Sitting of 11 February 1926

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Bristol Corporation Bill (by Order),
Guildford Corporation Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Tuesday next.
London and North Eastern Railway (Superannuation Fund) Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Wednesday next.
London Electric and Metropolitan District Railway Companies Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till To-morrow.
London, Midland and Scottish Railway Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Thursday next.
London Power Company Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Monday next.
Medway Conservancy Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Friday, 19th February.
Metropolitan Electric Supply Company Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Monday next.
Metropolitan Railway Bill (by Order),
Port of London Bill (by Order),
Southern Railway Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till To-morrow
Southern Railway (Superannuation Fund) Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Wednesday next.
Teignmouth and Shaldon Bridge Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till to-morrow.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  LOCAL LEGISLATION COMMITTEE.
  Ordered, That the Committee of Selection do nominate a Committee, not exceeding Fifteen Members, to be called the Local Legislation Committee, to whom shall be committed all Private Bills promoted by municipal and other local authorities by which it is proposed to create powers relating to Police, Sanitary, or other Local Government Regulations in conflict with, deviation from or excess of the provisions of the general law.
  Ordered, That Standing Orders 119, 150, and 173a apply to all such Bills.
  Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records.
  Ordered, That Four be the quorum.
  Ordered, That if the Committee shall report to the Committee of Selection that any Clauses of any Bill referred to them (other than Clauses containing Police, Sanitary, or other Local Government Regulations) are such as, having regard to the terms of reference, it is not in their opinion necessary or advisable for them to deal with, the Committee of Selection shall thereupon refer the Bill to a Select Committee, who shall consider those Clauses and so much of the Preamble of the Bill as relates thereto, and shall determine the expenditure (if any) to be authorised in respect of the parts of the Bill referred to them. That the Committee shall deal with the remaining Clauses of such Bill, and so much of the Preamble as relates thereto, and shall determine the period and mode of repayment of any money authorised by the Select Committee to be borrowed and shall report the whole Bill to the House, stating in their Report what parts of the Bill have been considered by each Committee.
  Ordered, That the Committee have power, if they so determine, to sit as two Committees, and in that event to apportion the Bills referred to the Committee between the two Committees, each of which shall have the full powers of and be subject to the instructions which apply to the undivided Committee, and that Four be the quorum of each of the two Committees. — [Sir William Joynson-Hicks.]

  STANDING ORDERS.
  Mr. Broad, Mr. Cadogan, Mr. Grundy, Captain Howard, Major-General Sir Newton Moore, Mr. Neville, Mr. Somerville, Mr. George Thorne, Lieut.-Colonel Dalrymple White, Commander Williams, and Mr. Robert Young nominated Members of the Select Committee on Standing Orders.—[Colonel Gibbs.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS,
  NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.

    MANCHESTER REGIMENT (DANIEL DEAN).
    Sir JOSEPH NALLasked the Minister of Pensions if he has inquired into the circumstances under which Daniel Dean, No. 4/2,848, Manchester Regiment, Pensions Reference 3 M.D. 4,645, came to leave hospital on Thursday, 28th January, and died at home on Sunday, 31st January; whether the deceased was in receipt of a disability pension at the date of his death, and what was the cause of the delay in awarding a pension which resulted in him being dependent upon the Poor Law for two years; and what provision is now being made for his widow?
    The MINISTER of PENSIONS (Major Tryon): I find that the man referred to left the hospital of his own accord and contrary to advice, stating that he wished to go home, and that he had no complaint against the hospital. He was in receipt of a disability pension at the date of his death, this pension having been awarded on a claim made by him in March of last year. The Ministry had no knowledge of Dean's condition for some years prior to the making of his, claim, no application having been received from him during the period. With regard to the widow, a claim is, I understand, being made and will receive immediate consideration as soon as it is received.

    WIDOWS' PENSIONS.
    Major COHENasked the Minister of Pensions what is the number of awards made since the introduction of the 1924 Warrant to widows, under Articles 17A and 17B, and the number of claims from
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    widows that have been rejected under Articles 17A and 17B since the introduction of the 1924 Warrant?
    Major TRYON: The net total of awards made under both parts A and B of Article 17 from the introduction of the Royal Warrant of January, 1924, to the 31st December last is 1,983, of which 993 were awards under Article 17B. The total number of claims rejected under the Article during the same period is 1,427.
    Mr. T. KENNEDYasked the Minister of Pensions the number of widows in England and Wales, and Scotland, respectively, whose pensions were stopped during last year for alleged misconduct; whether it is the practice of the Ministry to reconsider such stoppage of pensions within a reasonable period; and, if so, what means are available to enable widows to have their claims impartially considered?
    Major TRYON: It is not possible to give figures separately for England and Wales and Scotland, but the total number of cases in which pensions were declared forfeited during the year was 585. The decision as to whether the pension of a widow has become forfeited by reason of misconduct is a statutory function, not of the Ministry, but of the Special Grants Committee. It is the practice of the Committee carefully to consider at all times representations made directly by a widow or on her behalf by a war pensions committee in any cases of forfeiture where mitigating circumstances are adduced. During the year in question pensions were, in fact, restored in 194 cases.
    Mr. HAYES: May I ask whether the pensions are stopped on receipt of anonymous communications, or not until after inquiries have been made, and whether, where inquiry is made, the widow is allowed to be accompanied by a friend to represent her?
    Major TRYON: As the hon. Member must know, pensions can only be stopped by this committee after inquiry.
    Mr. HAYES: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what opportunities the widow has of being represented at this inquiry?
    Major TRYON: I should like to have notice of any question as to the exact procedure of the Special Grants Committee. If the hon. Gentleman will put down a question, I shall be very happy to give him the information.

    ARTIFICIAL LIMBS.
    Mr. T. HENDERSONasked the Minister of Pensions whether he is aware of the dissatisfaction existing amongst limbless ex-service men owing to the curtailment of the list of limb makers from 14 to 2; and is he prepared to consider the advisability of returning to the former position of having the 14 firms, thereby giving the limbless ex-service men the opportunity of a free choice of limb?
    Mr. PARKINSONasked the Minister of Pensions if he is aware that dissatisfaction exists among ex-service men who lost limbs during the War, owing to his decision in curtailing the list of artificial limb makers, which prevents them having artificial limbs supplied equal in quality to those supplied before the list was limited; and if he will reconsider the decision, with a view to giving these men a wider choice?
    Mr. WHITELEYasked the Minister of Pensions whether he is aware that his recent decision in curtailing the list of limb makers limits the choice to a very narrow list; that complaints arising since such decision are on the increase; and whether he is prepared to revert to the practice in operation during the last five years?
    Major TRYON: I would refer hon. Members to the very full answer which I gave on this subject on the 19th November last of which I am sending them copies. The present arrangements for the supply of artificial metal legs are working quite satisfactorily, and I am not prepared to reconsider them. The few cases in which representations are made for a special make of limb not covered by the present contracts are considered by a Board of Surgeons constituted for the purpose, and, where necessary, in accordance with their advice arrangements are made for the supply of an artificial limb similar to that previously used by the man, though not covered by the present contract.
    Mr. HARRIS: Is not the result of the present policy practically to create a monopoly, and does not the right hon. Gentleman think that a monopoly of the kind is unsatisfactory, and against the interests of the community?
    Major TRYON: The hon. Gentleman will be well advised to look at the Report of the Committee where it deals with the question of monopoly. I would remind him that this action of the Government was taken in consequence of the combined refusal of the present firms to tender under the old arrangement.
    Mr. HENDERSON: While it is perfectly true that the existing arrangement may be working perfectly smoothly, is it not, the claim of the ex-service men that the limbs do not work smoothly, and the men want to be able to go to other firms?
    Major TRYON: If the hon. Gentleman will read the Report of the Committee, upon which ex-service and disabled ex-service men were represented, he will see that the present type of limbs is excedingly good.
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir FREDERICK HALL: Is it not the case that the Committee that sat gave careful consideration to the matter and came to a unanimous decision advantageous to the ex-service men?
    Major TRYON: In reply to that it is the case, as my hon. and gallant Friend suggests, that the Committee realised the importance of the matter with which they were dealing and took into full consideration the point of view of the ex-service men. Their report was unanimous.
    Mr. T. KENNEDY: Is it true that certain firms are prevented from tendering?
    Major TRYON: No, Sir!

    APPEAL TRIBUNALS (WELSH LANGUAGE).
    Mr. ELLIS DAVIESasked the Minister of Pensions whether, as appellants under the Pensions Regulations resident in North Wales have now to appear before tribunals in Liverpool, he will say whether members of that tribunal, and particularly the officials, are able to speak with the appellants in their own language?
    Major Sir HARRY BARNSTON (for Colonel GIBBS): By hearing appeals from North Wales at Liverpool instead of

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    Wrexham, serious delay in deciding these appeals is avoided. The change has involved no alteration in the personnel of the Courts deputed to deal with these appeals, which includes Welsh-speaking members and secretary.
    Mr. DAVIES: Are any of the members of the tribunal or officials concerned able to speak the Welsh language?
    Major BARNSTON: Yes, Sir; the hon. Member may gather that from the answer.

    EDUCATION GRANTS.
    Mr. R. MORRISONasked the Minister of Pensions how many grants made by the Special Grants Committee towards the cost of education of the children of deceased and disabled officers have been made during the past year; and how many in respect of the children of deceased and disabled men?
    Major TRYON: Grants towards the cost of education were made out of the Vote of the Ministry of Pensions during the year ended 31st December, 1925, in 444 cases of children of deceased and disabled officers, and 1,419 cases of children of deceased or disabled non-commissioned officers and men.
    Mr. MORRISON: Could the right hon. Gentleman give the amount involved?
    Major TRYON: Not, without notice.

    TIME LIMITS AND FINAL AWARDS (EXPLANATORY MEMORANDA).
    Lieut. - Colonel DALRYMPLE WHITEasked the Minister of Pensions whether, in view of the importance of the questions of time limits and final awards, he will circulate to Members of this House the explanatory memoranda which he has sent to war pensions cornmittees?
    Major TRYON: I shall be very glad to fall in with my hon. and gallant Friend's suggestions by making copies of the memoranda suggested available at the Vote Office on application.

    STAFF (ACTON).
    Sir HARRY BRITTAINasked the Minister of Pensions the number of staff now being employed by his Department at the Issue Office at Acton; the total number employed in the building; and
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    from what Departments the remainder are drawn?
    Major TRYON: In the building at Acton the number of persons employed by my Department at the present time is 3,306, of which 2,086 are attached to the Issue Office. I understand that, in addition to the foregoing, there is a staff of 1,180 persons employed by the Ministry of Health in the same building.

    CENTRAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE.
    Mr. J. DAVISONasked the Minister of Pensions whether it is his intention to deprive ex-service men of the right to direct representation on the Central Advisory Council; and, if so, if he will say for what reason this is to be done?
    Major TRYON: There is no such intention. Representation of ex-service men on the Central Advisory Committee is provided for by the provisions of Section 3 of the War Pensions Act, 1921, under which the Committee is constituted, and will be secured in the same manner as heretofore.
    Mr. D. GRAHAMasked the Minister of Pensions the composition of the new Central Advisory Council; whether it is proposed that all the War Pensions Committees are to be directly represented; or, if not, how he proposes to allocate the representation so as to secure that co-ordination that is presumed by the Ministry to be desirable and necessary?
    Major TRYON: The Central Advisory Committee is, as required by Section 3 of the War Pensions Act, 1921, composed of representatives of War Pensions Committees, of ex-service men and officials of the Ministry, central and local. In order to secure its practical efficiency as an advisory body, its membership has been strictly limited in point of numbers both by myself and my predecessors. To give each of the 169 War Pensions Committees a representative on the Central Committee would enlarge the Committee beyond all practical limits, but in appointing representatives of War Pensions Committees I am having regard not only to the importance of securing representatives of areas of all types, including London (which had no direct representative under the arrangements which have now been superseded), but

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    also to the primary purpose, which I indicated to the House on the 17th December last, of securing the advice and assistance of persons acquainted by direct knowledge and experience as active members of the War Pensions Committees, with various branches of the work of my Department affecting pensions.
    Mr. SPENCER: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he has accepted the recommendations, or given effect to the recommendations, of these advisory councils at any time?
    Mr. SPEAKER: I think that hardly arises out of the answer.

    REGIONAL ADVISORY COUNCILS.
    Mr. D. GRAHAMasked the Minister of Pensions whether he will state the position of his Department with respect to the continuance of the present regional advisory councils; whether any change is contemplated; and, if so, whether he will state the form the proposed changes are intended to take?
    Major TRYON: No decision has been reached upon this question. The matter will have my careful consideration before any decision is arrived at.

    C. HUGHES, D. BATTERY.
    Mr. R. YOUNGasked the Minister of Pensions whether he is aware that C. Hughes, No. 150,165, D Battery, has had an operation in the War Memorial Hospital, Newton-le-Willows, for the removal of bone from his left leg; that he is likely to undergo another operation; and that these operations are stated by the doctor to be the result of war wounds and whether, as an application was made by him for a pension, he will state on what grounds it was refused?
    Major TRYON: There is no trace of any application having been made by the man referred to, but I am having inquiries made locally into the case, and will communicate later with the hon. Member.

    INVALID CHAIRS (AUTO-WHEELS).
    Sir F. HALLasked the Minister of Pensions whether he has now given consideration to the question of fixing auto-wheels to the invalid chairs used by permanently disabled men; and whether, in
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    view of the resultant convenience to men who are compelled to rely solely on these chairs in order to get about the streets, if he can see his way to grant the free fixing of auto-wheels in cases which are suitable for such facilities?
    Major TRYON: I have further considered my hon. and gallant Friend's suggestion, but I regret that I am unable to adopt it.
    Sir F. HALL: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is not struck by the manner in which some of these poor men have to propel these chairs through busy thoroughfares, and cannot something be done to alleviate their difficulties?
    Major TRYON: I quite realise my hon. and gallant Friend's sympathy with the object he is putting forward. I have myself gone into the matter with the men.

    SEVEN YEARS' LIMIT.
    Mr. T. KENNEDYasked the Minister of Pensions whether instructions have been issued to local officers to accept applications for pension from men suffering from wounds or injuries due to war service in cases where the applicant has been discharged more than seven years; and whether in these cases it is proposed to award pensions if the degree of disablement justifies the issue of a pension?
    Major TRYON: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave on the 10th December last to the hon. Member for King's Norton (Mr. Dennison), of which I am sending him a copy.
    I have issued instructions that in the rare case where an old wound, thought to have been healed, has now broken down, and the man is in need of urgent surgical treatment, immediate steps shall be taken to provide such treatment. I am advised that such cases are, for the most part, restored by treatment, but if in any such case the man is found after treatment to be seriously incapacitated, consideration will be given to the making of a grant appropriate to the case.
    Mr. KENNEDY: Will that new policy apply to all forms of disability and not only to wounds and other injuries—will it apply also to the general physical condition of the man?
    Major TRYON: I cannot state the whole policy of the Ministry in reply to a supplementary question. It only means that the policy which the Government said they were going to carry out has been carried out.

  METROPOLITAN POLICE.

    DEPUTY ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER.
    Mr. HAYESasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether Captain Royds was removed from the active list of the Royal Navy on taking up his duties as Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Davidson): I have been asked to reply. In accordance with the usual procedure in such cases, Captain Royds has not been removed from the active list, but placed on half pay. He will, in due course, be retired in accordance with the regulations,

    TRAFFIC REGULATION.
    Sir ALFRED BUTTasked the Home Secretary whether he will consider setting up a special branch of the Metropolitan Police for traffic regulation over and above the present establishment, or a new force for this purpose, and so release more constables for the prevention of burglaries street robberies, shop breaking, and other crimes which are unduly prevalent?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No, Sir; I should not favour any measures of this kind.
    Captain BRASS: Would the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of putting up signposts to indicate single direction roads instead of using policemen as at present?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Before the new directions are made permanent—at present they are in the experimental stage—I want to have the fullest investigation made to see whether they are a success or not.
    Captain BRASS: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider replacing the policeman at the end of Long Acre by a sign post as this has now been a single direction road for over a year?
    Mr. B. SMITH: Is it not a fact that the question has already been settled?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am much obliged to the hon. Member for giving me that information.
    Mr. W. THORNE: Would it be too much to ask his Department to give a return of the cases for 1914 and 1925?
    Mr. SPEAKER: Perhaps the hon. Member will put that question down.

    TRAFFIC OFFICER.
    Mr. R. MORRISONasked the Home Secretary whether any steps have yet been taken to fill the vacancy at Scotland Yard caused by the death of the late Chief Constable Passom
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The answer is in the negative. The rank which Mr. Bassom held was personal to himself.

  LICENSING HOURS (BONA-FIDE TRAVELLERS).
  Mr. LOOKERasked the Home Secretary if he proposes to restore the privileges of bona-fide travellers?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir William Joynson-Hicks): The Government are not able to deal with the Licensing Laws at the moment.

  WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION.
  Mr. SPENCERasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that considerable dissatisfaction exists amongst mine workers with the system and decisions of medical referees acting under the Workmen's Compensation Acts; and whether he can see his way to make early provision for an appeal in case of dissatisfaction by either an employer or employé with the decision of a medical referee to a medical appeal board?
  Sir W. JOYNSON - HICKS: Such representations as I have received hardly hear out the suggestion in the first part of the question, and, as the hon. Member is aware, proposals to substitute a medical board for the single referee have been discussed on several recent occasions in this House, but rejected. The proposal in the question to retain the single referee but allow an appeal from him to

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  a board would appear to be open to still greater objection.
  Mr. SPENCER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that medical referees are stating that there axe no means provided by the Home Office for taking X-ray photographs, for instance; and they are passing judgment upon men who have been seriously injured without having before them an X-ray photograph?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am not aware of that, and, if the hon. Member will forgive me for saying so, it does not arise out of the question. If he will put down a question about X-ray photographs, I will endeavour to give him full information.
  Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that many of these referees dealing with individual cases are often employed by the employers, and paid large fees, and then, when they become referees in cases of this description, it causes a good deal of suspicion in the minds of the injured workpeople? Will he consider the advisability of sending these cases to a medical board?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No, Sir, I do not think a medical board would get us out of the difficulty. I am quite aware—I think I have seen the hon. Member about it—of the difficulties, and the matter is under my careful consideration. I want to remedy it.
  Mr. SPENCER: The right hon. Gentleman asks me to put down another question about X-rays. I put it down in this question. I use the word "system," and surely the word "system" covers what I am asking.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I do not think it does.
  Mr. SPEAKER: Another question had better be put down.
  Mr. T. WILLIAMSasked the Home Secretary if he is aware that the cost of administration of national health insurance is, approximately, 13 per cent., of unemployment insurance 8 per cent., while the cost of administration of workmen's compensation insurance, including profits, is, approximately, 50 per cent.;
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  and will he consider the advisability of providing a national scheme for the administration of workmen's compensation?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The figures for 1924 show that in that year the expenses and profits of the insurance companies amounted to approximately 44 per cent. of their total income. That figure, however, was subject to a further reduction through the operation of the agreement with the Accident Offices Association, described on page 10 of the Statistics, which in the case of companies belonging to the association limits these charges to a maximum of 40 per cent. of the premiums and provides for the necessary adjustment by means of a rebate to the employers. These figures only apply to the insurance companies. A large proportion of the total compensation paid under the Act is paid by mutual associations of employers and uninsured employers and the cost of administration by the insurance companies must not, therefore, be taken to represent the cost over the whole system. The answer to the second part of the question is in the negative.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Will the right hon. Gentleman reply to the plain question as to the different percentages under the Compensation Act and under the Unemployment Act? I think he might give a brief answer to that question.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am aware of the discrepancy. The answer is a long one, but it explains my point of view.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of bringing compensation administration within the national system; and further is he aware that every 10 per cent. reduction in the case of the administration would mean a 20 per cent. increase in the compensation payment?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Not at all. It might mean a 20 per cent. decrease in the contribution paid by the employer.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Is he aware that the employers are demanding a reduction in the cost of production in the hope of improving their trade, and will he try to bring these costs down?
  HON. MEMBERS: Wait for the answer!
  Mr. WILLIAMSalso asked the Home Secretary if he is aware that, although there were 221 more fatal accidents in 1924 than in 1923, or 8·3 per cent., 10,064 more non-fatal cases in 1924 than in 1923, or 2·1 per cent., the amount of compensation paid fell from £7,134,096 to £6,675,038, a decrease of £459,058 or 6·4 per cent.; and, as this decrease in payments is due to the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1923, will he consider amending legislation to improve the position of injured workmen and their dependants?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The hon. Member has quoted correctly the figures given in the Home Office Statistics of Compensation for 1924 in regard to the seven groups of industries which are required to make returns. He has, however, omitted to point out that the decrease in the total amount paid was due entirety to a decrease in the compensation in disablement cases resulting from the repeal of the War Addition Acts. In cases of death there was a large increase amounting to as much as 33 per cent. The fact that there has been a decrease in the payments as compared with 1923 does not seem to me to afford arty sufficient ground in itself far revising the present scales of compensation which were discussed and settled by Parliament in 1923, and I should not be prepared to reopen this question after so short an interval.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Is the Home Secretary not aware that the 1923 Act has made a definite decrease in compensation payments per accident case, and does he not think the existing Act is inflicting undue injustice on the injured workpeople of this country?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No, Sir, I do not. I agree that the Act did reduce the payments because the War additions to wages had been removed, but I do not think there is any injustice.
  Mr. WILLIAMS: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware—
  Mr. SPEAKER: That is a matter for the consideration of the Government.

  INDECENT PUBLICATIONS AND STAGE PLAYS.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Home Secretary whether he has
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  now considered the memorial from the Bishop of London, acting on behalf of the London Public Morality Council, representing various religious and social organisations, with reference to indecent publications and stage plays; and what action he proposes to take in the matter?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Yes, Sir, and I am causing a reply to be sent to the memorial. I shall be happy to let the hon. Member have a copy.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman the question of which he wanted notice last week—what are his powers in regard to indecent books? I do not mean books brought in from abroad, but published in this country.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I asked the hon. and gallant Member to give me notice of it last week, and he has not done so.

  HERMAN KARP (REMAND TO PRISON).
  Mr. AMMONasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been called to the case of Herman Karp, a boy under 14 years of age, who was remanded at the Guildhall on the 16th January last to Wandsworth Prison for a week; and whether, having regard to the illegality of this act, he will make inquiries?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The reception of this boy in prison was reported by the governor, and I wrote to the Justices, who replied that the boy's age was stated by his mother to be 14. As the Court gave a certificate that he was too unruly to be sent to a place of detention, his removal to prison was not illegal. The boy has since been placed on probation.

  PENTONVILLE PRISON (DISTURBANCE).
  Mr. THURTLEasked the Home Secretary if he can make any statement as to the causes of the recent disturbances in Pentonville Prison, and as to any steps which may have been taken to remedy legitimate causes of grievance?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have made full inquiry into this matter. The

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  disturbance was caused by the worst section of the prison population, who were annoyed by certain measures properly taken by the acting-governor for the improvement of discipline. It took the form of an outburst of hissing and booing, with some shouting, directed against the acting-governor as he was about to leave the chapel at the conclusion of a service. Two prisoners left their seats; one of these, who was under mental observation, was removed by two officers; the other resumed his seat on being ordered to do so by the acting-governor, who addressed the prisoners. On the conclusion of his address the prisoners left the chapel in silence and good order, and there was no further incident of any kind. I am glad to say no blow was struck by any officer, and the whole incident was over in five or ten minutes. Commendation is due to the acting-governor for his cool and judicious handling of the situation.
  Mr. THURTLE: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for the answer. May I ask him if it is not the fact that there are structural defects in this prison which make the treatment of prisoners of the same class different, thereby giving rise to considerable dissatisfaction?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I was not aware of that. It so happens that I inspected this prison myself about two months ago, and my attention was not called to it. If the hon. Member will tell me what he has in mind, I will look into it.
  Mr. LANSBURY: The right hon. Gentleman has not been an inmate of that prison. Is it not a fact that this is one of the worst prisons we have in the Metropolis—[HON. MEMBERS: 'How do you know?']—and ought to have been dealt with structurally long ago?
  Sir H. BRITTAIN: Is it not true to say that our prisons are not as comfortable as they might be?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: In reply to the hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury), I admit that it is not one of the latest types of prison, but we cannot rebuild all the prisons.
  Mr. LANSBURY: It is a rotten hole, anyway.
  Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Has the right hon. Gentleman discovered how it was that a grossly exaggerated version of the incident appeared in the Press.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No, it is quite impossible for me to be responsible for the Press. It is very mysterious.

  ANIMAL MEDICINES.
  Mr. BASIL PETOasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been called to the provision in the Dangerous Drugs Amendment Act, 1923, which requires that every bottle and packet of medicine for horses and other animals which contains poison must have stated on the botle the name or names of the poison or poisons, and the quantity of each individual poison; and whether, in view of the fact that this provision, in effect, requires every manufacturer of animal medicines to publish to everyone the exact nature of the ingredients used, he will consider introducing, amending legislation to simplify these requirements?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Yes, Sir; I am aware of the provision to which my hon. Friend refers. As was stated in reply to a similar question on the 23rd July last, I am afraid it would be impossible for the Government to promote legislation to put the makers of animal medicines in a privileged position as regards the sale of preparations containing poisons.

  PRISON MEDICAL OFFICERS.
  Dr. WATTSasked the Home Secretary if he is aware that certain prison medical officers are not getting the full benefit of the recommendations of the Stanhope Committee as regards increases in salary; and if he will inquire into the matter, with a view to giving them the increases to which they are entitled under the Stanhope award?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative; the second part, therefore, does not arise.

  SHOPS (EARLY CLOSING) ACT.
  Colonel ENGLANDasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware of

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  the desire of Many local authorities that they should be empowered to suggest on which evening in the week the shops in their respective districts may be open until nine o'clock instead of this closing hour being restricted to Saturday, as provided by the Shops (Early Closing) Act, 1920; and whether he will consider the desirability of taking such action as is possible in that direction?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Yes, Sir; number of local authorities have expressed this desire, but as the law stands there is no power to meet it. The suggestion will be carefully considered when legislation to amend the Shops Acts is undertaken.

  NEW LAMBTON COLLIERY (FATAL ACCIDENT).
  Mr. LAWSONasked the Home Secretary if he is aware that the body of the late George Birtle, who was killed by a fall of stone in the New Lambton Colliery on 6th January, was kept in the ambulance station at the pit until 9th January, and that the widow of the man was prohibited from removing the body of her husband to her home; whether he is aware that the workmen's representative and relatives of the deceased protested against this proceeding at the inquest, and were told by the coroner that it was against the law to remove the body, although in fact it has always been the practice in Durham to do so; and whether he will take the necessary steps to amend the law in order to avoid the repetition of such incidents and give proper consideration to the feelings of the relatives in future?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am informed by the coroner that the inquest was held at 2 p.m. on the 7th, less than 24 hours after the death, and that the body was removed by the relatives, on authority given by the coroner, at 3.15 p.m. on the 7th. The coroner refused to give such authority until after the inquest began, as there was no mortuary near by and it was for the general convenience to hold the inquest near the colliery.
  Mr. LAWSON: Can the right hon. Gentleman not amend the law so that the body can be taken home in such circumstances?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am afraid the hon. Member has got the facts wrong. I think he said the body remained there until the 9th, but it only remained there until the 7th, the day after the accident, and as soon as the inquest was fixed it was found desirable to remove the body for the convenience of witnesses and others, and the body was removed.
  Mr. LAWSON: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that for the whole of the last century the bodies of miners have been taken home immediately and the inquest has been held in the ordinary way, and I have never heard of such a decision as was arrived at in this case, and I do not remember a body being detained in this way.
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Of course, the hon. Member knows more about the practice in pits than I do, but I am told that in this case the inquest was held at the pit for the convenience of all parties, but if the hon. Member says that is not the usual practice, I will make further inquiries.
  Mr. R. RICHARDSON: It is a general practice to take the body home.

  PARKHURST PRISON (PERCY GIBSON).
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the Home Secretary what is the present state of health of Percy Gibson, now confined in Parkhurst Prison; and upon what occasions and for what offences this roan has been punished whilst in prison?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have made inquiry, and am informed that the convict's state of health is quite satisfactory and has improved during the time he has been at Parkhurst Prison. His conduct has been good, and he has not been punished while in prison.

  INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES AND POLITICAL PROPAGANDA.
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the Home Secretary how many persons are at present serving sentences of imprisonment for offences committed in connection with industrial disputes and political propaganda in this country, in Northern Ireland, and in the Irish Free State?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: As regards Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State, I have no information. As regards England and Wales, the documents received by the prison authorities from Courts when offenders are sent to prison do not disclose whether the offences were committed in connection with industrial disputes or political propaganda.

  HOURS OF LABOUR INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE (HOLLAND).
  Brigadier-General BROOKEasked the Home Secretary why Holland is not being invited to the international conference on hours of labour in industry in view of the fact that, particularly in regard to ship-repairing, the hours of working in Holland are longer than here?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of LABOUR (Mr. Betterton): I have been asked to reply. The Powers invited to this Conference comprise the three Powers Belgium, France and Germany who attended a previous Conference on the subject held at There in September, 1924, with the addition of Italy, who has conditionally ratified the Washington Hours Convention. The subject concerns all industrial countries, but it is difficult and complicated, and I think that at this stage, at any rate, it would be better not to widen the ambit of the Conference.

  BIRTH CONTROL.
  Sir NICHOLAS GRATTAN-DOYLEasked the Home Secretary-whether he has received complaints from members of the medical profession and others regarding the transmission through the post of descriptive and illustrated circulars advertising various kinds of contraceptives; whether the Public Prosecutor has been consulted with reference thereto, and, if so, with what result; whether he will say if existing legislation is sufficient to protect the public against the effects of this traffic; and what steps he proposes to take in order to deal with it?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Yes, Sir. I have received numerous complaints and the Director of Public Prosecutions has
  1220
  given the subject close attention in conjunction with my Department. He has taken, and will continue to take, action in cases which appear to him to involve a contravention of the law, but the success of such proceedings depends upon the magistrates being satisfied that the postal matter complained of is in fact indecent, and I am afraid that the divided state of opinion on the subject of birth control has been to some extent reflected in the decisions given. I know of no further steps which I could usefully take.
  Sir N. GRATTAN-DOYLEasked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been called to the progressive fall in the national birth rate; and whether, as this decline is due to the public preaching of the doctrine of birth control, he proposes to take any steps to prevent the development of this doctrine?
  The MINISTER for HEALTH (Mr. Neville Chamberlain): The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. As regards the second part, I have no control over the public preaching of this doctrine, but I have already stated the view which I hold as to the use of institutions provided at the cast of public funds for the dissemination of information on birth control.
  Mr. THURTLE: Is it not a fact that the population of this country is still increasing and it is generally the view that the population is in excess of the resources of the country?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: That is a matter of opinion.
  Sir N. GRATTAN-DOYLE: Is it a fact that the birth re to is lower than that of any country in Europe?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I must ask for notice.
  Mr. ERSKINE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that owing to recent discoveries the grave evils, both moral and physical, attendant on present day methods of birth control are entirely obviated?

  PROFIT-SHARING (ELECTRICAL UNDERTAKINGS).
  Mr. BASIL PETOasked the Prime Minister whether he consider the

  1221
  advisibility of arranging for the allocation of an equitable share of profiles of statutory companies or municipal undertakings for the generation and transmission of electrical energy, reffered to in the Gracious Speech from the Throne, to persons employed by those new undertakings on the precedent operated for many years by the South Metropolitan Gas Company and other gas undertakings: and whether he will also consider including provision for employés to invest in the capital of the undertakings and for their representatives to have a share in the management?
  The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Baldwin): I have watched with interest the operation of profit-sharing schemes where they have been introduced, notably in the case of gas companies. While welcoming an extension of the principle on satisfactory lines, I feel that the matter is primarily one for agreement between employers and employed.

  EMPIRE PRODUCE (MARKETING).
  Mr. HURDasked the Prime Mintster if he will invite the Imperial Economic Committee to consider whether the Empire purpose of the grant of £1,000,000 for the larger sale of Empire overseas produce would not be best served by confining its operation te Imperial transit routes such as those of the St. Lawrence and the maritime provinces of Canada in place of the routes of foreign countries?
  The PRIME MINISTER: I have no doubt that the Imperial Economic Committee, in any further study which they may make of this question, will take my hon. Friend's suggestion into consideration.

  FOOD PRESERVATIVES REGULATIONS.
  Mr. R. MORRISONasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the importance of the issues which will be involved if the Public Health (Preservatives; etc., in Food) Regulations, which were issued on 4th August, 1925, are put into operation, he will give time for a discussion of them in this House at an early date?
  The PRIME MINISTER: If there is a general desire for such discussion, it could no doubt be raised on the Vote for the Minister of Health's salary then the Estimates are before the House.
  Mr. A. V. ALEXANDER: is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Minister promised definitely some months ago that there should be a discussion, and the operation of the Regulations was delayed for twelve months for the purpose? In view of the possibility of an increase in the price of food in this direction. We ought to have an early discussion.
  The PRIME MINISTER: I will arrange for a discussion on that date.

  HOUSING.

    WEIR HOUSES (BRITISH MATERIALS).
    Mr. T. KENNEDYasked the Prime Minister if the payment of subsidy on Weir houses is subject to any safeguard against the use of materials or fittings of foreign origin; and if he will inquire whether Messrs. Weir use British baths, rain water pipes and gutters, and steel in the houses erected by that firm?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Sir John Gilmour): Under the Housing Act, 1924, the Government are prohibited from discriminating against imported goods in any scheme on which subsidy is being paid under that Act. I understand that hitherto a certain proportion of the baths provided in houses erected by Messrs. Weir have not been of British make, but that the rainwater pipes and gutters have been of British manufacture. British steel will be used in all houses erected by Messrs. Weir for the Scottish National Housing Company.
    Mr. KENNEDY: Arising out of the right hon. Gentleman's answer, I desire to raise a point of Order. The question on the Paper is not, either in form or in substance, the question which I handed in. My question referred specifically to the use of German baths, German drainpipes and gutters, and Belgian steel and I wish to ask the right hon. Gentleman if he can answer those specific points.
    Mr. SPEAKER: I will inquire what are the reasons for the change in the question.
    Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: Is not the only way to protect those who want houses from rings and trusts in this country to throw open the ports to supplies from any source?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: With regard to the question of baths, I know that Lord Weir is very anxious to put in British baths, but it is a question of the price which is quoted.
    Mr. HARRIS: Is there not a combine already in connection with the construction of baths in this country, and is that not the reason for the high price?
    Sir F. HALL: Is it not advisable even that a little more money should be paid for these baths, in order that British workmen may be employed?

    SLUM CLEARANCE.
    Mr. TREVELYAN THOMSONasked the Minister of Health how many towns have begun any slum clearances under the Housing Act of 1919 and subsequent Acts?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The position in regard to the clearance of slum areas in England and Wales is as follows: 83 schemes relating to 66 local authorities have been confirmed since 1919. On the 1st January last tenders had been approved, or loans sanctioned, in respect of 48 schemes for the erection of new houses in order to provide accommodation for the displaced population and to enable clearances of the areas to be commenced. In the case of 54 schemes the areas had been wholly or partially acquired, and clearance was in progress in the case of 34 schemes.
    Mr. THOMSON: In view of the small amount of slum clearance that is going on, have the Government any proposals to make to local authorities to encourage them to get on with the work?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The matter is under consideration now.

    STEEL HOUSES.
    Mr. T. THOMSONasked the Minister of Health how many steel houses have been built to date, and in
    1224
    what districts; and how many are now in course of construction or have been sanctioned?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: As the answer involves a tabular statement, I will, with the hon. Member's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following is the answer:
    The following is a statement of the number of houses of external steel or cast-iron construction, the erection of which has so far been authorised. Complete information is not available as to the progress which has been made in the erection of these particular houses.

    Local Authorities.

    No. of houses.

    Birmingham T.C.

    8

    Bolton T.C.

    100

    Bristol T.C.

    20

    Derby T.C.

    250

    Dudley T.C.

    6

    Hastings T.C.

    58

    Oxford T.C.

    2

    Rotherham T.C.

    2

    Smethwick T.C.

    6

    Stocksbridge U.D.C.

    6

    Swansea T.C.

    2

    Woolwich M.B.C.

    A small number, not exceeding 20

    Wortley R.D.C.

    6

    Private Enterprise.

    Seaham Harbour

    1

    Wortley R.D.C.

    2

    The figures do not include the houses which have been erected or are in course of erection for demonstration purposes.

    HOUSING ACT, 1925 (APPEALS).
    Mr. GREENEasked the Minister of Health whether he will consider the advisability of the Ministry publishing their decisions given upon appeals made to them under Section 3 of the Housing Act, 1925, in order that local authorities may know the construction placed by the Ministry upon the Section?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The matter referred to by my hon. Friend has been engaging my attention. The great majority of appeals under the Housing Act are concerned with questions of fact, the decisions on which depend on the particular circumstances of individual cases and which, therefore, it would be

    1225
    unreasonable to treat as precedents necessarily binding in all cases. I however, considering whether it will be practicable to bring to the notice of local authorities through the Annual Report of the Ministry and otherwise, any decision which appears to involve any new and large question of principle.

    TOWN PLANNING.
    Mr. T. THOMSONasked the Minister of Health how many towns have begun to formulate town-planning schemes; and how many towns with a population of 10,000 or more have done nothing in the matter?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: 267 urban authorities have prepared or are preparing town-planning schemes, a number of which extend to portions of other urban areas. The number of urban authorities with a population of 10,000 or over in whose areas formal steps have not, so far as I am aware, been taken in the preparation of town-planning schemes is 289.
    Mr. THOMSON: What steps is the right hon. Gentleman taking to encourage local authorities to get on with this important work?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot keep on nagging the local authorities, but I am watching the work and I am very much convinced of the importance of it.

    PROPERTY OWNERS (COMPENSATION).
    Mr. RYEasked the Minister of Health whether he will take steps to promote such legislation as may be necessary to amend Section 46 of The Housing (Consolidation) Act, 1925, so as to provide for payment of fair and reasonable compensation to the owners of property acquired under an improvement scheme made in pursuance of such Act?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The question of legislation to amend in some respects the section of the Act of 1925 referred to has been receiving my attention, but I am unable to make any statement in regard to the matter at the present moment.
    Sir HARRY FOSTER: Pending the question of amending legislation, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the propriety of giving instructions that in respect of any inquiry which has to be held under the scheme, notice shall be specifically
    1226
    given to the owners that their properties are scheduled as insanitary and that they will remain as insanitary unless they appear at the public inquiry and show proof to the contrary?
    Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not think I can promise to do that. It would mean a very great addition to the expense of these inquiries. I think the present provision which causes public notice to be given of the inquiry, and which gives every opportunity for those who are interested to appear and make representations at the inquiry, ought to be sufficient. I am aware that as this procedure is comparatively new there have been cases where persons interested have not taken advantage of their opportunity and have afterwards complained that they did not know anything about it. I cannot help thinking that as the procedure gets better known these cases will be very few.

  EDUCATION.

    SCHOOL ATTENDANCE AGES.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMSasked the President of the Board of Education if he will state the age at which compulsory school attendance commences in the following countries, United States, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Australia and New Zealand?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Lord Eustace Percy): In France attendance is obligatory from six to 13, in Italy from six to 14, and in New Zealand from seven to 15. In the United States, Germany, Canada and Australia there is seine variety of practice as between one State or province and another, and will send my hon. Friend such information as I have on the subject.
    Mr. COVE: Is there not, in some of the States of America, a compulsory leaving age of 16, and even 18?
    Lord E. PERCY: Yes, and I think, speaking without the book, that in all those cases the lower age limit is as high as seven or eight.
    Sir JOHN MARRIOTT: Will the Noble Lord arrange to have this information circulated, and not merely sent privately?
    Lord E. PERCY: I will see that the information is available.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Is there any country except this in which the compulsory starting age is five?
    Lord E. PERCY: Not as far as I know, but I would prefer to have notice of that question.

    COMPARATIVE EXPENDITURE.
    Sir H. BRITTAINasked the President of the Board of Education whether he can inform the House as to the amount spent per head upon education in Great Britain, France, Switzerland, and Norway, respectively
    Lord E. PERCY: As the reply to this question is rather long, I will, with my hon. Friend's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT
    Following the reply:
    It is not possible to extract from the published statistics of the educational expenditure of the countries concerned, figures which would afford a reliable basis for comparison, and such figures as are obtainable can be rightly interpreted only in the light of an intimate knowledge of the educational and financial arrangements, and the social and economic organisation, of each country. Moreover, in the case of France, no figures are available of the expenditure of the local authorities. Subject to this important reservation the answer, so far as information is available, is as follows:
    England and Wales.—The Board's Estimates for 1925–26 of the expenditure from public funds, central and local, on the educational services within their purview, was £73,427,000, which represents an expenditure of £1 18s. 8d. per head of population of England and Wales. As regards Scotland, my hon. Friend should address his inquiry to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland.
    France.—The total proposed expenditure of the French Ministry of Public Instruction and Fine Arts for 1926, excluding the expenditure on universities, State records and scientific institutions, is 1,675,815,700 francs, representing an expenditure by the Central Government of 12 francs per head of population. As
    1228
    I have said, this does not cover any local expenditure, nor does it cover, I believe, the whole of the remuneration of teachers.
    Switzerland.—The total educational expenditure of the federal, cantonal and communal authorities (i.e., central and local) in Switzerland in 1922–23 was, excluding expenditure on university education, 179,547,030 francs, representing an expenditure of 46 frarcs (Swiss) per head of population.
    Norway.—The total expenditure in 1922 from public funds, central and local, on education in Norway, excluding expenditure on the university and on schools corresponding to the English industrial and reformatory schools, was 122,315,078 kroner, representing an expenditure of 46·16 kroner per head of the population.

    TEACHERS (APPOINTMENT).
    Major KINDERSLEYasked the President of the Board of Education whether he has any control over the appointment of teachers in the public elementary and secondary schools; and is he prepared to introduce legislation for the purpose of securing control by the Board of Education?
    Lord E. PERCY: The requirements laid down in the Regulations for Public Elementary and Secondary Schools appear to me to afford the board adequate control over the staffing of the schools for the purpose of ensuring that they are efficiently and properly conducted, and I do not consider that there is any need for legislation in the matter.

    ELEMENTARY EDUCATION (COST).
    Mr. EVERARDasked the President of the Board of Education the average cost per child for elementary education in the counties of England and Wales and the cost per child for the county of Leicester?
    Lord E. PERCY: According to the figures for the last completed year (1924–25), the not expenditure per child for elementary education in the counties of England and Wales (excluding London) was £10 10s. 1d.; the corresponding figure for Leicestershire was £9 3s. 11d.
    Mr. EVERARD: Will particular attention be given to those counties which provide very good education at a lower cost, in going into the block grant system?
    Lord E. PERCY: Yes, all those matters will be considered.
    Sir FREDRIC WISEasked the President of the Board of Education the approximate cost of the education of a child in 1913–14 and the estimated cost in 1925–26 in England and Wales?
    Lord E. PERCY: I assume that my hon. Frond is referring to public elementary school children. I would refer him to paragraph 6, on page 9, of the Memorandom on the Board's Estimates (1925–26) a copy of which I am sending him.

    MAINTENANCE GRANTS (CARNARVONSHIRE).
    Mr. TREVELYANasked the President of the Board of Education whether the Board are refusing their approval of maintenance grants in the Country of Carnarvon?
    Lord E. PERCY: I have intimated to the authority that, apart from the question whether it is desirable that maintenance grants should be made to children whose attendance at school is compulsory, it does not appear to me consistent with the intention of paragraph 4 of Administrative Memorardum 44 that they should include in their estimates for the year 1926–27 provision for a new scheme of maintenance allowances applicable to pupils attending public elementary schools.

    ADULT EDUCATION.
    Mr. RENNIE SMITHasked the President of the Board of Education if the change in educational policy, fore—shadowed in Circular 1371 and Memorandum 44 will in any way affect the grants made on behalf of adult education, and especially the Workers' Educational Association tutorial class movement; and whether he contemplates any changes in the future, either of a progressive or retrogressive character?
    Lord E. PERCY: The Circular and the Allemorandum will in no way affect the direct grants payable by the Board in aid or the programme of classes for the present academic year which was submitted to me by the responsible bodies and which I have approved. I cannot say to what extent local authorities are including provision for additional aid to such classes in their revised estimates, but the total amount of money involved is so small that I do not think the Circular
    1230
    and Memorandum need have any appreciable effect on the policy of local authorities in this matter. As regards the second part of the question, I have arranged to meet representatives of the various bodies interested in adult education, on 26th February, and I should prefer to make no statement in advance, but I anticipate that there will in any case he some increase in the amount of the Board's direct grants for the next two academic years.
    Mr. W. THORNE: Did the Memorandum 44 advise local education authorities not to build any more schools for the next two or three years, and if that is so, what is going to become of the children who are becoming of school age?
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member should give notice of that question.

  PUBLIC ORDER (LONDON PARKS).
  Mr. W. BAKERasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been called to the evidence given at the London Sessions during the appeal of Sir Basil Thomson; and whether he will consider the desirability of using to a far greater extent the opportunities which police officers have of knowing the character and circumstances of women such as the co-defendant in that case, for the purpose of befriending and helping them?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Within the scope of their duty, Metropolitae police officers do all in their power to help women of the class referred to who desire help, but it is well known that many such women would resent police interference. Every Metropolitan constable—man or woman—has a pocket directory, with a list of places where women of different ages and of different mode of life can find shelter and friendly aid, and advice of this description is frequently given.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Home Secretary whether he will inquire into the state of public order in certain of the London parks, which are open to the public after dark, with a view to better regulation and supervision?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have had this matter under my consideration upon several occasions. I am satisfied that the Regulations made for securing public

  1231
  order in the parks are sufficient, and that the police do everything in their power to enforce them.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Will not the right hon. Baronet consider either an earlier closing of certain London parks to pedestrians, or some better system of control, to prevent a repetition of these cases?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: In the first place, I have no power to close the parks, and personally I should deprecate the removal of a benefit to the whole community merely because of one or two unfortunate incidents.
  Mr. HAYES: Will the right hon. Baronet consider the question of improving the lighting in the parks, which is the great thing?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: That is not under my Department.
  Mr. HAYES: Will the right hon. Baronet consider that matter with a view to recommendations being made, as in fact was done some years ago with regard to the Outer and Inner Circles in Regent's Park?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: If the police inform me that absence of light is a, cause of misconduct, I will, of course, communicate with the responsible authority.

  TAXICABS.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Home Secretary whether any decision has been reached with regard to the placing of two-seater taxi-meter cabs on the streets of London; and whether this will mean any addition to the total number of taxi-meter cabs plying for hire?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: This question is still under consideration, and I am not in a position to make a statement?

  POLICE APPEAL TRIBUNALS.
  Mr. CHARLES EDWARDSasked the Home Secretary whether he has received a letter from the Monmouthshire
  1232
  County Council urging the necessity of establishing appeal tribunals for the police forces of the country, such officers when appealing to have the right to be represented by a legal or other representative; and will he state the policy of his Department in regard to this matter?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have received the letter to which the hon. Member refers. A scheme for the grant of an appeal in certain classes of cases has been prepared, and I am now considering whether it is such that I could recommend it to Parliament.

  SEXUAL OFFENCES AGAINST YOUNG PERSONS.
  Mr. CROMPTON WOODasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the increase of sexual offences against young persons, as shown in the Report of the Departmental Committee just published, he will find time shortly for legislation with the object of making the penalties for criminal assaults against women and children adequate to the offence?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have been asked to reply. As I mentioned on Tuesday, the whole question is under consideration, but I am not in a position to make a statement.
  Mr. WOOD: In View of the increase of these offences during the last five years by about 50 per cent., may I urge my right hon. Friend to see that there is no delay in bringing in legislation to check this increase?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: As I said on Tuesday last, I have received the Report of this Committee, but there is another very important Departmental Committee sitting at the Home Office with regard to young offenders, and I do not think it would be right to bring separate Bills before Parliament. I am awaiting the second Report, and then I hope to deal with the matter.

  DIPLOMATIC PRIVILEGE.
  Mr. ROBERT YOUNGasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will state the decision arrived at in the case of Mr. Pemetiro

  1233
  Porras, whose fine of 5s. for driving a car without a licence was rescinded by the magistrates at Hastings until the plea of diplomatic privilege was referred to the Home Office; and will he say what position the gentleman concerned held?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The decision reached by the magistrates at the adjourned hearing was to convict and inflict a fine of 5s. The position held was that of Consul, which does not entitle to immunity from process.

  COMMUNIST DOCUMENTS.
  Sir F. HALLasked the Home Secretary whether the Government will consider the advisability, in the national interest, of publishing in a suitable form some of the more important information which was discovered regarding Communist intrigues in this country as the result of the recent raid on the headquarters of the Communist party; and if such summary can be accompanied by fats miles of some of the pamphlets and other documents which were seized?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am afraid facsimile reproductions would be very costly, but I have the whole question under consideration, and will bear in mind the suggestion of my hon. and gallant Friend.
  Lieut. - Commander KENWORIHY: Will the right hon. Baronet have the necessary documents ready by the next Election, for a timely issue?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I do not think it will be necessary.
  Sir F. HALL rose—
  Mr. SPEAKER: I do not think we can discuss the matter further now.
  Sir F. HALL: There has not been a supplementary question asked on this question.
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member behind is a little apt to waste time in that direction.
  Sir F. HALL: We do not waste much time here, Sir.

  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS ACT.
  Mr. BARKERasked the Minister of Health the number of deposit contributors under the National Health Insurance Act; and if these deposit contributors enjoy full normal rights to benefit under the Widows', Orphans' and Old Age Pensions Act equal with other contributors?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: On the latest figures available, the number of deposit contributors in England and Wales is 250,617. Generally, deposit contributors now enjoy the same rights under the Contributory Pensions Act as other contributors, and their position is being made absolutely the same in this matter by Regulations about to be issued.
  Mr. ROBINSONasked the Minister of Health whether, under the powers given him in Section 36 of the Widows', Orphans' and Old Age Contributory Pensions Act, 1925, he will consider the desirability of issuing Regulations granting compensation to a widower on the death of his wife in cases where husband and wife are compulsorily insured persons?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: This proposal involves an extension of the class of persons for whom benefits are provided by the Act, and legislation would be necessary to give effect to it.
  Mr. ROBINSONasked the Minister of Health if he could furnish figures showing the number of cases in which husband and wife are compulsorily insured under the Widows', Orphans' and Old Age Contributory Pensions Act in the Counties of Lancashire and Yorkshire, and the remainder of Great Britain, respectively; and whether in these cases provision could be made for reduced contributions from married women?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No statistics of the kind mentioned are available, and I am afraid that I could not adopt the suggestion made in the latter part of the question. I may point out that under Section 2 (1) (a) of the Insurance Act an employed person who proves that he or she is ordinarily and mainly dependent for his or her livelihood on some other person is entitled to a certificate of exemption.
  Mr. KELLYasked the Minister of Health why men sent out by British firms to instal machinery in other

  1235
  countries are dealt with as being outside the Insurance Acts, even though these men are at times employed in the home shops in this country, such decision resulting in the widows of these men being refused a pension under the Widows', Orphans and Old Age Contributory Pension Act?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Employment within the meaning of the Insurance Act is defined in Part I of the First Schedule to that Act as employment in the United Kingdom, and there is no liability on a British firm to pay contributions in respect of employés while they are employed outside the United Kingdom. As regards pensions, the fact that her husband died when employed abroad would not necessarily disqualify a widow from pension if the qualifying conditions laid down in the Act are fulfilled in her case.
  Mr. KELLY: In the event of the employer failing to pay the contributions, and the men believing they are paid, is the widow still to be deprived of the pension, although the husband has been working for a British firm?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: If the hon. Member will read the answer I have given to him, he will see that the employer is not bound to pay contributions under these particular circumstances, but that fact does not necessarily disqualify the widow from receiving a pension.
  Mr. DENNIS HERBERT: Has the right hon. Gentleman considered if it is not the case that these men, although working out of the United Kingdom, are strictly employed within the United Kingdom, because their contracts are made here and their employers are carrying on business here?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: This case was considered while the Bill was going through the House, and I think my hon. Friend will find that it is provided for.
  Mr. GREENEasked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that Ministry of Health officials have ruled that allowances, payable under the Widows', Orphans' and Old Age. Contributory Pensions Act, 1925, in respect of children of widows, can be claimed only
  1236
  by, and be paid only to, the mothers, even when the children are inmates of charitable institutions; and under what provisions of the Act such a decision is arrived at?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: This ruling is in accordance with Section 3 (3) of the Act, which provides that "an additional allowance shall, subject as 'hereinafter mentioned, be paid to the widow together with and as part of the pension.'' The allowance may, by a later provision, be transferred, on the application of the widow, to any person having the temporary charge of the child and, if representations are made to the Minister that the widow has deserted, abandoned or ceased to support the child, he may, if he is satisfied that it is in the interests of the child, direct that the allowance shall be paid to some other person.
  Mr. CONNOLLYasked the Minister of Health if he is aware that certain boards of guardian; when grant ing relief to widows who are receiving the widows' pension deduct the fun amount of the pension from the amount of relief previously paid, and addition reduce the total amount paid by several shillings a week; and does he propose to issue any instructions to Poor Law authorities on this subject?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I have not received any complaint of the nature suggested, but I shall be glad to give consideration to any case which the hon. Member may wish to bring before me. As at present advised, I do not think there is any necessity for the issue of any such instructions as are suggested.

  SMOKE ABATEMENT.
  Sir A. BUTTasked the Minister of Health whether proposes to introduce a Smoke Abatement Bill this Session?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given to the hon. Member for the North West Division of Camberwell on the 4th instant.

  RATES (RESERVE FUNDS).
  Sir WALTER de FRECEasked the Minister of Heath whether, in view of the fluctuations of employment in certain

  1237
  areas, his Department has considered or will consider the establishment by the local rating authorities concerned of reserve funds in prosperous times against depression which comes at regular periods, seeing that such a policy would in those districts now styled necessitous obviate much of the recent financial embarrassmenets which exist?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I have considered the proposal put forward by my hon. Friend, but there are considerable difficulties in connection with it, and, as it present advised, I do not think that the legislation which will be necessary to give effect to the proposal would be justified.

  BIRTH RATE.
  Sir N. GRATTAN-DOYLEasked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the progressive decline in the birth rate of this country, he can give the percentage birth rate during last year and he same rate for the principal countries in Europe?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: As the reply contains a number of figures, I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
  Following is the reply:
  As the 1925 birth rates for foreign European countries are not as yet available, the figures asked for are given for the most recent year for which information has been received.

  Birth Rate per 100 Population

  England and Wales (1925)

  1·83

  England and Wales (1924)

  1·88

  Sweden (1924)

  1·81*

  France (1924)

  1·89

  Finland (1924)

  2·24

  Germany (1924)

  2·04*

  Denmark (1923)

  2·54

  Switzerland (1924)

  1·87

  Netherlands (1924)

  2·52*

  Belgium (1924)

  1·99

  Spain (1924)

  2·99*

  Hungary (1924)

  2·68

  Czechoslovakia (1924)

  1·95*

  Austria (1923)

  2·25*

  Italy (1923)

  2·93

  * Provisional.

  TUBERCULAR, ANIMALS (COMPENSATION).
  Sir HUGH LUCAS-TOOTHasked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that, while a farmer receives compensation for an animal which is found to be tubercular, if tuberculosis is discovered after sale to a butcher no compensation is paid; and whether he is prepared to introduce legislation to remove this anomaly?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I am aware that a farmer received partial compensation for an animal which is compulsorily slaughtered under the Tuberculosis Order in consequence of being affected with one of the specified forms of tuberculosis. The object of that Order is the prevention of the spread of tuberculosis amongst cattle. The proposal to pay compensation to butchers for animals found, after slaughter, to be tuberculous was considered and rejected by the Departmental Committee on Meat Inspection and I am not prepared to introduce legislation to give effect to this proposal.

  STATEMENT OF RATES ACT, 1919.
  Mr. RAMSDENasked the Minister of Health if he will state the number of the prosecutions in the years 1920 to 1925, inclusive, against persons who had not complied with the provisions of the Statement of Rates Act, 1919?
  Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have been asked to reply to this question. Two persons in 1923 and one in 1924 were proceeded against under this Act. No persons were proceeded against in 1920–22 and the figures for 1925 are not yet available.

  WEST HAM GUARDIANS.
  Mr. WARDLAW-MILNEasked the Minister of Health whether the West Ham board of guardians have applied for another loan from the Government, and what the indebtedness to the Ministry of that board now is?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: A loan of £300,000 was advanced to the West Ham board of guardians on the 29th January, and the indebtedness of the board of guardians to the Ministry is now £2,057,500.
  Mr. W. THORNE: Is it not a fact that the major part of the £300,000 loan is already expended?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Yes.
  Mr. THORNE: They will be coming along again shortly.

  OUTDOOR RELIEF, NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE.
  Mr. TREVELYANasked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that, as a result of the striking of large numbers of unemployed off benefit since August last, the expenditure in outdoor relief by the guardians of Newcastle-upon-Tyne has exceeded the estimate by £84,348; that this will mean an increase of about a shilling on the rates of the city; and what steps he proposes to take to make the maintenance of the unemployed again a national burden?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I am aware that there has been a substantial increase in the number of persons relieved in this Union in the last few months, but I am not aware that this is due to the cause suggested by the right hon. Member. As regards the last part of the question, the right hon. Member is no doubt aware of the existence of the Committee which is considering the question of the assistance of necessitous areas.
  Mr. TREVELYAN: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the guardians themselves approved of this course?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: It does not follow that I should do so.
  Major CRAWFURD: When does the right hon. Gentleman expect the Report?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot say.

  SMALL-POX, COUNTRY OF DURHAM.
  Mr. LANSBURYasked the Minister of Health how many cases of small-pox have occurred in the County of Durham since the present outbreak started down to the week ending 6th February, showing the number of cases each week; how many deaths, if any, have taken place; will he give the names of the towns, districts and villages where the outbreak is most severe; and what steps he has
  1240
  taken to discover the cause of the outbreak and the reasons which have led so rapid a spread of the disease?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: The total number of cases of small-pox which have been notified in the County of Durham from the 1st January, 1925, to the 6th February, 1926, is 1,966. I will circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT a statement showing the number of cases notified each week during that period and the names of the towns and districts where the disease is most prevalent. In two instances small-pox was entered on the death certificate as one of the causes of death. Numerous visits have been paid to the affected districts by medical officers of my Department for the purpose of advising and assisting the local authorities and their officers, and their reports indicate that the outbreak may be attributed to the spread of the disease from other infected areas, and that the present prevalence is in large measure due to the neglect of vaccination and in some districts to the lack of adequate hospital accommodation.
  Mr. BATEY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the districts that are the worst affected are the districts where the men have been most impoverished?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir; I do not think that is so.
  Mr. BATEY: It is so.
  Commander WILLIAMS: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what percentage of these cases have been vaccinated?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot answer that without notice.
  Mr. LANSBURY: Is it not a fact that in the County of Durham just now, in all the districts, poverty is very prevalent, and is it not a proved fact that disease attacks people whose physique is lowered through want of food?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: I think it would be very difficult to draw any safe deductions from the figures in my possession, but they certainly do not bear out the suggestion made the other night that the cessation of poor relief in a particular union was the cause of the special prevalence of disease in that union, seeing that in that particular union the prevalence of disease is considerably less than in an adjoining union, where there has been no such cessation.
  Mr. LAWSON: How does the right hon. Gentleman account for the fact that in the areas where there has been most unemployment the outbreak of small-pox is most prevalent?
  Mr. CHAMBERLAIN: Possibly there has been less vaccination there.
  Following is the statement promised:

  CASES OF SMALL-POX NOTIFIED IN COUNTY DURHAM.

  Week ended—

  1925.

  24th January

  1

  31st January

  3

  7th February

  2

  21st February

  2

  28th February

  1

  7th March

  1

  14th March

  2

  21st March

  21

  28th March

  2

  4th April

  8

  11th April

  8

  18th April

  8

  25th April

  6

  2nd May

  7

  9th May

  10

  16th May

  4

  23rd May

  4

  30th May

  3

  6th June

  2

  13th June

  4

  20th June

  8

  27th June

  11

  4th July

  19

  11th July

  43

  18th July

  17

  25th July

  20

  1st August

  7

  8th August

  18

  15th August

  9

  22nd August

  8

  29th August

  10

  5th September

  9

  12th September

  11

  19th September

  12

  26th September

  12

  3rd October

  10

  10th October

  11

  17th October

  23

  24th October

  29

  31st October

  42

  7th November

  37

  14th November

  49

  21st November

  46

  28th November

  70

  5th December

  80

  12th December

  86

  19th December

  119

  26th December

  104

  1926

  2nd January

  98

  9th January

  138

  16th January

  139

  23rd January

  177

  30th January

  182

  6th February

  213

  The areas where the disease is most prevalent are:—

  Gateshead C.B.

  Easington R.D.

  Blaydon U.D.

  Houghton-le-Spring R.D.

  Chester-le-Street U.D.

  Whickham U.D.

  Lanchester R.D.

  South Shields C.B.

  Sunderland R.D.

  Auckland R.D.

  Spennymoor U.D.

  Chester-le-Street R.D.

  Note.—No cases were notified for the weeks ended the 3rd, 10th and 17th January, and 14th February, 1925, respectively.

  LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

    COMPOSITION OF COUNCIL.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD(by Private Notice) asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has anything to say regarding statements
    1242
    that have appeared in the Press that two Powers in addition to Germany are to be granted permanent seats on the Council of the League of Nations and whether the Government have taken any attitude on these claims?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Austen Chamberlain): The application of Germany for admission to the League has opened, as was probably inevitable, the whole question of the composition of the Council, and is giving rise to claims in other quarters. But, until those claims have been formally preferred, and the arguments both for and against them have been heard, it is impossible to reach any final decision as to the course which will best serve the interests of the Council and of the League generally. As far as it is practicable to study them at this stage, the issues involved are receiving the careful consideration of His Majesty's Government.
    If it be possible for me to snake a further statement before I leave to attend the Council in March, I will gladly do so, but I feel sure the right hon. Gentleman will recognise that, on a matter which is to be the subject of debate and decision by the Council and Assembly, and on which a good deal of difference of opinion may at first exist, it is desirable that full weight should be given to the feeling which may be found to prevail in those bodies and to the arguments which may be adduced in their discussions. It would, in fact, defeat the whole object of such common consultation, and destroy the usefulness and influence of the League, if the representatives of this and other countries were bound in advance by rigid instructions which rendered any common agreement impossible.
    Captain BENN: Can the right hon. Gentleman give us any indication as to the attitude of His Majesty's Government towards the application of these two Powers?
    Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I think there are more than two Powers. At the present time I hope the House will allow me to confine myself to the considered statement I have made. If the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition puts a question down, say in the first week of March just before I go to Geneva, if there is further information which can

    1243
    properly be given, I shall be glad to give it.
    Mr. THURTLE: Would the right hon. Gentleman tell the House whether there is any truth in the suggestion which has appeared in the Press that he has given an undertaking to the Spanish Government that their claim for admission to the League Council would he supported by the British Government?
    Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not desire at the present time to add anything to the statement which I have made. I think it is inconvenient that I should be asked to do so.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Mr. MacDONALD: Will the Prime Minister say what business he proposes to take next week?
The PRIME MINISTER: We propose to proceed with the Supplementary Estimates, and it may be for the convenience of the House if I specify the order in which we propose to put them down.
Monday: Board of Control; Registrar General's Office; Stationery and Printing; Office of Works and Public Buildings; Mines Department and Royal Commissions. We shall then proceed with Votes not already disposed of in Classes 3, 4,5,6 and 7.
Tuesday: The Ministry of Agriculture Vote will be the first Order taken, followed by the Board of Trade Vote, the Vote for the Department of Overseas Trade and other Votes on the Paper.
Wednesday: Until 8.15 p.m., further consideration of Supplementary Estimates in Committee and on Report, and other Orders.
Thursday: Discussion of the new Anglo-Iraq Treaty, and, if time permit, other Orders on the Paper.
Captain BENN: Is it intended to suspend the Eleven o'clock, Rule?
The PRIME MINISTER: I cannot commit myself, but I very much hope that that will not be necessary. The
1244
hon. and gallant Member knows as well as I do that Supplementary Estimates have to be passed by a certain date, and if sufficient progress is not made I shall be compelled to move the suspensiou of the Eleven o'clock Rule.
Captain BENN: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that two important matters, the Unemployment Belief Grants and the Increase of Customs Vote on account of the new Duties, are taken at a reasonable time of day?
The PRIME MINISTER: If it be necessary to suspend the Eleven o'clock Rule, I shall certainly consult through the usual channels, and I will see that a Vote of solid importance, such as the one mentioned, shall be an early Order on any day.
Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: When does the right hon. Gentleman propose to take the discussion on the Anglo-Italian Debt settlement?
The PRIME MINISTER: That is a question which I certainly could not answer without notice. As I said the other day, I had understood it was to be taken as a Liberal Amendment on Monday last, but another subject was chosen. I cannot say at, this moment, without consideration, when the next opportunity will arise to discuss it.
Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Time will be given. I take it?
The PRIME MINISTER: I must consider that suggestion. I certainly had hoped that, it would have been discussed on Monday.
Mr. STEPHEN: Did the right hon. Gentleman not give us an assurance that there would be a discussion at an early date?
The PRIME MINISTER: If I put it as strongly as that, I am afraid that I was under the very definite impression—it may prove to be wrong—that it was to be the subject of debate last Monday, in the Debate on the Address, but, as I have said, I will consider what can be done in the matter.
Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that during the general discussion on the Address a number of speeches were made

1245
on the subject, by the hon. Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) and other hon. Members, of whom I was one—I was not the only speaker on this side—and we put certain questions to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who did not honour us by attending the Debate, and we have had no kind of reply from him? Is this sort of matter to be left without discussion and answer in this House?
The PRIME MINISTER: The Chancellor of the Exchequer was labouring under the same misapprehension as I was. He was very anxious to make a considered statement, and, as a matter of fact, had prepared material at that time in the hope that the Debate would take place on the Address on the Monday.
Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that we were given to understand that a reply world be made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer at a certain time? That was arranged through the usual channels, and far some reason the Chancellor of the Exchequer found himself unable to give his reply to the House. Is that treating the House and the country fairly?
The PRIME MINISTER: I will take the matter into consideration, but I cannot answer without notice.
Mr. STEPHEN: Do we understand from the Prime Minister that he is withdrawing his positive assurance that there would be an early discussion? Can I have an answer? I have put a curteons question to the right hon. Gentleman.
The PRIME MINISTER: I have no wish to prevent any hon. Member from drawing his own conclusions.

MIDWIVES AND MATERNITY HOMES BILL,
"to amend the Midwives Acts, 1902 and 1918, and to provide for the registration of maternity homes; and for purposes connected therewith," presented by Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE; supported by Major Hills; to be read a Second time upon Monday, 22nd February, and to be printed. [Bill 38.]
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.
  Considered in Committee.
  [Mr. JAMES HOPE in the Chair.]

  SUPPLY.

    SCOTTISH BOARD OF HEALTH.
    Motion made and Question proposed,
    "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £182,381, 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, 1926, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Scottish Board of Health, including Expenses in connection with the Administration of the Widows', Orphans' and Old Age Contributory Pensions Act, 1925, Grants and other Expenses in connection with Housing, Grants to Local Authorities, &c., Grants in respect of Benefits and Expenses of Administration under the National Health Insurance Act, 1924, and certain Grants in Aid."
    The SECRETARY for SCOTLAND (Sir John Gilmour): In presenting these Supplementary Estimates it may be of advantage to hon. Members if I make an introductory statement. Provision is made in the first four sub-heads of this Supplementary Estimate for payment of widows' and orphans' pensions. I should imagine that these items are not in any sense controversial. I will point out only that these expenses are incurred by other Government departments concerned in the administration of the Act. They will be charged against the Pensions (Scotland) Account. The Estimate makes provision for the necessary Appropriation-in-Aid. With regard to the other heads of the Estimate, "Advances towards the Erection of Steel Houses" in Scotland, I do not propose to speak at great length, nor to burden the Committee with a vast number of statistics; but perhaps I may be permitted to recall to the Committee the facts which have led the Government to take their present action.
    When the present Government took over the control of affairs and had to consider the question of housing in this country, particularly as it affected the provision of houses for the wage earner, they were
    1288
    faced, as previous Governments had been faced, with many difficulties. In conjunction with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health, various meetings took place between the Government Departments concerned and representatives of the building industry—representatives of both masters and men. The position in Scotland, as the House is aware from the speeches which have been made from time to time, and more particularly from the speeches of the Prime Minister, has given the Government very grave concern. It was because of the immense shortage and the still slow progress in solving this problem that, after repeated efforts, in conjunction and in consultation with the representatives of the trade and the representatives of the public authorities in Scotland, the Government were induced to offer to Scotland an extra and supplementary subsidy. Hon. Members are aware of the terms of the extra subsidy, as set out in publications which have been available to Members of the House for many months.
    These proposals, submitted to the local authorities of Scotland, failed to procure what the Government considered a satisfactory response. The reasons for that lack of response are well known to those who have followed this problem. From time to time computations have been made as to the shortage of houses in Scotland, and whether we agree with the larger figures or the smaller figures, one thing is amply clear to anyone who knows the conditions which exist, not only in the larger cities of Scotland, but in the mining districts and the villages throughout the country. We are aware that there is a shortage of anything from 100,000 to 150,000 houses in Scotland, and that, apart from that, the ordinary lag year by year of something like 10,000 houses per year has in no measure been reduced.
    4.0 P.M.
    I have looked into these figures from time to time, and I think I am not far wrong in saying that, while over a series of years there have been variations, all that has been done to meet this problem has been something like 6,000 houses per annum. Under these circumstances, being aware of the conditions in which many people were living, the Government were not content to leave the matter where it had arrived when it was found

    1289
    that the local authorities were not going to take advantage of the extra subsidy scheme, and they decided that they must proceed to deal with the problem in a more drastic fashion. Having come to that decision, the Government invited the Scottish National Housing Company to co-operate with them in solving the problem. That company, as hon. Members are aware, has for the last 10 years or so been operating in Scotland, has an efficient staff, and expert knowledge; and it was a great measure of satisfaction to the Government when it was found that the company was prepared to co-operate with them in this problem. The National Housing Company, for the development of this scheme, for the erection of 2,000 steel houses, has formed a second Scottish National Housing Company (Housing Trust) Limited. In so far as its capital is not obtained on loan from the Public Works Loans Board, it will be advanced by the Scottish Board of Health, and the houses which the company will erect include 1,000 houses which will be purchased from Messrs. Weir, 500 from Messrs. Cowieson, and 500 from the Atholl Steel Houses—
    Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: Has the company been instructed to examine all classes of steel houses that may be offered, or to select these particular types?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: As the hon. and gallant Member knows, there was a very large call for offers on the part of all the possible firms under the original Government scheme—the extra £40 subsidy. The conditions which were laid down under that scheme are materially the conditions laid down under the scheme with which we are proceeding now. It was from that list that, satisfying ourselves as to the capabilities of the various firms which offered—and it was an open offer to the whole of the country—these three firms have been selected.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: Selected by whom?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: By the Scottish Board of Health and the Government, who are responsible for this scheme. The conditions under which the capital will be advanced to the company will provide that the contracts for the houses
    1290
    will embody the conditions which were intended to apply to the special £40 subsidy schemeeas set forth in the Board of Health Circular issued on 23rd November, 1925, to all local authorities in Scotland, subject to such modification as may be agreed. It will be a further condition that any income derived from the rents of the houses and any money raised by the sale of the houses, after meeting maintenance and management charges, as well as interest upon and repayment of instalments of loans obtained from the Public Works Loans Board, will be applied towards meeting interest charges and repayment of advances made from the Exchequer.
    In other words, the Government are advancing the necessary capital, through the machinery of this Company, to carry out this scheme. This subsidiary Company is formed, and consists of some, I believe of most, of the directors of the original Company, with an added representative of the Treasury and the Scottish Board of Health. This will ensure that any profits which are made upon the transaction or any moneys which are received after meeting the charges which I have enumerated, will return to the Treasury.
    I should like to say here that the Government have been constrained to take this action because of the attitude or the fears of certain local authorities in dealing with what perhaps is admittedly an experimental method of building. It is a method of building in steel construction which at one period seemed to commend itself to a large number of people not confined to any single party, and I should like to say that it was during the tenure of office of the right hon. Gentleman opposite that the first inspections of these steel houses were made. I remember being present on one occasion at an inspection of a, house produced by Lord Weir's firm, and I understood it was favourable to those Ministers as an experimental type, and as worthy of consideration by the people of the country. We have travelled some way since those days, and experimental houses of more than one of these steel types have been in existence and have been occupied by people who can speak for themselves. The evidence which comes to my Department from those who occupy these houses

    1291
    goes to show that they are satisfactory. Any minor defects which may have occurred in their construction are just such minor defects as do occur and will occur in any method of construction; but that, in the main, they compare favourably with existing types of houses is, I think, now proved beyond dispute.
    I want also to say this. There appears to be in the minds of some the idea that this step which the Government are taking is a direct challenge to the building industry, to the rates of wages, and to the conditions of living which exist in these concerns. I want to say in the most emphatic manner, speaking not only on my own behalf but on behalf of His Majesty's Government, that this is neither intended nor believed to be a challenge of such a kind. Let me examine this problem a little closer. What is it that we are asking? Out of a possible output, a reasonable output, of something like 15,000 houses per annum in Scotland, is it to be said that the introduction of these methods, amounting to a few thousand, and limited as it is at the moment to 2,000, is in any measure a challenge to the building industry as a whole?
    Mr. MONTAGUE: The wages are.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I shall have something thing to say about the wages. I presume that the greater part of this Debate will turn upon a consideration of the terms, the wages, and the methods of one particular firm. We are well aware of the controversy which has gone on in the Press, and the statements which have been made both in this House and outside. I recall that, during the tenure of office of the right hon. Gentleman opposite, there was set up a Committee to inquire into alternative methods of building. I think I am not wrong in saying that, when Lord Weir's house was investigated by the Moir Committee, it was then stated clearly that this was recognised as a real contribution towards the housing problem, that it was worthy of the support of the Government, and that it appeared that it was a satisfactory solution, at any rate in a measure, of the problem which we had to face.
    Lord Weir is a man who has devoted himself unreservedly to solving or helping to solve this housing problem in Scotland. His firm, and all his energies and the
    1292
    capital which the firm have at their disposal, have been devoted to the development of these experimental measures without stint, and, to say the least of it, it is ungenerous on the part of those who are his detractors to-day not to recognise that public service. As to the suitability of the Weir house, we have ample proof that houses that have been lived in for over a year have met with the commendation of those who have occupied them. There is this one question which I would ask hon. Members to answer. Do they consider it is better that the population should remain in the condition in which they are existing to-day, rather than that they should go into a steel house? That is a question which the people, in my judgment, will answer for themselves, what ever view hon. Members may take. Let me add, as to the conditions under which Lord Weir is going to erect these houses, that he is doing it after an inquiry, an impartial inquiry, by a Committee set up by the Government, which had upon it not only experts but also representatives of labour; and what he is doing is to employ men in the industry to which he belongs.
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: Who were the representatives of labour?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: Mr. Cramp was one of them. That was the Bradbury Committee.
    Mr. GRAHAM: Does he come from Scotland?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It was a Committee of three. Mr. Milne Watson was the other member.
    Mr. GRAHAM: And not a single one was representative of Scottish Labour.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: This is not really a question of Scottish labour. It is, in my judgment, first of all a question of commonsense, and, in the second place, a question of a fair and reasonable solution.
    Mr. WHEATLEY: Am I to understand that Lord Weir undertakes to erect these houses by the labour of men of the class which he employs now, namely engineering labour; that he agrees to a collective system of bargaining about wages, and that he undertakes to recognise the A.E.U. or any recognised trade union body as a party to those negotiations?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: As I understand it, Lord Weir recognises collective bargaining, and is employing for this purpose mainly men who are unemployed in the engineering trade, and that he proposes to pay them the ordinary rates applicable to their trade. I also understand, and I think it will be found to be substantially true as time goes on, that while these rates are engineering rates and not what are understood to be building rates of wages, still the wages which the men occupied in the erection of these houses can earn are as good, and in many cases higher than they would get if they were being paid the ordinary building rate.
    Mr. WHEATLEY: The point on which I wish to be clear is this. In the fixing of rates, is Lord Weir prepared to recognise the trade union of which these men are members as a party to the determination of the wages?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I understand Lord Weir is one of the federated employers and deals with these matters on the same conditions as others in that Federation. In any case—
    Mr. WESTWOOD: You are evading the question. We are entitled to an answer.
    The CHAIRMAN: I must ask hon. Members to reserve their remarks until they are called upon.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: That is simply impossible.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It only shows how difficult it is for hon. Members to detach their minds from sectional questions in order to come down to the main question.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: It is a question of bread and butter; we cannot detach ourselves from that.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: What the Committee has to apply itself to is the problem of supplying houses to the people, and the methods by which that can be done. These other matters are, no doubt, subjects for proper negotiation by the firms concerned. I have never said, and I have no reason to believe, that Lord Weir is not prepared to negotiate, as other heads of firms are prepared to negotiate, in dealing with these matters.
    Mr. WESTWOOD: He has never done it.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It is clear that the methods which Lord Weir has evolved, and which are entirely different from the ordinary building methods, do not imply the necessity—in our judgment or in the judgment of the committee which the Government set up—of applying building rates of wages to this form of construction.
    Mr. HARDIE: The right hon. Gentleman made a statement just now which is tantamount to saying that Lord Weir is ready to make an agreement with other employers for collective bargaining. Can the Secretary for Scotland give us an assurance that Lord Weir is prepared to adopt collective bargaining with other people?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: We must leave to Lord Weir the negotiations which, quite properly, he must carry on with those concerned. The Government stand on the Report of the Committee, and are satisfied that that is a reasonable and fair solution of the problem. We propose to proceed with the erection of these houses. It is difficult to understand the factious opposition of certain hon. Members, because they are just as much concerned as the Government in finding a solution of this problem. I am anxious to co-operate in every manner—
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: Then remove Lord Weir.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: —with those who represent the great building industry of this country. But I must remind hon. Members that during the past year, following on the experience of the Members of the late Government, we have been struggling persistently to keep down the rising price of houses which made it so difficult to let those houses to the people at reasonable rents. That struggle is due to many factors, but we desire in every way to co-operate with the building industry and to see an expansion of the supply of labour, particularly in those sections which are essential. The spectacle of so many houses in the great city of Glasgow semi-completed and awaiting the plasterer and the lather is one which reflects not on the Government but materially upon the great building industry, both masters and men, in that they have not got together to solve this problem.

    1295
    The setting up of these committees throughout the country is of little use unless they come into active operation. I have invited their co-operation and assistance from time to time. I am bound to say it has been a deep disappointment to me that move good has not come from that source. There may be just and legitimate causes of complaint, on the part of the building industry or of the trade unions, that the present arrangements with the local authorities are not satisfactory. That position has been put before me on more than one occasion, and I have recently drawn the attention of the local authorities to the fact that there is this criticism. I have pointed out that if progress is to be made, there must be a continuous policy and no gap between one great scheme and another. That, again, is a matter of which the industry alone, if they are in earnest about it, can find a solution. We, on the other hand, are quite confident that these alternative methods will commend themselves to the people of the country. They are in essence the erection of houses by mass production. Rapidity of construction and erection is an essential part of the scheme, and the money for which I am now asking is to provide for the scheme up to the end of the present financial year. Of course a further main Vote will come up for consideration. This sum is intended to provide for the erection of at least 1,200 houses at a very early date.
    It may be of interest to the Committee if I say that, while we are awaiting Parliamentary sanction for the use of this money, preliminary steps have been taken, and sites have been acquired in the great cities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Dundee, and also in Greenock, Clydebank, and parts of Lanarkshire. These preliminary arrangements only await confirmation, in some cases, by the Dean of Guild Courts. But, in the main, by the 20th of this month we will be in a position to commence immediately the erection of these houses, and before very long we shall see them actually in being.
    I should like to say just a few words as to the construction of these steel houses. Criticisms have been made from time to time upon them. As I said at the beginning, minor defects, no doubt, have shown themselves, as they will in all
    1296
    experimental work. These minor defects have been, and will be, remedied. At any rate, what is proved beyond dispute is that to the people who have been living in these houses in some cases for nearly a year, and in some cases for over a year, they have proved satisfactory. Not only in their lay-out and the facilities which they give, but, above all, in the results of the scientific tests which have been made as to heat and cold, they have proved entirely satisfactory. I would appeal to hon. Members to realise that the Government are earnestly seeking a solution of this problem. They do not believe that this proposal will, nor is it intended to, strike any adverse blow at the building industry, either trade unions or masters, in any sense or form. They believe that there is room, and more than room, not only for all the enterprise and energy of the building industry, but for these additional methods as well. There may be temporary methods; and in the course of years they may be replaced by others, but in my judgment the problem is so urgent and so clamant that no Government—
    Mr. MAXTON: It has been clamant for 30 years.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: If it has been, is not that all the greater reason why we should deal with it as speedily as possible? It is because I, at least, feel that it is so clamant and so urgent that I cannot bear to let it remain where it is, that I with the co-operation of the Prime Minister and the whole-hearted support of the Government, commend this Vote to the Committee.
    Mr. RAMSAY-MacDONALD: The Committee is facing to-day one of the most urgent and most important of our national problems. No one who has even looked at the reports on house building in Scotland, not since the War alone, but since before the War, can lay his hand on his heart this afternoon and say that he is satisfied with the present position. More than that, within the last half a dozen or more years it has been perfectly obvious that the reliance which the Government opposite placed upon private enterprise as being an efficient supplier of houses for the people has failed; that private enterprise has proved to be a broken reed, and that the last experience of an approach even to the public authorities has also failed.

    1297
    Thus we find that a Government, profoundly hostile in principle and practice to State activity and State intervention, comes before the Committee this afternoon and asks us to vote £200,000 to enable the Government themselves directly to build houses which nobody else can build. This is a magnificent demonstration of the falsity of the Government's position.
    I want to say, so far as I am concerned, that I think in the position of housing, especially in Scotland, where we are not building more than one-tenth of the number of houses that we ought to build and probably not one-fifteenth of the houses that could be very promptly inhabited if they were built—I want to say quite clearly that I recognise the need of emergency measures and the need for urgent solutions. On that ground, and on that ground alone, would I ever vote or speak for the erection of steel houses. I do not know—it may be sentiment only—it may be that 50 years from now the steel houses will have settled as comfortably into the heart of the Scotsman as the brick house is beginning to settle, but to-day, do not let us mistake what is really happening, To-day, these houses, made by mass production, completed by machinery, turned out by the thousand, dull, drab—[HON, MEMBERS: "No!"]—dull, drab, ugly, are being dumped in our cities and our waysides in order to shelter workingclass men and women, because, owing to the failure of society, they cannot find means to get any other kind of more advantageous and better house. There is not a single Scotsman or Scotswomen who would take a steel house if it were put alongside a stone house or a brick house. Here, at this time, when we boast of our tremendous national wealth, it is a second class thing that is being offered our sons and our daughters of the working class in Scotland, in which to live. There it is. It is a temporary necessity. You cannot indulge too much on the quality of our houses; the necessity to-day is to get decent shelter under those conditions, and under those conditions only my hon. Friends and myself say, "Let us vote money for houses," and that is what we are going to do this afternoon.
    What is the position of the Government in this respect? The Government have referred to the Scottish National Housing
    1298
    Company, which it approached, but now, as a matter of fact the Government is not using that Scottish National Housing Company at all. The Government have never consulted that Scottish National Housing Company. Not at all. Never. The Government have gone to certain directors of the Scottish National Housing Company. Their intention, apparently, was to use that company, but on second thoughts they decided not to use that company, and are creating a new company and the company that they are creating is not a company at all. I hold in my hands the articles of association of that new proposed company. There is no feature in that company that associates it in any way with a public company. It is not a public benefit company, it is a thing got together with five or six worthy gentlemen called directors who, as a matter of fact, are going to be used as a sub-committee of the Scottish Board of Health, to do work for which they are not responsible to any shareholders, but responsible to the Government alone. There is power to make shareholders. But we are now informed that the Government are going to supply all the capital. We are now informed that there are to be no subscriptions through outside sources. The meaning of this is that the Government have appointed a committee, consisting of a certain number of persons, whose names are attached to these articles of association. [HON. MEMBERS: "Read them!"] They are most admirable gentlemen. I am not saying they are not. I am only dealing with the nature of the company. I am going to say that this company has got no responsibility at all.
    Sir FREDRIC WISE: What is the capital?
    Mr. MacDONALD: The capital is £100,000. The point is, that, as far as I can make out, this company does not exist except as a body of nominal directors, gentlemen called directors, who, as a matter of fact, in relation to the capital, and in relation to the authority, are simply a sub-committee of a Government Department in Scotland; and that everything the company does is of the nature of the act of a Government subcommittee. For these things the Government themselves are responsible, and must be held responsible.
    That is the situation. I am not at all averse to that. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear,

    1299
    hear!"] But what about hon. Members opposite? The proposal is to erect 2,000 steel houses, and, as I said, so impressed are we with the necessity of this immediate erection, that I doubt if there would have been a very serious Debate at all, if there had been no trouble about the conditions under which they are to be built. There would have been expressions of opinion, but no serious Debate. What is the position? The Government say that this company is going to do something or other. I will take the short way, and say that the Government are going to do something or other. This company has decided nothing. This company has not decided to place a thousand houses with Messrs. Weir, or to place half that number with the Atholl company. This company has not decided to place the other half of the remainder with Cowieson or any other firm. This company has decided nothing, and all that this House is asked to do actually by the Government is to vote £200,000, which is still to be spent, and which ought only to be spent in ways and under conditions in accordance with the expressed view of the House of Commons this afternoon. Let us be perfectly clear about that. Lord Weir has not got a contract for 1,000 houses, and to-night we are not voting for that contract going through.
    Where is the trouble? [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] The right hon. Gentleman and hon. Members may laugh. We understand their minds in this respect. The Secretary of State for Scotland made some remarks to which we did not object at all. The only remark he made that calls for reply it is far better not to talk about. I forget exactly his adjectives and his nouns, but he said that some of my hon. Friends may take mere pettifogging, non-national views of this question and of the responsibilities. Is the right hon. Gentleman so very sure about this? Some of my hon. Friends, especially those who come from the South-West of Scotland, are objecting to the particular distribution of these orders. Is he quite so sure they have no ground for the widespread suspicion that is about—nay more—the almost fervent conviction, that the Government are using Lord Weir in obedience to the opinions and the pressure of their own industrial supporters
    1300
    in the South-West of Scotland, to smash trade unionism. Will the right hon. Gentleman, supposing he resents that remark, deny that the suspicion is there? Will he deny that the fact is there? Will he deny that Lord Weir, after dinners and before dinners, at masters' organisations, and in public meeting, has declared again and again and again, not in relation to this, but in relation to general industry, that trade unionism ought to be smashed? Will he deny that? If he does, the reply is ready for him in the form of extracts from Lord Weir's speeches. Human nature is human nature, and if somebody, rightly or wrongly, fortunately or unfortunately, puts himself at the head of a movement like that, and commits himself to such statements as those, is it wise to mix up that movement with a great national scheme of housing such as this, with a scheme such as the Government are projecting to launch upon the country.
    A question was put by my right hon. Friend the Member for Shettleston (Mr. Wheatley) about fair wages. I want also to put a question, and it is this. Will any subsequent speaker, whoever is going to speak from the Government bench, tell the Committee whether Lord Weir has ever negotiated, or tried to negotiate, the rate of wages that he is now paying under his housing scheme? Perhaps we might get an answer to that question.
    Now I come back to my point about the Government in relation to this. The Government are the contractors, not any company. The Government, being the contractors, are subject by a Resolution of this House to the Fair Wages Clause. Will someone explain to me how Lord Weir can fit himself into the Fair Wages Clause? The Fair Wages Clause presupposes negotiations. The spirit embodied in the Fair Wages Clause, strikes, in every phrase and in every expression, at the idea that any man, either employer or workman, can, of his own free will, decide what he has to pay for work done under Government contract. If the Government once lets any individual employer, even if he is paying, to begin with, 10 times the trade union rate, fixed without agreement and without collective bargaining, and without a contract that is accepted by representatives of the employés—it does not matter the

    1301
    figure, or the generosity, or the meanness of the man—if the Government allow him to do that, then they are doing violence, both to the letter and the spirit of the Fair Wages Clause. But they say, "We will apply the principles of the Bradbury Report." The Government are doing nothing of the kind. In those cases in the Bradbury Report where reference is made to wages, the reference is always couched in terms of agreed wages. On pages 16 and 18 of the Bradbury Report, two very specific references to wages will be seen, where in both cases the assumption, expressed in parenthesis, is that there is agreement.
    There is another thing the Government must remember. I am assuming the Government are going to fulfil their obligations in the spirit, and not merely the letter. When the Government take the Bradbury Report and apply it to this case, will the Government remember that the situation which has now arisen is quite novel, and that when the Bradbury Committee sat, the Bradbury Committee had to consider the payment of wages by Lord Weir not in relation to a Government that, apparently, so far as I can make out quite honestly, is far more inclined to back him up than to stand rigidly by the Fair Wages Clause. The Bradbury Commission were never faced with that problem. They were faced with the question of what would be fair wages when paid on a contract let by a public authority which itself was enforcing a Fair Wages Clause. That was the whole position, and I am sure if the Prime Minister will bend his mind to this, and will look from the beginning to the end of the Bradbury Report, as I have done for the purpose of this Debate to refresh my memory, he will see that, from the beginning to the end of the Bradbury Report, the Report is drafted with the knowledge that there is this check upon wages paid by Lord Weir or anybody else making steel houses—the check that practically every local authority—and certainly every important local authority—in Scotland would only give a contract if the wages paid on the contract were, not only in amount, but in method of settlement, in accordance with the provisions of that Clause. All I say is, will the Government go back to that? Will the Government carry out the Bradbury Report in relation to circumstances which
    1302
    have arisen since Lord Bradbury signed his Report, and handed it over as a completed document?
    There is another observation. I am trying to get peace in this matter. Why are 1,000 houses going to this place to which objection has been taken, and the other 1,000 are going in two halves to two places, to which no objection has been taken? Let us see what is the meaning of this. Is it because there is so much difference of pounds, shillings and pence? I am informed—I am in the hands of the Government; I do not know—but I have been informed that now there is not, that it is a very simple matter, that the difference is practically negligible, and that with a little bit of adjustment which is expected to be effective in the course of the operation, the difference will disappear altogether. Is it a real, substantial difference of price? If it is, then the Government are simply buying cheap houses produced under unsatisfactory conditions so far as labour is concerned. But look at the difference. There is a, firm to which great objection has been taken, not only by the building trade. Resolutions in batches are being sent in by other trade unions that are absolutely impartial and unconcerned with regard to this specific issue. There is a firm of reputation which has twice as many houses as the other two. In any event, that is a great handicap to the other two. It is perfectly well known that one is in competition with the specially favoured one, and I think we ought to have some very detailed and very accurate explanation why the distribution is made in that way. A firm which, I do not say has bad labour conditions, because I do not think the conditions are bad—I do not think my hon. Friends do—
    Mr. BUCHANAN: Yes.
    Mr. MacDONALD: I said "friends."
    Mr. BUCHANAN: Then put me down an enemy.
    Mr. MacDONALD: No, no; I used the plural, and not the singular. So far as I have seen the wages' sheets, the weekly sum paid is not worse. It certainly is not a great wage. It is not a glorious thing. It is not a thing to boast about, but, compared with others, you cannot say it is very much worse. I put it that way. Therefore, this firm with no

    1303
    security, but with this very well-founded suspicion that it is out to destroy the influence and the authority of the trade unions, receives special preference at the hands of the Government, even when the other two firms have been approved by the Government as being capable of producing houses to the extent required. There are agreements between the building operatives and engineers. There is the agreement of the Constructional Engineering Union, a joint agreement which runs over the whole of England, and an agreement which has also received the adhesion of a fair number of the Scottish people. There are all sorts of opportunities for the Government to start negotiations to bring themselves within the four corners of the Fair Wages Clause.
    One thing more, and I do hope hon. Members opposite will take this from the point of view of men who want peace, but, to use our old Foreign Office expression, we also want security. I hope, also, taken from that point of view, they will not overlook this fact. I shall read an extract about which hon. Members may say, "Well, Lord Weir is an engineer. We have got a great revolution now in the production of houses. From being building affairs, they have become engineering affairs." It is a revolution which ought to be very, very carefully considered, in view of the limitations upon mass production in country places. However, that is an aside. The argument is, of course, "The slums—that is where mass production gives its maximum benefit." Of course it is, but come to my little village in the North of Scotland; I hope you will keep your mass production 500 miles away, because we do not want it and because if you tried it you could not make it succeed. I am simply saying, what everybody admits, that when you come to Glasgow and Edinburgh, where you have a mass population, of course you have your opportunity for mass production, but do keep your mechanical hand off these little villages where there are only 300 or 400 people, and where we prefer whitewashed walls, To the right hon. Gentleman, Lord Weir's mental process was this: "I am an engineer. I am producing houses. In the making of the doors in the factories there are the woodworking trade unions; in the making of baths and so on, there are other
    1304
    trade unions. Except when I am throttled by the light castings combination, and when I ask them for prices for baths, and they try to swindle me, I will go to Germany in order to show them that they have not a monopoly of this market. As a result, I get quotations much cheaper from the castings' companies." But when it comes to the mobilising of the articles, the right hon. Gentleman says, "I do not know about the amount of wages or about the standard of wages—oh, no; Lord Weir, who is a conservatively-minded engineer, when he asks a man to lay a floor, or hang a door, thinks of him as an engineer, and pays him engineer's wages. That is the explanation." Of course it is not. Mr. Barron, the Operatives' President, is reported in the verbatim report of the proceedings of a certain examination as having questioned Mr. Richmond, who is, I think, Lord Weir's Manager or agent; at any rate, he is his representative. This is what Mr. Baryon put to Mr. Richmond:
    "We may take it that Lord Weir or his firm has fixed a rate without consultation with any person at all, without consultation with any organisation of operatives, and that any man accepting employment is bound to accept the conditions laid down by Lord Weir himself without negotiation. Following that us, because he has replied to it, I would like to ask this. Is it quite probable that it might have been that the engineering rate was considerably higher than the building rate at the moment? It has been in times past. Would the same circumstances have obtained? Would the firm of G. and J. Weir have decided to pay the engineering rate preferably to the building trade rate?
    To this Mr. Richmond replied: 'There would be no necessity to pay the engineering trade rate, because the building trade rate would have been sufficient to get the men.'"
    That is the case, that is what is in the minds of my hon. Friends here, that is the gist of the controversy.
    5.0 P.M.
    Every now and again it seemed to me that the right hon. Gentleman, as he went on in his speech, was going to say that the difference was so small that, as a matter of fact, Lord Weir was far better than he could be expected to be. If that be so, if he is anxious to do this, if the Government are anxious to get this scheme of theirs the freest and the fairest field, why do not they, their company, their

    1305
    agents and their sub-committee go and apply the Fair Wages Clause to Lord Weir? Get him to get his negotiations, his settlement, his agreement; get him to get his collective bargaining. We are told that now it is only a matter of amour-propre, only a matter of dignity. Give us the substance of collective bargaining, give us the letter and spirit of your Fair Wages Clause. I really do not like your steel houses, I do not like the idea, but nevertheless, as a practical man, I know that houses are required, that thousands of houses are required now. We must not be conservative even if our habits are good.
    Give us the right conditions. Go and get every one of your 2,000 houses made under conditions that will leave no heart-burning, no strife and no enmity behind. Give us your 2,000 houses so that our people who build them can build them with their hearts as well as with their hands. I, therefore, appeal to the Government, and I appeal to the House, to put an end to this dispute in the way that I have indicated.
    Mr. KIDD: There is no dispute between our friends opposite and those who sit behind the Government on the only thing that really matters, namely, the necessity for houses. As the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Aberavon has said, houses are wanted by thousands. Let us have those houses by any and every means at the earliest possible moment. I think I am right in saying that that simply stated fact properly interprets the whole policy of the Government in regard to these steel houses. The right hon. Gentleman has very rightly exercised his privilege by offering some criticism in regard to the ways and means adopted by the Government to provide these houses. For instance, he has raised the point that organised labour has not been consulted as it should have been in the matter of the wages of the workers engaged in the building of those houses. I have not followed Lord Weir's speeches very carefully, but I do not think that any great industrial captain in this country at the present time would ever dream of ignoring organised labour. Every great captain of industry frankly recognises the services done, not only to labour, but to industry generally by those organi sations.
    1306
    Am I not right in saying that it is agreed that the men engaged in the erection of these houses, on the one hand, are not builders, and, on the other hand, are not engineers, and that what we are dealing with here is something in the nature of a novelty, something rather like a new occupation? If, as the right hon. Gentleman opposite has indicated, 50 years hence Scotland may overcome its prejudice to the steel house, and you have engaged in the erection of steel houses large aggregations of men, then quite obviously you may have the development of a new union. Meantime, however, it seems to me that it is sufficient for us to know that the men who are really engaged in the erection of these houses have put forward no complaint with regard to wages and with regard to conditions.
    I feel that because of the common mind which I have indicated, in all parts of the House, one should conduct this Debate in a thoroughly friendly spirit. But I do put forward the suggestion that there is really no point in the criticism that, on the one hand, the Builders' Union has not been consulted, and that, on the other hand, the Engineers' Union has not been consulted, because these unions do not apply to the men engaged in the erection of these houses. The time may come when they will have a union of their own. Meantime they have no complaint.
    Mr. WESTWOOD: There is one already. The Constructional Engineering Union.
    Mr. KIDD: I shall deal with that. There is, I submit, no union which can truly be said to be representative of the men engaged in the erection of these houses. These men have no trade union governing their present work. The Constructional Engineering Union referred to is a union which has nothing to do with the building of those houses. That union deals with big structures, in which you have a large amount of masonry, associated with heavy machinery. There is neither masonry nor machinery nor brickwork in the erection of those steel houses, and this particular union, which exists now, and to which it is suggested reference might be made by Lord Weir, cannot be said to be a union covering the men engaged in the erection of these houses.
    Mr. R. MacDONALD: I apologise if I used language that indicated that. What I meant to say was that this was a type of an agreement that might be followed.
    Mr. KIDD: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his fairness. I was rather referring to the interruption of the Member for Peebles (Mr. Westwood), who will now be corrected. I am not surprised that the right hon. Gentleman has suggested to the House that he has no admiration for steel houses. I do not suppose any Scotsman with any regard for the truth would declare himself as fond of them. If I had a choice of a house of stone, a house of brick or a house of steel, my preference would go out in that particular order. But the right hon. Gentleman almost tempted ate to go back to a very thorny topic when he referred to the failure of the building industry to supply the houses necessary. I would ask him at what point of our history building paralysis first began? I shall not pursue the topic, because I rather believe that you, Mr. Hope, would treat a back-bencher strictly in the matter. I rather suggest, however, that the explanation I hint at is the real explanation.
    It is only fair to Lord Weir to say that no one had a stronger feeling against the steel house than I originally had. Now I have somewhat revised my views. There is a little village about 250 yards from my door and the prospect of steel houses being put up there dismayed me. It is an ideal village, a beautiful village of houses each built with two bedrooms, kitchen, parlour, pantry, scullery and all the rest. They were built by an old Tory laird as far back as 1866, before the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) came along with his land schemes. The very prospect of steel houses going up near that ideal village appalled me. Now those steel houses are up. Unlike the right hon. Gentleman I do not hesitate to admit my Toryism. I know he is as Tory as I am, but hesitates to express it. But I find now that these steel houses look uncommonly well. They are a great improvement on the houses from which many of the people occupying them have come. There is an urgent demand for these houses. We cannot satisfy all the applications and time and again I have been requested to use any influence I have to get houses for one after
    1308
    another. Thus the houses which previously I viewed with as much hostility as the right hon. Gentleman have largely destroyed my prejudice.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: I have listened to the speeches which have been delivered here on this question of the housing of the people of Scotland, and I am in agreement with a good deal that has been said. I am also in disagreement with much that has been said. I do not agree with the idea that those nice little villages that we have in Scotland are all that can be desired. Distance—there is no doubt in this case—lends enchantment to the view. It is quite a different matter for the people who have to live in those houses. As our Leader has stated, there would have been absolutely no trouble to-day had it not been that the Government have seen fit, in its wisdom or otherwise, to introduce into this vexed question one of the worst type of employers of labour that we have in Scotland. He was up in the Gallery a few moments ago when the Member for Aberavon (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald) was accusing him of what he had said in after-dinner speeches. He was laughing very much as if he enjoyed it as a joke. I wish he had stayed a moment to hear me state what I wish to state on the Floor of the House of Commons, because I like to tell people to their face. Remember that it is the same Lord Weir that, with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon (Mr. Lloyd George) came down to the Clyde to get us to accept dilution of labour, so reducing our standard. That is why the building industry view with suspicion—and rightly so—anything which emanates from Lord Weir. Just as I told Lloyd George—[HON. MEMBERS: "Order!"] Here is this Gentleman. What does he say? Lord Weir, on 20th October, 1921, called upon the Government to deal firmly with the trade unions. He said:
    "Let the Government be under no illusion that they will alleviate the suffrage of any section of the community that is not already declaredly hostile to them. On the contrary. I profoundly believe that were they to declare, what they already know, that the power of trade unionism, used by the men who now control it, for purely political purposes,"—
    That is the man who was linked up with Lloyd George—
    "has become a tyranny and a menace to the workers themselves, that it bids fair

    1309
    to ruin the industrial position, and with it the well-being of the people of this country, and, that recognising this, they have determined that the exercise of this power for evil ought to be curtailed and restricted, then I believe they would rally to their support"—
    That is the Government would rally to their support—
    "and assistance to multitudes who are silently suffering at the moment, and look for a banner under which to struggle for their freedom."
    That is freedom from the tyranny of trade unionism!
    Mr. CLARRY: Who is that to?
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: To the Government—put to the Government by Lord Weir. I want hon. Members to bear in mind that so far as I am concerned, at any rate, that I view with some satisfaction the fact that the Prime Minister is prepared to go a long way in order to assist us out of this awful difficulty in which we find ourselves at the moment, I have that feeling. I hope the Prime Minister will not let me down. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I am hoping so, but he will not be the first who has let me down. I hope that he will not let me down here. The Prime Minister has set out to assist us at this time, and I want to render all the assistance I can, to use all the power I have got, and all the influence I have, in the interests of the people to get houses.
    I have no objection to steel houses, nor to brick houses, nor to wooden houses. I believe that these houses are much better than the houses that have been built in the villages of Scotland within the last 100 years. When our leader expressed the opinion he did, it was not the framework of the house he was speaking of; what he meant was a home. It does not matter whether it is the lowest shed that was ever raised on Scotland's plains. It is not the building. It is not the shed. It is the people that are in it! But to-day many people are not getting a chance, even of a shed, because those who control the matter have denied our people a home. There are no homes for tens of thousands of people in this country. They have to go into furnished lodgings. Even MacDonald—[HON. MEMBERS: "Order, order!"] Well, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Aberavon. What we are trying to do is
    1310
    to get these houses for the people, and get them now. The fact remains that the building industry has not yet marched with the great development that has gone on. They have not been able to give us the houses that we require. We require tens of thousands of houses. We have not got them. There is no denying the fact. I am not out to say who is to blame or who is not to blame, but the fact remains that the building industry has not lent itself to mass production. Along come the alternative schemes to turn houses out by mass production, and it is mass production that we require.
    There would have been, as I have said, no trouble in the industry, or in this question of houses, had it not been for the fact that the Government have been able to get Lord Weir to negotiate or to come to terms with the building industry. They have not been able to do that. There is no use the Government or anybody else trying to gloss that over. Lord Weir has set out to reduce the building industry down to a certain level. I do not say that he is a tool in the hands of the Government. I do not believe it. I know him. I have followed him for 20 years. I know he is making the Government his tool. He is the power behind the Throne. There is no doubt about that. He does not come into schemes, into sugar beet, or many other things, for the fun of the thing. He is the one dominating influence behind the Government. The people who work in the building industry at the moment are not too well paid. The money paid for the building of houses to-day and the standard of life of the building industry is not too high. That being the case, no matter who builds the houses now, they have a right to the same conditions of labour that appertain at the moment, no matter whether it is engineers, or tailors, or anybody else, or as it is commonly called, unskilled labour—although we as engineers and Socialists do not know such a thing as unskilled labour. All labour is skilled. The only individuals who talk that way are those who do not labour—and we are not interested in them!
    The Government, I hope, will seriously consider what they are up against because certainly we Socialists and we trade unionists mean to fight this to the very

    1311
    death. We must. That is what is being driven home in me at the moment. The Secretary for Scotland appears to be thinking of what is in front of the miners in May, thinking of the situation. As I see it as a member of the working classes it is a bread and butter question. Here is the Prime Minister, the head of a Government that has promised great things, and to whom the working classes of this country are looking forward to bring them out of the terrible state of affairs that exist at the moment. Many of our people are in a state of starvation. Here is this Government siding with a man whose whole history and efforts up to the present moment have been devoted to reducing the standard of life of the working classes. It is making us suspicious. Unless the Government can draw Lord Weir out we will have to vote against them here to-night. What this means, if I am able to understand it aright, is that the Government has the idea that the miners are threatened with a reduction of wages, that the whole of the working classes are threatened with a lowering of the standard of life; and it now appears to me that the Government is behind this idea of reducing the standard of life of the workers. Why otherwise would the Government back this man who is the only one who is demanding these conditions, conditions that no other employer of labour in this industry has demanded. Why? If I am stating the case too hardly, why is it that the Glasgow Corporation, which is not a Socialistic corporation, that the majority of the Glasgow Corporation, who are opposed to our views, and to us as Socialists and trade unionists, why, I ask, is it that the Glasgow Corporation turned down Lord Weir? Why is it that the Glasgow Corporation appealed to the Under-Secretary for Scotland, whom I am glad to see on the bench opposite, for he at any rate faces up to the House. Now I note the Secretary of State for Scotland has just resumed his seat. Behold, he cometh!
    The Glasgow Corporation came to the decision that they could not take on the Weir scheme in spite of the fact—I do not need to elaborate it—of the power that the Weir combination has in this country. With all that power and all that influence brought to bear upon them,
    1312
    the Corporation turned it down. Then they were brought to book, by whom? By the Secretary of State for Scotland. The last time he spoke from the Treasury Box, following the Prime Minister, I said it was too soon to congratulate the Prime Minister on his offer, though I would be the first man on these benches to congratulate him if he had made any contribution which would assist us materially with solving the housing question in Scotland. Then the Secretary for Scotland got up and elaborated the details, and told us who was going to build these houses, that it was going to be Lord Weir's firm, and that they were to get special terms. Further than that, the Secretary of State for Scotland said: "We are going an with the job, and if necessary we are coming back to this House to get powers so that we can carry out the job no matter what opposition is raised." If he thinks he is going to "come the fly man" when it suits him, he never made a bigger mistake, because we are here to look after the interests of the people who are going to be affected. We are not against the idea of houses being built, but we are up against the idea of houses being built by methods which mean the lowering of the standard of life in that industry.
    The Glasgow Corporation have a scheme which they call the Balshagray scheme. [HON. MEMBERS: "Circulate it!"] I can do more than circulate it. I can circulate you. Do not chaff me. It is all right for millionaires and jokers that have made fortunes out of supplying the British Army with Chinese ham during the War. We shall rear a hardy and intelligent army on that! In their anxiety, the Glasgow Corporation submitted this other scheme, this corporation which has been twitted by the Minister of Health, who told us about the wonderful houses which had been erected in Birmingham. He took jolly good care he did not stay in any of them. There are not worse houses in the country than those in Birmingham about which the Minister of Health boasted. There was another thing I did not tell the Minister of Health that day when he was boasting about Birmingham. The Birmingham employers pay higher wages, and got Scotsmen to go there Scotsmen went to these houses at Birmingham, but they were such

    1313
    scandalous houses that they refused to work on the job. Those are the houses that are being erected at the moment in Birmingham. The Glasgow Corporation set out with an ideal that was implanted in the people of this country after the War, when it was said we were to have a new style of houses, to have homes for the people. The day of the single end houses, the day of the colliery row, as we know it in different parts of Scotland, was to be a thing of the past, and nothing less than a three-apartment house was to be built. The Glasgow Corporation, in that spirit, went to the Department with the Balshagray scheme, and they were turned down because the Scottish Office said it was too dear. Those houses were of equal size with the Weir houses, the fittings were as good and they met all the demands; but the scheme was turned down because it was too dear. Yet they are £2 a year less than the Weir houses.
    Captain ELLIOT (Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health, Scotland): I am sure the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs (Mr. Kirkwood) does not wish to misrepresent the case. He may or may not have seen the statement that we went into the case with the financial representatives of the Corporation and that an agreed statement was issued—agreed to by the corporation—that the Balshagray houses were more expensive thar the Weir houses. That was agreed to by the corporation.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: This is a very serious matter, very serious for us in every way. I am astonished at the Parliamentary Under-Secretary saying that to me, when he knows quite well that I have the reply to it—that that was the initial cost. When the experts, who are not Socialists, went right into the matter and examined it, and analysed the whole thing, these experts at the job, men paid for the purpose, declared, and he knows it, that there was £2 difference, and that the Balshagray scheme—
    Captain ELLIOT: I do not want to get into any dispute as to matters of fact with the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs. I was not referring to the first cost, it was to the rent, and to the rent alone that I was referring.[Interruption.] Excuse me; I am discussing the matter with the hon. Member for
    1314
    Dumbarton Burghs, and English Members have no right to interfere when two Scotsmen are thus engaged. I do not want to enter into a discussion, because it is not fair to the hon. Member to interrupt his speech. I only want to make it plain that when I was giving that figure I was quoting, not the first cost of the house but the rent, and it was on the rent that the experts of the corporation and of the Board of Health were agreed.
    Mr. WHEATLEY: Would it be a fact to state that the Balshagray scheme, which you are comparing with the Weir houses, is one which was turned down by the Board of Health because of its extraordinary cost?
    Captain ELLIOT: I do not think it is fair to the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs to enter into a discussion of that now. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I am perfectly willing to discuss these things later on, but I do not think it is fair to the hon. Member that we should interrupt his speech to discuss them across the. Floor in this way.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: I can assure the Under-Secretary for Health that I do not require him to protect me in any way. The point I have made here the Parliamentary Under-Secretary has never refuted at any time that he has risen, and I will not elaborate the point any more. I want the Committee to keep these facts in mind, that we are prepared to accept steel houses—I know, at any rate, that I am—to accept any of the temporary methods of construction in order to get us out of this difficulty. The only thing on which I am in conflict with the Government is in their forcing on us Lord Weir's scheme. They could not have selected a worse individual, as far as the West of Scotland is concerned; and I want to say, also, that my English colleagues are embraced in this. This embraces the whole of the trade union movement of our country—there is to be no mistake about that. This is not to be isolated and treated as just simply a Scottish question. This is not a Scottish question. In my opinion, if this Government get away with this business of Lord Weir being allowed to engage labour as he likes, it will cut away from our feet as trade unionists all that we have ever fought for, it will cut at the very foundation of our organisations,

    1315
    will cut the very feet from under organised labour. That is what he has been fighting for for 20 years. His idea is to smash the trade union movement. He has elaborated it time and again in after-dinner speeches. He has written letters to the "Glasgow Herald" and to the London "Times"—I am glad to see him in his place up there—and he has made it clear that he believes that the trade union movement of this country is a menace. He knows perfectly well that when he brought Chinese into his works on the Clyde it was the first quarrel we had. He is the man who was responsible in the very first instance for causing trouble on the Clyde. He was the man who came to Parkhead Forge, along with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs, in order to force on us dilution of labour. Now he has succeeded. There is no doubt about it. He is the man. I wish I could impeach him at the Bar of the House of Commons. I am taking this, the best opportunity that ever I got in my life. This man has lashed my trade from Dan to Beersheba. The Prime Minister—who everyone, on the average, thinks is an honest, kind, Christian, philanthropic Prime Minister—has linked himself up with a man who has whipped the engineers down from being the aristocrats of labour to below the men who sweep the streets—down below what is commonly called unskilled labour. He not only reduced the engineers' wages but he took away from them every right they had, and they were denied the rights of men. Those who worked in the machine shop or the fitting shop at Lord Weir's works could not leave the works without giving their number to a boy who was placed there for the purpose, and, no matter how urgent their demand to leave the works might be, they dare not leave without giving in their number. These are the conditions which prevail in the great British Empire, with Lord Weir at the head of them, and his aim and object is simply to reduce the building trade down to the level of slavery.
    It is not only the building trade that will be affected, because this is only the beginning. You have to remember that in building a house you require over 1,000 articles, and I want to appeal to my fellow trade unionists, and to say to them
    1316
    that no matter what industry they represent it must be involved in the building of a house, and if Lord Weir gets his way all these other industries will be affected. Remember that this is only the bginning. I have watched the serpent at work before. You know what happened in the Garden of Eden. This is only the beginning, but it is the end if they accomplish it, and it will be more difficult for us to fight this thing unless we make a determined stand here to-night, and make it, clear to the Government that under no consideration are we going to be deprived of our rights, rights which our forefathers died for, the rights of trade unions and the right of collective bargaining.
    We are not going to surrender those rights. We surrendered those rights during the War at invitation of Lord Weir and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) in order to save our country, but the rules and regulations of our trade unions were not ours to sacrifice during the War any more than they are to-day. They are ours to defend, and I call upon every trade unionist within reach of my voice to stand as one man to-day and to declare that upon no consideration are they going to be hoodwinked one way or another into voting for terms such as these which would allow Lord Weir to carry on his abominable work. His name to us is worse than any German name ever was because no German would ever think of imposing such conditions as Lord Weir has imposed upon my fellow trade unionists. For those reasons, I hope the Government will consent to wipe out Lord Weir. Why not take on the Atholl houses in regard to which fair terms have been made and all the other alternative schemes? All I will say in conclusion is:
    If I'm designed you lordling's slave
    By nature's law designed.
    Why was an independent wish
    E'er planted in my mind?
    If not, why am I subject to
    His cruelty or scorn?
    Or why has Lord Weir the power
    To make his fellows mourn?
    Commander FANSHAWE: The hon. Member who has just sat down has been arguing on personal grounds, but I am afraid that I cannot follow him in that line of argument. His main argument appears to be that there is some danger

    1317
    of the trade unionists of this country being let down. It is true that we have heard the argument from certain hon. Members on the other side of the House that Lord Weir's workers were discontented, but I have not heard that from Cathcart from the workers themselves. But apart from this disagreement the Opposition do not seem to be at variance with the Government at all on this subject. There is no real evidence that the building trade unions in Scotland are opposed to this Measure, and if anyone looks carefully at the statistics for house building in Scotland they will at once see that there is plenty of room for the erection of steel houses, and stone and brick houses as well. In 1924 the Scottish Board of Health held an inquiry into the housing accommodation of Scotland, and it was found that there were 1,000,000 houses in existence and that 250,000 houses were wanted to make up the existing shortage, and also 10,000 houses a year to keep pace with the normal increase. Therefore, for over 15 years we should have to build more than 20,000 houses per annum in Scotland, whereas at the present time we are only getting about 6,000 houses built every year, leaving 14,000 more than are built at present for the building trade.
    There is one foundation which we have not examined to-day and we have not gone down to the bedrock of the problem. We seem to have overlooked somewhat the great necessity of accommodation for many poor people in our industrial areas. In my own constituency we have some of the most beastly slums in Scotland, and I assert that we could have decency in these places at once if we could only quickly put up, not merely 2,000 steel houses, but 20,000 houses. It is our bounden duty to get those people out of their squalor and misery, and, therefore, I urge the Government to go ahead with their scheme. The hon. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. Kirkwood) has invited the Government to cut Lord Weir out of this scheme altogether. But if you do this, where are you going to get the houses from at once? You can only obtain the houses required by mass production such as is suggested by Lord Weir and you cannot get them in this way anywhere else. You cannot get mass production at the Atholl factories. We want
    1318
    more houses at once and where are we going to get them and get them quickly?
    We do not want any more delay in this matter. We do not want to consider these personal differences of opinion with Lord Weir, and if hon. Members opposite have animosities against Lord Weir they should put them on one side. I believe the employés in Lord Weir's factory at Cathcart, when these steel houses are being manufactured, will receive better wages than their fellow workers in the building trade. Therefore, I appeal to hon. Gentlemen opposite to put aside personal animosities and co-operate with us in this attempt to raise these poor people out of their misery. I believe that the steel house is a very good house. I speak as a naval officer of twenty-five years' service, and as one who has lived in a steel house for that length of time. It is true that it was a steel house afloat, but that is a more lively article than a steel house on shore. We were all very comfortable in our steel houses, and those who have inspected Weir steel houses and other steel houses I think will agree that if we can find suitable localities all over the country we should combine and put up these houses in very large numbers. If we do this not only shall we give these people decent accommodation in their homes, but they will also have a little bit of private ground and we shall not have what we find in our mining villages, that is, houses erected near a muddy footway with the children running under the wheels of motors.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: We are not objecting to steel houses, but to the conditions under which the Weir steel houses are produced.
    Commander FANSHAWE: We are anxious to secure decent housing accommodation for these poor people and I think it is the duty of every hon. Member to urge the Government to increase their activities in this respect. There are in Scotland about one million houses and 12 per cent. of them are houses with one apartment only. About 40 per cent. have two apartments and 21 per cent. three apartments. No less than 8 per cent. of the population live in one-apartment. houses and 39 per cent. in two-apartment houses. Therefore every second person you meet across the border lives in a house with either one or two apartments. [An HON. MEMBER "You

    1319
    have created this state of things."] I do not care who created it, what I say is that our business now is to see that we do not perpetuate it. I ask hon. Members opposite to put aside their animosities and go forward with us in our endeavour to see that our people get the decent house accommodation which they deserve.
    Mr. DUNCAN GRAHAM: The spirit of the speech delivered by the hon. Member who has just sat down is very good, and it is very nice to feel that you have somebody else ready to co-operate with you, particularly if you get your own way. We have been asked by hon. Gentleman opposite to co-operate with them, and I understand that they are particularly anxious that more houses should be provided. We do not object to that, but you cannot provide these houses without labour, and what we are asking is that the labour conditions should be fair. I do not know Lord Weir personally, and I have not had the privilege of dining with him, but I understand he is very popular in the society to which he belongs. I also know some people who have had the pleasure of dining with him, and they tell me that he talks very nicely to them, and he has a very good reputation so far as that is concerned.
    6.0 P.M.
    I do not doubt that he is quite anxious that houses should be provided, and is willing to do his share in the provision of those houses, but no one here will imagine, surely, that he is more anxious on that matter than the Duke of Atholl, nor will anyone who knows the circumstances and conditions suggest that the Atholl house is not as good as the Weir house; and, if the Duke of Atholl can agree with the trade union involved in this matter upon satisfactory conditions so far as the labour is concerned, what possible objection should Lord Weir have to doing the same thing? It may be said that he is actuated by the very best motives, but the proof of that, as we view the matter, would be his willingness to do what he is asked to do. If I had an opportunity of giving real expression to my views on this matter and of voting upon it, I would vote against the steel house, because I do not believe in the steel house; and I go further, and say I have no great liking for the brick house.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: Granite is the best.
    Mr. GRAHAM: I would have the same as the hon. and learned Member, namely, stone, and I have the same right to it as he has. It may be, as the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition said, a question of sentiment, and I venture to say that I know the point of view of the ordinary Scottish working man very much better than the hon. and gallant Gentleman who preceded me in this Debate, whose point of view is not favourable even to a brick house. The sentiment of the Scottish people is in favour of the stone house, and there is any amount of stone in Scotland. We have agreed, however, that we are quite willing to meet the Government and co-operate with them on the question of providing houses, on condition that the Government see that those employers who are responsible for building these houses observe trade union conditions.
    Captain ELLIOT: Hear, hear!
    Mr. GRAHAM: It is no use my hon. and gallant Friend the Parliamentary Secretary saying "Hear, hear!" to that, when, as a matter of fact, the provision in this case is the very opposite of that. It, must not be imagined for a moment that hon. Members on this side have any animosity against Lord Weir. I can give the names of employers who are as bad as he is in other industries, but this is not the place or the time to deal with the question from the Joint of view of personal likes or dislikes. We are not approaching this matter from the standpoint of Lord Weir's relations as an employer in Cathcart; all that we are claiming is that the conditions that are good enough for Lord Invernairn and the Duke of Atholl should be observed by Lord Weir. If that is done, this question of division or disagreement or lack of co-operation with the Government would pass away at once.
    I would like to ascertain from the Government what they mean by 2,000 houses. No one is better acquainted than the Secretary of State for Scotland with the fact that a Royal Commission was appointed in 1912 to inquire into the housing conditions in Scotland. That Royal Commission was composed, as to a large majority, of men who believed as the majority in this House believe; they

    1321
    were Tories, not by sentiment, but by conviction, looking upon the ordinary members of the working class as having been created by a Being very different from that which created themselves. These gentlemen belonged to your own majority; they were not the Bradbury Commission, but awn infinitely superior Commission. They took five or six years to inquire into the actual conditions of housing in Scotland, and they recommended that, before Scotland would be fairly housed, something like 230,000 houses would require to be built. Now the Government come along with this paltry proposal of 2,000 houses—2,000 houses on an experimental basis, 2,000 steel houses; and they tell us they have the authority of everyone who has looked at these houses that they are the very best type of house in which to live, and that everyone is satisfied. The proof of the pudding is in the preeing of it, and I will believe in the steel house when the Tory gentlemen of England live in steel houses—when anyone on the other side can get up and say, "I have lived in a steel house." I know that the hon. and gallant Gentleman who spoke before me has lived in a ship, but not as an ordinary sailor—
    Commander FANSHAWE: I slept in hammocks for many years.
    Mr. GRAHAM: I know all about that, but, if a steel house, or a steel cabin at sea, was so very beneficial to the hon. and gallant Gentleman from the point of view of health and otherwise, then there is no reason why he should not have built a steel house since he left the Navy, and then he would have been able to tell us just exactly what sort of house it was. It is no use telling me or anyone else on this side that the steel house is a good one, but you will not live in it. So far as we are concerned, we are accepting the steel house under protest. We do not look upon it as any other than a, temporary measure.
    There is something that requires explanation in the attitude of the Government. We shall not solve the housing problem in Scotland by supporting this proposal for 2,000 houses. In the town where I live we could take 2,000 houses now, for that one town, and this number is being proposed for the whole country. In the Middle Ward of Lanark they will not take steel houses, and to attempt to
    1322
    force them to do so will only create trouble. You have already attempted to enforce your conditions on the Middle Ward of Lanark. The Middle Ward of Lanark has been compelled to accept the reasonable conditions laid down by the building trades union, and, let there be no mistake about it, the trade unionists of Scotland will support the builders in this matter—not because they are against the engineers, for the engineers have nothing to do with it. Even if the impression were created that the engineers were going to benefit by this proposal, people must not run away with the idea that the working classes generally in Scotland will have any hesitation in expressing their views favourably to the attitude of the building trade. At the New Year, the most representative conference of Scottish trade unionists and co-operators that can be held in Scotland met in Glasgow, and they decided against the steel house, and particularly against any attempt on the part of the Government to impose conditions similar to those which Lord Weir, evidently with their concurrence, is to be allowed to put into operation.
    I noticed that a question was put a few days ago to the Minister of Health asking for the number of houses built in England and Wales during the last two years, and I find from the answer that during the years 1924 and 1925, up to the end of September, 1925, there were 268,517 houses built in England and Wales. During those two years a fight has been going on in Scotland, not between the building trade and the town and county councils, but between the town and county councils and the Scottish Board of Health. The Scottish Board of Health refused to allow houses to be built in Scotland except under conditions that were very much worse than in England. I may remind hon. Members at this point that when the Royal Commission made its Report in 1917, a statement was made that something like a half a million houses were required to supply the needs of England and Wales, which had a population of something like 40,000,000, while Scotland, with a population at that time of 5,000,000 or less, required a quarter of a million houses. Between 1917 and the present time there has been such a building boom in England as to warrant the paragraph—inspired, perhaps—which appeared in the Scottish Press,

    1323
    that there are now so many houses in England and Wales that the Government can safely withdraw the Rent Restriction Act and allow the free play of supply and demand in regard to housing.
    During that period the country which was requiring the most houses has been deliberately starved, and the English Minister of Health is responsible for using public money, to which we contribute our share, in order to give conditions to the inhabitants of English towns and villages which are refused to the people of Scotland. I do not blame the Scottish Board of Health; they were the tools of the Minister of Health in England. There is more than one devil in this play; Lord Weir is not the only one. The right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Health has been a bitter and determined enemy of Scottish building every time he has had any opportunity to deal with the matter, and I accuse him here of being as largely involved in this matter as Lord Weir. The probabilities are that the family will make some profit out of it, just as the Weir family has intended to do. It is no use the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Scotland raising his eyebrows. There is something sinister in this matter.
    Lieut.-Commander BURNEY: Is it in order for an hon. Member to accuse a Minister of the Crown of making profit out of houses in Scotland?
    The CHAIRMAN: It is a matter the Committee must judge on its merits. It is not contrary to the technical rules of order.
    Mr. GRAHAM: In any case I did not say the Minister of Health but some members of his family.
    Lieut.-Commander BURNEY: Can you substantiate it?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I can substantiate quite a lot, but I am not going to say it. I have said quite enough. I can substantiate the fact that building has been held up in Scotland, that the conditions of payment made it possible for higher wages to be paid to the building trades in England than in Scotland, that the Scottish Board of Health have intervened and prevented building being done, because the builders naturally claimed
    1324
    the same conditions in Scotland as applied in England, and everyone will agree that I have made good the point that the Scottish Department is only a subordinate department of the Ministry of Health. There is a good deal in this matter which would be interesting if we could get to know it. I know that 2,000 steel houses will not meet our needs. 100,000 houses will not do it. And you do not care for the people who are in the slums. It is you who put them there. They are in the slums, not because there are not houses, but, because they cannot pay the rent, and the rent of the steel house is to be as high as the brick house. You will not solve the slum problem—you do not intend to solve it and it, is no use members of the Government imagining that we are taking this thing in a light spirit. We are not.
    We intend to fight this matter and it will take a long time for Lord Weir and those associated with him to break the spirit of the Scottish trade unionist and co-operator. It will take him a long time to break down the conditions that our fathers and ourselves have built up. If the Government are really sincere in their desire to get better housing in Scotland it is not worth their time and trouble to enter upon the policy in the spirit they are proposing to do. So far as I personally am concerned, I am willing to sink some of my convictions on the matter. I do not believe in the steel house, but I, and hon. Members on this side, are willing to meet and to co-operate with the Government to save any Division, even in this House to-night, if they will give us some assurance that they are really genuine and sincere in their desire to get rid of this difficult social problem. We do not want to accuse individual members of the Government or Lord Weir at all. Lord Weir counts for nothing in this matter. We want 2,000 houses. They can be provided by other firms if Lord Weir will not observe the conditions. If he will observe the conditions we do not object. All we are asking is that the conditions the Duke of Atholl is prepared to agree to should be laid down as conditions applying to every other employer who expects to secure any share of the subsidy that is to be voted here to-night.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: It is difficult to gather from the last speaker what his

    1325
    point of view is. At one moment he is denouncing the steel house and saying it is disgraceful and of no use. That may be one point of view, and that is intelligible. At the next moment he has not the least objection to the steel house as long as it conforms to the Atholl conditions.
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: I hope the hon. and learned Gentleman will pay attention. I said I did not believe in the steel house, but I was willing to compromise, to co-operate, to sink my convictions for the purpose of assisting and co-operating with the Government on this experiment of theirs. But it does not follow, because I am willing to do that, that I have changed my view as to the steel house.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: The steel house, then, cannot be so bad that such a terribly instantaneous slum is going to be created. My right hon. Friend, of course, upheld the stone house. The stone house, if you got it built of granite, might be all right, but I think one of the principal causes of the housing trouble has been that for generations we have built our houses far too substantially, and they have lasted for hundreds of years. What is the curse, of old towns like Edinburgh and Inverness? The houses were built centuries ago and they are as good as on the day they were built, and they are entirely out, of date. It is like the Royal Infirmary of Glasgow, which an American doctor said is a truly magnificent building. It will last a thousand years and he obsolete in 50. That is what is is wrong and always has been, with our housing in Scotland. I have seen magnificent buildings being pulled down to make way for shops or offices or tenants or some kind or another, and the whole capital sunk in them was wasted. I have the honour to have the first Weir house in my constituency. It is a very satisfactory building and one I should be very glad to live in, and when I am in a position to afford a second house in a country place it is a Weir house I am going to have. Many people are compelled to live in one roomed houses. When you look at the Weir house, it is comfortable, well fitted, up to date, with every sanitary convenience. It is a well-looking house from the outside. The only fault I have to find with it is that instead of using the splendid slates they make in the West Highlands they are using tiles.
    1326
    Unfortunately they do not make slates and tiles all of one size, and it is a great disaster to this industry in the West Highlands.
    The whole ground of the charge against the Weir house is that the building is being handed over to an engineer's firm instead of a builder. I have no use for the building trade, either masters or men. All this clamour for houses has been going on all these years. It is a shocking state of affairs and the local authorities are not much better. They have made the most unholy mess of it. When you come to mass production and want a lot of houses you do not want to build as the ordinary house is built, stone by stone and brick by brick, but you want them put up by engineers. You buy in bulk and you know exactly what you are getting and you will have a thoroughly sound house. As long as the Engineers' Union is satisfied—
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: They are not.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: I understand they are.
    Mr. ROBERT YOUNG: The Engineers' Union has nothing to do with this controversy. We are not concerned at the moment with the building of these things inside the factory. We are concerned with the building of the houses, and the engineering union in that respect is not interested.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: If the houses can be put up by unskilled labour, neither the engineers' nor the builders' unions have anything to do with it. [HON. MEMBERS "Yes:"] The right hon. Gentleman said there is plenty of stone in Scotland. The stone is in the hearts of the men who stand in the way of thousands of people who are clamouring for houses, and hundreds and hundreds of young ex-soldiers who have got married and are living all these years with their mothers-in-law. You want houses that will last for 40 or 50 years. That is long enough for any house to last. We shall then be living under different circumstances. The Scottish people were educated to the abominable tenant system because the people were so lawless that they had to live in walled towns for safety. They got used to it, and many people would not now live under a cottage system. We want to get rid of it,

    1327
    and you will only get rid of it by getting a cheaper and more easily erected type of house on its own plot of ground. I saw it stated at one time that slums would be created if you put up economically erected houses. The real slums in this country are the houses of the wealthy of past generations. They are the ones that degenerate into slums. People are no further forward in Scotland in house building than they are in Russia in clothing. The Russian peasant wears a leather suit and cap that he inherited from his grandfather. It is handed down from one descendant to another.
    It is not 2,000 houses we want but scores of thousands. We want them scattered all over the place and we want them to be on the system that a working man who inhabits a house of that kind shall pay the same rent that he pays normally, using the principle of the Town Tenants Act which has been extended to Ireland, and that it shall be used as a sinking fund, and in the course of a period of years the house becomes his own, and then he will take a great deal more care of it than if it is merely a rented house. To object to mass production of houses in a time of national stress like this because it infringes some principles of the trade union is a form of fanaticism. It is not common sense. Tailors might as well join together in saying, "There shall be no factory production with these long knives that cut 50 suits at a time. They must be cut by hand, and people shall go about without any clothes because we tailors insist on having the whole of the job." The whole thing is so manifestly wrong that it makes me ashamed of my fellow-Scotsmen, who used to be logical, that they can engage in anything so preposterous as to keep the present housing conditions in Scotland as a running sore for years and years. It is the very thing to provoke a spirit of revolution to keep people in these dreadful housing conditions.
    Mr. MacLAREN: Who has put them there?
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: Possibly it is only fair to give the people steel houses, so that if there is to be a revolution they may have some shelter from the bullets. I know Scotland and the Scottish working classes as well as any hon. Member
    1328
    opposite. I was bred among them, and I know many of them. Hundreds of my friends are scattered in all parts of Scotland, and I have many among the trade unionists.
    Mr. MAXTON: And among the criminal classes too.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: I have defended the criminal classes, and I am prepared to defend the hon. Member.
    Mr. MAXTON: I sincerely hope that, if that eventuality occurs, the hon. and learned Member will make a better case for me than he is making for the steel houses.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: If I had defended the hon. Member when he was tried for sedition during the War he would never have been put into confinement. He would have escaped.
    Mr. MAXTON: I wish I had known that.
    The CHAIRMAN: Possibly these remarks might be relevant to the Vote for the Lord Advocate's salary, but I do not think they are relevant to this Vote.
    Mr. MACQUISTEN: I know that the feeling of the working classes all over Scotland is one of bitter disappointment that the housing problem has not been tackled up to now, and that all Governments have shirked it and have run away from the clamour of these trade unions, and of the employers, who are hand in glove with them in order to get a monopoly for a generation. Nothing has done more to establish good faith in Scotland in this Government than the fact that they are at last tackling the problem, and contributing a substantial number of houses. If they go on with this policy and put up 10 or 20 times the number of houses that are now proposed, which can only be done by mass production, they will have support and enthusiasm in Scotland from all classes, which they could not have achieved if they had sat still and let things drift in a hopeless fashion, as did previous Governments.
    Mr. J. JONES rose—
    The CHAIRMAN: Mr. Rosslyn Mitchell.
    Mr. JONES: On a point of Order. Is this discussion simply confined to Scottish

    1329
    Members, or are we Englishmen and Irishmen not entitled to have something to say?
    The CHAIRMAN: That is not a point of Order.
    Mr. ROSSLYN MITCHELL: I hope that in the particular circumstances the Committee will allow me to say in my first sentence that I have never had at any time, and have not now, any association, either financial, professional, or social, with Lord Weir, or the Atholl Housing Company, or the Cowieson Company, or any association or society with which they are connected. I stand tonight and speak from these benches as a quite unrepentant supporter of the proposal that the Government have put before the House.
    I should like to draw the attention of the House to the real basic fact that lies underneath this proposition. There are in Scotland 4,882,000 people. Of that number, there are 400,000 who live now in single-room houses. I do not mean by that houses which are occupied in single apartments; I mean houses which are self-contained single rooms. There are 1,950,000 people in Scotland living in two-apartment houses. That means that there are 2,350,000 people—almost one-half the population of Scotland—who have never known what it is to have a home of three apartments, who have never known what it is to live in a home with hot water supply, who have never known what it is to live in a home with a bath, and who have never known what it is to live in a house with lavatory privilege. There is the substantial human position.
    Many of us on this side of the House know what life is in these conditions. We do not live in these conditions to-day. Many of us have seen the moment arrive when by some fortune, which we either merited or not, we have been able to leave these conditions, and we have felt ourselves, and all associated with us have felt themselves, filled with a thrill of hope at the prospect of the new quality of life which was to be the result of a three-roomed house, of a bath, continuous hot water, and lavatory privileges within the house. In Glasgow, out of 1,000,000 population, 600,000 people live in two-apartment or single-apartment houses. Here is great Glasgow, the pioneer of
    1330
    municipal enterprise, and yet in 1925 there were 600,000 of its people living under these dreadful conditions! Moreover—I still ask the Committee to give its attention to Glasgow—there are 13,600 houses in Glasgow, inhabited by families of British citizens, that have been condemned as unfit for human habitation, not by the standard of 1925, but by the lowest standard imposed by the terms of reasonable health being enjoyed by the people.
    In these houses to-day, there are women and children living. This is not a man's problem. The man leaves the house in the morning, and he is out all day. He comes home to his evening meal, and he goes out again. The woman lives in the house two-thirds of her time. The children are in the house one half of the time. Children sleep in the house, and the sleep of a child is the base rock upon which it is going to build up its nerve and sinew its blood, and the marrow in its bones. There can be no sleep under such conditions. There can only be slow asphyxiation. Here is a grim tragedy, when 13,600 of these houses are condemned as unfit for human habitation, there are hundreds of people who are even begging for the opportunity to get into any one of them.
    There are people living below the ground. There are people living in houses which they have to reach by mounting outside ladders, like a painter. There are people living in outhouses, people living in houses that are infested with rats, and they have to protect their children during sleep from rats. There are house: which I have seen in which the little children dare not lie down on the floor they have to sleep leaning against the wall, because of the vermin which are there. That is the problem.
    Mr. BUCHANAN: Hear, hear!
    Mr. MITCHELL: There are hundreds who have not even shelter, and who have to go to the parks to sleep on banks, or who have to go into the prison cells night after night, or have to go to the railway sidings to sleep, not on the seats, lest they should be arrested, but under the seats, so that they may not be observed. There are people who rig up little trumpery jute bag tents for a covering for their heads. That is the problem. That is the tragedy. What is the use of talking about the Empire upon which the sun never sets,

    1331
    when you have in the very heart and bosom of that Empire houses on which the sun never rises—airless, sunless, light-less homes for British citizens? Not only have we the absolutely homeless person, but we have the slum dweller. When we come to the 1926 standard of house, it is an artisan problem, and yet we have the artisans of Glasgow, those highly skilled engineers, the product of whose skill and industry excites the admiration and envy of the world, having to live in these two-apartment, or single apartment houses. We need now, not two years hence, 120,000 houses to maintain even that standard. We need, if we take the new standard of 1925, 250,000 houses now. We cannot wait for bricklayers, plasterers, and joiners to adjust their differences. There are old folk living in these houses, and they cannot wait. There are young people who are married or who are about to be married who have no home. They cannot wait. There are little children passing through the most impressionable stage of their lives, between the ages of one and seven, and they cannot wait.
    The whole honour and chivalry of the British race cannot wait. We must have 20,000 houses every year for 15 years. I wish the Prime Minister, instead of speaking about 2,000 houses and £200,000, had spoken about 200,000 houses, or £2,000,000. But I believe that this is just the first move, and that his heart is bigger than the figures represent. I rejoice as a life-long opponent of the traditions of the party opposite to see that they have allowed their hearts and their minds to be affected by the sorrows and anguish of their fellow-citizens.
    Now we come to the problem and the efforts made to solve it. What has been done? In six years in Scotland we have managed, with the help of the Treasury, the local authorities, the masters, and the builders, to produce 36,000 houses. We are, therefore, 84,000 worse off now than we were five years ago, judged by the standard that. I set before you. We have lost 14,000 houses a year. The labour is represented in Scotland by 69,000 operatives, 63,000 of whom are engaged upon buildings for banks and theatres and cinemas and stone houses and other edifices. Only 6,000 out of 69,000 of the operatives who to-day are protesting are engaged in work which entitles them to say a word.
    1332
    Out of 69,000 only 6,000. The 63,000 have no interest in this proposition. They have not been working on the job. They have been working at their own job, a job which needs them still, and will need them for many years.
    Materials? Every time a proposition is put before this House to increase building by existing and customary materials, the price goes up. It is £100 higher to-day for a house than it was two years ago. When the Coalition Government made a proposition the price went up twice, and the Minister of Health had to sacrifice, not only his proposals, but himself. When the right hon. Gentleman who is now the Minister of Health held office in a former Conservative Government, he had to face the prospect of adding another £70 to the price of a house. The Minister of Health of the late Labour Government made a proposition in order to give an extra £9 a year, and it was all consumed in the interest upon the extra cost of building material. And here we are land-locked — labour, material, money. The local authorities cannot face, single-handed, these great housing schemes; they must have national support. It has been the policy of those who sit on the Labour Benches, as far as I have been able to understand it, to promote and propagate the idea that this was a national proposition which should be helped by national funds. Now it is offered to us and I am very sorry that it should receive such a chilly reception.
    There is the question of time. It takes years to build houses on ordinary lines with ordinary materials and by ordinary craft labour. The hon. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. Kirkwood) knows that in his own constituency there are houses which have stood partly finished for over two years. I know areas, built up to a certain extent, that are losing thousands of pounds in interest and are not completed yet, and we do not know when they will be completed. They cannot be completed in time to meet this terrible need, and to restore those who are at present suffering so terribly. But if it is possible to conceive a scheme whereby a house, internally as good and externally adequate, can be made without trespassing on building material and building operatives, then you can fulfil the needs of the people for homes, and you can solve partially another distressing

    1333
    problem which faces men of high skill, who have been accustomed to work all their lives but are now spending year after year walking the streets, and are forbidden to apply their skill in this connection.
    That has been done in three cases at least. I know of others, but. I confine myself to the three that are before this House—the Weir scheme, the Atholl scheme, and the Cowieson scheme. These schemes are totally different in idea. The Atholl scheme provides an iron and steel framework and steel walls, and then calls upon the building contractor to supply building craftsmen, the joiner and plumber and all the rest, to perform their craft work on the site. There is no standardisation outside the frame. The Weir house idea is to employ the operative, the building craftsman, at his craft, not on the site where he is liable to the fluctuations of weather, but to employ him in a factory of his own, under his own trade union conditions and under his own employers, where he would have continuous employment to produce the finished article of his craft, and make it the raw material of the housing contractor. That is a totally different conception.
    I hope that this Debate will have at least one effect. I hope that it will have removed from the minds of the women of Scotland the unmitigated mischief which bas been caused by the reckless condemnation of this type of house as a house. To talk, as has been done, of this type of house as a dirty, insanitary, verminous, tin shanty and sardine tin, for it to be spoken of by men who have come from single ends as an insult to the poor—men who have tried to create in the minds of the women the idea that to live in one of these houses is to ostracise themselves socially from their fellows—that sort of talk has done irreparable injury. Whatever may be the consequence on the question of a trade union conflict, with which I am not here concerned, I hope that at least this Debate will have removed the pernicious influence that has been working all through Scotland during the past 12 months.
    I would like to refer in the greatest friendship to words that were used by the honoured leader of my party. He begged that at least his village should be kept
    1334
    clear of modern methods of building. I happen to be interested in that village too, and for years I have admired it because it was one of the first villages in Scotland to adopt the pioneer method of building houses with concrete blocks. What is this modern method? I will not say what it is myself, but will ask right hon. and hon. Gentlemen to read the Moir Report., which is signed by building trade employers and building trade operatives' representatives, under the aegis of a Socialist Minister of Health. Hon. Members will find that that Report analyses, and boasts that it analyses, the question from a technical point of view. It says that there is nothing peculiarly novel in the idea. The idea has been carried out for years with succcess. It analyses every criticism, such, for instance, as the statement that the house is hot in summer and too cold in winter, or that it is insanitary or verminous. And in every case it decided in favour of the house.
    But hon. Members need not take only-that Report. They can ask the town clerks of the local authorities which have put up the houses. What did they find as the result? Do not let our prejudice or our conservatism shut our eyes entirely to facts. Go to the Town Clerk of Stranraer or the Town Clerk of Newton Stewart, or the County Clerk of Lanarkshire or any of those who have put up these houses. Ask them, first, what is their view: second, what is the view of their tenants: and you will receive—as I could read to the house tonight—a unanimous and an enthusiastic report on behalf of the officials and the tenants in favour of these houses. Moreover, what was the decision of the Ministry of Health when it was occupied by a Socialist Minister, and Scotland was administered by a Socialist Under-Secretary? Did they not propose to the county of Lanark the erection of these houses? I have the OFFICIAL REPORT here, if My hon. Friend shakes his head. He may have forgotten.
    In August, 1924, a Socialist Government was in power, or in office. If there be anything at all that makes me nervous of my position or at, all uncertain, it is the fact that hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House are so enthusiastic in their support of my statements. In August, 1924, the Minister of Health and the Under-Secretary for

    1335
    Scotland did propose that these houses should be erected. There was no protest. An order was given for the erection. There was no protest until the order was about to be executed. Then there came this: In Leeds and Manchester and Sheffield and Plymouth, and in Lanark, the local authorities were met by the following threat, "If you dare to put up, even for demonstration purposes, a house built in the Weir factory under the Weir conditions, we will"—I ask Trade Unionists to mark this—"draw off from the whole of your local authority area every man engaged in the building of houses, public or private." That was a terrible threat. Is it any wonder that the local authorities, faced with such a position, and not having tested the house, and having only been asked to put up demonstration houses, said, "We cannot proceed with this arrangement." So there are not many being built.
    I will say a few words on the conditions. I have examined them personally with an absolutely unrestricted laissez passer to go through the whole of the houses and the factory, and to speak in confidence to any men. I will tell this House the result, because there has been so much innocent misunderstanding and so much innocent misrepresentation about the matter that we must face the facts.
    Mr. BUCHANAN: Now you are sneering.
    7.0 P.M.
    Mr. R. MITCHELL: One sometimes finds on occasions like this on what a flimsy basis friendship is built. May I ask the House to allow me to tell them that I am interested in the quality of life of the people who make these houses; I am interested in the quality of life of the people who assemble them; and I am interested in the quality of life of the people who live in them. I will tell the House what one of the men said to me personally:
    "This work is much less hard than my own job, which is that of a fitter. The pay is nearly double. I make £1 a day without any strain, and on Friday—that was the day before I spoke to him—I made 22s."
    Another fitter said:
    "It is far easier than fitting, much cleaner and nicer. There is no fatigue, and I make 18s. to £1 a day."
    1336
    A ship fitter said:
    "It is very light work compared with the work in the yard. All the lifting is done by the crane."
    He used to make £3 a week, and now makes £4 9s. with less exertion. Two others say that it is the best job they ever had. One was indignant at being called a blackleg. Three labourers said it was a fine job—never less than £3 a week, no broken time, and one of them told me he knew a thousand men who would jump at the chance. An erector on the site erecting fireplaces said he could erect one and a-quarter of those a week at £4 15s.; he never had less than £6; it was a cushy job. When I said, "What do you think of the house?" he said "I wish to God I had one." There was an order given for joiners' craft workmanship in doors and surrounds. It was given to a Glasgow firm who wanted work for their joiners under joiners' trade union conditions. The operatives of the federation which is so antagonistic said, "If you make those doors, we will withdraw every man from your works." The result was that the proprietor of the business had to ask that the order be cancelled. Judged from the trade union standard, what happened? The Glasgow joiners lost an excellent job to express in doors and surrounds their craftsmanship to a minute part of an inch. The doors had to be got from somewhere, and so they were got from Canada, quite good doors, not because they wanted Canadian doors, but because the British joiners were not allowed to make the doors for these houses. I know my friends do not like this, I do not like it, but I am going to state it. I maintain that these houses—and I am backed by hundreds of women in my constituency who have personally inspected them—are beautiful houses, immeasurably superior to the houses at present occupied by the skilled artisans of Glasgow and Paisley.
    I maintain that in appearance and internal arrangements they are a great advance on anything that we have had in the line of artisan houses in Glasgow. I maintain that they are better than many of the brick houses put up during the past few years. I maintain that the men employed in making the raw material which is their finished product are employed entirely under trade union conditions. I maintain that the assembling of these things in the shop is a new industry which bears no relationship to the building industry,

    1337
    which requires no building crafts. The question as to what union may eventually have to decide the terms is one which has to be decided when the factory starts going; not now.
    I maintain that the protests that are made against these houses and against the Government's scheme do not represent the views of the people of Scotland. I maintain, further, that at this moment the people of Scotland are trembling with expectancy, not simply as to whether these houses are to be built or not, but whether they are to be the lucky ones who are going to get them. I believe there are men and women in Scotland to-night who are praying to God that their children may be among the lucky ones. If I support the Government on this occasion, it does not mean that I accept any other principle of the other side of the House. It means—I do not know what it may mean. It may mean that if we are not one in faith and doctrine we may be one in charity. It may mean nothing; it may mean much. But if I retarded by one day the hopes and dreams of men and women who are seeing their children grow up as I see mine, and seeing their bodies and minds developing as I see mine, it would be better that a millstone were hanged about my neck, and I was cast into the depths of the sea.
    Mr. MAXTON: I cannot expect in the few words I want to say to earn the applause that my hon. Friend has just gained. He has, in a large proportion of his speech, made to this Committee a very powerful picture of the deplorable conditions that exist in Glasgow to-day, and have existed for fully 30 years. I am glad also that the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister has awakened, only when he had seen it for himself, to a realisation that these conditions are the facts, and not the wild vapourings of a small collection of hooligans sent down from that district. I am glad even now, four years late, that the Prime Minister is prepared to admit that the conditions are just as bad as any Glasgow Member ever painted them. I am glad to-night that my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell), who has not always been one of the strong protagonists of the people in the slums, has painted such a fine picture of the terrible conditions under which our men, women and children live. I was
    1338
    suspended by the votes of this House, by hon. Gentlemen opposite, for talking about the infants being done to death. They applaud the hon. Member to-night when he talks about the same thing for which they suspended me. If there be one thing more horrible than being penned in a single-apartment house or a two-apartment house, it is to be penned there inside those four bare wails, with all the horrors that my hon. Friend has so eloquently described, and not have a few coppers in your pocket to buy even the necessary food.
    Our anxiety on these benches is to get men decent houses to live in, to get children decent homes to live in, to see that the person who is inside the house has got the wherewithal to provide all the other necessaries. We know—I know through bitter experience in years of struggle—that while a Weir in the initial stages of promoting and pioneering a new industry is prepared to give all the conditions that these poor fools so eloquently described to my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley as obtaining today in Weir's works, Lord Weir and his type, given their own wills with their workers without some organisation to fight them, will drive them down to the barest level. My hon. Friend comes here to-night, and puts into the hands of our political opponents, our economic and industrial opponents, several arguments against this poor puny trade union weapon, because it is all too weak for the fight they have got to put up against the Weirs, aye, and against each one of you people as individuals. There are men on these benches who know that for standing up in their workshops, and denouncing the payment of 18s. a week to men to keep their families, men have not only been thrown out of their employment, but word has been sent round to every employer. "Do not employ this man. He is a wild agitator." Because he has asked for a shilling more to the wages of men who have 18s. or 17s.! I am not talking about past history, I am talking about fights I have been through myself with my fellow-workers. I have seen the poor devils who were building up this trade union organisation getting a miserable wage, because 18s. or 19s. was what we used to pay to them. I have been in a fight not two miles from

    1339
    my own home where we were fighting tooth and nail to get girls 6s. a week.
    We built up something like a trade union organisation, and my hon. Friend says: "Never mind about your trade union conditions; that is a trivial, petty-fogging issue to raise in face of this great proposal the Prime Minister is bringing forward for 2,000 houses to meet the needs of one or one and a half million people." I think my hon. Friend said: "Do not raise these petty issues!" They are very petty issues to people who do not know the struggle to maintain even a wage that would keep body and soul together, but to the men who have been through it, men who have been scarred in these battles, and been driven from pillar to post by the employers of labour, they are the fundamental things that the Labour movement must stand for, and can never give way. I for one want to register my strongest protest against the Government surrendering the rights of this House to this one man, surrendering the principles of trade unionism and fair wages that have become embodied in the law and practice of this land. I do not know what the bribes have been. I do not know what the arguments have been. I want houses turned out by the million. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] My hon. Friend the Member for Paisley said he wanted a Minister of Health in this country who would turn out houses by the million. At the street corners of Glasgow we have had to go round, and persuade the people that they have a Tight to demand better houses.
    We have had to go round begging of them to realise that their present accommodation was not good enough for human beings, and that they should demand something better. All the time we were doing so, hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite were telling the people, "This is only Socialist agitation. Your houses are all right. A room and a kitchen were good enough for your father and your grandfather, and should be good enough for you. If your houses are verminous and dirty, it is because your womenfolk are lazy and dirty." [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Do not tell me that is not the case. I know the arguments which we had to meet for 15 years. "Why give the workers baths? If you give them baths, they will keep
    1340
    the coal in the baths." We know all the things which were said by hon. Members opposite and their friends. They said that it was all exaggeration, and that there was no housing problem in the country. Now they come forward, and try to put me and others on these benches into a false position. They try to make the country believe that we are trying to prevent the people from getting decent houses. They could have given the people decent homes any time in the last 50 years, and it is because all this is so ingrained in the minds of the common people that we dare not trust one single employer in this country—not one of them. We know some of them are decent men in their own way, but such an impression has been created in the minds of the workers that no British worker who knows anything dare trust any British employer.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, with his long legal experience and his long experience of business and public affairs, is not so innocent as to try to make anyone on these benches believe, because Lord Weir may happen to be paying a wage this week on which a man can live, that next week or next month or six months hence—without the power of collective bargaining—the people engaged in erecting these houses will themselves on the income they get from Lord Weir be able to occupy the houses which they themselves have erected. Therefore, I propose to oppose this Vote with all my power, and I propose to carry my opposition to the most extreme limits allowed by the Rules of this House. I know perfectly well that hon. and right hon. Gentleman opposite will misrepresent my attitude in so far as they possibly can do so, but I have the firm conviction that not only do I want houses for the people to live in, but I want the people to have an assured income that will enable them to keep their houses decently.
    Mr. RYE: After the very clear, moving and convincing speech of the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell), I had hoped there would be no further objection to the Vote for these steel houses, and I, for one, am sorry that a violent attack should again have been made upon Lord Weir and his connection with this scheme. At all events we have progressed part of the way towards the erection of these houses since the Debate of

    1341
    last year. Then we were told that two things were wrong—that the houses were wrong and the man was wrong. To-night we have heard that the houses are exceptionally good, that they are giving satisfaction, and that they are required for the working class of this country. Once more we have been told that the man is bad—that he is a villain of the deepest dye. I put it to the Committee that we are not concerned at all with the man. Assuming Lord Weir to be all that certain Members of the Opposition have painted him; assuming him to be a villain as has been suggested—and I do nut believe it for a moment—what has that to do with the real issue, which is the provision of these houses? We are not concerned with a man. We are concerned with the masses. It is the duty of Parliament to see that the houses which are required in thousands are provided at the earliest possible opportunity.
    I was pleased to hear the speech of the hon. Member for Paisley, which was not only a moving speech, but one which breathed a spirit of humanity—one which, if I may say so, reflected the greatest credit upon the hon. Member—and I compare it with the statement made in this House a year ago by a Member of the Opposition when he said that he believed the building of the Weir house was going to bring work to thousands of unemployed iron and steel workers, but asked if it would be better for the industrial life of the country that houses of this kind should be built if it was going to involve the degradation of the building industry of this country. What about the degradation of our unfortunate people who have to live under insanitary conditions? That is the degradation with which we are concerned—the degradation of the people who are living in filthy surroundings which cannot be good either for their health or their morals. That is the real issue. It is not a question of the trade unions, but a question of decency for the people of the country, and we are here to see that this fatal degradation of the people is not allowed to continue. How are we to get over it? We can only do so by an alternative method of housing. We cannot do it in the ordinary way by building brick and mortar houses which every one of us would desire, as against steel houses. We cannot do so, and, therefore, we must go to the people who have the organisation
    1342
    and the factories—such as Lord Weir—and get their assistance.
    It has been suggested that some favour is being done to Lord Weir's firm, in as much as they are to be given a contract for 1,000 houses as against 500 to the Atholl company and 500 to another company. Does it not strike hon. Members who criticise the proposed contract that the reason for it is that Lord Weir's firm has the capacity and the organisation to turn out more houses than the others? If that be so, obviously we must give the contract to that firm. If it be suggested that we should abandon the Weir contract, the necessary result of that step will be that we shall not get the houses as soon as we otherwise would get them. I wish to refer to what has been said as to threats being put forward on behalf of the building unions. It was stated that if any corporation throughout the land offered to give a contract for the erection, even of demonstration houses of this type, the building unions would call out the men engaged on corporation work in that municipal area. In my own constituency of Loughborough the corporation have had the courage to construct a pair of demonstration houses of the Weir type. There has been no calling out of the men engaged on the municipal housing schemes. There has been no objection by the trade unions there, and the houses are now open for inspection. Everyone, of whatever social position, who has inspected these houses has come away satisfied with them. Everyone who has inspected the houses has expressed a desire to obtain such a house.
    Earlier in the Debate an hon. Member opposite challenged Members on this side as to why we ourselves did not build steel houses and live in them. If the question arose, if it became necessary in order to obtain accommodation, I am satisfied that any Member on this side would be only too pleased to occupy a steel house. They are excellent houses, and there is no reason whatever why they should not be erected. I hold no brief for Lord Weir or his houses, but I hold a brief for the people of this country who need decent housing accommodation. As far as I am concerned, I will strive to my utmost to see that this accommodation is provided and that steel houses are put up in bulk and in

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    volume at the earliest possible opportunity.
    Mr. WESTWOOD: When I hear expressions of sympathy with the poor in their housing conditions from hon. Members opposite, I am satisfied that they have been too long about expressing that sympathy. I am just as earnest and enthusiastic for the building of houses as any hon. Member, not because I know of people who live in bad houses, but because I myself have been a victim of bad housing conditions. I give way to none in demanding the building of houses, and I am prepared to accept alternative housing schemes as against brick or stone, but I cannot believe that Lord Weir is earnest about the housing of the people of Scotland when he builds a stone house for his motor car and a steel house for the chauffeur who drives the motor car.
    Hon. Members opposite smile, but surely if a tin house or a steel house is good enough for a human being, it is good enough for a motor car; or are we to understand that a motor car is to be considered as of more value than human life? [HON. MEMBERS: "No"!] How then are we to explain the fact that there is a scarcity of housing in Scotland to-day because building operatives have been employed upon the building of garages and cinemas and structures other than houses for the working classes? I put a question the other day to the Secretary for Scotland regarding the housing conditions in my own constituency and particularly as to the number built in the Gala district of Midlothian. Although there has been Government housing schemes back to 1919–20 in that particular part of Scotland only 10 houses have been built under such schemes. The people have been repeatedly asking for more houses in that district and the Scottish Board of Health have repeatedly refused. An application was made by one borough for the erection of 60 houses, but the demand was whittled down to eight, and during the time the Conservative Government was in office in 1923 I appealed again and again that they should be built. Those eight houses are not completed even to-day. [An HON. MEMBER: "What about 1924?"] It was only in 1924, when we had a Labour Government,
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    that we obtained permission to go on with the building of these houses. Until that time it had been absolutely impossible to get on with them, and the houses are not completed yet.
    The builders are willing, but every little pettifogging reason is given by the Scottish Board of Health in order to keep back the building of houses in that district. We have a district council which absolutely refuses to give effect to the desires of the inhabitants, and what is the result? There are 130 houses of one room in this area, 630 houses of two rooms, and 397 houses of three apartments. These one-roomed houses and these two-roomed houses were provided by the class represented by hon. Members opposite because you consider one or two rooms quite good enough for my own class to live in.
    I speak with a certain amount of feeling on this subject, and I am pleading for those who have been compelled to live under these conditions. When I was fighting an Election in 1922, I received a telegram from home stating that the flower of my flock had to be taken away to a sanatorium. This was not because I was an individual who took drink, not because I had wasted my substance in any form, not because I do not want better housing, not because I was not prepared to make any sacrifice in order to pay the rent for a three or four-roomed house, but because there was not such a house to be got. Can you wonder I speak with a great deal of feeling. I say that hon. Members opposite are not honest. [An HON. MEMBER: "Speak on!"] I am going to speak on, and if you will be quiet you will hear me much more easily. My hon. Friend probably has not been in the same position as I have myself, possibly he has not scene his kith and kin carried away from him because of the bad housing conditions that prevail. I speak with much feeling on this matter, and I demand on behalf of the people of Scotland better housing conditions.
    It is not the building trade that is responsible for the situation. I am not going to vote to-night against the building of houses, but I am going to vote against the right of Lord Weir to dictate the conditions under which these houses shall be built. I have spent my time in building up the trade union organisation and for five years there has been a bar put up against me in the County of Fife

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    because I have fought for my own class. I am not going to knuckle down to Lord Weir. I am not afraid of Lord Weir, or of the hosts opposite. I am prepared even to be misrepresented, so far as this particular fight is concerned. I am going to fight for more houses, and I am prepared to support the Government in their demand for more and more houses, but hon. Members opposite are cowards to take advantage of the housing shortage for the purpose of trying to destroy trade unionism.
    Major KINDERSLEY: I do not want to detain the Committee for more than a few moments, but I should like to elucidate a statement, which fell from the Leader of the Opposition, on the subject of the company which has been formed to carry out the building of these houses. The right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, unfortunately, is not present at the moment, but I hope, whoever replies for the Government, will be able to answer the point I am going to raise. As I understood the right hon. Gentleman opposite, these houses are not to be built by the Scottish National Housing Company but by a subsidiary company, which has been formed for the purpose, and that there would be representatives on the Board of the Ministry of Health and the Scottish Board of Health.
    He had the advantage of me because he was in possession of the articles of association of this company, which I have not seen, and, in reply to a question, he said that the capital of the company was to be £100,000. On this he built up a considerable case, the case that this company was merely a sub-Committee of the Government. I want to ask whether this capital is fully subscribed, and, if a loss is made on the contract entered into by this company who will bear that loss? Is it to be the company or the Government? If the company have to bear the loss, then the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition has distinctly misled the Committee. As I understand it, this is a company formed to build these houses with a capital of £100,000. The Government make a contract with them, they have to deliver the houses, and, if there is a loss on the contract, it is to be borne by the company and not by the Government. I may be wrong, but, if not, then surely the Leader of the Opposition
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    quite unintentionally misled the Committee in the statement that he made.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It is a subsidiary company of the National Housing Company, and the capital is supplied by the Government either from the Loan Commissioners or through the Treasury. The management of it is under the directorship of members of the company, representatives of the Scottish Board of Health and the Treasury. The question of what money is made in any transaction, or should any loss occur, will be a matter for the Government and accounted for by the Government.
    Mr. VIANT: I have listened very carefully to the charges made on the building industry, and one would imagine that each penson engaged in that industry was already provided with good housing accommodation. I should like to inform hon. Members that quite a large number of those who are operatives in the building industry are without adequate accommodation themselves, and they are quite as desirous as anyone that this housing problem should be tackled in an effective manner. It is unfair to charge the building industry with being responsible for the shortage of housing. We are paying the price to-day in the shortage of housing for the treatment meted out to the building industry in pre-War days when it was not an uncommon thing to have 14 per cent., 15 per cent., and 16 per cent. of unemployed in the building industry. The result has been—
    The CHAIRMAN: I think the hon. Member is speaking now of the building industry as a whole. I must remind him that this is a Scottish Vote.
    Mr. VIANT: I beg pardon. I was dealing with the supply of the necessary labour even for the purpose of erecting houses in Scotland, and I was going to draw attention to—
    The CHAIRMAN: If the hon. Member is going to argue the English aspect it would not be in order. If he confines his remarks to Scotland, he will be in order.
    Mr. VIANT: I appreciate the point. The point I want to make is this, that from each of our large industrial centres in Scotland, when the impetus to the erection of houses in Scotland ceased some three years ago, quite a large number of building trade operatives

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    migrated to Canada and America. The neglect of past Governments has contributed largely to the shortage of building operatives at the present time. Now I want to return to the Weir house. Listening to the Debate, one would imagine that there was some special merit attaching to the Weir type of house which no other house possesses. There is nothing exceptional in the Weir house. I am comparatively a young man, but I can remember building similar houses during the South African War. The only difference was this, that we had corrugated iron on the outside instead of steel. The bulk of the work, 95 per cent. of the work, on these houses is done by those engaged in the building trade industry. The major portion has to be done by carpenters. There are a hundred and one building establishments throughout the country who have the plant and the equipment that is necessary for the provision of these houses in Scotland, and very important offers have been made by builders to provide other houses. One builder has offered to provide, within four years, 10,000 houses of an alternative type, in which there would not be engaged more than 10 per cent. of skilled labour. That offer has not been entertained. That in itself is sufficient to cause those who are associated with the industry to feel that there is undoubtedly a preference being given to Lord Weir over other contractors.
    The main opposition that is offered to the Weir house is on the ground that trade union conditions are not being observed. Those who are engaged in the building industry offer opposition to these houses, and they go so far as to make threats in connection with their erection. They make that threat by virtue of the fact that they are entitled to use all constitutional means in their power to safeguard their social and economic position. They would not be worthy of the name of members of trade unions if they were not prepared to put up the most strenuous opposition to such methods as are being adopted. The hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell) drew attention to the fact that the contractors who were making the doors and as sub-contractors were prepared to supply various parts, were threatened with a withdrawal of labour. They are
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    threatened on this ground, that they are becoming accessories in the sense that they are assisting Lord Weir to defeat the trade union object, which is to maintain decent standards of living and labour.
    When the hon. Member for Paisley makes an appeal to this Committee that it is in the interest of men, women and children that these houses should be erected, and that those who are opposing them are to be blamed for such opposition, he forgets the fact that right through the whole of our trade union history we have always been charged with the same thing when we have been trying to obtain decent conditions of labour. So this is no singular accusation in this respect. Sentiment will cover a great deal. The Government of the day are the people who can alter the position. All that the building trades are asking for is decent conditions of labour, and I have yet to learn that even a Conservative Government has any right to violate the Fair Wages Clause as embodied in a Resolution passed by this House. The giving of this contract under these conditions is undoubtedly a violation of that Resolution.
    There is another aspect of the business that has come to my knowledge, and it is this. There are many builders in Scotland as well as in England who would be prepared to give a guarantee to erect a far larger number of houses than are being asked for, if, at the same time, they were given the same privileges that are going to be given to Lord Weir in the erection of these houses. Quite an exceptional condition, I believe, has been granted. If I am wrong, the Secretary for Scotland will correct me, but I understand the ordinary rules observed in the trade are not to be observed, in so far that one-third of the price of the contract is to be given to Lord Weir when the order is passed. The second third is to be given when the parts are delivered on the site, and the other third is to be handed over immediately the contract is completed. These are exceptional conditions that have not been known before. All they have to do is to erect the houses. The question of defects then is not to be considered. There is always a proportion of the contract price held over until the representatives of the clients are satisfied that the contract has been carried out in a satisfactory manner.

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    Here, again, I say there is a preference being given to Lord Weir that no other firm in this country has ever had before, and we are justified, even on those grounds, in opposing this grant of money.
    These preferences, I fear, are becoming all too common. If a preference is to be shown to a contractor, I suggest that even if the Government feel that they are not in much sympathy with the building industry, even on preferential grounds they may be prepared to grant to the building industry trade union conditions in this contract. But it is not only the wages. The hours of labour, again, are different. Lord Weir is not working the hours of labour in his factory that are being observed in the building industry, and when it is argued by some that this is engineering work, I am afraid those people who argue on those grounds are not quite au fait with the kind of work that is being done. The only engineers who are engaged on these houses are those who are rolling the steel plates and those who are cutting the plates. The rest of the work is being done by those who are ordinarily engaged in the building industry. The building industry cannot be charged with demanding exceptional wages. The building industry has had serious cuts in wages by virtue of the fact that a common agreement exists that their wages are fixed by representative committees of the employers and operatives, and based upon the cost of living. From that point of view, it cannot be claimed that the building trade operatives because of the scarcity of labour are at any time seeking to squeeze the community, and get an undue share of wages from the community. That charge cannot be levied against the industry.
    Therefore, I feel that the operatives—and the employers are with them—are perfectly entitled to ask that the trade union conditions as observed in the building industry shall be observed in this contract. A court of inquiry was set up. I agree to consider this question, but the court of inquiry was composed of those who were not in any sense of the word cognisant of the conditions that obtained in the industry. Lord Bradbury, Mr. Milne Watson, and Mr. Cramp formed the Committee, None of those were in any way conversant with the conditions of labour obtaining in the
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    building industry or in the engineering industry, and they had to decide a technical issue, which, I submit, they were not able in any way to decide. They were not qualified without the necessary technical knowledge of the industry itself. It was an impossibility for them to give a decision which was in any sense of the word in keeping with the requirements of this industry.
    This is no new type of house. It is on all fours with the type of Army hut we were making for the South African War and the last War. The merits of the house I have described here already. As a Member of this House I have strenuously opposed it, not because I am associated with the industry, but because it is uneconomic. We are not getting value for money. It is being foisted on the public, and, as a public representative, while I say there is an urgency for houses, and one has to agree that there is a need for them, and that latitude has to be given in this respect, that does not exonerate the Government from observing the trade union conditions. The building industry cannot be charged with being opposed to alternative types of houses. The building industry has always said right throughout, "We are not opposed to alternative types of houses. If the community want these types of houses they are entitled to have them." The industry, as an industry, has never attempted to interfere with the tastes or the desires of the community in this respect. It is erecting alternative types to-day. It is working on all alternative types except the Weir type. That, in itself, is evidence of the fact that the industry is quite impartial so far as alternative types are concerned, and is only concerned with the conditions of labour and the wages paid.
    Major TASKER: I believe the last speaker would agree with me that conditions, bad as they are in England, are really worse in some parts of Scotland, and that the housing position is one which ought to be brought to an end. I have listened to this Debate, hoping to hear smile suggestion put forward as an alternative to the suggestion of the Government, but there is no alternative. We have tried in the South and the North, and the difficulties that we are experiencing here obtain in Scotland to a far greater degree: It is impossible to

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    obtain the skilled mechanics to put up the ordinary house. The Government made certain overtures and offers on more generous terms to Scotland than to any of the municipalities in England, and they were unable to carry out their project, though they were perfectly willing to provide those houses, had labour been forthcoming. It was not. My hon. Friend spoke about the shortage of work, only he put it in another way—a certain percentage of men out of work in the building trade. It is always there, and always must be there. [An HON. MEMBER: "Why?"] If my hon. Friend knows anything about it, he will know that certain trades cannot work in certain weather. That is quite obvious. But the greater proportion of unemployment in the building trade has always been among the unskilled operatives. We have had evidence this afternoon showing that unskilled operatives will enjoy even a greater wage than my hon. Friend suggests should be paid for unskilled work.
    8.0 P.M.
    There is a certain resentment felt by those engaged in the building industry, and I observe, in passing, that whenever housing is discussed in this House, the people who seem most urgent are those who have never been engaged in the building trade. The only difference between the hon. Member who has just sat down and myself is that I have had a longer experience than he has, and it has extended over more than one trade. I submit that for the building trade to attempt to dictate to an engineering trade is impertinent. Why, the operatives cannot agree among themselves. Three of the trade unions have broken away from their organisation. The hon. Member would have us suppose that they are a kind of plaster saint. [An HON. MEMBER: "Like you!"] Like myself, I agree. I would not act professionally for 100 guineas if I thought I could get 200. My hon. Friend would not work for 2s. an hour if he thought he could get half-a-crown. If his ambitions lie in the same direction as mine, they would be in this direction, that every skilled operative in the building trade should not earn less or get less than half-a-crown an hour. These operatives are exploiting their labour. What is the use of pretending that they are not. There are
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    agreed terms. They are violated, and when this House is informed that there was an agreement entered into between the operatives on the one side and the master builders on the other, I ask the utterer of that statement to refer to any trade union or any builder to see whether it is not a fact that, although an arrangement was entered into that a certain rate of wages should obtain for a certain definite period, that was not violated and a strike threatened, and an increase in wages given in August of last year of one halfpenny an hour and a further penny an hour in October.
    It is trifling with the House to bring forward such statements. The people of Scotland are entitled to food and to shelter. Both are essential conditions of existence and what the building trade are trying to do is to deny them shelter. They cannot supply operatives themselves, and when alternative means are presented and the Government show their willingness to provide houses, we are met with a great opposition. There is no one on the other side of the Committee but knows that people are living in verminous conditions, and there are no decent men on that side or this side, or outside the House, who want to see people so crowded together. It is deplorable. I do not suppose there is a single social worker in this country who does not know the terrible conditions which exist to-day. I should have thought, that the people who come here representing labour would have been the very first to have acclaimed the intention of the Government and to have said: "We will help you all we can." Instead of that, we are told it is their intention not to vote against the houses but to vote against a condition which does not exist. I ask members who really are in earnest and who do desire houses to be provided, to reconsider their position, and to do all they can, not only to provide these 2,000 houses, but to encourage the Government to multiply those 2,000 by 100.
    Mr. SCRYMGEOUR: I am very glad that a vote is to be taken on this question and I do not want to give a silent vote. As one of the representatives for Dundee, I know that the Corporation there has made splendid progress in the erection of houses of various sizes, and at the present time they are negotiating with one firm which is making a practical

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    offer which will probably be brought to a successful culmination for a larger supply of houses still. The position as regards this question, in the way we have had it put before us, is that Dundee Corporation turned down the idea of steel houses like some of the other large cities, and of course as the Secretary of State for Scotland has said, Dundee is one of the cities where the Government have been able to secure site facilities for the construction of some of these houses which they intend to proceed with.
    It is not really the matter of the housing question in its wide national aspect that is being handled here to-day. The picture drawn, and very faithfully drawn by the Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell) was one that unquestionably gripped the heart and mind of every Member of the House, and of the whole nation, for it is known perfectly well that that unfortunately is a situation which has confronted us for many years. But when emphasis was laid on the slum conditions, the appalling circumstances and the picture of grief, agony and despair which prevailed in these sordid quarters, when this is looked upon in the light of what we are discussing to-day, every one of us, including the hon. Member for Paisley, will recognise quite frankly that there is no intention of making any change in those powerful conditions by which the country is beset. The matter of providing some houses of a certain size and constructed of a certain class of material does not at all determine the factors which have got to be dealt with outside of this question, which is a branch question and not a root question. The central point here to-day, as it has been emphasised to us by representatives of the Corporation in Dundee, is that undoubtedly a very determined effort is being made by Lord Weir to cut in upon working class conditions as regards trade unionism. Very striking evidence was given by the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs (Mr. Kirkwood) and the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton), which brought us face to face with the facts, and I should have thought when such evidence is presented to the Members on this side of the House that there could be no doubt whatever about the imperative duty of all who side for thorough-going and just labour conditions, that from the Front Bench to the back, and that every man
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    and woman would be available for refusing to support the arrangements whereby the Government has been brought into hold-fast conditions by Lord Weir.
    I have had it put to me by a Baronet connected with the constituency which I have the honour to represent that, unfortunately, Lord Weir has got far too strong a hold upon the Government not only on this question, but upon other questions. I get a message like that presented to me quite spontaneously, and I put it alongside the deliverances, such as we have had from our own side, from men who unquestionably do know. There is no one here who has challenged what they have put forward concerning the very determined line of action which his lordship has set his mind upon accomplishing. Now if we are to grip these things effectually, I hold that it is not sufficient to say, as the Leader of the Opposition said, that we are not being asked to authorise these arrangements, or the actual contract—and that we are only being asked to make the grant. But I should say if we are agreeing upon that, and if we are going to agree upon the grant, then our case is hopeless. I do not think there is any leadership in that, and I am exceedingly disappointed with that particular deliverance. I could not help noticing it gave very great satisfaction on the other side of the House. Dundee is in exactly the same predicament as Glasgow Town Council—as the representatives from the West emphasised—and a majority of the council are not those who represent the Labour party, and so in Dundee the majority of the council are not of the Labour party. There is only a minority, and yet that council decided to reject the steel houses.
    One of the particular features of this very question is that it has raised friction, and intense feeling has prevailed throughout the Labour movement throughout the country. If we have the representatives of the local authorities in such communities as Glasgow and Dundee arriving at such decisions, then I should say we here, as representing the community Parliamentarily, must of necessity abide by the position that has been upheld by the local authority, and evidently with the approval of the community. There is a need for houses. That is one thing, but there is something which does strike one as rather farcical in present-day conditions, with the

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    House as it is constituted to-day. The Press of the country certainly has been very active in giving the hon. Member for Paisley plenty of space to express his views, seeing that he is taking that particular line. We can quite understand it. That is important in itself. You find a Press that has had its journalistic operators in the country writing many, many years ago descriptive articles about the appalling conditions for the purpose of selling the paper. But why did we never have that particular Press, which is so keen in booming the hon. Member for Paisley, rousing the country and any Government that sits on those benches to tackle this question in the way we are supposed to believe they are going to do it to-day? It is, as the Americans say, "a frame-up"—very much of a frame-up. It is mass production for the mass.
    It is pathetic for any thinking man to see in our thoroughfares, many years after the War, those miserable wooden huts with the touching spectacles of little bits of curtain attempting to indicate something like a home, until now things have got so well settled down that these are not considered to be a temporary provision. They are now considered to be so satisfactory that the people are abiding in them peaceably. They never set fire to them, but retain them, as apparently nothing else can be done. The next project is that the capitalist schemer with his mind very active, planning and scheming a series of capitalistic operations here and abroad, gets his hold upon the Government and says: "Now here is something whereby we can get in upon industry, something at the same time that will enable us to get a smash in upon trade unionism." We must not forget the anxiety of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Argyllshire (Mr. Macquisten) to get there. His contribution this afternoon has to be viewed from that standpoint. It is a cute device to come in at a point and prove a given purpose: that a body of people under poor circumstances and conditions are going to have this put forward as a thing which is going to give them their particular desire.
    When that is done the Government comes along and fit into the situation with such a tremendous force, as determined
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    to foist this upon the community, even though the community says they do not want it. It is something to know that a Conservative Government, a Government which, with its supporters over the country, has been adamantine about these things, has seen these appalling conditions and treated them as if they were but that which ought to be so far as any action was concerned—and it is something new to have these people, as representing the Conservative party, envisaged as an advance guard concerned about the people in the deplorable conditions depicted in Dundee, Glasgow and elsewhere. I have no hesitation in saying I do not believe it! There is nothing really to prove it. If it were a question of really considering the occupants of the houses, and not a question of the production of houses, or the mass production of material, if it were a question of considering the minds and souls of this important body of men, women and children, then I could understand that there would be a very peculiar situation in this House if any section were opposed to tackling the question.
    It is not a question of certain roomed houses. We do not propose to dispense with one or two-roomed houses. The hon. Member for Paisley in his splendid deliverance, certainly gave us a remarkable flow of language and evidence of fair feeling; but we cannot forget, as has been pointed out, that some years ago he was not so very much concerned about this matter. Is this not rather a psychological study on the part of the hon. Member for Paisley? Does he not see here an opportunity for coming in at a particular time when the Government wishes to do this. He had done a very marked dis-service to-day to the organised labour movement. I speak of the movement. I am not talking of the party. But I do say that if this kind of thing develops within the ranks of the Labour party, and that references are to be made to trade unionism as a mere triviality, then we may recollect the hon. Member for Paisley in one of the committee rooms upstairs only last Session leading for the Government, for the Tory Government, in a Measure which was intended to work a remarkable scheme whereby they were going to govern the whole legal fraternity by means of a handful of men. The hon. Gentleman was attacked by members of

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    his own party and he had to submit, and the Government that he represented made no further use of him.
    I do not belong to the Labour party, but I say this—and I have always said so—the nearer that the Labour movement comes to the party on the Front Bench the greater their difficulties will become. It is not in theoretical deliverances by which we ought to be accepted. It is a question of how much we are to sacrifice our prospects, as they may be considered, individually and collectively. It is whether we are prepared to take our stand on given conditions, and realise that it is not only in the matter of these steel houses but in many questions which come before us in this House. Money, influence, and affluence grip those who happen to be in office, and are said to be in power, although when it comes to the push very often in these questions and in others they are not really in power; there are other forces behind. They may up in the gallery be speechless, but they can afford to smile, as the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs pointed out in relation to Lord Weir when he said that he was in the gallery smiling. Well he might! He knows that whatever takes place here, so far as he is concerned, he has got a grip on the Front Bench opposite; he also sees, which gives him still more satisfaction, the cleavage in the Labour party and the hesitancy as to whether or not they should go to the vote. If they fail to strike a blow as against the power of Lard Weir and all these financial interests, in striking off the shackles of the people; if the Labour party fails to do that; if they fail to go into the Lobby in one solid phalaryx, that will mean that they miss the opportunity of presenting to the country the spectacle that they stand solid in reality, even when confronted with difficulties such as those with which they are troubled to-day.
    Mr. J. JONES: So far as we are concerned, we on this side of the House are interested in this housing question not merely from the standpoint of the pathos which has been introduced into the Debate this afternoon, and the speeches made with appealing tears asking us to sacrifice all our trade union principles and industrial solidarity. Some hon. Members have spoken about the possibilities of the housing question. I remember in 1886 a book was published by the late General Booth—" In Darkest
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    England, and the Way Out"—which, of course, included Scotland! All over the picture which has been painted this afternoon we have had very glaring colours of the problem. We have had Tory Governments in office in succeeding years, and we have had Liberal Governments in office, but every party in office has always had the problem of housing the people still remaining. But the people have not been housed. They have been warehoused. I myself have lived in one of these desirable residences which the average workman has got to occupy in London, especially in the East End, where the walls are so thick that you can hear the woman next door changing her mind. Those of us who have not been able to undertake the responsibility of a larger house, because of the impossibility of meeting the rent, have been forced to crowd.
    One of the questions not tackled this afternoon is how the people are to find the means to pay for the houses when we have built them. The poverty problem is at the bottom of the housing problem. The people are badly housed because they are poor, and from that aspect the housing problem will always be with us. I am a builder's labourer by profession. Some people say I am a Member of Parliament by accident. Builders' labourers have had a long struggle to establish something like decent conditions of work in the building trade. We are not proud of the fact that as labourers we are paid better than almost any other body of workers in the country at the present time, only sorry that our fellow workers in other trades are not so well fixed as we are; and we look upon this scheme of Lord Weir's as a sinister attempt to bring us down to the level of those trades that have been dragged down to the bottom. And the Government are going to subsidise it! It may be all right for the sentimental people outside who are so anxious about housing to say that we should give away everything. In London there are plenty of decent contractors in the building trade who would be quite prepared, if they got, the same terms as Lord Weir, to obey all the conditions the workers in the building industry want, and build houses of any kind, by alternative methods or otherwise.
    Why has Lord Weir been picked out for special favour? What influence is at

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    work? Cannot the same conditions be offered to all other contractors? Could not the Government come forward and say to all sections of the community who are willing to provide houses that if they are willing to do so the Government will be prepared to consider any schemes they may put forward, and will not give preferential treatment to anybody? Those of us associated with the building trade have been charged with being opposed to the building of houses. It is not true. The Government have a way out of all their difficulties in that connection, if they will do what they did in war time, and undertake the rationing of buildings. They could easily do it. By consultation with the building trade they could arrange for the rationing of buildings. Banks can be built, public-houses can be built or altered, workmen are employed wholesale on luxury work. Why should we not say, "A certain proportion of the men employed in the building industry, and a certain amount of work carried out by contractors, shall be for housing and housing only"—that is, if we made properly understood arrangements with the building trades, instead of trying to get behind them surreptitiously by schemes of this kind?
    Are we going to see the houses come along? Can Lord Weir deliver the goods? Not if he gets the hostility of the organised workers of the country. However big he is, however much he may have behind him—all the influences behind the scenes—the building trade will not voluntarily surrender its position. We are not going to have our standard of wages and hours of labour interfered with. We have been told about skilled workers in the engineering trade and fancy rates of wages. Where are those rates paid? I dare to challenge any Member of this House to show me where a labourer is getting £6 a week helping to build houses for Lord Weir. I can understand mass production; I have worked under it in the engineering trade, and I know what it means. On the average, it means about 20 per cent. increase on the basic rates, if one is lucky, and when the first job comes out all right then the price is cut down on the second job. Whenever they find the men getting more than a certain amount, the price is cut down on the next job. It is a game
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    of "beggar my neighbour," and we understand what is to be the end of it all, and therefore we say that on the eventual result the Government are deliberately subsidising sweating. If the country wants houses it can have them, and have the men who can build them, who are ready and anxious to do the work; but we are not going to stand idly by and see any attempt, direct or indirect, to reduce our standard of comfort and our standards of wages and hours. In so far as we on these benches are concerned, I hope the matter will go to a Division, now that we have been told what we have been told.
    An hon. Member on the benches opposite said he had had great experience in the building trade. Some of us have also had experience of the building trade—have tramped the streets of London week after week, out of employment, only working when the weather was fine and we were lucky. Now the whirligig of time has brought its revenge and we are face to face with this problem. In the building trade a labourer gets 1s. 4d. an hour in London—a terrible lot of money; a lawyer would not sign a document for less than 6s. 8d.—and is expected to work for an hour, hail, rain or sun, for the purpose of producing profit for gentlemen like the hon. Member opposite. Yet we are supposed to be bleeding the community. I will undertake to say that, for every pint of blood we take from the community, he takes a barrelful, and does less for it. We are not asking for privileges, we are not asking for what Lord Weir has got, but only for a fair and square deal, asking that the building trade workmen shall be given a chance and not be attacked. You are not going to drag us down, without a struggle, to the level to which you have brought the engineers, or to which you have brought the iron and steel workers and the miners. We are going to stick to what we have got for all we are worth and help our fellow-workers to secure better conditions than they now enjoy.
    Mr. STEWART: This Debate is similar to a number of Debates we have had in this House of late. It is only a few days ago, comparatively, since the Prime Minister informed us that he was going to take steps to provide houses for the people. To-day we understand exactly

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    the position. We are to get 2,000 houses—500 from one contractor, 500 from another and 1,000 from Lord Weir. No one who has spoken on this side of the House has had it down that we are opposed to Lord Weir building houses. The whole quarrel between us and those who sit on the other benches is as to the conditions under which these houses are to be erected. I heard the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell) say the wages were £6, and £3 a week. He did not tell us why it was there was such a wide difference as between £6 and £3 in the wages of men working under the same conditions; but the fact remains that if our proposals are accepted, as we think Lord Weir ought to accept them—other contractors having accepted them—we are going to save him money. We are not asking Lord Weir to pay £6 per week. All that is being asked is that he should conform to the building trade conditions and pay the building rates of wages. That is not neatly £6 a week and I think it is some where about £4 a week. I believe the reason why the workers are so much against Lord Weir's method of doing trade is on account of their bitter experience under him.
    There are several well known works in Glasgow which are worked under a system of piecework with some form of bonus We have had this system carried out in the great sewing machine manufacturing concern known as Singers Company, which is one of the largest firms who employ labour in this country, and there the system of mass production goes on, and this kind of thing has caused the workers to look with suspicion on any form of mass production under the system which has been indicated by the hon. Member for Paisley, who did not make it quite clear. We on this side of the House have had an opportunity of judging of these conditions in the engineering trades quite apart from this work in connection with the Singer Sewing Machine Manufacturing Company, and we have had experience of the premium bonus system. Under it the men, after having produced more than the regulation quantity, find that their wages are cut down, and while under this system the employers exact the maximum power of the worker they have gradually
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    reduced their wages down to the lowest basis of existence.
    That is why we object so much not to Lord Weir's houses or the building of houses of steel, but to the conditions under which those houses are to be constructed. Some of us are old enough to have heard this story about the conditions under which people lived in this country many years ago. I remember when I was little more than a lad, 40 years ago, that the "Daily Telegraph," the "Daily Chronicle," the "Daily News" and G. R. Sims told us a great deal about how the poor lived. At that time many people made visits to discover the condition under which the poor lived, and there is nothing that has been said to-night that can send such a thrill of horror through anyone as the words that were uttered about the condition of the poor in the days I am alluding to. In the past we have had Royal Commissions inquiring into this question and we have had His late Majesty King Edward VII as Chairman of a Commission dealing with the housing question. Now we find ourselves 40 years after that time listening to the same story. For all these years the poor people have been living in the slums producing disease and misery and physical and mental degradation. You have known this all along, and it is no new story, but nevertheless you have allowed it to go on.
    It may be that you are now becoming alive to the fact that this is a problem which, if it is not solved, will dissolve, and some day, as the result of this society itself may crumble under such an underground of rottenness. You are now going to give us 2,000 steel houses. The Under-Secretary for Health for Scotland is as much alive as I am to the problem that exists, but what are you going to do about it? You are going to give us 2,000 steel houses. Will that solve the question? No, it will not touch the quesion, and it is less than a drop in a bucket in the solution of this question. We are not against alternative schemes. We have heard a good deal about the wooden shacks which have been erected in Scotland. I know they are somewhat unpleasant to the sight, but nevertheless we have agreed to their construction. The log hut in the backwoods of Canada is not so ugly. We have had these wooden

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    shacks elected in the City of Glasgow, and we have agreed to many forms of alternative houses. I have been anxious that wooden houses should be constructed, and I have no sympathy with the idea that all houses should be built either of brick, concrete or stone. I have seen wooden houses which from an architectural point of view are as beautiful as any houses built of stone or brick.
    We have no desire to oppose any form of alternative houses that you can produce. The hon. Member for Paisley said that we on this side were not in favour of the Weir system of houses, but I would like to challenge him to produce any evidence to that effect, because we are not opposed to the Weir system at all. I do not think I am committing any breach of official confidence when I say that the first scheme of Weir houses was submitted to the Scottish Board of Health a good many years ago, and it was then decided that it ought to be turned down because the price was higher than the ordinary brick house, with even superior accommodation. As a result of our action on that occasion the price was reduced by something equivalent to £80 per house. That did not show hostility to the Weir houses. At that time we were trying to get houses just as we are to-day, and if the Weir house is cheaper to-day I for one am not prepared to give any credit for that reduction to the firm of G. and J. Weir. It is not really cheaper. I understand that to-day there are other firms who are making offers—I cannot speak with authority, but the statement is made, and perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman may be in a position to give fuller information with regard to the offers that are being made in this respect.
    There is just one other point upon which I want to dwell. We have had a prolonged discussion to-day, and I think we have pretty well repeated from each side of the Committee each other's speeches. Not much can be said on the matter, but I think it has been demonstrated clearly and unmistakably that, as far as we are concerned, we are not frightened to face the position. It may appear that we are opposing a scheme that would alleviate the conditions. It is, however, well known to every one who has any connection
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    with the city of Glasgow that I myself have spent some years of my life in advocating better and improved housing conditions, and that in the town council, of which I was for years a member, I have taken a prominent if not a leading part in advocating the improvement of housing. Therefore, it cannot be urged against either myself or my friends that we are against the building of houses for the people. We are just as alive to the necessity for it as anyone else. I would appeal to the Government to consider this matter in all its bearings, and to allow us to compel Lord Weir, or any other firm or individual who may desire to help to solve the housing problem, not to create such a state of affairs as would retard the very object that he or they or we may have in view.
    Contemplate the prospects! It is easy enough to say front those benches that, despite every obstacle that can be thrown in your way, you will hew your way through it, that you will brook no opposition. Strong men and strong Governments have said that before, but men have always had to bow to circumstances, and, if you are wise, you will not precipitate a quarrel between the majority of the House of Commons and the workers of the country generally, for I am as certain as that I am standing at this Box that, if that quarrel is precipitated, the building trades will stop work. The sense of class solidarity that there is in the trade union movement would make them, even if the building trades were wrong, come to their side, just as you on your side flock to the support of your fellows even if you think they are making some mistake. Do you desire to do that? At the best you can only cause trouble. You may be able to build your houses, but, in building those houses, you will lose far more houses than you are going to build.
    I do not think it is worth it. I desire the houses; you desire the houses; every Member of the House now says, and I believe them when they say so, that they are desirous of having houses; but for God's sake do not let us fritter away our efforts and cause disunity in the country over a matter that is capable of adjustment. All that Lord Weir or the firm of G. and J. Weir has to do is to do as the Duke of Atholl, Messrs. Beardmore, Messrs Cowieson, Messrs. Braithwaite, and all the other firms in the country have

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    done—to agree that, so far as building houses is concerned, the building trade regulations, wages and conditions, will be observed. Then you can go ahead and build as many steel houses as the price will warrant and the community is prepared to accept. I hope that the Government will offer some compromise to-night.
    Mr. JOHNSTON: I do not intend to take up more than a few moments of the time of the Committee, but I should not like to register a vote to-night upon this issue without explaining exactly why I hope to do so. Like the last speaker, I have not the faintest objection whatever to steel houses. I welcome steel houses, wooden houses, papier maché houses, any kind of houses other than the filthy, fetid dens in which hundreds of thousands of our people are compelled to live now. But when I heard this afternoon the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell) eliciting Tory cheers, eliciting cheers from men, some of whom have spent years of their lives fighting against a better standard of housing, I was confirmed in the opinion I had previously held, that this proposal this afternoon is not so much a proposal to increase the number of available decent houses for the working class of this country, as a political stunt with an ulterior economic object.
    If our suspicions are unjustified, perhaps the Under-Secretary for Health will be able to tell us, when he rises to reply to-night, how it is that a leader of his own party in Scotland, the Duke of Atholl—a man who cannot be accused of the slightest Bolshevik sympathies, who has no connection with trade unionism, about whom there is nothing of the bricklayer who only lays a brick a week, who is running the Beardmore industry, which has a bigger plant than Weir's, and who comes to terms with the building industry and says frankly, "I do not want to break rates of wages, I do not want to lower conditions, and I will come to terms"—how is it that this leading light of the Conservative party only gets 500 houses, while the gentleman who repeatedly says he is out to break trade unionism gets 1,000 houses? Let us go further than that. There is the Cowieson house. I have not the faintest idea what the Cowiesons are politically, but their house is said to be £8 cheaper than the
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    Weir house. Why do Cowiesons not get the 1,000 and Weirs the 500?
    Then, perhaps, the hon. and gallant Gentleman will tell us why it is, if it be the case, that an English firm of contractors, Messrs. Henry Boot and Company, who have offered at various times to build large numbers of houses in Scotland, and who, I understand, in their most recent offer, made on the 22nd December last, offered to build 10,000 houses in four years at a cost complete of £400 per house—why is it that the Government first of all refuse Messrs. Henry Boot and Company's offer on the ground that their offer was made too late for the subsidy, and subsequently have delayed and delayed and delayed, so that Messrs. Henry Boot and Company's offer has not yet been accepted? If these are the facts, if it be the case that Messrs. Cowieson have arranged with their workers, if they have agreed to recognise collective bargaining, if the Duke of Atholl has done it, if Messrs. Henry Boot and Company have done it, will the hon. and gallant Gentleman, when he replies to-night, spare us what might have been spared the Committee this afternoon—pathetic pictures of slum dwelling in Scotland, and figures as to the death rate, about which we are all agreed—will he spare us that, and tell us why it is that His Majesty's Government stands ranged solidly behind Lord Weir, the champion trade union smasher of Scotland?
    I remember when first I entered public life I entered to fight on a town council for municipal houses. We had a scheme prepared, we had architects to draw plans, we had measurements, we had estimates. These cottages could then have been built at £200 each, and the party represented by hon. Members opposite in my locality fought strenuously day and night to beat us, and they did beat us. Eight or 10 years afterwards these same gentlemen are compelled to build these 200 houses. They have to build them, not at £200, but at £1,000 a house. Their delay, their hostility to decent working-class houses, cost our community no less than £160,000 on these 200 houses, and it is idle for hon. Members opposite to seek to make party capital out of our hostility to a further breaking of the conditions of the working classes by pretending outside that we are hostile to decent

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    houses for the working classes. Since 1921, Lord Weir and others of his kidney, more powerful factors in public life than Lord Weir, have spent their time breaking the rates of wages and the living conditions of the people. I have in my pocket now quotations from them. One of their leaders says, "We will require to bring the workers down from the clouds in which they are living to earth again." They have succeeded.
    I quite agree that the figures of the hon. Member for Paisley were correct, but Lord Weir is not going to start from the beginning paying 14s. or 16s. a week. He puts the best face upon it. If the Government means to stand as a fair wage Government, and a social reform Government, if it does not mean to get down to the level of the sweated employer, why does it not say to Lord Weir, "We will take your steel houses, but you must conform to what the Duke of Atholl has conformed, and what Cowieson's and Henry Boots and others have conformed to—the system of collective bargaining, which is the only ultimate safeguard the poor working classes have against being driven further and further down into the mire of starvation." If any hon. Members on this side of the Committee care to go to a Division to-night I am willing, for one, to register a vote not against steel houses, not against any kind of houses, but to protest in the most effective way I can against this further step, taken with the assent and encouragement of the Government, to lowering the conditions of the working classes.
    9.0 P.M.
    Mr. WRIGHT: This question is of such vital importance to the people of Scotland that I do not want to remain silent during the Debate. I am not going to attempt to depict the horrors of the present housing system. I am not going to emulate the example of the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell). Overcrowding and adult men and women sleeping in the same room in my own constituency was described in this House in a maiden speech three years ago. We are all agreed that the conditions are very shocking. While in my judgment the housing conditions of Scotland are worse than they are in England and in Wales—I have lived in each of those countries—it has appeared in the Press quite
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    recently that in England you have a family of seven persons living in a dis-used lamp cabin at a colliery. You have people living under canvas in a dis-used quarry. I have seen in Lincolnshire, the county of my birth, people who are living in dis-used railway carriages. The housing problem is a very old one. It goes back for forty years and very much longer. In the history of Molesworth, 80 years ago, conditions were described in London equal to anything in Scotland. Some of the most powerful statements made by Kingsley and Tennyson are based upon the horrible housing conditions that existed in England 80years ago. There is no need specially to dwell upon these aspects of the question.
    In my judgment what is behind my colleagues here to-day, and the trade union movement throughout the country, in resisting the demands that are being put forward by the Government in support of Lord Weir and his schemes for housing, is the tradition and the memory of the very awful conditions of labour which have prevailed in days gone by. Those of us who in the early years of our life followed the calling of manual labourers have had on many occasions to remember the starvation conditions that prevailed and for 100 years the trade union movement, against untold difficulties, has striven to get away from those awful conditions. In every mining county in the country that is true, and in many other industries as well, and we do not forget these things. We know that men have suffered imprisonment, eviction and transportation. They have fought in season and out of season. They have fought for 10, 20 and 30 weeks together while their wives and children were starving, and they were compelled to go back, not because they believed they had not got a just cause, but because they could not resist any longer the starving conditions imposed upon them by the employers of labour. When those very employers themselves were paying 10 per cent., 20 per cent., 30 per cent. or 40 per cent. per annum they were driving down the conditions of labour, and it is the memory of these things that is behind the organised trade union movement to resist this break in the terms and conditions of employment and wages.
    We are as anxious to have houses as anyone; we are all very anxious about it, but we cannot allow this to pass in

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    silence, and I earnestly hope the Government will reconsider its decision. I have a very vivid recollection of the day when the Prime Minister at the close of last Session announced this change that was to take place. I do not forget that the Secretary for Scotland used words which at that time struck me as being something in the nature of a threat that this would be forced upon the people regardless of what the trade unionists might do. It is too late in the day to attempt to ignore the trade union movement. It cannot be done. At any rate I do not think it can be done successfully. Therefore I appeal to the Government that if all these other employers of labour can grant the conditions that labour is asking, an exception will not be made in the case of Lord Weir. Appeals have been made from time to time to us and to the trade union movement for a policy of peace and good will.
    The Prime Minister has repeated that plea and so have other Cabinet Ministers, over and over again. Three years ago the Prime Minister of that day was appealing for a policy of tranquillity. Is all the tranquillity to come from one side? Are all the traditions of labour, which we have built up gradually during a hundred years, to be looked at as a matter of no consequence, as a mere trifle of no concern to the manual workers? It may have been a very small thing in the early days of Christianity to ask the early Christians to burn incense to the heathen gods, but it was a matter of vital importance, so far as Christianity was concerned, that they should maintain their principles. The maintenance of the principles of the trade union movement to-day and of the declared trade union standards is a matter of very vital importance.
    Mr. WALLHEAD: I rise for the purpose of expressing my sympathy with my colleagues representing Scottish constituencies in the fight they are making to-day. I have no doubt that Lord Weir in the long controversy over these houses has been put to a considerable amount of expense. He has attempted to foist his steel constructions upon all kinds of public bodies from one end of the country to the other. Happily, England and Wales have to a large extent succeeded in evading his blandishments. Now, it
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    appears that because no public authority in England or Wales is prepared to accept these steel houses, he has persuaded the Government to assist him in making a last desperate throw to foist these steel things upon the people of Scotland.
    Scotland is the last place where this type of house should be erected. I should have thought that a house of this type of construction might have stood a chance somewhere in the South of England, but in Scotland, where the traditional method of building houses has been to put up a wall of considerable thickness on account of the inclemency of the weather, to foist upon the people these things of tin and steel or steel and paper, passes my comprehension. I cannot understand how anyone with any idea of public economy can attempt it. I am opposed absolutely to the steel house. There have been many persons prepared to buy houses, but I do not know that Messrs. Weir have been able to persuade many private persons to put their money into the building of a steel house. I do not think the Government have expected to give a subsidy or have given a subsidy to any private persons for the purpose of building steel houses.
    Why should the public authorities of Scotland have foisted upon them a type of construction which no private person with any sense whatever would accept for himself? The sound policy to adopt is this: What you will not do for yourself, why compel public authorities to do? Public authorities will be compelled afterwards to come to the public for the maintenance of these wretched places. The one single virtue about these steel houses is the comparative shortness of their life. I am told that the steel house may last 40 years. That, for a structure of this kind, is probably 30 years too long. I do not think the thing will last 40 years. I am in favour of getting whatever æsthetics we can in the construction of houses, and it is from that point of view that I most strongly oppose the erection of these steel things.
    I cannot understand the energy with which the Government is pursuing this question. There are so many methods of constructing houses which do not bring one into conflict with the building trade unions. I live in a district where hundreds of good cottages are being built of concrete. They are built, as far as the

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    walls are concerned, by men who previously have not been skilled in the erection of houses. They are built in accord with the building trade operatives. The men who are trained to do this type of work do very well, and the houses are satisfactory from every point of view. There is another type of house, the Tibbenham, Tudor style, which is probably the best-looking house of all the new types of house. I know nothing of the firm concerned with it, but I have seen their illustrations. I know something of the method of building the old black and white house in Cheshire. I know the length of life of the black and white Cheshire cottage. There are beautiful cottages in Cheshire built with good oak and with mud and wattle which have lasted for 300 years.
    Why press these steel contraptions upon us? Why not utilise some of the national factories for turning out woodwork for the type of house I have mentioned, and get labourers to do the concrete work? The building trade operatives will put nothing in the way. These houses could be made æsthetic and lasting, and would be better from every point of view than these things which Lord Weir wishes to foist upon the people of Scotland, faced with the desperate condition in which they stand to-day so far as the housing of their people is concerned. I look with some alarm upon the haste with which a responsible Government will rush into the erection of these hideous things. [HON. MEMBERS: "18 months!"] Eighteen months, yes, but why all this desperate hurry to get these things done now? Why all this desperate hurry to foist these wretched steel things upon the country? Why not exercise the same energy in getting a better type of house?
    If the Government want to deal with the housing problem, why have they not dealt with the profiteering in the building trade materials? Why have they not dealt with the brickmakers? Why have they not done something to control the brick-makers and others who have raised the prices of materials year after year? Why all this wonderful energy now to protect a man who deliberately states his intention of smashing building trade regulations? If hon. Members opposite think that we are likely to accept that point of view, they have made a very considerable mistake.
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    I know something about the building trade, because I spent 20 years of my life in it. I know the conditions under which the building trade operatives live. I say that they are thoroughly justified in attempting now to preserve what advantage they have obtained in their trade. [Laughter.] Yes, I know. Hon. Members laugh. I have known the time when highly skilled men in the building trade have thought themselves lucky to get an average of 24s. per week. I say that they are thoroughly justified in attempting to avoid these new conditions so far as they can. In their attempt to preserve their standard of life, which they have won with so much difficulty, I am heartily behind them in the fight that they are making.
    I regard this housing problem as capitalism's greatest failure. [Laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen opposite laugh. I understand that speeches have been made from this side of the House depicting the deplorable condition under which the people were living in the great industrial centres, and that when that kind of thing was said hon. Gentlemen opposite expressed sympathy, as they always do, with one eye on their constituencies; but when they come back from dinner later we get a revelation of their real mind and sentiments and spirits, for they laugh in the way that they did a moment ago at the remark which I made. This housing difficulty is capitalism's greatest failure, its outstanding failure.
    Brigadier - General Sir HENRY CROFT: Is the hon. Member not aware that more houses were built during this last year than during any year in the history of this country?
    Mr. WALLHEAD: You are building them because of the subsidy paid by the State. The State loses money in the building of uneconomic houses. That is what you have brought us to.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Sixty thousand houses were built last year without any State subsidy.
    Mr. WALLHEAD: Yes, and a million are wanted. We are getting on! The party opposite represent the agricultural interests, both in Scotland and in England. They are asking for special terms on top of those already given, for the building of cottages for their

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    labourers. We know the type of house that the labourers have had to live in in the past, with their rotten leaky roofs—the thing that looks nice in pictures by B. W. Leader, whose wonderful landscapes never depict the rain coming through the thatch or the fungoids growing at the corners of the roofs. The failure of the party opposite is written all over the countryside. It is the same in the towns. The high death-rate is due to the failure of capitalism to deal with the housing question. Hon. Memhers may attempt to laugh it off, but the fact remains that they dare not get up and attempt to deny what I say, at any meeting in the great industrial centres where the victims of their policy have been condemned to spend a miserable existence. I hope we shall continue to fight inside and outside this House against this wage-smashing policy of Lord Weir and those who back him. I shall fight against steel houses for all that I am worth. I object to public authorities having foisted on them a type of house which is uneconomic in the extreme, which will put a burden on the authorities in the years to come—a type of house which has been rendered necessary only by the supineness of hon. Gentlemen opposite.
    Captain ELLIOT: After the whole-hearted and full-blooded denunciation of the last speaker, it is perhaps a little difficult to get back to the atmosphere in which I was urged by the junior Member for Dundee (Mr. Johnston) to conclude this Debate. I often wish that hon. Members from other nations would make themselves a little more acquainted with our Scottish conditions before exposing their ignorance before the whole House. It will make the Scottish Members so conceited that there will be no holding them thereafter. What the last speaker reproached us with was overhaste. He said, in effect, "Why this haste and hurry? Stop, look, listen!" Have we not spent enough time in talking about this question? Really, when an hon. Member opposite reproaches us with anything, I am willing to sit silent, except when he reproaches us with being too hasty in our action to remedy this evil. Then the hon. Member said, "You have not examined all the types of houses yet. There are other houses, mud and wattle,
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    splendid houses, lasting for 300 years. Let us not be hasty. Let us examine the possibility of mud and wattle. There is a great deal to be said for mud and wattle."
    Mr. WALLHEAD: Concrete is merely mud and water. You need not attempt to misrepresent me in the way that you are doing. I have no objection of course to the interplay of chaff between us, but I did not say, nor did I recommend, that houses should be built of mud and wattle in Scotland. I said that mud and wattle houses had lasted for 300years in Cheshire.
    Captain ELLIOT: I apologise to the hon. Member, but I still think that he falls under my second condemnation, that of making a speech which would leave all my colleagues from Scotland, and particularly those who sit on the opposite side of the House, so conceited that there will be no holding them thereafter. He said; "We English have lived for hundreds of years in mud and wattle; splendid cottages."
    Sir H. CROFT: Withdraw!
    Mr. WALLHEAD: I shall not withdraw.
    Captain ELLIOT: I understand the hon. Member does not withdraw his words. If I am not to make a speech such as has been made from the benches opposite by the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell), if I am not to keep a restraint upon myself in this Debate, if I am not to enliven it with an occasional joke, if I were to use all the words that come to my palate, I would be suspended from the House without a doubt. We are not going to indulge in mutual defamations across the Floor of the House. The conditions are difficult enough for us to consider them in a cool and reasonable temper. The problems before us are problems of the most tremendous importance to all sections of the community. The Debate was opened in temperate language by the Leader of the Opposition. It comes down to two claims, that Messrs. Weir have been favoured and that Messrs. Weir are engaged in an attack upon trade union conditions in this country. Let us examine those closely. The right hon.

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    Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition said that he could not understand why this large monopoly had been given to Lord Weir. Why should a contract of 1,000 houses be given to Lord Weir, 500 to Atholl, and 500 to Cowieson? The question was reiterated by several speakers on the other side of the Committee. Let us consider, first of all, that the Moir Committee, which was set up by the Labour Government itself, dealt primarily and wholly in its first Report with the Weir type alone. They said:
    "We have given some attention to other alternative systems, but we are not yet in a position to submit a detailed expression of opinion in regard to them."
    The right hon. Gentleman's own Committee found that the other methods of construction were not sufficiently advanced even for them to make an interim report.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: Date?
    Captain ELLIOT: The Committee was appointed on 10th September and reported on 4th November, 1924. Surely the right hon. Gentleman knows that a lead once established like that is not a thing which disappears suddenly. As the processes are perpetuated, as the demonstrations are further carried out, as the methods are examined, those who have come after the firstcomer into the field are still in the position of having several months delay before arriving at the position in which the Weir houses were in when this Report was made.
    Mr. MacDONALD: I think perhaps I would save time if I remind my hon. and gallant Friend that my objection to the distribution of the 1,000, 500 and 500 was not in respect of the type of house, but in respect of the disputed conditions under which the contract was to be carried out.
    Captain ELLIOT: We understand that the right hon. Gentleman does not quarrel with the decision of the Government in allotting a larger number of Weir houses; that he recognises, as we recognise, that the development of the Weir houses had gone further, that the experiment had been tested more thoroughly, that many scores of those houses had been put up for demonstration purposes throughout, the land as against single units or not
    1376
    more than dozens of the other types, and that all those things made it urgently necessary, if the Government were to take advantage of the development and extension work already done, that they should give the greatest order to the firm which had most thoroughly worked out the production and construction of this new type. The right hon. Gentleman says, "But the conditions under which these houses are being erected are such that they should do away with the advantage which is got from the greater experiment which has been carried out in this way. These houses offend against certain canons of the social structure of this country. They do not fulfil trade union conditions. The maker does not pay trade union rates or observe trade union conditions." On account of that I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman thinks Lord Weir should have some order or no order, but he thinks he should not have received this order for 1,000 against the other two. We must call evidence in support of our claim, which is that Lord Weir has observed trade union conditions and that he is paying trade union rates, that if he is not observing trade union rates and conditions he will not get the contracts of the National Housing Company.
    I will take the right hon. Gentleman himself and an Act, which he and his Government put on the Statute Book. I take the conditions there quoted as the conditions to be observed by housing contractors under the Act of 1924. In Section 3, Sub-section (I), paragraph (d) you will find that a Fair Wages Clause, which complies with the requirements of any Resolution of the House of Commons applicable to contracts of Government Departments and for the time being enforced, shall be inserted in all contracts for the construction of the houses. The right hon. Gentleman says if we accept trade union conditions let us have that. We accept that. That Clause will go into the contract that we are drawing with Messrs. Weir. This is the right hon. Gentleman's own Clause, his own provision, his own stipulation. We are making the firm that is contracting with us conform with the contract as laid before that firm for signature. Surely that disposes of a great many of the objections which have been urged from the benches opposite.

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    I have called a front bencher in evidence. It is not always, I understand, that the views of the Front Bench are taken as the pure, unadulterated milk of the word on both sides of the House. Let us call a back bencher, one who is supported by the mass of the party. Let us take the chairman of the party, the man democratically elected by the rank and file of the party. [HON. MEMBERS: "Who is he?"] Mr. Cramp, the chairman of the party. [An HON. MEMBER: "He is not a back bencher at all!"] Like Mohammed's coffin, he is suspended between Heaven and earth. Which is Heaven and which is earth, I will leave to hon. Members occupying both benches to decide. I am taking him because he is not subject to any suggestion of a suspicion of pressure from the deluding claims of office which are supposed so to warp the minds of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen.
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: We are anxious to know what back bencher you are referring to.
    Captain ELLIOT: His bench is so far back that he has not yet got into Parliament. Let us see what he says. He says quite clearly that the whole position was laid before them in a Debate lasting for many days, where the representatives of all the trade unions gave evidence, and more particularly the trade unions concerned most closely with the building industry. He says there that it was put clearly before him and he states the case in a word as clearly as could be done by any hon. or right hon. Gentleman opposite:
    "The operatives regard the Weir scheme as an attempt to undermine the Fair Wages Resolution of the House of Commons on which the Fair Wages Clauses of the local authorities are based, and to break down trade union rates and conditions which are at present thus safeguarded."
    On conditions of work, he says:
    "Any system of payment by results or piecework is opposed by the operatives, as in their view it is not appropriate to the building industry and leads to bad and scamped work."
    That shows he was clearly seized of the issues which were to be discussed by the Court of which he was a member. He comes to this conclusion:
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    "A comparison of this factory (a building trade factory) and of Messrs. Weir's factory at Cardonald leads us to the conclusion that Messrs. Weir's methods of manufacture are essentially different from the traditional methods of the building trade."
    He goes on to point out that
    "Just as in the development of many forms of mechanical engineering, the standardisation of house-parts by Messrs. Weir has reached a stage at which all that is required for the erection of the house is the assembly of standardised parts, prepared by mass production methods in the factory, of a character so simplified that there is no longer need to call for the skill of the craftsman."
    On the very point at issue, the question of payment by results—one of the points on which as the building trade representatives will agree, there is the most vital clash of opinion—this is what the chairman of the party went on to say:
    "Furthermore, there can be no doubt that payment by results—a recognised feature in the engineering industry—is peculiarly appropriate to the methods both of manufacture and assembly, followed by Messrs. Weir in house construction, and we are convinced that such a system, worked out in conjunction with the men's trade unions, will, if put into operation by Messrs. Weir, result in advantage both to the firm and to the men employed."
    [HON. MEMBERS: "Do you accept that?"] Undoubtedly; Lord Weir is a member of the federation of engineering firms, and if in any way he has contravened the regulations produced by collective bargaining, or the principles of collective bargaining, or the system of hours and wages which has been produced by collective bargaining, then obviously he is not in a position to remain a member of that federation, and he is not in a position to comply with the Fair Wages Clause laid down in the Government contract. I have called a Front Bench witness; I have called the Chairman of the party. These are the men on whose recommendation and with whose agreement the Government is going forward with this experiment. It is useless to recapitulate the many arguments on one side and the other which have been used this evening, but I am glad it is recognised that all parties in the House are anxious to remove the scandal which hangs over us in regard to the housing conditions in Glasgow and in Scotland generally. The controversy has been raised as between two-roomed and three-roomed houses, and we have

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    been subjected to many scarifications by hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, for permitting the production of two-roomed houses at present in Lanarkshire and surrounding counties. Not one of these houses has less than three rooms. They conform to the regulations desired by hon. Members opposite, and yet in spite of that hon. Members opposite actually propose to go into the Division Lobby and vote against this provision of further money for housing in Scotland. I cannot believe that any Member for a Scottish constituency will carry that intention into effect until I see him passing the clerks at the turnstile, and recording his name against the proposal.
    We regard the proposition which we are putting forward as a very moderate contribution towards the housing of the people of Scotland. We agree that 2,000 houses is a small contribution. There are already passed for construction something between 14,000 and 15,000 houses which we hope to finish this year, and of steel houses the number is from 1,000 to 1,200—and as many more as we can get. Not one in ten of the houses which it is proposed to build this year—which have been passed for this year—is of the steel method of construction. Ninety per cent. are to be built by the traditional methods. Only 10 per cent. are to be built by the new methods, and only half of that number are to be built by the particular method to which hon. and right hon. Members have taken exception this evening. Of the whole shortage of 100,000 to 150,000 houses, the suggested Government contribution does not amount to one in 50, and yet it is against the provision of one in 50 that hon. Members propose to go into the Lobby. It is against the provision of five per cent. of the year's construction that they propose to divide the Committee.
    They say they will do their best to defeat or delay the proposal, in spite of the fact that we have a Fair Wages Clause in the contract as embodied in the Act placed on the Statute Book by their own Government; in spite of the fact that we have a, building trade report showing that it will be 15 years before they can catch up to the present shortage; in spite of the fact that we have the Moir Committee Report, signed not merely by capitalists, but by Messrs. Coppock and Hicks, representing the building trade
    1380
    operatives, stating that they would like to put on record their appreciation of the services Lord Weir has rendered to housing, and his personal endeavour to help in solving this national problem: and in spite of the recommendation of Messrs. Coppock and Hicks that local authorities and others concerned in housing schemes ought to be encouraged to undertake voluntarily the production of houses of this type in sufficient numbers to enable the scheme to be tested.
    In spite of all these recommendations, in spite of the Report of the Building Trade Committee, in spite of the report of the Chairman of the Labour party. Mr. C. T. Cramp himself, who heard all the evidence which could be led on either side, hon. Gentlemen opposite still say they propose not merely to divide against the proposal, but to do their utmost to hang it up in the country when it comes to be put into operation. I cannot but believe that their bark is worse than their bite. I cannot believe that the Government will in fact encounter the opposition with which hon. Members have threatened us. Consider what it would mean. It would say to the building trade, "We shall go on building banks, and garages, and houses for the wealthy, piles of flats at Devonshire House, and palatial mansions on the outskirts of cities like Glasgow, but what we will not do is to build any more houses for the working class of this country." We have seen it in various ways before. In Mid-Lanark, that is what happened. The building of the great banks in Glasgow went on. The democratically elected local authority, in negotiation with the Scottish Under-Secretary for Health, under the aegis of the Socialist Government itself, placed an order with Messrs. Weir for houses under conditions which were not changed by Messrs. Weir between the time of the discussion and the placing of the order, and it was said that if these houses were to go on, work would be called off—
    Mr. BUCHANAN: Is it not a fact that the democratically elected authority, through their clerk, Mr. White, made an offer that while all the parts were to be made in the factory under conditions of any kind, without objection being raised, the building trade conditions should apply to the work of erection on the site, and was not that offer rejected?
    Captain ELLIOT—and the local authority, a democratically elected authority, signed a contract with Messrs. Weir for the erection of houses under conditions which are exactly the same as those objected to by hon. Members opposite this afternoon. They signed that contract—I happen to know this—and then, and not till then, was labour suspended, and the labour was suspended on the houses which would take people out of the dreadful slums in Mid-Lanark. These houses were of brick and stone—that was the scheme that was held up. No pressure was brought to bear on the capitalist section of the community. No, where the pressure was brought to bear was on the working-class houses which were being erected by a democratically elected authority in Mid-Lanarkshire.
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: If you inquire from the clerk to the Middle Ward his opinion of the steel houses that are being built, I think there would be a change at least in the picture you are attempting to paint to-night.
    Captain ELLIOT: It is not my practice when I want to find out anything about a structure that is being built to make inquiries from the clerk of the local council of the area in which the contract is being carried out. I went to see these houses for myself no longer ago than Friday of last week. I inspected these houses, I spoke to the housewives, and it is because of the knowledge gained in this way that I am going to recommend the Committee to proceed forthwith to vote mormy for more houses of the same type. We have had many instances given from one side and the other during this Debate. May I give two which I saw for myself? I saw two cases of families which had moved into these houses from a one-roomed house and from a two roomed house. They had possessed no hot water, no bath, no lavatory accommodation, and in many cases did not possess outside conveniences. They moved into a house of three rooms, with a bath and conveniences of their own. A separation of the sexes was able to be carried out. You had one family with two grown-up girls and two grown-up sons the husband and the wife, who had been living in two rooms. There was another house which was full of children. There were seven children and the man and his wife, and up to that time
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    they had been living in a single room at Benhar.
    Mr. D. GRAHAM: I know the district the hon. and gallant Member is speaking of very well. His description is correct, but what I want to know is whether he visited the steel houses that are being built in Harthill, and what is the position now that the Middle Ward of Lanarkshire has cut off all connection with them. I should also like to ask him whether he has received a booklet from the Scottish Coalowners' Association showing the houses that have been built by the mineowners during the last 10 years—and not a single steel house amongst them?
    Captain ELLIOT: I am always willing to give way to the hon. Member and to do my best to help Members in any way I can, but it is not possible for me to go down all the by-ways in this debate, and I am not going to be drawn into a discussion about about the booklet issued by the Scottish Coalowners' Association. At the same time I am delighted to hear the hon. Member, who is not always so friendly disposed towards booklets issued by the Coal-owners' Association, recommending it to the attention of Members of this House. It seems that the "Locarno spirit" is spreading. I did see the houses that are being built at Harthill, and I do not understand what the hon. Member means by saying that the Middle Ward has struck off all connection. I saw houses being built, and when I was there I was told that six new families were just going in, that the pressure was so great that, there was the greatest difficulty in apportioning the houses properly, and that many were actually taking in lodgers.
    I think I have proved the case I set out to prove. I do not believe, in the face of the overwhelming weight of evidence, that hon. Members opposite can, as a party, go into the Lobby against this Vote. The only thing that remains is this underlying current of suspicion which has been referred to by so many hon. Members during the course of the discussion. It is the suspicion that this is an attempt to break the wages of the building trade. We say that there is no such intention in the mind of the Government; that the safeguards which

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    were laid down by the Labour Government itself against an attempt to break wages will be embodied in any contract we enter into with any contractors under this scheme, be it Lord Weir or anybody else. These proposals are not 10 per cent. of the building programme we have sanctioned and authorised for brick houses this year, and they are not 2 per cent. of the total shortage that is needed over the whole of Scotland. When I spoke to the tenant of one of these houses as to what she thought of it, she used the highest encomium a Scottish woman can use about anything. She said: "We canna' complain." The only thing I have to say is that I think we have been too patient; we have waited too long, the delay has been too great, we have not pressed on with sufficient speed. If we delay now by one week, or even one day, in an attempt to speed up the programme, then, indeed, the housewives of Scotland would have cause to complain. It is our intention that they shall not have cause to complain again.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: Would the Committee mind if I occupied a minute or two? I will raise no new points, but with reference to this question of the Fair Wages Clause, I do not think it can be left where it is. I am delighted at the Moir Committee's Report. I am very proud, indeed, we were associated with it. It shows a "Locarno spirit" before Locarno, and if hon. Members would read the various reports in addition to the Moir Report that were drafted and signed in those days, they would discover in every one of them a very strong desire to pull together in order to produce houses. That is my desire now. It is quite true the Government now propose to embody that Clause of the 1924 Act in its contract with Messrs. Weir, the Duke of Atholl and the others. My hon. and gallant Friend knows perfectly well that that does not mean anything, Everybody who has dealt with the Fair Wages Clause knows that every now and again there are very intricate questions of interpretation, and again and again the matter has been raised in this House. It is no matter of party politics.
    Ever since I have been in this House we have had points under this Clause that have had to be raised and discussed
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    here. Why do I say that so far as the Weir houses are concerned, and only in respect of them, this Clause requires interpretation? I say it for a reason which, I believe, the hon. Member knows perfectly well. That Clause came before the Glasgow Town Council. It was not interpreted by the Glasgow Town Council or by a party committee or a party section of the town council. It was referred to the Glasgow Town Clerk, so that he might give a definition and interpretation in relation to the proposed contract, and he gave it as his opinion that the conditions under which the mobilisation of the Weir material took place were not in accordance with the 1924 Act.
    Captain ELLIOT: I understand, and I think it is within the knowledge of my colleagues, that what the Clerk of the Glasgow Town Council was asked to interpret was the Fair Wages Clause in the Glasgow Corporation bye-laws, which he did, and the Glasgow Corporation subsequently modified their bye-laws, bringing them into what they considered was a closer co-relation with the Government Fair Wages Clause. But the Government Fair Wages Clause was never in dispute. The town clerk gave no opinion upon it. What the town clerk interpreted, very properly and rightly, was the question referred to him as to whether the proposed construction was within the terms of the bye-laws of the corporation. He gave his opinion, and there was no question of the Glasgow Corporaton asking for any opinion as to the meaning of the Fair Wages Clause.
    10.0 P.M.
    Mr. MacDONALD: Neither my hon. and gallant Friend nor myself will have time to deal with this further. The standing orders of the Glasgow Town Council were subsequently strengthened in the direction of the 1924 Act. They contributed to the rejection of this particular form of contract, because it was outside their scope. There is this other point. The fact remains—and I do not think the hon. Gentleman will contradict it—that the conditions under which this particular part of the work is being done have never yet been co-related to the Fair Wages Clause. It is a new venture; it is a new experiment. Do not the Government think it worth while to try and get this settled, and get the relation

    1385
    established between them, not by saying, "This is our decision," but by agreement? There can be no interpretation of that Clause in relation to this specific point, except by agreement. Do not the Government think it worth while to employ all the influence they can command either of themselves or of others to get that settlement made, so that the work can be carried on without any continued dispute, whether it is a bark or a bite. I want neither the bark nor the bite.
    The second point is this. My hon. Friend said Lord Weir is an engineer, has engineer employés, and is a member of The Masters' Fedeeation, and, therefore, his wages must be trade union wages under the Fair Wages Clause. He knows enough about trade union methods, and trade union contracts with employers, to know that what I am going to say is quite true. If you work under a trade union agreement, say on piece-work, your piece-work is specified in a schedule which is the subject of a signed agreement, and if he or I were to employ men under those conditions, and wished to vary it, we could not without going to the representative authority that had sanctioned the establishment of the rate. Where is Lord Weir's specification and list of prices? Is it really too much to ask that that should be put on paper and settled? If this is going to be an engineering affair, I do not know whether it will satisfy, but in any event let it be settled; and if it is going to be an engineering agreement, it must be an agreement with the engineering union. Is there such an agreement? Has any attempt been made to make such an agreement? I hope hon. Members will not go away and say we are holding up the contract. Nothing of the kind.
    Everyone knows perfectly well that the questions I am now putting are touching the difficulties at every point, and that these questions ought to be answered. If any hon. Member of this House started business to-morrow and took on engineers as trade unionists, and was a member of the Masters' Federation, he would require to settle those points, or to ask how those points had been settled definitely and specifically before he engaged a single man. What is the objection? This is a new job, we all know. Why is it going to be kept in a position of the rates and
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    all the conditions being dependent solely on one man's will—a good man or a bad man makes no difference to me. There is going to be a Report stage. I am certainly not going to vote against this to-night. I never intended to. I shall not vote against it. Between this and the Report stage there is surely time to get this matter straightened out, so that when this money finally leaves our control, it will leave our control on a guarantee that it will be spent as the House of Commons again and again have decided ever since 1886, I think it was, when under Lord Buxton the Fair Wages Resolution was carried. The money when it leaves our control will then be spent—and we shall have a guarantee that it will be spent—under conditions that the House of Commons again and again and again has imposed upon various Governments.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: May I ask one question, and it is a simple and plain question which will solve the whole problem? I want to ask if you are prepared to give a guarantee that Lord Weir will not get an order for the building of these houses unless he is prepared to comply with the building industries regulations? I do not wish to pass any strictures on him but just want to bring him into line with the Duke of Atholl and the rest of the competitors, and to get that guarantee of a Fair Wages Clause.
    Mr. BUCHANAN: I should like to ask two or three questions of the Under-Secretary who, I hope, will be able to reply to them. I regret I was unable to be present at the beginning of his speech as I heard all the lebate and he rose just after I had left and I was a little late in getting back. There are one or two points which ought to be subjects of interest to certain Members from Scotland. I heard beautiful speeches, not for the first time, from a Member on these benches telling us how many of the slum people who will occupy these houses. Representing a constituency with one of the worst housing conditions in Scotland, I want to ask two or three questions.
    It is said that the slum people are going to occupy these houses. The question I want to ask is what is the rent at which these steel houses are going to be let?
    I have here the minutes of the Middle Ward of Lanarkshire which first negotiated the contract under the Labour Government

    1387
    in 1924. The price at which Lord Weir had offered to carry out the construction of the houses was £400, and after considerable negotiations, as the Secretary of State for Scotland will admit, that figure was reduced to £375 for the first hundred, with an option of the second hundred at £350. Taking the first figure of £375, which neither includes roads nor sewers or other works, and adding the ordinary charges that one would add, the net cost of the house will work out at something like £462. The rent of that, taking it at 60 years, which is the equivalent of a brick house, with all the reductions for subsidies, £9 under the Wheatley Act and £4 10s. from the local authorities, the rent is £24 1s. 8d.
    I want to ask the hon. Member for Paisley (Mr. R. Mitchell) how many of the slum-dwellers in Kelvingrove who work at the docks can pay £24 1s. 8d. and rates on the top of that on their earnings at the present time? It is a fanciful tale, this tale of steel dwellings for the working people. It is wrong. It is misleading; it is untrue, and it is unfair. I have lived in a tenement dwelling in Glasgow. My house is let under the Addison Act. The rent is £26 10s. Adding rates, it cost me in light, rates and coal, under the barest circumstances possible, £1 per week, and the average engineer labourer's wages in the engineering works of the constituency of the Under-Secretary for Health is 39s. 3d. per week. How can they pay it?
    The Moir Committee, of which we have heard so much, and it was a neutral Committee accepted by both sides of the House, took the length of these houses at 40 years. Working it out. on that basis, the rent of the steel house is going to cost £27 10s. per annum and then you have rates. How can you get that from your slum-dweller? You can build houses from this to the end of time but unless you can bring up the income of the persons who are going to occupy them to the standard of the rents, you are adding insult to injury. Let me give an illustration of the rent collected in Glasgow and Lanark from the slum-dweller. Then rent of the slum-dwellers is much less than the rent for the steel houses. What do you find? The rent charged under the slum clearance scheme only amounts to 9s. or 10s. a week
    1388
    including rates and even with that much smaller rent the people are finding the greatest difficulty to meet that rent. I want to suggest to the Secretary of State for Scotland that one of the first problems he ought to face is this question of rent, that these houses are going to be let at. It is no use the hon. Member for Paisley arguing—and in this connection when I hear him argue for a scheme of payment by results, it makes me think about Satan rebuking sin. Of all the men of the party he has been a moralist and purist. I have often played cards for pennies and twopennies but he has always been an anti-gambler and on a high moral standard.
    There are only two other such Members who come here, the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Serymgeour) and the hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Barr), and both are quite sincere, but when the hon. Member for Paisley comes along to ask men to go on payment by results, he must remember that the man who enters on earning by payment by results is entering on a gamble as to the amount of wages he will be earning per week. When the hon. Member condemns gambling in private life, he ought not to encourage men to earn their income by gambling. I worked at it for years, and it is a deplorable thing when we hear so much about family life, for let me illustrate the effects. Here is an hon. Member who knows possibly more than anybody about payment by results. What is the effect? The woman never knows the man's income, or very seldom, and the result is, it does not make for harmony in home life.
    My main purpose was to get an answer. [Interruption.] If I had been speaking with the hon. Member for Paisley backing me up, you would have been cheering. The question I want to ask the Under-Secretary is, what is the rent it is intended to charge for these houses? Is it to be a rent sufficient for a slum dweller? He tells us he is anxious about that! Is it to be a rent that the slum dweller can pay? That is the question I wish to impress upon the hon. Gentleman. If the rent is not within their ability to pay then the talk about the building trade holding up the slum dweller is not to the point. I should like the Under-Secretary just to tell us how it is proposed to work out what these houses are to pay?
    Captain ELLIOT: I have been asked a number of questions to which I shall endeavour to reply. The right hon. Gentleman opposite again submitted to me a point as to the interpretation of our original scheme, and whether an interpretation was asked for on the part of the Government as to the Fair Wages Clause of the Glasgow Corporation. I have consulted my officials, and from all the information I can get I stick to what I originally said: that the interpretation was the interpretation of the Corporation by-laws, and not the interpretation of the Government Clause.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: Is the Government Clause stronger than the Glasgow Corporation by-laws, as interpreted?
    Captain ELLIOT: It is a little difficult to quote offhand, not merely the Statutes of the Government, but the by-laws of great municipal authorities. I think, however, I may say the Corporation Clause went further than the Government Clause, and that it was subsequently modified so as to bring it more into co-relation to the Statute which the right hon. Gentleman's Government placed upon the Statute Book.
    Mr. MacDONALD: That does not answer the query.
    Captain ELLIOT: The other question which the right hon. Gentleman asked I think was in relation to piecework. All one can say as to that is, if we are to begin a discussion of piecework at all, has the right hon. Gentleman consulted the hon. Members behind him? Do we understand now that the Labour party is officially prepared to agree to piecework on these houses, and that he wants to discuss the rate at which piecework is to be paid?
    Mr. MacDONALD: With all respect, that is evading the issue. Lord Weir works by piecework. Whatever may be said of that piecework, as to its merits or demerits, as a matter of fact it is not in accordance with the Fair Wages Clause because it is not the agreed piecework rate. All I asked my hon. Friend was, when he said that piecework was to be worked, is that piecework subjected to the terms necessary to bring it under the Fair Wages Clause?
    Captain ELLIOT: My definition of the position does not exactly square with that of the right hon. Gentleman, and I hesitate to come into conflict with him. But my information is quite definitely that the suggestion is wrong; that piecework in the engineering is not fixed by the trade unions concerned; that piecework, on the contrary, is fixed in the individual shops, and is a matter of arrangement between the foremen and the men or their representatives. That is the general practice. However, on all these highly technical matters I do not wish to come into conflict with hon. and right hon. Members opposite. That is my information, that is what I understand. The only other point was one raised by the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) who asked me repeatedly—
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: What about my question?
    Captain ELLIOT: I understand the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs (Mr. Kirkwood) put a question to the Secretary of State for Scotland. Far be it from me to interfere between the hon. Member and the Secretary of State for Scotland. If it is supposed that, on a casual question, even from the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs, we are going to abandon the Moir Report, the Bradbury Report, the Chairman of the Labour party, the Prime Minister, the Secretary of State for Scotland and the whole of the Unionist party during this Debate, the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs is making a great mistake.
    Mr. KIRKWOOD: You know the whole thing hinges on that question.
    Captain ELLIOT: One last question was put to me by the hon. Member for Gorbals. This shall be my last word, for I am afraid we have taken up a great deal of the time of the House. The hon. Member asked what was the rent of these houses, what rents were to be paid, and poured scorn upon the suggested rents of houses in Mid-Lanark, which, he said, would work out at £22 or £28 a year, or some rent which was beyond the power of slum dwellers to pay. Let me give him only this personal information, which I derived no longer ago than last Friday by asking housewives in these houses what was the rent they were actually paying. They were actually paying for these

    1391
    houses rent of 5s. and 6s. per week, and that is a rent well within their power. All I can say as to the general question of the rent is that, of course, these houses will be let at rents comparable with those of similar houses in the vicinity in which the houses are built.
    Question put, and agreed to.

    POLICE, SCOTLAND.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £47,100, 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, 1926, for Grants in respect of Police Expenditure and for a Grant in Aid of the Police Federation in Scotland."
    Mr. BUCHANAN: May we have a brief explanation of this Vote?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: This is a Supplementary Vote for grants in respect of police expenditure and for a grant-in-aid of the Police Federation in Scotland. It provides for the abolition of certain deductions which used to be made from police pay, and it is carrying out a recommendation contained in the report of a committee which considered this subject in June, 1925. That is why we are asking for this additional grant.
    Mr. BUCHANAN: I understand that a certain proportion of this money has to be paid by the local authorities, and I would like to know whether the Secretary of State for Scotland has received any protests from local authorities against this proposal?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: The share that is borne by the local authorities was a matter of discussion with the local authorities, but it is in the main agreed.
    Mr. N. MACLEAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman explain what the anticipated saving in regard to the Police Federation means, and where the saving is to be effected? It is only £50, but I think it is just as well that the Committee should know exactly how it arises.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: This is merely a small sum which it is anticipated will not be required for the purpose for which it was voted.
    Mr. MACLEAN: We have an inquiry going on in Scotland now with regard to certain things which are alleged to have been done, and there are other places in Scotland, and in England as well, where certain allegations are being made against individuals that they have abused their rank in the police force to try to keep constables from accepting the usual offices in the Police Federation. I want to know exactly what this is. It is evident, from what the right hon. Gentleman has said, that he does not know what this amount was for, or how this saving is going to be effected. All that he knows is that it is £50, but that is no more and no less than the rest of the Committee knows, and the Committee is entitled to some explanation as to why this saving is being effected.
    Captain GARRO-JONES: I do not know whether many hon. Members realise that we are voting a sum of £47,000, and an attempt has been made to get it through without a word of explanation or discussion. It might be asked what right an English, or, indeed, a London Member cif Parliament has to raise questions on the Scottish Estimates. The only right he has is that he represents a number of people who are paying their share of the money.
    Mr. MACLEAN: No; that is not so. Figures were submitted to the House only a week ago showing that Scotland was paying more than its just proportion of the national expenditure.
    Captain GARRO-JONES: I am afraid I should not be in order in entering upon a subject so large or so humorous, and I should not have the wit to reply to the hon. Member in any case. I wish to ask the Secretary of State for Scotland one or two questions about this sum. On being requested to do so, he rose to give an explanation of the £47,000, but I observed that the only sum about which he offered any explanation was a sum of £16,000. He explained very carefully the deductions from the rent allowances paid to the police, in accordance with the terms of the Report of the Committee of Temporary Deductions from Police Pay, and the additional amounts payable during the current year on this account are estimated to amount to £16,000. But we are voting £47,100. Might we have some

    1393
    little explanation about the larger remainder, as to which the right hon. Gentleman said nothing?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It is quite true that there is a sum of £16,000 in respect of the deductions to which I have referred. As to the remainder of £31,000, a sum of £25,000, for which we estimated, was cut out by the Treasury, but now it is found to be essential. There was also another estimate by the Police Authorities, amounting to £3,000, and compensation for loss of Income Tax, which is now wiped out. All together that makes a total of £31,000. I would only add, with regard to the £50, that I understand the total amount allotted to the Police Federation was £250. It is solely due to the fact that the Police Federation did not require the remaining 250, and not for any private reason, that that sum is shown as a saving.
    Mr. MACLEAN: That brings out my point. Is that saving being effected by the attitude taken up by the chief constables in some places, of preventing police constables from accepting office in the local branches of the Police Federation, thereby making the local branch in question inoperative, and consequently costing no money?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: It has nothing whatever to do with anything of that sort.
    Mr. LANSBURY: I beg to move to reduce the Vote by £100.
    I do so as a protest against taking further Votes at the fag-end of a Debate which we imagined would last till Eleven o'clock. I remember hearing the Prime Minister yesterday or the day before saying it was proposed to devote the whole of this evening to one Scottish Estimate.
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I must protest. These Votes were definitely put down, and have been on the Paper.
    Mr. LANSBURY: They may have been on the Paper, and you may protest, but I also sat here and listened to the Prime Minister, and it was given out the other day that we were going to discuss the Housing Estimates, and I think most of us took it for granted that that discussion would probably go to 11 o'clock. I know it is a very aggravating thing to the Lord Advocate to have to sit here and listen
    1394
    to us, but he has to earn his salary somehow, and part of earning his salary is listening to us. I have no doubt it is very disgusting, but if he sat on this side he would probably be doing what I am doing, though I am doing it worse. I listened to the Secretary of State for Scotland and I am as wise as when he made his first few remarks. I do not know what this £47,000 is for. I should like this Government of economy to tell me why it is that you have found £47,000 more to spend on the police. I understood Scotland was more peaceable than ever and that there is less need for police than for very many years past. At the bottom there is this footnote. I should like someone not acquainted with the Scottish Office to tell me what it means—someone who is going to vote for this:
    "The total approved estimated expenditure of the police authorities in respect of which grant is payable in the year ending 31st March, 1926, has proved larger than was anticipated, and has been further increased by the discontinuance since 1st August, 1925, of the deductions from the rent allowances paid to the police, in accordance with the terms of the Report of the Committee on Temporary Deductions from Police Pay (Cmd. 2444). The additional grants payable in the current year on the latter account are estimated to amount to £16,000."
    £16,000 from £47,000 leaves £31,000. What I really want to get at is what is the relationship between the additional grants payable in the current year on the latter account—will someone tell me what the latter account is—and the £47,000. It is so much Dutch to me. It seems to me that Scotland spends a lot of money on the police. The original Estimate was £765,000 and now you put on £47,000. No one has told us what the £47,000 is for [Interruption.] You may think you know, but the only people who know are those on the front bench.
    I have now got the Command Paper on which this Estimate is based. I will read the paragraph that deals with these deductions. A Report was made by Lord Lee, Mr. W. Anderson, Lieut.-Colonel Anson, Constable Branthwaite, Mr. Cattell, Constable Cowie, Mr. McCraig, Lord Deramore, Mr. A. L. Dixon, Lieut. Duncan, Mr. Walter Hogg, Sir H. Keith, Mr. Moylan, Mr. G. Strangeways—he must be a member of this Government—Mr. Turner, Inspector Webster, and Superintendent Woodeson.

    1395
    They were the Committee, and they were set up to inquire into the question of
    "a continuance of the deductions from police pay and allowances, and in the alternative the suggestion that the rateable deductions in respect of police pensions under the Police Pensions Act, 1921, should be increased, and to report upon that suggestion and upon any connected questions that may arise in the course of their deliberations."
    I cannot say what the evidence was. I suppose the evidence has not been printed. Apparently these gentlemen only met on three days. They had sessions morning and afternoon. It is an extraordinary thing to find this sum of £47,000 being voted, although the Committee did not take any oral evidence. I do not think it is the proper way for a committee to go about its work, not to have witnesses before it. I am not giving any money away to Scotland. I have great respect for my Scottish colleagues, but I am not giving them anything. A Scotsman does not, require anything to be given to him, because he takes care to take it. Here is the paragraph that deals with these deductions in respect of police pay and allowances. I hope the Committee will take notice. The Report says:
    "The deductions which are the subject of our inquiry are (a) the deductions from rent allowances (with corresponding charges for quarters)."
    What does "quarters" mean?[Laughter!] Hon. Members are amused. You can have quarters on your coat-of-arms. I do not understand what "quarters" means in this connection. [HON. MEMBERS: "Barracks!"]
    Mr. ALBERY: On a point of Order. I cannot understand what the hon. Member is talking about.
    The CHAIRMAN: That is hardly a point of Order. It depends upon him who speaks and him who hears. Either or both may be at fault.
    Mr. LANSBURY: I have just came from a very big meeting, where I have been trying to do the Government a bit of good. My voice may not be as good as it ought to be. Perhaps the hon. Member will allow me to remind him that I was calling attention to the Report upon which this Estimate is based. I am calling attention to it, because no one on the Government
    1396
    Bench has told us anything about the Estimate. Either the Secretary of State for Scotland tried to tell us but did not know sufficient about the subject, or he would have told us something that we could understand. I want to find out what this £47,000 is all about. The Committee, as I have said, met on three occasions for three whole days. They tell us:
    "The deductions which are the subject of our inquiry are (a) the deductions from rent allowances (with corresponding charges for quarters) at the rate of 3s. 6d. weekly for constables in England, and 2s. 3d. weekly for constables in Scotland, with higher rates for the higher ranks in each case."
    I do not think that: that ought to be possible. There is great inequality as between Scotland and England, and this is another injustice for my hon. Friends from Scotland to complain about. The Report goes on:
    "(b) Supplementary deductions from pay at the rate of 2½ per cent. applicable to all ranks, which were introduced in 1922 as part of the measures taken by the Government to secure certain reductions in police expenditure recommended by the Geddes Committee."
    Mark that what they are doing now is exactly what I charge them with doing in other respects. One year they apply the Geddes axe, and in a year or two they repeat the whole offence. What is the good of having a great expert like Sir Eric Geddes, a grant wielding an axe, and then in a couple of years time putting the tree up again? As a matter of fact, the Geddes Committee did get this thing put on a certain footing, and the Government of the day took great credit to itself for reducing expenditure. Now, apparently, the Government intend to do exactly what Sir Eric Geddes said ought not to be done. I expect that that is how all the economy stunts will run; you will cut down one year, and put the expenditure up in another, whenever you are dealing with this kind of person. We are now told that we must cut down unemployment relief and education. But when it comes to the police we can go back, as it were, and undo the good work of the Geddes axe. That in itself is sufficient to warrant the passing of my Amendment.
    These economies, we are told, were imposed with the assent of the respective Police Councils for England and Scotland.

    1397
    I do not know what Police Councils they mean, whether they mean the Watch Committees or the Police Commissioners of London. I did not know that we had Police Councils for England and Wales and Scotland. Perhaps the Secretary for Scotland will tell us what this means. My point is that these Councils were consulted in 1922–23,
    "and it was accordingly provided in the respective Regulations that they should cease to apply as from the 31st March, 1923, to the English forces, and as from the 30th April, 1923, to the Scottish forces, unless renewed by further Regulations."
    That is only three years ago. Only two years ago you altered this business, and what I want to know from the Secretary of State for Scotland or the Lord Advocate—and if the Home Secretary were here I would like to ask him—is: Is this payment to the police the price you are going to pay for what you hope the police will do for you in May next? Is this part of the preparations for what you think will be a very difficult time? If not, will somebody tell me why you have changed your mind in two years? When we want more money in this House for certain services, we are told we cannot afford it. Last night when an hon. Member for Lancashire was speaking about the sheltered workmen and what the unsheltered workmen had to pay, you were almost lyrical in your cheers when he was telling you of the burdens that the producing workers had to bear. Yet here you are going within two years of an alteration to replace the burden on the very people that the hon. Member was asking you to safeguard last night. Nobody has given us a word of explanation. I have gained nothing from this document which warrants the money being paid.
    Mr. DENNIS HERBERT: You have gained a quarter of an hour.
    Mr. LANSBURY: Whether I have gained a quarter of an hour or not, the hon. Member for Watford, where the brewery is, and the hon. Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) have often made speeches on economy, and I would like one or other to explain why this money should be voted. There is nothing in this Report that gives any reason whatsoever, unless it is the very sinister reason I suggested a moment ago. This was only in 1923. The Committee go on to say they
    1398
    have been continued by further Regulations for the years 1923–24 and 1925. That shows that the matter has been considered in the past right up to the present moment.
    I hope the right hon. Gentleman will tell me what these police councils consist of. I am speaking in the hearing of lots of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen who have had to do with burgh and town councils and works' committees, and I venture to say none of them had heard of this police council till now. I would like to know who they are, what they are, and how they are constituted. These councils have been discussing this matter and have revealed an increasingly strong cleavage of opinion as between representatives of the police authorities, on the one hand and the police forces on the other. I suppose the representatives of the police forces are men who represent the policemen, and somebody represents the officials and the authorities. Are the police authorities the Police Council? [HON. MEMBERS: "Ask a policeman!"] No, I propose to ask the the Secretary of State for Scotland. Further in this Report I find:
    "When the matter came before the Police Councils for England and Scotland which met this year, the representatives of all ranks of the police"—
    that includes inspectors, sub-inspectors, superintendents, sergeants and constables—
    "pressed for the immediate discontinuance of all deductions, while the representatives of police authorities"—
    Sir J. GILMOUR rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
    Question put, "That the Question be now put."
    The Committee proceeded to a Division.
    Mr. BUCHANAN(seated and covered): On a point point of Order. Did you consider, Sir, in accepting the Motion for the Closure that no Scottish Member except myself has had any opportunity of speaking on this matter? I myself put two questions to the Secretary of State for Scotland, and I have had no reply. Is it in order to take the Closure without allowing Scottish Members to speak on an important Scottish Estimate?
    The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) was at fault in allowing a Southron to be the only Member to rise. [HON. MEMBRES: "You called him!"]
    Mr. BUCHANAN: I asked for certain information arising out of this Estimate, and I had no idea that any Southron was
    going to take part in the Debate I ask you if you will reconsider your acceptance of the Motion for the Closure in order to allow a reply to be made on the points raised.
    The Committee, divided: Ayes, 203; Noes, 68.

    Division No.14.]

    AYES.

    [10.57 p.m.

    Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel

    Gilmour, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Nall, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Joseph

    Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir James T.

    Glyn, Major R. G. C.

    Nelson, Sir Frank

    Albery, Irving James

    Golf, Sir Park

    Nuttall, Ellis

    Alexander, E. E. (Leyton)

    Gower, Sir Robert

    Oakley, T.

    Allen, J. Sandeman (L'pool, W. Derby)

    Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.

    O'Neill, Major Rt. Hon. Hugh

    Amery, Rt. Hon. Leopold C. M. S.

    Greene, W. P. Crawford

    Pennefather, Sir John

    Atholl, Duchess of

    Gretton, Colonel John

    Penny, Frederick George

    Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley

    Grotrian, H. Brent

    Perkins, Colonel E. K.

    Balfour, George (Hampstead)

    Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.

    Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)

    Balniel, Lord

    Gunston, Captain D. W.

    Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)

    Barclay-Harvey, C. M.

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

    Philipson, Mabel

    Barnston, Major Sir Harry

    Hanbury, C.

    Pleiou, D. P.

    Betterton, Henry B.

    Harland, A.

    Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton

    Blundell, F. N.

    Harrison, G. J. C.

    Price, Major C. W. M.

    Bourne, Captain Robert Croft.

    Hartington, Marquess of

    Radford, E. A.

    Bowyer, Captain G. E. W.

    Henderson, Capt. R. R. (Oxf'd, Henley)

    Raine, W.

    Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive

    Henderson, Lieut-Col. V. L. (Bootle)

    Reid, Capt. A. S. C. (Warrington)

    Briscoe, Richard George

    Henn, Sir Sydney H.

    Reid, D. D. (County Down)

    Brocklebank, C. E. R.

    Hennessy, Major J. R. G.

    Rentoul, G. S.

    Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.

    Herbert, Dennis (Hertford, Watford)

    Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)

    Broun-Lindsay, Major H.

    Herbert, S. (York, N. R., Scar. & Wh'by)

    Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)

    Bullock, Captain M.

    Hills, Major John Walter

    Ropner, Major L.

    Burman, J. B.

    Hoare, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir S. J. G.

    Ruggles-Brise, Major E. A.

    Burton, Colonel H. W.

    Hogg, Rt. Hon. Sir D. (St. Marylebone)

    Rye, F. G.

    Butt, Sir Alfred

    Holland, Sir Arthur

    Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)

    Cadogan, Major Hon. Edward

    Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)

    Sandeman, A. Stewart

    Cazalet, Captain Victor A.

    Hopkinson, A. (Lancaster, Mossley)

    Sanders, Sir Robert A.

    Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir Evelyn (Aston)

    Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)

    Sandon, Lord

    Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton

    Huntingfield, Lord

    Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W.R., Sowerby)

    Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. N. (Ladywood)

    Iliffe, Sir Edward M.

    Shepperson, E. W.

    Christie, J. A.

    Inskip, Sir Thomas Walker H.

    Simms, Dr. John M. (Co. Down)

    Churchman, Sir Arthur C.

    Jackson, Sir H. (Wandsworth, Cen'l)

    Skelton, A. N.

    Clarry, Reginald George

    Jephcott, A. R.

    Slaney, Major P. Kenyon

    Cobb, Sir Cyril

    Kennedy, A. R. (Preston)

    Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dine, C.)

    Cookerill, Brigadier-General G. K.

    Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)

    Smithers, Waldron

    Colfox, Major Wm. Phillips

    Kindersley, Major G. M.

    Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)

    Conway, Sir W. Martin

    King, Captain Henry Douglas

    Sprot, Sir Alexander

    Cooper, A. Duff

    Lamb, J. Q.

    Stanley, Col. Hon, G. F. (Will'sden, E.)

    Cope, Major William

    Lane Fox, Col. Rt. Hon. George R.

    Stanley, Lord (Fylde)

    Cowan, Sir Wm. Henry (Islington, N.)

    Lister, Cunliffe, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip

    Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)

    Craig, Capt. Rt. Hon. C. C. (Antrim)

    Lloyd, Cyril E. (Dudley)

    Steel, Major Samuel Strang

    Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.

    Loder, J. de V.

    Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.

    Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)

    Lucas Tooth, Sir Hugh Vere

    Strealfeild Captain S. R.

    Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Gainsbro)

    Lumley, L. R.

    Thom, Lt-Col. J. G. (Dumbarton)

    Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert

    MacAndrew, Charles Glen

    Thompson Luke (Sunderland)

    Dalkeith, Earl of

    Macdonald, Sir Murdoch (Inverness)

    Titchfield, Major the Marquess of

    Dalziel, Sir Davison

    Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)

    Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement

    Davidson, J. (Hertf'd, Hemel Hempst'd)

    Macdonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)

    Wallace, Captain D. E.

    Davies, Dr. Vernon

    McDonnell, Colonel Hon. Angus

    Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.

    Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)

    MacIntyre, Ian

    Waterhouse, Captain Charles

    Dawson, Sir Philip

    McLean, Major A.

    Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)

    Dean, Arthur Wellesley

    Macnaghten, Hon. Sir Malcolm

    Watts, Dr. T.

    Dixon, Captain Rt. Hon. Herbert

    McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John

    Wells, S. R.

    Eden, Captain Anthony

    Macquisten, F. A.

    Wheler, Major Sir Granville C. H.

    Edmondson, Major A. J.

    Maitland, Sir Arthur D. Steel.

    White, Lieut.-Colonel G. Dalrymple

    Elliot, Captain Walter E.

    Makins, Brigadier-General E.

    Wiggins, William Martin

    England, Colonel A.

    Malone, Major P. B.

    Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)

    Erskine, Lord (Somerset, Weston-s.-.M.)

    Margesson, Captain D.

    Williams, Herbert G. (Reading)

    Everard, W. Lindsay

    Marriott, Sir J. A. R.

    Wilson, R. R. (Stafford, Lichfield)

    Fairfax, Captain J. G.

    Mason, Lieut.-Col. Glyn K.

    Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George

    Fanshawe, Commander G. D.

    Merriman, F. B.

    Wise, Sir Fredric

    Fermoy, Lord

    Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)

    Wood, E. (Chester, Stalyb'ge & Hyde)

    Fielden, E. B.

    Molos, Thomas

    Wood, Sir Kingsley (Woolwich, W.)

    Finburgh, S.

    Moore, Lieut.-Colonel T. C. R. (Ayr)

    Wragg, Herbert

    Forrest, W.

    Moore, Sir Newton J.

    Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.

    Fraser, Captain Ian

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

    Fremantle, Lieut. - Colonel Francis E.

    Moreing, Captain A. H.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Gee, Captain R.

    Morrison-Bell, Sir Arthur Clive

    Mr. F. C. Thomson and Captain

    Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon, George Abraham

    Murchison, C. K.

    Viscount Curzon.

    NOES.

    Alexander, A. V. (Sheffield, Hillsbro')

    Hardie, George D.

    Saklatvala, Shapurji

    Baker, Walter

    Hayday, Arthur

    Scrymgeour, E.

    Barnes, A.

    Hayes, John Henry

    Scurr, John

    Barr, J.

    Henderson, T. (Glasgow)

    Sexton, James

    Batey, Joseph

    Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)

    Shiels, Dr. Drummond

    Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)

    Hore-Belisha, Leslie

    Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)

    Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.

    Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)

    Sitch, Charles H.

    Bromfield, William

    Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)

    Stephen, Campbell

    Buchanan, G.

    Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)

    Sutton, J. E.

    Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel

    Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)

    Taylor, R. A.

    Cape, Thomas

    Kelly, W. T.

    Thurtle, E.

    Clowes, S.

    Kenworthy, Lt.-Com. Hon. Joseph M.

    Tinker, John Joseph

    Compton, Joseph

    Kirkwood, D.

    Townend, A. E.

    Crawford, H. E.

    Lansbury, George

    Varley, Frank B.

    Duncan, C.

    Lawson, John James

    Viant, S. P.

    Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

    Lunn, William

    Watts-Morgan, Lt.-Col. D. (Rhondda)

    Evans, Capt. Ernest (Welsh Univer.)

    Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)

    Welsh, J. C.

    Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.

    MacNeill-Weir, L.

    Wilkinson, Ellen C.

    Gillett, George M.

    Maxton, James

    Windsor, Walter

    Gosling, Harry

    Potts, John S.

    Wright, W.

    Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

    Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)

    Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)

    Ritson, J.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:—

    Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)

    Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R., Elland)

    Mr. Warne and Mr. Allen.

    Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)

    Rose, Frank H.

    Parkinson.

    Question put accordingly, and agreed to.

    It being after Eleven of the Clock, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.
    Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.
    Committee to sit again To-morrow.

  PRIVILEGES.
  Ordered, "That the Committee of Privileges do consist of Ten Members:"
  The Prime Minister, Mr. Attorney-General, Lord Hugh Cecil, Mr. Clynes, Mr. Arthur Henderson, Sir Ellis Hume-Williams, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, Sir Robert Sanders, Sir John Simon, and Lieut.-Colonel Spender Clay nominated Members of the Committee.
  Ordered, "That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records:"
  Ordered, "That Five be the quorum."—[Colonel Gibbs]

  PUBLICATIONS AND DEBATES' REPORTS.
  Ordered, "That a Select Committee be appointed to assist Mr. Speaker in the arrangements for the Report of Debates, and to inquire into the expenditure on Stationery and Printing for this House and the public services generally."
  Sir Rowland Blades, Mr. Bowerman, Mr. Burman, Mr. Gates, Mr. Hall Caine, Mr. Hore-Belisha, Mr. Looker, Mr. Naylor, Colonel Perkins, Mr. Ramsden, and Mr. Frederick Roberts nominated Members of the Committee:
  Ordered, "That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records";
  Ordered, "That Three be the quorum."—[Colonel Gibbs.]

  PUBLIC ACCOUNTS.
  Ordered, "That the Committee or Public Accounts do consist of Fifteen Members."
  Mr. Walter Baker, Sir Gervase Beckett, Mr. Briggs, Captain Craig, Sir Henry Craik, Mr. Gillett, Mr. William Graham, Sir Robert Hamilton, Mr. Harmsworth, Sir John Marriott, Mr. McNeill, Mr. Pethick-Lawrence, Colonel Assheton Pownall, Major Salmon, and Sir Fredric Wise nominated members of the Committee:
  Ordered, "That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records";
  Ordered, "That Five be the quorum—[Colonel Gibbs.]
  The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

  UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFIT.
  Motion made, and Question proposed. "That this House do now adjourn."[Colonel Gibbs.]
  Mr. LANSBURY: I am sorry that on has to take this sort of opportunity for dealing with what I think is a very serious state of affairs in connection with unemployment insurance. I think also I

  1403
  ought to tell the Minister for Labour, that many of us on these benches think there ought to be some means by which his Department can tell us the number of women entitled to standard benefit, that is, women with stamps on their cards who are disqualified from the moment of unemployment from any sort of relief from the fund or any sort of payment from it. I have tried on two occasions to get from the right hon. Gentleman the number of women so disqualified, as apart from those who apply for standard benefit, but he tells us there is no way of giving us these figures.
  It is time that this Department devised some arrangement by which that could be done, because I do not believe the House has given the right hon. Gentleman or any officials of his Department the right to say to a woman that, after the first week she is out of work, she can be considered a person not genuinely seeking work. I put to the right hon. Gentleman a question to-day or yesterday and it was with reference to a number of women who had informed me that they had stamps on their cards and, incidentally, were told that the stamps only counted for days. His answer to me is not that the women were applying for extended benefit, but that they were not genuinely seeking work.
  I have not had the opportunity because I have not had the time, and if I had the time I have not had the means, of going to the Employment Exchange and thoroughly investigating these cases. I know in several cases of which I have been told—and I will subsequently read out the statement of the women—that they are entitled to standard benefit. They have all of them been asked at the Exchange what was their trade, and they said they were in the fur trade. Every year there is a slack period in that trade. One would have thought that when it came that the women would automatically get that for which they had paid. It is that point to which I want the right hon. Gentleman to direct his reply. If I have been misinformed and these women should only have applied for extended benefit, I shall have something to say of the manner in which they have been treated. But it would be a different argument from the one I am putting now. I have been
  1404
  writing through all the months to the right hon. Gentleman about individual cases and would not have bothered the House if it were not that I have had nearly 25 women down at my house on this subject and have been asked by them to go outside the Exchange myself and get information from the women's standpoint.
  It may be that they are liars. The right hon. Gentleman must demonstrate that Remember that they are all engaged in the fur trade, and the bulk of them have been out of work for several years. They have received no payment at all, but right from the beginning have been told that they are not genuinely seeking work. All of them have challenged me to go to their employers and get the record of their employment.
  I might as well clear up another point before I read out their names, and that is the treatment which they receive at the hands of the officials. I am not a person who having had to do with officials all these years believe of necessity every story that is told of officials. I had two of these women in my house who told practically the same story. Here is one story. She was asked: "Have you a father?" and she replied, "No, I am living with my mother." "What about her, cannot she work?" "No, my mother is old." "It is time she did." That statement was made in the presence of other women who heard it.
  Another statement is that a woman was given a paper on which her money was put down. This was handed to her when she went to get the money, but the paper was subsequently taken away and torn up, and she was told it was a mistake. Another woman who is separated from her husband, and who keeps her two children, was told: 'Your business is to get a summons against your husband and make him keep the two children." But they have been separated for three or four years. The point is that if these women have paid into the insurance fund—and if their stories are true that they have the stamps on their cards and have not exhausted their benefit—no one has the right to ask any of these questions. The right hon. Gentleman in his reply to me simply says that they are not genuinely seeking work. He also says that they have been referred to the referee. Here, again, he knows that unless they have an

  1405
  organisation behind them they have no right of appeal to the umpire.
  If I have been misinformed in this, I shall be glad to be told so, because I shall try to get the women to go to the umpire and take one case as a test case. I have asked the right hon. Gentleman in my questions to have an investigation into these women's cases and the statements they have made in regard to the people at the Exchange. I shall be perfectly willing to await the result of any proper investigation. I beg to assure the House that I would not dream of bringing up these statements if they had not been verified by at least a dozen women, who came to see me, not altogether, but on two separate occasions.
  Mr. BUCHANAN: On a point of Order. Is it in order for an hon. Member to organise amongst his fellow Members a deliberate count-out of this House?
  Mr. LANSBURY: I shall not object if the Members of this House are so little interested in a matter of justice to a considerable number of women. The responsibility is on the Members, not on me. They will not do me any discredit by walking out, and I shall not complain in the least. All these women are Jewesses, but whether they are Jewesses, or foreigners, or foreign-born, has nothing to do with the question. If they have paid in their money they are entitled to their benefit:
  Leah Reuben.—The statement I have got in regard to her is that she has been paying in and drawing nothing for about three years. She has been six weeks out of work. "Money sent down." What she means is the paper was sent down, but the manager has torn it up.
  Rebecca Cohen.—Started three years ago paying in. Six months ago had some out-of-work benefit. She has 24 stamps. She has been out of work eight weeks and not paid a penny.
  Rachel Landsman.—Has been seven years at one job. I think she is one of the women who was told she was not genuinely seeking work. She has stamps. She has had nothing at all since she has been out of work. This is the woman the manageress told to summon her husband.
  1406
  Rachel Cohen.—She has been a contributor for four years. She was last out of work two years ago. She has been out of work 10 weeks and has not been paid a penny.
  Dora Mattison.—She has been in about four years. Her last benefit was over 12 months ago. She has been three weeks out of work and not got a penny. The manageress told her that her stamps counted only for one day.
  I have all the rest here, but they are on the Order Paper. I will not continue, in order that the Minister of Labour can give his reply.
  The MINISTER of LABOUR (Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland): I will reply as briefly as I can on the general principle. It is that whether people have stamps to their credit or not, from the point of view of standard benefit they have to be genuinely seeking work. That was a statutory condition in the Act of my predecessor. That has to be ascertained, and in a matter of doubt the case is sent to the chief insurance officer. There is an appeal from him to the Court of Referees, and, if the Court of Referees be in doubt, they can allow a further appeal to the Umpire. I want justice to be done in cases like this. The most important point really is that to which the hon. Member has referred—the alleged unfair or reprehensible treatment at the Exchange. The remark he quoted is, of course, a sentence which in itself would be to my mind absolutely reprehensible, if actually made.
  As the hon. Member knows, it is a very difficult matter to deal with, but I am more anxious than any one in this House to see that the administration is as considerate as possible. The hon. Member has made a serious charge. I told him that I would have an inquiry, and I started it yesterday before I came to the House to answer his question. In a matter like this it is necessary that I should have the question probed as carefully as possible. I repeat that when anybody, on prima facie evidence of this kind, makes the statement which the hon. Member has made, it is necessary to get to the bottom of it and to see that the administrative action is as considerate as possible at the Exchange.
  Mr. LANSBURY: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for his statement. As far as these women are concerned I understand that the matter goes to the chief officer. These 12 women were employed in a seasonal occupation, and someone has decided that from the moment they are out of work they are not genuinely seeking work. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman should carry this investigation further and go to the Exchanges and find out how many women have applied for standard benefit and how many have been refused.
  Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am going to try to ascertain the whole facts, and then I will communicate with the hon. Member. Whenever it is a case of standard benefit I have always considered that there is a presumption in favour of the claimant when he has a sum standing to his credit, but even so, there has to be primâ facie case that the person is quite genuinely seeking work.
  Miss WILKINSON: But in seasonal work all the firms are out together.
  Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: It all depends on the circumstances. In seasonal trades there is a different set of circumstances to be borne in mind. I say, with regard to all those cases, and particularly as regards the Exchange, I will do my best to have the matter thoroughly sifted, and will communicate the result to the hon. Member.
  Mr. MAXTON: Would the right hon. Gentleman make his investigation very thoroughly, and try to find out if at this Exchange the words "not genuinely seeking employment" are interpreted in exactly the same way when the claimant is a woman as when the claimant is a man?
  Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: Could not the right hon. Gentleman see his way to give some better guidance as to what these words "genuinely seeking work" really mean? I have many people coming to me producing what to me appears to be conclusive evidence that they have spent hours tramping the streets seeking work, and yet they could not prove it to the committee. Some guidance from the right hon. Gentleman would be very helpful, particularly in cases of standard benefit.
  Mr. NEIL MACLEAN: Is it not the case that the Act itself, even the right hon. Gentleman's own Act of last year, lays down specific grounds with regard to the number of stamps in a given period required to qualify a man or woman for unemployment benefit, and if the man or woman has those stamps upon his or her card, is not that a sufficient guarantee that the individual is genuinely seeking employment?
  Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: No.
  Mr. MACLEAN: Why not?
  Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: That does not follow. A person may be genuinely seeking employment weeks or months after he has run out of standard benefit, while it is quite possible that a person may not be genuiiely seeking employment, and yet have stamps to his credit.
  Mr. MACLEAN: I am taking up the case put by the hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) that they have stamps and yet are refussd any standard benefit.
  It being Half-past Eleven of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

INDIA.
  BOMBAY COTTON MILLS (SAFETY APPLIANCES).
  BOMBAY COTTON MILLS (SAFETY APPLIANCES).
  SICK PRISONERS (MEDICAL ATTENDANCE).
  SICK PRISONERS (MEDICAL ATTENDANCE).
  POLITICAL PRISONERS.
  POLITICAL PRISONERS.
  AMERICAN CITIZENS (PROSECUTION AND ESCAPE).
  AMERICAN CITIZENS (PROSECUTION AND ESCAPE).
  CURRENCY AND EXCHANGE.
  CURRENCY AND EXCHANGE.
  ENGINE DRIVER'S PUNISHMENT.
  ENGINE DRIVER'S PUNISHMENT.
  AGRICULTURAL COMMISSION.
  AGRICULTURAL COMMISSION.
BRITISH ARMY.
  OFFICERS TRAINING AND CADET CORPS.
  OFFICERS TRAINING AND CADET CORPS.
  PURCHASES AND CONTRACTS (BRITISH PRODUCTS).
  PURCHASES AND CONTRACTS (BRITISH PRODUCTS).
  BRITISH VOLUNTEER FORCE, HANKOW.
  BRITISH VOLUNTEER FORCE, HANKOW.
  AIR SERVICES.
  AIR SERVICES.
  ROYAL AIR FORCE (RECRUITS).
  ROYAL AIR FORCE (RECRUITS).
ROYAL NAVY.
  NON-CONTINUOUS SERVICE OFFICERS' STEWARDS AND COOKS.
  NON-CONTINUOUS SERVICE OFFICERS' STEWARDS AND COOKS.
  SICK-BERTH ATTENDANTS (PROMOTION).
  SICK-BERTH ATTENDANTS (PROMOTION).
  MEDICAL SERVICES.
  MEDICAL SERVICES.
  SMALL-POX (RESTRICTIONS ON LEAVE).
  SMALL-POX (RESTRICTIONS ON LEAVE).
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
  PAYMASTER-GENERAL'S OFFICE.
  PAYMASTER-GENERAL'S OFFICE.
  ADMIRALTY STAFF (COST).
  ADMIRALTY STAFF (COST).
  MINISTRY OF PENSIONS (DISCHARGES).
  MINISTRY OF PENSIONS (DISCHARGES).
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH (OVERTIME).
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH (OVERTIME).
  EX-SERVICE TEMPORARY CLERKS.
  EX-SERVICE TEMPORARY CLERKS.
  STAFFS.
  STAFFS.
PUBLIC HEALTH.
  MENTAL PATIENTS, SCOTLAND (TREATMENT).
  MENTAL PATIENTS, SCOTLAND (TREATMENT).
  WATER SUPPLY, BLEDLOW RIDGE.
  WATER SUPPLY, BLEDLOW RIDGE.
  SANITARY INSPECTOR AND SURVEYOR, LITTLE LEVER (APPOINTMENT).
  SANITARY INSPECTOR AND SURVEYOR, LITTLE LEVER (APPOINTMENT).
  MILK (TUBERCULIN TESTS).
  MILK (TUBERCULIN TESTS).
  SNOW CLEARANCE (SALT).
  SNOW CLEARANCE (SALT).
  DANGEROUS DRUGS.
  DANGEROUS DRUGS.
  BOARDS OF GUARDIANS (LOANS).
  BOARDS OF GUARDIANS (LOANS).
  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS ACT.
  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS ACT.
  ASYLUM PATIENT, ST. HELENS (MAINTENANCE CONTRIBUTION).
  ASYLUM PATIENT, ST. HELENS (MAINTENANCE CONTRIBUTION).
HOUSING.
  TENANTS WITH CHILDREN (RENTS).
  TENANTS WITH CHILDREN (RENTS).
  EJECTIONS, ST. HELENS.
  EJECTIONS, ST. HELENS.
  ADMINISTRATIVE COUNTY OF WARWICK.
  ADMINISTRATIVE COUNTY OF WARWICK.
  HOUSES ERECTED (1923 AND 1924 Acrs).
  HOUSES ERECTED (1923 AND 1924 Acrs).
  RURAL AREAS.
  RURAL AREAS.
NAVAL AND MILITARY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.
  DISABILITY PENSIONS (A. PATERSON).
  DISABILITY PENSIONS (A. PATERSON).
  ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICES CLOSED.
  ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICES CLOSED.
  TUBERCULOSIS.
  TUBERCULOSIS.
  EX-KING HUSSEIN.
  EX-KING HUSSEIN.
TRANSPORT.
  NEW ROADS (ADJACENT LAND VALUES).
  NEW ROADS (ADJACENT LAND VALUES).
  ROAD FUND (GRANTS).
  ROAD FUND (GRANTS).
  TRAFFIC PROBLEM (INVENTOR'S SCHEME).
  TRAFFIC PROBLEM (INVENTOR'S SCHEME).
  POLICE (WHITE DETACHABLE SLEEVES).
  POLICE (WHITE DETACHABLE SLEEVES).
MOTOR TRAFFIC.
  AUTOMOBILE ASSOCIATIONS (TRAFFIC CONTROL).
  AUTOMOBILE ASSOCIATIONS (TRAFFIC CONTROL).
  OFFENCES (FINES).
  OFFENCES (FINES).
  PUBLIC TRUSTEE (CHARGES).
  PUBLIC TRUSTEE (CHARGES).
  PRE-WAR PENSIONERS, DUBLIN.
  PRE-WAR PENSIONERS, DUBLIN.
  BRITISH FASCISTS' CAROL PARTY (OFFICIAL ENVELOPES).
  BRITISH FASCISTS' CAROL PARTY (OFFICIAL ENVELOPES).
  GUIDE TO CURRENT OFFICIAL STATISTICS.
  GUIDE TO CURRENT OFFICIAL STATISTICS.
  PRE-WAR AUSTRIAN AND HUNGARIAN DEBTS.
  PRE-WAR AUSTRIAN AND HUNGARIAN DEBTS.
  DOMINIONS (NATIONAL DEBTS).
  DOMINIONS (NATIONAL DEBTS).
  ENEMY ACTION CLAIMS.
  ENEMY ACTION CLAIMS.
  INCOME TAX.
  INCOME TAX.
  ENTERTAINMENTS DUTY.
  ENTERTAINMENTS DUTY.
  ADVERTISEMENT POSTER. (TAXATION).
  ADVERTISEMENT POSTER. (TAXATION).
  LANDOWNERS.
  LANDOWNERS.
AGRICULTURE.
  SUGAR SUBSIDY.
  SUGAR SUBSIDY.
  WHEAT.
  WHEAT.
  WAGES, NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK.
  WAGES, NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK.
  CHEESE (STANDARDS).
  CHEESE (STANDARDS).
  POTATOES.
  POTATOES.
  MOSUL FRONTIER.
  MOSUL FRONTIER.
  PASSPORTS.
  PASSPORTS.
  SPECIAL JURORS, MIDDLESEX.
  SPECIAL JURORS, MIDDLESEX.
  POLICEMEN'S WIDOWS.
  POLICEMEN'S WIDOWS.
  PETROLEUM BILL.
  PETROLEUM BILL.
  DRUNKENNESS (TESTS).
  DRUNKENNESS (TESTS).
  AUCTIONEERS' LICENCES.
  AUCTIONEERS' LICENCES.
  BRITISH EMPIRE EXHIBITION.
  BRITISH EMPIRE EXHIBITION.
  FOOD SUPPLIES (SHORT WEIGHT).
  FOOD SUPPLIES (SHORT WEIGHT).
  GREAT BRITAIN AND UNITED STATES (TRADE).
  GREAT BRITAIN AND UNITED STATES (TRADE).
  SHIPS' WIRELESS OPERATORS (WAGES DISPUTE).
  SHIPS' WIRELESS OPERATORS (WAGES DISPUTE).
  COAL PRICES, LONDON.
  COAL PRICES, LONDON.
UNEMPLOYMENT.
  BENEFIT DISALLOWED.
  BENEFIT DISALLOWED.
  TRADE BOARDS ACT.
  TRADE BOARDS ACT.
  JUSTICES' ADVISORY COMMITTEE, NORTH RIDING, YORKSHIRE.
  JUSTICES' ADVISORY COMMITTEE, NORTH RIDING, YORKSHIRE.
Preamble
The House met at a, quarter past four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES (AMEND MENT) BILL. [H.L.]
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY): My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill entitled the Weights and Measures (Amendment) Bill, and to move that it be read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 1a. —(The Marquess of Salisbury.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

EXECUTION OF DILIGENCE (SCOTLAND) BILL. [H.L.]
THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL(THE DUKE OF SUTHERLAND): My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to amend the law relating to the execution of diligence in Scotland, and to move that it be read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 1a. (The Duke of Sutherland.)
On Question, Bill read P, and to be printed.

MONEYLENDERS BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD CARSON: My Lords, in moving the Second Reading of this Bill I should like to remind your Lordships very briefly of the history of the Bill which I introduced in the last Session and the different stages through which it, proceeded. Having done that, it seems to me that it will be unnecessary for me to occupy your Lordships' time at any length to-day seeing that the Bill was so very recently before you. The Third Reading of that Bill took place, if I remember aright, some time in December. It went to another place too late to be passed there in any circumstances: indeed, it was apparent when it left here that there was no probability of its becoming law.

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That Bill was accorded a Second Reading in your Lordships' House with considerable unanimity. The noble and learned Viscount opposite gave it his blessing, though he made a prophecy with which I entirely agreed, that it would not stop all the gaps it was necessary to stop. At the same time, he saw a useful provision in the Bill for trying to put an end to some of the great scandals which arise in relation to moneylending transactions in this country. The Bill was welcomed also by the noble Lord, Lord Desborough, who on that occasion represented the Home Office, and the Lord Chancellor said that he desired that the matter should be taken up and dealt with. Therefore, a Second Reading was given with considerable, if not with absolute, unanimity in this House.
Your Lordships may remember that after the Bill had been read a second time it was referred, on the Motion of the Government, to a Joint Select Committee of the House of Lords and the House of Commons. That Committee, a very able Committee presided over by my noble friend Lord Darling, a Judge who for many years had dealt with the law as it stood in relation to moneylenders, sat for a considerable time and heard a great deal of evidence, which has been published. I do not know whether any of your Lordships have read any of that evidence, but it is not at all uninteresting. Having taken the evidence both of those who are engaged in the business of moneylending and those who were affected by the moneylending law as it stands, and also very important evidence by a lady who is connected with social welfare in Liverpool and also from bankruptcy officials in this country—I shall have to say a word about that evidence before I conclude—they made a number of Amendments in the Bill and sent it back to us. Your Lordships adopted the Amendments that were made and in addition to that, the Bill having been examined by the Home Office, certain Amendments were proposed on behalf of the Government and those Amendments were also adopted by this House. Then the Third Reading was passed and the Bill was sent to another place.
Therefore, as your Lordships will see, the Bill has had considerable examination of a, most important character and I think it may now be taken to be the
112
maturely considered Bill of all Parties, because all Parties were represented on the Select Committee drawn from this House and the House of Commons. In those circumstances it is not necessary for me to go at any great length into the terms of the Bill, though I must, of course, say a few words in explanation. I ought to state that the Bill as I have now introduced it is in exactly the same form as that in which it left this House in December. It does not altogether represent my own views in certain respects and there are Amendments that I personally would like to see inserted. would not he nearly so generous to the moneylender as the Committee have been, but I am a sufficiently old Parliamentarian to know that one cannot do exactly as one would like and I bow to the superior wisdom and greater knowledge of the Select Committee which heard the evidence. The Committee changed the figure that I would have allowed as the one that throws the onus upon the moneylender of showing that the transaction is fair and not unconscionable from 15 per cent. per year to 4 per cent. per month. That limit in the Bill seems to me to be a very generous one.
On the whole, I feel certain that if the Bill is passed in its present form, or with such Amendments as may be made, that it will effect a real improvement in the law. I can only hope that public opinion will from time to time enable such gaps as are found in it—and such gaps will undoubtedly be found in it—to be filled by those who come after us and who have to deal with the grievances as they arise. We are now in this position: We have the Report of the Committee of 1898 upon which the Bill of 1900 was framed; that Bill is at present the law of the country which regulates the transactions of moneylenders. The Report of the Committee of 1898 is, I think, one of the most able and informing documents of the kind that I have ever read. As I pointed out before, there is nothing of a serious nature in the Bill which has not already been recommended by the Committee in 1898. That Committee started with one finding to which I shall refer. It is a finding that I think ought never to be let out of sight, because the amount of evidence that the Committee heard and the

113
eminence and knowledge of the great Judges and others who were examined before them were really more than are generally met with in inquiries of this kind by Select Committees.
The Committee start with this statement:—
"The system of moneylending by professional moneylenders at high rates of interest is productive of crime, bankruptcy, unfair advantage over other creditors of the borrower, extortion from the borrower's family and friends, and other serious injuries to the community."
That was the conclusion the Committee came to, and the basis that guided them in framing their Bill. The Receiver in Bankruptcy, who was examined before the joint Select Committee of the two Houses last year, said practically the same thing. He said that he had never known of a case (and he had had a very wide experience) in which any trader had ever in the long run been benefited by going to moneylenders and borrowing at high rates. He also stated that in his experience the petitions in bankruptcy that came to his notice were in the bulk petitions by moneylenders, and that they were generally used for the ulterior purpose of trying to bring pressure upon relatives and friends to come to the rescue of those who probably would be ruined if a bankruptcy order were made against them.
How that goes on still from day to day I was reminded the other day when I got a letter from a gentleman who had had an honourable career of some 35 years in a position from which he retired on pension. He had a son who was starting in life, and who had had a distinguished scholastic career, and had just obtained that start in life which it is so difficult to procure when, unfortunately, the son was induced to borrow money from moneylenders. A bankruptcy petition was presented which would have ruined him at the very outset of his career, and his father was obliged to go to moneylenders to borrow money in order to pay off the petition presented against his son, and he himself had to take his son's place and allow the moneylenders to present a bankruptcy petition against him. That kind of case is not at all infrequent, and they lead one to wonder whether, upon the whole, the evils of allowing moneylending at all are not so great that much more drastic steps ought not to be taken,
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though for those steps at the present moment I do not think the public are quite ripe.
I have read a great deal of very intresting literature sent to me from America, where they are presenting what they call a "Sharks Bill." I refer to the Russell Sage organisation. Their reports of the misery, poverty and crime that have arisen from the action of moneylenders are of a most extraordinary character. I am bound to say that they are in favour of it and what they call the "Sharks Bill" has been passed by almost every State in America, which allows something like 30 per cent. as a limit. In America—and this must be said to their credit—they are setting up by degrees various semi-philanthropic institutions throughout the States which are attempting in some way to relieve the extreme distress of people who find themselves involved, through no fault of their own, in a condition in which they are compelled to borrow money and can not get it at reasonable rates. One may hope that the example of Liverpool, which was proved in the evidence I have already referred to, of starting an organisation of that kind, may sooner or later be encouraged and helped by the Government of the country. I am not going to read to your Lordships the number of cases I referred to last time—they are all on record—but it is worth while calling your Lordships' attention to the extent of the evil with which we are dealing and in order to do so I will read one or two passages from the evidence of Miss Keeling, of Liverpool, given before the Joint Select Committee.
She was asked whether she was speaking for some association and she said:
"I am speaking as Chairman of the Moneylending Committee which was appointed by the Liverpool Women Citizens' Association and also as Secretary of the Liverpool Personal Service Society which supplies the evidence, or most of it, to that Committee to work upon. Speaking as a social worker of long experience, I have never come across such agony of mind as that caused by the habit of borrowing at high rates of interest with no hope of being able to repay. This experience has been very considerably increased by the recent inquiry made in Liverpool by the Women Citizens' Association and the Personal Service Society, and also by means of the recently formed Experimental Loan Fund administered by the Liverpool Personal Service Society. Cases going before this

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Fund are mostly of people who are already entangled in the meshes of unscrupulous moneylenders, and many of them are heartrending in the extreme. One woman we knew borrowed and re-borrowed for five years from moneylender after moneylender, borrowing from one to repay another and, finally, last July, committed suicide, leaving four young children. Her husband came and begged us to make her story public in order to restrain others by her example. In Liverpool and Birkenhead we have 1,380 registered moneylenders, over 1,100, or 80 per cent. of them, being women. …
The usual rate of interest charged by these 1,100 women moneylenders in Liverpool appears to be 1d. in the 1s. per week, or 433⅓ per cent. per annum, although cases of 1½d. 2d, and even 3d. in the is. per week have been known. We feel the great importance of having a fixed maximum interest allowed instead of as at present, leaving the Court to decide in each individual case what is harsh and unconscionable."
Then Miss Keeling goes on to deal with a form of the evil of which very little is heard. She says:—
"Our experience is that the moneylenders who charge the highest rates of interest are bullies of the worst type and that their poor debtors are far too terrified of them to take the cases into Court. Many borrowers have refused even to give us permission to see the moneylenders or in some cases to tell us their names through fear of being bullied afterwards. One woman moneylender who was interviewed and persuaded to halve the amount she claimed to be owed, went straight to her client, who had been confined only two days previously, to tell her what she thought of her."
There is much more evidence of a similar character, but it is not necessary for me to repeat it because your Lordships will, I know, trust the judgment come to by the Joint Select Committee presided over by my noble and learned friend.
Let me now mention shortly how the Bill stands and what it tries to do. Under the Bill passed in 1900 it was left open to the Court to inquire into any moneylending transaction, and if the transaction was unconscionable and the interest deemed to be too high the Court had power to investigate the transaction and fix a lesser rate of interest. At the time everybody foretold that such a provision as that would really not solve the question at all. In the first place, there was no indication in the Act as to what would be held, or could be held, to lie unconscionable. There was no suggestion as to what rate of interest would be fair. It was left to each Court to determine as
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it pleased according to its own view of these transactions and you find the most extraordinary difference amongst various Judges before whom these cases have gone as to the amount of interest that was allowed.
One of the provisions of the present Bill is to fix the standard at 4 per cent. per month. That is the standard fixed by the Joint Select Committee and if the interest is over that it is to be assumed to be unconscionable and too high unless the Court in all the circumstances thinks there is reason for it. In addition to that, if any person wants to borrow and is prepared to pay a higher rate of interest, the borrower and the lender can go before the registrar of a county court who may enquire into the facts and afterwards say whether the limit of the 4 per cent. per month can be exceeded or not. I think that when you read of cases in which 400 per cent., 500 per cent. and even 600 per cent. has been charged—there was a, case only in to-day's newspaper where I think the interest was 400 per cent—it is quite right that you should have a standard setting up the limit of 4 per cent. per month, because it gives some basis to a Judge upon which he can start. That is one of the provisions of this Bill.
Another provision is that there shall not be compound interest. One of the most ordinary methods of the moneylender is the use he makes of compound interest. He has generally in his agreement a stipulation that if an instalment is not paid the whole sum becomes due. Then the unfortunate man has to give him another note, the moneylender adds on to the note the whole of the interest due, gets an additional sum for giving him the note and then charges his 100 per cent., or 150 per cent., or whatever it may be, upon the whole sum; and so it rolls up like a snowball from week to week until it becomes an utter impossibility for any person in such conditions as surround these borrowers to deal with the matter. Further, as I am reminded by a noble Lord beside me, if one instalment is not paid the same thing happens all over again, and so it goes on. I have come across cases in my own family. I had to pay a sum where the borrower had paid the whole of the advance at 50 per cent. with compound interest, and still owed, on a borrowing of £500 or

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£600, nearly £600 still, which was all rolled up in that kind of way in two or three years until the debtor was wise enough to come to consult me and I was either foolish or generous enough to pay. That is the sort of case that we have tried to meet, and I think that your Lordships will agree that this is a most valuable provision.
Another provision that I look upon as of the greatest importance is that which has been inserted to give the Legislature power by Order in Council, which has to be laid on the Table of both Houses of Parliament, to direct the Courts in which moneylenders can sue. At the present moment there is an absolute denial of justice to the borrower. What happens is this. When the money becomes due the moneylender takes out a writ in the High Court. He is taking out a writ against a man who could not get a shilling in the world except by paying 200 per cent., or whatever the amount may be. He takes out a writ and then, under the summary procedure of the Courts, he moves for judgment. In nine eases out of ten, whatever may be the rights of the borrower to raise the question of the loan being unconscionable and at too high a rate of interest, he cannot contest it. He would have to employ a solicitor and counsel and would have the have the whole thing fought out on this summary motion. If he then gets leave to defend he would have to go on with litigation in the High Court, which in any case would cost him £200 or £300, no matte' how cheaply he tried to do it. I say that this is an absolute denial of justice which leaves the law nugatory even under the Act of 1900.
I had a letter the other day from a man in Paris of whom I knew something and who told me that he had been served with one of these summary notices. He was in a state of absolute poverty and asked what he could do. He could not, of course, afford to employ counsel and fight the case in the High Court, although he had paid off an amount which he believed to be far more than that to which the lender was entitled if a, proper account were taken on a fair basis. I regard this provision that the moneylender should be compelled to take his ease into the county courts or even, where such small amounts are concerned
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as could be limited by the Order in Council, before the magistrates, as of the greatest importance, and I believe that by treating the matter in the county courts you will arrive at a far steadier and better way of dealing with cases than you can possibly reach through this summary procedure in the High Courts, where people cannot afford to be present and where there is really no argument heard on the one side, so that the Judge is bound to give judgment for the applicant. I think that the sooner this provision becomes law the better, as otherwise nothing that has been enacted is of the least use to the man who has got into the toils of the moneylenders, no matter how good his case may be.
Another provision in the Bill, perhaps the most important of its provisions, is designed to limit proceedings to be taken in the Court of Bankruptcy. As I have told your Lordships, the service of a bankruptcy summons is the most terrible weapon that the moneylender has. If a man becomes bankrupt, no matter how honourable he may have been, be may be absolutely ruined. Even at the start of his life, if he has got into the hands of a moneylender, he may find the stigma of bankruptcy upon him. The evidence on this point was of the greatest possible importance. Let me refer to the evidence of Mr. Williams, who is an Official Receiver in Bankruptcy. He said this:—
"In my opinion, the moneylender does not present his petition with a view to bringing about a rateable distribution of the assets amongst all the creditors, which really should be the object of a. petitioner, but rather with a view of exerting pressure which will bring the money from somewhere. It is only an opinion, but that is the opinion I have formed."
Then he was asked about a provision in the Bill concerning this point that I introduced before your Lordships, and he expressed the opinion that it was a fair provision and would not be unduly harsh to the moneylender.
He added:
"Of course, one sees constantly cases coming in on a receiving order, where perhaps there are a dozen petitions filed against the same debtor, most of those petitions being petitions by other moneylenders. I had a case only the other day where there were fourteen petitions against a debtor and twelve of them were petitions by moneylenders. Of course, many of them had been paid off, but ultimately what does happen is that the debtor conies in with, in my view, increased liabilities, and his

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assets have been very considerably diminished in trying to pay off the instalments to the moneylenders. In that way I believe that the ordinary creditor suffers. … I think it follows that a debtor makes great efforts at the expense of his trade creditor, whose goods he very often uses, or goods supplied by them he often uses, that is, the proceeds, to pay off the moneylenders. We have a large number of cases where the debtor gives, as one of the causes of his insolvency, that he has been borrowing money at rates which he could not afford to pay."
At a later stage, as I have told your Lordships before, he used these words:
"I think I ought to say that in my experience I cannot recall a single case where the borrowing of money by a trader from a moneylender was likely to result in any useful purpose at all. It only served to postpone the actual date of the failure. I cannot recollect a single case where it could have served any useful purpose."
Accordingly, the Committee inserted Clause 10 of this Bill, concerning bankruptcy proceedings. One of the provisions is that no moneylender can bring an action until he has got an order from the county court for payment by instalments, so as to give the man a chance. of paying off the debt. The other proceeding is that when the moneylender does make the man bankrupt he can only get 5 per cent. upon the loan in bankruptcy, until the other creditors have been satisfied up to the same extent, and if there is anything over after that it can be distributed by the court in accordance with the contracts entered into. That is looked upon by those who have to administer the bankruptcy laws in the interests of the general trading community of the country as an immense improvement.
The next matter to which I would call attention—I am not going through the whole Bill—is this. Nothing, I think, is so lamentable as the way in which young officers, either of the Civil Service or of the Army or Navy, get into the hands of moneylenders. There is hardly a port in the kingdom in which there are not to be found touts and agents of these moneylenders. There is hardly a case in which a ship comes into port with young officers, who have been abroad, in which they are not approached by these people with a view to their wanting money for the purpose of having a good time. Indeed, in many cases it is mixed up, I regret to say, with the business of betting. What happens is that a bookmaker gets a young officer into his hands and gets him to bet large sums, and when the young officer
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says he has not the money the bookmaker replies: "I know a good fellow to whom I could introduce you; he will let you have the money, and it will be quite secret and private." There are two observations to be made with regard to that kind of case. The first is that in reality the moneylender knows perfectly well that where a man is in Government employment, with an assured salary of some kind, there will be extraordinary efforts made by all those with whom he is connected to try to keep him from the loss of his post. Therefore he is not really dealing, as no doubt in many cases he is dealing, with a person of no prospects at all.
The second point, and this is really a point of great importance, which I ventured to urge upon the House last year, is that the pay of the Civil Service and the pay of these officers is given with a view of enabling them to discharge efficiently their public duties, and can you imagine, my Lords, a young man entangled as these young officers so often are, worried to death and not knowing what is going to happen owing to these entanglements in which they find themselves, trying to perform efficiently for the public service the duties which are cast upon them? It is because of that, and because of the necessity of their being left these moneys which they are paid for public services, that so many Acts have provided that the pay of such people cannot be taken in execution under any judgment, whether by a trader or anybody else. They are supposed to have this money for the purpose of supporting them and keeping them in a proper position while they are discharging their duties to the State. But the moneylender at once has resort to bankruptcy proceedings. We have therefore proposed in the Bill, and the Committee have proposed in the Bill, that in no case where the law is that the salary of a public official, whether in the Civil Service or in the Army or the Navy, cannot be attached for a debt, can there be a bankruptcy proceeding to attach that salary for that debt. I think that is a protection which is worth giving, as well in the interests of the individual as in those of the public service.
I spoke of the touts of the moneylenders. The touting of moneylenders is really one of the most extraordinary organisations which it is possible to conceive,

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and we have tried in the Bill to stop the enormous number of circulars which are from day to day delivered to almost everybody, with a view of inducing people to come into the parlour of the spider. I gave particulars to the House on the Third Reading last year of a case which was sent by the Public Prosecutor, where a man in a very short time was shown to have sent round 160,000 of these circulars, all with full postage, for the benefit of the Post Office, and all on very enticing paper, so that the recipient would be likely to open them. I have examined hundreds of these circulars, all artistically got up and printed on beautiful paper, looking extremely interesting, and I venture to say I have scarcely ever examined one of these circulars in which there was not falsehood throughout the whole of it—I do not say absolute statements that were false, but a suppression of the truth, and indications of rates of interest which were not the true rates of interest at all.
Then there are the names which are used. I have here a letter from the Albemarle Trust Co., Ltd. This is a letter which was sent to a lady who was ill in a home. Sonic relative of this lady had died and left her some money. To show your Lordships the activity of these people, they must have gone searching through the wills at Somerset House, because here is the letter:
"Under the will of the above, you are entitled to a very large sum. We wonder if you would care to let us make you an advance … which we can do quite easily at a fraction above hank rate."
It is always "a little over," or "a fraction above," the bank rate.
"You can rely on all dealings with us; strict secrecy is observed. We shall be glad to hear from you at your earliest. We might mention you can have an advance within 24 hours."
The solicitor for this lady sent on this letter. She was not in want of any money and had never known anything about moneylenders. She was being sick-nursed in a home and she got from a thing calling itself a "trust" this letter to try to get her into the hands of these men.
I have another letter here of a different character, showing the way in which they try to get touts. It is dated July last year, and runs:
"We have in our possession a considerable number of silver wrist watches, sold
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during the war for £3 10 s. These were made dust-proof and water-tight. The 15-jewel movement is splendid, the whole being a very desirable watch.
"We have decided to give one of these watches until they are all disposed of to each customer who introduces from this date, either personally or by letter, a client to us to whom lye lend £5 or upwards."
This letter was sent on to me with this note:
"Cannot anything be done to stop this iniquitous procedure?"
We have put drastic provisions into the Bill, with penal consequences, to try to put a stop to this touting and this great abuse of advertisement, which in every case is really an attempt, on the face of it, to perpetrate a fraud.
I do not think it is necessary to go further into this. Bill. I hope your Lordships will receive it as you received the Bill last year.. At all events, recollect that it has been thoroughly sifted by the Joint Select Committee. As we are now at an early stage of the Session I would make an appeal to His Majesty's Government to try to help us to get this Bill turned into an Act of Parliament. I notice that in the ballot in the other House an hon. Member who was also a member of the Joint Select Committee which heard the evidence, has got an early clay on which he will bring in a Bill —I imagine it will be the same Bill as this. In the circumstances, therefore, would press upon His Majesty's Government to give us any possible facilities to get this Bill passed. I believe it will be some improvement. I am not too optimistic about it but it will be, at all events, some improvement, and should do something, at any rate, to relieve those who are in distress, and whose distress is taken advantage of to get them entangled with moneylenders by the methods that I have ventured to describe. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Carson.)
LORD DESBOROUGH: My Lords, as concerns the Government, to appeal has been made by my learned friend, all that I have behalf of the Home Office is the main provisions of the Bill, substantially the same as re Bill of last year, they are in agreement, but there may be a

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few Amendments which I shall feel it my duty on their behalf to move at a later stage.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, on the previous occasion when this Bill came before the House I expressed my sympathy and that of those with whom I am associated with the purposes of this Bill. I think it is fortunate that the measure should have been in the hands of the noble and learned Lord, who is not a person carried away by sentimental notions, and who has a great experience of this class of transactions. He has been fortunate in having associated with him in the revision of the Bill the noble and learned Lord who sits by him (Lord Darling), who also has had great experience of these cases in the Courts. The Bill is probably as good a Bill as any Bill of its kind could be made. I only wish to utter a word of warning to your Lordships about one thing. This is a measure of social reform—a very important measure of social reform, if it fully attains its purpose—and the House is indebted to the noble and learned Lord for having entered upon a new step towards redressing a great evil. But I am afraid that this Bill will not cover the whole of the field that it is necessary to cover if the evil is to be redressed.
With moneylenders you have two things to remember. You are dealing with an extremely astute class, and you are dealing with a sort of business in which large fortunes are to be made by people of sufficient individual ability. It is all a question of the individual ability of the moneylender and his judgment. A business of that kind is not easily put down by Act of Parliament, and the difficulty is increased by the fact that the desire to borrow money is sometimes a very powerful desire which will lead people to take almost any sort of risk. It is like the taste for drink—difficult to repress and impossible to extirpate when circumstances cause it to arise. These very experienced people—experienced in moneylending, experienced in providing for a. human passion—will find, if it be possible, a way round this Bill, should it become an Act.
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When the Usury Acts N\ ere in force the rate of interest was very definitely restricted, and the moneylender could not recover on his loans above a certain rate of interest. What was the result If you look into the law books and the law reports and the history of the times you will find that there was an enormous business in purchasing annuities. Instead of sending round moneylending circulars it was intimated that if you wanted a sum of ready money you could have it, provided that you would sell au annuity, provided you would undertake to pay—not interest, not anything in re-payment of borrowed capital, but an annuity pure and simple. It might be a. terminable annuity, or it might be a perpetual annuity. The point was that it was not a loan, and so did not come within the Usury Acts. An enormous amount of business was done on that footing, and the Courts could not get at it, because the law did not reach it: it was not a transaction of lending. No more will such transactions be transactions of lending within this Bill as I read it. The noble and learned Lord has done his best to cover the ground, but I suppose it was not possible to bring Within the scope of this Bill the sales of annuities. They are very awkward things to deal with. People do sell annuities. They sell them as part of family settlements sometimes, and it would not be at all convenient to pass legislation which would interfere with the very legitimate transactions of that kind.
What I have risen to say is, that the House must be prepared, if this Bill becomes law, for at least the possibility of being a good deal disappointed. These astute people will put their transactions into a new and novel form, and they have the means of making themselves known to those who require their services. Where the Bill, if it becomes law, will do real good is in dealing with that class of moneylender who lends to the poor. The poor will not sell annuities, at any rate in ordinary cases, and transactions of loan will be within the strict purview of the Bill. There we may hope for something better, particularly as the provisions of the criminal law can be put into force against those who lead people into misery in this fashion.

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There is only one other thing I wish to say. There is, I believe, a small fraction of the moneylending community which consists of fairly decent persons who do not try to ruin people or to extort more than the high rate of interest which is necessary to make their business a lucrative one. They are all lumped together with the had class, and I am afraid that on the whole the Bill will be more successful in extinguishing the good moneylenders—the term is relative and it is only as a relative term that I use it—than in extinguishing the bad ones who will get round the corner by such means as I have suggested. That cannot be helped. You cannot make omelettes without breaking eggs, even when you are dealing with the money lending business. Consequently, on the balance of considerations, I find myself decidedly a supporter of the noble and learned Lord.
LORD HUNSDON OF HUNSDON: My Lords, as the noble and learned Lord claims that one of the great advantages of this Bill is that in no case shall compound interest be charged or allowed and as I think that is the only defect in the Bill, perhaps I might be allowed to say a word about it, although it may be more a question for the Committee stage. I do so in the hope that the noble and learned Lord will consider whether some amendment of the Bill might not be possible. The noble and learned Lord told us in regard to compound interest that one of the great evils of the arrangements which moneylenders make was that if the interest was overdue the whole of the principal also became due. That certainly should be prohibited. But that has nothing whatever to do with compound interest, which merely means that interest should be paid on a debt which is overdue.
When a man owes another man money, whether for interest or for
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any other purpose, he does pay, and ought to pay, interest upon it. Therefore I hope that the clause in question will be amended. Let a low rate of interest be paid, if you please, but some rate of interest ought certainly to be paid. On the hypothesis that the interest is overdue, the security for the payment of that interest is worse in all probability than the security for the original loan. Therefore, to my mind, it would be perfectly just that whatever the interest was on the original loan it should be paid on that overdue interest: but certainly some interest should be paid.
The clause as it stands, will have two effects. The first is that even if the borrower has the money with which to pay he will not nay on the due date because he will be earning interest instead of the lender. The second effect will be that in making a loan the moneylender will take into account the disadvantages he will I suffer as a result of this clause and will raise the rate of interest on the original loan. I am not raising these objections in the least degree for the sake of the borrower or the lender, in neither of whom am I particularly interested; but I hope your Lordships will not agree to a clause which seems to me, at all events, to be contrary to commercial practice and to reason.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: My Lords, if I understand the noble and learned Viscount opposite, he is of opinion that Bills dealing with social reform are not of touch value. With that I agree, and if his Party ever come into power again I hope they will remember that saying of the noble Viscount.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
House adjourned at a quarter-past five o'clock.

ASCOT DISTRICT GAS AND ELECTRICITY BILL. [H.L.]
BARNET DISTRICT GAS AND WATER BILL. [H.L.]
BIRMINGHAM CANAL BILL.
BRISTOL CEMETERY BILL. [H.L.]
BRISTOL WATER BILL. [H.L.]
BROMPTON, CHATHAM, GILLINGHAM, AND ROCHESTER WATER BILL. [H.L.]
CHOSEN SYNDICATE BILL. [H.L.]
LEICESTERSHIRE AND WARWICK SHIRE ELECTRIC POWER BILL. [H.L.]
MANCHESTER SHIP CANAL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]
MEXBOROUGH AND SWINTON TRAM WAYS BILL. [H.L.]
MILFORD DOCKS BILL. [H.L.]
READING UNIVERSITY BILL. [H.L.]
SERLE STREET AND COOK'S COURT IMPROVEMENT COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
SHROPSHIRE, WORCESTERSHIRE AND STAFFORDSHIRE ELECTRIC POWER BILL. [H.L.]
TRENT FALLS IMPROVEMENT BILL. [H.L.]
WEST HAMPSHIRE WATER BILL. [H.L.]
Presented, read 1a; and referred to the Examiners.

ABERTILLERY AND DISTRICT WATER BOARD BILL. [H.L.]
BERWICK-UPON-TWEED CORPORATION (FREEMEN) BILL. [H.L.]
BIRKENHEAD CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
CHORLEY CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
COLWYN BAY AND COLWYN URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL. [H.L.]
CONNAH'S QUAY URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL WATER BILL. [H.L.]
DARWEN CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
EASTBOURNE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
HALIFAX CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
HASTINGS CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]
MARGATE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE AND GATES HEAD CORPORATIONS (BRIDGE) BILL. [H.L.]
RHONDDA URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL. [H.L.]
SOUTHEND-ON-SEA CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
TAF FECHAN WATER SUPPLY BILL. [H.L.]
WALTHAMSTOW URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL. [H.L.]
WORCESTER CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Presented, and read 1a.

LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]
Petition for additional provision of London County Council; together with proposed amendments and clauses annexed thereto read, and referred to the Examiners.