transport should have the full support of this House, for he is in the position of looking after the interests

  2195
  of the general body of taxpayers. This House is not concerned primarily with the interests either of the railway shareholders or the railwaymen, though they are both concerned, because this amount of £21,000,000 cannot be said to be earmarked for dividends; it is going into the railway pool out of which wages as well as dividends will be paid. I fully recognise that, and one may regard it as in the interests not only of the shareholders but of all those engaged in this great industry. A settlement is more likely to be made if the Minister of Transport can feel that he has the support of this House in resisting any attempt that may be made to secure terms unduly favourable to the railway companies. The House should have drawn to its notice as evidence of the kind of thing that the Minister is likely to have to meet in dealing with the claims that have arisen, and which will continue to arise, a statement that was made by the chairman of the Caledonian Railway Company, which appears to me to run very near an infringement of the privileges of this House. The chairman of that company, speaking about the claims with which we are dealing this afternoon, said:
  "The extent of these claims may be enormous. It is evident that these claims of the railway companies will be increased or diminished according as the measures taken by Parliament in the next Session prove to be more or less adequate for our needs. Therefore, the claims will not be formulated until the nature and effect of those measures is fully known."
  It seems to me to be a very improper statement to make, that the claims of the railway companies are to be based upon the action which this House takes. If they move in one direction, the claims may augment, and, if they move in another direction, the claims may diminish. It appears to be an attempt to apply that sort of pressure which this House has been always disposed to resent from whatever quarter it came, whether from hon. Members on this side of the House or from any other quarter. I merely quote that statement this afternoon as indicating the kind of spirit with which my right hon. Friend will have to deal, and I do suggest that he should be able to feel that in this matter he will have the support of the House in resisting any manifestation of the spirit indicated in that quotation. We are not in this position on account of any action of this
  2196
  House. It is not by reason of any legislative measures passed by this House that we have to pay during two years a sum of nearly £100,000,000 into the funds of the railway companies. We are in this position to-day as the result of a series of administrative acts, some of them by Treasury officials and some of them by the Cabinet, but in no case by the action of this House. The position of the Minister would be very much strengthened if he could give the House the assurance that the settlement of this claim would depend ultimately upon the sanction of this House. We have to recover control over finance, and it is perfectly obvious that it is no use coming here day by day and fighting hard over Supplementary Estimates, trying to cut down expenditure by a few thousand pounds of all the time officials can commit us to the expenditure of millions of pounds, and if afterwards we are to be told that these agreements have been made and all that we have to do it to pay. I suggest that the Minister would find it an advantage if he gave this House an assurance that the settlement to be made with the railway companies would be submitted to this House for its sanction.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: I desire to assure hon. Members who may wish to take part in this Debate that I only propose to intervene for a few minutes. I wished to ask the Leader of the House a question if he were here. But meanwhile I would like to say this with regard to what my hon. Friend (Major Barnes) has just indicated in his concluding remarks. It is not a matter of hope or request that this House shall have the last word in these matters. The House must have the last word, and whatever arrangements are made by the Minister of Transport, or any other official, the right and duty of Parliament to see that everything relevant comes under its review and receives its final sanction is undoubted. That I am certain will be duly carried out. I do not presume to offer advice, but I should like to say one thing to the railway managers and chairmen, and if my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport will allow me to tender him also a word of advice I will include him in it. I wish to point out to them all that they will never have a better opportunity than this Session affords of arriving at a final con-

  2197
  clusion of this much vexed question. If it is deferred till next year a General Election may intervene and there may be a great change in the circumstances. A new set of men may be brought in who have not been in touch with the trend of our discussions or with the atmosphere in which the whole matter has been brought within the purview of the House. Once a question of this kind drifts into litigation it really means that discussion takes place at the point of the bayonet. Immense amounts will be wasted, not only of money, but of effort and time, both of the officials of the Government and of the officials of the railway companies, and that time might be devoted to other and more fruitful objectives. It would be a sad waste so far as public and private interests are concerned.
  My business experience has taught me that nothing militates more against the success of our great railway undertakings than litigation, especially in the Committee Rooms of Parliament on private Bills. General managers, departmental managers and chairmen, spend months of the best time of the year in fighting Bills, and meanwhile the whole administration of the railways is suffering. Suppose that occurs in connection with this question and there is litigation on this tremendous issue. The railway companies will be damaged, the public will be damaged, and the country will suffer. Everyone will suffer, including the Government, and therefore I would urge all concerned in this most troublesome and difficult question to combine all their energies to get a settlement of it this year. Everybody will benefit thereby. I see the Leader of the House is here now, and I should like to ask a question to which I think the House is entitled to have an answer. Statements have appeared in the Press in the last two or three days, and particularly so this morning, which seem to indicate that the Minister of Transport may speedily resign his office and the whole railway question be again thrown into the melting pot, and some fresh policy undertaken in regard to it. I think we are entitled to know whether there is any truth in those statements. Quite soon we shall have before us the Estimates from the right hon. Gentleman's Department, and previously to that I imagine we shall have a Debate on what is known as the Colwyn Report.
  2198
  I should therefore like my right hon. Friend to tell us what truth, if any, there is in these statements, and, if they are well founded, what course the Government propose to pursue?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: First of all, with regard to what my right hon. Friend has said as to the railway dispute, I can give him a definite assurance. I quite agree with the view he has expressed, that it is not in the interest either of the State or of the railway companies that the dispute should be prolonged. Like myself, my right hon. Friend has been a Member of the House of Commons for a considerable time. In the old days, whatever Government was in power, I used to think there was an inclination to treat the railway companies not quite fairly in regard to private Bills. Everyone knows that railway conditions in this country are vital to our trade and industry. I can assure the House that, so far as the Government is concerned—I have not gone into this question on its merits—while we must safeguard the interest of the taxpayers, it will certainly be our desire to deal fairly with the railway companies on any question which arises. If negotiations take place, as I hope they will, my right hon. Friend will understand, of course, that it will be the duty of the Minister of Transport to keep the House in touch, as far as possible, with everything done. But it must be obvious that while negotiations are going on, we cannot publish what is happening. I can give this undertaking that the Government will commit themselves to nothing which the House has not the power to revise. I find a little difficulty in answering the last question put by the right hon. Gentleman, because it is to a certain extent personal. I have read with great surprise myself the statements which have appeared in some newspapers to the effect not only is my right hon. Friend giving up office, but that he is giving it up because the Government will not let him have his way in regard to railway policy. There is not a word of truth in those statements.
  Mr. SWAN: How can he do the work which the Department was set up to do if the money intended for it is taken away? There was money set aside for development. It has been taken away from the Minister of Transport, and what is the use of his holding on to office now?
  Mr. BONAR LAW: My hon. Friend really raises a very big question on which I should have thought all parties in the House, and even hon. Members on the Labour Benches, would have taken the same view. We have to consider in connection with the expenditure of money, not merely whether it will be of advantage to the country, but also what is the state of our finances at the time, and I do not see how such a matter as this can be pressed now, the financial condition of the country being what it is. As regards the other question my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport has been working for two years on this railway problem. It is a very big problem. What has happened during the War, while the railways have been under control has had this result, that it can safely be said you cannot hand the railways back to the companies without an attempt being made to arrive at some method of dealing with them which will be good for the railways and good for the country. If you were to hand them back without doing this, I believe the Government would fail in its duty. I believe we must face it. My right hon. Friend has submitted his proposals to the Cabinet. A Cabinet Committee is now examining them, and I have no reason whatever to believe that we shall not be able to agree upon some plan which we shall submit to the House of Commons.
  As regards my right hon. Friend's continuance of his office, it is a fact—and since it has appeared in the Press he agrees there is no object in postponing the anouncement—that he is giving up his position in the Government at the end of August. I ask the House to bear in mind that it is at the end of August that railway control comes to an end, and therefore there is ample time for him to deal adequately with the problem as to his giving up his office. There is really nothing new in that. It was, as I have said before, the desire of my right hon. Friend, before the Election of 1918, to resign his position then, but the Government felt that the state of the whole of the transportation question in this country was one of the most difficult subjects with which we had to deal, and we had confidence that my right hon. Friend was capable of dealing with it. The Prime Minister and I used all the influence we possibly could to persuade my right hon. Friend to undertake that
  2200
  task. He was not willing to do it, and that is rather a curious commentary on the idea which some people have had that he was making a post for himself, and that he was full of megalomania in undertaking something which he was going to do for the rest of his life, when he was really doing his best in the public service in difficult times. He agreed to stay for two years, and that was all the promise we could get from him. When he came towards the end of the two years he wished to go, but we thought he was a valuable asset to the country, and should stay till the period of control ended, and he agreed to do so. It is a very unpleasant thing to say nice things about a colleague in the Cabinet at any time, and still more unpleasant for me to say them, because it is like praising oneself. I am bound to say that I am convinced that we could not have got any other Minister who would have tackled this problem with the same energy and skill, and, I hope it will be found, with success. At all events, he does understand the problem. He has devoted his whole heart to it, and even the House of Commons will recognise this, although for some time he was not one of the most popular figures on this Bench.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: He has always been that.
  Mr. BONAR LAW: I do not think so When he told us definitely at the end of last year that he must go at the end of August, I said to him, "I venture to think you are making a great mistake; and if you are not careful, you will soon be one of the most popular men in the House of Commons." There is no disagreement between him and the Government. In my sincere view he has rendered a great service to the country. People who like myself are more or less professional politicians have a right to expect to be attacked and do not much mind it, but I have always felt it was a little hard that men who were not doing the work for any motive of ambition, but with a desire to the best of their ability to serve their country should be attacked. My right hon. Friend has done that, and I think the House of Commons will realise that he has done it.
  Mr. INSKIP: With regard to what the Leader of the House has just said, the only thing I should like to say is that I

  2201
  agree with what he has said as to the great earnestness, sincerity, and zeal in the public interest of the Minister of Transport. I have had the honour of serving under him in a very humble capacity before, and I am able to state that all those who have had anything to do with the right hon. Gentleman have nothing but admiration for the way in which he has discharged his duties. I do not understand what the object of the hon. Member for Newcastle (Major Barnes) was in making his observation about the past history of the railway agreements. The hon. and gallant Member's view is well known because it was stated in the Colwyn Report that when he thinks an agreement has been obtained under pressure it should be departed from on the ground that it is not equitable. Those are not the principles upon which great British industries and confidence have been built up. The last thing I wish to do is to criticise Mr. Runciman, who had very difficult duties to fulfil, and we all know the circumstances under which he was brought into this railway business.
  The hon. and gallant Member went on to suggest that railway companies drove hard bargains with the State. If the suggestion is that, because those were hard bargains the Government ought not strictly to fulfil them, I desire to protest against any such suggestion. I do not think the position is anything like that which has been described by the hon. and gallant Member. The Government has been well served during the War by a number of eminent civil servants who advised the Government at every single stage in regard to these agreements, and they sometimes forced upon the companies agreements which the companies would have preferred not to make. When the suggestion is put forward that the companies drove hard bargains at the time, and that it is no longer equitable that they should be carried out, I hope-such opinions will find no response in any section of the House. There is some sort of suggestion that the railway companies have benefitted very largely out of these agreements. It is true that large sums have to be paid. It seems to me that the position of the hon. Member is like that of the golfer who, having made a number of fortunate shots, indicates what a good score he would have made had he not made so many misses. The
  2202
  Government secured immense benefits from the operation of this agreement, both financially and in connection with the general conduct of the War, and it is not fair to suggest that, because in some connection the railway companies secured benefit on their side, those benefits should be treated as having been improperly obtained. As a matter of fact, as I have already suggested, Sir William Plender advised throughout. As it turned out, at a certain date the interest swung round and some profits accrued to the railway companies. It is not the case, however, that the railway companies drove a hard bargain, but it was because they accepted the advice of Sir William Plender that they secured whatever benefit may have resulted from the agreement. I want to suggest in agreeing with the right hon. Gentleman the Minister for Transport, and with the Leader of the House, and I think, with the majority of hon. Members, that in such questions as these the proper way to avoid litigation—and I hope the Minister of Transport will give me his attention—is to make it clear that the Government, notwithstanding the invitation held out to them from some quarters, intend to adhere to the bargains so far as they can read and construe them in their strictest possible sense.
  Speaking from my own experience, which I think is the experience of the majority of hon. Members, I have found that, if two men enter into a bargain and that bargain is not clear and explicit, the best way to provoke litigation is for one of them to suggest that because the bargain is not clear and explicit he does not propose to be held by its terms, but that he proposes to remake his contract or to make a new contract. But if the two parties meet and agree that, so far as they can agree on the construction of a contract, they will abide by its terms to the last letter of that contract, there will be a spirit and a feeling on both sides which will be to the interests of the parties concerned. I hope that the Minister of Transport, in his responsible duties to this House and the country, in working out the effect of this agreement, will let the railway companies know that we shall not accept the invitation of the hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle (Major Barnes) and those who think with

  2203
  him, but that the Minister is going to give the railway companies credit for having acted in a proper manner during the War, and that he will adhere to the bargains made both in the letter and in the spirit, and that, to show the anxiety which I am quite sure he personally feels, no suggestion shall ever be made that the Government evinced any intention or desire to depart from the bargain. One of the great objections to nationalisation is that in the dealings of Government Departments with industry there is a difficulty sometimes of getting them to hold to their bargains. They are too apt to take an advantage which power gives them to depart from the bargains made. That is one of the dangers of nationalisation. In this particular case the Minister of Transport has a great opportunity, and the greatest testimony which will be given to him when he leaves his position—if he is able to earn it—will be that he has conducted negotiations in a conciliatory way—as I am sure he will— with the railway companies, and not in the spirit of those who wish to depart from the strictest letter and spirit of a single one of the terms of the agreement.
  2.0 P.M.
  Sir J. HARMOOD- BANNER: The speech of the hon. Member who has just spoken so very fully bears out my views when I listened to the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle (Major Barnes) that I do not propose to add very much to what the hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. Inskip) has so ably said. I do think, however, that it wants a little bit of application as regards the somewhat hard speech which we have heard from the hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle (Major Barnes). First, I should like to congratulate the company to whose services, I presume, the Minister of Transport is preparing to return—
  The MINISTER of TRANSPORT (Sir Eric Geddes): No, Sir; I wish to correct that statement at once. I am returning to no railway company.
  Sir J. HARMO0D-BANNER: I am sure we should be very sorry to lose the right hon. Gentleman. The success of the company for whom he so ably acted as general manager before he came here is evidence of how far we ought to trust him in the interests of the railway com-
  2204
  panies. During the whole of his remaining term of office between now and August I hope he will take a very generous view as regards the position which ought to be taken up by the railway companies towards the immense number of trustees holding debentures and preference stock, and the shareholders who have entrusted their moneys to the railways in the past, and who now really are in a terrible state of anxiety, as can be seen by the heavy fall in railway shares in consequence of the Colwyn Report and in consequence of the strictures in the Press. No doubt they ought not to be paid more than that to which they are properly entitled, but we have to remember that we have to keep up the credit of the country, which has expended its money in the building of these railways and in the promotion of them to the immense advantage to the State. It is a fact that the insurance companies, the widows, the orphans, and the trustees of every sort are hardly knowing which way to turn or how to act towards the beneficiaries on whose behalf they have invested moneys owing to the conditions in which the railway companies are placed.
  I would venture to reproach the railway companies a little, because I think they have allowed this matter to go on too long. Look at the position of the railway companies in 1914. They were growing, they were doing their work, and they were doing it successfully. When the War came they gave up their right to improve their revenue, to improve their capital, to improve their expenditure, and they have been stunted ever since. In 1914 they had every element of progress and every chance to acquire further capital at very moderate terms. They had every chance to make such a success as had been achieved by the right hon. Gentleman the Minister for Transport when he was holding the position of general manager of a railway company. Then the State came in, and for the purpose of the War took the railways over, and ever since they have been stunted. In 1914 they gave the very best of their services; men like Sir Herbert Walker, of the South Western Railway, and all the managers. The hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle (Major Barnes) tried to put it on the directors. The directors are very efficient men, but it was not the directors but the managers who were placed on the Executive Com-

  2205
  mittee and who conducted the affairs of the railway companies in such a brilliant manner that, whereas in the old days, you had to send goods from Carlisle to Woolwich, or Dover, or Southampton with all sorts of difficulties of transhipment, traffic arrangements were altered in such a way that those of us who wished to send goods were able to send them straight from the place of manufacture to the place of embarkation. That assisted the country materially in conducting the War. The audit accountants, the engineers, their shops, and everything connected with the railway companies, were placed at the service of the State, and, as I have said, their progress was stunted and stopped. As to the question of increased wages, I understand that the hon. Member says that there were special Committees who gave those wages and that he had nothing to do with it. All of us who observed this question of wages, however, saw boys who were receiving 10s. put up suddenly to the level of £3 10s., and getting more wages than the station-masters at small stations. We saw all sorts of extravagances, so that it was impossible that any railway company, without enormously increasing its rates, could pay on the increased wages. When to that is added the increase in cost of material, one can see what the railway companies had to meet. The hon. Member for Newcastle talks about their making a hard bargain with the State. I happen to be a railway auditor and to know a little about these matters. The total expenditure, in the case of a railway company with which I was concerned was £9,000,000 to the end of 1919, while in 1920 it was £13,500,000; and yet the railway companies are attacked for not having made the progress which they should have made. They have not een given extra rates and extra facilities in order to meet this enormous increase of expenditure. It reminds one of the sweep who went into the confectioner's shop, put his thumb into a tart, and then said, "How much for this damaged tart?" That is exactly what has happened in the case of the railway companies. You have damaged the railways by putting on them this enormous extra cost of wages, a great' part of which was unnecessary, and then you do not give them facilities in order to make it good.
  2206
  There is one way in which the railway companies could make good something, and that is my adapting some of their work to motor lorries. The outsider is adapting motor lorries, but the railway company cannot do so because there are laws passed by this House which interpose and tell them that it is not within their powers. Therefore, one source by which they might make some return is denied them; and that is the case all along. The position, therefore, before us is that we have got to meet the railway situation, and to meet it in a fairly generous spirit towards those people who put their money into railway preference and debenture stock. I think the railway companies charged nothing for all the soldiers that they carried. If the fares of those soldiers had had to be paid, there would have been a large increases in the funds available for the purposes of the railway companies. The railway companies carried free enormous quantities of material for the Government, and did their work, as I have said, through their managers, engineers, audit accountants and so on, in the most thorough way without any chance or possibility of reward, and, save in one or two exceptional instances, without any increased dividend from 1914 to the present time. What industry has been content to live from 1914 without being allowed the privilege of paying Excess Profits Duty? The railway company had no chance of paying Excess Profits Duty, or of doing anything except living upon this poor miserable fact that in 1914 it received so much money, and may, perhaps, by the grace of God and of this House, get so much money up to a certain date. That certain date has now arrived, and to everyone it looks as though there was not going to be any reward, but a penalty. The ordinary shareholder is going to go without any dividends at all, and the preference shareholders and debenture holders, and the immense number of people who invested trust money, are to receive no consideration or reward whatever. I rather blame the directors and chairmen of the railway companies for not having attempted to agree with their enemy quickly while they were in the way with him, because, to continue the Scriptural phrase, if he hales you before a judge, then you have to pay your uttermost farthing. That is a principle which is being acted upon, and which was ad-

  2207
  vocated by the hon. Member for Newcastle. I remember that, during the strike last year, I saw an outside porter talking with one of the railwaymen who had gone out on strike, and saying, "It is all very well, but you are ruining our work, and the shareholders who have put their money in." The railwayman at once consigned the shareholders to a place which was not Heaven, and that appears to be the spirit in which the hon. Member for Newcastle spoke. I would appeal to the Minister to try and meet the chairmen of the companies, to ask them to come to him and propound a scheme which will save the situation. That scheme should be published and made known as early as possible, so as to console and help and give some satisfaction to all those widows, orphans and other people who put their money into the railway companies, and who are now in a state of great anxiety and distress.
  Mr. SWAN: I will not follow the hon. Member who has just spoken into the questions of costs and losses to which he referred, nor comment upon his remarks as to the extravagant wages received by the workers. I regret to hear that we are likely to lose the Minister of Transport, although I am pleased that the collective opinion in this House is so far changed to-day that his services are beginning to be acknowledged. A very short while ago no epithet was considered bad enough to throw at him both by Members of this House and by influences outside. However many of us looked upon the Department and the Minister at its head, especially in the Labour party, as being able to make great progress and to co-ordinate the service to the advantage of the whole nation, and one regrets, after serving on the Ways and Communications Bill with the Minister, to see that the railways have got to be handed back and, as part of the bargain, this amount of £21,000,000 has to be paid to them because many of us shuddered as to the state we should all have been in had the Government not taken control of the railways. It is common knowledge that they absolutely failed to function, and hence the State had to step in and control them.
  My chief objection to this to-day is because the powers which the railway
  2208
  companies possess are possessed in order that they might function for the benefit of the community. The manner in which they have neglected to carry out their obligations to the community is very deplorable. In fact, I have been deluged with requests, because of that very fact, to hold up every measure that is introduced. The last speaker suggested the great cost of taking goods from Carlisle to Woolwich. Owing to the negligence of the railway company in putting a line a matter of 12 miles through the area I represent, and also Mr. Speaker's Division, we are going to have a whole deserted area. Goods have to be taken hundreds of miles round, where if they carried out their duty to the State and laid a line, where there are no engineering difficulties, there would be an enormous saving to the State, it would open up valuable areas and enable the community to retain the services of men, develop uncultivated land, and enable the people, in that part to work minerals which cannot be done to-day except at a loss. In fact, mines and quarries have had to be closed owing to the huge cost through want of railways, and it seems strange in the light of this negligence that they should have paid to them a matter of £21,000,000. Where they failed, the Ministry of Transport was set up. Everything was set aside for that Department in order that where required the Minister, with an officer of the Board of Trade, should set about to construct lines. In spite of enormous expense to the State and the taxpayers, nothing has yet been accomplished. They could have done the work, and many of us who served on that Committee expected that when the Government set up that Department it was in earnest, and did not intend to waste the ratepayers' money in having such an expensive Department. But we find, owing to financial influences inside and outside, that the Minister of Transport has not a penny to lay these railways, whereby men could be found employment, and resources which to-day are lying dormant might be developed. There is no hope that if the railway companies go back to the old times they will function any better than they did in the past. The passenger service today is inadequate, and they are making no attempt whatever to construct convenient lines so that industry in this

  2209
  country will be able to hold its own with the industries of other nations. It would be a great blunder for the nation to hand them back, and the bargain which has been made is far in excess of what they need, because they absolutely failed, and had the Government not taken control of them the whole of this nation possibly would have gone down.
  Sir E. GEDDES: I hope the House will now allow me to have the Third Reading of this Bill. I should like, however, to make one point clear in reply to what my right hon. Friend opposite put to me. He said that no settlement of these outstanding matters with the railways ought to be come to without the cognisance of the House. That the Leader of the House has agreed to as far as is possible. With that I entirely agree. The one outstanding satisfaction to me in to-day's Debate is that I feel that I am getting the support of the House in this matter. The House is realising, possibly as it never realised before, that I am representing the interests of the community and doing the best for the community in a very big and intricate financial transaction. If I feel that I have the House behind me, that I have its support and the interest of Members of the House, it will enable me to conduct the negotiations with much greater success and much greater confidence. That being my attitude I desire to the fullest possible extent to keep the House advised and I desire that the House should know of every relevant settlement which is come to before we are irrevocably committed I must have the House with me in this matter. There are very large sums involved.
  There must be no misunderstanding on this point. It has been said by responsible or irresponsible people that the railways have never yet submitted claims. The speech of the chairman of the Caledonian Railway was read by the hon. Member for Newcastle, in which they said their claim would be put forward. The claim is put forward every month. It is a progressive claim. It is a running account, and I should be misleading the House if I left them under the impression that nothing which is in dispute under this arrangement can be paid until the House has had an opportunity of discussing it, because if I stopped items of
  2210
  large magnitude because I disputed them the railways would come to a standstill. Some of them are not strong enough financially to enable them to make the deductions which I think are open to doubt, and at the same time continue paying their running expenses. So that the most I can do—and I do it with the fullest possible desire to meet my right hon. Friend—is to say I will consult with him and with any of his friends and any other Members who are interested in order to see how I can keep the House in touch with these very large claims month by month. It is impossible to publish statements in the Press which deal with the whole story. I cannot make them fully intelligible. The subject is too big. If my right hon. Friend will help me to that extent and will meet me, I will see what I can give the House so that the House may know how this money is going, and it is going, rightly or wrongly I will not say, in millions every month. This very high state of the expenses of the railways is due to the fact that we are overtaking arrears. They are spending money under the agreement. These claims come in every month. Whether they are justifiable or not, it is very difficult to hold them up or you wreck the finance of the railways. I should like to consult my right hon. Friend and others interested as to how the House can be kept in touch. There is nothing I desire more than to have the fullest confidence of the House, and give it the fullest information. I hope with that assurance the House will now pass the Third Reading.
  Sir D. MACLEAN: We quite understand that any meticulous particularity with regard to what is happening with regard to my right hon. Friend and the railways would not only be detrimental to the public interest, but would be a waste of time. Perhaps my right hon. Friend might have it in his mind that the House would like as far as possible a monthly statement as to what progress has been made in this matter and what sums are being paid out.
  Sir E. GEDDES: I will see what I can do.

  SUPPLY.
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir EDWIN CORNWALL in the Chair.]

CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPART- MENTS SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1920–21.
  CLASS III.

    LAW CHARGES.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the salaries of the Law Officers' Department; the salaries and expenses of the Departments of His Majesty's Procurator-General, and of the Solicitor for the Affairs of His Majesty's Treasury, and of the Department of the Director of Public Prosecutions; for the costs of prosecutions, of other legal proceedings, and of Parliamentary agency."
    Major ENTWISTLE: There are one or two questions which I should like to ask on this Vote. In regard to the first item there is an additional sum required because of the increase in the number of important prosecutions. I should like to know the reason why these prosecutions have increased. I presume it is an increase in the number of prosecutions in which one of the Law Officers of the Crown has been engaged. It would be interesting to know what is the test of the kind of case in which a Law Officer is engaged. It may be said that the number of serious crimes have increased during the last year. When the murderer Holt was charged in connection with what was known as the Sandhills tragedy, the Attorney-General went to the Manchester Assizes to conduct the prosecution, and it struck me as rather extraordinary that an important personage like the Attorney-General, who has such important functions to perform in this House and in other matters, should have thought it necessary to go to Manchester to conduct that prosecution. I presume the result was additional expense to the State. I do not know what cost to the State was involved by the Attorney-General's appearance there, but there would be a leader under him, and, in addition, there would be a junior. The facts of the case were simple; there was no important point of law involved, and if ever there was a case which was perfectly clear and which would cause no difficulty that case
    2212
    struck me as pre-eminently one of them, and the King's counsel who was junior to the Attorney-General in the case was amply competent to conduct the prosecution. I do not know what principle governs these cases. Take the Greenwood poison trial. The Attorney-General did not appear for the prosecution in that case, and yet to the average man that case would appear to have been one of very much greater difficulty and complexity than the charge against the murderer Holt. What principle governs the selection of the type of criminal case in which the Attorney-General or the Solicitor-General appears? There are a great number of cases in which the Attorney-General appears where it is not necessary, and the expense of the State is thereby increased, because he would not appear in a case without having another leader with him.
    In connection with the next item due to the intervention of the Procurator-General (the King's Proctor) in divorce cases, I find that the estimate is due to the increased inquiries into undefended cases. That is due to the increased number of cases in which the King's Proctor has intervened. A Bill passed through all its stages in the House of Lords to increase the grounds on which divorce should be granted—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is now going on to discuss legislation. We are only concerned now with a Supplementary Estimate.
    Major ENTWISTLE: I was not discussing legislation, but only using it as an illustration of increased expenditure being incurred by the unnecessary intervention of the King's Proctor in cases under the existing legislation, against the feeling of the country. The King's Proctor should not unnecessarily interfere in cases against the public feeling in the country. As evidence of that we have had a Bill which has passed through the House of Lords and we have had a Motion which did not go through the House of Commons, but which met with a considerable measure of support, and I submit that the country does not view with favour the unnecessary interference of the King's Proctor. In a great many cases he interferes on grounds of the highest technicality against the whole wishes of the country. Where a marriage is one which

    2213
    has proved an absolute failure and the parties have got a divorce, I cannot see any cause on grounds of public policy for these irritating and unnecessary interferences of the King's Proctor. He interfered quite enough before, and I object to have to find an additional sum of £9,500 in order to meet the expenses of that official's increased activities, when the whole of our influence in the House ought to be exercised towards reducing his activities. We ought to have very strong reasons advanced for this increased activity before we pass this Vote.
    Mr. MOSLEY: In view of the remarkable increase in the expense of this Department, I trust that we may have some explanation from the Solicitor-General. Under Item B, for instance, we find that in 1919–20 the sum of £20,000 was allocated for criminal proceedings and quasi criminal proceedings, and in the Estimate for 1920–21 there is a sum of £26,500. In the original Estimate for this year there was an increase of £6,500, and in the Supplementary Estimate there is an additional increase to the amount of £6,000, so that the total increase over last year is £12,500. A detailed explanation is demanded by such figures and I trust that we may have it. With regard to Item F, "Intervention by the King's Proctor in divorce cases," I would like to know in exactly how many cases has the King's Proctor seen fit to intervene so as to cause this increase of expenditure, and in how many eases has he intervened with success?
    Mr. CAUTLEY: Though only £10 is asked for, the real increase is £16,000, but Appropriations-in-Aid amount to £15,990. When I look for details I see the explanation that in a number of cases larger county allowances are being received than were anticipated. Does that mean that we are transferring from the national taxation to the rates or local authorities the costs of these prosecutions? If so, why should that be so? As regards the second part of the explanation—that
    "the costs in Prize cases have exceeded expectations and also the costs from Crown nominees' estates"—
    is the whole £15,900 made up of costs received, or is it some part, and, if so, what part?
    Mr. ACLAND: I assume that we shall have some explanation of Sub-head K—
    "Expenses of the Director of Public Prosecutions under the Criminal Appeal Act."
    To whom is the extra sum of £500 really paid, because what is stated in the Paper, unless one happens to know the case of Crane and the Director of Public Prosecutions, does not explain itself. Then I would like an explanation of what these county allowances really are? Do they come from county courts, or a charge on the rates, or what? Are they only an additional burden placed on the ratepayer or the taxpayer which is being brought in to provide Appropriations-in-Aid?
    Lieut. - Commander WILLIAMS: I would be glad if the right hon. Gentleman would explain what is meant by Prize Cases. I would like an explanation of the technical position, as I am not quite certain what these cases are.
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Baldwin): I will do my best to answer the points which have been raised. I took the precaution of securing the assistance of the Solicitor-General (Sir E. Pollock) in case there should be any legal points with which I might not be able to deal. In reference to Subheads B and F, my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow (Mr. Mosley) asked for some figures showing the increase of work that has been done owing to divorce cases, and they will be of considerable interest, to the Committee. Although in the view of one of my hon. Friends (Major Entwistle), it would be a good thing if the Government took no notice of these private suits, and left people to go their own sweet way in anticipation of legislation which has not yet been passed, the view of the Government is that as long as the present law exists, we should do our1 best to prevent collusion, which undoubtedly occurs. As long as human nature remains unchanged, whatever the law may be, attempts at collusion will be made, so that in some degree we may always look for these charges. The bulk of the increased charge under B is directly attributable to the great increase in the divorce cases, because in so many cases the evidence that has been discovered on intervention leads to prosecutions for perjury and, I may add, a very regrettable circumstance, there has also been a marked increase this year in

    2215
    the cases of prosecution for abortion. Those two causes form a very great deal of the increase under B, and, of course, the divorce cases account entirely for the increase under F.
    In 1915–16 there were 962 inquiries in divorce cases held by the King's Proctor, and 36 cases of intervention. In 1918–19 there were 1,721 inquiries, and 41 interventions; in 1919–20, the last year for which there are complete figures, there were 3,051 inquiries, and 68 interventions; and I am advised that during the current year such increases still continue. I would remind the Committee that these inquiries which are held undoubtedly have a deterrent effect, but whatever deterrent effect they may have, the figures go on increasing, which shows that for the time being, and I hope that it may be only temporary, we really have an alarming increase in this type of case. The Attorney-General, in the course of the present year, appeared in two cases only, and my learned Friend the Solicitor-General in nine. When a Law Officer appears in a case, he exercises his own judgment as to the importance of the case, and he does it after consideration with the Director of Public Prosecutions. With regard to Appropriations-in-Aid, if my hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Cautley) does not know it, I may tell him that county allowances are dependent on an Act of Parliament of 1908, on which the learned Solicitor-General is better able to advise the House than I. The costs in the Prize cases have exceeded what we anticipated, and I think that that has been owing largely to the success of my learned Friend the Solicitor-General in the Courts. Doubtless he will say something about that.
    Lieut.-Commander WILLIAMS: Will the right hon. Gentleman say what are the Prize cases?
    Mr. BALDWIN: That is part of my learned Friend's work. I always feel that in this matter of examining Estimates my mind runs very much on all fours with that of the right hon. Member for Camborne (Mr. Acland). When I saw a reference to the case of Crane versus The Director of Public Prosecutions, I at once asked for information on the subject. I am not a lawyer, but I can give my right hon. Friend the information supplied to me, and I hope he will understand it. If there is any point
    2216
    not quite clear to hon. Members I shall be only too pleased if they will address a question to my learned Friend. The case mentioned is an appeal by Crane from a decision of the Court of Criminal Appeal to the House of Lords, brought at the fiat of the Attorney-General, on the ground that the point involved was a principle of importance. It is a trial where a thief and a receiver, although indicted separately, were tried together, and the trial was therefore a mere nullity and of no effect. The Court of Criminal Appeal under the Act has no power to order a new trial. The question is whether, when the trial has been ab initio void, the Court can send the case back for further trial, or whether an order to do this is ultra vires, as being equivalent to an order for a new trial.
    Captain BOWYER: Why is it that in 1915–16 there were 36 interventions out of 962 inquiries, whereas for the last year for which figures are available there were only 68 interventions, and the inquiries had gone up to 3,051? It appears to me that if there are so few interventions, the vast majority of the inquiries must be pure waste of money. Will the Government see that in future inquiries are made only when there is some primâ facie case made out, or some circumstances of suspicion, or some likelihood that intervention by the King's Proctor will be made?
    Mr. KILEY: I wish to emphasise the point made by the last speaker. Although there have been 3,000 inquiries and in 68 cases there has been intervention, it does not follow that even in those 68 cases there was any justification for intervention. Assuming there is justification, does it not suggest that a little more care exercised might reduce the number of 3,000 to reasonable proportions. If there is free play for those concerned to set going as many inquiries as they like and the net result of all their work is only 68 interventions, it suggests that there might be room for a reduction of the number and a saving of expenditure.
    Captain Viscount CURZON: In order to elucidate the point as to the inquiries, will the learned Solicitor-General state roughly the number of inquiries which have been successful, and can he also give us the figures for the corresponding years of the numbers of divorce cases?
    Mr. MOSLEY: I would like to endorse the comments made on the remarkable figures given to the Committee. It would appear that, in cases where inquiries have been made, in not 2 per cent, of those cases has any action been taken by the King's Proctor. Would the learned Solicitor-General also give detailed information as to Item B, which shows an increase of £12,500 over the Estimate for 1919–20?
    The SOLICITOR-GENERAL (Sir Ernest Pollock): I am very glad to reply as far as possible to the questions, which are all very reasonable questions. As to inquiries made by the King's Proctor into divorce cases and his intervention. In order to get a divorce, the parties must, come into Court with clean hands. It is not every person who is entitled to a divorce if he himself has been guilty of a breach of his conjugal contract. Under the law as it stands, if there were no inquiries made at all, there would be an opportunity of collusive divorce being obtained contrary to law. This is a matter in which detailed experience is not common to every Member of the House. The practice which has prevailed for a very long time indeed is this—that in the undefended divorce cases, of which there is a very great number now, inquiries are always set on foot by the King's Proctor to see whether or not it is a case of collusive divorce. In the very large number of undefended divorce cases amounting to 3,051 in the present year, it was necessary to make the same inquiries that have always been made, I was going to say, for a generation or more, into these cases, and that has a very important reflex deterrent effect against persons going into Court and endeavouring to obtain a decree nisi by false or collusive evidence. In the C8 cases of intervention, I think in every case the intervention was successful; that is to say, the King's Proctor intervened and found that he had good grounds for saying to the Court that although a decree nisi had been made, there were sufficient grounds for asking the Court to withhold the decree absolute, and without the inquiries by the King's Proctor it would have been impossible to have taken that action.
    The, inquiries may be carried further in some cases than in others, but it is necessary to make some inquiries in all cases. If they appear to be doubtful, further in-
    2218
    quiries are made, and, if necessary, intervention follows. I am sure the Committee will feel that the discretion of the King's Proctor has been rightly exercised when I say, as I have said before, that all these 68 interventions were upheld by the Court. The next question put by the hon. Member for Harrow (Mr. Mosley) was one which it would take more than the afternoon and next week to answer, because he asked a question relating to the whole of the prosecutions in all Courts throughout the country, and that includes Assizes in all counties, and so on. Perhaps he will not be surprised at my candour if I say that I am not able at the moment to answer such a searching inquiry. It would certainly have to be a matter of very careful, expensive, and laborious returns if we were to get all the information, but if the hon. Member likes to ask me privately something more which I can explain from such experience as I have, I shall be delighted to help him.
    Mr. MOSLEY: Surely when there is an increase in the Estimate of this year over that of last year amounting to £12,500 for criminal prosecutions we can have some explanation before we pass this sum?
    Sir E. POLLOCK: My observations are really supplementary to those of my right hon. Friend, who has already said that there has been a very largely increased number of prosecutions, particularly of cases of perjury and abortion, and, of course, it is quite impossible to form an estimate beforehand as to how many prosecutions there will be of a particular type.
    3.0 P.M.
    Mr. KILEY: I am not at all satisfied an to the precautions exercised in regard to the inquiries set on foot by the King's Proctor. Can the hon. and learned Gentleman tell us what supervision is exercised over the number of cases in which inquiries are made? When you have a Department with power to spend money, it is easy enough for them to find work. Are there not any cases where, on the evidence which is submitted to the King's Proctor, it is unnecessary to have further inquiries made by sending a number of officials all over the country for the purpose? I should like an assurance that some care is exercised in this matter.
    Sir E. POLLOCK: I thought I had said that, in the case of the undefended divorce cases, in every case it is the duty of the King's Proctor to take the evidence into consideration, and when he has considered the evidence, and so on, it is his duty to decide whether or not it is a case in which he ought to take further steps, and if according to his discretion he thinks it a fit and proper case for further inquiries, then he will make such inquiries as he thinks right. The hon. Member need not be afraid that hordes of officials will go touring round the country in order to find work for themselves, because that is not the case. This is a judicial officer charged by law with the duty, in all cases of undefended divorces, of making such inquiries as in his discretion he thinks right. He is a very responsible and high officer, and I think the Committee may have every confidence in the exercise of his discretion in this matter.
    Major ENTWISTLE: Is it a statutory obligation to make inquiry into every undefended divorce case?
    Sir E. POLLOCK: The Judge who grants the decree nisi, in all cases sends the papers to the King's Proctor for the purpose of his exercising his discretion. In regard to the Prize Court, this is a Court set up at the commencement of a war for the purpose of dealing with the ships and cargoes—cargoes in particular—which have been intercepted as being contraband goods on their way to the enemy. During the War we had a very elaborate system of what was called generally the blockade, for the purpose of stopping goods, the ultimate destination of which was the enemy countries at war with this country. That system was extraordinarily successful. We have got condemnation of a vast quantity of contraband goods. A very large sum thereby has been paid into what is called the Prize Fund, and will ultimately be distributed, according to the practice, in His Majesty's Navy. This figure of the cost here does not really represent the true conditions of things, because in most cases condemnation against a neutral shipper or owner is condemned with costs, and he has to pay them. Owing to the system on which the account is made up, I do not think in this case that any credit is taken for the costs which are recovered from the person against
    2220
    whom the order of condemnation is made, and, therefore, in the Prize Court, as indeed in every Court, there is often a very large sum to be taken as a credit against the actual outlay which is asked in the Vote, because in the Prize Court and other Courts, when the unsuccessful party is condemned, he pays the costs.
    The actual work of the Prize Court is now nearing its completion. It was hoped it might be possible to finish it in the course of this Term, but I know, as a matter of fact, that that will not be possible. But, speaking generally, the success of the Prize Court, or, in other words, the discretion with which proper cases have been brought before it, has been somewhat remarkable, and the number of cases in which condemnations have been obtained has been very large. These are the cases with which the Prize Court has had to deal. The amount of goods dealt with has been very large indeed, but no doubt the system was of great use during the War.
    Lieut.-Commander WILLIAMS: Why is it that in some cases you can put the costs of the proceedings in these Prize Courts on the enemy firm, and in other cases, apparently, you take it out—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: This is getting too technical. The hon. and gallant Gentleman is dealing with the procedure of the Law Courts now.

    LAND REGISTRY.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £7,530, be granted to His Majesty to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of Land Registry."
    Sir D. MACLEAN: I beg to move,
    "That the Vote be reduced by £1,530."
    This will reduce the sum to £6,000, and the main reason I am moving the reduction is this. I am afraid it is now a reason which loses some of its weight by its constant repetition, but it is the only way, I am afraid, to drive a thing fully home. This is the fourth increase during the present year. The first increase was when the original Estimate was submitted. That original Estimate asked for a sum of £73,287. But that was an increase of £19,722 on the preceding year. Then

    2221
    a further sum of £20,310, included in the Supplementary Votes, for War bonus, came on twice, first in July and then in November. What possible reason can there be for these four increases in 12 months? We have had it out before in other Estimates, and I must direct attention to this very significant fact. It is only by constantly hammering away that we find out what the real increases are. By way of illustration, I would remind hon. Members of the Debate we had yesterday on the National Debt Office, and the Comptroller-General's increase there was from £2,000 to £2,500, but it was only at the very end of the Debate that an hon. Member asked for particulars as to bonus. My right hon. Friend at once said, quite frankly, £500, so that really the increase that gentleman had during last year was from £2,000 to £3,000—a clear net increase of £1,000 on his salary. That is the only way in which you can get at the facts. I again urge upon my right hon. Friend, when these Estimates are framed, to see that, instead of hon. Members having to go through this long process of examination, and possess a good deal of technical knowledge of these Estimates, all these relevant facts should be plainly stated on the Paper itself, so that anybody can understand by any reasonably careful examination of the Estimates what the facts really are.
    So far as I am concerned, I am more fortunately placed than the majority of Members of this House, because for a number of years it was my special business, when I was occupying your position, Sir Edwin, to see these Estimates through the Committee, and very often, in listening to hon. Members, I used to divert my attention, and occasionally amuse myself, by seeing what these Estimates really meant, and it is by that knowledge that I have really got to know what the Estimates are. It is most unfair that the ordinary Member has not got all these perfectly simple and relevant facts so that they should be staring him in the face. Let us apply that to this particular Vote which is before us. First of all, what is the real actual increase which these gentlemen are getting? In addition to the sum appearing on the Paper, they have had their share of £20,310. Then the next question I would ask my right hon. Friend is this. Under Sub-head A (Salaries, Wages and Allowances), there is provision for reorganisa-
    2222
    tion of and additions to Map Department Staff, £1,850, additional assistant clerks £435, copying, etc., £300, and then a very remarkable item—overtime, £4,200. I want to know what that really means. What was the special pressure which necessitated the work of overtime What was the particular occasion which caused it, and is it a regular practice, as is sometimes the case, to supplement salaries by working overtime? My right hon. Friend will agree with me that that is a figure which requires an explanation, and I am sure he will give it. Why should these large increases be made under the present circumstances of today when unemployment is rampant and liable to be even more widespread? All servants of the State should join other citizens in bearing their share of the burden, and whatever their merits may be for these increases, they should wait a more favourable time.
    Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I have
    been trying to understand this Estimate, and should like to ask my right hon. Friend one or two questions about it. In the first place, in the middle of the page, rather like a plum in a cake, there is a sum down for receipts, but it does not look, unfortunately, as if this plum was ever in the hole, for, as far as I can see, the receipts amount to £45,000; the original Estimates were £120,000, the revised Estimate is £165,000, so you have an increased amount of receipts put down as £45,000. But I do not see that these receipts have been taken into account in the actual sum the hon. Gentleman is now asking from the House. I do not see how these receipts work into the Estimate. Does this Estimate really include the whole of expenses of this Department? The right hon. Gentleman knows very well that one of the recommendations of the Committee on National Expenditure was that each Vote should show the total expenses of the Department. It very often happens that outside the actual sum asked for for a Department under a particular Vote other moneys are required for a Department that come under different Votes, the Stationery Department and Office of Works, for instance. Does this really represent the whole of the money required for this Department? Does it include, for instance, the Stationery or Postal Department? When we are discussing the Votes of this Department it is really a good thing to know whether

    2223
    that is the total expenditure or whether there is some other Departmental expenditure belonging to the Department under a separate Vote.
    I should like to emphasise the point of the right hon. Member for Peebles (Sir D. Maclean) It seems to me that there is an enormous sum required for overtime. I do not understand that. If you look at the original Estimate you will find that last year the sum required for overtime was £200. This year the original Estimate for overtime was £850. That is to say, an increase of £650 over last year; but now we are asked for £4,200 extra for overtime, an increase of £4,850 over the overtime last year—a total altogether of £5,050 overtime. One would naturally suppose that if all this overtime was being put in the officials would have remained the same, but that is not so. Not only are we asked for an enormous extra sum for overtime, five times what it was last year, but we also find that the officials have increased. In last year's Estimate there were 229 officials in the Land Registry Department. This year the original Estimate was 256, an increase of over 12 per cent, and now they come down with a Supplementary Estimate for "Reorganisation of, and Additions to, Map Department Staff," and various other sections, so there is a further increase of staff under this Estimate. I daresay my right hon. Friend will be able to tell us how this additional sum was necessary since the original Estimate was made. Anyhow, we are going to be charged apparently for the Map Department alone, for additions of staff, £1,850. That seems to me, taking this enormous increase in overtime into consideration, to be a figure that must be explained, because if you look at the original Estimate it gives the list of the various gentlemen who are engaged in this Department, and it is quite clear that a proportion of the whole list of the officials have been working overtime. Possibly comparatively few of these people have actually been earning this overtime money. In my right hon. Friend's reply I should like to know how many of these officials have been earning this £5,050, because the business of this Department must have increased quite enormously for the sum of overtime to have increased five times over what it was last year. My right hon. and learned Friend will correct me if I am
    2224
    wrong, but every county in England does not have a registry. It is a very limited number of counties, and Middlesex and Yorkshire are probably the two chief counties in England that have these registries. Therefore we are only dealing with a very limited area of the country, and I cannot conceive why there should have been this very large increase now. I should be very grateful if my right hon. Friend could reply to these points.
    Colonel NEWMAN: In this Estimate there is the usual note about war bonus amounting to over £20,000 on a salary estimate of £83,800. You recollect that when we discussed Vote 2 (A), page 10, the salary of a Minister without Portfolio, I raised the question then about this war bonus. In that case it amounted to £3,700 on an estimated salary of £34,000, and further you pointed out to us that we were able to discuss the Vote for war bonus on page 36, "Unclassified Services, 20," where there is a war bonus on £12,650,000. When we come to discuss the war bonus, shall we be able to go right back and discuss its allocation on all these Votes? I cannot understand how it is that in this particular Vote the bonus comes out at a very big figure, £20,000, nearly a fourth of the whole, whereas the unfortunate people under the Minister without Portfolio get only about one-eighth. How does that come about, and who is to answer the question? Is it to be deferred until we get the war bonus Vote, and, if it is, shall I be entitled to go right back and ask the various Departments if they have been diligent in getting their seven-twenty-sixths?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I may not be in the Chair when the Vote in the unclassified services dealing with the war bonus comes under consideration, but I take it that when that matter is under discussion the only question will be whether the Committee will grant the Supplementary Estimate. If it does, the Treasury will have the money to deal with, and, if it does not, the Treasury will not have the money. It would not be in order to go back to the Votes passed, and discuss the allocation of the money. Nor is it in order, as I said yesterday, upon each of these Supplementary Estimates to discuss the policy of the war bonus, though the amounts are given for the information of Members.
    Colonel NEWMAN: Might I definitely ask this question? Why is the War bonus in the case of the Land Registry officials so much higher than in the case of the officials of the Minister without Portfolio? In going through the different Votes, I find the same discrepancy, though apparently the bonus is given in a systematic way. The Vote for the bonus says:
    "Provision for further increase from 1st March, 1921, of 2/26th (making 7/26ths in all) in the rate of bonus payable from 1st March, 1920, in accordance with the scheme approved for the Civil Service, subject for payment of rates of bonus fluctuating with increases and decreases in the cost of living."
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I do not know what the right hon. and gallant Gentleman is reading.
    Colonel NEWMAN: Page 36.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: We are not on page 36; we are only on page 19.
    Colonel NEWMAN: Can I have the information?
    Sir JOHN BUTCHER: I should like to ask one or two questions about this large amount for overtime. How many hours do these gentlemen normally work, and when does overtime begin? Have the hours which they work decreased, or have they been the same for some considerable time? Overtime is very expensive work. I presume it is paid at a higher rate than ordinary time. If so, and if the increase in business is likely to demand overtime for some considerable time, would it not be far better and cheaper to employ, temporarily, some ex-service men until the pressure of business decreases, thus giving them employment and getting their services at the ordinary rate instead of paying extremely well-paid civil servants additional sums for overtime? Therefore, I would ask my right hon. Friend to tell us whether overtime is likely to continue, and if so, will he adopt the cheaper and more advantageous course of employing, temporarily, at any rate, ex-service men?
    Mr. CAUTLEY: There are two questions which I should like to ask. The original Estimate was £76,292, and just below in small type it says:
    "The total original net Estimate, 1920–21, for the Land Registry was £89,292."
    I want to know what is the reason for the additional £13,000, and why £89,000
    2226
    was not given as the original Estimate instead of the figure that is given. Is there any provision by which the amount of the war bonus varies with the cost of living, and, if so, how often is it adjusted? Now that prices are going down and the cost of living is diminishing, is there any immediate prospect of this sum for war bonus diminishing accordingly?
    Sir H. CRAIK: This question of war bonus is being raised over and over again in small driblets, but I understood you to hold that it could be only discussed at some length when we come to the unclassified services. I feel very strongly about it and wish to criticise it from several points of view, but it will really interfere with a satisfactory Debate if we attempt to deal with it in driblets. I would therefore suggest that we should postpone it until we get to that Vote. Otherwise, those of us who feel strongly on the question must raise it and discuss it on each Vote.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: As I understand it, a Supplementary Estimate may be asked for an increase of £200 on a salary of £1,000, making it £1,200, and at the same time the same official may receive £200 war bonus, making the total £1,400. That seems to me proper and essential information for the Committee to have without discussing the policy of the war bonus. Without knowing that £200 war bonus is paid, the Committee would not have all the facts. When we come to the unclassified services the question of the war bonus will be open for discussion, but I do not think the Committee can discuss the bonus piecemeal simply because of the fact that it is brought to its notice that certain sums for war bonus are included in the different Votes.
    Sir H. CRAIK: I hope you will not preclude us, when we come to discuss the bonus, from raising the question of increases of salary upon which the bonus is paid. One of my objections to the bonus is that it has followed a general increase of salaries, and I could not argue the question of bonus without referring to the fact that independently of it salaries have been generally increased.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: No, but the fact that war bonus is being paid is material information now.
    Lord ROBERT CECIL: There is no advantage to be gained by carrying on our discussion under a misapprehension. I understand that when we get to the Unclassified Services we shall not be entitled to discuss the policy of the war bonus at all.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Oh, yes.
    Lord R. CECIL: Well, I may be wrong, I shall be glad if I am, but I understood from the Chair that even then we shall only be entitled to discuss any addition made by the Supplementary Estimate, but not the policy of the war bonus at all. I think we ought to be absolutely clear as to where we stand in this matter, and whether we shall be able to raise the question of principle or policy of the war bonus on the Unclassified Services.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The Noble Lord is correct. We are talking only about Supplementary Estimates, and when I said we could discuss the war bonus when we came to Page 36 I was referring, of course, to the Supplementary Estimates, and the same Rules of Debate will apply to the discussion of the Unclassified Services as apply to the other Supplementary Estimates, and hon. Members will only be able to discuss the point in so far as any addition is asked for in the Supplementary Estimate.
    Sir H. CRAIK: Are we to be entitled to raise the policy of the war bonus when we get to the Vote for the Unclassified Services?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: That point can be answered when we reach those Votes. The present discussion cannot be carried any further.
    Lieut.-Commander WILLIAMS: I think we ought to have a little more information in regard to this Estimate. Item A refers to "provision for additional staff, etc., necessitated by increased business and the re-organisation of and additions to the Map Department staff." The sum put down for that is £1,850, but if we look back at the original Estimate for the Map Department, we find a footnote to the effect that the numbers of the subordinate staff in that Department have not yet been finally settled. Apparently this Department is still increasing in size, and I should like to know clearly whether a definite point has yet been reached in regard to that matter, or whether further
    2228
    increases of staff are to be anticipated. I would also like to know why it is that this Department has allowed its expenses to get out of control. Surely the fees it receives ought to cover its expenses.
    Mr. SWAN: I notice that in Item A, the total of which is £6,758, as much as £4,200 is put down for overtime. Seeing the enormous number of men out of work, it seems to me hardly fair that such a charge should appear here. I am not against overtime where it is necessary, but when we know there are so many men, not only ordinary civilians, but ex-soldiers and officers, out of work, and that huge pressure is being brought to bear on the Ministry of Labour to provide employment for them, it seems strange there should be such an amount of overtime provided for in this Estimate. Could not the work be handed over to some of these unemployed men? It would be more economic to do this, and it would be an advantage to the whole country, if an effort were made to revive posts for men out of work, and relieve them of the necessity of applying for the unemployment benefit by giving them the work now done in overtime.
    Mr. ACLAND: My right hon. Friend just now said that his mind and mine ran so much on the same lines that he often found himself thinking what questions I might ask, and fortifying himself in advance with the information I was likely to apply for. I feel certain he will have fortified himself with an answer to the question I now propose to put, and it is: What is the meaning of the words "advertisements for absolute titles," which are to be found in Item B? I presume they refer to land titles and not titles in the peerage, because if it were the latter, and if the Exchequer resorted to the practice of advertising for persons who desire such titles, there should be considerable Appropriations-in-Aid to be brought in on the other side.
    Mr. BALDWIN: I have never had much experience on the subject which my right hon. Friend has just raised, but I do not think in this country it will ever be necessary to advertise for people who want peerages. I propose to deal with one or two of the small points which have been raised in the course of the Debate. My hon. Friend the Member for East Grin-stead (Mr. Cautley) pointed to a serious discrepancy between the total of the Supplementary Vote and the total of the

    2229
    original Vote. Probably he has discovered his mistake by now, but I may remind him that the Supplementary Estimate applies only to Items A and B, while the original Estimate contains Item C, for which there is no Supplementary Estimate, and if he bears that in mind he will find that the totals exactly coincide. With regard to the point put by my hon. Friend the Member for Wood Green (Mr. Locker-Lampson), it is a curious slip for one so familiar with Parliamentary practice. He complained that there were no figures about the other expenditure, such as the Office of Works and other Departments, on the face of this Vote. If the hon. Member thinks for a moment he will remember that those figures are never given on the Supplementary Estimates, but he will find them in full on the original Estimates on page 21, and they will then be placed on the original Estimates for the coming year.
    Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: What I asked was whether there was anything for stationery, and whether this Supplementary Estimate entailed something for stationery which might appear in some other Vote?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I beg my hon. Friend's pardon. I think the best way to reply to the general criticisms which have been made will be to say a few words about the work of this office. I agree it may appear startling that an extra £7,530 is being asked for, but I would remind the hon. Member for Tavistock (Lieut. -Commander Williams) that he made an error in imagining that the receipts in connection with Land Registry did not cover expenses, because they cover far more than the expenditure. The estimated increased receipts is no less than £45,000, making the total we expect to receive £165,000 as against the original estimated receipts of only £120,000. That in itself is no reason, I admit, why we should not be as economical as possible. There is no reason to be extravagant be cause we happen to have a branch which brings in a considerable sum to the revenue.
    I want to explain that the whole of the increase of expenditure on the face of this Estimate is caused solely and entirely by the abnormal increase in the work of the Department, and consequently the large increase that is shown on the face of this Estimate of the receipts that are coming
    2230
    in. The total number of applications for registration under all the Acts with which this office is concerned in 1919 amounted to just under 48,000. In 1920 the total was 69,000; that is the year just completed. That is a very large increase, and the result of that increase in work, bringing in increasing receipts, is that it has thrown a very great strain upon the office. That strain is the direct cause of the overtime upon which I wish to say a few words. Some hon. Members asked me why should not the unemployed come in instead of working this overtime. The position is that the overtime has been sanctioned by the Treasury with great reluctance as a temporary measure in the Map Department. The work in that Department rises correspondingly with the work in the Land Registry. We have had in the course of the year to increase the staff in the Map Department by about 30, but for a good deal of the most skilled work, such as the work done by surveyors and draughtsmen, we are in this difficulty. The premises in which they are engaged are full. We have not yet decided the best way to deal with that, and we find great difficulty at the present time in getting men skilled for this very special and technical work who will come at the present rates which are being given for that work.
    The supply of men competent for that work is extremely limited, and so while the question of the reorganisation of this office is still under revision we felt that the only thing for the time being to do was to sanction overtime. If we had been able to do without overtime, we could only have done it by employing a number of fresh people, and that would have meant that we should have had to have got more room, and there was considerable difficulty about that. The overtime applies to between 80 and 90 members of the staff. I do not think it will be necessary to continue the overtime for very long, but in the circumstances it was the only way to meet the difficult position in which the Land Registry Department found itself.
    I might point out rather a curious fact which, oddly enough, has attracted attention, and that is Sub-head (b) is a remarkable one. It has been the practice in this Department to pay their own postal and telegraph charges. It cost the revenue nothing for that work, and, of course, with the increased work that is being

    2231
    done there is extra postage as a charge on the Department. It is a satisfactory feature that although to meet this enormous increase in business we have had to have these increases which may be temporary, the receipts are increasing in quite as great a proportion as we could expect, and the actual surplus of the Department for the year, I think, will maintain work in the same ratio as when the business was done on a much smaller scale. For a short time during the War this Department was not paying, but with the conclusion of the War business has come back, and, as I have shown by the figures, not only that, but it has come tack with a gigantic increase, which I am sure hon. Members will feel is very satisfactory. I think my hon. Friend the Member for Wood Green (Mr. Locker-Lampson) was rather wondering why the receipts did not appear as an Appropriation-in-Aid of this Vote. The reason is that these receipts in common with certain other receipts of other Departments, are payable by Inland Revenue stamps.
    In this case they have always been treated in the Estimates, not as Appropriations-in-Aid, but they are paid direct to the Exchequer and appear in the details to make up the total of the miscellaneous revenue account. I hope I have now dealt with all the points.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Could the right hon. Gentleman tell me the normal length of hours which these men work?
    Mr. BALDWIN: I am afraid I have no recollection, but I will find out, and send particulars to the hon. Baronet.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Will the right hon. Gentleman at the same time state whether any change has recently been made?
    Mr. BALDWIN: Yes.
    Question put, "That a sum, not exceeding £6,000, be granted for the said Service."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 22; Noes, 141.

    Division No. 18.]

    AYES.

    [12.58 p.m.

    Addison, Rt. Hon. Dr. C.

    Gardner, Ernest

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

    Amery, Lieut.-Col. Leopold C. M. S.

    Geddes, Rt. Hon. Sir E. (Camb'dge)

    Nicholson, Reginald (Doncaster)

    Astor, Viscountess

    Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

    Norman, Major Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

    Baird, Sir John Lawrence

    Gilmour, Lieut.-Colonel John

    Parry, Lieut.-Colonel Thomas Henry

    Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley

    Gould, James C.

    Pearce, Sir William

    Balfour, George (Hampstead)

    Grant, James A.

    Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

    Barlow, Sir Montague

    Green, Joseph F. (Leicester, W.)

    Percy, Charles

    Barnett, Major R. W.

    Greenwood, Colonel Sir Hamar

    Perkins, Walter Frank

    Barnston, Major Harry

    Hacking, Captain Douglas H.

    Philipps, Sir Owen C. (Chester, City)

    Bellairs, Commander Car yon W.

    Hambro, Captain Angus Valdemar

    Pollock, Sir Ernest M.

    Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)

    Harmsworth, C. B. (Bedford, Luton)

    Rankin, Captain James S.

    Bennett, Sir Thomas Jewell

    Henry, Denis S. (Londonderry, S.)

    Raw, Lieutenant-Colonel N.

    Birchall, Major J. Dearman

    Hopkins, John W. W.

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

    Blake, Sir Francis Douglas

    Home, Sir R. S. (Glasgow, Hillhead)

    Rees, Capt. J. Tudor- (Barnstaple)

    Borwick, Major G. O.

    Hunter, General Sir A. (Lancaster)

    Roundell, Colonel R. F.

    Bowyer, Captain G. E. W.

    Hurst, Lieut.-Colonel Gerald B.

    Sanders, Colonel Sir Robert A.

    Brassey, Major H. L. C.

    Illingworth, Rt. Hon. A. H.

    Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.

    Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive

    Inskip, Thomas Walker H.

    Scott, A. M. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Brown, Captain D. C.

    Jodrell, Neville Paul

    Shaw, William T. (Forfar)

    Bruton, Sir James

    Jones, J. T. (Carmarthen, Llanelly)

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

    Buckley, Lieut.-Colonel A.

    Joynson-Hicks, Sir William

    Smithers, Sir Alfred W.

    Bull, Rt. Hon. Sir William James

    Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement

    Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

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

    Law, Rt. Hon. A. B. (Glasgow, C.)

    Stanler, Captain Sir Beville

    Butcher, Sir John George

    Lewis, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Univ., Wales)

    Stanley, Major Hon. G. (Preston)

    Cautley, Henry S.

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

    Steel, Major S. Strang

    Cecil, Rt. Hon. Evelyn (Birm., Aston)

    Lindsay, William Arthur

    Stewart, Gershom

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

    Lloyd-Greame, Sir P.

    Sugden, W. H.

    Chamberlain, N. (Birm., Ladywood)

    Lorden, John William

    Sykes, Colonel Sir A. J. (Knutsford)

    Clay, Lieut.-Colonel H. H. Spender

    Lowther, Major C. (Cumberland, N.)

    Taylor, J.

    Coats, Sir Stuart

    Lynn, R. J.

    Thomas-Stanford, Charles

    Coote, Colin Reith (Isle of Ely)

    M'Curdy, Rt. Hon. C. A.

    Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)

    Coote, William (Tyrone, South)

    M'Donald, Dr. Bouverie F. P.

    Thomson, Sir W. Mitchell- (Maryhill)

    Cope, Major Wm.

    M'Guffin, Samuel

    Townshend, Sir Charles Vere Ferrers

    Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)

    Mackinder, Sir H. J. (Camlachie)

    Ward, Col. J. (Stoke-upon-Trent)

    Craig, Captain C. C. (Antrim, South)

    McLaren, Robert (Lanark, Northern)

    Ward, William Dudley (Southampton)

    Craig, Colonel Sir J. (Down, Mid)

    M'Micking, Major Gilbert

    Wheler, Lieut.-Colonel C. H.

    Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

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

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

    Davidson, J. C. C. (Hemel Hempstead)

    McNeill, Ronald (Kent, Canterbury)

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

    Denniss, Edmund R. B. (Oldham)

    Magnus, Sir Philip

    Williamson, Rt. Hon. Sir Archibald

    Dockrell, Sir Maurice

    Mallaby-Deeley, Harry

    Wilson, Daniel M. (Down, West)

    Doyle, N. Grattan

    Malone, Major P. B. (Tottenham, S.)

    Wilson, Colonel Leslie O. (Reading)

    Du Pre, Colonel William Baring

    Matthews, David

    Wilson, Lt.-Col. Sir M. (Bethnal Gn.)

    Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

    Mitchell, William Lane

    Winterton, Earl

    Edwards, Hugh (Glam., Neath)

    Moles, Thomas

    Wise, Frederick

    Eyres-Monsell, Commander B. M.

    Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred M.

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

    Falcon, Captain Michael

    Moreing, Captain Algernon H.

    Wood, Major Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)

    Falle, Major Sir Bertram G.

    Morris, Richard

    Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.

    Fisher, Rt. Hon. Herbert A. L.

    Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

    Yate, Colonel Sir Charles Edward

    FitzRoy, Captain Hon. E. A.

    Nall, Major Joseph

    Young, Lieut.-Com. E. H. (Norwich)

    Forestier-Walker, L.

    Neal, Arthur

    Forrest, Walter

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

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Lord E. Talbot and Captain Guest.

    NOES.

    Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)

    Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Widnes)

    Sexton, James

    Barnes, Major H. (Newcastle, E.)

    Holmes, J. Stanley

    Swan, J. E.

    Bell, James (Lancaster, Ormskirk)

    John, William (Rhondda, West)

    Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)

    Briant, Frank

    Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)

    Walsh, Stephen (Lancaster, Ince)

    Davies, Major D. (Montgomery)

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

    Waterson, A. E.

    Edwards, C (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

    Morgan, Major D. Watts

    Wignall, James

    Finney, Samuel

    Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Stourbrdge)

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Redmond, Captain William Archer

    Wilson, W. Tyson (Westhoughton)

    Glanville, Harold James

    Rose, Frank H.

    Hartshorn, Vernon

    Royce, William Stapleton

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

    Mr. T. Griffiths and Mr. G. Thorne.

    Divsion No. 19.]

    AYES.

    [3.58 p.m.

    Acland, Rt. Hon. F. D.

    Glanville, Harold James

    Murray, Lieut.-Colonel A. (Aberdeen)

    Barrand, A. R.

    Hartshorn, Vernon

    Poison, Sir Thomas

    Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.

    Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Widnes)

    Sexton, James

    Clynes, Rt. Hon. J. R.

    Holmes, J. Stanley

    Wignall, James

    Davies, Major D. (Montgomery)

    Irving, Dan

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. W. (Stourbridge)

    Entwistle, Major C. F.

    Kiley, James D.

    Wilson, W. Tyson (Westhoughton)

    Finney, Samuel

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

    Galbraith, Samuel

    Morgan, Major D. Watts

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Mr. Swan and Mr. G. Thorne.

    NOES.

    Adair, Rear-Admiral Thomas B. S.

    Edwards, Major J. (Aberavon)

    Lowther, Major C. (Cumberland, N.)

    Amery, Lieut.-Col. Leopold C. M. S.

    Edwards, Hugh (Glam., Neath)

    Lynn, R. J.

    Baird, Sir John Lawrence

    Eyres-Monsell, Commander B. M.

    M'Curdy, Rt. Hon. C. A.

    Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley

    Falcon, Captain Michael

    M'Donald, Dr. Bouverie F. P.

    Balfour, George (Hampstead)

    Gardner, Ernest

    M'Guffin, Samuel

    Banner, Sir John S. Harmood-

    Gibbs, Colonel George Abraham

    McLaren, Robert (Lanark, Northern)

    Barnett, Major R. W.

    Gilbert, James Daniel

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

    Barnston, Major Harry

    Gilmour, Lieut.-Colonel John

    McMicking, Major Gilbert

    Bellairs, Commander Carlyon W.

    Goff, Sir R. Park

    Mallaby-Deeley, Harry

    Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)

    Gould, James C.

    Moles, Thomas

    Birchall, Major J. Dearman

    Grant, James A.

    Mond, Rt. Hon. Sir Alfred M.

    Borwick, Major G. O.

    Hacking, Captain Douglas H.

    Montagu, Rt. Hon. E. S.

    Bowyer, Captain G. E. W.

    Hall, Lieut.-Col. sir F. (Dulwich)

    Morden, Lieut.-Col. W. Grant

    Breese, Major Charles E.

    Hanson, Sir Charles Augustin

    Moreing, Captain Algernon H.

    Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive

    Harmsworth, C. B. (Bedford, Luton)

    Munro, Rt. Hon. Robert

    Bruton, Sir James

    Hennessy, Major J. R. G.

    Neal, Arthur

    Buckley, Lieut.-Colonel A.

    Henry, Denis S. (Londonderry, S.)

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

    Bull, Rt. Hon. Sir William James

    Herbert, Hon. A. (Somerset, Yeovil)

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

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

    Hinds, John

    Nicholson, Reginald (Doncaster)

    Butcher, Sir John George

    Hoare, Lieut.-Colonel Sir S. J. G.

    Nield, Sir Herbert

    Carr, W. Theodore

    Hopkins, John W. W.

    Norris, Colonel Sir Henry G.

    Cautley, Henry S.

    Hunter, General Sir A. (Lancaster)

    Oman, Sir Charles William C.

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

    Hurst, Lieut.-Colonel Gerald B.

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

    Clay, Lieut.-Colonel H. H. Spender

    Illingworth, Rt. Hon. A. H.

    Palmer, Brigadier-General G. L.

    Coats, Sir Stuart

    James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert

    Parry, Lieut.-Colonel Thomas Henry

    Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.

    Jodrell, Neville Paul

    Pearce, Sir William

    Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)

    Jones, J. T. (Carmarthen, Llanelly)

    Pease, Rt. Hon. Herbert Pike

    Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry

    Kinloch-Cooke, sir Clement

    Peel, Col. Hn. S. (Uxbridge, Mddx.)

    Curzon, Commander Viscount

    Law, Rt. Hon. A. B. (Glasgow, C.)

    Percy, Charles

    Davidson, J. C. C. (Hemel Hempstead)

    Lewis, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Univ., Wales)

    Perkins, Walter Frank

    Denniss, Edmund R. B. (Oldham)

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

    Pollock, Sir Ernest M.

    Dockrell, Sir Maurice

    Lindsay, William Arthur

    Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton

    Doyle, N. Grattan

    Lloyd-Greame, Sir P.

    Present, Major W. H.

    Purchase, H. G.

    Stewart, Gershom

    Watson, Captain John Bertrand

    Ramsden, G. T.

    Sugden, W. H

    Wheler, Lieut.-Colonel C. H.

    Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

    Sykes, Colonel Sir A. J. (Knutsford)

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

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

    Taylor, J.

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

    Rees, Capt. J. Tudor- (Barnstaple)

    Terrell, George (Wilts, Chippenham)

    Wills, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Gilbert

    Reid, D. D.

    Terrell, Captain R. (Oxford, Henley)

    Wilson, Capt. A. S. (Holderness)

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

    Thomas-Stanford, Charles

    Wilson, Daniel M (Down, West)

    Sanders, Colonel Sir Robert A.

    Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)

    Wilson, Colonel Leslie O. (Reading)

    Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.

    Thomson, Sir W. Mitchell- (Maryhill)

    Wilson-Fox, Henry

    Shaw, William T. (Forfar)

    Townshend, Sir Charles Vere Ferrers

    Wood, Hon. Edward F. L. (Ripon)

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

    Vickers, Douglas

    Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.

    Smithers, Sir Alfred W.

    Ward, Col. J. (Stoke-upon-Trent)

    Young, Lieut.-Com. E. H. (Norwich)

    Sprot, Colonel Sir Alexander

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

    Stanley, Major Hon. G. (Preston)

    Ward, William Dudley (Southampton)

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

    Steel, Major S. Strang

    Warren, Lieut.-Col. Sir Alfred H.

    Lord E. Talbot and Captain Guest.

    Resolutions agreed to.

    POLICE, ENGLAND AND WALES.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a supplementary sum, not exceeding £440,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the salaries of the Commissioner and Assistant Commissioners of the Metropolitan Police, and of the Receiver for the Metropolitan Police district, war bonus to Metropolitan police magistrates, the contribution towards the expenses of the Metropolitan police the salaries and expenses of the inspectors of constabulary, and other grants in respect of police expenditure, including places of detention and a grant in aid of the Police Federation."
    Mr. SEXTON: I want to call attention on this Vote to the present position of the men implicated in the police strike two years ago. The right hon. Gentleman will agree, I am sure—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: It would not be in order to have a discussion with reference to the police strike which occurred some time ago, nor would it be in order for the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary to reply. We are now only concerned with a Supplementary Estimate of £440,000 on an original Vote of £6,175,000, and it would not be in order to discuss the general administration of the police of England and Wales.
    Mr. SEXTON: That was not my intention. My intention was to ask the Home Secretary whether, in the future provision for the employment of police under this Supplementary Estimate, it would be possible to consider the eligibility of these men, who, as we all know, have suffered severely, and whether, if vacancies occur in the police force, they would be considered eligible for rejoining the force.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: We cannot discuss that now.
    Sir D. MACLEAN: On a point of Order. This large sum of £330,000 is being asked for additional pay for police, and I suggest, with much respect, that it is open to my hon. Friend to put his case before the Home Secretary, and ask whether, with regard to this additional sum, the men referred to are entitled, as my hon. Friend suggests, to favourable consideration.
    The DEPUTY - CHAIRMAN: As I understand it, a supplementary sum of £440,000 is being asked for, and that is the only question before the Committee. If there is any item of expenditure in this £440,000 for payment to any of the ex-police officers with whom the hon. Member desires to deal, he would be in order in asking for information or discussing any money involved in their case. If, however, there is no such money included, it does not come before the Committee now. I understand that the question of the ex-police officers who were on strike does not come into this figure. If it does, then, in so far as it comes in, it will be in order, but at present, as I understand, it is not included.
    Mr. SEXTON: Am I in order in referring or calling attention to that deductable portion of the men's pensions during the time they were in the service? This Vote deals with pensions, and money has been deducted from these men, who had 10 or 15 years' service.
    The DEPUTY - CHAIRMAN: As I understand it, that does not arise on this Vote.
    Sir D. MACLEAN: On that point of Order. Would it not be better for the Home Secretary, who knows all about this, to state whether they are or are not included, and whether my hon. Friend's point can or cannot be dealt with on this Vote? With great respect, it is for the right hon. Gentleman to say whether any

    2235
    part of this is within the ambit of the case which my hon. Friend wishes to lay before the Committee. If it is not that is an end of the matter, but I suggest that the Home Secretary might answer at once.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I rather agree with the right hon. Gentleman.
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Shortt): There is nothing in this sum of money which provides for pensions for police constables.
    Sir A. SHIRLEY BENN: I should like to ask the Home Secretary if he could state the amount of the grants to the councils of counties and boroughs that support a police force, whether or not the various boroughs have agreed to the increases and what steps he intends taking if some of the boroughs refuse to fall into line on the increases.
    Mr. G. LOCKER-LAMPSON: There has been a heavy increase since last year in this Vote. Last year, apparently, the original Estimate was just under £2,000,000, and then the Government came down with a Supplementary Estimate of about £4,000,000, which made the whole expense suddenly up to about £6,000,000. Then the original Estimate this year was just over £6,000,000, and they now ask us for very nearly another £500,000. That is to say, for last year the additional expense is just about £750,000. Every single pound that is paid out by us in respect of the police adds to the rates all over the country, because it is a proportionate grant, and you cannot possibly increase the grant for the police without adding to the rates all over the country. Various councils during the last few months have passed resolutions begging the Home Office not to keep on increasing these grants, because wherever the Homo Office increases them it falls upon the rates. The police are a very deserving body of fine men, but I hope the right hon. Gentleman will bear in mind that a great many of these local councils are most anxious that these grants shall not keep on being increased, because it simply means that they have to make a proportionate increase, and it always goes on the rates.
    Mr. CAUTLEY: I wish to call attention to much the same case as has been
    2236
    raised by the two previous speakers. In every county the Joint Committee has a pension scheme for the police to which are contributed, as I understand it, grants from the Home Office. That pension scheme is fixed with some reference to the ordinary rates of wages prevalent in the district. In many counties the police force are perfectly content with the pension scheme they have. I understand the Home Office are taking up the line of saying to these counties where everyone is contented, "Unless you adopt a new and increased scheme of pensions and a scheme which in many cases will raises the pay of the police out of all proportion to the wages of the class of persons from which they are called and amongst whom they live, we will withhold the grants we have hitherto been making." Am I correct in saying that he is doing that, and if so what power has he to do it? Would he modify the great zeal which he is displaying in the performance of his duty, and leave the local authorities to manage their own affairs a good deal more, and keep from interfering in the way that he has done? This is a matter of considerable substance, because the local rates are so high that they are making the cost of living prohibitive to many people. I object on principle to this attempt to make flat rates all over the country. I am glad to see several Members of the Labour party present, because in the railway world they have succeeded in making a flat rate. It was unnecessary, and it is causing a great deal of discontent in the villages. In a village you see a railway porter, who may be a single man of 20 or 21 years of age, who is getting more money than a married man, who may be a skilled carpenter or a skilled man in agriculture. These railway men, in many cases, are getting more money than is necessary, and the cost is damaging to the railways, while at the same time it is causing discontent among other classes of people who live in the district. It does seem a mistake to force upon the police a flat rate all over the country without regard to the needs of the country districts. As a consequence of this you have the same discontent that is felt over the attempt to form a flat rate for other trades.
    Sir H. NIELD: I desire to ram home what has been said by the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. G. Locker-Lamp-

    2237
    son). I see the hon. Member for Plymouth present (Sir A. Shirley Benn) who was associated with the Port of London Authority, and I daresay he will bear me out when I say that this policy in regard to the police has had a very detrimental effect upon those large authorities who are employing dock police and others who perform similar duties. It is impossible for these commercial undertakings to go on if these charges are constantly put upon them by comparison of what is being done in the Metropolitan area with regard to the police. No one desires to prevent any servant of the State from having such a wage as the present condition of things entitled them to, but it is not fair that public funds should be used to give a wage which is in excess of that which is reasonable, and which presses so heavily upon undertakings which are depending upon the earnings of those trades which are now so seriously jeopardised.
    Mr. SHORTT: I gather that the point which is raised applies to what is called the police bonus, which is a bonus additional to the police pay having regard to the cost of living. As there seems to be some misapprehension in regard to the police bonus, I will endeavour to state exactly what has happened. Under the Police Act, 1919, the police have in their own body of the whole country what corresponds to a trade union. They have a representative body of their own election called the Police Council, which is a central body on which every grade of the police are represented, and on which body the police authorities, the standing joint committees, etc., are also represented. At a meeting of the Police Council the police brought forward the question of bonus, because of the additional cost of living since the Desborough Committee had reported. The Desborough Committee recommended a scale of pay which has been adopted all over the country. The police representatives on the council pointed out that the cost of living had increased very largely since the Desborough Committee reported, and therefore they were entitled to a bonus having regard to the rise in the cost of living. On that a Committee of the Council was appointed, and upon it were representatives of the police and of the authorities. It was so constituted that no recommendation could be made by it unless both sides, that is to say the
    2238
    authorities as well as the police, were agreed. Therefore anything which the police wished to recommend the representatives of the police authorities could have completely closed down by refusing to agree to it.
    The question of bonus is what they had to consider. The representatives of the police authorities on that Committee explained that this was a new subject and that they had no mandate with regard to it and did not feel that they would be justified in coming to any conclusion upon it without having first consulted their constituents. The Sub-Committee's proceedings were thereupon adjourned for two months to enable them to do so. One would imagine that two months was a sufficiently long period. At the end of these two months those representatives came back and stated that they had consulted with their constituents the local authorities. Thereupon the Committee proceeded to consider the proposal of a bonus, and with the exception of one small detail, having regard to the amount of increase in the purely rural district, the Committee were unanimous in recommending the additional bonus. That was a representative Committee, which had full time to consider this, who had representatives of the local authorities who had gone to consult their constituents, and they came back in complete unanimity with regard to the fact that some bonus should be paid, though there was one dissentient as to the amount of that bonus in rural districts. In face of that what is the Home Secretary to do? The only police over which I have actual control is the Metropolitan Police Force, and in obedience to the recommendations of that Committee I adopted this police bonus. An enormous majority of the police authorities in the country have done the same. Some have not and through their representatives say that they are unable to do so.
    That may or may not be true. I do not know. However, after a considerable amount of discussion, I have seen a number of deputations, and I have ventured with all respect to point out to the local authorities that really their organisation is defective, and that that is largely accountable for any trouble that has arisen, because they now say that their representatives upon the Council

    2239
    and the Sub-Committee were not really representative at all. I did not choose them. They chose their own representatives, and if their organisation is deficient, and people come who are not really representative, it is no fault of mine. I ventured with great respect to point that out. I have called, as I am entitled under the Act to do, for another meeting of the Council. I have asked the representatives of the police authorities to choose people on that who really represent them in the matter, and send them to this Council, and then we will discuss what will be done with regard to those authorities who say that they cannot possibly afford this bonus. They will sit in the course of a few weeks. I hope that they will come to some solution of the difficulty with regard to those authorities. I assure the Committee—I hope that I am not very much out of order, but they may wish to hear it—that the one object which the Home Office has is to secure an efficient police force. When we are told that we are interfering and are taking control out of the hands of the local authorities, the statement is absolutely without foundation. The one thing we are bound to insist upon is efficiency. There are many things which go to make up efficiency. One of the main things is contentment. A discontented force is not an efficient force. With regard to all the rest, every authority is complete master of its own house, and there is no attempt on the part of the Home Office to interfere.
    Mr. SWAN: I understand that overtures have been made to the Home Secretary to re-absorb the men who were dismissed. Is anything included in these Estimates for that?
    Mr. SHORTT: Nothing.
    Mr. SWAN: You had requests?
    Mr. SHORTT: I had requests a number of times.
    Mr. ACLAND: The statement of the Home Secretary will have convinced the Committee that the payment of this extra bonus is inevitable. If you have an increased cost per unit, the only way to avoid a greater total charge is to reduce the number of units concerned. I would like a statement as to the practice of the Home Office with regard to fixing the numbers of the police forces in some of the districts under their control. I have
    2240
    in mind the case of the borough of Tiverton. I do not sit for the Division so I am not asking the question in my own interest, though I confess I hope to sit for the constituency some day. The borough of Tiverton, I understand, has recently asked the Home Office whether it may reduce its police force. The borough council thinks that the bonuses are too large, but has assented to the payment of them. As Tiverton becomes even more peaceful than it has ever been, the inhabitants feel that they do not require the same number of police as before, and they have asked whether they can have a slight reduction. There is practically no disorder in the town. The only temptation for the inhabitants to commit disorder is to give the police something to do, or, possibly, there may be risk of civil disturbance on the part of the ratepayers because of this heavy burden of the expense of the police. A unanimous request for a reduction of the force has been sent to the Home Office by the Tiverton Town Council. In view of the extra expense for this bonus I would like to know whether any attempt has been made to recast or review the rules which guide the Home Office with regard to the numbers of the police forces which have-to be maintained. This country, one hopes, is gradually becoming more orderly. It is not like Ireland. Therefore it might be thought that there would be from time to time an opportunity for a gradual reduction of the police. Certainly the increasing cost of them makes it more necessary that the question should be considered carefully. If, therefore, we may have a statement as to what steps are now being taken to see whether reductions in numbers may not in certain circumstances be possible, I think the House will be obliged.
    Sir J. D. REES: I should like to ask the Home Secretary whether any and, if so, how much of this additional sum of £440,000 is incurred on account of the women police in London, because if any portion of it is devoted to that object, I feel it my duty to say that I believe the whole of that money was wasted, and the not inconsiderable sum spent on the travesty on police uniforms of these women police, who have no powers and duties but to perambulate the parks and streets, is a most regrettable expenditure of public money at the present time, when, Heaven knows, there is little enough of it

    2241
    available. As there has recently been a report on the subject, I do not think it becoming to refer at any length to the question on which hon. Members have been good enough to hear me before to-day, but I cannot let the Vote pass without asking the Home Secretary this question, and if the answer is in the affirmative, it is to my extreme regret that so obvious and necessary an economy is not effected. As regards the grants to borough police forces, is a grant made to every borough which has a separate police force? I gather that is so. I see in the description of the Supplementary Estimates it says "War bonus to Metropolitan police magistrates." I did not know dignitaries of that class received a bonus of this description.
    Mr. SHORTT: So do county court judges.
    Sir J. D. REES: Then I hope it will not reach the judges of the High Court, not for any criticism of them, but because I think the bonus system is being very largely developed, as this Vote testifies. What is the grant in aid of the Police Federation? I am no doubt exposing an ignorance which is not shared by any other Member of the Committee, but I do not know. As regards the Home Secretary's remarks on the necessity for efficiency, I submit that neither he nor any other official, nor any Department, can insist upon efficiency irrespective of cost. It is entirely a question of cost, of how much efficiency the taxpayer and the ratepayer can afford, and it is even better, I submit, to stop short of a very high mark of efficiency and have a few pennies left in one's pocket than to have an exceedingly efficient police force and not have a copper left to pay for a bus ride. As to the representatives on the Committee, of which the right hon. Gentleman spoke, everybody repudiates representatives who do not recommend exactly what they want. Every House of Commons is unrepresentative of those who were defeated at the polls, and I think very little of that. I look to the Home Secretary to exercise a stern and rigid economy, and I hope he will begin to do it by ceasing to spend any more money on clothes and salaries for the policewomen in London. I am not speaking without having made some inquiry. I have made it my business to inquire. I have asked all over
    2242
    the place in London. Whenever I see one of these people perambulating the streets in fine clothes, at the taxpayers' expense, I have asked, What do they do? And I have never heard a single member of the public who said that they were the slightest use whatever, but were an absolute excrescence upon the police force, and ought to be abolished.
    Viscount CURZON: I would really like, as strongly as I can, to dissent from what the hon. Member for Nottingham (Sir J. D. Rees) has just said on the subject of women police. I do not possess any extensive knowledge of what they are able to do, or what their duties are, but I do not think you get the best out of any force by running it down in the way the hon. Gentleman has done. I am quite confident there are some duties they perform far more efficiently than men could perform them, and, indeed, I believe that to that, testimony has been borne in the Report which has been issued to the House on the subject. I do not know whether there are any women police in Nottingham, but, if not, possibly it might, be a good thing to start them there. With regard to what the right hon. Gentleman said on the police bonus, I would like to draw attention to the fact that the Navy has an absolutely analogous institution to the police force in its welfare committees, which have made certain recommendations to the Admiralty on the subject of pay, to which the Admiralty have not seen their way to agree. When the Police Federation made a recommendation to the Home Secretary in favour of an increase of pay, he said in rather pathetic terms, I thought, "What is the Home Secretary to do?" I suggest he might have done exactly what the First Lord of the Admiralty did on the subject, and that is refuse a great many requests which were just as reasonable. The Navy does not enjoy a war bonus to-day, and I do not see why it should be paid in all cases in the police force. There is a great deal to be said for further inquiry about the war bonus to the police force before it is continued. What I want to know is exactly how much of this expenditure of £440,000 is necessitated by the operations, chiefly of the Metropolitan Police, against automobiles. This is a subject about which I do claim to know something. I have put a series of questions to the Home Secretary in

    2243
    the past Session on the subject of the control of motor traffic in the Metropolitan Police area I have all the figures—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I do not know whether the Supplementary Estimate provides any money for these particular duties to which the Noble Lord is going to refer. If not, it would not be in order to discuss them now.
    Viscount CURZON: I ask the Home Secretary whether any portion of the money is for the police employed on this duty. It is impossible to ascertain it from the Vote. It simply says it is a contribution towards the expenses of the Metropolitan Police District. The Metropolitan Police I was talking about, and no less than an average number of about 70 to 80 per week were employed upon no other duties than the control of motor traffic in the Metropolitan Police area alone during last summer up to a certain point. I know it is different now. What I would like to know is whether we could not secure a more efficient and better police service, so far as motor traffic is concerned, organised on different lines. I do not wish motor traffic to go unrestricted in the Metropolitan Police area, or anywhere else, but I do maintain that the system which necessitated the employment of so many police constables every week-end last year was not efficient. They caught very few people who really wanted catching. All they did was to catch people going from speeds of 25 to 30 miles an hour. The people going 40 miles and over were very seldom, if ever, caught. I want to press upon the Home Secretary whether he will not consider instituting in future some special form of road police. I know the subject has been considered, but we have heard nothing of it for a long time, and I hope he can give us some information. A special branch of road police, given a certain amount of mobility, mounted on motor-cycles or something of that kind, would be a great success here as they have been in America and other countries. Is the Home Secretary inquiring into this?
    In the Metropolitan Police area, too, a certain number of mounted constables are to be seen in the streets. Does the Home Secretary really think that this expenditure is justified by what these police do? I do as much motoring in the Metropolitan Police area as any other Member,
    2244
    and I have never seen a mounted policeman directing the slow-moving traffic to get to the side of the road, or dealing with the crawling taxis. There is a great scope for them, and they are badly needed. I urge upon the Home Secretary that further orders and powers should be given to them in order that they may regulate London traffic, which is increasing by leaps and bounds. In my opinion it is nothing to-day to what it will be in two or three years' time with further motor and other traffic on the streets. If the police require further powers on this matter they should be given it as soon as possible.
    There are foot police employed specially to see about motor vehicles stopping in the main arteries of traffic in London. These police have no instructions to what they are to do other than that they are to move on any motor vehicle that stops. Would the Home Secretary see these police are given some sort of direction as to where they are to send traffic that desires to wait in the principal streets, and that they send them somewhere where they can go and be parked without being an obstruction? I am sure motorists wish to make the task of the police as light as possible, and any scheme of that sort will be welcomed. Would the Home Secretary see whether he could arrange for some sort of parking place, and for the police who move on motors to have information? He would confer a great benefit on motor traffic and on all road users in the Metropolitan Police area.
    Mr. MOSLEY: I heartily agree with my hon. Friend who has just spoken. Before the Committee passes this large Sum for the police bonus, we should be satisfied of an increase in efficiency commensurate with the increase in pay. The evidence available points to the reverse of the proposition. In the police organisation there is a remarkable lack of a sense of proportion. I cannot vie with my Noble Friend in such experiences, but a few cases have recently been brought to my own notice, in only one of which I myself was involved. These instances are annoying and remarkable, when considered in conjunction with the fact that there are demands for the police and for police control at spots where it is really vital for the preservation of human life. In my own constituency,

    2245
    within the Metropolitan area, at a certain corner there have been recently three very serious accidents. Two of them were in the month of February. The local council represented to the Home Secretary that a policeman should be put there on point duty to save accidents in the future, but the request was summarily refused. It was a request for a policeman to be placed on point duty at a spot where his presence sooner or later would be certain to save a serious accident involving the loss of human life. In conjunction with that, we find policemen throughout the country employed upon the most frivolous tasks, apparently designed to harrass and irritate—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: It is not in order on these Supplementary Estimates to discuss the policy and duties of the police. The only question now under discussion is whether this Supplementary Estimate should be granted for these additional expenses. It is never in order on the Supplementary Estimates to discuss the main policy.
    Mr. MOSLEY: With all due respect to your ruling, the question of the efficiency of the police was originally introduced by the Home Secretary.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: He was out of order if he introduced it.
    Mr. MOSLEY: As we are voting this additional sum of £440,000, are we not entitled to ask whether we are going to have increased efficiency in the organisation? Clearly, we should be satisfied on that point before we vote this increase in pay. The pay of the men is increased under this Vote, and, under these circumstances, I submit that we are entitled to question the efficiency of traffic control in the Metropolitan area. We find a remarkable lack of proportion—
    Colonel NEWMAN: Are we not discussing the expenditure under "e" and does not "e" in the footnote set out exactly how the expenditure has been incurred and what the police are doing?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: No, not the whole administration of the force throughout the country. It is obvious that is not the matter before the Committee. It is quite clear that has been sanctioned by Parliament to the extent of £6,175,000. The only question to be discussed now is whether an additional
    2246
    sum of £440,000 should be granted. That does not raise the whole question of administration.
    Mr. ACLAND: As I understand it, my hon. Friend was beginning to refer to cases where he considered that an un necessary number of police were being employed. Would not that be in order as tending to show that a reduction might have been made in the numbers and that therefore this extra expense might have been saved?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: Certainly, if directed in that way, it would be in order. I could not disallow it.
    Mr. MOSLEY: That is exactly what I was trying, very inadequately, to point out. If the police were not employed upon frivolous duties, it would be possible to utilise their services upon vital work and to effect a reduction in the expenditure. Recently many cases have come to light in which the police have taken action, not with a view of preserving life by preventing motor travelling in dangerous places and at excessive speeds, but in bringing purely frivolous charges involving technical offences, such as the temporary failure of a side light, while powerful headlights were still burning. The charge has been recently made against myself, and I have heard of other cases.
    I know of a case in which a motorist's sidelight failed to operate owing to a piece of wire introducing itself into the electrical arrangements. For that he was summoned and because, instead of attending, he sent a letter admitting a technical offence a warrant was issued for his arrest. That is carrying matters too far. In many districts policemen are engaged in pulling motorists up for trivial offences and charging them when it is quite unnecessary for the safety of the public, while men cannot be found for points where their presence is vitally necessary In London large vans are permitted to perambulate—
    Sir J. BUTCHER: Is it in order on this Vote to go into the general administration of the force?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I have already told the hon. Member it is not, but he has continued to disregard my ruling. The general administration of the police force is not under discussion

    2247
    and it is not in order on this Supplementary Estimate to discuss the question of policemen looking after motor cars or questions of policy and principle which have already been settled by Parliament.
    Sir W. PEARCE: As a London Member, I would point out that a few years ago the London police force might have, been very much open to criticism, but to-day, as regards discipline, contentment and efficiency, it is in first-class order. I believe that that is due very largely to the policy of the Home Secretary in seeing that the men are properly paid and looked after. I saw a large number of policemen together one night last week, about 400 of them. The Special Commissioner and many of the officers were present. I was much impressed by the popularity of the officers, and the discipline and good temper of the men. I think, therefore, that the policy of the Home Secretary is not only right, but has added greatly to the security of London.
    Mr. SHORTT: With regard to the question put by my hon. Friend (Mr. Mosley) as to the necessity for stationing a special man to deal with motor traffic at a corner he mentioned, I may say the place will be visited by an inspector and full inquiry made, and if anything can be done it will be done. I hope the Committee will now give me the Vote.
    Sir J. BUTCHER: I think part of this £440,000 has been spent in connection with the Pensions Increase Fund. I should like to know whether the increase has been sufficient to meet all cases of hardship brought before the authorities, and how large is the increase?
    Mr. SHORTT: I am afraid I cannot give that information. I have not the figures here.

    REFORMATORY AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS, GREAT BRITAIN.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £15,100, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the salaries and expenses of the Office of the Inspector of
    2248
    Reformatories, and for the expense of the maintenance of juvenile offenders in reformatory, industrial and day industrial schools, and in auxiliary homes in England and Wales."
    Mr. KILEY: I wish to ask the Home Secretary whether it is in his power to issue a circular stating whether there are not other facilities for these boys, such as sending them to sea in the Mercantile Marine, instead of putting a charge upon rates in this way. If he could do this—if he could take some action in this direction—I am sure it would be of great service.
    Mr. SHORTT: We do consider that, and we have discussed it. May I point out, however, that it is a little difficult to send circulars round to the gentlemen who administer justice. It seems very much like interference, but we do make suggestions of that kind.
    Mr. MOSLEY: I do not think that a Supplementary Estimate showing such a large increase should be passed.
    Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to.—[Colonel Sir R. Sanders.]
    Resolutions to be reported upon Monday next.
    Committee report Progress; to sit again upon Monday next (7th March).

REPORT [3RD MARCH].
  CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPART- MENTS SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1920–21.

    CLASS II.
    Resolutions reported:

    1. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the salaries and expenses of the National Debt Office."

    2. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £63,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the salaries and expenses of the Office of the Commissioners of His Majesty's Works and Public Buildings."

REPORT [2ND MARCH].
  CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPART- MENTS SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1920–21.

    CLASS I.
    Resolutions reported,
    1. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £328,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for Rates and Contributions in lieu of Rates, etc., in respect of Government Property, and for Rates on Houses occupied by Representatives of Foreign Powers, and for the Salaries and Expenses of the Rating of Government Property Department, and for a Contribution towards the Expenses of the London Fire, Brigade."

    CLASS II.
    2. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £3,500, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the Salary of a Minister without Portfolio and the Salaries and Expenses of the Cabinet Offices."
    3. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £5,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the Salaries and other Expenses in the Department of His Majesty's Treasury and Subordinate Departments, including Expenses in respect of Advances under the Light Railways Act, 1896."
    4. "That a sum, not exceeding £250,625, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of His
    2250
    Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies, including a Grant in Aid and other Expenses connected with Oversea Settlement."
    5. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £3,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1921, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Civil Service Commission."

    INDIAN AFFAIRS.
    Ordered, That the Lords Message [1st March] communicating the Resolution, "That it is desirable that a Committee of Eleven Lords be appointed to join with a Committee of Eleven Members of this House as a Standing Joint Committee on Indian Affairs," be now considered.
    Lords Message considered according
    Resolved, "That this House doth agr with the Lords in the said Resolution. [Colonel Gibbs.]
    Message to the Lords to acquaint them therewith.
    The remaining Orders were read and postponed.
    Whereupon Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 3.
    Adjourned at One minute after Five o'clock till Monday next (7th March).

EDUCATION.
  TEACHERS' SALARIES, MIDDLESBROUGH.
  TEACHERS' SALARIES, MIDDLESBROUGH.
  CONTINUATION SCHOOLS, LONDON.
  CONTINUATION SCHOOLS, LONDON.
  TRAINING COLLEGES (GRANTS).
  TRAINING COLLEGES (GRANTS).
  JUVENILE UNEMPLOYMENT CENTRES.
  JUVENILE UNEMPLOYMENT CENTRES.
NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  AWARD ISSUE (C. E. NEATH).
  AWARD ISSUE (C. E. NEATH).
  WAR SAVINGS COMMITTEES (GRATUITOUS SERVICE).
  WAR SAVINGS COMMITTEES (GRATUITOUS SERVICE).
  LAND VALUATION DEPARTMENT.
  LAND VALUATION DEPARTMENT.
  HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT (VENTI- LATION COMMITTEE).
  HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT (VENTI- LATION COMMITTEE).
  HOUSE OF LORDS (LETTERS).
  HOUSE OF LORDS (LETTERS).
  RUSSIAN RUFUGEES.
  RUSSIAN RUFUGEES.
  POLICE PENSIONS.
  POLICE PENSIONS.
  TERRITORIAL FORCE (KING'S COLOURS).
  TERRITORIAL FORCE (KING'S COLOURS).