Sitting of 15 March 1927

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
PRIVATE BILLS (Standing Orders not previously inquired into complied with),
Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table deport from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the ease of the following Bill, referred on the Second Reading thereof, the Standing Orders not previously inquired into, which are applicable thereto, have been complied with, namely:
County of London Electric Supply Company Bill.
Bill committed.
PROVISIONAL ORDER BILLS (No Standing Orders applicable),
Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That, in the case of the following Bills, referred on the First Reading thereof, no Standing Orders are applicable, namely:
Ministry of Health Provisional Orders (No. 1) Bill.
Marriages Provisional Order Bill.
Bills to be read a Second time To-morrow.
Nar Valley Drainage Bill,
As amended, to be considered To-morrow.
Reading Gas Bill,
As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.
North Metropolitan Electric Power Supply Bill [Lords],
Yeadon Waterworks Bill [Lords],
To he read a Second time To-morrow.
London, Midland, and Scottish Railway Bill (by Order),
Second Reading deferred till Monday next, at a Quarter-past Eight of the Clock.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  "FOUDROYANT" AND "CUTTY SARK."
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that the Falmouth Harbour Commissioners have given orders for the removal of the historic frigate "Foudroyant," in use for 20 years as a boys' training ship and still used for this purpose, and the historic clipper the "Cutty Sark," in spite of the offer of the respective owners to pay harbour dues; whether he proposes to take any steps to prevent this action; and, if it is persisted in, whether his Department has berths at its disposal where these two vessels could be preserved?
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Sir Philip Cunliffe-Lister): I am informed that the Falmouth Harbour Committee have given notice to the owners of the "Foudroyant" and "Cutty Sark" that their vessels cannot occupy their present berths, owing to the demands for further accommodation. The owners are being asked to meet the Harbour Committee to see if other berths within the harbour can be found where these vessels can be moored with head and stern moorings. The Board of Trade have no power to interfere, and have no berths at their disposal.
  Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Is the right hon. Gentleman interesting himself in the matter, in view of the fact that the "Foudroyant" trains boys for the sea and the "Cutty Sark" is an old relic of the heyday of the sailing ship in commerce carrying?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: Yes, and that is why I have already been in communication, though I have no power to intervene with the Harbour Commissioners, to ascertain if there is to be a meeting between the harbour authorities and the owners.

  RUSSIA.

    ANGLO-RUSSIAN TRADE.
    Mr. REMERasked the President of the Board of Trade (1) if, in view of the fall in British exports to Russia of agricultural machinery, he can state the value of such exports from Germany to Russia in 1913 and 1926, respectively;
    (2) if, in view of the fall in British exports to Russia of agricultural machinery, he can state the value of such exports from the United States of America in 1913 and 1926, respectively?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The value of agricultural machinery exported from Germany to Russia in 1913 was £699,000. In 1926 the value of such machinery exported to the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics was £613,000, and to the Succession States (including the parts of Poland formerly German and Austrian) £145,000. The value of agricultural machinery exported from the United States to Russia in the year ended 30th June, 1914, was £1,509,000. In 1926 the value of such machinery exported to the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics was about £1,365,000. The figures of the exports to the Succession States in 1926 are not yet available, but in 1925 they amounted in value to £27,000.
    Mr. TAYLOR: Has the right hon. Gentleman any information as to German exports of agricultural machinery being financed by British capital?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: No, I have not any. The only thing that springs to the eye in comparing the returns is that the Soviet places very few orders here.
    Mr. TAYLORasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been drawn to the statement that Russian industrial requirements for the year 1926–27, apart from orders for railways, municipalities and agriculture, amount to £15,000,000; and whether, seeing that no case of default has taken place in connection with Russian orders for British manufactures he will say what, steps he will take to encourage British manufacturers to develop Anglo-Russian trade?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I understand that a statement to the effect indicated by the hon. Member has re-
    1816
    cently appeared in the "Soviet Union monthly." As I have repeatedly stated, it rests with the Russian Government to take the necessary steps to encourage manufacturers to trade.
    Mr. TAYLOR: Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that speeches made by members of the Cabinet have created a good deal of anxiety and uncertainty in the minds of those conducting Anglo-Russian trade, and does he not think it his duty as President of the Board of Trade to do what he can to remove the misconception created by his colleagues?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: No, I am quite clear as to what it is that deters British manufacturers from giving large credits to Russia. It is the conditions obtaining in Russia, and it is only the action of the Soviet Government that can remedy it.
    Mr. REMER: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to the long credit, amounting to three years, that is demanded by the Soviet, Government from British manufacturers, and will he take steps to inform that Government that those are not terms of credit that British manufacturers can give?
    Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to the heavy losses that have been occasioned to Germany in connection with their large concessions in Russia and to the fact than an appeal has been made of the German Government for further cash to prevent collapse?
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is it not the case that Britain has lent money to Germany at one rate of interest, which in turn has been advanced to Russia so as to enable the German people to continue their trade with Russia?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: With regard to the point put by my hon. Friend, I have seen a report, which I believe is well authenticated. With regard to loans, no doubt a certain amount of money has been lent by financiers in this country to Germany, and it may be that Germans have lent money, and they have certainly granted credit, to Russia, but those who advanced the money rely upon German and not Russian credit.
    Mr. SPEAKER: This is becoming a debate.

    MILITARY FORCES.
    Sir W. DAVISONasked the Secretary of State for War what are the approximate numbers of the military forces of the Russian Soviet Republics, both on a peace and war basis; and whether any reduction or increase has recently been made in such forces?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for WAR (Sir Laming Worthington-Evans): According to the latest information which I have, the standing army of Russia numbers nearly 650,000 men, and if the "Territorial" Militia be included, over 1,000,000, while the Reserves number over 8,000,000 in addition. As regards the last part of the question the strength of these forces has shown a slight increase during the past year.
    Sir W. DAVISON: Has my right hon. Friend's attention been called to speeches in the last few weeks by members of the Soviet Government, stating that war between Soviet Russia and the capitalist States is inevitable, and asking the masses in Russia to continue their work while the Red Army is being made ready for the inevitable clash?
    Mr. SPEAKER: Russia seems to tempt speeches.

    DETENTION OF BRITISH SEAMAN.
    Major GEORGE DAVIESasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has received any complaint from ex-Fireman David Scott concerning the treatment received by him in Russia; and what, if any, action he contemplates taking in connection therewith?
    Colonel WOODCOCKasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is considering any steps which may be taken on behalf of Mr. David Scott in connection with his treatment in Russia?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Godfrey Locker-Lampson): His Majesty's Government have not received any complaint from Mr. Scott. A protest against Mr. Scott's treatment was made but, as my right hon. Friend stated on the 23rd ultimo, this is not a case in which compensation could be claimed, and no further action is contemplated.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is it not a fact that a report of the case when dealt
    1818
    with in one of the Russian courts is available, and cannot the hon. Gentleman obtain a copy for the benefit of his colleague?
    Sir W. DAVISON: Is it not a fact that this case has not been dealt with in any Russian court of any kind or description?
    Mr. WOMERSLEY: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Sailors' and Firemen's Union have asked the British Trades Union Congress to sever connection with Russia until satisfaction is given on this question?

    POISON GAS.
    Major-General Sir ALFRED KNOXasked the Secretary of State for Wax whether he is aware that several factories are being operated by the Soviet Government in Russia for the manufacture of poison gas; and can he state the number and location of such factories and the present and potential output?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: His Majesty's Government have information that the study of gas warfare is being actively pursued in Soviet Russia. Numerous factories have been set up and are in course of erection, which are or will be capable of poison gas production on a very considerable scale_ It is not considered that any useful purpose will be served by detailing the number and location of such factories or by indicating their present and potential output, but there is no doubt that the Soviet military authorities are actively studying this type of warfare and making preparations on a large scale for its possible eventual use.
    Sir A. KNOX: Can the right hon. Gentleman state whether in his opinion the preparations being made for this kind of warfare in Russia are greater or less than in other countries?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: There is no doubt that much greater preparations are being made in Russia than anywhere else in the world.
    Mr. BECKETT: In view of the very unnatural effects of this warfare, cannot the right hon. Gentleman consider whether an offer might be made to Russia and all other countries that we are prepared to abandon this weapon entirely if they would be prepared to do the same?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: I would draw the attention of the hon. Member to the Convention at Washington and the proceedings which are now before the League of Nations. Russia is not a party to either of those.
    Mr. MAXTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell the House the source of his information about Russia?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: No, Sir.

    FRANCE (CUSTOMS TARIFFS).
    Mr. TAYLORasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been drawn to the Bill introduced by the Government into the French Chamber of Deputies on 3rd March last, under which prohibitive increases in French tariffs are proposed; whether he is aware that in some cases the increases in tariffs on the import of machinery, and particularly oil engines, amount to an increase of 200 to 500 per cent; and what steps are being taken by his Department to protect the interests of British manufacturers?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: A translation of the French Tariff Bill will be published immediately in the Board f Trade Journal (the first instalment appearing on Thursday next), and as soon as the views of British traders regarding the proposals are available, I will consider whether any action can usefully be taken by His Majesty's Government.
    Mr. TAYLOR: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that that is information which has already been circulated to the French deputies and that it involves, in the case of a 50 h.p. oil engine, an increase of tax from £51 to £212, and will he see that his Department takes energetic action?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I am taking precisely the kind of action the Department can take, namely, as soon as information is available, to publish it and consult the manufacturers who are likely to be affected.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Will anything be effective other than a threat of retaliation?

    CASQUETS WIRELESS BEACON.
    Brigadier-General WARNERasked the President of the Board of Trade if the experimental beacon wireless station at the Casquets light vessel, English Channel, has proved a success; and if it is intended to extend similar stations round the coast of the British Isles?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I am informed that the experimental wireless beacon at the Casquets has proved a success. Wireless beacons will be established at suitable points round the coast as circumstances permit.

  BRITISH ARMY.

    RECRUITS (REJECTION).
    Mr. SPOORasked the Secretary of State for War the percentage of applicants for recruitment in the Army whose applications were refused on physical and medical grounds in the following years, respectively, 1913, 1914, 1919, and 1926?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: On page 12 of the General Annual Report on the British Army for 1926 the right hon. Member will find the figures for the years 1911–12 and 1912–13 and for the years 1920–21 onwards. I regret that figures for 1914 and 1919 are not available.
    Mr. SPOOR: Has there been any increase?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: I Chink the hon. Member would be wise to look at the actual figures.

    WOOLWICH AND SANDHURST.
    Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURYasked the Secretary of State for War whether he has ever-considered the advisability, for the purposes of economy, of amalgamating Woolwich and Sandhurst; and whether he could state, approximately, the amount of such economies?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The question has been under consideration on more than one occasion but, apart from other difficulties, the accommodation is not sufficient either at Sandhurst or Woolwich to meet the requirements of both establishments.

    WAR OFFICE (STAFF OFFICERS).
    Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURYasked the Secretary of State for War what were the number of staff officers employed at the War Office in 1914 and in 1927?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The number of military officers employed at the War Office in 1914 was 174. The present number is 244.

    MILITARY PRISON, WOKING.
    Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURYasked the Secretary of State for War to state what is the cost of the military prison at Woking; how many prisoners are detained there; and what is the cost to the State of each prisoner?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The cost of the military prison at Woking is estimated at £6,800 a year. The average number of prisoners detained there during 1926 was 16, the cost based on that number being 23s. 4d. a prisoner a day. The question whether other suitable and more economical arrangements for dealing with these prisoners could be made is under consideration.
    Lieut.-Colonel HOWARD-BURY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that it costs more to keep a prisoner there than to send a boy to Eton to-day?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The cases are not exactly parallel.
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir FREDERICK HALL: What is the usual accommodation there? What is the number?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: The high cost is because, fortunately, we have only an average of 16. That is the fortunate fact.
    Sir F. HALL: Cannot accommodation be found for them elsewhere?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: That is precisely what is being Poked into at this moment.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider amalgamating with the Admiralty for combined treatment of naval and military prisoners?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: I will bear that in mind.

    HOUSING.
    Mr. ROBINSONasked the Secretary of State for War, with regard to the housing schemes which he is promoting at Aldershot and elsewhere, whether the work is being done by his Department, His Majesty's Office of Works, or by private contract; if he will state the average cost per house of the non-parlour type and of the parlour type, respectively?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: Married quarters for Army personnel are as a rule erected under War Department contracts, though in a few cases the work is done by labour directly employed under the Royal Engineers. The conditions under which these quarters are built are generally speaking dissimilar to those obtaining in civilian housing schemes; the type of quarter is not precisely the same as the civilian type, and the prices are therefore not comparable. At Did-cot, for example, where we are building some quarters the cost of a house containing a living room, scullery, and three bedrooms is estimated to cost £530.

    COURTS-MARTIAL (CIVIL OFFENCES.)
    Mr. ROBINSONasked the Secretary of State for War the number of offences against the Civil Law which were dealt with at the 3,269 courts-martial held during the year ending 30th September, 1926; and if he will consider the desirability of submitting to the Civil Courts all alleged offences against the Civil Law committed by officers and other ranks serving in the Army?
    Sir L. WORTHINGTON-EVANS: I regret that I am unable to supply the information asked for in the first part of the question, To do so would involve the examination of the proceedings of all the courts-martial. As regards the last part of the question, I am not prepared to make any change in the existing procedure.

    PENSIONS DISALLOWED.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHAasked the Secretary of State for War how many men were invalided from the service in 1926; how many of these were denied pensions on the ground of non-attributability; how many appealed to the War Office against the original decision; and in how many cases the decision was modified?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Captain Douglas King): The exact number of men invalided from the Army during 1926 is not available, but the total number of disability cases (including those of men already discharged) dealt with by the Chelsea Commissioners during that year was 2,546. In 2,100 cases the disability was found to be not attributable to military service, but 639 of the men concerned were eligible for non-attributable awards of gratuity or temporary pension. As I informed the hon. Member in July last, it is not possible to distinguish between appeals made by the men themselves and eases referred to the War Office by the Chelsea Commissioners for further consideration. The approximate number of cases referred under both heads was 137, and the decision was modified in 59.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHA: Does the hon. and gallant Member suggest that the figures with regard to invaliding from the Army are not kept at the War Office? Can they not be made available? Is the Department considering the necessity for establishing a proper legal appeal tribunal?
    Captain KING: In the answer, I give the cases dealt with by Chelsea Hospital. There are other cases in the commands which do not necessarily come before the Chelsea Commission.
    Dr. VERNON DAVIES: Does the hon. and gallant Member think that the present method of assessment could be improved upon?
    Captain KING: I think that the present method of assessment is proving quite satisfactory.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHA: Is the Department considering the necessity of establishing an appeal tribunal? And has the hon. and gallant Member's attention been called to the remarks of the First Lord of the Admiralty last night?
    Captain KING: My attention has not been called to those remarks. The question of an appeal tribunal has been considered on many occasions, but it is not considered necessary to set one up.

    FOREIGN INVESTMENTS.
    Mr. WELLOCKasked the President of the Board of Trade if, in view of the tendency to invest money in countries where labour is cheaper than British labour, he will cause an inquiry to be made into the matter and into the advisability of exercising some sort of control over foreign investments?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Ronald McNeill): The answer is in the negative.
    Mr. JOHNSTON: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that many of these investments are directed to the detriment of British trade and British standards of living?
    Mr. McNEILL: No, Sir.
    Mr. BECKETT: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, in spite of the very great shortage of capital for reconstruction in certain British industries, the Prudential Insurance Company and others have been able to invest very large sums in Poland, where the cost of labour is low?
    Mr. SPEAKER: This is Question Time and not Debate.

  SCOTLAND.

    POLICE FUND.
    Major Sir ARCHIBALD SINCLAIRasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has had any official communication from the trustees of the Police Fund with regard to the Scottish share; what proportion of the total fund is to be allocated to Scotland; on what principle this proportion is to be distributed among the Scottish police forces; and upon what objects it will be spent?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Sir John Gilmour): The holder of my office for the time being is Vice-Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the National Police Fund. The fund relates to Great Britain and is not allocated between England and Scotland. As regards the remainder of the question, I would refer to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Horne Secretary on the 17th February.
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: Will there be no allocation to Scotland? When the allo-

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    cation is made, surely the right hon. Gentleman will be responsible for the distribution among the different forces in Scotland?
    Sir J. GILMOUR:I have made it clear in my answer that no allocation has been made. The questions will be considered on their merits whether they come from Scotland or England.

    SCHOOL ACCOMMODATION, BROUGHTON.
    Mr. WESTWOODasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is aware that a petition was signed over six years ago by parents in the parish of Broughton, Peeblesshire, appealing to the Peeblesshire education authority to give them a school within the three miles limit for children in the district; that so far nothing has been done; that children are being allowed to leave school at 13 years of age in Peeblesshire where they are outside the three miles limit from the nearest school; that nothing is being done to provide reasonable opportunities for education in several instances in the foregoing district; and what action, if any, is he prepared to take, with a view to the Education Acts being carried out by the Peeblesshire education authority?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given to the question on the 1st instant. The education authority now inform me that following upon the petition referred to, a survey of educational requirements for the whole area was made and one new school was built. The authority were not satisfied, however, that the circumstances justified providing a school for the petitioners. They affirm that they do everything in their power to discourage children leaving school before the leaving age, and repeat that all applications made to them for travelling facilities have been granted. If the hon. Member will furnish me with particulars of the specific cases he has in mind, I shall be glad to consider what further action can he taken.
    Mr. WESTWOOD: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Peebles Education Authority furnished him with wrong information on the last occasion, hence the necessity for putting this question? I will give the right hon. Gentleman the information.

    ERRIBOL ESTATE (SALE).
    Sir A. SINCLAIRasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether the hoggs forming part of the proper ewe stock of Erribol Farm, but wintering in the Black Isle or elsewhere, will be taken over by the purchaser; and whether acclimatisation value will be paid for all of these sheep?
    Sir J. GILMOUR: The hoggs in question were taken over by the purchaser at acclimatisation value—with the exception of the shotts, which were retained by the Board, and which will be sold by them at the end of the wintering period.
    Lieut.-Colonel JAMES: Is it not a fact that the number of questions asked on this absorbing subject exceeds the number of sheep sold by several?

  COAL MINING INDUSTRY.

    WORKING HOURS.
    Mr. WHITELEYasked the Secretary for Mines whether he will prepare a statement showing the hours worked in the various mining districts prior to the stoppage and the hours now in operation; and whether he will state the times of descending and ascending for the same periods?
    The SECRETARY for MINES (Colonel Lane Fox): Before the stoppage of last May the full ordinary underground shift was seven hours not including winding-time. The only exceptions were the hewing shifts in Northumber land and Durham which were generally rather shorter. At the present time the corresponding figure is eight, except in Yorkshire, Kent, and Notts and Derby, and in Northumberland and Durham for hewers, where it is 7½. The winding times vary pit by pit, and shift by shift. The latest information that I have relating to the average winding time in each district will be found on page 269 of the Royal Commission's Report.
    Mr. GEORGE HALLasked the Secretary for Mines the average time spent below ground each working day by the miners in the coalfields of this country where the full eight hours have been enforced by the employers?
    Colonel LANE FOX: Approximately eight and a half hours, with a shorter period on Saturdays, in many districts.
    Mr. HALL: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in some of the larger collieries in South Wales nine and a half hours elapse from the time the first man goes down to the time the last man comes up?
    Colonel LANE FOX: The hon. Member asked for the average, and I have given it.
    NUMBER or Wage-earners employed above and below ground at Coal Mines in Great Britain during the weeks ended 27th February, 1926, and 26th February, 1927, and the number of Coal Miners insured under the Unemployment Insurance Acts recorded as Unemployed at 22nd February, 1926, and 21st February, 1927, respectively, the nearest dates for which information is available.

    Area.

    Number of Wage-earners employed during the week ended

    Number of persons unemployed at 22nd February, 1926.

    Number of Persons unemployed at 21st February, 1927.

    27th Feb., 1926.

    26th Feb., 1927.

    Wholly unemployed.

    Temporary Stoppages

    Total.

    Wholly unemployed.

    Temporary Stoppages.

    Total.

    England and Wales.

    Northumberland

    57,227

    54,028

    5,321

    232

    5,553

    6,652

    330

    6,982

    Durham

    156,111

    131,278

    29,545

    700

    30,245

    36,012

    7,634

    43,646

    Cumberland and Westmorland.

    11,416

    11,417

    1,193

    525

    1,718

    732

    126

    858

    Yorkshire

    188,899

    183,613

    4,436

    320

    4,756

    6,556

    26,333

    32,889

    Lancashire and Cheshire.

    97,562

    90,562

    6,083

    6,268

    12,351

    7,626

    3,127

    10,753

    Derbyshire

    63,571

    60,699

    641

    45

    686

    1,810

    1,314

    3,124

    Notts and Leicester

    68,313

    68,253

    736

    893

    1,629

    1,249

    4,671

    5,920

    Warwick

    20,026

    19,151

    179

    4

    183

    418

    4

    422

    Staffs., Worcester and Salop.

    71,302

    67,668

    4,218

    995

    5,213

    3,817

    686

    4,503

    Gloucester and Somerset.

    13,627

    11,556

    1,205

    714

    1,919

    1,535

    80

    1,615

    Kent

    1,837

    2,186

    93

    1

    94

    76

    335

    411

    Wales and Monmouth.

    230,368

    201,438

    30,336

    7,140

    37,476

    47,685

    17,459

    65,144

    Remainder of England.

    —

    —

    301

    40

    341

    393

    11

    404

    England and Wales

    980,279

    901,849

    84,287

    17,877

    102,164

    114,561

    62,110

    176,671

    Scotland

    127,247

    110,835

    15,829

    743

    16,572

    19,967

    1,101

    21,068

    Great Britain

    1,107,526

    1,012,684

    100,116

    18,620

    118,736

    134,528

    63,211

    197,739

    It should be noted that the number of insured persons recorded as unemployed for any particular date includes some persons partially employed, who are also included in the number on the books of the colliery companies for the corresponding date: the latter number also includes some persons (e.g., persons under 16 years

    MINERS (EMPLOYMENT).
    Mr. MAFIDY JONESasked the Secretary for Mines what was the total number of miners employed above and below ground in each of the coalfields of Great Britain for the week ending 27th February, 1926, and for the week ending 26th February, 1927, respectively; and what was the total number of miners unemployed in each British coalfield during each of the said two periods?
    Colonel LANE FOX: I will circulate the figures in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following are the figures:
    of age) who are not insured against unemployment. The two sets of figures are therefore not mutually exclusive, and due caution should be exercised in making comparisons between the sums of the two sets of figures for different dates, as the amount of overlapping may vary considerably from time to time.

    MINES AT WORK.
    Mr. MARDY JONESasked the Secretary for Mines what was the total number of coal mines at work in each of the coalfields of Great Britain during the week ending 27th February, 1926, and during the week ending 26th February, 1927?
    Colonel LANE FOX: I will circulate the figures in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following are the figures:

    Number of Coal Mines at Work during the Week ended 27th February, 1926, and daring the Week ended 26th February, 1927.

    District.

    Week ended 27 Feb., 1926.

    Week ended 26 Feb., 1927

    Northumberland

    103

    102

    Durham

    212

    209

    Cumberland and Westmorland.

    30

    29

    South Yorkshire

    102

    105

    West Yorkshire

    132

    128

    Lancashire and Cheshire

    202

    195

    Derbyshire (except South Derbyshire).

    97

    92

    Nottinghamshire

    41

    41

    South Derbyshire

    10

    8

    Leicestershire

    23

    22

    Cannock Chase

    28

    28

    North Staffordshire

    63

    65

    South Staffordshire and Worcester.

    88

    92

    Shropshire

    35

    34

    Warwickshire

    20

    22

    Forest of Dean

    44

    42

    Bristol

    4

    3

    Somerset

    17

    18

    Kent

    3

    3

    Total, England

    1,254

    1,238

    South Wales and Monmouth

    526

    501

    North Wales

    29

    25

    Total, Wales

    555

    526

    Fife and Clackmannan

    57

    59

    The Lothians (Mid and East)

    28

    25

    Lanarkshire

    233

    227

    Ayrshire

    78

    74

    Total, Scotland

    396

    385

    Great Britain

    2,205

    2,149

    WHEELLESS TUBS (HAULAGE).
    Mr. WHITELEYasked the Secretary for Mines whether he can state the names of the collieries and the districts
    1830
    where they are still using the guns for coal haulage of wheelless tubs?
    Colonel LANE FOX: There are 17 collieries, all in the Somerset coalfield. I will circulate their names in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Mr. WHITELEY: Will the right hon. Gentleman use his influence to get facilities for the early passage of the Bill on the Order Paper to-day—Coal Mines (Abolition of Wheelless Tubs) Bill, in order that this old and degrading system may be abolished?
    Colonel LANE FOX: Any question as to the business of the House should not be addressed to me.
    Mr. MARDY JONES: Will the right hon. Gentleman enable hon. Members to realise what this system means, by providing photographs showing the abominable conditions under which these people are working in the mines?
    Mr. HARDIE: As the right hon. Gentleman has said that these men are all in Somerset, is he aware that there are two mines in Wales where that system is employed?
    Colonel LANE FOX: No, Sir. I was not aware of that.
    Mr. HARDIE: How is the right hon. Gentleman going to become aware of it? When a question is put down asking for definite information, it means, if the Department cannot give the information, that they are neglecting their duties in not being able to report on the conditions of the mines [HON. MEMBERS: "Speech!"]
    The following is the list of mines in the Somerset Coalfield:

    Old Mills.

    Farrington.

    Mells.

    Moorewood.

    Newbury.

    New Rock.

    Norton Hill.

    Bromley.

    Pensford.

    Braysdown.

    Camerton.

    Priston.

    Clandown.

    Dunkerton.

    Radstoek.

    Kilmersdon.

    Foxcote and Writhlington.

    EXPORTS.
    Mr. MARDY JONESasked the Secretary for Mines what was the total quantity of coal exported from each of the exporting coalfields of Great Britain during the week ending 27th February, 1926, and during the week ending 26th February, 1927; and what was the average f.o.b. price per ton of exported coal (large) in each of the said two periods

    Total Quantities of All Classes of Coal exported from the Various Groups of Ports in Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Average declared value per ton f.o.b. of Large Coal exported from certain Ports during the months of February, 1926 and 1927.

    A. All Classes of Coal.

    B. Large Coal.

    Groups of Ports.

    Quantity of Coal Exported during the month of—

    Ports.

    Average declared value per ton f.o.b. of large coal exported during the month of—

    February, 1926.

    February, 1927.

    February, 1926.

    February, 1927.

    Tons.

    Tons.

    s.

    d.

    s.

    d.

    Bristol Channel Ports

    2,057,756

    1,793,774

    Cardiff

    …

    21

    9

    22

    10

    North-Western Ports

    143,272

    114,489

    Hull

    …

    20

    4

    21

    11

    North-Eastern Ports

    1,346,474

    1,572,324

    Hartlepool

    …

    17

    5

    17

    2

    Humber Ports

    205,888

    173,587

    Newcastle-on-Tyne

    …

    15

    6

    15

    9

    Other Ports on the East Coast.

    14,559

    10,974

    Leith

    …

    15

    6

    18

    6

    Glasgow

    …

    19

    1

    20

    11

    Other English Ports

    —

    —

    East Scottish Ports

    366,526

    323,999

    West Scottish Ports

    199,307

    176,701

    North Irish Ports

    6,224

    7,008

    All Ports in Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

    4,340,006

    4,172,856

    All Ports in Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

    20

    8

    21

    8

    COKE OVENS.
    Mr. WHITELEYasked the Secretary for Mines the number of collieries, and the districts in which they are situated, where coke ovens are still idle that were in operation prior to the stoppage?
    Colonel LANE FOX: I regret that the information asked for is not available.

    BOYS (MEDICAL EXAMINATION).
    Dr. VERNON DAVIESasked the Secretary for Mines if he is aware that boys of 14 years of age are permitted to work in coal mines without a previous medical examination for fitness; that under the Factories and Workshops Acts no child of 14 years of age is permitted to work without a previous medical
    at each of the following ports: Cardiff, Hull, Hartlepool, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Leith, and Glasgow?
    Colonel LANE FOX: I regret that I am unable to give the precise information desired, but such figures as are available I will circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following are the available figures:
    examination by the certifying factory surgeon; and will he take steps to remedy this anomalous condition of affairs by seeing that no child is allowed to work in a coal mine without previous medical examination and certification of fitness for that occupation?
    Colonel LANE FOX: I am aware of the facts stated, but doubtless my hon. Friend is aware that the existing system of examination under the Factories and Workshops Acts has been recently condemned by a Committee of Inquiry as a failure and that an improved system of examination is to be submitted to the House in the Factories Bill. If it is approved, the application of similar provisions to mines and quarries will certainly be considered.

    MINERS' NYSTAGMUS.
    Mr. SHORTasked the Secretary for Mines the number of cases of miners' nystagmus during 1925 and 1926, respectively; whether the incidence of this disease is still heavy; and what action, if any, does he propose to take?
    Colonel LANE FOX: In 1925 the number of new cases in which compensation was paid was 3,444 and the number continued from previous years was 7,890. The figures for 1926 are not yet available. The Mining Association and the Miners' Federation have been invited to cooperate with the Home Office to give effect to the recommendation of the Nvstagmus Committee, and continual effort are being made to improve lighting in mines.
    Mr. W. PALINGasked the Secretary for Mines how many cases of miner's nystagmus have been reported during each of the last seven years; and whether he has any means of ascertaining how many of such cases have occurred at pits where the method of illumination is by oil lamps and by electric lamps, respectively?
    Colonel LANE FOX: As the information required by the hon. Member involves a series of figures, I propose, with his permission, to circulate them in the OFFICIAL REPORT. With regard to the second part of the question, the information could not be obtained without returns from every colliery, which would be very laborious both to prepare and to collate; and in view of the number and diversity of the factors contrbuting to the incidence of nystagmus, the results would not warrant the expenditure of this amount of labour.
    Following are the figures promised:
    The statistics of workmen's compensation are as follows:

    Cases continued from the previous

    New Cases.

    year.

    1919

    2,718

    3,731

    1920

    2,865

    4,163

    1921

    1,913

    4,804

    1922

    4,092

    5,063

    1923

    3,872

    7,270

    1924

    3,271

    7,635

    1925

    3,444

    7,890

    The figures for 1926 are not yet available.

    WAGONS.
    Mr. T. WILLIAMSasked the Secretary for Mines whether he is aware that the Samuel Commission elicited the information that there are 57 different types of coal wagons in use in this country, varying in capacity from eight to 20 tons; that if all the wagons were 20 tons capacity a reduction in freightage charge, equal to 10 per cent., would be possible; and that 69 per cent. of the wagons are privately owned by 10,000 separate owners, and it was estimated that if these wagons were all owned by one company 9,000,000 engine hours per annum would be saved; and, in view of their recommendation that a committee on mineral transport should he set up, will he state what his intentions are on this question?
    Colonel LANE FOX: A Joint Standing Committee on Mineral Transport, such as the Samuel Commission recommended, was appointed on the 17th February and has already held its first meeting.

    COMPETENCY CERTIFICATES.
    Mr. LUNNasked the Secretary for Mines whether, as there is now a surplus of men holding first-or second-class certificates, a number of them in addition holding degrees or diplomas, it is still the policy of the Department to operate Section 22 of the Mining Industry Act, 1926, so debarring these men from attaining to the higher official positions, and at the same time to refuse to amend Regulation 47, so barring them, to a very large extent, from the position of over-men?
    Colonel LANE FOX: Nothing that the Mines Department is allowed to do under Section 22 of the Mining Industry Act, 1926, will debar any holder of a first- or second-class certificate from seeking the higher posts in the industry; nor is any person so qualified debarred from seeking the post of overman. All who hold qualifying certificates for the respective posts are, and will continue to be, eligible for appointment on their merits.
    Mr. ALLEN PARKINSONasked the Secretary for Mines whether, in view of the fact that in 1921, the latest date for which the figures are available, there were only 400 fewer men holding first-or second-class certificates employed, otherwise than as managers or oversmen,

    1835
    than there were oversmen holding only firemen's certificates, and that since that time about 2,000 certificates of competency have been granted under the Coal Mines Act, he will consider the advisability, in the interests of safety and efficiency as well as for the encouragement of the large number of students attending the mining classes in the mining districts, of so amending Regulation 47 of the Coal Mines Act as to make it compulsory that the official defined in that Regulation as superior to the fireman, but inferior to the under-manager, shall be required to hold at least a second-class certificate of competency under the Coal Mines Act?
    Colonel LANE FOX: This proposal has been very fully considered, on several occasions, during the past few years and rejected. All the considerations to which the hon. Member calls attention were taken fully into account, and no fresh reasons for re-opening the question have been brought to my notice.
    Mr. MAXTON: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider doing something some time for the improvement of the mining industry?

    FATAL ACCIDENTS (BOYS).
    Mr. CAPEasked the Secretary for Mines the number of young persons under the age of 18 killed in the coal mines of this country during the months of December, 1926, and January and February, 1927?
    Colonel LANE FOX: Twenty persons under 18 years of age were killed at coal mines in Great Britain during the months of December, 1926, and January and February, 1927.

    RE-ORGANISATION.
    Mr. R. RICHARDSONasked the Secretary for Mines if his attention has been drawn to the recent ascertainment of the position as to profits and wages in the Durham coalfield, and to the fact that it reveals that wages which would be 20 per cent. below minimum rates could be paid from the funds remaining after meeting all other expenditure; and, viewing the fact that the workmen have made great sacrifices as to both hours and wages, will he take action in re-organisation of the industry to reduce the cost of
    1836
    production and give some hope to the workmen of better conditions than now exist?
    Colonel LANE FOX: The hon. Member does not specify what action he has in mind, and I do not understand in what manner he thinks it is within the power of the Government to achieve the result indicated. It can only be done by the industry itself, if it can be done at all; and the fact that the ascertainment shows an economic wage lower than the minimum and therefore involves a loss to the owners obviously provides the best possible incentive to those engaged in it to do everything in their power to that end.
    Mr. RICHARDSON: May I ask what organisation the right hon. Gentleman proposes to set up for the purpose of increasing the amount which comes to the workmen?
    Colonel LANE FOX: My answer quite meets that point. The Government cannot do anything. It is for those who are chiefly interested in the industry to carry out these improvements.
    Mr. MARDY JONES: Is it not a fact that the Samuel Commission laid the utmost stress on the need for re-organisation; that there is very little going on; and why do not the Government expedite it by legislation?
    Lieut.-Colonel JAM ES: Is it not the fact that the cost of production in Durham is largely affected by the large increase in local rates due to the action of the Chester-le-Street Guardians?

    OVERWINDING ACCIDENTS.
    Mr. PALINGasked the Secretary for Mines (1) how many accidents have occurred during the last five years due to overwinding; how many have occurred since 1st December, 1926; how many deaths occurred as a result of such accidents; and in how many cases was electrically driven winding gear in use;
    (2) how many collieries in Great Britain have steam-driven winding engines and electrically-driven winding engines, respectively?
    Colonel LANE FOX: It will take a little time to get the information asked for in this and the following question.

    1837
    If the hon. Member will repeat the questions this day week, I hope to be able to reply.

  MOTOR TRAFFIC.

    COMPULSORY INSURANCE.
    Mr. W. BAKERasked the Minister of Transport whether he has decided to make motor insurance against third-party risks compulsory?
    The MINISTER of TRANSPORT (Colonel Ashley): This question has been under my consideration in connection with the Bill for the better regulation of road traffic. The draft Bill which I hope will be circulated during the course of this week provides for a certain measure of compulsory insurance in the case of public service vehicles on the part of persons or companies who are not in a position to carry their own risks. The extension of this provision to all motor vehicles presents considerable difficulties. I am at present inclined to the view that it would be desirable to gain practical experience of the working of compulsory insurance in connection with public service vehicles before attempting to extend its application to all motor vehicles.
    Mr. B. SMITH: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that compulsory insurance for taxicabs and single-owned omnibuses has been enforced by the Home Office for a considerable period; and in the light of that experience, is he prepared to extend it to all owners of motor cars?
    Colonel ASHLEY: If the hon. Member had appreciated my answer, he would have gathered that I propose in the draft Bill that compulsory insurance should be imposed on public service vehicles, and that as regards private vehicles we should see how it works.
    Sir F. HALL: I hope the right hon. Gentleman will consider the position in which some people are placed in the event of a collision with another car, the owner of which is not insured. Considerable damage is sometimes done, and it is not covered by insurance. Will he not realise the importance of insisting upon private cars being insured?
    Captain CROOKSHANK: I hope the right hon. Gentleman will remember that it is not so much a question of the vehicle being insured as the driver of a vehicle taking out an insurance. There is a distinction.
    Colonel ASHLEY: It shows that it would be much better to wait and see the proposals of the Bill, and discuss it afterwards.
    Mr. BAKER: Is not the risk with the commercial and privately-owned car rather than with the public service vehicles; and, if third-party insurance is to be insisted upon, ought it not to be insisted upon in the cases where the risk lies?
    Mr. SPEAKER: This is developing into a debate on a Bill which has not vet been printed.

    STREET ACCIDENTS, LONDON.
    Mr. W. BAKERasked the Minister of Transport what steps he is taking to deal with the problems created by trade and commercial motor vehicles in London which have killed 104 persons and been involved in 6,058 accidents to persons and property within the Metropolis during the last quarter of 1926?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I regret to say that accidents, both fatal regret non-fatal, caused by vehicles in the Metropolis, are not by any means confined to trade and commercial vehicles; 189 persons have been killed, and 25,000 accidents have been occasioned to persons and property by other classes of vehicles in the period mentioned in the question. The problem of these accidents must be dealt with as a whole. I am expecting in the course of the next few days a report from the London Traffic Advisory Committee on the subject of the prevention of street accidents, and I have convened a conference of representatives of all local authorities and other bodies concerned in the metropolitan area, for the 21st March, to consider the question.
    Mr. LUNN: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that the time has now come when legislation should be tightened up and penalties increased on people who are taking other people's lives in this way?
    Colonel ASHLEY: That is the question we are investigating on the 21st.

    LOCAL AUTHORITIES' VEHICLES (TAXATION).
    Mr. T. WILLIAMSasked the Minister of Transport how many vehicles, mechanically and electrically driven, are Owned by local authorities and used in non-trading services such as sanitary and road cleansing; and the net sum paid in taxation for these vehicles in 1925 and 1926?
    Colonel ASHLEY: The records of the licensing authorities are maintained in such a form that the information desired by the hon. Member could only be extracted by a long and laborious search. I hope, therefore, that he will not press for a return.
    Mr. WILLIAMS: is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the increase of the taxation on those vehicles that operate only within the districts where they are owned, and that the item is a very considerable sum for the local authorities, and have representations been made to him, and what does he intend to do in the matter?
    Colonel ASHLEY: As the hon. Member is aware, this subject was very fully discussed on the Budget last year, and no doubt it will come up again for discussion this year. I do not remember having received any special representation on the point.
    Mr. B. SMITH: Will the right hon. Gentleman undertake to afford the information by circularising the whole of the local authorities as to the number of vehicles they have.
    Colonel ASHLEY: No; I reckon that in these days of economy we should try to save where we can.

    OMNIBUSES, LONDON.
    Mr. HARRISasked the Minister of Transport how many omnibuses belonging to the London General Omnibus Company and their associated companies have been allocated routes in the Metropolitan Police Area under the London Traffic Act; and how many omnibuses have been allocated routes under the same Act belonging to private individuals and to companies in which the London General Omnibus Company has no share interest?
    Colonel ASHLEY: There has not been any allocation of omnibus routes under the London Traffic Act. The routes now
    1840
    being worked were selected by the companies, or the individual proprietors themselves, subject to the condition that the route or routes selected were approved by the Commissioner of Police or the licensing authority. The Orders and Regulations with regard to "restricted" streets merely stabilised the position, as at certain dates, on the streets affected. The numbers of omnibuses scheduled for operation in the Metropolitan Police District at 1st November, 1926, were as follows: 4,190 belonging to the London General Omnibus Company and associated companies or to undertakings in which that company have a controlling interest, and 409 belonging to independent proprietors.
    Mr. HARRIS: Does not that prove that the combine has now complete control owing to the working of the London Traffic Act—that it has a practical monopoly?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I lo not think that follows. The condition is largely the same as existed before the Act.
    Mr. HARRIS: Is it not a fact that the combine has bought out most of the other undertakings?
    Colonel ASHLEY: No, Sir. There has been no marked change.
    Mr. R. MORRISONasked the Minister of Transport whether the discussions at present taking place upon the co-ordination of London passenger-carrying transport undertakings include any consultation with the Independent Omnibus Owners' Association?
    Colonel ASHLEY: The question whether some form of co-ordination or co-operation between London passenger transport agencies is practicable is under consideration by the London Traffic Advisory Committee, to whom I had referred the matter, and I understand that they propose to consult all interested parties before submitting any proposals to me.
    Mr. MORRISON: In view of the fact that, as far as one can gather, the conversations between the London County Council and the General Omnibus Company have reached an advanced stage, has not the time come when the right hon. Gentleman's Committee ought to

    1841
    take some steps to consult with these independent proprietors, who own 400 omnibuses?
    Colonel ASHLEY: That is exactly what I say; it is proposed to consult all interested parties.

    FRANCHISE TO WOMEN.
    Mr. SPOORasked the Prime Minister on what date he proposes to make his promised statement on the granting of Parliamentary suffrage to women at the age of 21?
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Prime Minister whether he has yet reached any decision with regard to the extension of the franchise to women below the age of 30 years; and, if so, when it is proposed to introduce the necessary legislation?
    The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Baldwin): I shall answer these questions together. As has already been announced, a statement on this subject will be made before Easter.
    Mr. SPOOR: Are we to understand that the Bill is to be introduced before the General Election?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I think it would be much better to await the statement which is promised before Easter.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: Will the right hon. Gentleman undertake to give the statement to this House in the first place, and not to any outside body?
    The PRIME MINISTER: Certainly.

    CHINA (SHANGHAI DEFENCE FORCE).
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHYasked the Prime Minister the last date on which the Committee of Imperial Defence met; whether the despatch of the Shanghai Defence Force has been under consideration by the Committee of Imperial Defence; and how many times the Committee has met during the present year?
    The PRIME MINISTER: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the answer which I gave him on the 11th March, 1926.
    Mr. HARRISasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the City of Shanghai has been asked to make any contribution towards the cost of the British Defence Force sent there; and whether British citizens domiciled there pay British Income Tax?
    Mr McNEILL: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given yesterday by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to the hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull. As regards the second part of the question, a British citizen domiciled in Shanghai, in common with other persons, who are not resident in the United Kingdom, is, broadly speaking, liable to British Income Tax on any income which he derives from this country; such persons are not otherwise liable to the tax.
    Mr. HARRIS: Are they liable to any direct taxation in Shanghai for any purpose?
    Mr. McNEILL: I do not know; I could not say without notice what is the taxation in Shanghai itself. I am speaking only of British taxation.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is it the case that during the War they escaped Supertax, Excess Profits Duty, and so on?
    Mr. McNEILL: I do not know that they were subject to any special exemption during the War. They are subject to the usual rule, the same as any other residents outside the United Kingdom.
    Sir HARRY BRITTAIN: Are not these people doing everything they can to defend their own city, and are not these questions extremely unfair?

    INCOME TAX.
    Captain FRASERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that in many cases, particularly of London working-class houses, the revenue authorities are declining to deduct from the assessment the usual allowance for repairs; if any instruction or communication has been issued to the authorities in any districts directing a cessation of this allowance; and, if so, to what districts such an instruction or communication has been sent?
    Mr. McNEILL: The statutory allowance for repairs is expressly prohibited by the income Tax Acts in the case of any property where the rent, as reduced by the repairs allowance which would be granted if the Income Tax assessment under Schedule A were on the amount of the rent, exceeds the gross Schedule A assessment of the property, which in the Metropolitan area is the annual value appearing in the valuation list. As part of the normal procedure following the recent revaluation of the Metropolis, the Inspectors of Taxes generally were reminded of the statutory position.
    Mr. MORRISasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the annual value of the property and profits assessed to Income Tax in the year ending 5th April, 1926, in England, Scotland, and Wales (including Monmouthshire), respectively, showing the amounts separately under each schedule?
    Mr. McNEILL: As explained in the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the hon. Member for Pontypridd on the 9th December last, the present statistics of the Income Tax do not distinguish Wales separately from England. The latest year for which particulars for England (including Wales) and Scotland are available is 1924–25 and, with the hon. Member's permission, I will circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT a table giving the figures for that year.
    Mr. MORRIS: Is the right hon. Gentle man aware that in pre-War years the Chancellor of the Exchequer was able to give the information asked for?
    Mr. McNEILL: No, I do not know that.
    Mr. MARDY JONES: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is considerable dissatisfaction in the Principality of Wales because we do not get separate figures in this way, which we did get in pre-War times? The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in reply to my question last December, gave a provisional promise that he would consider the proposal for the present financial year.
    Mr. McNEILL: I do not know about that promise. I have no doubt there may be dissatisfaction in Wales over this and other matters.
    Fallowing is the table promised:

    Schedule.

    Actual Income assessed to Income Tax, 1924–25.

    England (including Wales).

    Scotland.

    £

    £

    A

    204,008,328

    17,952,530

    B

    25,226,047

    3,864,595

    D

    914,322.635

    94,118,094

    E (Manual Wage Earners).

    295,654,515

    45,354,844

    E (other Assessments).

    593,372,040

    49,513,669

    Total (excluding Schedule C).

    2,032,583,565

    210,803,732

    Schedule C

    £135,403,139 (Great Britain).

    Notes.—1. Actual Income, means the statutory income of taxpayers, estimated in accordance with the provisions of the Income Tax Acts, excluding the income of individuals with a total income not exceeding the exemption limit, which for 1924–25 was £150 for earned income and £135 for investment income.
    2. The interest and dividends coming in charge under Schedule C are assessed in London for the whole of Great Britain, and the amount payable to Scotland cannot be distinguished.

    ENTERTAINMENTS DUTY.
    Sir WALTER de FRECEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has received any representations from the entertainment industry as to the fact that the Entertainments Duty is not levied upon places of public refreshment which give entertainment in conjunction with meals; and what steps he is proposing to take to remedy this inequality so long as the Entertainments Duty is in existence?
    Mr. McNEILL: My right hon. Friend has received such representations in connection with a deputation from the entertainments industry which is to be received at the Treasury. For the rest, I cannot add anything to the reply given to my hon. Friend on the 31st March last.

  TRANSPORT.

    SUTTON BY-PASS ROAD.
    Colonel DAYasked the Minister of Transport if his attention has been

    1845
    drawn to the dangerous condition of the Sutton by-pass road; what representations, if any, he has made to the authorities concerned; and what action is being taken?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I am not aware that the sections of this by-pass which are open to traffic are in a dangerous condition, and I have not made any representations in the matter.
    Colonel DAY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the majority of motorists, instead of using this by-pass road, go through Sutton, on account of the awful conditions of the by-pass road?
    Colonel ASHLEY: Probably the reason is that a temporary surface has been put on the road, as is usually the case, until the road consolidates; but in a short time, when a proper surface has been put on, the road will be all right.
    Colonel DAY: When will the proper surface be put on? Motorists at present shun the road.
    Colonel ASHLEY: We must await the process of consolidation.

    RAILWAY WAGONS, HULL.
    Lieut.-Colonel LAMBERT WARDasked the Minister of Transport whether his attention has been called to the inconvenience and loss of trade which is being caused by the shortage of railway wagons at the port of Hull; and what steps he intends to take to remedy the repeated complaints that have been made by the traders of this city?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I am aware that there has been a shortage of wagons at Hull for the timber trade, and I have been in communication with the railway company on the subject. From recent information I have received it appears that the position has considerably improved.
    Lieut.-Colonel WARD: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that it is only since the railways have been amalgamated and placed under the control of his Department that these complaints have arisen?
    Colonel ASHLEY: No. It may be post hoc, but it is not propter hoc; it is
    1846
    not because of my Department, but owing to the general strike and the coal trade dispute.
    Major CARVER: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that a great many telegraph poles are made in the Hull district and that they are for the General Post Office, and that great delay has been caused owing to the shortage of wagons and the inability of traders to obtain transport?
    Mr. PALING: Can the right hon. Gentleman say how much of the delay is due to the private ownership of wagons, and would it not be likely to be reduced if there was a pooling of wagons?
    Colonel ASHLEY: That I cannot say. In reply to my hon. and gallant Friend., I would state that we do appreciate the position at Hull, and we are doing all that we can. I know it is a considerable inconvenience to the traders.
    Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by an improvement? On the 12th of this month one of the biggest importers could get only 60 per cent. of the wagons he required, and that sort of thing is general through the port.
    Colonel ASHLEY: Even if that be so, it does not follow—
    Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Member for Central Hull (Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy) seems to be giving information, rather than asking for it.

    COMMERCIAL VEHICLES (DANGEROUS DRIVING).
    Mr. BROMLEYasked the Minister of Transport how many drivers of commercial road vehicles were prosecuted for excessive speed and/or dangerous driving during 1926 and during January and February, l927; and how many were involved in fatal accidents during the same periods?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir William Joynson-Hicks): I have been asked to reply. The returns of prosecutions and, of accidents furnished to my Department for statistical purposes do not distinguish those concerning drivers of commercial road vehicles, so that I am not in a position to answer the question.
    Mr. BROMLEYasked the Minister of Transport if he is aware that drivers of commercial road vehicles are often ordered to cover distances from point to point which necessitate an average speed of 35 miles per hour and over; and seeing that this entails dangerous speeds for heavily loaded vehicles, will he endeavour to deal with the question in such a manner as to prevent such speeds being ordered?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I have been asked to reply. So far as the Metropolitan Police District is concerned I am informed that, generally speaking, the police are not aware that drivers of any vehicles are ordered to drive at a speed which would be in excess of the limits allowed by the law, but if such cases were brought to their notice, necessary action would be taken against the person or persons responsible for giving such orders. There are occasionally cases, when the owner is present, in which there is evidence that the owner had ordered the driver to commit a breach of the law. In such cases the owner is prosecuted for aiding and abetting. If the hon. Member has any cases of an average speed of 35 miles an hour and if he will let me know, I will consider them very carefully.
    Mr. BROMLEY: The right hon. Gentleman has only replied in regard to the Metropolitan area, but my question deals with the country at large. Has he no further information?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: No, Sir; I have not, and really there is nobody who has the information in regard to the rural districts or the non-Metropolitan areas unless the hon. Member were to apply to the Watch Committees. It is only the Metropolitan Police who are directly under the control of the Secretary of State, the others are under Watch Committees or Standing Joint Committees.

    EXPLOSION, BEACONSFIELD ROAD, W.4.
    Sir H. BRITTAINasked the Minister of Transport whether his attention has been called to the evidence and verdict at the inquest upon Mrs. Elizabeth Waterworth, of 1, Beaconsfield Road, W.4, who received fatal injuries in an explosion at this address; whether the
    1848
    gas which caused the explosion was evolved by the heating of the covering of certain adjacent electric cables in the road; and, if so, whether he has taken any steps to prevent such an occurrence in future?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I am advised by the Electricity Commissioners that there does not appear to be sufficient evidence that the explosion was in fact due to the breakdown of an electric main, but I am asking them to make further inquiries.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: Will the right hon. Gentleman do all he can to press for a public inquiry into teat case so as to allay the great anxiety felt in the district in regard to this explosion?
    Colonel ASHLEY: I think I had better wait and hear the result of the further inquiries to be made by the Electricity Commissioners. If they are not satisfactory, I will consider what my hon. Friend suggests, namely, a public inquiry.

  BROADCASTING.

    AMATEUR TRANSMITTING STATIONS.
    Colonel DAYasked the Postmaster-General the number of amateur broadcasting wireless stations there are in operation in Great Britain?
    The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Sir William Mitchell-Thomson): No amateur wireless station is authorised to undertake broadcasting. It is one of the conditions of the licences granted for experimental wireless stations that the stations shall not be used for general calls, or for sending news or other communications of a non-experimental character.
    Colonel DAY: Have there been any prosecutions for broadcasting by amateur transmitting stations without a licence?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: No, I think not. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will put down a question.

    BRITISH BROADCASTING CORPORATION.
    Mr. SHORTasked the Postmaster-General how many meetings have been held by the governors of the British Broadcasting Corporation since their appointment?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: Under the terms of their charter the British Broadcasting Corporation are required to furnish an annual report of their proceedings. They are not required to notify me of the dates or number of meetings they are holding, and I do not propose to ask them to do so.

    PROGRAMMES (PUBLICATION).
    Mr. JOHNSTONasked the Postmaster-General whether, in view of the valuable press property being built up by a private firm as a result of the monopoly of broadcasting programmes and news supplied to the "Radio Times," he will consider the printing by, and publication from, the State printing works of broadcast programmes and news?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: I understand that the British Broadcasting Corporation have made arrangements which they consider satisfactory for the printing and publication of the "Radio Times." The responsibility in this matter rests with the Corporation, and I do not propose to intervene.
    Mr. JOHNSTON: Do the British Broadcasting Company get any monetary consideration in return for the very valuable news which they hand over to the proprietors of the "Radio Times"?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: I do not follow the question. The British Broadcasting Company has ceased to exist and the "Radio Times" is the property of the British Broadcasting Corporation.

    RECEIVING LICENCES (HOSPITALS).
    Sir H. BRITTAINasked the Postmaster-General whether, seeing that when in use in a hospital which is spread over a series of separate buildings each specific wireless receiving set, if separated in these separate buildings, has to have a separate licence, he will reconsider this Regulation?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: The rule governing the use of wireless receiving sets in hospitals is that a single licence covers the installation of any number of receiving sets for general use in the main building; but separate licences are necessary for sets installed in other buildings, for example, in the private residential quarters of members
    1850
    of the staff. I am always prepared to give consideration to any case in which a strict application of the rule appears to work harshly.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: Is it not obvious that this would impose hardship in the case of a hospital with several buildings; and does the right hon. Gentleman consider it reasonable that separate licences should be necessary in the case of a hospital?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: I think it is quite reasonable to require separate licences in the case of residential quarters for each building.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: But in the case of a hospital with segregated buildings a separate licence has to be taken out for each building, and is not that a hardship?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: No. I have already explained that the rule does not so apply. The rule that there must be a separate licence to each block of buildings applies only to residential quarters.
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: May I assure the right hon. Gentleman that I have received authentic information that it is not so?

    OSCULLATION (DETECTION).
    Sir H. BRITTAINasked the Postmaster-General if he can give the House the number of cars made use of throughout the country for the detection of the source of oscillation caused by wireless sets; and whether there is any present intention to increase that number?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: One car is in use at present, and a second car is on order.

  POST OFFICE.

    PUIVATE BRANCH TELEPHONISTS.
    Colonel DAYasked the Postmaster-General how many telephone subscribers who have private branch exchanges in the London area have, during the 12 months ended to the last convenient date, availed themselves of the opportunity of having their private branch switchboard telephonists trained in telephone operating free of charge?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: During the year ended the 31st December last the number was 39.

    TRANS-ATLANTIC TELEPHONE SERVICE.
    Sir W. de FRECEasked the Postmaster-General whether he has received a request from the German Ministry of Posts asking his Department to act as an intermediary between Continental telephones and the telephone system of the United States; and, if so, what is the attitude of the Department towards the matter?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: Yes; but I do not think the time is yet ripe for the suggested extension of the Trans-Atlantic telephone service.

    AUXILIARY POSTMEN, TOTTENHAM.
    Mr. R. MORRISONasked the Postmaster-General how many auxiliary part-time postmen are employed at the Tottenham sorting offices; how many of those are married ex-service men with families to maintain; what are their weekly earnings; whether he is aware that the guardians will not grant relief to these men and that, although they have to pay full unemployment contributions, they cannot receive any benefits while partly employed; and will he take steps to allow these men to work a sufficient number of hours to earn a living wage?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: 35 auxiliary postmen are employed at the Tottenham Sub-District Offices, 14 at the Tottenham Office and 21 at the South Tottenham Office. 21 of them are married ex-service men, but I have no information regarding their families. The pay ranges from about 31s. to about 41s. a week, according to the number of hours worked, the average pay being 36s. I have no information as to the circumstances in which relief is granted by the guardians, and the question of unemployment benefit is a matter for the Ministry of Labour. The services of these auxiliary postmen are only required during the morning and evening periods of pressure, and I regret that it is impracticable to increase their attendances.
    Mr. MORRISON: In view of the tremendous difficulties suffered by these auxiliary postmen who are employed only on part time, and are nearly all ex-
    1852
    service men, could not the right hon. Gentleman explore the possibility of enabling them to work a few hours longer per week, in order that they might earn a living wage?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: I am constantly exploring possibilities of that character. It is very difficult to provide employment for these auxiliary men except in the early morning hours and the afternoons.
    Mr. MORRISON: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that the present unfortunate system is a great temptation to dishonesty?

    WHITLEY COUNCIL.
    Mr. H. WILLIAMSasked the Postmaster-General whether it is his intention to make any changes in the constitution of the Post Office Whitley Council; and, if so, what representation he proposes giving to the National Federation of Postal and Telegraph Clerks?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: The matter is receiving my consideration but I am not yet in a position to make any statement on the subject.

    LETTER DELIVERIES, HARROW.
    Major SALMONasked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that frequently a letter posted in London on Sunday is delivered in Harrow by the second post on Monday, while a letter posted in Durham at the same time arrives by the first post; and whether he will take steps to improve the postal deliveries in Harrow?
    Sir W. MITCHELL-THOMSON: Letters posted in time for the late evening collections in London on Sundays should be delivered in Harrow by first post on Monday morning in the majority of cases; but at the present time the connection cannot be secured from all parts of London owing to curtailments of the train service. Proposals for improving the existing arrangements are under consideration.

    WAR PENSIONS ADMINISTRATION (TRURO AND PLYMOUTH).
    Mr. HORE-BELISHAasked the Minister of Pensions whether his attention has been called to the resolution passed by the Truro branch of the British Legion Conference protesting against the further curtailment of office facilities in

    1853
    Cornwall, especially in so far as the office of Truro is concerned; and whether he will give consideration to the retention of the Plymouth area, seeing that Plymouth has an ex-service community among whom many are disabled, and the work of the war pensions committee shows no sign of lessening?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of PENSIONS (Lieut.-Colonel Stanley): I have seen the resolution to which the hon. Member refers and to which a suitable reply has been sent. The decision to reduce the office attendance at Truro was arrived at only after careful consideration of the small amount of work to be performed, and there is no evidence to show that the new arrangements are in any way inadequate. There is no proposal before me which would involve the abolition of the Plymouth area, and no change in the local arrangements there will be made without consulting the local war pensions committee.

    ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS, LONDON (ANTHRAX).
    Sir W. DAVISONasked the Minister of Agriculture whether, in view of the recent outbreak of anthrax at the Zoological Gardens in London, he will consider the advisability of extending the present Contagious Diseases of Animals Order so as to include all animals in the United Kingdom, wild as well as domesticated?
    The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Guinness): Yes, Sir. I am at present considering the advisability of including within the scope of the Anthrax Order of 1910 all animals susceptible to anthrax which are kept in public or private zoological collections and travelling menageries.
    Sir W. DAVISON: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind the necessity of having these cases dealt with by qualified veterinary surgeons, in view of the great danger to the community which is involved?
    Sir H. BRITTAIN: Which animals contracted this unfortunate complaint?
    Mr. GUINNESS: Two elephants, I understand. In the second case anthrax was proved: in the first case it was suspected.

    CYPRUS (GRANTS-IN-AID)
    Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what sum total has been paid by His Majesty's Government in grants-in-aid to Cyprus; when the last grant-in-aid of £50,000 was paid; whether any of those grants have been treated as loans; how much is at present paid by the Cyprus treasury towards the interest on the Anglo-French guaranteed Turkish loan of 1855; and whence the balance of interest on the loan comes?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Amery): The total grants-in-aid made by His Majesty's Government from 1879 to 1926 inclusive amount to £1,839,335 The grant for £50,000 for the current year is being paid as usual. None of these sums are loans or repayable. With regard to the fourth and fifth parts of the question, I would refer to the replies given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the hon. Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) on the 17th February and 3rd March, 1925.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Are we to understand from the right hon. Gentleman that the French, so far, have not acted up to their obligations under this loan, and are leaving it entirely to the British taxpayer?
    Mr. AMERY: No, I am not aware of that. If a question on that matter is desired to be put, it had better be addressed to the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
    Colonel WEDGWOOD: Is it not a fact that all the money we are paying, £50,000 a year, is coming from the British taxpayer, and going to the bond-holders under this loan?
    Mr. AMERY: No. The money is paid to Cyprus to make it easier for Cyprus to pay her instalment of £92,000 a year.
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: Yes, Mr. Speaker, but is it not a fact that all the assistance given to Cyprus is given by the British taxpayers exclusively, while the instalments paid by Cyprus are shared between French and British bond holders?

    PALESTINE (LIQUOR LICENCES).
    Mr. BARRasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether his

    1855
    attention has been called to the fact that there has been a great increase in the number of places licensed for the sale of alcoholic liquors in Jerusalem and at the railway stations in Palestine since that country was taken under our mandate; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
    Mr. AMERY: I have no information on the subject, but any increase in the number of licences issued for the sale of intoxicating liquors in Jerusalem and at railway stations in Palestine is presumably due to the large increase of population of European provenance in that country since 1921, and I do not propose to take any action in the matter.
    Mr. BARR: In view of the fact that for certain mandated territories it is laid down that there shall be a complete prohibition of alcohol sales, is this not in direct opposition to the principles laid down in the Covenant of the League of Nations?
    Mr. AMERY: No. The hon. Member will understand that there is a great difference between an aboriginal population in Africa and a population which is largely of European origin in Palestine.
    Mr. SCRYMGEOUR: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of that other prohibition law, which says that nothing that "worketh abomination or maketh a lie" shall enter into the New Jerusalem?

    The number of potteries with leadless glaze certificates is 193. This figure includes 22 low solubility glaze factories which, having satisfied the Chief Inspector of Factories that leadless glaze is used for a substantial part of the output, are entitled under No. 2 of the Regulations to the same exemption as leadless glaze factories. The number of potteries with low solubility glaze certificates (excluding the 22 above-mentioned) is 171. Total 364.

    Year.

    Number of samples of leadless and low solubility glazes.

    Results of analysis.

    Leadless.

    Low Solubility.

    Leadless.

    Low Solubility.

    Total.

    Not exceeding 1% total lead.

    In excess of 1% Details below.

    Not exceeding 5% Soluble lead.

    In excess of 5% Details below.

    (1)

    (2)

    (3)

    (4)

    (5)

    (6)

    (7)

    (8)

    1924

    23

    60

    83

    21

    2

    58

    2

    1925

    47

    50

    97

    37

    10

    49

    1

    1926

    20

    64

    84

    19

    1

    64

    —

    Commander WILLIAMS: May I ask if this is not due very largely to the increase of people from America?
    Mr. MONTAGUE: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman agrees with the policy of "Hands off Palestine"?
    Mr. WESTWOOD: Is this not changing the old tradition of a land flowing with milk and honey to a land flowing with beer and whisky?
    Mr. BARR: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to accept the statement which I make that the number of places licensed for the sale of liquor in Jerusalem has been increased from 35 to 300?
    Mr. AMERY: I will certainly make inquiries. There is no doubt that there has been an increase, but I have no reason to think there is any excessive consumption of alcohol as a result.

    LEADLESS GLAZE.
    Mr. CLOWESasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department the number of pottery firms which use leadless or low solubility glaze: what was the result of the 83 samples taken under the Regulation in 1924, the 97 taken in 1925, and the 84 taken in 1926; and what percentage of lead did the above samples contain?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: As the information asked for cannot be conveniently given except in tabular form, I propose to circulate the answer in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following is the reply:

    Samples showing Excess on Prescribed Percentage of Lead.

    Year.

    No.

    Leadless or Low Solubility.

    Result of Analysis.

    Remarks.

    Explanation of Excess.

    (1)

    (2)

    (3)

    (4)

    (5)

    (6)

    Per cent.

    1924

    1

    Low Solubility.

    8·1

    See 2

    Change in mixing caused change in reactions in frittkiln and soluble lead salt was produced.

    2

    Low Solubility.

    5·06

    Check sample in respect of 1. Further check sample taken. Result 0·7 per cent.

    3

    Leadless

    3·52

    Check sample taken. Result 0·6 percent.

    Possibly due to leadless charge being fritted after a lead charge without relining bottom of kiln.

    4

    Leadless

    1·2

    Check sample taken. Result 0·7 per cent.

    Probably due to insufficiently washed tubs.

    1925

    5

    Leadless

    1·48

    Check sample taken. Result 0·7 per cent.

    Cause not ascertained but Inspector thought it possible worker at firm supplying glaze had turned on wrong tap.

    6

    Leadless

    3·75

    Check sample taken. Result 0·5 per cent.

    Resampled and glaze then found to be well within prescribed limit.

    7

    Leadless

    2·2

    Check sample taken. Result 0·2 per cent.

    Leadless pad had broken down and charge had to be ground on a low solubility pan, which perhaps had not been sufficiently cleaned.

    8

    Leadless

    1·2

    See 9

    Do. do.

    9

    Leadless

    1·1

    Check sample in respect of 8. Further check sample taken. Result 0·3 per cent.

    10

    Leadless

    2·2

    —

    Want of care in cleaning out grinding pans, etc.

    11

    Leadless

    14·9

    —

    No explanation could be obtained and firm did not use any more of the glaze which showed excess.

    12

    Leadless

    2·4

    See 16

    Could only have happened by an accident to an odd tub.

    13

    Leadless

    7·3

    —

    No explanation could be obtained of how or where contamination arose. Firm ceased to use leadless glaze and their certificate was cancelled.

    14

    Leadless

    1·5

    Check sample taken. No lead detected.

    Owing to pressure of work and slackness of foreman, machinery and appliances used for both low solubility and leadless had not been properly cleaned on the change over.

    15

    Low Solubility.

    5·3

    —

    No explanation could be discovered as to cause of irregularity. All previous samples had been well within limit and no change of formula had been made.

    1926

    16

    Leadless

    1·1

    Check sample in respect of 12.

    CINEMATOGRAPH FILMS BILL.
    Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: I gave notice of a private Question to the Prime Minister regarding the Cinematograph Films Bill, but I see that he is not in his place. In view of the importance of this
    1858
    Bill now that it has been published, and in view of the great public interest which is being taken in it, will the Government change their programme as announced last Wednesday, and give the House more time to discuss it on a Second Reading?
    The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Commander Eyres Monsell): We shall take the Bill as the first Order to-morrow, and then, if we see that more time be required for its discussion, I have no doubt at all that we shall be able to accommodate the House in that matter.
    Mr. MacDONALD: Does that mean that if the Debate is still going on at 8.15, there will be no Closure?
    Commander EYRES MONSELL: Well, it means that, if there be any considerable desire to continue the Debate in the House.

BALLOT FOR NOTICES OF MOTION.
  BOARDS OF GUARDIANS (DEFAULT) BILL.
  Mr. BUCHANAN: I beg to give notice that, on this day fortnight, I will call attention to the Boards of Guardians (Default) Bill, with special reference to Chester-le-Street, and move a Resolution.
  ACCIDENTS IN MINES.
  Mr. G. HALL: I beg to give notice that, on this day fortnight, will call attention to the question of Accidents in Mines, and move a Resolution.
  NATIONAL EXPENDITURE AND ECONOMY
  Colonel WOODCOCK: I beg to give notice that, on this day fortnight, I will call attention to the question of National Expenditure and Economy, and move a Resolution.
  ACRICULTURE(LAND SETTLEMENT AND UNEMPLOYMENT).
  Mr. RILEY: I beg to give notice that, on this day fortnight, I will call attention to the question of Agriculture and its relation to Land Settlement and Unemployment, and move a Resolution.
BILLS PRESENTED.

  REORGANISATION OF OFFICES (SCOTLAND) BILL,
  "to provide for the transference of the respective powers and duties of the Scottish Board of Health, the Board of Agriculture for Scotland, and the Prison Commissioners for Scotland, to Depart-
  1860
  ments of Health and Agriculture and a Prisons Department for Scotland; and to make further provision with regard to the office of Chairman of the Fishery Board for Scotland and other offices in Scotland, and with regard to the Public Registers, Records, and Rolls of Scotland," presented by Secretary Sir JOHN GILMOUR; supported by the Lord Advocate, Mr. Solicitor-General for Scotland, and Major Elliot; to be read a Second time To-morrow, and to be printed. [Bill 84.]

  PACIFIC CAELE BILL,
  "to consolidate with amendments the Pacific Cable Acts, 1901 to 1924," presented by Mr. MCNEILL; supported by Mm. Secretary Amery; to be read a Second time To-morrow, and to be printed.[Bill 85.]
  COAL MINES (ABOLITION OF `HEELLESSTUBS) BILL,
  "to provide for the abolition of wheelless tubs in coal mines,' presented by Mr. HARDIE; supported by Mr. Whiteley, Mr. David Grenfell, and Mr. Lunn; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 86.]
  LEASEHOLD ENFPANCHISEMENT BILL,
  "to enable leaseho4lers of houses or premises whose orisginal leases were granted for a period or term of not less than thirty years to.compulsorily acquire the freehold estate and such other outstanding interests affecting the property by agreement or, failing agreement, by arbitration under the Arbitration Act, 1889, or any statutory modification thereof," presented by Mr.HAYDN JONES; supported by Mr. Ellis Davies, Mr. C. P. Williams, Mr. David Grenfell, Mr. George Hall, Mr. Ernest Evans, Mr. Morris, Sir Robert Thomas, Mr. Jenkins, Mr. Kenyon, Mr. Wiggins, and Mr. John; to be read a Second time To-morrow, and to be printed. [Bill 87.]

BETTING (JUVENILE MESSENGERS) (SCOTLAND).
Mr. WESTWOOD: I beg to move,
"That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit the use of young persons in the conveyance or delivery of messages or information relating to betting; and for purposes connected therewith."

1861
I do not propose to enter into the merits or otherwise of betting so far as adults are concerned. The purpose of this Bill is in some way to seek to safeguard our children from being used for carrying messages or acting as messengers in connection with betting in any shape or form. The short Bill that I am seeking to introduce is backed by the Executive of the Education Authorities in Scotland, who set up a committee, on which the Noble Lady who is now Parliamentary Secretary to the English Board of Education sat for several years, for the purpose of inquiring into this growing evil. Several education authorities, and particularly those of the scheduled burghs in Scotland, have been carrying through very far-reaching inquiries and investigations into this evil, and they have collected a most amazing mass of facts, which go to prove that the evil is growing in our midst, and as the education authorities have the responsibility for looking after our children, the Executive of the Education Authorities, of which I happen to be a member, have asked me to present this Bill to the House. I sincerely trust it will have a unanimous backing in this House, and that, as there is no Bill on the stocks at the moment, so far as Scotland is concerned, it will be given facilities by the Government so that it can be discussed in the Scottish Standing Committee. The Bill is of one Clause only as far as its operative work is concerned. It will make it an offence for anyone to use a young person under 16 years of age for the purpose of carrying slips or messages in connection with betting. It will seek to impose a fine, for the first offence, up to a maximum of £20, and, in the case of a second offence, it will increase that maximum to and will also give Justices of the Peace or magistrates, as the case may be, the opportunity of giving, if necessary, even hard labour for adults using children for the purpose of carrying betting messages. I cannot do better than quote a few statements that were made by the Home Secretary during the Debate on Friday, in which he said:
"The law has to take note of the beginnings of evil amongst the children of our land."
While it may be right or wrong, from whichever point of view we like to view
1862
it, for adults to take part in betting, I submit that it is wrong to use children for the purpose of carrying betting messages. We ought to give them the chance of getting the best opportunities and the best teaching, and we are responsible for passing laws to avoid that which is wrong being taught to our children. Another statement made by the Home Secretary was:
"We have no right to allow the tares which are interfering with the lives of young children grow together with the good wheat which is being taught to them in the elementary schools.—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th March, 1927; col. 1604, Vol. 203.]
In Scotland, I believe, we have as tine a body of teachers as there is in Great Britain. They are doing all in their power to educate our children in the best of ethics and the best of morals. They find, as far as our big cities are concerned, that much of their effort is being wasted because of outside agencies being used for the purpose of detracting from the teaching which they are giving to our children, and one of the agencies is this of using young children for the purpose of carrying messages, and ultimately turning them out as gamblers, or at least a section of our young persons. This Bill is to be backed by representatives of all parties in the House. It is backed by the representatives of all the scheduled parishes in Scotland, and representatives of Liberal, Tory and Labour are prepared to back this Bill in the hope that opportunity will be given for trying, in some small measure, to save our children from, being taught how to become gamblers, and to try to keep them in the path of rectitude.
Question put, and agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Westwood, Mr. Barr, Mr. Rosslyn Mitchell, Mr. Cowan, Mr. Cooper, Mr. Hardie, Mr. Johnston, Mr. Thomas Kennedy, and Dr. Shiels.

BETTING (JUVENILE MESSENGERS) (SCOTLAND).
  BETTING (JUVENILE MESSENGERS) (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  "to prohibit the use of young persons in the conveyance or delivery of messages Or information relating to betting; and for purposes connected therewith," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Wednesday, 23rd March, and to be printed. [Bill 88.]
STANDING COMMITTEES.
Ordered, That all Standing Committees have leave to print and circulate with the Votes the Minutes of their Proceedings and any amended Clauses of Bills committed to them.—(Mr. William Nicholson.)
CHAIRMEN'S PANEL.
Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSON reported from the Chairmen's Panel: That they had appointed Major Sir Richard Barnett to act as Chairman of the Standing Committee A (in respect of the Auctions (Bidding Agreements) Bill), and Sir Cyril Cobb (in respect of the Moneylenders Bill): and Mr. Ellis Davies to act as Chairman of Standing Committee B (in respect of the Government of India Bill). Report to lie upon the Table.
SELECTION (STANDING COMMITTEES).

  STANDING COMMITTEE A.
  Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSON reported from the Committee of Selection; That they had added the following Fifteen Members to Standing Committee A (in respect of the Auctions (Bidding Agreements) Bill): Lieut.-Colonel Acland-Troyte, Mr. A. V. Alexander, Mr. Bromley, Major BrounLindsay, Mr. Dean, Lord Erskine, Mr. Everard, Captain Hacking, Mr. Hardie, Mr. Harney, Mr. Lamb, Sir Hugh Lucas-Tooth, Major Alan McLean, Sir Douglas Newton, and Mr. Thurtle.
  Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSON further reported from the Committee; That they had added the following Fifteen Members to Standing Committee A (in respect of the Moneylenders Bill): Major BrounLindsay, Mr. Burman, Mr. Rhys Davies, Mr. Dennison, Lord Erskine, Major Glyn, Captain Hacking, Mr. Harney, Sir Ellis Hume-Williams, Mr. Manly Jones, Major MacAndrew, Colonel Perkins, Mr. Somerville, Lieut.-Colonel Watts Morgan, and Mr. Wells.

  STANDING COMMITTEE B.
  Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSON further reported from the Committee; That they had discharged the following Members from Standing Committee B: Sir Henry Cautley and Major Steel; and had appointed in substitution: Mr. Hanbnry and Mr. Rye.
  Mr. WILLIAM NICHOLSON further reported from the Committee; That they had added the following Ten Members to Standing Committee B (in respect of the Government of India (Indian Navy) Bill): Mr. Ammon, Captain Eden, Lieut.-Colonel Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel Howard Bury, Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy, Mr. Pilcher, Mr. Snell, Sir Victor Warrender, Mr. Wardlaw-Milne, and Earl Winterton.
  Reports to lie upon the Table.

  BUXTON CORPORATION BILL.
  Reported, with Amendments, from the Local Legislation Committee (Section A); Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed.
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  ROYAL AND PARLIAMENTARY TITLES BILL.
  Considered in Committee.
  [Captain FITZROY in the Chair.]

  ROYAL AND PARLIAMENTARY TITLES BILL.

    CLAUSE 1.—(Power to alter style and titles of Crown.)
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."
    Viscount SANDON: I should like to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department one question in connection with this Clause. I understand that this intends to introduce in the Royal title the words "Great Britain, Ireland and of British Dominions beyond the Seas." The question I would ask is that, in so far as the greater includes the less, why is it necessary, seeing that Southern Ireland is a Dominion, to mention that Dominion specifically. If we include Ireland, then Canada, Australia and all the other Dominions should also be mentioned. I quite appreciate that Northern Ireland would have to be specified, as she is not a Dominion. Personally I should have been agreeable to omitting even "Great Britain," and to using the inclusive term of "King of the British Empire,' which is far simpler but, in any case, I cannot see why the general term "Ireland" should be used.
    The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir William Joynson-Hicks): Technically, my hon. Friend is correct. The South of Ireland does not need mentioning any more than any other Dominion. It is equally correct to say that while the South of Ireland is included in the King's Dominions beyond the Seas, Northern Ireland is not included, and, on the whole, in order to prevent any feeling, shall I say, between one part of Ireland and the other part, we chose, after very careful consideration at the Imperial Conference, to treat it geographically, and put in "Great Britain, Ireland"—not as a political entity, but as a geographical entity— "and of British Dominions beyond the Seas." That, of course, saves anybody's feelings, and, as I think my Noble Friend will realise, although he is technically correct, expresses the position the King
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    does occupy as King over all the Dominions.
    4.0 p.m.
    Sir JOHN MARRIOTT: Possibly the Committee will recollect that, in the Debate on the Second Reading, I had an opportunity of stating why, not only from the point of view of constitutional jurists, but also from the point of view of accurate political phraseology, I regarded this Bill, to put it at the lowest, with a good deal of misgiving. The Amendment which I am now submitting touches, as the Committee will perceive, only one point, which some may think not a particularly important point. But if they take that view, and if His Majesty's Government take that view, I am going very respectfully to disagree with them, and I will give the Committee very shortly my reasons for the view which I take. When I first glanced through the provisions of this short Bill, the expression "Great Seal of the Realm" rather grated unfamiliarly on my ears. The phrase "Great Seal of the Realm" seemed to me, to say the least, an unusual phrase—unusual in constitutional law. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, in the speech which he addressed to the House on Second Reading, justified the use of this unusual phrase by reference, as the Committee will remember, to two very different kinds of documents. On the other hand, he made a reference to what he described, quite correctly, as "the Statutes of the Order of the Bath." Of course, I need not remind the Committee that that is not a public Statute in the ordinary sense of the word. It is not a public Statute of the Realm or of the United Kingdom or of anything else. Those Statutes of the Bath, as I understand them, arc simply Regulations issued under Letters Patent. My right hon. Friend will correct roe if I am wrong, but I presume, when he spoke the other day, he was referring to the Statute which was issued by Her late Majesty Queen Victoria in the year 1847. Am I correct in thinking that was the Statute to which my right hen. Friend referred?
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Perhaps I ought to say that I may have misled my hon. Friend when I spoke of "the Statutes of the Order of the Bath." The document I really meant was the Royal

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    Proclamation of King George I enacting the Statute of the Bath. I have that here, and I intended to refer to it in my reply.
    Sir J. MARRIOTT: The Statute to which I am now referring is the Statute of 1847, and it recites the Statute to which my right hon. Friend refers.
    "Whereas our Royal Progenator and Predecessor King George the First," etc.—
    On looking at this Statute, I find that, on the first page, it refers to the "Great Seal of Great Britain."
    "Whereas our Royal Progenator and Predecessor King George the First, by certain Letters Patent, under the Great Seal of Great Britain."
    On the very next page, it refers to the "Great Seal of the Realm":
    "those Letters Patent, and had been passed under the Great Seal of the Realm."
    But on the very same page it refers to
    "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom aforesaid,"
    reciting, that is to say, in the course of a, couple of pages, three different titles:—
    "The Great Seal of Great Britain,"
    "The Great Seal of the Realm,"
    and
    "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom."
    Therefore, if my right hon. Friend is relying—I do not suppose he is, but he did mention it in his speech the other day—on that precedent, I would venture to submit to him, and to the Committee, that the language of the Bill that is now before us is just as slipshod, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for the South-East Division of Leeds (Sir H. Slesser) said the other day, as some of its predecessors. The Committee will not, I think, fail to observe that something may be forgiven in a Letter Patent which cannot be so easily tolerated in a Public Statute of the Realm. Leaving this so-called Statute of the Order of the Bath, I turn to the other precedent on which my right hon. Friend relied. He recited, and with great effect, the Preamble to the famous Statute of 24 of Henry VIII, Chapter 12, in which it is stated:
    "This Realm of England is an Empire."
    So far as I know, no one has ever questioned the accuracy or the propriety of that expression.
    "This Realm of England"
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    is an expression, of course, very well known to constitutional jurists. The Committee will understand, I think, why my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary cited this famous Statute in particular and why he places such reliance on this particular precedent. They will appreciate that when I remind them, as, of course, they know very well, that this Statute of 24 of Henry VIII was the famous Statute in restraint of appeals to Rome. It was the Statute which was passed at the instance of Henry VIII to prevent an appeal to Rome against his divorce from Queen Catherine of Aragon, and I have no doubt that the robust Protestantism of my right hon. Friend, which I greatly respect and humbly attempt to imitate, led him to select this particular precedent. But, after all, I venture to submit that the term "Realm" in the Statute of Henry VIII has no more bearing upon the correct description of the Great Seal than it has upon the geography of Timbuctoo. The whole point of that Statute, quoted as a precedent by my right hon. Friend, was to assert, as of course the Committee are well aware, the historic independence of this Realm of England against the Papacy on the one hand and against the Holy Roman Empire on the other. After all, what is a realm? We are asked to put in this Act of Parliament the phrase:
    "The Great Seal of the Realm."
    What is a realm etymologically? I had the curiosity to seek enlightment on that point from an authority which the whole Committee will recognise as final and unimpeachable—I mean the Oxford Dictionary. What does the Oxford Dictionary say of a realm? It says:
    "A realm"—
    and I copied it out for greater accuracy—
    "is a primary zoogeographical division of the earth's surface."
    Is my right hon. Friend really going to put into an historic Statute, "The Great Seal" of the primary zoogeographical division of the earth's surface? I hope the Committee are going to accept the Amendment which I am proposing, and, if they agree to leave out this primary zoogeographical division, the question arises: what shall we put in its place, or whether we shall put anything in its place? I want to put this point to my right hon.

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    Friend. If he does not like the alternative which I am now suggesting "The United Kingdom," will he consider, between now and Report stage, the desirability of omitting altogether the words "Of the Realm" and leaving the expression simply as "The Great Seal,' without further designation. I should not like to urge that as an alternative to the suggestion in my Amendment, but I think it would be preferable to the phraseology in the Bill, because I am quite certain that phraseology in the future will lead to ambiguity and confusion, if to nothing worse. May I, in order to justify what I have just said, remind the Committee that the Bill, I will not say has been rendered necessary, but, at any rate, is intended to make or to authorise certain changes in the style and title of the Crown and in the style of Parliament, those changes being consequential upon the passing of an Act, the Irish Free State Constitutional Act of 1922. That was an Act for the abrogation, or, at any rate, the partial abrogation, of the Act of Union, and, therefore, the pertinent precedents, I suggest, are not the Statutes of the Order of the Bath nor even the famous Statute of 24 Henry VIII, but the Act of Union with Scotland and the Act of Union with Ireland. The Act of Union with Scotland, the Act of 5 Queen Anne, Chapter 11, in its 24th Clause, enacts that there shall be
    "From and after the Union…one Great Seal for the United Kingdom of Great Britain which shall be different from the Great Seal now used in either Kingdom."
    Then it goes on in regard to the character of the Seal, the quartering of the arms and the Rank of Precedency of the Lyon, King of Arms of the Kingdom of Scotland and so on, and proceeds:
    "And in all other Matters relating to England as the Great Seal of England is now used and that a Seal in Scotland after the Union be always kept and made use of in all things relating to private Rights or Grants which have usually passed the Great Seal a Scotland."
    Under this Statute, there was to be a new Great Seal of Great Britain, but for certain purposes the, old Great Seal of Scotland was to continue to be used. That was the position after the passing of the Act of Union with Scotland. I now come to the other precedent, perhaps even more pertinent—I mean the Act of Union with Ireland. That Act, in Sec-
    1884
    tion 4, provided that Proclamation for elections to the United Kingdom Parliament and certain other writs to the Lord Chancellor of Ireland shall issue—this was the phrase—
    "Under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom,"
    although that Act, like the Act of Union with Scotland, provided for the continued use in Ireland, in certain cases, of the Great Seal of Ireland. I presume that Great Seal of Ireland is still in existence in Dublin. Of course, it was until a few years ago in the custody of the Lord Chancellor of Ireland. I do not know whether my right hon. Friend is in a position to tell the Committee this afternoon in whose custody it is to-day, but I shall be very glad to know. Of course, it still exists, and is still for certain purposes in legal use. Then came the very important Act of 1922, the Irish Free State (Constitutional Provisions) Act, which authorised, in fact required, the creation of another Great Seal, a new Great Seal for Northern Ireland. I would ask the Committee to note that this new Great Seal fur Northern Ireland was not to be used in substitution for the Great Seal of the United Kingdom. That seems to me an extremely important point. It was not to be used in substitution for the Great Seal of the United Kingdom, it was to be used only in substitution for the Great Seal of Ireland for certain purposes.
    In those circumstances, what ought we to do in relation to the Bill now before the Committee? I am not at all sure that, if the particular Amendment which I am proposing be not accepted, and if His Majesty's Government are not prepared to accept either of the two alternatives which i am suggesting, anything need be done at all. [Laughter.] I will explain to the Committee what I mean. We have got a Great Seal of the United Kingdom now; there is a Great Seal of Scotland, which is used for certain purposes in Scotland, there is also in existence, I presume, a Great Seal of Ireland, about the custody of which the Home Secretary is going to tell us, and there is, or will be in existence a Great Seal of Northern Ireland. That being the case, why not retain in this Bill the phraseology to which we have been accustomed for centuries Why not keep the existing phraseology, and

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    why not keep the existing Great Seal of England? By doing that, we shall avoid—I speak as a rigid guardian of economy, a zealous apostle of economy—the not inconsiderable expense of making a new Great Seal; and, what is infinitely more important, we shall avoid the confusion, the contradiction and the ambiguity which will almost certainly be created between the person of His Majesty the King in two capacities. Everybody knows that His Majesty the King is at once the head of the Executive in this country and also a component element in the High Court of Parliament. It seems to me that if this Bill passes in the form in which it is proposed to the House, we shall create confusion, contradiction and ambiguity between the executive functions of the Crown—between His Majesty as head of the Executive—and His Most Gracious Majesty as a component part of this High Court of Parliament.
    Commander WILLIAMS: I would like to say one or two words in favour of the Bill as it stands, and against the Amendment. I admit quite frankly that I am not influenced in any way by the extraordinarily able technique of the speech to which we have just listened. I look on this matter from the point of view of trying to get these things into plain, simple terms which any ordinary man can understand. If there be one word which the ordinary man can understand—I am not talking of lawyers, I say ordinary, simple men—it is "Realm." It is thoroughly and typically English. It has a good, wide meaning. One can read an awful lot into it if one has the mind to, and I think the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill would be thoroughly well advised to stick to this word, which is really good English—not English based necessarily on the Oxford Dictionary, but thoroughly good English, and a word which every one of us can understand. We were told that it means,
    "A primary zoogeographical division."
    In dealing with these matters I do not think we need go into that kind of thing, because what we are trying to produce in this Bill is a form of phraseology which is absolutely simple and fairly able to be understood. If we use the amended words "United Kingdom," we are rather liable to create in the minds of many people some small confusion as to what
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    it is we are talking about. The United Kingdom is not the same as it was five years ago, but the Realm of the country is very much the same as it was then, that is to say, the ordinary people of the country, through Parliament, control their affairs. I do frankly hope that the Minister will not be led away by any of the able speakers who may wish for the other term, but will keep to a term which is simple, which is quite definite, which has an extraordinarily wide meaning—and we want one with a wide meaning—while, at the same time, one that the average person may well understand. I felt it would not he right for us to pass from this Amendment without someone putting quite shortly the point of view of the average man, who, I think, would prefer the simpler and more thoroughly English word.
    Mr. D. REID: I wish to ask the Home Secretary one question. Has it been kept in mind that there are in existence certain Acts relating to the procedure for affixing the Seal, and that in those Acts the phrase used is "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom"? We were told on the Second Reading of this Bill that after it was passed it would be necessary to strike a new Great Seal. Is it clear that if this Bill, as an Act, calls the new Seal by another name, which I presume will be "The Great Seal of the Realm," that the Acts to which I refer will recognise that to be the Seal referred to? For example, there is the Crown Office Act, 1877, which throughout refers to "The Great Seal," but in the definition Clause, says:
    "Great Seal means the Great Seal of the United Kingdom."
    Another example is found in the Great Seal Act, 1884, which has no definition Clause but which does use in the body of the Act the phrase "Great Seal of the United Kingdom." Will it be necessary to put into this Bill some words which will define this new Seal as the Seal which is referred to in those Acts?
    Sir BERTRAM FALLE: We have had a perhaps rather amusing definition of what "Realm" may mean from my right hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott). When all is said and done, what does the English word "Realm" mean? Is it not simply "re-alm," Rename an earlier form of the word royaume? Is it not the old Norman

    1887
    French word signifying "Kingdom"? If that be so, it seems to me that what we are doing is to change the words "United Kingdom" into "Kingdom." I do not see any disadvantage in that, but at any rate when we do it we ought to know what the word means, and what it implies. The phrase "The Great Seal of the Realm" means "The Great Seal of the Kingdom." Surely there can be no objection to that—beyond the fact that we are dropping the word "United" from the term. "The Great Seal of the Realm" will simply mean the "Great Seal of the Kingdom" over which His Majesty rules I see no objection to the word.
    Mr. GROTRIAN: Inasmuch as there must be thousands of precedents for the use of the term "Great Seal of the United Kingdom," I hope that the Home Secretary will not launch into this new phraseology "Great Seal of the Realm." My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Torquay Division (Commander Williams) is really stretching things a little far—although he confesses to being no lawyer he is no worse for that, but all the better—when he tries to persuade this House that the man in the street can understand the phrase "Great Seal of the Realm" and cannot understand "Great Seal of the Kingdom of Great Britain" or of "The. United Kingdom." I think he is underrating the intelligence of his fellow-countrymen. I hope the Home Secretary will take no notice whatever of that speech. I wish to support my hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) in the very able argument with which he has supported his Amendment.
    Sir CHARLES OMAN: I would like to point out that there is at least one good precedent for supporting the Amendment of ray hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott), and that is that on the last occasion when there was a great dropping of an item in the Royal title, the words "United Kingdom" were retained. I am referring, of course, as my hon. Friend will know, to what happened when a King of England dropped a very important part of his title although he was retaining a considerable piece of the territory to which that title referred. The reference is to the dropping by the Parliament of George III of the title "King of
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    France," which was done after the Peace of Amiens, although it had been part of the Royal title ever since the reign of Edward III, and despite the fact that a perceptible part of the ancient Kingdom of France remained subject to King George, namely, the islands of Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney and Sark, part of the old French Duchy of Normandy.
    Sir B. FALLE: May I interrupt my hon. Friend? As we all know, he is a great authority on ail these points, but he ought to be aware that the Norman Islands never were under the sovereignity of the Crown of France.
    Sir C. OMAN: Pardon me!
    Sir B. FALLE: The islands were never under the sovereignty of France. They did belong to Armorica, but that was never France or part of France till the 15th century.
    Sir C. OMAN: I beg to differ from my hon. Friend. A great many years before, the Frankish Kingdom was divided into "Neustria" and "Austrasia," but after the time of Charlemagne, those of his descendants who ruled in the west only called themselves "Reges Francorum" not "Reges Neustriae." There not the slightest doubt that Charles the Simple, or any of those other 10th century Kings were what we should now call Kings of France. The term "Neustria" was dead. Nobody ever called himself officially Rex Neustriae, and the Frankish dominions west of the Meuse were now what we can not but call a Kingdom of France. Moreover, nobody pretended that the Duchy of Normandy ceased to be part of the Kingdom of France. The Dukes of Normandy habitually did homage to the French Kings for their Duchy, and therefore for the Norman Isles. Therefore, the Norman Isles were part of the Kingdom of France, and for that reason I feel entitled to support my hon. Friend the Member for York, for the term "United Kingdom" was retained after the change in the old Royal Title.
    Sir MALCOLM MACNAGHTEN: I think the point which has been raised is one of some importance. If we are going to change the title of the Great Seal and call it "the Great Seal of the Realm" instead of what it has been called since 1707, that is "the Great Seal of the United Kingdom," we must take care that

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    the statutory provisions relating to the Great Seal shall apply to the Seal under its new name. For this purpose I should like to enforce the argument of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Down (Mr. Reid). With regard to formalities to be observed before the Great Seal can be attached to any document there are strict Statutory provisions and it is only when these provisions have been complied with that the Great Seal can be attached to any document. In those statutes the Great Seal is invariably described as "the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland," and therefore if you are going to change the title of the Seal you must make sure that those statutory provisions apply to it under its changed title.
    There is really a good deal of substance in this point in spite of the jeer of the hon. and gallant Member for Torquay, who has a very poor opinion of lawyers. I would remind the Home Secretary who is the principal executive officer in the administration of the criminal law that under the Forgery Act of 1913 there is a section dealing with counterfeiting of the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. If you change the title of the Seal to that of the "Great Seal of the Realm" will that statute apply to the Seal under its changed name? Ought there not to he some provision that all the existing statutes applicable to the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland shall hereafter be applicable to the "Great Seal of the Realm"?
    There is one other point I wish to raise. On the Second Reading of this Bill the Home Secretary said that it would be necessary to have a new seal. I submit, however, that that is really unnecessary. It is, of course, necessary to provide that in the King's Great Seal the King's title should be correctly set out. I think we are all agreed upon that: but the Imperial Conference which was very much pressed for time have omitted to observe that the primary title of the King is a Latin title. If they had looked at any of their coins in their pockets they would have observed that fact. If they had looked up the proclamations proclaiming the King's title in 1801 or 1876 or 1901 they would have found in each of those proclamations the title of the King is set out first in Latin and then in English. There is little doubt that His Majesty will
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    adopt the English title suggested by the Imperial Conference, namely, "King of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas."
    It so happens that when King George III assumed his new title after the 'Union of Ireland with Great Britain, he took for his English title that of "King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland," but he took for his Latin title the words "Britanniarum Rex,' which mean King of the Britains—North Britain, South Britain and West Britain. Therefore there is no need to change the Latin title of the King and when the proclamation is issued under this Act setting out the new title of the King it will be possible to retain exactly the same Latin title which George III took when Ireland was united with Great Britain. There is no need to have a new Great Seal at all and if that is so then the Seal which is now in the custody of the Lord Chancellor can be maintained the Latin title on that Seal will correctly represent the new English title which the Imperial Conference have suggested to His Majesty. That rather emphasises the point that the Seal by whatever name it is called remains the same Seal. But if the name of the Seal be changed, it should be made clear that the statutory provisions relating to the, Great Seal will continue to apply to it.
    Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: I am bound to say that I have listened very carefully to the speeches this afternoon and I think a case has been made out by the hon. Member for Londonderry (Sir M. Macnaghten) and the hon. Member for Down (Mr. Reid) which is unanswerable. It is admitted that there are now four Great Seals. There is the Great Seal of the United Kingdom, the Great Seal of Scotland, the Great Seal of Ireland and the Great Seal of Northern Ireland.
    Sir M. MACNAGHTEN: There is also the Great Seal of Canada.
    Sir W. DAVISON: That is so. It is admitted that the word "Realm" is a general term, whatever the dictionary meaning may be. It is a vague general ward signifying kindgom. It seems to me that when we are dealing with a public document laying down a, new title for His Majesty it ought to be done in an authoritative form. When we take the Statutes referred to by the hon. Member for Down, first of all we had in 1877 an

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    Act for making provision with respect to the preparation and authentication of commissions and other documents issued from the Office of the Clerk of the Crown in Chancery, and in all those documents the phrase used is "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom." When we turn to the other Act of 1884 to simplify the passing of an instrument under the Great Seal that is dealing with the matter we are now considering the phrase is "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom" therefore whatever may be the King's title in the future in order to give it effect we have to authoritatively proclaim it in accordance with the instrument we have now in hand. It seems clear therefore that the name of the Seal under which this proclamation shall be issued having regard to the words of the Statutes to which reference has been made, is the Seal of the United Kingdom. I accordingly urge the Committee to retain this perfectly well understood phrase in the Bill we have before us this afternoon.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: Several hon. Members have given me good advice in regard to this question, and I am told that the case put forward is unanswerable. That puts me in a difficult position, because I have to answer to the best of my ability an unanswerable argument. However, I will try to do it. Beyond the historical question, there is a matter of substance. The Seal is not the Seal of the Kingdom or of Parliament, but it is the Seal of His Majesty the King. Now you are going back to the time when the Seal was much more used than to-day, when every document centred in the King and was authenticated by the King's Seal. There is a very good description given by Matthew Paris, a chronicler of the 13th century, who described it as clavis regni, key of the Realm. I am really going back to the old description of the Seal as the Key of the Realm. That is not the key of the United Kingdom, but something much greater than that. Perhaps I may mention here the point raised by the hon. and learned Member for Londonderry. On the question of the Latin title I need hardly say that I do not want to inflict the cost of a new Great Seal upon the country. Whatever description is given to the Great Seal does not make the slightest difference to the question as to whether
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    there shall be a new seal or not. That depends on the title of the King. Un the last occasion when the actual draft of the Royal Proclamation which I have in my possession was made, it will be noticed that there was an alteration in the Latin description of the King's title. The present title runs Dei Gratia Britanniarum et terrarum transmarinarum …Rex. The intention is to translate the new title by the words Dei Gratia Magnae Britanniae, Hiberniae…Rex. For the word Britanniarum there will be substituted Magnae Britanniae Hiberniae, taking in Ireland as well.
    Sir M. MACNAGHTEN: The word "Britannarium" does include Ireland, and it includes North Britain, South Britain and West Britain. So that not only are we to have the expense of a new Seal, but we are to use two words where up to now one has done.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: First of all, the title in English is one which has been accepted after very careful investigation by lawyers, by others who are not lawyers—historians and others who quite as able as lawyers—and by the Imperial Conference; and I have to get the best translation I can of the English into Latin. I appreciate my hon. and learned Friend's description of the width of the word Britanniarum, but there is no doubt that, in ordinary parlance, "The United Kingdom of Great Britain" would not include Ireland, because it is included in the words "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland." I am assuming for the moment—I do not know—that my hon. and learned Friend's argument as to the use of the Latin word Britanniaruin is correct in Latin, and in that case it would give us a difference in verbiage between the Latin and the English titles, which I am very anxious to avoid.
    Sir M. MACNAGHTEN: It was used in 1801 for the very purpose of expressing "Great Britain and Ireland."
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: That may be so, but I assure my hon. and learned Friend that I have taken the very utmost care to get a correct translation of the English title. After all, the English title is the one that matters. We are not back in the Middle Ages, when kings wrote their letters in Latin, and when their proclamations were very largely

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    either in Latin or in ancient Norman-French. We are dealing now with English, and it is merely, if I may say so, a concession to historical research that we are including the Latin title. We have endeavoured to give the best translation that we can of the English title into Latin. If I find it at all possible to advise His Majesty not to have a new Seal, I shall, of course, do so, but the question of a new Seal depends on the new title of the King, and not on the new title of the Seal. The title of the Seal, which we are discussing at the moment, merely contains the best description that we can give of a particular "Key of the Realm," if I may go back to the old 13th century description of it. That is all that we are doing to-day—merely describing the Seal itself.
    I think my hon. and learned Friend (Sir M. Macnaghten) told us that since the time of Queen Anne, the time of the Union, the only description of the Seal that had been used was "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom." That, I am afraid, is not strictly correct. I find, all through the Statutes, the descriptions "The Great Seal," "The Seal of the United Kingdom," 'The Great Seal of England," and The Great Seal of Britain," scattered all over the Statutes of the Realm, almost indiscriminately, though it is only fair to admit that the one that is used the greatest number of times is "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom." In the reigns of some Kings or Queens there were some Statutes which used one description and some which used another, according, apparently, to the kind of description which appealed to the mind of the particular person who drafted the Measure in question. I took very careful advice as to whether it would be necessary to alter, or to provide in this Bill for the continuance of, all those Acts, some of which have been referred to by my hon. Friends, in which reference is made to documents executed under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom; and I am advised quite definitely that, as during the last two centuries various Statutes have used various descriptions of the Seal, so there is, and can be at any one time, only one Great Seal of Great Britain, and that the description which may be given to it in any particular Statute makes no
    1894
    real difference, but that the Statute refers to the existing Seal of the existing King. I do not know whether the Committee remember, but I am sure my hon. and historically learned Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) will remember, that there was a case in history when two Kings—I believe Henry IV and Henry V—used the same Seal; but at some time or other it was discovered that the one King had a beard and the other King had no beard, and, therefore, a fresh Seal had to be struck more in consonance with the physiognomy of the King. There is no law against any monarch using the Seal of his predecessor if he chooses to do so, and that would be the Seal for the time being of the existing King.
    Now we come to the question why I suggest that it is not necessarily desirable to follow the historical precedents of the past, whether it be the Royal Proclamation of George I. creating the Order of the Bath, in which it was called "The Great Seal of the Realm," or whether it be in the Statute of Queen Anne, in which it was called "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom." We are not living to-day in the time of George I, or even of Queen Anne; we now have to face the fact that the position is rather different from what it was, not only in 1800, but 20 years ago. There was a time when the description, "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom," could be quite properly used, as I think it was in the Act of Union, which referred to "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and the Dominions thereto belonging." The new fact with which we are faced to-day is that there are no "Dominions thereto belonging." The Dominions of the Crown, the great self-governing Dominions are, certainly since this last Imperial Conference, co-equal with the United Kingdom. They do not belong to this Parliament; they are not in any sense subject to the jurisdiction of this Parliament; the one link which binds—
    Sir J. MARRIOTT Sir J. MARRIOTT indicated dissent.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I am sorry if my hon. Friend is determined to differ from me.
    Sir J. MARRIOTT: It is a very dangerous thing to say.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: It is perfectly clearly true. If my hon. Friend would take the trouble to read the Report of the Imperial Conference—
    Sir J. MARRIOTT: I read it very carefully indeed.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: My hon. Friend may have read it sadly. It is no good shutting our eyes to the fact that the Great Seal to-day will be, and is, the Great Seal of the King, who is the King, not merely of the United Kingdom, not merely of Northern Ireland, not merely of Southern Ireland, but of all the Dominions; and the Great Seal from now onwards will be the Great Seal of all those territories which are subject to the dominion of the King.
    Sir W. DAVISON: The new Seal.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The significance of the Great Seal has changed with the changes which have taken place in the Constitution of this very remarkable Empire of ours. It does change in an imperceptible way, and I had to find, as I have said—it is not a term of art at all—some kind of description which would include, in the nomenclature of the Great Seal, something which would cover that curious collection of all these great Dominions that are bound together, under the authority of the King, with the Mother Country, the United Kingdom.
    Sir C. OMAN: Ought we not to distinguish between Dominions like Canada and Australia, and Possessions over which the King has actual dominion, such, for example, as Gibraltar and Ascension? They are not Dominions in the one sense, but they are in the other.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: They are all equally under the realm, or the realm-ship, if I may coin a very awkward word, of the King, and if we give His Majesty the King a Seal to-day, and call it "The Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland," it would be a true description of one particular portion of the Empire, or Commonwealth, or whatever we may call it, and it could properly be used as a description of a Seal which might be used to seal documents connected, let us say, with Northern Ireland. Quite recently, the Seal of the United Kingdom was used for the institution of the Governor of
    1896
    Northern Ireland, which is, of course, part of the United Kingdom. But, the Great Seal has from time to time been utilised for sealing various documents connected with other parts of the Empire than the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Therefore, I want the Committee to realise that there is, I will not say some argument on my side, but some method in my madness. On the whole, I am surprised that my historical Friends in the House are not pleased with the grand old English description which we have utilised. To call it "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom" is incorrect to-day in nomenclature; we must call it something which indicates the totality of the Imperial power of the Empire. My hon. Friend the Member for York made one suggestion which I think would do, though I do not like it so well, namely, to call it simply "The Great Seal." That suggestion I am quite willing to consider carefully between now and when the Bill reaches another place; but I am bound to confess that, for my own part, I prefer the other form, because I think it is rounder, and expresses really what the Seal connotes, namely, the Imperial character of the whole Empire of the King, wherever it is. The best description I can find in the whole English language is "The Great Seal of the Realm," and I hope that in these circumstances the Committee will support me.
    Sir W. DAVISON: I agree, if I may say so with all respect, with what the Rome Secretary has said as to the necessity for altering the description of the King's titles, in view of recent events; and this Bill is the instrument by which this change in His Majesty's titles will be made. What my right hon. Friend has very properly put before the Committee is what the New Seal has to provide for and what the new title ought to describe. The whole object of this Bill is to lay down the process by which the changes which my right hon. Friend has so admirably described shall he brought about, and the Clause which we are considering says:
    "It shall be lawful for His Most Gracious Majesty, by His Royal Proclamation under the Great Seal of the Realm, issued within six months after the passing of this Act, to make such alteration"—

    1897
    and so on. Therefore, the whole point, as I understand it, that other Members and myself have urged, is that the Seal by which these changes are authorised shall be properly described in the way in which it has been described in the past. All that the Home Secretary had said in his speech—and I think all of us fully sympathise with what he has said—is that the necessity for making the change, and the adoption of the words that he has urged, will be considered in the Proclamation and in the new Seal. All that we are concerned with to-day is that those things shall be legally brought about in the manner prescribed both by Statute and by ancient custom, and it seems to be clear that the proper title for the existing Seal is that which my hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) has suggested, and which the Home Secretary has promised to consider, namely, "The Great Seal," as there is only, as my right hon. Friend very rightly says, one Great Seal at any given time. Or, if it be not called "The Great Seal," let it be called "The Great Seal of the United Kingdom." I take it that all the points which the Home Secretary has so clearly put forward will be considered when the new Great Seal is made, and when the Proclamation of the King's pleasure in connection with his new title is made to the country.
    5.0 p.m.
    Sir B. FALLE: This is a very learned dispuisition, and I must admit that what the Home Secretary has said has met the points very considerably, but I should like to draw attention to one point which my hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) called dangerous, namely, that, apparently because the Imperial Conference has settled that the Dominions in future shall be co-equal with us, therefore the status of the Dominions is going to be altered without the House of Commons having a word to say in the matter. When the Treaty with the Irish Free State was before this House, we were told that we could not alter so much as a, comma. Now, apparently, because the Imperial. Conference comes into the matter, this House is to accept the conclusions of that Conference, and to give the Dominions a new and a full status. I should be very much obliged to my right hon. Friend if he could tell us how he looks upon that matter, be-
    1898
    cause it appears to me that only the two Houses of Parliament, and His Majesty can put the Dominions in a new position. It appears to me that the Imperial Conference has no power, no right and no authority to set aside any decision to which the Houses of Parliament may come. We might have another Imperial Conference which would put the people of this country into an inferior position to the rest of the Donainions, and that seems to me to be a very dangerous doctrine. I join issue with my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford University (Sir C. Oman) when he said that Neustria in the main was never Norman. Of course it was when once it was conquered by the Scandinavian people who took it from its rightful owners.
    Sir C. OMAN: Normandy was only small part of Neustria.
    Sir B. FALLE: But it was an important part, and it was called Normandy from the Northmen who conquered it. The King of France may have claimed a shadowy suzerainty over Normandy. I would remind my hon. Friend that there ware, a country called the Transvaal over which we claimed suzerainty, but the Boers were not English and when we tried to make use of our suzerainty we found our claim resisted and resisted in such a way that the war ended in the country being placed in the hands of the Boers.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I do not think this discussion can be carried any further.
    Sir B. FALLE: Since the whole matter deals with the question of an amendment to the word "Realm," or Reaume as Murray's dictionary says, "Royaume," which is a Norman-French term, am I not justified in answering my hon. Friend whom you allowed to make his speech and state things which I do not believe are either historically or otherwise facts? For historical facts we must go to the historian. We know Freeman and we know Stubbs, and we know that "Freeman buttered Stubbs and Stubbs buttered Freeman"—
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I think this is getting worse.
    Sir B. FALLE: When you have allowed my hon. Friend to make statements,

    1899
    surely you will not deny the right of another Member to answer him?
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I think this discussion cannot be allowed to proceed further.
    Sir ALFRED HOPKINSON: I think it is desirable at this stage that we should drop this interesting discussion of medieval history and read the Clause of the Bill itself and know what the object of it really is. The object of this Clause is simply to empower His Majesty to alter his title. How are you going to make the alteration? By what instrument is it to be made? Surely under one now existing and known to the law, namely, the Great Seal, which is called usually in Acts of Parliament and elsewhere the "Great Seal of the United Kingdom." I am a plain man in the street and I do not know what is the meaning of the term "the Great Seal of the Realm.' I do not understand what is meant by the term "realm," and I had the curiosity, since the point was raised, to consult the dictionary as to the meaning of the word. I do not know what a lawyer would say was the meaning of the word "realm," but this is what Murray's Dictionary says. The first definition of realm is a "kingdom," but that does not convey very much. The second definition is "the kingdom of Heaven." Then there is a further definition, in these terms:
    "The sphere, domain or province of some quality, state, or other abstract conception."
    Finally, Murray tells us:
    "A realm is a primary, zoo-geographical division of the earth's surface."
    The perplexity of the man in the street as to the meaning of "realm" is not unnatural. The introduction of the new phrase introduces an unnecessary breach of continuity and may lead to confusion. We do not want a new Seal for this, but we may do after the alteration has been made and the new title has been adopted to meet the altered conditions. As the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) has pointed out, the first step under the authority now to be given by Parliament is that the title should be altered, using the instrument known already to the law and regularly used and then to make a new Seal if found necessary or desirable.
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: I would appeal to my hon. Friends to let this Bill go through. I have already made a promise to my hon. Friend the Member for York (Sir J. Marriott) that I would consult the legal advisers of the Crown as to whether we could use the words, "Great Seal." I think the words "the Great Seal of the Realm" are the best, but I am quite willing to consult the Law Officers of the Crown between now and the time when the Bill will go to another place.
    Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill," put, and agreed to."

    CLAUSE 2.—(Alteration of the style of Parliament.)
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."
    Major CRAWFURD: I only want to raise a point which I raised on the occasion of the Second Beading of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman (Sir W. Joynson-Hicks) was kind enough then to give me a reply, but, unfortunately, I had to go away, and I did not hear it. My point refers to the title which it is proposed to confer on the present Parliament. According to Clause 2, this Parliament is described as
    "the Thirty-fourth Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland."
    If this Bill is, as I believe it to be, an attempt to bring the titles into accordance with the facts, it is impossible to call this "the Thirty-fourth Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland." because Northern Ireland—not as regards population or area or characteristics which remain as they were—but as a constitutional entity which has to be described in the title of Parliament, did not exist before 1922. Therefore, it seems to me to he not only wrong but ridiculous to refer to this as "the Thirty-fourth Parliament of Great Britain and Northern Ireland." This is, in fact, the Third Parliament of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and, when we are dealing with matters of fact, I do not think we can possibly call this the Thirty-fourth Parliament."
    Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS: The hen and gallant Gentleman has very frankly told us that he has made the same speech which he made on a previous occasion. He then got a very able answer from the

    1901
    hon. and learned Member for Londonderry (Sir M. Macnaghten), which appeared in the OFFICIAL REPORT on the 9th of March. I think the point was then made quite clear, and I adopted my hon. and learned Friend's argument as my own. This is, in fact, "the Thirty-fourth Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland." Certain portions of Ireland have, as it were, slipped out of the United Kingdom, and we now call it the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but it is still the United Kingdom, and this is still the Thirty-fourth Parliament of the United Kingdom. I have adopted, as I said, the very able argument of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Londonderry, and I think it is still quite correct to describe this as the "Thirty-fourth Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland."
    Question put, and agreed to.

    Clause 3 (Short title) ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Bill reported, without amendment; read the Third time, and passed.

DISEASES OF ANIMALS BILL [Lords].
Order for Second Reading read.
The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Guinness): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
The object of the Diseases of Animals Bill is to improve arid modernise our methods of defence against contagious diseases in animals. The Bill carries out various proposals which resulted from the recommendations of the Pretyman Committee on Foot-and-Mouth Disease which reported in 1922 and 1925. Clause 1 is based on the recommendations of the Pretyman Committee, and it would enable us to deal with foot-and-mouth disease, cattle plague and pleuro-pneumonia by means of administrative Orders. At the present time our procedure, a very rigid procedure, is laid down by the Diseases of Animals Act of 1894. In certain details the methods there prescribed have been found to be cumbersome and out of date, and to involve undue cost. We can already deal with swine fever, a minor disease compared with the three
1902
scheduled diseases which I have mentioned, by means of administrative orders, and we seek in this Clause to apply the same methods to the more serious diseases and thereby to avoid the unnecessary expense and inconvenience which are now caused by this obsolete procedure, and at the same time get the benefit of all the advances in modern scientific experience. Clause 2 repeals the obligation to slaughter animals which have been in contact with cases of cattle plague. Fortunately we have not had for many years an outbreak of cattle plague or rinderpest in this country, but it is endemic in certain parts of Eastern Europe. In 1920 it came as close to our shores as Belgium, and there is always the possibility that we may be faced with an outbreak. If such a misfortune should occur we want to avoid the waste of animal life and the heavy compensation which would be involved in a slaughter policy, and we want to be in a position to prescribe the immunising of contact animals by the method which has been used with very great success in foreign countries which have recently suffered from this plague.
Clause 3 would allow the slaughter of imported animals at the port which were found to be suffering from such a disease as tuberculosis on the order of an official of the Ministry of Agriculture. We believe this power is necessary, and I think the House will agree when I tell them that in one year we had 80 cows brought in with indurated udders, a very dangerous form of tuberculous infection.
Mr. ALEXANDER: Where do they come from?
Mr. GUINNESS: I should have to look it up, but I know there were 80 cases. It shows that it is necessary that we should have this power and should not have to have recourse, as slow, to the powers of the local authority to deal with these dangerously infectious cases. Clause 4 would allow the charging of fees to cover cost of detention and testing of animals for certain diseases which might be suspected on importation. We are now, fortunately, free from glanders, which used to take such a very heavy toll of our horses, and we wish, by means of the Mallein test, to be able to ensure the continuance of this freedom from

1903
foreign infection. We can now impose the test at the premises of the importers, but it is at our expense, and we consider it reasonable that where animals are brought into the country the test should be performed at the expense of the importer and at the safest place, namely, the landing place where the animal was originally imported. Clause 5 is taken from a recommendation of the Pretyman Committee, and would allow a magistrate to impose heavier penalties in the case of serious offences. Since 1922, when the first recent disastrous outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease took place, by means of greater vigilante and improved administration, we have been able to effect a steady advance in the resistance of this country to foreign invasions of foot-and-mouth infection, and I hope the House will give us the further resources for which we ask for dealing with this disease and others which will help us in the fight which means so much to the British farmer, and in which Parliament and the country have always given the Minister such ready and generous support.
Mr. MACPHERSON: Does the Bill apply to Scotland?
Mr. GUINNESS: Yes, it does.
Mr. BUXTON: I think this Bill takes powers which are urgently needed. I want to ask the Minister if, before the Second Reading is granted, he will tell us a little more about it and about the situation. Undoubtedly the procedure under the existing law is exceedingly cumbersome and I think, if only from my experience at the Ministry, it has been responsible for part of the very heavy cost that has fallen on the country during the last four years—in 1923 no less than £2,250,000 in connection with foot-and-mouth disease alone. Therefore undoubtedly the Bill is urgently needed. The officials of the Ministry have certainly been again and again hampered for want of more complete administrative powers and the spheres of the Ministry and of local authorities have not been adequately demarcated. The Bill, I hope, does not yield anything to compromise on that question. I want the Minister to assure us that he is taking all the powers that in his opinion the Ministry ought to have. So far as it stiffens up the powers of the
1904
Ministry the Bill is very welcome. We cannot afford any defect in our procedure at all. Diseases are vastly expensive for the loss that they inflict, quite apart from the direct cost that is incurred in dealing with them. The Bill results, I suppose, in the main from the conclusions of two Committees, the Pretyman Committee and the Leishman Committee on Research. Both those Committees were appointed during the time of the Labour Government, and I felt very fortunate in the personnel we were able to secure. I think they have very fully justified the confidence that was felt in them.
The Minister, I hope, will tell us, following the precedent set in another place when this Bill was introduced, rather more about the general situation in regard to foot-and-mouth disease, for the reason that it is the ground for asking the House to pass this Bill. The Leishman Committee as it was appointed, under Sir William Leishman, confirmed the extraordinary virulence of the germ, if it is a germ, which no one can detect, of foot-and-mouth disease. It also showed the extraordinary uncertainty of various treatments. For instance, in spite of the fearful contagiousness of the disease, rats infected with foot-and-mouth disease in close contact as a rule did not impart it to each other. But it has been established that the virulence of infection is even greater and that it remains in the blood no less than 40 days and in bone and marrow 76 days on some occasions. But these discoveries have not vet led to the cultivation of the virus. It was hoped, during our term of office, that German scientists had discovered it. That led to disappointing results, and the method of immunising is still obscure, but the general result of the research is to confirm the need of screwing up the procedure in dealing with outbreaks. We felt that a Committee directly concerned with administration was urgently needed. Captain Pretyman and others were great authorities on the subject, and the Pretyman Report makes a large number of recommendations, some of which are in the Bill, but I should like to ask the Minister if there are not one or two others which ought to be in it as well.
The main thing the Government have done in regard to foot-and-mouth disease is not to adopt the recommendations for stiffer administration but to use their

1905
administrative powers to put an embargo on foreign pig meat. That is worth consideration in connection with this Bill, because I see that in support of it in another place the Under-Secretary used the argument that the figures of outbreaks in this country and in foreign countries showed that very great success had been secured by the embargo. It appears to me that that argument is rather thin. There is no real proof in the figures, comparatively favourable to this country, that the embargo has had a marked effect. There never was any possibility of comparing the outbreaks abroad with the outbreaks here because in every period in recent times they have been immeasurably and incomparably greater abroad than here. I should like the Minister to tell us whether there is really any definite proof. It will need a much stronger one than that in favour of the embargo. The fact that the argument was used by the Government in another place makes me rather suspicious. Is there no better evidence to adduce in favour of a policy coming from a party avowedly desirous of taking Protectionist measures? To put it shortly, one feels that it is incumbent on them to give us very definite evidence that their hands are clean in that respect and that there is objective proof, quite apart from the undoubted popularity with a large section of the farmers of the embargo. Surely it would not be fair to the public to put on an embargo which would lead to a considerable rise in price unless you have some very clear evidence.
There is the further point that interests agricultural Members, that the embargo has not been an unmitigated benefit to agriculturists. It has markedly hampered the operations of the bacon factories, and one of the most hopeful movements of our time is the promotion of bacon factories, and particularly of co-operative bacon factories. A factory such as the Kiddington factory—and I think all others—has been very seriously hampered by the falling off of supplies of cheap pigs.
As to the Clauses of the Bill, it is quite true that the Pretyman Committee describes the procedure under the Act of 1894 as archaic. It used to be a kind of dual control, and that has certainly led to delay. The Committee even suggested that the action of local Committees has sometimes been dictated
1906
not purely by the public interest but by what it calls trade jealousy. That certainly shows that the Minister could make no compromise in estimating what is absolutely the most efficient system. Does the Minister by this Bill get real complete control? Under Clause 1, I would like him to tell the House whether the reference to Section 10 (5) of the principal Act indicates that powers are being retained by the local authorities which are in excess of the absolutely correct powers which should belong to them. It would be interesting also to know how far the local authorities, through their associations, have shown themselves ready to concur in the provisions of the Bill.
When we come to Clause 3, I think the Minister is quite right to lay emphasis on the question of tubercular cattle. It is only logical, now that we are beginning to deal effectively with tubercular milk, that the efforts of local authorities and the Ministry should be supported in regard to importation. So long as the efforts strictly aim at protecting the public health, everyone will support such a proposal. I hope the Minister can say that the efforts are completely and solely aimed at public health. There is nothing more important than a clean milk campaign, and I trust that if the Bill becomes law it will be a powerful reinforcement in that direction. Clause 5 seems to me as important as any in the Bill. I remember a case where neglect to report led to extraordinarily serious results and enormous public expense. Even if you take greater powers to inflict penalties, you find sometimes that magisterial benches are not sufficiently alive to the need of action. I hope, therefore, that the Minister will take steps to inform and educate the benches, by circulars, explaining to them the great urgency of using the law.
There are one or two things which the Bill does not include. The Pretyman Report, on one of its pages, summarises some of the proposals of the Committee in regard to more efficient and more rapid valuation, thereby avoiding delay in action, and it is recommended (1) that there should be a panel of valuers and (2) that a deduction of 10 per cent. from the value given ought to be the general rule when symptoms have become visible

1907
at a visit aimed at diagnosis. I do not know why the Minister should not include proposals in the Bill carrying out these recommendations. If he did so, I think he would find very wide support. The Report is rather striking with respect to one or two dangers of the system of slaughter and compensation. On page 49, there is sympathetic reference to the argument that in certain quarters money has been made out of the appearance of disease among stock and, consequently, these provisions about the amount of compensation to be given are very important.
There is one further proposal of the Committee which I should very much like to see embodied in the Bill. Among the important proposals occurs this one, that compensation ought not to be limited to the farmer who, of course, is perfectly entitled to it, because he loses perhaps very heavily in profits; but there is another set of people who lose even more heavily, namely, the workers, as occurred in the Cheshire outbreak in 1923 and 1924 when very large numbers of workers, many of them skilled, were thrown out of employment and who, according to the Committee and acccording, surely, to the moral sense of the public, are equally entitled to compensation. The Committee urged that their case is as strong as any other; surely, it is even stronger, because although the farmer suffered grievously, as a rule his loss did not mean that his children went hungry; but in very many cases so far as the workers were concerned, it actually meant the partial ruination of their lives for a time and in some cases their children actually went hungry on account of the outbreak, and there was no power to grant them compensation. A simple method is recommended by the Pretyman Committee. The Minister would find the House sympathetic if, in amending the procedure dealing with diseases, he could deal with a claim which is even more urgent than any other.
Mr. EVERARD: As one who has several times in the past criticised the administration of the Foot-and-Mouth Disease Regulations, I should like to congratulate the Minister on the step he has taken in bringing this Bill before
1908
the House to-day. The work of the veterinary side of the Ministry has been of the greatest advantage in inquiring into the question of foot-and-mouth disease and other animal diseases, and the Ministry in the action which it has taken recently has very materially assisted agriculturists by relieving them from the terrible scourge which has overtaken them in past years. In my own part of the country, the disease has in the past been very prevalent, and has inflicted very great hardship upon a very large community. In 1923, the actual loss on the market tolls, owing to the serious scourge of foot-and-mouth disease, was equivalent to no less than a fourpenny rate in the town of Melton Mowbray. Therefore, I sincerely congratulate the Minister on the step forward he is taking.
This Bill comes on the top of several Orders which have materially assisted in combating the disease. There are four Orders which materially affect the question we are discussing to-day. The first Order is the one thing dealing with imported packing material; the second Order enforces the keeping by farmers of a record of the destination of the stock sold; the third Order is the embargo upon fresh meat from the Continent, and the fourth Order deals with the boiling of offal from the slaughter houses. These four Orders together with this Bill will very materially assist in stamping out this terrible disease. I was very interested to read a report of what took place in the House of Lords, and the figures given by the Parliamentary Secretary with respect to foot-and-mouth disease in this country. We can congratulate ourselves very much upon the position in which we find ourselves to-day.
On looking at the figures, I find that whereas in Germany in 1924 there was an outbreak amounting to 56,000, the figures had gone up in 1926 to 187,000. In Belgium the figures have increased from 3,000 in 1925 to 35,000 in 1926. On the other hand, our figures of the disease have gone down from 1,929 outbreaks in 1923, which cost the country £2,250,000, to only 264 outbreaks in 1926, costing £188,000. I believe that this year the number of outbreaks is about half the number recorded at this time last year. Therefore, the advance we have made in this subject is a matter for great congratulation to all concerned.

1909
I am in agreement with the right hon. Gentleman opposite on the question of some reduction being made as to the animals which are actually found with disease upon them. I think the farmers of this country would generally welcome a Regulation of that sort, and I am sorry that it is not introduced in this Bill. I am glad to see that the penalties are being increased. I do not think that they have been increased quite enough, as I am perfectly convinced that the average farmer realises the enormous damage that is done by this disease, and also that any effort to conceal the disease might mean a tremendous financial cost to the neighbours and everybody else in the district. I am certain that the farmers would welcome the strictest method of ensuring that information is given when the disease is among a flock, and also making quite certain that there is an adequate fine charged when that is not done.
We have not yet absolutely identified the germ of this disease, hut we have gone a very long way towards it, and we ought to congratulate those who have been doing the research work and to express the hope that by this time next year some definite germ will have been found whereby the disease can be prevented in this country. If we spend more money on research, as we are doing, I am glad to say, through the action of the Minister, Bills of this sort will hardly be necessary in the future. The Minister has told us that rinderpest is practically non-existent, and that glanders is practically non-existent. I believe that if the germ of foot-and-mouth disease, owing to the foresight of veterinary inspectors, can be isolated, the disease will in future be nonexistent in this country.
Mr. A. V. ALEXANDER: Like my right hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk (Mr. Buxton), I wish to refer to some of the things which are not in the Bill. This is a Bill to amend the Diseases of Animals Act. It is a pity that, in bringing forward legislation of this kind, the Government have not taken a more comprehensive attitude in dealing with the question of the elimination of disease and the making of the food of the people as pure as possible. We welcome the fact that, under one of
1910
the Acts, they are now paying compensation for the destruction of tuberculous cattle; but one thing which is concerning us very much is that very slight inroads are being made upon the cows which are producing tuberculous milk. Take the figures which are given to us now by the various medical authorities. Take, for example, the figures given by Dr. Nathan Raw at a recent conference in London. There were 10,000 cases under treatment for tuberculosis and over 2,000 of them were traced directly to infection by tuberculous milk. It is a great pity that we are not making greater inroads upon it and that the Government has not introduced into this Bill an extension of the amending Act of 1922. In that Act powers were given to the Minister to arrange for replenishing the herds of the country by the importation of healthy cattle from Canada. In this country we have a high percentage of tuberculous cattle, it is probably not less than 35 to 40 per cent. of our milk cows, and it is a rare thing indeed to get tuberculous cattle imported from the Dominion of Canada. The local authorities—
Mr. SPEAKER: I have read the Bill very carefully, and do not see any reference to tuberculosis.
Mr. ALEXANDER: With all respect, may I draw your attention to Clause 3. In his explanation the Minister of Agriculture said that this Clause was necessary in order that he may have power to order the immediate slaughter at ports of tuberculous cattle. That is the reason why I am raising this point on the Second Reading; it may be far more difficult to raise it at a later stage of the Bill. Local authorities in all the industrial areas of the country, who are taking the matter up again, are urging either that the Minister shall alter the amending Act of 1922 and make it compulsory on the Minister to admit cows or that the right hon. Gentleman should take steps to make an Order under that Act so that we can make up the loss to our herds caused by slaughtering by the importation of healthy cattle from the Dominion of Canada.
Mr. GUINNESS: On that point of order, I should like to draw your attention, Mr. Speaker, to the fact that though we do propose to take powers under Clause 2 to deal with tuberculous

1911
animals at the ports, we do not, in this Bill, suggest any amendment of the Importation of Animals Act, 1922. That would be quite outside the scope of this Bill, which is limited to the amendment of the Diseases of Animals Act.
Mr. SPEAKER: I do not think the hon. Member should argue that point at any great length.
Mr. ALEXANDER: The Title of the Bill says that it is
"an Act to amend the Diseases of Animals Acts, 1894 to 1925."
It deals with a whole series of Acts, and, therefore, I think the point of order mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman is based on a false premise. I do not wish to argue it at great length, but now, when some attempt is being made, under the payment of public money for compensation, wiping out gradually the disease in the herds of this country, I think, in order to supply the milk required by the people of this country free from tuberculosis, you should take steps to replenish the herds by importation from abroad. There is also another point referred to by the right hon. Member for Norfolk (Mr. Buxton) which is of importance in this connection. Clause 3 of this Bill gives greater power to the Minister to order slaughter at the ports. It is true that the Minister has said that he desires this Clause in order to deal with tuberculous cattle, but in connection with the administration of the 1922 Act he will be aware that great dissatisfaction is felt with the way in which animals are now ordered to be slaughtered. In some cases, the importers consider the animals should not be slaughtered. We, therefore, view with a certain amount of suspicion the powers given in this Bill, which seem to he quite general in character. By the way the Act of 1922 has been administered in connection with store cattle I should have thought that very little was lacking in the powers of the Ministry with regard to the slaughter of animals.
There is also a point in connection with Clause 4, which is marked as having been introduced in another place, and underlined, in order to show that they desire to avoid any question of privilege. This is a proposal to make it possible to increase the charge by the Department in respect of animals landed at the port, if
1912
it is so desired. It is true that the Minister has said that, in the main, the Department desires this power ha order to deal more particularly with pit ponies. We have a great suspicion that the Government, with its well-known Protectionist tendency and a general power of this sort, will not be long before they apply all kinds of tests in order to prevent the landing in this country of cattle which are really necessary for the maintenance of a supply of fresh meat to the working-class population. I hope the Minister of Agriculture will be able to reassure us on that point. Then, again, we who are connected with the retail trade in supplying the consumer with fresh meat have experienced great difficulty since the Ministry placed an embargo on the importation of pig meat. It has caused an extraordinary rise in the price and, moreover, has seriously handicapped bacon factories. One or two people who are interested in bacon factories have communicated with me on the matter.
If it was ever intended by she Ministry to be anything more than a protection against disease, it has been an actual protection for the farmer and has secured the rise in prices which has taken place. It is extraordinary that farmers have not taken more advantage of these high prices and supplied meat in the place of that which was formerly imported. Those who are engaged in buying for immediate supply fresh meat or bacon to the consumers of the country know that not only have prices gone up, but they show no tendency of coming down, because farmers have not taken sufficient steps to make good from home supplies the losses which have been sustained by the operation of the embargo. I feel great difficulty in tracing the actual reduction in the, number of outbreaks in this country, which we all welcome, to the working of this particular embargo, and I agree with my right hon. Friend that more detailed information is necessary as to how the continuance of the embargo is going to help in the reduction of these outbreaks or he of benefit to the community.
Mr. LAMB: I desire to support the Minister of Agriculture in his request to the House to give the Bill a Second Reading. All agriculturists, and the general public, are well aware of the

1913
great necessity for dealing with these cases with expedition, and any power which the Minister may deem necessary to enable these cases to be dealt with in their earliest stages should receive the assent of every hon. Member in the House. Acts of Parliament passed so long ago as 1894 cannot be expected to be suitable for dealing with the position at the present. Few people realise how much greater is the risk of infection to-day, and it will increase, as compared with years ago because of the greater facilities for transport which obtain to-day between the Continent, other countries and Great Britain. Undoubtedly the greater facilities for transport to-day increase the risk of the importation of disease from those countries where, unfortunately, they not only exist but are increasing. We have some cause for satisfaction that in this country, with our present powers, we have been able to reduce the number of outbreaks.
The hon. Member for Hillsborough (Mr. A. V. Alexander) has referred to the Order which was made dealing with the importation of carcases, and has charged the farmers of this country with not having done enough to repair the loss of supplies caused by that Order. Unfortunately, pigs cannot be produced like rabbits out of a hat, and if he will give the farmers reasonable time, I am sure they will make up the deficiency. A reference has been made to the loss which agriculturists suffer through the prevalence of this disease. It is not only the agriculturists who have to suffer this loss. It is a loss to the community as a whole as consumers. They undoubtedly feel the effects of these outbreaks, and, further, the taxpayers of the country are grieviously hit by the expenditure which it has been necessary to incur. There is a loss to the farmer, a loss to the consumer and a loss to the taxpayer, and we should spare no efforts to reduce disease. I deplore the fact that the hon. Member for Hillsborough attempted to bring into this discussion a very acrimonious subject and one which would receive very great opposition from agriculturists. I do not wish to enter into that subject, except to say that I deplore the fact that he introduced it, because it may tend to delay the passage of this Bill if we attempted to include such a contentious matter in this Bill
1914
I feel confident the Minister has the support of the whole agricultural community in bringing forward this Bill, and I hope the House will give it a Second Reading.
6.0 p.m.
Sir DOUGLAS NEWTON: The hon. Member for Hillsborough (Mr. A. V. Alexander), in the course of his able speech, suggested that there would he no necessity to bring in a Diseases of Animals Act—or it almost amounted to that suggestion—if steps were taken to amend existing legislation with regard to the importation from other sources of live cattle into this country. As he developed that argument, perhaps it will be permissible for me, in reply, to refer to certain figures. Last year only 53,000 cattle were so imported into this country, and it would be unreasonable to think that we would ever be able to import so many cattle from abroad as to enable us to replace our diseased cattle in this country. Moreover, we have in this country the healthiest cattle in the world, and we are exporting them to these very countries from which the hon. Member wants to import. I desired to draw attention only to this one point, because I think it is not quite fair to suggest that a remedy can be found in this direction for diseases which are inherent in this country, and which these other animals would quickly catch if they were imported into and fed and kept in this part of the world. I hope that the Bill will receive the Second Reading that it deserves. The Bill has the backing of the whole agricultural community behind it, and I believe it will do something to assist in dealing with the important question of the diseases of animals.
Mr. GUINNESS: Hon. Members opposite have asked for information as to the present position of foot-and-mouth disease, especially with reference to the action which we took last year in imposing an embargo on meat imported from continental countries. The improvement in regard to our resistance to the invasions of disease which have been taking place at intervals throughout the heavy infection of the last few years in Europe, is very remarkable. The number of outbreaks that we have had in the first 2½ months of this year is only 21, as against 45 outbreaks in the corresponding 2½ months up to 14th March of

1915
last year. But those figures do not show the whole improvement, because it is important to distinguish between primary outbreaks, for which there is no explanation, except untraced infection from abroad, and secondary outbreaks which may be definitely linked up by means of human carriers or other direct infection between one infected place and another. If you compare the number of initial outbreaks which took place in the first 4 months of last year before the embargo with the number this year, you will find that last year there were 15 initial outbreaks, and that this year there have been only three. So it does look, seeing that we have brought down the initial outbreaks to one-fifth of what they were last year, as if the improvement is due to the action taken under the embargo.
The embargo was imposed because of an outbreak at Carluke, where certain infected carcases from Europe were found in a bacon factory. The effluents from that bacon factory infected the sewage farm, and the animals on the sewage farm contracted the disease. There was strong evidence that the infection was carried by the effluent from the factory, and, acting on that, we imposed the embargo. The Report to which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Northern Norfolk (Mr. Buxton) referred, the Report of the Foot-and-Mouth Disease Research Committee, confirmed the action which we took, because in that Report there is an account of experiments which reproduced the condition which had occurred at Carluke. Healthy pig carcases were splashed with the infected blood of other pigs, or smeared with it in another case. They were kept at a temperature of 15 degrees, and four days afterwards rinsings were taken. Those rinsings, which reproduced the condition of the effluent at Carluke, were found to be capable of infecting healthy animals with foot-and-mouth disease. So I think that in that Report we have strong confirmation of the view that we took as to the causation of the Carluke outbreak.
It is quite true that in that Report there is very disquieting information about the infectivity of bone marrow. We cannot possibly justify keeping out our importation of foreign bacon and overseas supplies of chilled and frozen
1916
meat from the Argentine. Fortunately these imports are free from the risks which apply to the fresh blood on Continental carcases. It is a trade of such enormous dimensions that if the stamping out of foot-and-mouth disease involved the terrific public sacrifice that any such policy entailed, the public would probably say, We cannot stamp out foot-and-mouth disease, and we must just face the evil." So we have to deal with the bone marrow danger, which is only a theoretical danger after all, shown in the laboratory, but of which we have no confirmation in practical experience. We have to deal with this theoretical danger by a different method. We have issued an Order to try to obviate the danger from infected marrow, by imposing an obligation on all those who give swill made from meat and bones to the pig, to see that it is thoroughly boiled before it is consumed. I think that the embargo policy was absolutely justified, and I do not agree with the hon. Member for Hillsborough (Mr. Alexander) that the effect on prices has been very serious. It is quite true that in London, as the Metropolitan market was so largely dependent on imported Continental pig meat, there was a very considerable dislocation in the early weeks, but matters are now adjusting themselves, since alternative sources of supply have been de eloped, and there has not been any corresponding rise in price in Birmingham or Manchester, where the markets have all through been far more dependent on home-grown sources of supply.
The right hon. Member for Northern Norfolk asked why we had not carried out certain recommendations of the Pretyman Committee. He mentioned the Committee's suggestion that there should be panels of valuers in cases of slaughter. That was very carefully considered. It was felt that if you had panels of valuers every valuer would send in a claim to be included. Every farmer, on the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, would be tempted to ask for the valuer whom he knew, and there was a great likelihood that the Exchequer would suffer. Apart from that, it is all important to get immediate slaughter. You cannot wait for your valuation. For these reasons we have felt it better to retain the existing system of valuers appointed by the Ministry—valuers who can be called in at

1917
the shortest possible notice to assess the market value of the animal, and we have reached this decision in consultation with the Pretyman Committee, who are, I think, convinced of the strength of our arguments. The right hon. Gentleman asked also why we did not accept the recommendation to make a deduction of 10 per cent. from the value of all diseased animals which were slaughtered. We do not think that any such change would be equitable. If the owner of animals where an outbreak takes place is guilty of any offence, he can be dealt with under the powers of the Minister of Agriculture to withhold compensation for any offence in relation to animals, and we are careful not to impose this penalty unless we can base the decision on a conviction in the Law Courts, where the man's case would have been heard and where he would not have been found guilty except on due evidence.
The right hon. Gentleman also pressed the case of agricultural workers who were thrown out of employment by outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease. I think that a good many of these arguments about unemployment have been based on a misunderstanding as to the basis of compensation. We do not pay compensation for the farmers' losses. We pay the market price for the animals which we seize for slaughter. The farmer has many other incidental losses, for which he gets no consideration whatever. He may have fat stock ready for market, which are withheld from the market at heavy loss to himself for many weeks. He may have cows in milk and be prevented from marketing his supplies. If we are going to give compensation for indirect losses, we shall be embarking upon a course which will lead very much further than the consideration merely of the claim of the agricultural labourer, and we shall inevitably have to extend the calls on the Exchequer in the interests of the farmer as well.
Mr. BUXTON: Is not hardship the basis in both cases, and does not the Pretyman Committee, basing its statement on that, say that unemployment is as great a hardship to the agricultural workers as the loss of slaughtered stock is to the employers?
Mr. GUINNESS: That may be the basis which the Pretyman Committee thought would be reasonable, but the
1918
actual basis of existing legislation is the market value of animals which have been seized for slaughter, and there has been no consideration of any indirect hardship apart from the assessment of that market value. The hon. Member for Hillsborough raised the question of the importation of non-pedigree breeding stock. I am afraid we cannot possibly reopen that matter. It was considered at the Imperial Conference in 1923 and the Canadian Government were informed—
Mr. SPEAKER: The right hon. Gentleman is taking the fly a little too readily. I ruled that subject out of order.
Mr. GUINNESS: I am grateful to you, Sir, for reminding me that I need not follow all these very contentious points. Our Bill is admittedly limited in its scope. There are no doubt other provisions which hon. Members opposite would like to see included in it but we do not think they are necessary for the efficient administration of our defence against animal diseases and we certainly cannot possibly accept the very contentious extensions which have been pressed by them.
Mr. ALEXANDER: May we have a word about Clause 4, in which it seems the Ministry are taking very general powers?
Mr. GUINNESS: The hon. Member's point on Clause 4 was that we might test for other diseases. There is no thought of testing store cattle with tuberculin but we certainly ought to test pedigree animals which are brought in far breeding purposes. I think where we test with tuberculin it is reasonable under this Clause that we should be entitled to get the cost from the importer. It is not only with tuberculin but there is another disease known as dourine with very serious danger to this country, and there is a very hopeful method of testing in that connection which we also want to use. Therefore we want to keep this Clause in its present form so that it will enable us to charge fees for any of these tests which we may find it necessary to impose at the ports in the interest of keeping out infection.
Question, "That the Bill be now read a Second time," put, and agreed to.
Bill read a Second time, and committed lo a Standing Committee.

ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Lieut.-Colonel Headlam): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
This is an unambitious little Bill, which is rendered necessary to bring the existing practice with regard to the Naval Reserve into line with the law, or, rather, to bring the existing law into line with the existing practice. It is a Bill which should have been introduced a good many years ago, and I do not, therefore, quite understand why it is the intention of the lion. Member for North Camberwell (Mr. Ammon) to postpone its appearance for another six months. It seems to me to be absolutely necessary, and it is just as necessary now as it was when he occupied the post which I now fill. The first Clause in the Bill deals with the question of the bounty which it is proposed to pay to Naval Reservists when they are called up. Under the Royal Naval Reserve (Volunteer) Act. 1859, the reservist, whose services are required on mobilisation, if the period of his service is extended for over three years, is paid 2d. a day in addition to his ordinary pay, and that payment is made applicable to the men of the Royal Fleet Reserve by the Act of 1900; but it was never made applicable to the men of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. After the War it was decided to pay a bounty of £5 on mobilisation to all men of the Naval Reserve, and under the new Regulations in regard to the Reserve that bounty is promised to those who join it. Therefore, what the House is asked to do in this Bill is to sanction this change to £5 on mobilisation to the Reservists in place of the 2d. a day after three years' service paid to certain classes of Reservists previously. I think the House will realise that this is a fair scheme all round, and brings the payment to Naval Reservists into line with the payment that is made to Territorials in the case of the Army.
The next point where it is desired to bring the law up to date will be found in Sub-section (3) of Clause 1 which alters the period of training for Reservists. Under the Act of 1859 a period of 28 days was laid down as the maximum period of
1920
training. Obviously that period is too short in these days when technical training is so much more strenuous and difficult than it was in 1859. Therefore, for some time before the War, the period of training service for certain technical men asked for, greatly exceeded the 28 days prescribed by law. At the present time the period of service during which engine-room artificers and certain other classes who join the Naval Reserve are called upon to train is three months in each of the first four quinquennial periods of service, and in the case of newly enrolled engine-room artificers and certain classes, this service is to be continuous; in other cases the service may be in periods of not less than one month. I wish the House to realise that the regulations in regard to that period of training have been in force in the Royal Naval Reserve for a great many years and, even before the War, it occurred to the Admiralty that it might be necessary to get legal sanction for this extension of service. For some reason which is wrapped in the mystery of the past, this legislation was not actually introduced into Parliament. What is desired now is to make it clear that this extended period of service is legal. I desire the House to realise that the period of service now undergone by these reservists is working well and, as far as I know, no con plaints have been made about it. The higher technical training required at the present time necessitates a longer period.
The third and last amendment in the law which is required, refers to the terms of service in the Royal Fleet Reserve. That Reserve was brought into existence by the Naval Reserve Act of 1900. It consists of two classes—A Class and B Class. A Class is composed of Royal Naval Pensioners and Royal Marine. Pensioners who had entered the Service after the passing of the Act and were called upon to serve in this Royal Fleet Reserve as part of their terms of service as pensioners. In their case it was compulsory service in the Reserve and included also in that class are men who were in the Service before the passing of the Act of 1900 and who joined the new Reserve voluntarily. Class B consists of persons other than pensioners who, after service in the Royal Navy or Royal Marine, enrol for service in this Reserve.

1921
The difficulty which has arisen is this. The Act of 1900 while providing for the voluntary enrolment of those naval and marine pensioners who entered the sere vice before the passing of the Act and the compulsory service of those naval and marine pensioners who entered after the passing of the Act made no allowance for the voluntary enrolment in this Reserve of men who were in the later class. In practice, disability pensioners have been allowed to join the Royal Fleet. Reserve if they were medically fit and as it has been decided that they were pensioners, although not pensioners coming under this Act, but pensioners for service done to the State, it was doubtful whether they could serve in this Reserve unless they had joined the Service before 1900. It is necessary therefore to amend the law in order to clear up the position of those disability pensioners who are already in the Royal Fleet Reserve.
Sir FREDRIC WISE: What is the approximate cost of this Bill?
Lieut.-Colonel HEADLAM: I shall come to that point in a moment. We shall require a Money Resolution.
Sir F. WISE: No amount is mentioned either in the Resolution or in the Bill.
Lieut.-Colonel HEADLAM: It is almost impossible to say what the cost of the Bill will be; if the hon. Member will for give me I will finish the points with which I am now dealing and will then turn to the difficulty of estimating the exact cost. I have explained the position in regard to the disability pensioners. The other point which it is necessary to make clear is that the Admiralty have now decided as a measure of economy not to make it compulsory for pensioners to join the. Royal Fleet Reserve. As from 1925 onwards pensioners will not be compelled as a condition of their service to join the Royal Fleet Reserve. We are anxious, therefore, to make it clear that men who join, arc not joining any longer on the old basis—that is to say they join the Royal Fleet Reserve voluntarily, and the number who so join depends upon the number required by the Admiralty at any particular time. It is no longer a condition of service. The holding of a pension no longer makes it necessary for certain classes of men to belong to the Royal Fleet Reserve.
1922
These are the three changes in the law which this Bill proposes. They are all necessary in order to carry into effect what the Admiralty is already doing, and has been doing for some time. As I said in my earlier remarks, this Bill ought to have been introduced a good many years ago. It has not been introduced, for reasons over which I do not think the Admiralty have much control, and I take it that, although the difficulties existing were apparent before the War, the coming of the War and the muddle and confusion during the War, took the matter entirely out of the hands of the Admiralty and left it more or less in the hands of successive Governments. I ask the House to give the Bill a Second Reading because it is absolutely necessary in the interest of the Naval Reserve. I should like to answer my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) as to the probable cost. As far as I can see, the effect of the Bill will be a reduction in expenditure, not immediately, but in the future, because the automatic increase of the Royal Fleet Reserve will not continue. We are limiting its numbers, so in that case I suppose there will be a reduction. With regard to what the effect will be of extending the £5 bounty instead of giving the 2d. a day extra pay now given after three years' service, I must leave it to the far higher skill of my hon. Friend to work out exactly what the cost will be to the country. The numbers of the Reserve are put down on the Paper, and it seems to me that if you calculate £5 per head for each man, you will more or less get the charge that might be necessary if all the reserves were called out at the same time, which is hardly likely and will not, I hope, occur. But whether we save money or not will depend upon the duration of the war.
Mr. AMMON: I can relieve the feelings of the hon. and gallant Member who has just spoken right away by telling him that I placed the Amendment on the Order Paper because at first it was not quite clear what was the purpose of the Bill, but since then he has issued an explanatory White Paper with the Financial Resolution, and we have heard his statement just now. There are, nevertheless, one or two points that I would like to raise, and one has been raised already by the hon. Member for

1923
Ilford (Sir F. Wise). I do not think it would have been quite so difficult to give us some idea of the cost if only we had been informed of what has been the cost hitherto under the old system, and whether or not one expects there will be any reduction in that direction. That would have given us at least some lead in the matter. The particular part of the Bill with which I am concerned is Sub-section (3) of Clause 1. I understand from the hon. and gallant Gentleman that the Government are now seeking legislation in order to cover, not illegal, but extra-legal practices that have been carried on by the Admiralty for some time. Am I right in gathering that the three months' period of training, instead of the 28 days, that is now legally in operation is rather concerned with artificers and those engaged in what one would call the more technical work of the modern navy, and will not be applied rigidly with regard to A.B.s' and ordinary seamen? The reason why I put that question is because representations have already been made to me with regard to people who follow the avocation of fishermen, and who might find it difficult to get away from their calling for a three months' training.
Lieut.-Colonel HEADLAM: The point is that this extension of training to longer than 28 days is not for all classes, but it is in operation already, and has been for some years past, and, therefore, any difficulties or inconvenience that may have arisen, are there already and have nut to be anticipated in the future.
Mr. AMMON: What I was trying to press was that it has not been rigidly applied to those who are A.Bs., because some of them have put it to me that this will make a difference to them. I am hound to say that the explanation of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, coupled with the White Paper, has put a different complexion on the Bill, and there is no intention of opposing it. I only hope that his expectations will be realised and that it will not impose any hardship on those who form the Royal Naval Reserve in complying with the longer period of training as compared with that already in operation.
Commander WILLIAMS: I welcome the fact that the Government are putting down a definite period instead of the old period of 28 days, which was very often lengthened in the past. It is much fairer to the men themselves that they should have a real knowledge of where they stand, and I would like to say that I think that will be generally welcomed on all hands. As to the necessity for increasing the period, it must be increasingly obvious that, whereas 50 or 60 years ago, in the transition from a sailing ship to a battleship, which was then nearly always itself a sailing ship, it was a very easy thing for a man to learn his duties, but to-day it is necessary that these men, in their own interest and in the national interest, should be thoroughly trained rather than that we should have more men not so efficiently and effectively trained. That is all I wish to say in welcoming this Bill, which, I believe, on the whole, will he thoroughly satisfactory to the men concerned.
Mr. WOMERSLEY: I represent a large number of men who serve in the Royal Naval Reserve, and who are very interested in this Bill. I should like to press the point made by the hon. Member for North Camberwell (Mr. Ammon) as to whether it is the Admiralty's intention rigidly to insist upon a three months' training, because I can assure the Financial Secretary that it will not meet with the approval of the fishermen whom I represent. They are quite satisfled with the arrangements that are at present in force, and if it be the intention of the Admiralty to carry on in the same way as in the past, I do not think there will be any great objection, but there will be an objection from the fishermen if it be laid down that they have to do a three months' training, because it will he absolutely impossible for them to do that and to carry on their own avocation during the seasons when they are required for the fishing industry.
On the whole, the Bill is welcome to the men of the Royal Naval Reserve. I regret there is nothing in it, however, to provide for the payment of the gratuities to the skippers and mates on completion of their training rather than, as at present, making them wait till the end of the year before they draw the

1925
gratuities, because it must be remembered that these men have to sacrifice a good deal in order to serve in the Royal Naval Reserve. Possibly, they have got to the period of the year when they could be earning considerable money as fishermen, and they have to leave their home towns and go away for the training, and they feel that at any rate some portion of the gratuity ought to be paid to them on the completion of their training. I should like to have a clear answer fin the point raised by the hon. Member for North Camberwell.
Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: I was not at all sure if my information was very superannuated or not when I listened to the hon. and gallant Member explaining the Bill, but I am encouraged to add my voice and reinforce the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Camberwell (Mr. Ammon) by what has been said by the hon. Member for Grimsby (Mr. Womersley). I do not know how far the Admiralty are now using the services of the East Coast fishermen in Scotland, but they used to use the services of these men very generally. I am aware that some change has taken place, but if they are still using the services of men who are engaged in the ordinary operations of fishing, it is quite impossible for the Admiralty to impose a three months' training upon those men—absolutely Impossible—and I feel perfectly certain that this House will pause and consider before they give the Admiralty power to impose such impossible responsibilities upon men who wish to serve in the Royal Naval Reserve. I speak with a great deal of hesitation, because I admit that I have been a little out of touch for some time with what has been done, but if these men's services are still being used, and the Admiralty still wish to use their services, we must press upon the hon. and gallant Member to give an answer to those points which will reassure the men and secure us in the enjoyment of their services.
Lieut.-Colonel HEADLAM: I am willing to reassure the right hon. Gentleman. It is not the intention of the Admiralty to do anything more than what I have said, and I am afraid I have not made myself as clear as I ought to have done. Broadly speaking, 28 days,
1926
which is the old period of training, are only exceeded in training by acting engine room artificers, of whom I spoke. Provisional seamen and stokers have their 14 days' drill and 28 days' training, but the training of the rest of the men is mostly for 28 days, sometimes less. There is no intention whatever of altering the existing Regulations in this respect.
Question put, and agreed to.
Bill read a Second time, and committed to a Standing Committee.

ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE BILL.

  ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE (MONEY).
  Considered in Committee under Order 71A.
  [Sir ROBERT SANDERS in the Chair.]
  Resolved,
  "That it is expedient to authorise the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament for naval purposes to men called into actual service in pursuance of an Order under Section four of the Royal Naval Reserve (Volunteer) Act, 18:59, such sums, not exceeding five pounds a man, as the Admiralty may appoint under any Act of the present Session to amend the enactments relating to the Naval Reserve Forces."—[King's recommendation signified.]—[Mr. R. McNeill.]
  Resolution to be reported To-morrow.

WAYS AND MEANS.
Considered in Committee.
[Sir ROBERT SANDERS in the Chair.]

WAYS AND MEANS.

  MONEYLENDERS (EXCISE).
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Captain Hacking): I beg to move,
  "That on and after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and twenty-eight, there shall be charged on a licence to he taken out annually by a moneylender in Great Britain an excise duty of fifteen pounds or, if the licence be taken out not more than six months before the expiration thereof, of ton pounds,"
  This Resolution is necessary before the Bill that was passed in this House on Second Reading 10 days ago can be discussed further in Committee. Clause 1 of the Bill requires that every moneylender, whether in business alone or as a partner in a firm, has to take out annually, in respect of every address at which he carries on business, an Excise licence, upon which there has to be paid

  1927
  an Excise Duty of £15, but subject, of course, to certain provisoes in the Bill. An Excise Duty requires the sanction of a Ways and Means Resolution, and it is that sanction which I ask the Committee to give now.
  Question put, and agreed to.
  Resolution to be reported To-morrow.

FORESTRY BILL.
As amended (in the Standing Committee) considered.
The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Ronald McNeill): An Amendment has been handed to me in the name of an hon. Member opposite who is not now in his place.
Mr. SPEAKER: I did call the hon. Member's name.
Mr. RAMSAY MacDONALD: I am sorry to say we have not got the Amendment.
Bill read the Third time, and passed.
Mr. SPEAKER: As there is business appointed for 8.15, I will resume the Chair at that time.
Sitting suspended at Thirteen Minutes before Seven o'clock.

WAGES.
Mr. KELLY: I beg to move,
"That, in the opinion of this House, the rates of wages now prevailing in industries in this country, even in those not, subject to outside competition, are insufficient to ensure to the men and women concerned and their dependants a reasonable standard of life, that the provision of adequate wages should be made a first charge upon industry, and that in this, as in all other respects, His Majesty's Government ought to he model employers."
In bringing this Motion before the House I desire to direct attention to the conditions under which the great bulk of our people have to exist, from the beginning to the end of each year, on wages that are inadequate, with no prospect of betterment, no hope of improvement, and certainly with no security. I do not know what would be said by those who
1928
make after-dinner speeches and preside at company meetings if they were compelled to live on wages such as the bulk of the people of this country have to exist upon. These are the wages received by the people who are responsible—never mind about the directing of their efforts—for the carrying on of the commerce and industry of the country. I have used in the notice I gave the expression "sheltered and unsheltered" because hon. Members opposite have been under instructions for a lengthy period now to bring before the House the question of wages in sheltered and unsheltered industries.
Mr. HANNON: Whose instructions?
Mr. KELLY: The instructions of the party opposite. I had noted on two occasions that hon. Members opposite were under instructions to bring forward such a Motion.
Mr. HANNON: Speaking for myself, I have no knowledge of any sort or kind of instruction ever having been given in the House.
Mr. KELLY: Had the hon. Member been in the House that day, he could hardly have passed his Whips as he entered without receiving a paper upon which there was the entry of such a Motion. I am not ping to define what is a sheltered and what is an unsheltered industry. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why not?"] Because the people who have used the term have used it not because they are able to clearly define "sheltered" or "unsheltered," but in order to try to rouse up the feelings of those who are low paid against certain people who are higher paid in certain industries. I have wondered many times what industries they place under the umbrella of "sheltered." Is municipal service a sheltered industry?
Sir WALTER GREAVES-LORD: Is there any competition in it?
Mr. KELLY: I take it that that is accepted by the other side as a sheltered industry. Is Government service a sheltered industry? [HON. MEMBERS: "Yes!"] Then I accept their definition, because I am going to show that this charge of high wages that is made against those in Government employment, particularly in the industrial establishments,

1929
and the charge made against those who are in municipal employment of being highly paid is away from the mark, because it cannot be proved that even the wage they receive is adequate for a reasonable standard of life. I am quite prepared to take what hon. Members opposite have hinted at as a sheltered industry for the purpose of the discussion. I wonder how many of them have taken the trouble to investigate what are the wages operating in those industries they term "sheltered"? I take municipal employment. In comparing the rates I find that they are between 40s. and 60s. per week. I am referring to those in the non-trading sections of municipal employment. Is anyone on the other side prepared to say that a wage of 60s. paid 52 weeks in the year is adequate for a reasonable standard of life? If they are prepared to say that, I think very little of their ideas of their fellow citizens. Take electricity supply, with wages ranging between 55s. and 65s., and the gas industry with its 52s. to 60s. I want to take the transport worker, because we have heard so much about the dockers with their 11s. to 13s. 6d. per day as something that requires to be reduced. I wonder how many Members realise what that means. Then we have people stating that that is a wage—55s. to 70s. at the very best—that ought to be brought down, a wage that the country cannot continue paying. Again, I ask Members would they like to live and work for such a wage and at such an occupation? Then there comes the favourite topic of employers who are dealing with wages, the topic of the railways. We are told how wonderfully well paid railway servants are. I have looked into it closely, and I cannot find those high wages operating. I find wages, so far as the traffic side is concerned, leaving out engine drivers' for the moment, of 40s. to 50s. a week. In the railway shops and sheds the rate is 46s. a week. Is anyone prepared to say that is even a reasonable, let alone an adequate wage for the work that is undertaken by those people? I am including everything. I am not leaving bonuses out. I am quoting all in wages.
With regard to road transport, we have the same level of wages, ranging from 60s. downwards, and even at the very highest in London the rate is about 70s. a week.
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That is a very inadequate wage for the work and responsibility undertaken by these people. Then we have the engineering industry. I hope the hon. Member for the Moseley Division of Birmingham (Mr. Hannon) will make a note of the figures that I am about to give, because he must have some concern with that industry, coming from the Midlands. In that industry, we find wages running between 35s. and 43s. 6d. as far as the lowest paid workers are concerned, and as far as the highest paid workers are concerned, fitters in London going to a rate of 60s. 11d. In the so-called heart of the Empire—I have heard Birmingham placed in that category—we find a rate of 40s. a week operating for labourers in the engineering trade and 58s. a week for the highest paid men. Is that looked upon as an adequate wage? Yet we hear that wages are at such a level that we cannot continue industry unless wages are brought down.
Mr. HANNON: Is the hon. Member quoting full-time wages or not?
Mr. KELLY: I am quoting full-time wages for a week's work of 47 hours in the engineering trade.
Dr. VERNON DAVIES: Minima and maxima?
Mr. KELLY: I am quoting the time wages operating, of 35s. paid to labourers in some districts. The highest paid districts in the country—and I make a present of this to the hon. Member for Tamworth (Sir Edward Iliffe), who is to move the Amendment—are Coventry and London with 43s. 6d. a week. I would like to know how these people live on such wages. I notice that the hon. and gallant Member for Sedgefield (Major Ropner), who is to second the Amendment, has a family connection with the shipbuilding industry. Certainly his family have had a close connection with that industry. If we take the shipbuilding industry, we find wages of 37s. all-in operating, and as far as the shipwrights are concerned, a rate of 56s. a week. Is that a wage to be proud of? Is that a wage upon which people can live? It is impossible for any hon. Member of this House to prove how these people can live at this time on such wages. These low wages apply also to the cotton industry. In the cotton in-

1931
dustry, one of the staple industries of this country, it is well within the mark to say that the average wage has been round about two guineas per week. I can quote the exact wages of warehousemen as far as the cotton-spinning section is concerned, which runs to 47s. a week for some, and for the general warehousemen 43s. a week. Surely, it is time that hon. Members on the other side had some regard for the conditions of life of the people of this country, and that they should realise that the wages which are now paid are altogether inadequate for giving reasonable standard of life.
In agriculture we have wages at the rate of 30s. to 42s. a week. How the people are living, I cannot tell. Later, I shall refer to one or two household budgets in order to show that wages in every industry arc inadequate, and I shall give figures to show that the wages paid by the Admiralty and the War Office and the Board of Trade—they have done nothing to help us to raise them—and the wages paid even by the Minister of Labour in his own Department are quite inadequate for giving a reasonable standard of life. In the earlier part of my speech I was interrupted by one hon. Member with the statement that the Government service is a sheltered industry. I am quite willing to quote what is happening in the Government service. There are 150,000 people in the Civil Service with less than £3 a week and 225,000 who have less than £4 a week. The women employed in the Government service receive wages which are a discredit to any Government, whether it be a Liberal Government such as we have had in the past or Conservative Government such as we have at the present time.
In the industrial establishments of the Government we find men receiving wages of 49s. a week. That wage is paid at the Arsenal. A wage of 47s. a week is paid at the dockyards to men for a full week, and 35s. a week to women. I hope that when the Minister of Labour replies he will be able to show us how people in this country can live at the present time on wages such as those I have enumerated. Then, we have the spectacle of the War Department declaring that people who stand high in
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their service must have no connection with the trade union movement, for fear lest their labour should be lost to the service of the War Department at some stage or other. Yet these people who stand so high in the estimation of the War Department are paid wages of from 51s. to 70s. a week, and for the last three years the War Department has refused even arbitration with the object of securing some improvement in the conditions.
I must leave a number of the figures that I desired to quote. I would remind hon. Members that we are often told of the high wages operating in America. I remember the Chairman of a Joint Industrial Council, of which I was secretary in 1921, reminding us that he had just returned from a visit to America—the industry with which we were dealing at that time is one of the most prosperous industries of this country—and saying that in America the workers had accepted reductions of 20 to 30 per cent. and that, if we were to hold our markets, we also must be prepared to accept reductions of 30 per cent., in order that our products might go to the markets of the world and be sold. Luckily, we did not believe that; luckily we fought against it, and luckily we secured an advance in face of the opposition of the employers. Now that we are hearing of the high wages paid in America, we hear nothing from those employers about the high wages in America and that we ought to follow the example of America as far as wages in that industry are concerned.
Mr. HANNON: Give us the production.
Mr. KELLY: The production is such that the shares of those companies engaged in the chemical industry stand at a much higher level now with the higher wage than they did when the lower wage was in operation. Now that I have mentioned the industry, perhaps the hon. Member will be prepared to agree with me. Many quotations might be made regarding women's wages. I wonder what employer can feel proud of the wages paid to women at the, present time, which run from between 20s. at the very best under Trade Boards to £2 per week. Yet women are asked to live at a reasonable standard on such a wage. It cannot be done. The mere mention of money wages, however, is not sufficient for the

1933
purpose of this discussion, and I want to show the purchasing value of these particular wages.
Quite recently I was in an industrial court dealing with members of my union who are employed by Trinity House, men who are employed in the light vessels around the, coast, on the wharves and on the Trinity House boats. As far as the men on the light vessels are concerned, we were able to have a complete account of the purchases made by them. They go aboard these light vessels for two months at a time, and they have to purchase a month's food before going. Despite all the examination made by those who were on the other side of the conference table, they were not able to shift any one of the figures presented to them, which showed that these men required over £5 per month for food for each individual man who went aboard the lightships, over £5 a month, and nothing for rent; no clothing, no tobacco, no newspapers, no luxuries, no cinemas for the men on board these light vessels.
Over £5 a month for food! If that is the case what must be the position of those people who are asked to continue on wages such as those operating in the industrial and commercial side of this country's activity. What is the opinion of the right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Bench when they think of the people in their own services endeavouring to exist on less than £3 a week? I wonder how these charwomen at 30s. a week exist. I wonder if the Minister of Labour will tell us, as he told the Committee on the Unemployment Insurance Act in 1925, that the working people, the men and women in the Government employ, are able to save sufficient to keep themselves during the six days they are waiting for unemployment benefit. I say without hesitation that there is not a margin in the wages operating in industry at this time, and particularly in Government services, and I claim that it is the duty of the Government to be model employers and see that those in their service receive wages which will enable them to maintain a reasonable standard of life. The budget. I quoted is not for the highest quality food or for large quantities of food. In this budget of £5 is included the purchase of meat, and I have here the receipt from the butcher who sup-
1934
plied it, at 6d. a lb. 1s that what our people are expected to live on? I have had a budget taken out for South London, where the cost on the home was £3 5s. per week for a family of five. The wages are on such a level that they do not enable people to purchase anything but poor quality and small quantities of food. It is the bounden duty of the Government to give a lead in regard to wages and to see that those in their employ are adequately paid so that they may have an opportunity of rising to a decent standard of life.
Hon. Members who are moving and seconding the Amendment are making a very bitter attack on the employers of the country. I am sorry they have taken that line. They talk in their Amendment about having efficiency in production. Who are responsible for inefficiency. None but the employers, and I say that without hesitation. The hon. Member who is moving the Amendment knows something about Coventry. Does he say that they are inefficient there? Does the hon. Member for the Moseley Division of Birmingham (Mr. Hannon) declare they are inefficient? Is it an attack upon the efficiency of the workers. If it is I imagine they have not looked much into the conditions of industry during recent times. I hope hon. Members opposite, who we have to meet sometimes in conference, will realise that industry cannot be carried on with low wages, which prevent people living at a reasonable standard. All the talk about our wealthy possessions and our Empire pales before the fact that people cannot get enough upon which to live, and cannot find a home that is worthy of the name. In making this Motion I ask the House to pass it so that it shall be an instruction to the Government that wages must be adequate, and in the hope that something will sink into the minds of the employers that they must not look for cheap labour but pay those in their service a wage which will enable them and their wives and children to live a decent and reasonable standard of life.
Mr. ROBERT YOUNG: I beg to second the Motion.
I have listened with much interest to the speech of the hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly), who has given us

1935
a very informative and lucid statement in regard to the wages paid in certain industries in this country. To my mind he has shown quite clearly that the wages paid are, in the main, quite inadequate to provide a decent standard of life for many of the wage-earners of the country. These wage-earners are the vast mass of the working population. They are the overwhelming majority of the actual producers of our national wealth, upon whose wellbeing the prosperity and development of our industrial and commercial activities depend. It will be no answer to our Motion to-night for hon. Members opposite to say that wages are higher to-day than they were before the War by more than the increased cost of living. We do not admit that wages were adequate before the War, and we certainly do not admit that they are anything like adequate to-day. We are asking to-night that the Government will endeavour to assure an adequate wage for all workers, whether those wages be high or low, a wage which will be sufficient to secure a decent livelihood. We are not very much concerned as to the number of shillings that are paid per week. We are more concerned as to what these shillings will provide for the worker. The Motion says that the provision of adequate wages should be a first charge on industry. That is not a presumptuous demand, but an ethical claim, with which I am pleased to believe an ever-increasing number of people not obsessed with the idea of big dividends are willing to agree. I say it is not a presumptuous demand, but an ethical claim, and if the Government is to be a model employer of labour, it should give immediate effect to that claim, and it should give effect to that claim quite apart from the rate of wages paid even by trade union assent to men employed by other employers doing similar work to that done in Government Departments. For the Government to pay trade union rate of wages is not enough in many circumstances. If those wages are not adequate to insure a decent standard of life to its workers, then it is not a model Government.
In ordinary employment, in circumstances such as exist to-day, economic considerations are very often divorced from ethical principles. If a Govern-
1936
ment Department or a municipal authority decides to become a model employer of labour then the provision of an adequate wage to its workers becomes not only a moral obligation, but a moral obligation which every public body in the country should be willing and anxious to fulfil. The principle of a living wage is to guarantee means of subsistence to all. The first essential for a citizen in any democratic country is that for work done he should have a wage large enough to provide, and not only to provide, but to maintain, comfortable physical efficiency on the one hand and social and economic well being on the other. It is infinitely more important that we should have 45,000,000 citizens earning incomes sufficient for their needs, than that we should have 40,000,000 citizens earning inadequate wages and 5,000,000 citizens enjoying incomes far beyond their needs. It is far better for the nation as a whole that we should all live in small and comfortable houses than that a comparative few should live in large houses and palatial residences, while hundreds of thousands of our fellow countrymen are condemned to live in slurps, in insanitary areas and unhealthy homes. We cannot justly blame those who, having lost all hope of attaining a decent standard of life, become regardless of moral, social and economic amenities.
But we do not wish to burke the problem which we have a placed before the House. At the same time we have a right to point out what has intensified the problem. At the present time we are faced with a great problem of unemployment. A million of the workers are earning no wages at all. In addition, large numbers are not earning full wages. How far is that due to the depressing of wages that many employers of labour followed since 1920? The right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Labour knows, as we know, that there is a tendency, even in prosperous times, to check expanding trade by demanding for commodities prices far in excess of a reasonable return over the cost of production. That is what took place in the years immediately after the War. In 1919 there was a good deal of saved wages in the pockets of the working classes of the country, and there was money in the possession of men who had returned from war service. Where did it all go? The circulation of essential commodities

1937
was freer and the demand for them was greater. Where did the saved money of the people go? I will tell hon. Members opposite.
Apart from a little extravagance here and there, by thoughtless and not farseeing people, the savings of the War period and the wages then paid to those who were in employment were extracted from the pockets of the consuming public by methods of profiteering, which were quite well known to the Government of the day, and were complacently tolerated, if not actually encouraged. The inevitable result followed. Consumption declined and demand fell off. Then began the slump of 1921. Wages decreased practically every year. It is true that there was a slight interruption to that decline in wages. In 1924 the Labour Government threatened to deal with profiteers. With what result? There was a decline in the prices charged for commodities. There was an increase in the 'Wages Bill of the country for the year, and there were indications of a return to good trade. That was all to the good. Some of us at that time thought we had turned the corner and that we were getting out of the east wind of industrial adversity. The result of the General Election of 1924 was responsible for more than putting a reactionary Government in office. All the tendencies of 1924 vanished on the advent of this Government. With what result? That the cost of living in February, 1927, is not less than the cost of living in September, 1924. And this is the result—that there is an increased percentage of people unemployed, although there are half a million more workers covered by the Unemployment Insurance Act to-day than there were then. And with this further result—that during 1926 there was continuous decrease of wages going on.
The MINISTER of LABOUR (Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland): When was it that this decrease in wages went on?
Mr. YOUNG: During 1926. Not only that, but while we are now hoping for improved trade, wages deductions are still going on. I learn from the "Labour Gazette" that in January of this year there was a weekly wage reduction of £38,000, covering 270,000 people. On the other hand, I admit that there
1938
was an increase of £20,000, covering 400,000 people, leaving a net decrease of £18,000 a week. We have to realise that the continuous progress of a country depends not alone on the industry of its workers but also upon their ability to procure an ever increasing portion of the things that they produce. Can anyone say that that has been their lot during the past seven years? When the slump threatened there was a cry from many platforms for increased production. I confess that I took part in that cry. I have no reason to believe that there was no response to that cry. But I know this —that increased production without increased consumption of the things produced leads to stagnation of trade, to lower wages and to increasing unemployment. That was what happened again in 1921. The purchasing power had been diminished by high prices, by falling wages and by extensive profiteering. All led to the unemployment which we are experiencing to-day.
In spite of it, what has been the cry of hon. Gentlemen opposite? The cry has been that the Government should not interfere in industry. In spite of the demand of Liberals and Conservatives for Governments not to interfere in industry, the fact remains that wages are a social and national concern. Unmerited poverty and bad conditions of life should not be tolerated in any civilised state, and still less in one—if we hark back to last Friday's Debate— which claims to uphold the tenets of Christianity. It is strange that in the stress of war we learned that much, and that now in the time of peace what we learned in the stress of war is not only denied by hon. Gentlemen opposite but in many cases completely forgotten. What did we learn under the stress of war? I trust that I shall be allowed to quote the following. It is from the Ministry of Reconstruction pamphlet entitled "State Regulation of Wages." It says:
"One tiling is certain. The question of wages will never be allowed to return to the position of 10 years ago, when the Government had no concern in it. A policy will be pursued of stimulating production, and at the same time securing to the workers a fair share of the product—a reasonable standard of wages must be a first charge."
That is our Resolution to-night. Then, on 18th August, 1919, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hillhead (Sir R.

1939
Horne)—who has considerably fallen from grace since those days—introduced a Bill, the preamble of which read:
"Whereas it is expedient that minimum time rates of wages shall he fixed for all persons of the age of 15 years and upwards; that all such persons, whether employed at a time rate or otherwise, shall be afforded an adequate living wage; that a Commission shall be appointed to inquire into and decide what these rates shall be, and the manner in which they shall be brought into operation."
After quoting that, we have a right to ask what have past Governments done to maintain a decent level of wages and to fulfil their promises made during the War? The answer is, in effect, nothing. The continuous decline in the wages bill goes to prove that nearly all the efforts of the Coalition and Tory Governments to assist industry were along wrong lines, and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) is not blameless in this connection. He was Prime Minister of the Coalition Government. Perhaps he is sorry for that now. He promised the workers a new earth. It is a good thing for us that the promise of a new Heaven was not within his ken. What did he say? He spoke for many people who now sit on the other side of the House, because this Government is the lineal descendant of the Coalition Government. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] There are Members now sitting on the Treasury Bench who were associated with the Prime Minister of the Coalition Government, and when he said the words which I am about to quote he spoke for them—?
"Millions of young men have fought for the new world. Hundreds of thousands died to establish it. If we fail to honour the promise given to them, we dishonour ourselves."
With that in mind, I find it difficult not to recall the experience of last year, when the Government practically became a committee of the mineowners, with the result that hours had been increased by Act of Parliament, and the wages of the miners have been decreased. If there is any dishonour, the dishonour lies there. I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs is not in his place. If he had been, I would have asked him, "Is this world any better to-day for the workers as a result of winning the War?" As he is not
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here, we may ask one or two of his followers—I almost said employés. We may ask them, what they think of his promises? He went on, in words of burning eloquence and with a picturesque and rhetorical imagery which he alone among all his country men can conjure up with startling vividness, to ask this question:
"What was the old world like?"
and he answered it as follows:
"It was a world where toil for myriads of honest workers, men and women, purchased nothing better than squalor, penury, anxiety and wretchedness, a world where, side by side with want, there was a waste of the inexhaustible riches of the earth. If we renew the lease of that world, we shall betray the heroic dead, we shall be guilty of the basest perfidy that ever blackened a people's fame. The old world must and will come to an end. No effort can shore it up much longer. If there be any who feel inclined to maintain it"—
I recommend these words of the right hon. Gentleman to right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite—
"let them beware lest it fall upon them and overwhelm them and their households in ruin."
9.0 p.m.
No wonder right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Bench opposite and those behind them conjure up visions of red revolution, bringing upon them this disaster which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs prophesied would overtake them. The right hon. Gentleman lost his opportunity. He allowed it to slip past, and the result now is that the only way to redeem it is the threat that we are going to have 500 Liberal candidates at the next Election to save the country from Toryism on the one hand, and Socialism on the other.
Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Mr. James Hope): This is some little distance away from the question of wages.
Mr. YOUNG: I desired to the programme and the policy been suggested in relation matters.
Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Does the hon. Member suggest that these 500 candidates will affect wages?
Mr. YOUNG: I was going to suggest that these promises had been made and that we are entitled to ask about the fulfilment of the promises made in 1919. What were those promises? Again I say,

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many right hon. and hon. Gentlemen on the other side were pledged by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs. The first was a living wage for all workers—and that is what we are asking to-night. The second was a maximum of 48 hours a week—and the Tory Government refused to ratify the Washington Convention. The third was a voice in working conditions—and last year the voice in working conditions for many was silenced, as far as this Government were concerned. That is the position in which we find ourselves tonight. I have asked what this Government have done and what past Governments have done to fulfil the pledges made in relation to this matter. What is the net result to the workers to-day? We find wages reduced by £10,000,000 a week and, in addition to that, £500,000,000 has been given to the Income Tax payer. The policy of hon. Gentlemen opposite seems to be one of low wages, low Income Tax, and increased hours. That policy has been and will continue to be a miserable failure, but I am a bit of an optimist. There is a saying, "The young live in the future, the middle aged in the present, and the old in the past." My name happens to be Young, therefore I want, to live in the future, and I believe that good wages can be paid to the workers if profiteering is punished and if high profits and dividends are curtailed. The economic circle is only vicious because, we go the wrong way round it, Demand is weak because wages are low; consumption is small because prices are high; prices of essential commodities are high because profits are high. Let me give an illustration or two. Take this in reference to the production of houses and their cost, for which the workers are always blamed. I cut it from the papers on the 21st of January of this year, and it is called "A real dividend appetite." It says:
"In the Chairman's remarks read at the Maidenhead Brick and Tile Company meeting yesterday were the sentences: I am aware, considering the results, that some of the shareholders think they ought to have been paid more than the 17½ per cent. on the Preference and the 56 per cent. on the Ordinary shares. But I think it is better to place the company on the pinnacle of sound finance so as to be in a position to meet any contingency that may arise in the distant future.' The company raised
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its profits from £13,666 in the previous year to £14,777 in the past year, notwithstanding the industrial disputes."
That is not bad for the profiteers. That is how the wages of the workers, even as paid to-day, do not provide them with an adequate sustenance. There is another quotation, dated 12th March of this year, as follows:
"As indicated by yesterday's rise in London Brick Company and Forders shares to 52s. 3d., the market was well satisfied with the dividend statement. The final distribution of 10 per cent. makes 20 per cent, for the year, which is the same as for the previous year. Goodwill item which stood in the books at £60,000 has been written off, and the outstanding balance of £39,943 of the 4½ per cent. and 6 per cent. Debentures has been redeemed. There are now-no charges in front of the share capital."
That company paid 10 per cent. in 1923, 15 per cent. in 1924, 20 per cent. in 1925, and 20 per cent. in 1926, and it gave £70,000 in the form of a capital bonus, and that bonus was the fourth in six years.
Dr. WATTS: Will the hon. Member give particulars of the profits made in the cotton trade?
Mr. YOUNG: I will give another quotation. It is headed "Coal Wages and Prices," and it occurred before the end of the industrial dispute:
"At Nottingham it is reported that five miners working at Clifton Colliery drew £40 in wages. They worked 5½ shifts of 7½ hours each."
That is not bad. That means £8 per week, but listen to what they did for it. They hewed 323 tons of coal for it! The report goes on:
"This coal was sold by the colliery company at the pit-head price of 55s. a ton, which works out at £888 5s."
For which they paid £40 in wages! I have only one word more to say. I am a believer in peace in industry. I have worked for peace in industry. I believe it is in the interests of the worker as well as in the interests of the country as a whole, but it must be peace based on mutual agreement. I have no doubt we shall be told to-night that the interests of Capital and Labour are identical. Do hon. Members opposite believe that? Under certain circumstances, I am prepared to say that I agree that there should be agreement between Capital and Labour, but I know this, that as long as

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Capital, which is the product of labour, takes precedence over labour in the results of industrial progress, then recurring contention and dangerous disputes are bound to break out. Capital must place itself in a new relation to Labour. It must no longer assert the position of supreme boss or tyrannical master in relation to Labour. It must realise that its function is to increase the productiveness of labour, and when it realises that, I shall have no hesitation in then believing that the Motion that we are moving will be readily accepted. At all events, better relationships between employer and employed will begin when the former are prepared to give an adequate sustenance to each willing worker, which will be sufficient for the purposes of life.
Sir EDWARD ILIFFE: I beg to move, to leave out from the word "That," to the end of the Question, and to add, instead thereof, the words
"the rates of wages and regularity of work now prevailing, even in sheltered industries, have been adversely affected by the general strike and the coal strike of last year, that the only way permanently to improve the standard of living and of wages is through increased efficiency of production, and this House calls upon all political parties to co-operate to this end."
Members of all parties will agree that in many industries the wages of this country are too low to-day, and it will also be agreed that the standard of living, although that standard of living today is higher than it has ever been in this country, is altogether too low. But a mere increase in wages is going to be no solution whatever to this problem, because, after all, if higher wages are imposed on any particular industry than that industry can afford, the only result will he unemployment and a lowering of the general standard of living in the country. What we have to do is to make higher wages possible, and that can only be done by making industry more efficient in this country than it is at the present time. It is all a question of high production, and this is the policy of the Unionist party to-day. We believe absolutely in increasing the production of the individual, we believe in cheapening the cost of living so that the wages paid are more effective, and we believe absolutely in encouragement to pay the highest possible wages that industry can afford. It is
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only by that method that we can hope to increase the standard of living for all sections of the community in this country. The hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly), who moved the Resolution, dwelt on the fact that higher wages must be paid. I agree with him, but he got the sequence entirely wrong, and the sequence is very important. The first thing is to get greater production and greater efficiency, and following that high wages, and then, following that, you will get greater demand, and in that way this high production will be equitably distributed throughout the community. It is that, and that alone, which will make for an increase in the standard of living in this country, and also—which is most important—automatically an increase in our export trade."
The Mover of the Resolution seemed in some doubt as to what was a sheltered industry and what was an unsheltered industry. An unsheltered industry, in my opinion, is an industry which is subject to world competition, and a sheltered industry is an industry which is not subject to world competition. The difficulty with regard to getting this increased efficiency in industry, which is so necessary, is due to the attitude of the Labour party and the attitude of the great trade unions, who do not seem to grasp really fundamental facts. The trade unions, of course, are absolutely necessary organizations, because, after all, the workers must have the power co bargain collectively. But I do wish the trade unions of this country would copy to some extent the methods of some of the American trade unions. These American trade unions, first of all, have nothing whatever to do with politics. They concentrate on two things, and two things only—first of all on making their industries as efficient as they possibly can, and then on extracting the highest possible wages for their members from those industries, and, I say, more power to their elbow. Do our trade unions really encourage efficiency? [An HON. MEMBER: "It has nothing to do with it!"] I think trade unions have everything to do with it, and until they realise that they have something to do with the encouragement of efficiency, we shall never get as high a standard of living in this country as we ought to have. The trade unions, as far as I gather, do not encourage the introduction of labour-

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saving machinery, which is the workers' best friend. It is essential, as I say, that trade unions should make industry as efficient as possible.
Mr. KELLY: Would the hon. Member tell the House of one trade union in this country which has prevented the introduction of such machinery?
Sir E. ILIFFE: I do not say they have prevented industry from being efficient, but I say they are not encouraging it to be efficient. I shall believe trade unions are really encouraging their members to be efficient when I pick up in the morning an illustrated paper, and see a photograph of Mr. Cook handing a trophy to a body of workers who have brought up the largest amount of coal in a particular district, or when I see an illustration of Mr. Coppock handing a prize to a bricklayer who has laid the largest number of bricks in the country for his normal day. That, indeed, would show there was a different spirit in industry, and directly we get that different spirit we shall find the standard of living will rise. [Interruption.]
Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER:I must point out that the Mover and Seconder of the Motion were given an attentive hearing.
Sir E. ILIFFE: Some hon. Members regarded the General Strike as a strike in order to secure for a certain body of people a higher standard of living. In my opinion, the General Strike really was a strike against high wages, because the result of that strike has been a loss of production. It has meant higher costs for articles purchased by industry, higher local rates, and, therefore, has meant a smaller margin for wages, at any rate in the unsheltered industries, which have to compete in the markets of the world. I think if we can really settle down to work, and if we can avoid all this prejudice, this country is bound to go ahead, and the standard of living is bound to rise. After all, we are all partners in the great enterprise of running this country, and we all participate in the success of that operation.
The Seconder of the Motion referred to the fact that certain industries show large profits. I never can understand why the trade unions of this country do not invest more of their funds in in-
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dustry, as is done by American unions. If we were all partners, if we all did our best to make industry in this country successful, we should find the standard advance very rapidly indeed. Personally, I feel that the solution is that every working man should become a capitalist, as is the case in America to-day. In a Debate in this House the other day, an hon. Member pointed out that the "Economist" published statistics showing the results of 1,500 industrial companies, and he said that their profits showed that they were making no less than 11 per cent. on their ordinary capital. He seemed to think that that was rather a dreadful thing, considering there was so much poverty in the country. The reply to that is that all those shares are purchaseable in the open market, and, therefore, why should not trade unions in this country invest their money in that way? That is, obviously, the right thing to do. I have not doubted the hon. Member's figures, although, of course, it is quite clear he only dealt with successful companies, and did not deal with companies which have failed, as, obviously, those companies would have no annual return to include in the list. But the point was that 11 per cent. was being made. If 11 per cent. were being made, why should not the trade unions make it? If I were a trade, unionist, one of the first things I should do would be to try to get my union to organise, say, a trade union investment trust. I would go to the City of London, and get the very best commercial man I could, put him in charge, and give him a high salary and a bonus upon results if he could produce 11 per cent. We are all partners, and if trade unions would only take a leaf out of the book of the American trade unions, we should find the workmen of this country would soon own a very large slice of industry.
Mr. OLIVER: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that trade unions are forbidden to invest in such securities?
Sir E. ILIFFE: I certainly was not aware of that, and if that be so, the sooner that law is altered the better. Let me reiterate, that the standard of living depends upon more production, and upon the distribution of that production, which, as I say, can be brought about through higher wages. Take the example of

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America and the example of Russia. In America, you have got a high output per individual, high wages and a high standard of living. In Russia you have got a low output per individual and low wages, and a low standard of living. Take another example, the position of this country to-day and the position a hundred years ago. We all realise that the standard of living has enormously risen in the last 100 years, and that we are all better clothed, better fed and better housed, but why is it? Because production per individual has increased so enormously through the use of labour-saving machinery and the more scientific management of industry, and not through working longer hours or under more ar ous conditions. If this increase of production has brought about an increase in the standard of living, the policy in future should be a continuance of increased production. If we did that we should make the life of the Minister of Transport a burden to him, because we should soon find we had as many motor cars on the roads in this country as they have in America in proportion to our population. If that were the case, we should have nine times the number, because every working-class family in America owns a motor car. It seems to me it is absolutely necessary that all parties in this House should co-operate and try to create the right atmosphere for producing high wages, that is, that we- ought not to make the workers dissatisfied but make them desire themselves to become capitalists, and we ought to avoid half truths and misrepresentations. If we only pull together in that way we can enormously increase the standard of living in England.
Major ROPNER: I beg to second the Amendment.
The Proposer of the Motion this evening did little more than recite a series of figures. He gave us what I am quite prepared to accept as facts with regard to the wages paid in certain industries. There is no Member on this side of the House who would not wish to see the raising of wages in every industry in the country; but the hon. Gentleman has given me very little to reply to. The Seconder of the Motion also gave us the rates of wages in certain industries and, in addition, made a series of groundless
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and unsubstantiated accusations against the Prime Minister of the Coalition Government and against hon. Members sitting on this side of the House. I am well aware that in seconding the Amendment I run a considerable risk of being misrepresented by hon. Members opposite and I must add that except for one word and a grave omission I can find no fault with the Motion, which calls attention to
"the discrepancy between wages in sheltered and unsheltered industries and their inadequacy in both cases."
I will not deal for the moment with this discrepancy between wages in sheltered and unsheltered industries but call particular attention to the last few words of that part of the Motion which I have read. If it is a pious hope that wages may be raised, then we on this side of the House entirely agree with that view. Whether the Proposer and Seconder of the Motion will receive unqualified support from their own side of the House, I am not nearly so certain, for reasons which I hope to dwell on shortly. Then the Resolution runs:
"That in the opinion of this House, the rates of wages now prevailing in industries in this country, even in those not subject to outside competition, are insufficient to ensure to the men and women concerned and their dependants a reasonable standard of life."
I will now reply to the Proposer of the Motion concerning his remarks with regard to the shipbuilding industry. I would much sooner see wages of 46s. or 50s. or less paid in British shipyards than I would see those shipyards closed and the men who are now employed in them go on the dole and British ships be built in foreign shipyards.
To revert to the Motion for a moment, anyone who has been even a very junior subaltern in the Army knows that such words as "insufficient" or "reasonable" should never be employed in orders. I will read a short extract from the Field Service Pocket Book which I looked up this morning. It says:
"Orders and reports must be as concise as possible, consistent with clearness. Language should be simple and anything of an indefinite or conditional nature should he avoided."
Could anything be more indefinite or conditional than the Motion which we are discussing this evening? It may be a good thing for orders and reports to be concise and definite, but hon. Members opposite when tabling a Resolution find

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very often that it pays to be conditional arid indefinite. The next clause of this Resolution says:
"The provision of adequate wages should be made a first charge upon industry."
That is a phrase with which I cannot agree—not because I consider that wages should not be a first charge, but because wages are already a first charge on industry, as I hope to show. Just to finish the Resolution, as I have been dealing with it clause by clause and phrase by phrase, I will draw the attention of the House to the last sentence which says:
"In this as in all other respects lids Majesty's Government ought to be model employers."
I can only say that a model Government cannot help being a model employer. Model Ministers cannot help being model employers, therefore, so long as the present Government remain in power, that last phrase is quite unnecessary. I should like now to try to show that wages are already the first charge on industry, and to do that I will ask the House to remember that the essentials of production are land—which we may leave out of our discussion. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Well, you can for the purpose of this argument—labour and capital. Labour can be divided into what is usually known as skilled and unskilled labour, that is manual work, performed by those workers who are usually termed wage-earners; and the second division of labour is represented by managers, officials, clerks and the black-coat brigade, who work for salaries.
Capital we may also separate into two divisions. There is that capital which expects reward in the nature of interest for the provision of plant in the broadest sense of the word, factories, machinery and everything else, and which provides, for instance, wages and salaries while, say, a factory is being built and wages and salaries are being paid. Then, secondly, there is capital which quite rightly asks to be rewarded for taking risks. Imagine the start of a new industrial undertaking, we will say a factory for making red flags and red ties. The factory must be built, machinery must be provided, and during the whole of that time wages must be paid, and wages will be paid. They are the first charge on the industry. Salaries will be paid also. What may not happen is that
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the capital invested in that industry will receive any interest. And that the ordinary shareholders—as distinct from the debenture holders, who expect a set rate of interest on their money—may lose the whole of the capital which is invested. Whereas the men who risk their capital may lose everything, wages will be paid so long as the undertaking can carry on at all; and in that sense, the economic sense, wages are undoubtedly a first charge on industry.
The Amendment which stands in the name of my hon. Friend and myself is meant to draw attention to the criminal folly of the general strike and the coal strike, and the responsibility for the general strike and the coal strike which rests on the shoulders of hon. Members who sit on the benches from which this Motion was proposed. I will give a few figures to illustrate the appalling loss which was the direct result of those two industrial disputes. The general strike cost the workers alone £20,000,000—these estimates are necessarily somewhat vague, but that, I believe, is the estimate of the right lion. Gentleman the Member for Aberavon (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald)—and 500,000 men were thrown out of work. The coal strike cost the country £500,000,000. The miners lost £60,000,000 in wages, and other workers, as a result of the coal strike, lost £40,000,000 in wages. We cannot have a raising of the standard of living in a country which is subjected periodically to industrial disputes of that nature.
A decade ago, nearly, the Great War was won. Attention has been drawn to remarks made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) but I am not going to discuss whether false hopes which were raised during the War were justified at the time or not. It may be that we needed cheering up, and that when we were, told that we were to mine back to a country fit for heroes to live in we fought a little harder or, at any rate, did not run quite so quickly. That, however, hardly enters into the discussion this evening, except that it prevents us perhaps from fully appreciating the appalling losses in capital suffered by this country during the war. You cannot blow up capital for five years and expect to find a more wealthy country at the end of that time. We found ourselves impoverished,

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and just because the country is impoverished as the result of the War we have an increase in Socialism, which is a disease of poverty. As a result of the increase in Socialism we have seen a growth of the Labour party. We have seen also, because Socialism is also a disease of discontent, the capture and exploitation of the trade union movement by the political Labour party; but that captive trade union movement has become too strong for the Labour party, which is now in the impossible position of representing itself as being a party of the State and has meanwhile sold itself body and soul to one section in the country, the trade union movement.
We are fighting to-day, in another war for civilisation, a more dangerous and a more insidious enemy. Disunion and envy are being stirred up all over the country, largely by hon. Members opposite. Whereas during the general strike we heard only a plaintive whisper against the strike from the more responsible and moderate leaders of the Labour party, we now listen daily to floods of invective pouring forth between one trade union leader and another, between some prominent and between some unknown members of the Labour party. Since the War nearly 300,000,000 working days have been lost in industry through disputes. A simple mathematical calculation will show that at 10s. a day that is equivalent to a loss of £150,000,000 in wages. That takes no account of other workers put out of work in other industries as a result of those disputes. The Proposer of the Amendment has already drawn attention to the fact that you cannot raise the standard of living in a country unless you increase the national dividend. Mr. Alfred Marshall, in his book, "The Economics of Industry," wrote:
"By adding together the incomes of any society, whether a nation or any other larger or smaller group or persons, we arrive at the social income—the National Dividend. Everything that is produced, every service rendered, every fresh utility brought about, adds to the national income and to the average level of wages which can be paid throughout the country."
It is perfectly true that by trade union restriction of output in a sheltered industry you may definitely benefit the men employed and the members of that trade union, but the workers and everyone else
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throughout the country are going to suffer in the end by that restriction of output.
Mr. OLIVER: What trade union does that operate in?
Major ROPNER: The bricklayers', for one. It is important to accentuate this fact once again, that before you can raise the standard of living you must get a greater national dividend, by means of higher efficiency in industry and, in consequence, higher wages. When we have given trade unions political freedom, when we have crushed Socialism, but not social reform, then we shall have prosperity in spite of the Labour party, then we shall have industrial peace and increased efficiency in spite of what remains of the Socialist party, and then we shall be able to pay higher wages and raise the standard of living. What is the use of Resolutions such as the hon. Member for Rochdale has proposed and to which we have moved an Amendment, when the unofficial leaders of the Labour party are driving their official leaders further and further from the paths of idealistic Socialism which they tentatively tread from time to time down the steep hill of revolutionary Socialism. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Aber-axon (Mr. Ramsay. MacDonald) has said with truth that there is
"no future for this country at all industrially, unless by hook or by crook we can establish industrial peace on a sound and enduring, foundation."
The hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Manton) only a few days later said that
"the talk about industrial peace at the present time is cant and humbug."
The Labour party are more and more committed to the policy which is a direct negation of the Resolution which has proceeded from the Labour Benches this evening. They are determined to bring Socialism and "Socialism in our time" by destroying profits ruining industry, starving the people, cad if the electorate cannot be persuaded to welcome Socialism they are determined to make them beg for it by reducing the whole country to a state of starvation. Could there be a more classical case of cant and humbug than the Resolution before the House this evening, coming as it does from hon. Members opposite?
Mr. POTTS: After listening to the speeches made by the Mover and Seconder of this Amendment, I want to say at once that what they have told the House so far as industry is concerned has no foundation in fact. So far as the Resolution is concerned, it is well grounded. Much has been said to-night with respect to the mining situation, but I have no intention of speaking very long on this subject. I will, however, endeavour to put what I have to say in a very few words in support of the Resolution before the House. I will confine myself to two points. One is connected with the mining situation and the actual position so far as the wages of the miners are concerned at the present moment. My other point is to demonstrate to this House that under the Tory Government, so far as trade is concerned, we have less trade to-day than there was under a Labour Government. I hold in my hand a newspaper circulating in the borough which I represent, and only last week that newspaper endeavoured to lead people to believe that the wages and conditions of workers in mines at the present time were actually better than before the stoppage, and that the miners were receiving better wages. That newspaper says:
"So far from the men experiencing under the new conditions any shrinkage of pay their wages have gone up to the tune of 7s. End per week above the wages paid before the stoppage. This splendid result shows that the condition of the settlement are on a thoroughly liberal scale."
Let me examine the situation so far as Yorkshire is concerned. Yorkshire is one of the highest paid counties, In Yorkshire the wage ascertainment for last January shows an average wage per shift worked in our mines throughout the county of Yorkshire lls. 0–72d. In December, 1925, I pointed out to the Prime Minister that there would be a stoppage of labour in this country, but he took no notice, and then we got the lock-out from which we have suffered so much. The wages in 1925 for the entire year were 10s. 6·08d., so that the average, compared with last January ascertainment, shows an increased wage of 6–64d. The average wage for the quarter ending March, 1926, was 10s. 4·79d. Compared with last January, ascertainment shows that the wages are only 7·93d. higher than in March, 1926. It should be remembered that in Yorkshire we are working half-
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an-hour longer that we were prior to the stoppage. What is the value of that extra half hour I happen to be the individual who submitted the case to the Royal Commission for shorter hours, and we established that case. It works out in the whole country exactly at 1s. 6d. per shift for every shift worked in the mining industry, so that after working half-an-hour longer than we did prior to the stoppage the result is that the present position is that the miners, instead of getting an advance of wages for the additional half hour are actually getting less.
Major PRICE: Has the hon. Member added the subsidy in 1925?
Mr. POTTS: Yes, the subsidy is included in that, and the subsidy never added a penny to the miners wages. I can prove that if it is necessary to do so. The Seconder of the Amendment has been talking about profits. Let us see where we stand at the present time. The miners in Yorkshire, which, as I have already said, is one of the highest-paid counties in the country, have less than 8d. additional wages per shift under the existing arrangement, which is said to be such a liberal and good arrangement. That statement, therefore, has no foundation in fact. Making allowance for the additional half-hour, we have a reduction. I find that 9d., the value of the half-hour, has gone to the employers, and, in addition to that, they are making additional profits. The employers get 8·54d. per ton increase in profit, according to the returns for January of this year, plus the 9d. I have already mentioned, making ls. 5·54d. increased profit to the owners at the present time, while the workmen receive 7·93d. In the quarter ending March, 1996, the profit in the mining industry—[Interruption]. I know what the losses were in 1925; I have them here; but, taking the March quarter of 1926, we find that the profit exceeded 1s. 8d. per ton, while in the Eastern area the profit on this ascertainment in Yorkshire is 3s. per ton, and, the higher the selling price, the more the profit under existing conditions.
In the January ascertainment, the average selling price of coal was 17s. 1·89d., as against 15s. 9·47d. for the March quarter of 1926. I say, without fear of contradiction that the employers in the country

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are taking advantage of the public so far as prices are concerned. The miners are getting no more wages, having regard to the extra half-hour, and all the increase is going to the employers, whose profit is increasing. The arrangement that has now been made is an unfair arrangement, and one which ought never to stand. I have always tried, all my life, to get peace in the indusry, but this arrangement cannot stand, and, in order to get an opportunity, whether we have to fight or not, we shall take every step we can to break down the existing arrangement.
Mr. LLOYD: Does the hon. Gentleman understand that, if that increase in profit does exist, it acts, through the ascertainment, to increase wages?
10.0 p.m.
Mr. POTTS: No, Sir. Owing to the existing conditions, the employers are participating at a higher percentage in the proceeds than they did before the stoppage in the industry, and the conditions that have been forced upon the men are such that the men cannot possibly get the wages they have been getting hitherto. This arrangement will result in the workmen being, in a very short time, in a much worse financial position than they are to-day. Taking the whole of the year 1925, the average working time was 4·79 shifts per week. In the March quarter of 1926 it was 5·12 shifts per week. Why did it rise? Because the employers knew they were going to lock out the men, and worked the pits more than they would have done under normal conditions. I only say that to show that what hon. Members opposite have in their minds has no foundation in fact. In the paper I have already quoted, I find a statement that the percentage paid to the men over their basic wage is 68·81 per cent, but that statement has no foundation in fact. The January returns give 61–81 per cent.
In the Press we find stated the basis wage plus 61·81 per cent., but I want hon. Members to remember that the standard wage includes 10 per cent. belonging to the pre-War period, and you have to allow for that 10 per cent. in calculating what the percentage increase is. The percentage, therefore, is not 61, but 51. Taking the actual wages paid in March
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of the year preceding the War, and working out the figures for last January, the miners receive their pre-War wage with an addition of 34⅓ per cent. at the present time. That is what they have to set against the increased cost of living. We were told by the Prime Minister that he wanted us to have a square deal, but, instead of getting a square deal, we have a worse deal by far than we had, owing to the Eight Hours Bill having been brought in and passed in this House. We are told repeatedly by Members on the other side, at election after election, that, if the workmen of this country want higher wages and shorter hours, we must endeavour to get increased exportation from this country to other countries.
Lieut.-Colonel GADIE: Hear, hear!
Mr. POTTS: The hon. and gallant Member says, Hear, hear!" I will give the results, and if any Member of this House desires to challenge my figures, and if you, Mr. Speaker, will allow me, I will give every figure in connection with the exportation of manufactured goods. The result is this I will take, for purposes of comparison, the year 1923, before the Labour Government came in; I will take 1924, which includes two months of Tory Government; and I will take 1925 and 1920. In 1924, when the Labour Government was in office, our exports increased, as compared with 1923, to the extent of more than £55,000,000. When the Tories came back into office, in 1925, our exports fell in that, their first year of office, by over £13,500,000, and in 1926 they fell again by £149,000,000 odd. [HON. MEMBERS: "The strike!"] But in 1925 there was no strike or lockout. I have heard hon. Members opposite making statements not long ago, and that is why I examined the figures.
If exportation is increased wages can be increased and hours can be decreased, then the credit stands to Labour, and the country ought to elect Labour to this House of Commons. The figures demonstrate it by the increase over 1923, when Toryism was ruling, and by the decrease in 1925, when Toryism came back and when there was no stoppage. In 1926 the figures fall again. Therefore, I say to hon. and right hon. Members on the other side of the House, and to the country—and I will defend it on any platform in any

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constituency in this country—that the figures demonstrate that, if Labour ruled instead of Toryism, there would be more trade in the country, there would be higher wages, and there would be better conditions. Therefore, I have great pleasure in supporting our object and our Resolution, that we may endeavour to alter things to the advantage of the country, and of the working people of this country in particular.
Major HILLS: I hope the last speaker will forgive me if I do not follow him in all the details of the figures he has given. If I refrain from doing so, it is not from any lack of respect to him, but because I have a few remarks of a more general nature to make, and time is going on and many hon. Members want to speak, so I want to cut my speech as short as possible. May I start by saying that I agree with the last speaker entirely in one point. Wages are too low and ought to be raised. Whatever standard of living you take—and many have been put out to us—over large blocks of industry the amount of basic wage is not sufficient to support the family in a decent standard of life. I do not believe that anybody in the country, and I am sure nobody in the House, would deny that.
Mr. KELLY: In every industry wages are too low.
Major HILLS: There are certain wages in all industries all over the country that do not support a decent standard of life. I believe we shall all agree on that, but on this question I find myself in disagreement with some of the views expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House. I do not think we shall do very much by quotations of speeches made in 1919 and 1920 and by exchanging quotations across the floor of the House. This question is so much bigger, and I think it is approaching a condition when a settlement is more likely than some hon. Members on both sides of the House appear to think. When I say that I want to raise wages, if I really express my own thoughts, I want to do much more than that. I want to take away the distinction that at present exists between the man who is paid a wage that is drawn every week, and the man who is paid a salary, or the man who draws a dividend. I
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should like to see all wage-earners over the whole of the country converted into dividend drawers. I know that is a very Utopian wish, but I do most sincerely think that we could get a wage dividend. One fault of the present industrial system is the sharp division that cuts right down, cutting off the wage-earner at one end from the more fortunate individual at the other who draws a salary or who draws dividends.
But when I come to the particular means by which the Mover and Seconder of this Motion propose to deal with the existing state of affairs, I am afraid I must part company with them. You would not increase wages by a single shilling if you incorporated the whole of your Motion in an Act of Parliament. It would not have that effect. I do not believe an Act of Parliament could do it. In fact, I go further. I ask hon. Gentlemen opposite to cast their minds back 30 or 40 or 50 years. In that time millions of money have been spent on strikes; first on strikes to raise wages and then on strikes to maintain wages. I believe, except in certain of the sheltered industries, that all that money has been wasted. I do not believe that wages have been raised a single shilling. All that money has been thrown into the sea. Why should not the Labour movement do what was suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Sir E. Iliffe) and which was received with some laughter from the Labour benches? Why should it not copy the American system and invest some of its surplus money in industry? It does not waste those funds by investment. Investment conserves and increases, and supposing a strike is unavoidable, and strikes under certain conditions are necessary, all the money is there and can be used for industrial war. Cannot we get the conversion of this country into a country of capitalists? I do not think it is so difficult. I believe it is much nearer than some people think, but I do not think that it would be helped by passing a resolution of the kind we see on the Paper, even though that resolution were made into an Act of Parliament.
Now I come to what I think we can do. I do not think the Government can do very much. I do not believe that legislation can do very much. It can do something. I agree with the Mover that

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the Government ought to be a model employer. I agree with the Mover that the Government is not in all cases a model employer. I agree with the Mover that it pays women, at any rate, scandalously low wages. I believe those wages ought to be increased, and I do believe that the Government might reasonably consider whether the Fair Wages Clause in all cases is in line with modern conditions and modern requirements. It was passed, after all, a long time ago, and it has fulfilled a number of purposes. A good deal of water has flowed under the bridges since then. Then it might be that the Government could encourage the forming of co-partnership schemes or profit-sharing, though I know the objections which are felt to that from the trade union side, and I share some of those objections.
But the two factors which count most in any change of the sort are the employers and the trade unions, and they can do far more than any Government can do. I think the employers can recognise the increasing share of labour in management and in the operations of business. Behind the wages claim stands the bigger claim comprised in the word status. It is not only a demand for more money; it is a demand for human recognition, and as such it has my most sincere sympathy. I believe it can come inside the lines of our present system, modified sufficiently to meet the changed conditions of the case. The trade unions can do a very great deal. They can do a great deal more than they are doing now. They can encourage the desire to get the best out of work and to get the best results out of employment. I think the employers can do a lot. I cannot put it in words and I cannot put it in an Act of Parliament, but there is a new spirit moving in the air, and we should do all we can to encourage it. I believe we are going through the same sort of industrial revolution that the United States have gone through in the last few years, because of the immense wealth and the large distribution of wealth which has taken place owing to the very high wages paid and to the investment of those wages in the industrial concerns of the country. I believe we are about to start on the same course. I do not believe we can do it by passing abstract Resolutions of this sort. I do not approve of the low
1960
wages quoted by the Mover of the Resolution. I believe that wages ought to be raised, and that they ought to be such as to support a decent standard of life. I do not think you can get it by pressing the Government to decree this or to decree that, but I believe I see it coming and it rests almost entirely with the employers on the one side and the trade unions on the other.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Perhaps one of the things that have most justified the Debate has been the extraordinarily suggestive speech to which we have just listened. Perhaps I may be allowed to say a brief word or two about it later. But I should not be dealing with the Motion if I did not refer first of all to the speeches of the Proposer and the Seconder. There is a kindred spirit in all orators, and when I listened to the hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly) and then to the hon. Member for Newton (Mr. R. Young) I could not help thinking of Mirabeau, who always counselled audacity—audacity in the first place, audacity in the second place and always audacity. [Interruption.] It is true, perhaps, of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) but it is equally true of the Mover and Seconder of this Resolution. To start with, the Mover called attention to the discrepancy between wages in sheltered and unsheltered industries but he discreetly omitted that in the Resolution he moved, and I should think the reason is quite plain. If anyone tried to deal with the discrepancy between the wages in unsheltered and sheltered industries, he would come hard up against the economic facts at once. That was the last thing, I think, which the Mover of the Resolution would want to do, if he wanted to get it accepted by the House.
The hon. Member who seconded the Motion was very indignant with the Government. He produced many severe statements and be buttressed them up with a certain number of facts, as he called them, one or two only of which I was able to take down. One of the reasons for his condemnation was that there had been a continuous decline in wages in 1926. I have had that matter looked up since he made that statement and I see that in 1926 there was a net increase in the wages bill of £37.500 per week.
Mr. R. YOUNG: If that is so, I beg the right hon. Gentleman's pardon. It does not agree with the figures at my disposal.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: The next time, I will let the hon. Member have more correct figures at his disposal in order to save him from making misstatements of that kind. From both hon. Members there came a criticism of the Government with regard to the general rates of pay in Government employ. We were severely condemned. If I remember aright, there are Whitley Councils which deal with the rates of employés in Government Departments, and there are those who take the cases on the workmen's side before those Whitley Councils. The hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly) would be a perfectly ideal representative for that purpose. He is persuasive, he is combative, he is not too rigid in his adherence to logic and, consequently, he would state their case ideally. Yet, at the same time, I rather think that he signed some of those agreements himself, perhaps more than one.
Mr. KELLY: I am a member of at least four of those Councils. In no case have I signed or has the workers' side signed those agreements. In fact, the Government of 1922 and 1923 forced the redaction upon the workpeople in the dockyards and in the arsenals.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Dockyards and arsenals. Then I take it that the hon. Member did not sign any of them, not even with regard to messengers?
Mr. KELLY indicated dissent.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Never mind, the Seconder of the Motion really got my hon. Friend out of his trouble, because he said that merely to observe conditions laid dawn in the Fair Wages Clause and to observe trade union rates, does not mean that the Government is a model employer. I look at the practice under the late Labour Government, and I take the statement of their practice by the then Prime Minister, the present Leader of the Opposition. He said:
"The practice of the Government is to pay rates and wages and to observe hours of labour not less favourable than those commonly recognised by employers and trade societies, or in the absence of such
1962
recognised wages and hours those which in practice prevail amongst the employers in the trade in the district where the work is carried out."
In fact, he adopted that as his own standard.
Mr. WEBB: My right hon. Friend was merely quoting what has been the Fair Wages Clause for a great many years.
Sir A. STEEL-MA1TLAND: Indeed he was, and he was also adopting it as the standard of his own practice. That is what hon. Members will find if they will look up the quotation on the 15th May, 1924. I quite admit that the party opposite may have thrown over their leader once more. He has been made to toe the line over the Chinese question and I have no doubt he will be made to do it again. [Interruption.] I am within the knowledge of every hon. Member opposite when I say that. [Interruption.] I adhere to what I have said. I take the figures quoted by the Mover and Seconder of the Motion. The hon. Member for Rochdale referred to the ease of the engineers. I quite sympathise with their ease and also with the ease of the iron and steel and shipbuilding employés. But the hon. Member should not over-state his case. He referred to the rate of 57s. a week for engineers—in sotto voce he added the word time rate—but he knows that engineers work on piecework rates wherever possible.
Mr. KELLY: That is not so.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Every employer if he can and every workman if he can prefers to work on piecework, and the rate for piecework is time and one-third, and there is all the difference between 57s. a week time rate and time and one-third, which is the basis for piece rate.
Mr. KELLY: Do you mean to suggest that this applies to labourers say in the Birmingham area, your own district, who are working at 40s. a week? There is no piecework there.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am referring to the hon. Member's 57s. a week, and he is now trying to draw a little red herring across the track. I am speaking of the 57s. a week person, to whom he referred as a skilled engineer and who is on piecework and wants to

1963
go on piecework whenever he can; and piecework is on the basis of time-and-one-third and not 57s. a week. Next take the instance quoted by the hon. Member for Newton (Mr. R. Young) of the five miners who earned £40 between them in a week. The hon. Member said that the product sold at the pits mouth prices for £880, and the men were paid £40 in wages. To any outsider who had not studied the subject this would give the belief that the wage cost of that 323 tons of coal was £40, but those who are acquainted with the facts know that it is nothing of the kind. Besides the hewers you have all the rest of the men employed in the coal mine, and such over-statements of the case, unintentional as they are—
Mr. R. YOUNG: I only quoted what I read in a newspaper.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: The hon. Member ought to be more critical when he reads his daily paper, and he ought not to pass it on without first properly digesting it himself.
Mr. PALING: The hon. Member referred to it as representing the wage cost of the hewers alone.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: That was not the way in which he stated it. I took particular care to note what he said. The hon. Member was very severe and talked about the dishonour that may attach to hon. Members on this side of the House, and to anyone who had supported the right hon. Member for Carnarvon (Mr. Lloyd George) when he was Prime Minister—that did not, touch me because I had resigned. He was very severe on hon. Members on this side of the House. He used the word "dishonourable." I do not want to employ that word for the moment. I think he was simply forgetful or else he had not read his paper properly. Whatever form of mental aberration it was on the part of the hon. Member, his argument had the whole bottom knocked out of it. Let us look at the actual facts. We have had very few of them this evening. Let us look at the facts of the sheltered and unsheltered trades. That brings one down to the extraordinary discrepancies between them, discrepancies which have been remarked by everyone who has gone into
1964
the facts, whatever be their opinions in politics. I take Mr. Barnes, but the same was true of the Report of the Committee on Pay under Sir Allen Anderson. Here I have an extract from a statement by Mr. Barnes:
"I am glad to notice that at last the disparity in wage rates as between skilled and unskilled labour is attracting widespread attention. The present conditions in Southampton show how things are going. Here in London engineers are working side by side with unskilled labourers, who are paid nearly twice as high rates. The busman is paid higher, and the dustman is an aristocrat as compared with the engineer."
Mr. KELLY: He did not agree that the other man is paid too high.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am pointing out the discrepancies which the hon. Member put. These are due to actual economic reasons. Every one knows, even the one black sheep from Birmingham. [Hon. MEMBERS: "No, a white sheep!"] It all depends on the way the light is reflected on the fleece. The hon. Member knows quite well that the wages in the iron and steel trade and in the shipbuilding trade and, to a lesser but still an acute extent, the wages in the engineering trade, and in all the unsheltered trades, are much lower than all the other wages; not only lower, but the men in the trade, besides having lower wages, have had much longer spells of unemployment, and they are lower just because of the blast of foreign competition. Those are the hard economic facts. They are the economic facts which hon. Members opposite have not attempted to face to-night for one moment. You cannot cure those economic facts. They can be sometimes made worse; they can, indeed, by private action. I know of a municipality with a Labour majority, which recently made a contract and the English tenderer was not a closed trade union house. They put this contract abroad, and, as far as I can make out, no inquiry was made as to whether the foreign tenderer was or was not a trade union house before action was taken to the disadvantage of their fellow citizens. In that way it can be made worse. Corning back to the sheltered industries, I agree at once that wages are not as high as we should wish, and I am at one with hon. Members opposite in hoping that we can get a steady improvement. But when we ask

1965
what is really demanded in the way of improvement we get no answer. What does the hon. Member who moved this Motion think adequate for the unskilled workmen with 55s. a week I Should it he 5s. or 10s. or 15s. more?
Mr. KELLY: Whatever makes a reasonable livelihood.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I see, but the hon. Member carefully avoids giving as any figure. I can understand that,, from the ideal point of view, nothing short of the salary of a Cabinet Minister would be adequate. From all we hear from the Mover of the Motion he expects—this is the trouble—that the increased wage shall come down like manna from Heaven, while he stands by like some patriarch of old. The hon. Member who seconded the Motion was just the same. He is like a modern Elijah, who thinks he has a little cruse that will go on pouring out high wages for ever, and never petering out. We had no constructive suggestion from him at all. What is it that is expected? Is it 5s., 10s. or 15s. a week? If every pound of income over £5 a week could be re-distributed at this moment, it would not mean as much as 5s. a week per family in this country. You cannot get a quart out of a pint pot, and that is what hon. Gentlemen opposite refuse to recognise. We are much more humble in our statements. The only way to improve matters is by gradually increasing the productivity of the nation—there we are on common ground—and thus improving wages in a slower but a surer way, little by little. I would like to see all people dividend-receivers, and I think it could be done without any damage to the real interests of the trade union organisation. I would gladly see the workman having more and more of a voice in the management, in the settling of conditions and also in the knowledge of business.
I know the prejudice against profit sharing or co-partnership which arises from the fear that it would undermine the trade union position. I believe that advance is possible along those, lines without undermining any legitimate trade union influence, and I myself think it is not so much the profit-sharing alone, as the actual feeling that you know what the industry is doing and that you have some voice and some interest in it, that
1966
is wanted. Along those lines you can get a great advance in contentment in productivity, and also in wages, and that is the line to pursue. If it is to be done, it is to be done more by industry itself than by continually bringing politics into the question. I say that freely. If industry were left both to the employers and to the men, I think we should see, as I hope we may see, a greater advance than will be made if political considerations come in to warp and bias what might be otherwise take place. It is from that point of view that I cordially assent to the last part of the Amendment which states that this House calls upon all political parties to co-operate to this end. I think the foe to industrial advance is the fact of having too much politics, and I think the co-operation which we ought to exercise is an act of self-abnegation, that from the political side we should not interfere too much.
Mr. PALING: Not even to increase hours.
Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Not even to support the Communists or the quasi-Communists. [HON. MEMBERS: "What did you do last year?"] Let the party opposite settle it among themselves. They have condemned the people who caused the strike before now. If they like to put it in that way, I can well imagine the difference of opinion—even in a united party such as the party opposite—between the industrialists and the political people in the trade union ranks. If I were an industrialist there, in the trade union ranks, my feelings towards the political and labour ranks would be—.
"Your friends aren't my friends,
And my friends aren't your friends,
And the less we are together,
The hosier trade will be."
Mr. WEBB: I hope the right hon. Gentleman will not think it discourteous if I do not attempt to follow all that he has said. Especially when he dropped into a somewhat lyrical strain at the end, I am sorry my abilities do not enable me to cope with him. There was one observation which he made for which I had been waiting, and when it came, it did not come in the form in which I had expected it. I have been very much surprised in leading the past history of discussion in this House at the way in which Government after Government and Parliament after Parliament went on busy

1967
over many things, but never once considering the level of wages that prevailed in the country. Mr. Gladstone never dreamed of that as a possible political question, but I was rather surprised that no one to-night has protested that Parliament ought not to be troubled with the subject of the level of wages. The right hon. Gentleman, in finishing up, gave us the modern version of that protest. He did not say the subject ought not to have been brought before Parliament—and that, I think, is a very great advance—but he said it was better to leave it to industry itself and not allow Parliament to interfere at all. I suggest that there is some difficulty in doing that. An hon. Member opposite said we were fighting another war to-day, a war upon which civilisation depended, and which was creatine dissension among the people and that, this was very injurious. I dare-say it is injurious, but that is what you have got because Parliament has not given sufficient attention to this question of the level of wages, and has been told, as the right hon. Gentleman told us, that Parliament should not interfere and could not effectively do anything. Therefore, in consequence of that, or at all events following this neglect of Parliament and of Governments, you have got this widespread state of what is called dissension and envy and discontent, which is apparently inimical to the highest possible production.
I submit that, unless yon will change the attitude of Governments and of Parliament with regard to this question of wages, unless you give up the belief that Parliament can do nothing and ought to do nothing, inevitably you will have the discontent continuing and existing, and the envy, dissension, and all those things that are hostile to the highest production. This House and this Government have their choice. I do not blame this Government only; I blame all Governments. Unless the Government does apply its statesmanship, and the House its influence, in order to raise the standard of life in this country, to enable the people to get a decent standard of living, you will have this war and dissension and envy. That is the choice which we have before us. I believe; that the Government can do something, and I would like to trouble the House with some considera-
1968
tions in regard to what has happened to wages generally.
I do not want to fail into the error of suggesting that things are worse off now than they were a generation ago, or 50 years ago, or a hundred years ago. On the contrary, things are better off now than they were then. During the 19th century, I suppose, our production per head has increased something like fourfold. I am not sure whether the standard of life of the mass of the people has risen as much as four-fold, but there has been an improvement, and that has been due to the enormous increase in the efficiency of industry. But what is very significant is that there has been no improvement in the distribution of the products. There has been a rise. The man at the bottom, in the lower ranks, has got more, and the man in the middle has got more, and the man at the top has got more, but it is very curious that the slope has remained almost unchanged during the last 100 years. However, for the moment that may not be so bad if people at the bottom have risen.
If you take the generation preceding the War, there was an increase in the prosperity of the country, and wages, apparently, increased at something about the same rate as the total income did. But I would like the House to notice that the whole of that increase as far as wages were concerned came to an end in 1895, and from 1895 until 1913, though you had a rise in money wages, it fell far behind the increase in prices, and that has been the case since the War. Consequently, you have these complaints today. Nevertheless, there has been some improvement, and it is very instructive to notice how that improvement has come about. You cannot show there has been an improvement in wages. There has been a backward tendency in wages as a matter of fact, if you take into account the rise in the cost of living over a particular period. But although there has been a backward tendency in wages, or, if you take another period, only a slight increase in wages, there has been a very perceptible increase in the standard of life of the people. You will find that in many respects. Following the great inquiry which Mr. Charles Booth made in London in 1891, he found that, fixing a possible line at which people could barely live at all, namely, 20s. a week, after

1969
calculating the income of every working class family in London, he found to his surprise that 30 per cent. of the entire population of London at that date was at or below this poverty line of 20s. per week. A similar estimate was made by Rowntree and various people in other towns, and they brought out very much the same figure. It would he extremely valuable if that inquiry in London were made again. The inquiry has been repeated in some other towns, and the result was in this way satisfactory, that there was a considerable diminution of the number of people who are in the lowest class. I expect we should find in London, that instead of 30 per cent. of the whole population being at or below what corresponds to 20s., you would probably find 15 per cent, or 20 per cent., which has been the result elsewhere.
My point is that you still have a very large number of people at a level which is not sufficient for a decent subsistence. I would like to point out that during the past generation in some industries which have earned profit to allow of higher wages, the employers have not given the higher wages. I can mention the brewing industry and the brick industry. It is suggested that, if an industry could be made to afford a higher wage by increased efficiency, the employers would be only too glad to give higher wages. Experience, however, shows that they are not. It is admitted that, when the profits are not only high but steadily increasing, you do not find that the employers increase the wages in those industries. They ask why they should pay higher wages than other industries. Yet hon. Members say to the trade unions that employers would give a higher wage if productivity was higher. No one can deny that there are great industries in this country which have been for the last five, 10, 15 years making large and increasing profits on their own showing, but we do not find that in those industries they have paid these higher wages in any single case.
Mr. WRAGG: Is the right hon. Member correct in stating that, because I believe that in the brewing industry the minimum wage is 56s. a week while prior to the War it was something like 18s?
Mr. WEBB: I am grateful to the hon. Member, because he has informed me that in the brewing industry prior to the War
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they were paying to the lowest-paid workers 18s. a week. The brewing industry prior to the War, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer knows perfectly well, was making very large profits indeed. Yet they did not pay any more to their employers than they needed to pay. Why should they? When they say the wage now is 56s., you have got to allow for the increase in the cost of living. Besides, 55s. is one of those wages which the hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly) quoted as being insufficient. What has been the cause of the increase in the standard of living where it has risen? I submit that the cause has been two-fold. One is the action of this House and of the Government in the gradual increase in the Measures of what we might call social reform. The fact that these Measures are now costing over £300,000,000 a year, whereas 30 years ago they were only costing £22,000,000 year, shows that that is a great element in maintaining a higher standard for the working classes. If we are asked for something constructive, I can only say that the Government and the House should go on in the same direction and cause as great an increase in social services in the next few years as in the past. On the contrary, we find the Government falling back again in the development of the social service. We find that they are cutting down some of the most valuable of these services and that they are refusing to go ahead on the question of hours of labour. In fact, the right hon. Gentleman himself has had time and again to explain to the House that, although he wishes to ratify the Washington Convention and intends that it shall be ratified and although it should, ought, could and would he ratified, somehow or other to-day is not the day on which it is to be ratified, but it is always the day after to-morrow. Take, again, the case of housing. Are we not threatened with slowing down the whole provision of housing and with a reduction in the housing subsidy?
It is those schemes which have been effective in maintaining the standard. It is along those lines, without adopting anything which they denounce as Socialism, that we ask this Government to go ahead, and we protest against this Government going back. There is one other way in which families have not

1971
been pressed down below the level quite so far as they used to be. I offer no opinion about this; I simply state it as a fact. The reduction in the size of the average family is recorded as a large factor in preventing so large a proportion of the total falling below the poverty line. The reduction in the size of the family is one of the most important and significant economic facts which have to be taken into account. The right hon. Gentleman is very anxious that we should take account of important economic facts, and I would ask the Government to take account of that economic fact, and take care of what they do in that matter if worse things are not to happen.
If we are dealing with wages which are below the poverty line, wages which do not allow of the maintenance of a decent standard of living—and the right hon. Gentleman has said there are such cases, and the hon. and gallant Member for Ripon (Major Hills) of course knows there are such cases in almost every industry—a great instrument for raising those wages, which has proved more potent in these downtrodden industries even than trade unionism, and has been worked now for nearly 20 years with very great success, has been the Trade Board legislation. The operation of the Trade Boards Act has led to miraculous improvement in certain industries. Do we find that the Government are going to carry on that work? What has happened to the Trade Boards branch of the Ministry of Labour? What blight has fallen on that branch which has caused it to shrink in size and in activity? How many Trade Boards have been started during the last two years under the present Government, and how many more are going to be started next year? Between now and the General Election what extension of the Trade Boards shall we see? The right hon. Gentleman will be the first to admit that
the Trade Board Acts have been magically successful in many of the industries to which they have been applied and without diminishing the profits of the employers.
I think we wish to see the Government not only a model employer and wish to see the Fair Wages Clause amended and brought up to date, and I hope we shall see the hours of labour reduced, the Washington Convention ratified, and the social welfare work, which has been costing £300,000,000 a year instead of £20,000,000 a year—let us hope to see that doubled. I do not say that it should increase in the same ratio as between the £20,000,000 and the £300,000,000, which increase has been the work of preceding Governments; if the Government cannot keep up that breakneck pace, at any rate they might let it be doubled in the next few years, let that £320,000,000 be made into £640,000,000. By doing that, we should be emulating the work of preceding Governments. When all these things have been done we shall then probably find that it is not necessary to wait for increased efficiency in industry, though we want that increased efficiency. The hon. Member who spoke about increased efficiency always seems to think that it means that the individual workman has to work harder. That is not how I see how increased efficiency has come in the last 100 years. It has been done through an enormous increase in capitalisation, in the amount of machinery, in technique, and in the skill and enterprise of the employers of the past generation. That is what we want to see increased—not the workman made to work harder. I would ask the House to reject the Amendment and vote for the Resolution.
Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
The House divided: Ayes. 117; Noes, 200.

Division No. 44.]

AYES.

[11.0 p.m.

Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fite, West)

Bromley, J.

Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)

Adamson, W. M. (Staff., Cannock)

Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)

Pay, Colonel Harry

Ammon, Charles George

Buchanan, G.

Dennison, R.

Baker, J. (Wolverhampton, Bllston)

Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel

Duncan, C.

Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)

Cape, Thomas

Dunnico, H

Barr, J.

Charleton, H. C.

Evans, Capt. Ernest (Welsh Univer.)

Batey, Joseph

Clowes, S,

Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.

Beckett, John (Gateshead)

Compton, Joseph

Gibbins, Joseph

Bentinck, Lord Henry Cavendish-

Connolly, M,

Gillett, George M.

Bondfield, Margaret

Cove, W. G.

Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

Broad, F. A.

Dalton, Hugh

Graham, Rt. Hon. Wm. (Ellin., Cent.)

Bromfield, William

Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)

Greenall, T.

Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)

March, S.

Smith, H. B. Lees (Keighley)

Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)

Montague, Frederick

Smith, Rennie (Penistone)

Groves, T.

Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, North)

Snell, Harry

Grundy, T. W.

Murnin, H.

Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip

Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvll)

Naylor, T. E.

Spoor, Rt. Hon. Benjamin Charles

Hardle, George D.

Oliver, George Harold

Stamford, T. W.

Mayday, Arthur

Palin, John Henry

Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)

Hayes, John Henry

Paling, W.

Sullivan, J.

Henderson, Right Hon. A. (Burnley)

Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.

Sutton, J. E.

Henderson, T. (Glasgow)

Ponsonby, Arthur

Taylor, R. A.

Hirst, G. H.

Potts, John S.

Tinker, John Joseph

Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)

Purcell, A. A.

Townend, A, E.

Hudson, J. H. (Huddersfield)

Richardson, R. (Houghton-Ie-Spring)

Viant, S. P.

John, William (Bhondda, West)

Riley, Ben

Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen

Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)

Ritson, J.

Watson, W. M, (Dunfermline)

Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)

Roberts, Rt. Hon. F. O. (W.Bromwich)

Webb, Rt. Hon. Sidney

Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)

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

Wellock, Wilfred

Kelly, W. T.

Rose, Frank H.

Welsh, J. C.

Kennedy, T.

Salter, Dr. Alfred

Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.

Lansbury, George

Scrymgeour, E.

Whiteley, W.

Lawson, John James

Scurr, John

Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)

Lee, F.

Sexton, James

Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)

Lindley, F. W.

Shepherd, Arthur Lewis

Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)

Lowth, T.

Shleis, Dr. Drummond

Windsor, Walter

Lunn, William

Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)

Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)

MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)

Sitch, Charles H.

Mackinder, W.

Smillie, Robert

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

MacLaren, Andrew

Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)

Mr. Allen Parkinson and Mr. A. Barnes.

NOES.

Acland-Troyte, Lieut,-Colonel

Crookshank,Cpt.H.(Lindsey, Gainsbro)

Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

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

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

Kennedy, A. R. (Preston)

Ainsworth, Major Charles

Davies, Dr. Vernon

Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)

Alexander, E. E. (Leyton)

Dawson, Sir Philip

Kindersley, Major Guy M.

Alexander, Sir Wm. (Glasgow, cent'l)

Dixey, A. C.

Knox, Sir Alfred

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

Edmondson, Major A. J.

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

Applin, Colonel R. V. K.

Elliot, Major Walter E.

Lister, Cunliffe-, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip

Ashley, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Wilfrid W.

England, Colonel A.

Lloyd, Cyril E. (Dudley)

Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)

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

Lougher, L.

Atkinson, C.

Everard, W. Lindsay

Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh Vere

Balfour, George (Hampstead)

Fairfax, Captain J. G.

Luce, Maj.-Gen. Sir Richard Harman

Balniel, Lord

Fielden, E. B.

Lumley, L. R.

Barnett, Major Sir Richard

Finburgh, S.

Macdonald, Sir Murdoch (Inverness)

Barnston, Major Sir Harry

Ford, Sir P. J.

MacDonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)

Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P. H.

Forestier-Walker, Sir L.

MacIntyre, Ian

Bellairs, Commander Carlyon W.

Forrest, W.

McLean, Major A.

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

Fraser, Captain Ian

Macmillan, Captain H.

Betterton, Henry B.

Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.

McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John

Bowater, Col. Sir T. Vansittart

Gadie, Lieut.-Col. Anthony

MacRobert, Alexander M.

Bowyer, Captain G. E. W.

Ganzoni, Sir John

Maitland, Sir Arthur D. Steel-

Braithwaite, Major A. N.

Gates, Percy

Makins, Brigadier-General E.

Brassey, Sir Leonard

Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham

Manningham-Buller, Sir Mervyn

Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive

Gower, Sir Robert

Margesson, Captain D.

Briscoe, Richard George

Graham, Fergus (Cumberland, N.)

Marriott, Sir J. A. R.

Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.

Grant, Sir J. A.

Mason, Lieut.-Col. Glyn K.

Broun-Lindsay, Major H.

Greaves-Lord, Sir Walter

Meller, R. J.

Brown, Brig.-Gen.H.C.(Berks,Newb'y)

Greene, W. P. Crawford

Merriman, F. B.

Bullock, Captain M.

Gretton, Colonel Rt. Hon. John

Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)

Burman, J. B.

Grotrian, H. Brent

Monsell, Eyres, Com. Rt. Hon. B. M.

Burton, Colonel H. W.

Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.

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

Butler, Sir Geoffrey

Hall, Vice-Admiral Sir R. (Eastbourne)

Murchison, Sir Kenneth

Cadogan, Major Hon. Edward

Hall, Capt. W. D'A. (Brecon & Rad.)

Nail, Colonel Sir Joseph

Campbell, E. T.

Hammersley, S. S.

Neville, R. J.

Carver, Major W. H.

Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry

Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)

Cayzer, Maj. Sir Herbt. R.(Prtsmth.S.)

Harland, A.

Nuttall, Ellis

Cazalet, Captain Victor A.

Hawke, John Anthony

Oakley, T.

Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir Evelyn (Aston)

Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.

O'Connor, T. J. (Bedford, Luton)

Charteris, Brigadier-General J.

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

Oman, Sir Charles William C.

Churchman, Sir Arthur C.

Henderson Lleut.-Col. V. L. (Bootle)

Penny, Frederick George

Clarry, Reginald George

Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel Arthur P.

Percy, Lord Eustace (Hastings)

Clayton, G. C.

Hennessy, Major Sir G. R. J.

Perkins, Colonel E. K.

Cobb, Sir Cyril

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

Perring, Sir William George

Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.

Hills, Major John Wa

Peto, Sir Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)

Cockerill, Brig.-General Sir G. K.

Holland, Sir Arthur

Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)

Conway, Sir W. Martin

Holt. Captain H. P.

Pllcher, G.

Cooper, A. Duff

Hopkins, J. W. W.

Pownall, Sir Assheton

Cope, Major William

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

Price, Major C. W. M.

Couper, J. B.

Hutchison, G. A.Clark (Midl'n & P'bl's)

Radford, E. A.

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

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

Raine, W.

Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.

Jephcott, A. R.

Rees, Sir Beddoe

Crookshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)

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

Rice, Sir Frederick

1974

1975

Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)

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

White, Lieut.-Col. Sir G. Dairymple-

Roberts, Sir Samuel (Hereford)

Starry-Deans, R.

Wiggins, William Martin

Ruggies-Brise, Major E. A.

Stuart, Crichton-, Lord C.

Williams, A. M. (Cornwall, Northern)

Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)

Styles, Captain H. Walter

Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)

Rye, F. G

Sugden, Sir Wilfrid

Williams, C. P. (Denbigh, Wrexham)

Salmon, Major I.

Sykes, Major-Gen. Sir Frederick H.

Williams, Herbert G. (Reading)

Sandeman, A. Stewart

Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)

Wilson, Sir C. H. (Leeds, Central)

Sanders, Sir Robert A.

Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)

Wilson, R. R. (Stafford, Lichfield)

Sanderson, Sir Frank

Titchfield, Major the Marquess of

Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George

Sandon, Lord

Vaughan-Morgan, Col. K. P.

Wise, Sir Fredric

Savery, S. S.

Waddington, R.

Womersley, W. J.

Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dlne,c.)

Wallace, Captain D. E.

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

Smith-Carington, Neville W.

Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.

Wragg, Herbert

Smithers, Waldron

Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otley)

Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)

Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

Sprot, Sir Alexander

Watts, Dr. T.

Sir Edward Iliffe and Major Ropner.

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

Wells, S. R.

Question proposed, "That those words be there added."
Mr. SCURR Mr. SCURR rose—
It being after Eleven o' Clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

ADJOURNMENT.
Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Commander Eyres Monsell.]
Adjourned accordingly at Eight Minutes after Eleven o'Clock.

AGRICULTURE.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, WORCESTER.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, WORCESTER.
  MOTOR TRAFFIC (FRONT-WHEEL BRAKES).
  MOTOR TRAFFIC (FRONT-WHEEL BRAKES).
POST OFFICE.
  TELEPHONE-DICTATED TELEGRAMS
  TELEPHONE-DICTATED TELEGRAMS
  CLERICAL OFFICERS, SAVINGS BANK DEPARTMENT (PROMOTION).
  CLERICAL OFFICERS, SAVINGS BANK DEPARTMENT (PROMOTION).
  BEDDINGTON AND WALLINGTON.
  BEDDINGTON AND WALLINGTON.
  TELEPHONE DIRECTORIES.
  TELEPHONE DIRECTORIES.
SCOTLAND.
  CONNELL FERRY TO BALLACHULISH RAILWAY.
  CONNELL FERRY TO BALLACHULISH RAILWAY.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, RUM.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, RUM.
  ILLEGAL TRAWLING (CONVICTIONS).
  ILLEGAL TRAWLING (CONVICTIONS).
BRITISH ARMY.
  CHELSEA HOSPITAL,
  CHELSEA HOSPITAL,
  CAVALRY REGIMENTS.
  CAVALRY REGIMENTS.
  RUSSIA (INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS).
  RUSSIA (INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS).
  ITALY (FOREIGN NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENTS).
  ITALY (FOREIGN NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENTS).
  SUDAN (MR. SUNDERLAND).
  SUDAN (MR. SUNDERLAND).
  EMIGRATION.
  EMIGRATION.
CHINA.
  MADAME BORODIN.
  MADAME BORODIN.
  WASHINGTION TRFITV (RUSSIA).
  WASHINGTION TRFITV (RUSSIA).
EDUCATION.
  INFANT SCHOLARS (METROPOLITAN BOROUGHS),
  INFANT SCHOLARS (METROPOLITAN BOROUGHS),
  HIGH STREET SCHOOL, BROMLEY-BY-BOW.
  HIGH STREET SCHOOL, BROMLEY-BY-BOW.
ROYAL NAVY.
  DOCKYARD EMPLOYéS (LEAVE).
  DOCKYARD EMPLOYéS (LEAVE).
  OFFICERS' PENSIONS.
  OFFICERS' PENSIONS.
  SHIPBUILDING.
  SHIPBUILDING.
  TUBERCULOSIS.
  TUBERCULOSIS.
  RENT RESTRICTIONS ACTS.
  RENT RESTRICTIONS ACTS.
  FLOUR (CHEMICAL SUBSTANCE'S).
  FLOUR (CHEMICAL SUBSTANCE'S).
  SUBVERSIVE PROPAGANDA.
  SUBVERSIVE PROPAGANDA.
  BILSTHORPE COLLIERY DISASTER.
  BILSTHORPE COLLIERY DISASTER.
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
  BONUS.
  BONUS.
  SHORTHAND TYPISTS (EXAMINATION).
  SHORTHAND TYPISTS (EXAMINATION).
Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The EARL OF DONOUGHMORE on the Woolsack.

TEMPERANCE (WALES) BILL. [H.L.]
LORD CLWYD: My Lords, I beg to present a Bill to amend the law relating to temperance in Wales; and to move that it be read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 1a.—(Lord Clwyd.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

SALE OF FOOD AND DRUGS BILL.
Brought from the Commons, read 1a, and to be printed.

ROYAL ALBERT HALL BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD ABERCONWAY: My Lords, this is a Bill to make further provision for the maintenance of the Royal Albert Hall, to provide for a rate on seats therein, and for other purposes. Your Lordships will doubtless remember the circumstances in which the Albert Hall was built. It was erected by private subscription, by a body known as the Corporation of the Hall of Arts and Sciences, and this body has a lease of 999 years granted by the Commissioners of the Exhibition of 1851 at a rent of one shilling per year. For every £100 subscribed for the building of the Hall the subscriber had a right to a seat in perpetuity without further payment. It was hoped that this scheme would be self-supporting and one cannot help acknowledging the very great services that the Committee of this Association have performed in the interests of art, and especially of music, in London.
Unfortunately, the income derived from letting was found to be insufficient to meet the necessary expenses and by an Act of Parliament in 1876 a majority of the members were allowed to impose a rate on every seat of £2 a year. That

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provision was cheerfully accepted. It was, however, again found that the revenue derived from letting was insufficient for maintenance and repair, and a supplementary Charter was granted in 1888 giving the Committee power to exclude members ten times in every year and to let the seats that belonged to them. A higher rate was generally received for those occasions. In addition, many voluntary surrenders of seats have since taken place. No fewer than twenty-one seat-holders surrendered their seats last year in addition to the ten surrendered under the Act of 1876. There are now 395 members holding 1,241 seats.
After the War the cost of maintenance increased. An Act of 1913 subjected the Hall to certain powers conferred on the London County Council as to means of escape in case of fire and the County Council have demanded some £16,000 from the proprietors towards the cost of making good the necessary alterations. I understand that a further capital expenditure of from £6,000 to £7,000 is necessary in order to put the Hall into a proper condition for public meetings. As your Lordships know, no profits can be divided: whatever surplus revenue comes from the use of the Hall must, under the Charter, be devoted to the furtherance of art or some object of that kind, and for the public benefit. The original subscribers have contributed £164,000 to the maintenance above the original subscription and the value of their seats is very much less than it was supposed to be when the subscription was taken up. Nevertheless, they are prepared, in the public interest, to make any further sacrifices that may be required. Your Lordships will see that Clause 3 provides for a further compulsory seat rate of £3 per annum for six years levied on every seat holder. This is intended to form a security for borrowing money for the purposes of the undertaking. There is also power afterwards to increase the seat rates from 22 to £3. Clause 16 allows theatrical, operatic and other performances, and there are various powers for facilitating the letting of seats.
One would have thought that a Bill of this kind would meet with no opposition, but I understand that the noble Duke opposite, the Duke of Atholl, is supporting a Petition that has been presented
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by a body called the Royal Choral Society. This is a body that is very well-known in London for the excellent concerts that it has given for many years, a body of which one cannot speak too highly. That society has had the use of the Albert Hall for many years, paying, of course, a certain rent, but a rent much less than is usually exacted from the promoters of concerts in the Hall. The society has had the use of the staff, the building, the ticket offices, and rooms for practice. I believe that they practice every week during the winter season without any charge at all. Having enjoyed all these privileges, none of which amounts to a legal right in any sense of the word, they are quite indignant at the idea of anything being done which might prevent their enjoying the same advantages in the future. I may say at once that the members of the Committee have not the slightest intention of diminishing in any way the advantages enjoyed by this excellent society, but they naturally regard them in the same light as anybody else who comes along and desires to use the Hall for any purpose whatever.
It appears, however, that on account of the special favour that we have accorded to this society they are going to oppose the Bill. I do not understand what other grounds they have. We cannot promise them particular nights, because the state of our finances will not allow us to do so. The object of the Bill is to overcome financial difficulties, and nothing else, but apparently its promoters, if the opposition succeeds, are to be made to suffer for their generosity in the past. These people, however, have no locus standi whatever and, so far as I know, under the Rules of Parliament they could not even be heard before a Private Bill Committee. They are not injuriously affected. They coveted another man's property. It only shows how these Socialistic ideas are permeating even the most exalted minds. You might as well say that people who exhibit pictures at the Royal Academy have a right to interfere with the administration of that institution. You might have those who promote prize fighting exhibitions, or the Salvation Army or anybody who has had the privilege of organising a show in that building coming and claiming the same rights

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as those who have the real and absolute rights in the property. I cannot think that that is a proposition which will find favour in your Lordships' House. It seems to me an absolute interference with private property and with a body of men who are trying to do their best for the public. For sheer audacity I never remember a proposition of a more extraordinary character, and without further words I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Aberconway.)
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL, who had given Notice to move, That the Bill be read 2a this day six months, said: My Lords, we have all listened with great interest to what Lord Aberconway has said. First of all, may I assure the House that I have, not yet turned "Bolshie"—not even Socialistic—although I do expect, quite contrary to the views expressed, that we may secure this afternoon certain Socialistic votes, if there be any, on our side. Unfortunately, Lord Shaftesbury cannot be here to-day as he is at present indisposed; otherwise he would be in my place. I must say that I feel it is almost a national disgrace that the spirit of the Trust erected by the original promoters of the Albert Hall of Science and Art, which I notice that the noble Lord emphasised, should be broken and that the Albert Hall should be able to be let, without any safeguards whatsoever, for a period of twenty-one years to the highest bidder, without any conditions of any sort and used for the purpose or purposes of a variety theatre. That is what your Lordships are being asked to do this afternoon.
My immediate purpose in moving the rejection of the Bill is to take this, the only, opportunity of safeguarding the interests of music lovers in general in this country. I am not particularly interested in the possible fate of the Royal Choral Society. We have to consider a far wider public than the Royal Choral Society. There are the Royal College of Music, the Royal Amateur Orchestral Society, the Royal Choral Society and kindred associations. In the last four months we have seen three most magnificent meetings at the Albert Hall for community singing, and that is what I might call the democratic way which the musical public has of declaring itself. Anything of that sort would be
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threatened under this Bill. Then you have to look at the way they treated their own particular orchestra. Sir Landon Ronald's orchestra was kicked out neck and crop because it was only making a profit for them of £2,000. It was turned out at a moment's notice and someone else, I think an ordinary musical agent, was put in because he offered to give them a larger sum and to give a very different type or class of music.
I would explain that the Royal Albert Hall was built on a site owned by the Royal Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851 and with their financial aid. The Commissioners had for their object the promotion of artistic and scientific education by means of a fund derived from the Kensington Estate purchased from the surplus left over from the Great Exhibition. The Commissioners of the Exhibition, having finished their immediate work:, entrusted the management of the Albert Hall to a Provisional Committee, and when the Hall was completed and opened, handed over their Trust to the Council of the Hall; and it will no doubt be made clear, almost clearer than Lord Aberconway has made it, how the Council, known as the Corporation of Arts and Sciences, has carried out its work. The lease speaks of the Corporation building and maintaining a hall for the purpose of science and art, music, including performances on the organ, industrial exhibitions by the artisan classes and the general purposes of science and art. You cannot have it very much more clear that that. I might go on and give many quotations from the Charter which are similar and even stronger.
The Report of the Provisional Committee of the Royal Albert Hall of Arts and Sciences, to which reference has been made, appointed by the promoters in April, 1867, and signed by His late Majesty, then Prince of Wales, is not without interest, because in Clause 13 the Commissioners especially commend to the care of the Corporation "A series of cheap concerts for the people"; "a society of amateurs of all classes for instrumental music"; and "a national training school for music." Then Clause 14 of the same Report tells us that the Committee have made arrangements for various other concerts, and that they have undertaken, on

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the part of the Corporation, that they shall have a series of eighteen concerts. They have established a Choral Society of 1,000 selected and well trained voices, and the Committee consider that it is likely to be of great and permanent value to the Hall. In this case you may not unreasonably, for "the Hall," read "the public." In the Appendix to the Report to which I have referred one finds considerable reference to musical performances and subscription concerts, and a prospectus for the formation of a choral society in connection with the Albert Hall, consisting of 1,600 voices carefully selected and tested, and various regulations that refer to the membership of the choral society.
The choral society, which is now the Royal Choral Society, has been carrying on uninterruptedly, with the exception of the period of the War, since 1872. It has its offices in the building, and since the War has annually held, I think, eight or ten concerts, as well as some thirty rehearsals. If nothing else did, I should have thought that that at least would have entitled it to some consideration, and possibly the law of prescription might come in. But I am not really basing my arguments on the law, but on the general idea of what, in the view of its promoters, the Albert Hall should be. I feel that there are many other places where the purposes to which it is now proposed to put it could be carried on equally well or badly. The National Training School for Music, now the Royal College of Music, found premises of its own, but is still linked up with the Royal Choral Society. Those musical societies have strictly kept their side of the bargain, and it is now proposed, so far as I can ascertain, to kick them out bag and baggage. The noble Lord, Lord Aberconway, dissents, but the reason why I say so is that they have absolutely refused up till now to put any single thing in writing. As a result the Royal Choral Society will disappear, or is in great danger of disappearing, and the last place for what I may call big music on popular lines, now that the Queen's Hall is going, will cease to exist. I believe that these people, when they protested very mildly, were told that they were like vipers in the bosom. I have an idea that what was
460
really desired was that they should emulate the proverbial eel and like to be skinned.
On February 10, on looking into the proposals of this Bill, the Royal Choral Society wrote to Lord Howe, the President of the Council of the Royal Albert Hall, saying that they were advised by solicitors, in order to safeguard their position under provisions of the Bill, to oppose it, in an entirely friendly way. They asked if the Council would accept an amended clause which would safeguard their position. They did not want to have rights, but they wanted to be certain that they would not be turned out. The reply was received that Lord Howe was ill and was prevented from taking any part in the proceedings, but that the letter of the Royal Choral Society had been referred to Mr. Cochran, the manager, who would bring it to the notice of the Council. No reply at all was sent to the letter and the whole matter was dropped with the contempt that it did not, in my opinion, deserve. Presumably the reason was that the belief was held that the Royal Choral Society had really no legal standing—a matter possibly of ancient neglect; but it was founded by the Council and has been there through what I may term the good will of the Council, by reason of the good work it has done, and by its popularity. It is not only generally looked upon as an integral part of the Albert Hall, but it is enshrined in the minds of the people, and rightly so, as one of the main objects and chief delights of the Albert Hall. It is, of course, a moot point as to whether the Royal Choral Society, owing to fifty years of good work, faithfully done, with the direct encouragement of the Council, has not acquired some form of prescriptive right.
In all the original Charters or official instructions that have been issued since the Albert Hall was started it has been expressly stated that it was intended for the promotion of science and art, and more particularly that the Hall could only be let for a limited period; it has been expressly stated also that the Albert Hall shall not be used for theatrical entertainments and the like. I could give quotations from the various Charters, but these are facts, and I have no doubt they will not be disputed. The Committee,

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however, now come to Parliament and ask for leave to let the Albert Hall for twenty-one years and to permit theatrical entertainments to be carried on. The Albert Hall, presumably, is to be let to what I may call a second sub-tenant at a high price, and whoever that sub-tenant may be, owing to high rent he will only be able to make both ends meet and pay his rent if he indulges in a competition of vulgarity with the various so-called entertainments which are found so much more suitably housed in other parts of the Metropolis. Anyhow, such entertainments are certainly not the objects for which the Great Exhibition of 1851 was held and the Albert Hall erected in 1871, and I shall be interested to see what people who are specially interested in the moral welfare of the country have to say on the subject once they realise what is about to be done.
One idea, I understand, is to turn the Albert Hall into a vast arena for a circus next winter. Whether this be true or not, there is no doubt that the entire character of the Hall is to be changed, not for the good of the Hall, and not for the good of the people. It seems fairly obvious also that this is to happen in view of the fact that the manager—and I sincerely hope that it will not be thought that I am attacking him personally—has been chosen, not so much because he was a financial genius or a great business manager in the way of controlling a great hall, but rather because he was a great organiser and entrepreneur of variety entertainments, many items of which on more than one occasion have had some difficulty in passing the censor. This surely shows, when he was appointed manager, what was the general line in view for the future of the Albert Hall.
I am still not persuaded that the financial position of the Albert. Hall is really as bad as has been represented. If it is at all financially unsound it might require what is technically known in these days as reconstruction. But anything would be better than putting it to purposes very much more base than those for which it was intended and doing away with the best chances that people will get hereafter of hearing good music in London. I have reason to believe that since the change of management there have been entertainments of a much more questionable
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character than those which formerly took place there. I am told that the Charleston Ball held on Boxing Day was not altogether of an edifying nature. I have the ticket here, and it does not suggest the purpose, the promotion of science and art, which was in the minds of the founders of the Hall. The ticket runs as follows:—
"Boxing Day. Charleston Ball. Competitions and Cabarets. Another Cochran Show. 12 Hours' Dancing and a Great Show for 5s. 2 p.m. 2 a.m. Royal Albert Hall."
That itself speaks for the class of entertainment given there.
LORD ABERCONWAY: All these entertainments are given, and legally given, under the existing powers of the Charter.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I go a great deal further. I object to a good many of the uses to which the Albert Hall has been put. If this is what they do now, what would they do later? Great play is made of the fact that the main object of the Bill is financial and your Lordships are asked to help the Hall to make itself self-supporting. The immediate cause of the trouble is that the London County Council has asked that the Hall should be brought up-to-date structurally. A statement was circulated to your Lordships to-day stating that this is to cost £16,000. That is an extraordinary statement. We are told a great many things in it, but are not told a great deal about other things. As a matter of fact, it is not stated that, of the £16,000 which is required £7,800 has already been paid. I think, therefore, that it is misleading to send that statement round when only £8,200 has to be budgeted for; I maintain that that sum can very easily be got out of the increased money to be obtained from the seat-holders without having to let the Hall for purposes for which it was never intended and without having to kick out the musical side of the programme. Nor does the statement say that part of this £16,000 that is required is the balance of a debt due upon the organ, which amounts to something like £5,000. I do not see what the organ has to do with the London County Council. The whole statement is misleading. If you deduct what is still due on the organ the real balance required for the London County Council would appear to be in the neighbourhood of £3,000.

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I do not want to delay your Lordships longer, but it seems perfectly obvious that if the price of the seats is increased, as proposed, the increased rent will very easily cover the expenses about which the noble Lord made such a song just now. I will also remind your Lordships that paragraph 6 of the original Charter states that no dividend shall be payable to any member of the Corporation, but shall be applied in carrying into effect the purpose of the Corporation, which is the promotion of science and art. I consider that the Bill proposed by this Corporation goes much too far and should only go to the extent of what is necessary to enable the fabric to be preserved and used for science and art The Bill includes power to let for twenty one years and makes the purpose in view to be "anything that the Council thinks is for the benefit of the members," which would render the Charter any longer meaningless as regards the original object. It is not going to be carried out for ideals or objects any more, but for the benefit of the members and nothing else. That is how I read the statement that I received this morning.
I want to point out to your Lordships that the Royal Choral Society have done everything they could to come to some reasonable agreement. They have in the past been entitled to some eighteen concerts and twenty-six rehearsals. A great point was made of the expenses of these rehearsals, which was given as one of the reasons for removing them. If that reason were valid I think I should probably be supporting Lord Aberconway, but as a matter of fact that is far from being the case. I myself met the advisers of the promoters of this Bill and was asked to withdraw my opposition and the Royal Choral Society were also asked to withdraw their Petition, it being alleged that this Bill in no way interfered with the present arrangements that the Royal Choral Society enjoy. We were told, in effect: "This Bill is not going to interfere with you in the least, so you really can withdraw your Petition. All you have to do is to let the Bill go through and go to the Council at its next meeting and you will find that the great majority of the Council will be in your favour and continue your concerts and rehearsals." I very naturally replied that I fully appreciated their points and that the Royal Choral Society intended
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to be reasonable, but I pointed out that the Council probably would not meet for some months and that in the meantime there was nothing to prevent the Hall being permanently let to a third party. Would they, therefore, undertake if the Hall were let, that it would be subject to permission to the Royal Choral Society to hold a certain number of concerts? That was a very reasonable request considering that they had been there for fifty years. But that request was absolutely refused.
I also suggested that as the Council was apparently so strongly in favour of the continuance of these concerts there could be no reason why they should not give me some undertaking in writing in favour of the Choral Society. I said that we were quite reasonable and we were prepared to cut down the number of concerts from eighteen, which were allowed under the Charter, to eight, and do away with all the rehearsals. Where is the noble Lord's grievance? He cannot even promise eight concerts. We offered to do the rehearsals else-where, yet a great deal is made in this statement about the rehearsals and concerts. That gives only one side of the story. With regard to the expense to the boxholders I pointed out that if they agreed and we withdrew the Petition for this year, at least the expense to the boxholders would probably be considerably less than opposition to the Bill, especially when you consider the concession in regard to the concerts and rehearsals to which I have just referred. I had the greatest hopes that this offer would be accepted. I went to Scotland that night and that shows my faith in the matter. They then asked me, somewhat ingenuously, again to withdraw my opposition and the Royal Choral Society their Petition. I said: "Certainly, this moment, if you will give me in writing what you now profess to undertake." But this was refused.
How fortunate it is that I did not do so is borne out, by the fact that the Royal Choral Society's legal advisers received the following letter from the Albert Hall Committee:—
"The Corporation has every intention to give to the Royal Choral Society preferential treatment so that the society may have in the Hall, say, from four to eight concerts in the winter session to be mutually arranged, but it must be understood that

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the proper financial working of the Hall cannot be jeopardised and this must not be taken to be anything in the nature of a binding agreement."
This, of course, is not worth the paper it is written on. The noble Lord said that it was impossible to fix any dates beforehand. But dates have always been fixed beforehand. How does the noble Lord expect that any society can arrange a great concert to be taken part in by six or eight hundred voices and to have rehearsals and arrange for the people to come from all over England without being able to settle beforehand the date on which the concert is to be given? It is absurd to think that it could be done. Whatever happens the date must be fixed a reasonable time in advance. We again tried to persuade them to make certain modifications and I think probably, if left alone by the legal advisers, I could have come to some reasonable conclusion, but the matter was referred to Mr. Cochran, who is supreme. If this measure goes through in its present form, I will not say that the fate of the Royal Choral Society is sealed, but its position will be a very dangerous one.
I would like to say one word more. The Bill gives power to let for twenty-one years and makes the purposes anything that the Council think is for the benefit of the members. This would make the Charter no longer mean anything as regards objects. The amount of consideration which those for whose benefit the Charter was granted may expect to receive is shown by the fact that the promoters say openly they will object to the Choral Society even being heard by the House of Lords Committee. They say that they have got no legal standing, no locus standi, and for that reason when the Bill goes to Committee they are going to move that they be not heard. That means that the merits of the Bill will not be discussed and that all discussion as regards music will be completely stifled. One would at least have thought that they would have left it to your Lordships to decide whether you would wish to hear both sides of the question or not. It is quite open to the Corporation to go to the Privy Council to get their Charter extended, but they did not dare to do it because, if they did, anybody interested in the Albert Hall would have had a
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right to be heard; and they hope that, here they will not have the right to be heard.
I mention all these matters to show that I could have a very good cause for opposing the Bill in its entirety, but even at the last moment, if I receive assurances that guarantees will be given that the reasonable interests of the Royal Choral Society and other musical societies at present interested in the Albert Hall will be reasonably safeguarded, and if I am also given the assurance that Petitioners may be heard in Committee, then I am prepared not to oppose the Bill to-day. Otherwise I much regret I shall have to press my Amendment that it be read a second time this day six months as I now do.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE EARL OF BALFOUR): My Lords, the speeches that we have just heard have, quite naturally and I have no doubt properly, been almost entirely confined to the aspects of this case as it affects the Royal Choral Society. They are apparently the only Petitioners against the Bill and it is therefore natural and proper that their claim should be the chief subject of discussion. But I would venture to ask the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees, who is going to explain the position, whether there is not, behind the particular quarrel between the Royal Choral Society and the noble Lord opposite, a larger public question involved, and whether that larger public question could or could not be properly dealt with by the Private Bill procedure of your Lordships' House.
As I understand the matter—I am not talking of it from the strictly legal point of view but from a somewhat larger point of view—the Albert Hall was built partly out of public money and at all events on lands which were bought out of the money belonging to the Commissioners of the Exhibition of 1851. The use to which that great block of land, including the Albert Hall and running down southwards, has been put is really on the whole—in spite of all the criticisms that have been made of it from an architectural or from any other point of view—a very great public benefit and it is, so far as I know, unique in this country. I am not aware, in fact, that there is anything quite parallel to it in any other country.

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It includes the Natural History Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Imperial College, and many other buildings devoted to the higher works of art and science, forming together a group of edifices unparalleled in any other part of this kingdom and perhaps in any other kingdom. Of that group of buildings one of the most important is the Albert Hall—one of the most important in point of bulk and one of the most important as regards the uses to which it has been put.
Is it not a very serious thing that we should divert from its original purposes this particular building? I am aware that there may be financial reasons. I do not doubt that there are financial reasons which make some change necessary. I do not go into that and I am not qualified to do so. But in my long experience of London and of places in London where great choral performances could be adequately held, I have seen, I am sorry to say, a diminution rather than an extension of the opportunities at present available to musicians. When I was young and also when I was middle aged, there were great choral performances at St. James's Hall and at the then Exeter Hall. Both of those have vanished. Of the Queen's Hall, which is still with us, I hear rather depressing rumours. I am not aware that there is in existence in London any other great hall, in which choral performances can be adequately held. I do not think that, excellent as it is as a place for musical performances, the Central Hall at Westminster, within a stone's throw of this House, is quite of the size of the halls of which I have been speaking, and of course it is far inferior in point of accommodation to anything that can be given in the Albert Hall.
I frankly admit that I cannot without great misgivings, in regard to a building, which is of a semi-public kind, in a Metropolis where we are all too poor at present in accommodation for musical entertainments and musical performances of this kind, see an alteration of its status, which I do not fully understand, but which—if the noble Duke who has just sat down has not been obsessed by very unnecessary misgivings—may entirely or largely deprive us of the Albert Hall as a place for great musical performances and may, on the other hand, make it a
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theatre of operations for entertainments which, however excellent, can find a resting place or an opportunity of exhibition in many places in this Metropolis. I do not think we are under-theatred. I am not qualified to speak, but I do not think so. Whether we are or not, we are certainly under-supplied with the kind of accommodation which the Albert Hall was built originally to satisfy. That being so, I rather hope that, either at this stage or at some later stage in your Lordships' House, or in another place, an opportunity will be found for considering the wider aspects of this subject, removing it from a controversy between the promoters of the Bill and the defenders of this Choral Society and looking at it as a part of the intellectual inheritance of the Metropolis. I have to admit that, if the result of this Bill—on which I do not dogmatise—is what I fear and what the noble Duke fears, I think the Hall's conversion by law from its present uses will be a step down in the civilisation of London.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE): My Lords, with the whole of the speech which the noble Earl has just delivered I entirely agree. I think, if there was the danger before us which the speech of the noble Duke, the Duke of Atholl, has evidently instilled into the mind of the noble Earl, we should be in danger by reading this Bill a second time of injuring the artistic and musical future of the Metropolis. When I heard the speech of my noble friend the Duke of Atholl, I asked myself whether he had read the Bill, because seven-eighths of what he said had nothing whatever to do with the Bill, which is almost purely a financial Bill. Let me take your Lordships very briefly through the marginal notes of the Bill. The first clause is the short title. The second clause is the ordinary interpretation clause. Clause 3 deals with the seat rates, which are now £2—many of your Lordship; have to pay that, as I do—and are to be increased to £3 for the next six years. That clause also deals with the machinery by which they are to be collected. Clause 4 gives power to recover by action if the seat rates have not been paid. That in no way affects the musical future of London. Clause 5 sets up a new fund into which the seat rates will be paid, and Clause 6

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deals with the same point—a new fund that is to be called the Endowment Fund. The marginal note to Clause 7 reads: "As to moneys paid to Special Maintenance Account" and the existing account is merely qualified by this. Clause 8 applies certain sections of the Act of 1876.
I am in no way connected with the Albert Hall at present, but it is fair that I should tell your Lordships that I was at one time a member of the Council, and I remember that one of our difficulties was that if we had to borrow we were not able to offer legal security. Clause 9 puts that right. Clause 10 deals with the form of mortgage and Clause 11 with protection of lenders from inquiry. That appears, of course, in every Corporation Bill. Clause 12 says that the corporation is not to regard trusts. That is a common form of clause. Clause 13 deals with the appointment of receiver and Clause 14 with transfers of mortgages. The fifteenth clause is a clause dealing with a fund for the repayment of borrowed moneys. The sixteenth clause is an amendment of the Supplemental Charter, a power which is required because it is important to lay it down that entertainments may be given in costume. I may say that the promoters have undertaken to introduce an Amendment to bring that matter under the jurisdiction of the Lord Chamberlain.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: May I ask the noble Earl to read that clause? It is a short one.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: The clause reads thus:—
"Notwithstanding anything in the Charter or in Article 9 of the Supplemental Charter the Hall may be appropriated to the purposes of and used for theatrical entertainments operatic performances and such other purposes as the Council may consider to be for the benefit of the members."
I think that is not a new power, but there has been doubt about it.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I do not want to interrupt, except in case of necessity, but what costume is to be worn? Some people might be wearing none; I do not know.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I should be prepared to argue that with the noble Duke at the Garrick Club. I think the argument would be more appropriate
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there than here. Clause 17 deals with a very small point, with the occupation in certain circumstances of the amphitheatre stalls. Clause 18 is a clause to which the noble Lord has referred in which there is a variation of the old provision in the Charter. The nineteenth clause deals with the future letting of the Hall. The authorities of the Hall say that they have always had that power. Their legal advisers have always advised them that they had the power, but their members have not always thought that they had. That is the whole of the Bill. Your Lordships will therefore see that a number of the things which the noble Duke fears and criticises are within the powers of the authorities of the Hall at this moment.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Does the noble Earl know anything about a ball recently held there?
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: The noble Duke forces from me the embarrassing confession that I did attend. It was not a ball in the common sense of the word. It was a competition in a particular dance—and a very ugly dance, I think—open to the whole British Isles. I think it was not unedifying, although, in my judgment, ugly. Really the vast majority of these complaints do not come within the ambit of this Bill. It is a quarrel as between the Royal Choral Society and the Royal Albert Hall and does not come within the ambit of the Bill. My noble friend has spoken of the Royal Choral Society giving up the right to rehearsals. They have never had that right. They have been given the privilege of rehearsals on a number of occasions, but that does not confer any right. I can meet the noble Duke to this extent, that although I do not believe the Royal Choral Society has any right in the Royal Albert Hall, I think it would be a calamity if the society disappeared from the Hall. The noble Duke referred to my noble friend Earl Howe, with whom, in the cause of his absence, we all sympathise. He referred to Earl Howe as Chairman of the Royal Albert Hall, but he is also a member of the Council of the Royal Choral Society.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: But he never attends its meetings.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: That is a matter of which I have no knowledge.

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Really this is not much more than a storm in a teacup. I say quite frankly that if the Royal Albert Hall excluded the Royal Choral Society from the Hall it would be a calamity from the point of view of London music. But it is not necessary to reject this Bill to secure the noble Duke's object. This is a Bill which is the result of months of financial anxiety and hard work. Surely a small point like that can be settled. I cannot believe that it will be impossible to secure a settlement before the Third Reading.
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, I only wish to say a word or two on this Bill. I think the real point is this. The only real chance of the Royal Choral Society getting what it desires is that this Bill should pass. If it does not pass there is danger of the Royal Albert Hall disappearing altogether. It is obviously in great financial difficulties. It has been called on by the London County Council to raise £16,000 for purposes necessary in the public interest. How is it going to raise that money? As the position now stands I would not advise any one—and I have had some experience of these things—to lend one penny on the present security.
The object of the Bill is to put the Corporation in the position of an ordinary owner of property and enable it to offer security. If that is so, all the rest is matter for investigation in Committee. There may be a great deal in the points of which the noble Earl has spoken. I do not go into them—they are not points which concern me at the moment—but they are points which would properly come before a Committee and undertakings have been indicated to-day which will assist when that inquiry takes place. For the present our proper course—the course which is always taken, except in the rarest cases—is to read the Bill a second time and send it to a Select Committee where it can be investigated.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, there has been a certain amount of discussion as to what are the real objects of this Bill and I am not surprised because, as not infrequently happens, the persons chiefly concerned are absent from the debate. The two persons chiefly concerned, the persons who know all about the rights
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and wrongs of the matter, are Earl Howe and the Earl of Shaftesbury, who represents the musical interest. It is unfortunate that neither of them is able to be present this afternoon, and what is still more unfortunate is the fact, now disclosed to the public, that there appears to be no future for serious music in this country.
The facts with regard to this question seem to be fairly clear. Everybody knows that the Albert Hall has been in a bad way for a long time, and the climax seems to have come when the London County Council came down upon them for a good many thousand pounds. It is disputed whether the amount is £16,000 or £8,000, but at any rate it is a substantial sum. In their extremity and distress they looked about for someone to rescue them from their position, and their choice has fallen upon a certain Mr. Cochran. Mr. Cochran—for the benefit of noble Lords who have never heard of him before—is, if I may so describe him, a sort of British Barnum; he is a sort of idol of the sensational Press and, I should think, a man after Lord Beaverbrook's own heart. I suppose he would describe himself as "one of the world's great showmen" or, perhaps, "the greatest showman on earth." He is ready to organise and to exhibit anything. He would be ready, I should think, at the shortest notice to organise anything from a Pan-Anglican Synod to a nigger minstrel entertainment, and the last thing that this gentleman would have any use for would be, to use his own expression, "highbrow" music. I can well imagine that an oratorio, for instance, would fill him with the most profound feeling of contempt.
What this gentleman will do when he gets control of the building is perfectly obvious. He will probably, in the first place, to use his own language, "stage" a gigantic prize fight, one of those competitions in which a man earns a great many times the amount of a Cabinet Minister's salary for being knocked out in the space of a minute or two. He might, as an alternative, turn the place into a circus, and then, if the circus is successful, what chance is the Choral Society or anybody else going to have of practising their art? If the circus is a failure he will have a third alternative;

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he may turn the place into a dancing hall. At any rate there seems to be no probability that the hall will be used for the purpose for which it was originally intended. As has been remarked over and over again in the course of the debate, this place was founded in order to advance science and art. I cannot help thinking that under this prospective management art will take a very modest place. I should say that, upon the whole, the art of self-defence is the only one that will have any prominence. The re-salt will be that the original purposes of this building will disappear altogether, and the Royal Choral Society will be deprived of the place that they have been allowed to use for many years and will probably have to take refuge in community singing or something of the kind. They are evidently going to be crowded out altogether, and I confess that I feel considerable sympathy, not only with my noble friend, but also with these unfortunate "highbrow" musicians who are to be driven out of this place and who will have no future.
But at the same time, although my noble friend seems to have a good case, I am not sure that he is well advised in moving the rejection of this Bill. I think that the issues involved in the Bill are rather more important than they were represented to be by my noble friend Lord Donoughmore, and it seems to me that they are almost too important to be decided by a casual Committee of this House. What I would suggest to my noble friend is—unless he feels sure that he can win on a Division—that he should not press his Motion for the rejection of the Bill, on the understanding that the musical interest is allowed to be heard during the proceedings. So far as I can understand, the Royal Choral Society, who are the real opponents of this Bill, do not appear to have a technical locus standi, but it ought not to be beyond the power of my noble friend Lord Donoughmore and the officers of this House to ensure, somehow or other, that these people should obtain a hearing. I cannot help thinking that, if something of the sort could be done and if the Second Reading were agreed to only on an undertaking that a locus standi is given to these people, it is highly probable that an agreement would be arrived at between the contending parties and that everybody would be satisfied.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I should like to say one word as regards the method of procedure suggested by the noble Lord opposite. I entirely agree with what he has said. I have had much experience, as has my noble friend Lord Aberconway, of Private Bill procedure on questions of this kind, and I agree that, if this Bill were merely read a second time in its present form, the Choral Society would have no locus standi, nor would the larger question that has been raised by the noble Earl opposite come in any way before the Select Committee. It is quite possible, however—I have seen eases where it has been done, both in the old days and recently—that although a technical locus standi does not exist, yet, when the promoters come and ask for statutory rights—and this is the real point, for they cannot do what they want without statutory rights—they can be put in a position of being forced to allow opposing interests, which really ought to be heard on the substance of the matter, to come before the Committee, although technically, according to the rules of our procedure, they would have no right to be heard at all. They would have no such right in the present case, but only if their property were actually being taken away. There is no suggestion that they have any property in that sense. I hope that the Second Reading may be allowed to proceed on condition that permission is given to the persons who otherwise could not be heard to put their case, and that the other interests to which the noble Lord has referred will also have a chance of being heard on the Committee stage, after the Second Beading has been allowed.
VISCOUNT BURNHAM: My Lords, I venture with great diffidence to suggest that your Lordships should go a little further than is proposed by the two noble Lords who have jug addressed you. If this Bill is read a second time, I should wish to move that it be referred to a Select Committee of the public order. There is no doubt, as the noble and learned Lord has just said, that under the rules of procedure musical societies and other persons who, in a sense, represent the public in this matter would not have a locus standi, and, even if special permission were given and exception

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made, I do not think that this would entirely meet the necessities of the case. After all, the Albert Hall is a definite part of the Victoria tradition, no matter how much artistic criticism may have been directed against it. It cannot be treated as if it were private property of the ordinary kind. The purposes of its origin were originally public purposes, as the noble Earl, Lord Balfour, has said, the funds were provided by a public body and they were got together by subscriptions that were obtained on public grounds.
Accordingly I venture to think that it would be a great mistake to act as if we had no public responsibility in this matter. We cannot deceive ourselves. It is intended to make a great change in the use of the Hall for the purpose of public entertainment. In spite of what the noble Earl, the Chairman of Committees, has said, it would become a music hall of the ordinary kind, in which there would be theatrical performances that might be more or less good and decent but that would not be of the character to which the Hall has been accustomed, and undoubtedly would not partake of the nature of the original foundation. Supposing you refer this Bill to a Select Committee, there would be no question of locus standi, for any of the bodies who wish to appear before it. Evidence could be given from the public point of view, and one hopes that there might be even some recommendation made that the greatest local authority in the country, the London County Council, might do well to treat it as a place of public education as well as of public entertainment. I therefore should like to vary the Motion which would be made after the Bill had been read a second time, so as definitely to secure public interests in this matter. I believe they do exist, and I am quite certain that if this is only treated in the ordinary way as a matter of Private Bill legislation, those interests cannot be considered.
LORD GAINFORD: My Lords, I should like to intervene for a moment, because I have been interested in the Albert Hall for some time owing to my association with the British Broadcasting Corporation, which has had to consider where music could best be broadcast from various halls and institutions in this country. I am very anxious that this
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Bill should be given a Second Reading without being sent to a Select Committee; because I am practically authorised by the promoters to say on their behalf, that they will take no exception whatever to musical societies, and especially the Choral Society, being heard. In those circumstances I think that the noble Duke, after what he has said, should not further press his opposition to the measure. The whole principle of the Bill is of a financial character, and it is necessary really that the funds of those who are responsible for the Albert Hall should be made adequate to meet the expenses which they are bound to incur in these days.
LORD PHILLIMORE: My Lords, I cannot but think that unless the promoters undertake to withdraw Clause 19, our proper course is to reject this Bill on Second Reading. Clause 19 is the mischief. I know that the noble Chairman says that the authorities of the Hall believe that they have the right. Then they do not want the clause. It is because there is a doubt that they want the clause. Do not let your Lordships give it them. After all, this is not private property. If it were, they would not be coming here for an Act of Parliament. No doubt the Hall has been raised from private contributions and private funds, and those private people have great rights, but the Hall has been raised upon public ground, on valuable public soil, let at a nominal figure, and under the terms of a Royal Charter or Charters, and I do not think that we ought to allow this body, if they have not the power already, to have the power of letting this Hall for twenty-one years, away from any control, and apparently without any provision as to how it is to be controlled. For my own part I think several exhibitions have taken place in the Albert Hall which never should have taken place, and I fear that many more are likely to occur. So far as the County Council wishes to ensure against its being destroyed by fire, I can imagine worse evils than its being burnt down.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: My Lords, I am perfectly willing to withdraw my Amendment if I can have an undertaking. I only want to safeguard the interests of music. At the present moment, if I give way entirely, then the

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interests of music cannot be heard before the ordinary Committee, and I should certainly prefer not to withdraw unless I have an undertaking.
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, I hope that the proposal for a Select Committee, as opposed to the Committee upstairs, will not be pressed for consideration. Really it will be doing the same thing at five or six times the expense. I desire to support what Lord Gainford has said. The promoters have indicated to us that they would not object to the Royal Choral Society being heard before the Committee to which the Bill is referred. I hope that will satisfy the noble Duke, it being always remembered that he reserves all his rights on the Third Reading.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY): My Lords, I have always great reluctance to intervene in these Private Bill discussions, because I think they ought to be decided without any reference to the ordinary Party divisions of this House, or to the organisations whit exist for conducting those Parties. We are always sitting, I think, in respect of these Bills, in a special judicial capacity, in which we ought to decide without reference to Party connection, and on what we believe to be the merits of the case. I do not think, however, that any one could have listened to this debate without realising the great interest which has been aroused in the Bill in certain circles which deserve from this House the highest attention and the greatest regard for their feelings. We do not want to see the Albert Hall degraded in any sense. I believe that there is profound feeling, and I suspect that it is entertained by a vast majority of the House. I am therefore very anxious indeed, if we agree to Second Reading—I personally wish it should be agreed—that the status of the Hall should be absolutely safeguarded.
I ask myself what tribunal would be most likely absolutely to safeguard the status of the Albert Hall, of course paling duo respect to the financial difficulties which exist. I am very much afraid that a Private Bill Committee ordinarily, without any action of the House, cannot be thoroughly relied upon for that purpose. I have been debating in my own mind whether the better
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course would be to have an instruction moved to make it certain that these musical interests should be heard, or whether it would be better to go a step further and send the Bill to a Select Committee. There is no doubt that if you could be certain you would enumerate the proper interests in the form of the instruction, that might be sufficient, but I am a little doubtful. I have not the technical equipment to mention straight off the interests which ought to be heard, and which ought to be included in the form of the instruction. If that be true, the better course would be to send the Bill to an ordinary Select Committee of the House. Then we should be quite certain that all the necessary interests would be heard.
Speaking for myself, and not in any sense as the Leader of a political Party, I certainly would not be satisfied if the Second Reading went through quite by itself. I think there must be some further step taken, either in the form of an instruction or by reference to a Select Committee. I do not desire to be dogmatic on either of those courses. I think on the whole, with some acquaintance with your Lordships' House, that the Select Committee would be the more complete of the two, and would be more satisfactory to public opinion. After all, you have to satisfy public opinion outside. That is very important in a matter of this kind, and I think the Select Committee would probably satisfy it better ban anything else.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I am quite prepared to agree to a Select Committee. The Bill would, of course, have to go afterwards through the procedure in another place, but if it passed the Select Committee of this House it would help enormously. I do not want to "down" the Albert Hall at all, but I also do not want the musical interest to be "downed."
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: I think your Lordships might pass the Second Reading. An Order has already been made by the House provisionally referring this Bill to a Select Committee. I will, of course, see that that Order is delayed in order to give my noble friend an opportunity at the time he selects to give notice to raise a debate.
On Question, Bill read 2a.

THORNE COLLIERY RAILWAY AND WHARF BILL. [H.L.]
Read 2a.

EASTBOURNE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion which stands on the Paper in my name.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 91 be considered in order to its being dispensed with in respect of the Bill, and that the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Donoughmore.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and Bill read 2a accordingly.

ECCLESIASTICAL AND GLEBE LANDS BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: My Lords, the Bill to which I have the honour to ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading is, happily, a very small Bill; in fact it is hardly a Bill at all. It is a corollary of the Small Holdings and Allotments Act of 1908, and is really consequential on that Act. Your Lordships will remember what the Act of 1908 did. It put upon the county council, the duty of providing land for agricultural labourers. If land could not be provided voluntarily, then the county councils had the right to take it compulsorily; and if—and only if—the price asked for the sale of the land or for the leasing of the land was exorbitant, the Minister of Agriculture could send down an agent of his own, who allowed no private agent or lawyer to be in the room, to fix the rent according to what he thought right; and against that there was no appeal. That Act, which your Lordships passed, went much further than any Act passed in any one of our Dominions or in any part of the British Empire.
The Bill of which I move the Second Reading this afternoon proposes simply that all agricultural land vested—and I ask your Lordships to pay attention to that word "vested"—in the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and all the glebe land shall become vested in the Minister
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of Agriculture, and any portion of those lands which are suitable for small holdings or allotments may be sold or leased for that purpose to agricultural labourers, and the rest of these lands shall be managed by the Minister as he may think fit. That means that there will be no disturbance of any farmers whose land may not be required. The proceeds of these lands, after the deduction of expenses of management, will be paid to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. Clause 2 is only a matter of arrangement, and Clause 3 is a definition clause, with which I need not trouble your Lordships.
The advantages of this Bill are very great. They are so clear and simple that need not take much time in pointing them out. In the first place half a million acres, of which half is glebe land, will be available for selection for small holdings and allotments, and rectors who are dependent on the glebe and who have to let the glebe to a tenant will be in receipt of a fixed income, as the whole management will be in the hands of the Minister of Agriculture; they will no longer be, as they are now, at the mercy of their tenant, who very often is the churchwarden, or of that Old-Man-of-the-Sea whom they know so well, and fear so much, the Diocesan Inspector. I think there can be no doubt that under this arrangement the proceeds of the land will be considerably increased, and all the money will still be paid, as heretofore, to the Church of England. I really think this is a Bill that should recommend itself to most people.
I hoped that there would not be much opposition to it and, as I have tried all my life to play with the cards on the table, I went down to the palace of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners on Millbank and had an interview with a very courteous individual, a high official, in that magnificent building. He said to me: "What are the Government going to do about your Bill?" I said: "How on earth should I know? I am the last person to know. You ought to know about that." Then he said: "So far as I know we have not moved—" I forget whether he used the word "yet" or not, but he said: "We have not moved in the matter." That was very comforting, but there has nevertheless, no doubt, been a good deal of underground work by the opponents of this Bill—whether authorised

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or unauthorised I am unable to say. I have the advantage of subscribing to a Press cutting agency, which has been good enough to send me some very remarkable cuttings of what has appeared in the provincial Press. One of the first cuttings that attracted my notice was a very important one. It said that in consequence of the certain opposition of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and of the Church dignitaries it must be taken for granted that the Government would be bound to resist this Bill. I do not think that can be authentic. Still there was in all these newspapers a distinct trend to what really would be strong opposition to the Bill.
The Western Times, a newspaper from which I should ask to be allowed to quote to the House, gave good resumé of all the reasons why this Bill should be opposed. The first, reason given in this newspaper, in the course of a well-written argument, was that there ought to be no interference at all with the present state of things because, from time immemorial, the Church itself had always been very much in favour of putting men on the land. I suppose that is quite true. If you go back three thousand years you will find the Shepherd King, as soon as he ascended the throne, was faithful to his class and issued an injunction against not only the futility but the stupidity of having large estates. He pointed out that, it was all wrong and foolish to add field to field and call estates after men's own names. He went even further than that, for we read in the Psalms that he advocated the sub-division of large estates, which were perhaps the order of the day then, and said: "I will divide Shechem and mete out the valley of Succoth." I have not the remotest idea where Shechem or Succoth is, but perhaps noble Lords familiar with the Psalms will be able to enlighten us. It is evident that the Psalmist himself was in favour of small holdings and we may, I think, truly say that, he was one of the pioneers of that great movement. Then we come down another thousand years to the Early Christians. British Early Christians had their land in common and it is to them we owe especially the great commons that are of such value and benefit to the country as a whole.
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As regards the Ecclesiastical Commissioners I should be rather disposed to think that they hardly acted up to this Hebraic standpoint. They were hardly up to Royal David's form. I should like to ask one question of the noble Lord Lord Bledisloe, if he will be good enough to answer it. I do not know whether he will, but it is an easy question to answer. My question is: What was the number of small holdings and allotments on the vast estates of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners before the Bill of 1908 was introduced? I had some little to do with that Bill and I can assure the noble Lord that we did not receive any great assistance from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners with regard to small holdings, but rather the reverse. I have not the time and this is not the place to call attention to any direct instances, but I think I may fairly say that at first the attitude of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners was extremely cold towards the movement. Ultimately, however, they rather altered their attitude—like the cuckoos in June they altered their tune. They began to realise that the county councils had the power of taking land compulsorily and when the county councils began to show their teeth the Ecclesiastical Commissioners altered their position to some extent.
In the newspaper to which I have referred there is a panegyric on the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. We are told that they informed the county councils that when farms fell in they would not object in any way to offer the farms for small holdings if (and only if) they thought there was a reasonable chance of their being properly cultivated. They went even further than that, for they took the great credit of having offered them on their own accord to the county councils and, incredible as it may seem, the county councils refused the offer and these ungrateful agricultural labourers would not have anything to do with the farms offered. That seems a very good argument and a difficult one to answer, but I well remember in the early days that argument being brought forward in this House by a noble Lord. It undoubtedly had a very great effect, but, fortunately, I happened to know the land that was offered to these poor people. It was land on the top of a very high hill; it was not very good land;

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the rent was pretty high and the land was two miles distant from the nearest village. Was there any wonder that the men would not take it? If they spent three days a week there that would have meant their walking eight to ten miles a week and in a year it would have meant that they would have to tramp between five and six hundred miles. That is a great deal to ask an agricultural labourer to undertake who has to do a hard day's work in the fields.
The defenders of the present system brought in the subject of the Partington estate, but I need not take up the time of the House in arguing that. They made a good case out of it. The last thing they brought forward and laid great stress upon was this. They said: "We are all in favour of your Bill, we shall only be too delighted if we can see you get the Bill through; but, as usual, you are too late; it is too late to do it now, it ought to have been done ten years ago at least. Why? Because then there was a very much larger amount of land. In those days the glebe was something like 650,000 acres of land with £1,000,000 revenue, and the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, of course, took great advantage of the agricultural boom, which took place between 1908 and 1920, and sold an enormous quantity of land—over 100,000 acres—and now you are too late. It is not worth thinking about. There is not much land left and all the best land has been sold." Things are not always what they seem. "All that glitters is not gold"—but some of it is and some of the land that is left is golden.
It is very good land indeed and what is not the very best land is quite good. It is something like the post-prandial drink which was offered to his friends by an Irish baronet, who was well known to many of your Lordships' fathers. He asked his butler one day, when the decanters were put on the table: "Is that the best port?" "It is not, Sir," the man replied. "What is it then?" he asked. "It is the best you've got, Sir." That land is like the Irishman's Blue or Yellow Seal, it is very good stuff indeed, and, there is a great deal of land which is well worthy of being cultivated and which would be received with great gratitude by any of the persons who were fortunate enough to get hold of it. I only mention this because they made
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great stress of this argument. How anybody can stand up in a body of intelligent men and say that as there is only a small flowerpot of land left, only half a million acres, therefore this Bill on that account ought not to receive consideration, I cannot understand. With all this land left I would hardly have believed that any person would have had the hardihood to stand up and argue for the rejection of the measure on that ground.
Probably one of the great objections to the Bill will be that it is a Money Bill and therefore we cannot discuss it properly because it would be a breach of Privilege to discuss such a Bill. How can you possibly make this Bill into a Money Bill? It does not interfere in any way with public money. It does not put a shilling on the rates. It does not add one farthing to the heavy taxation which is crushing us out of existence. All it does is to transfer the money from one pocket to another. In this instance, as in not many others, the two pockets belong to the same man and, in addition, the money put into the second pocket will certainly be increased and there will be no loss to the man himself.
All I have to do now is to thank your Lordships for permitting me to introduce this Bill and to point out what is really wanted. I am asking you to give a second Reading to this Bill. What is a Second Reading? It is only the affirmation of the principle of a Bill. The machinery for carrying out this Bill may not be of the very best, but that is relatively unimportant. All we ask you to do is to accept the principle. The method for carrying it out is only a matter of arrangement. There is one point on which we lay enormous stress. We say that, if this Bill is passed, all the money is to go to the Church and not one single sixpence is to go to any-body else we say that the money belongs to the great Church of England; we say "Render unto Cæsar the things that are Caesar's," and we do not even ask for the canine privilege of picking up one solitary crumb that may fall from the ecclesiastical table.
Your decision on this Bill will be eagerly awaited to-night by large numbers of your fellow-countrymen, who are afraid now that vested interests—for that is really what it comes to—will prevail in the end. We—I think I may include

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all the Liberals on these Benches—are pleading for the poor clergymen whose existence now in many cases is in danger. We are also pleading for the poor parishioners. Remembering the glorious record of your Lordships' House in the wondrous management by which you and your fathers before you have managed your vast estates, and remembering the care you and yours have shown to the women and children of those men who have the good fortune to live on those estates, we plead for them, we plead for those poor men who are living in some parts of England and whose condition is still a national scandal, a national danger and a national crime. We are pleading for these poor workers on the land who fought for you, for me and for the country, which they all helped to save. Remembering all this, we plead for them and hope that to-night our efforts will not be altogether in vain.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Marquess of Lincolnshire.)
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD BLEDISLOE): My Lords, we all have to admit that the noble Marquess, who has introduced this Bill to your Lordships' notice, is a great protagonist of the small holders of this country and has probably done more than any one man to develop small holdings, under his Act of 1908, which is the foundation now of all modern legislation on the subject, and to maintain the enthusiasm and activities of politicians in this connection. I should like to make it perfectly clear that whatever may in the past have been the attitude of members of the Party to which I belong on the subject of small holdincrs—and I believe we were, in fact, responsible for the first measure of the kind which was placed upon the Statute Book—our enthusiasm to-day for the reasonable development on economic lines of small holdings is at least as great as that of the noble Marquess, and I believe very much greater than that of the Psalmist.
The noble Marquess has anticipated certain arguments which may be directed against this Bill. These arguments appear to have been derived mainly from newspaper cuttings which, personally, I have not had the privilege of seeing. One argument he suggested was that this might be described as a Money Bill. I
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am sure it would be so described in another place, but I am certainly not going to base any opposition to the Bill on that ground. Let me assure him that if he thinks that His Majesty's Government are going to oppose this Bill owing to the opposition of Church dignitaries, which seems to be the main gist of the cuttings to which he has referred, our withers are wholly unwrung by anything Church dignitaries may say on this subject. It is a matter which, in relation to our desire to develop small holdings, is of relatively small importance. If this Bill is really intended to develop small holdings surely it is upon that ground only and on the strength of arguments in support of that thesis alone that you can ask for a Second Reading.
I am going to suggest to your Lordships—and I say it with all deference to the noble Marquess and with a large measure of sympathy with him—that there is no argument before the House to show that small holdings are certain to be increased by the passage of the Bill or that the income of the impoverished clergy is likely to be increased thereunder. So far as I can gather, the object of the noble Marquess in introducing this Bill is to increase small holdings, and nothing else. I rather assume that that is the sole object of the noble Marquess in submitting this Bill. From that point of view we have very carefully examined its provisions, and our considered opinion is that the Bill will not have this effect and may have an effect of an opposite character.
First of all, in looking at these estates of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners from this standpoint, I think we are entitled to ask two questions. Are these estates at the present time only sparsely provided with small holdings, that is, small holdings in a statutory sense, holdings of less than 50 acres? And is there any reluctance now—whatever there may have been in the past—on the part of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to meet county councils in the, provision of statutory small holdings? After a perfectly impartial investigation of this subject, we find that there is no ground of complaint against the Ecclesiastical Commissioners so far as small holdings are concerned. The agricultural estates of the Commissioners amount to 240,000 acres, divided into 3,000 separate holdings. Of these 3,000 holdings no fewer than 1,800,

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or 60 per cent. of the whole, do not exceed 50 acres. They are, therefore, technically or in a statutory sense small holdings. As regards the matter of glebe lands, which are also dealt with by this Bill, the noble Marquess stated that they totalled 600,000 acres.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: No, 250,000 acres now.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I beg the noble Marquess's pardon. That is the figure which I have—250,000 acres. As these are spread over thousands of rural parishes throughout the country a very large proportion, possibly as much as 70 per cent., must be in holdings of less than 50 acres. We have no precise figures on this subject, but I think we may assume that as far as glebe land is concerned a preponderant portion of the land is in holdings of less than 50 acres. The noble Marquess has already pointed out that no money will actually change hands as between the Ecclesiastical Commissioners on the one side and the State on the other. Apparently the Ecclesiastical Commissioners under the Bill will become no more than a sort of conduit pipe through which the net revenues of these lands will pass from the Ministry to the Clergy. As he said, it is taking money out of one pocket and putting it into another. But again I ask: Will it have the effect of either adding to the income of the clergy or increasing small holdings?
As regards the first point, I think it must be perfectly obvious that if you are going to introduce another authority between the owners of the land and the ultimate small holders it must involve some cost and certainly the employment of a certain number of officials who are not at present employed. I believe that from every quarter of the House in present circumstances and in the present state of the National Exchequer, there would be opposition to a multiplication of Government officials. But the Bill will not render these lands any more available than they are to-day for the purposes of small holdings. There are in existence ample powers, which can be directed against the Ecclesiastical Commissioners just as much as against any private owner, for the acquisition upon reasonable terms of any land required for this purpose and suitable for this
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purpose, if necessary by compulsion. Let me remind your Lordships that compulsion can be exercised in the last resort just as much against the Ecclesiastical Commissioners as against any private estate owner in this country.
The noble Marquess admitted, and it is true, that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners have repeatedly offered land to the county council when the tenancy of such land has become vacant. He went on to say that a good deal of it was unsuited for the purpose—I am sorry to say that in other cases also a good deal of land offered to the county councils has proved to be unsuitable for small holdings—but a large area of such land has been found perfectly suitable and has been accepted by the county councils. Mere transfer to the Ministry of Agriculture would not result in such land becoming vacant. Existing tenants of the land have to be dispossessed whether the land is in the hands of the Ministry of Agriculture or any other hands, and your Lordships have provided by successive Acts of Parliament that full and sufficient compensation for disturbance shall be provided for such persons even when the land is required for small holdings.
The noble Marquess said that the land comprised certain plums. He rather indicated that although all that glitters is not gold, there was a certain amount of gold, and those golden parts would be the parts that would be taken for small holdings. But the more golden those parts are the more gold would have to be paid to the outgoing tenant. What is going to happen to these people? Surely in our desire to provide small holdings we must at least consider the requirements of the sitting tenant. At any rate the Small Holdings Act of last year was founded on the principle that, while making every reasonable effort to provide more small holdings in the country, we did not feel justified in unduly disturbing those who were already cultivating land to the advantage of the nation and themselves.
I do not quite know, after studying this Bill, whether the noble Marquess proposes that a new small holdings authority should be set up such as he did not contemplate in his Act of 1908, but I cannot imagine anything more unfortunate than that the Ministry of Agriculture on the

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one hand and the County Councils, with much more local knowledge, on the other should be competing in the task of providing prospective small holders with the land that they require. So far from accelerating the activities of the county councils the result, to my mind, would inevitably be that the county councils would lose a great deal of the enthusiasm that they feel to-day—and with every quinquennial period that passes that enthusiasm is becoming more evident—and the task would ultimately be left to a Government Department that is particularly unfitted for it and that, in our judgment, would carry it out far less efficiently than the county councils are doing at the present time. I do not know that I can say any more, but I am going to ask your Lordships not to agree to the Second Reading of this Bill, and for the best of reasons—namely, that in our judgment, and after careful and not un-sympathetic examination of the Bill and its probable results, we believe that it would not tend to add to the number of small holdings and would especially, if an attempt were made to speed up the provision of small holdings under it, involve considerable cost, by way of compensation and otherwise, which would reduce the amount of revenue now passing to the somewhat impoverished clergy with whom we have considerable sympathy.
LORD PARMOOR: My Lords, I do not think that the noble Lord opposite has really met the arguments that were brought forward by the noble Marquess who moved the Second Reading of this Bill. I should like to point out very shortly that some of the matters that he raised are really not relevant to the Bill that is now before your Lordships' House, but before doing so I would make one point quite clear. I certainly should not support the Second Reading of any Bill of this kind unless I had ascertained that the provisions for compensation were in my opinion entirely satisfactory, because, although I have sometimes been accused of another view, I may mention that about fifty years ago I wrote a book, as the noble Lord will know, laying down views on compensation which I have never changed from that day to this. The provisions proposed regarding compensation are in principle quite right. If other words are needed they can easily be added, but, so far as the income of
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rectors or vicars is concerned (I will deal presently with the Ecclesiastical Commissioners), that income is, I think, entirely secured by the provisions of the Bill itself. The only criticism of the Bill that I have to make—and I dare say that the noble Marquess will consider this point if the matter comes to Committee—would be that, in his clause dealing with compensation, he does not say the number of years prior to the transfer that are to be considered in order to obtain the basis of the income actually received. But that is a matter of detail.
In a matter of this kind the highest test of compensation is that equal security—and I think the noble Marquess is right in speaking of greater security under this Bill—should apply to the existing income from land as is now being enjoyed. That is the highest measure of compensation, and I think the noble Marquess is quite right, having regard to the conditions of land tenure and ownership in this country, in saying that he provides a very desirable measure of compensation in favour of the Church. I do not want to go into points of detail, but I feel quite certain that, if all the landed possessions now dedicated to Church purposes were transferred on the terms that the present holders should be secure in the income that they are now enjoying, this would be an admirable settlement from the point of view of the Church. I have said that several of the matters to which the noble Lord referred do not arise on this Bill. There is no suggestion here of interference with existing tenants. On the contrary, exactly the same principle would be applied as regards small holdings constituted under this Bill as applies to small holdings at the present time. I do not want to misinterpret the noble Lord in any way, but I thought that he suggested that, in the Bill as it stands, there would be some insecurity for the existing tenant to which he is not subject at the present time.
LORD BLEDISLOE: I did not mean to suggest that. All I wanted to point out was that the same difficulty regarding getting rid of existing tenants would arise under this Bill as arises at present under the county council scheme.
LORD PARMOOR: Everyone would assent to that proposition, but I do not

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think that it is an objection to this Bill. I hope that, whenever small holdings are taken, they will be taken having regard to the security of existing tenants; but the purport of this Bill is a different one and, I think, an excellent one. It is that, as regards what are called ecclesiastical and glebe lands, there should be a transfer from one public Department to another—that is to say, from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to the Ministry of Agriculture. The Ministry of Agriculture ought really, if we are to have an effective system of small holdings, to be the Department in authority and control wherever land suitable for small holdings is under public management, providing, of course, that in that transfer all interests are properly compensated. What, then, is the objection that the noble Lord makes? There will be no interference here with the enthusiasm of the county councils. On the contrary, there will be an assistance to them, because the Ministry of Agriculture would naturally be sympathetic to the demand for small holdings which is really the purpose of the present Bill.
I do not think that any one who knows what has been done by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners will suggest for a moment that they have not managed their property in an admirable manner. I see that my noble friend Lord Daryngton, who has taken his part in that management, is present. No one suggests that the management is not of the best possible kind, but that is not the question before us. I want to take the test that the noble Lord himself took. Is this Bill likely to add to the number of small holdings?—whether under tenants or owners does not really matter, because you give the tenant a security practically equal to that of an owner. I think it certainly will. My own view regarding small holdings, which I have stated before to your Lordships, is that we are bound to have a very large extension of small holdings if we are to keep agriculture on an economic and safe footing in this country. That, I know, is the opinion of the noble Lord opposite. Only the other day I spent some time in Guernsey looking into land tenure there. It was admirable. There was prosperity on every side, and yet the average holding was something less than ten acres and the largest holding that I found in
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Guernsey was about thirty acres. The consequence is that there is content all round and the farms are admirably farmed and managed.
What has the noble Lord to say against this Bill on that point? The Ministry of Agriculture is the very Department which ought to deal with the matter. Full compensation is provided for all the interests affected, and surely it is right that in a matter of this kind, particularly when one remembers the views of the noble Lord himself, the Ministry of Agriculture should have a direct interest in meeting the county councils and making the provision of small holdings as sympathetic, if I may use that expression, and as economic as possible. Of course you cannot hare small holdings on other than an economic basis. Everyone knows that, but I want to say that in one respect the noble Lord, I think, made a mistake. Small holdings are already defined not only by a limit of acreage, but also by rental, which is not to exceed £100. That is the class of holding that is really managed by the owner or the farmer and his family, and that is the form of holding that is going to be the safeguard of agriculture in this country. Larger farms in my experience are extraordinarily expensive, and a failure both to the farmer and the landowner at the present time. I must say that I regret that a more sympathetic attitude has not been shown by the Government in respect of this Bill, which in my opinion, and I agree with the noble Marquess, is of considerable value and cannot be of injury to any interest involved, owing to the ample measure of compensation which is contained in the provisions of the Bill.
LORD DARYNGTON: My Lords, as an Ecclesiastical Commissioner, perhaps I. may be allowed to say one or two words with regard to the speeches which have been delivered on the other side. I think the noble Marquess, in his very amusing speech, rather skated over some of the points in the Bill, and I should like to emphasise what they are. This is a Bill to put into the hands of the Minister of Agriculture certain lands which he can sell or lease for the purposes of small holdings or allotments, and two bodies are chosen, out of all the landowners in the country, to be attacked. In the opinion of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners

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the compensation would be grossly inadequate in large areas. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners and the other body are to be expropriated from all their agricultural land, whether it is land suitable or not for small holdings, and whether it is held in trust or not, and when the noble Marquess turned round to the noble Lords behind him, and said they were all going to vote for the Bill, I think they cannot have realised the fact which I have just stated. The two bodies mentioned in the Bill are the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and all incumbents of parochial benefices, and it must be plain that this Bill is a sort of nationalisation, or attempt at it, which is absolutely unjust.
LORD PARMOOR: Nationalised now.
LORD DARYNGTON: I do not think the noble Lord would have said that when he wrote his book fifty years ago. Perhaps it is the duty of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, more than it is the duty of other bodies, to provide small holdings. I believe the Commissioner's are very desirous of providing small holdings, and have shown that by their actions in the past, but much building land is agricultural, and they are not to receive the value of their properties. Most of us know how difficult it is to say what is agricultural land and what is not. I should like to quote what is said in this Bill:—
"Any portions of the said land and the said glebe land (notwithstanding anything contained in the Glebe Lands Act, 1888) which are in the opinion of the Minister suitable for the provision of small holdings or allotments shall be sold or leased or otherwise dealt with in accordance with the provisions of the Small Holdings and Allotments Acts, 1908 to 1926, and until the dates of their sale or lease shall be managed by the Minister; and any portions of the said land and the said glebe land which are in the opinion of the Minister not suitable for the provision of small holdings and allotments shall be managed by him as he may think fit, and he may sell such portions by ordinary sale.
"The proceeds arising from the said land and the said glebe land during the management by the Minister, and the proceeds of any sales of such land either limier the Small Holdings and Allotments Acts, 1908 to, 1926, or otherwise, shall, after the deduction of the expenses of management and sale and whatever sums may be payable by the Minister in respect of taxes and rates, be paid to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, who shall deposit all sums so received in the first Fund or the Second Fund (as hereinafter
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defined and described) according as to the money paid by the Minister accrues from the said land or from the said glebe land."
The Commissioners are to have no voice at all in these dealings, and I think all noble Lords must realise that that is an injustice.
The amount of agricultural land held by the Commissioners has been stated to-night in this House. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners hold 235,000 acres, in 800 English parishes, spread over the whole of the counties of England. Out of 3,000 tenancies there are 1,800 tenancies of one to fifty acres. Those figures show that they have done a good deal on behalf of small holdings and are trying to facilitate the acquisition by county councils of land for small holdings. The total area of glebe land of benefices is about 250,000 acres. There is no return to show how much is agricultural land, but if the noble Marquess would look at the Glebe Land Return, 1887, he would see how many holdings there are of less than fifty acres. I would like to ask one simple question. What is the object of transferring the land from one authority to another? Is there any reason to believe that these holdings would increase? I think, if I may say so, that there have been many statements made to-night in this House without any real knowledge as to the Commissioners' properties and their liabilities. I do not know whether your Lordships are aware that the common fund of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners is an account of the yearly revenue and disbursements, and the yearly revenue is legally charged with perpetual annual payments to a large percentage of the whole. I could say much more, but owing to the late hour I will merely ask your Lordships to reject the Bill.
THE MARQUESS OF LINCOLNSHIRE: My Lords, I do not want to stand between the House and a Division, but a, direct challenge has been made to me to prove that the income would increase for a certainty under the Bill. I was not surprised at the question coming from the noble Lord who represents the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, but I am surprised at Lord Bledisloe asking that question. What we are asking the House to do now is what we did in 1908. What we did then was to take over the agricultural land from the Crown. We took

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over the Crown agricultural lands, which are now State or national lands. We took over 70,000 acres of agricultural land, and the result was that in three years—I was in office—we put 5,000 acres under small holdings, and we built, altered and improved a great many cottages. We did away with all tied cottages which were under the old management, and, for all I know, under the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' management. There was one woman, I remember, who had 17 cottages in one village. We did away with all the subletting, which, under the same men who are doing the Ecclesiastical Commissioners' work now, was then allowed. In one instance a parson, who was the Crown tenant, had sub-let to another man, who himself had sub-let to a third man, and we reduced the rent from £25 an acre to £5 an acre. In addition to
Resolved in the negative and Motion disagreed to accordingly.
that, at the end of three years we had paid into the Public Treasury £8,000 more than was paid before under the old management.
If we could do that with 70,000 acres, what could we do with 500,000? I ask that question with all humility and all respect, and I hope I have answered the challenge thrown out to me to say that these unfortunate rectors' incomes would not be decreased. I think that, from what we have done in the past and what I believe the agents are doing now, I have every right to say that under my Bill the rectors' incomes would be increased, and the position of their parishoners improved.
On Question, Whether the Bill shall be now read 2a?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 26; Not-Contents, 64.

CONTENTS.

Lincolnshire, M. (L. Great Chamberlain.)

Aberconway, L.

Northington, L. ((L. Henley.)

Anslow, L.

Parmoor, L.

Bethell, L.

Sandhurst, L.

Beauchamp, E.

Charnwood, L.

Saye and Sele, L. [Teller.]

Oxford and Asquith, E.

Clwyd, L.

Shandon, L.

Strafford, E.

Doverdale, L.

Shuttleworth, L.

Gainford, L.

Southwark, L.

Haldane, V.

Hemphill, L.

Stanmore, L. [Teller.]

Leverhulme, V.

Marshall of Chipstead, L.

Tenterden, L.

Muir Mackenzie, L.

Thomson, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Salisbury, M. (L. Privy Seal.)

Southwark, L. Bp.

Howard of Glossop, L.

Worcester, L. Bp.

Hunsdon of Hunsdon, L.

Kilmaine, L.

Airlie, E.

Armstrong, L.

Lamington, L.

Denbigh, E.

Avebury, L.

Lawrence, L.

Fortescue, E.

Banbury of Southam, L.

Leigh, L.

Iveagh, E.

Biddulph, L.

O'Hagan, L.

Leven and Melville, E.

Bledisloe, L.

Oranmore and Browne, L. (L. Mereworth.)

Lovelace, E.

Carew, L.

Lucan, E. [Teller.]

Chaworth, L. (E. Meath.)

Ormonde, L. (M. Ormonde.)

Midleton, E.

Clanwilliam, L. (E. Clanwilliam.)

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Onslow, E.

Plymouth, E. [Teller.]

Cottesloe, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Stanhope, E.

Darling, L.

Ruthven of Gowrie, L.

Westmeath, E.

Daryngton, L.

Sackville, L.

Desart, L. (E. Desart.)

St. John of Bletso, L.

Bertie of Thame, V.

Desborough, L.

St. Levan, L.

FitzAlan of Derwent, V.

Dynevor, L.

Saltoun, L.

Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore.)

Ernle, L.

Sempill, L.

Faringdon, L.

Sinclair, L.

Inchcape, V.

Gage, L. (V. Gage.)

Swansea, L.

Knutsford, V.

Hanworth, L.

Templemore, L.

Novar, V.

Hare, L. (E. Listowel.)

Teynham, L.

Younger of Leckie, V.

Horne, L.

Wharton, L.

THE TERRITORIAL ARMY.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (THE EARL OF ONSLOW): My Lords, on the Motion for the Adjournment I desire to take the opportunity of explaining that owing to the lateness of the hour and the fact that ten or a dozen noble Lords have expressed a desire to take part in the debate on
498
the Motion of my noble friend Lord O'Hagan, with reference to the Territorial Army, he thinks that it would be bettor to adjourn the debate on that Motion and has, suggested it should be taken on Thursday next.
House adjourned at ten minutes to seven o'clock.

LORD CONYERS.
The House being informed that his Lordship was attending with his Writ of Summons, the Lord Speaker explained to the House his Lordship's descent: Then his Lordship was called in and took the Oath, and then took his place on the Baron's Bench next below the Lord Willoughby de Broke.
The LORD CHANCELLOR The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House, that the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificates from the Examiners that the further Standing Orders applicable to the following Bills have been complied with:—
Abersoch Water [H.L.].
North British and Mercantile Insurance Company [H.L.]—(Substituted Bill).
Scottish Provident Institution [H.L.]—(Substituted Bill).
The same were ordered to lie on the Table.

BRIGHTON CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Petition for additional provision of Corporation of Brighton; together with proposed amendments and clause annexed thereto: Read and referred to the Examiners.
LEEDS CORPORATION BILL.
Report from His Majesty's Attorney-General received, and ordered to lie on the Table.
YORKSHIRE ELECTRIC POWER BILL. [H.L.]
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill no parties having appeared in opposition thereto: Read, and ordered to lie on the Table: The Orders made on the 3rd and the 8th instant discharged, and Bill committed.
HASTINGS TRAMWAYS COMPANY (TROLLEY VEHICLES) BILL. [H.L.]
  SOUTH STAFFORDSHIRE MOND GAS COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]

    WESSEX ELECTRICITY BILL. [H.L.]
    MAIDSTONE WATER BILL. [H.L.]
    ABERDARE URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL. [H.L.]
    Report from the Committee of Selection, That the following Lords be proposed to the House to form the Select Committee for the consideration of the said Bills; namely:—

    M. Bristol (Chairman),

    L. Sinclair,

    L. Suffield,

    L. Stewart of Garlies (E. Galloway),

    L. Lilford;

    agreed to; and the said Lords appointed accordingly: The Committee to meet on Tuesday, March 22, at eleven o'clock; and all Petitions referred to the Committee, with leave to the Petitioners praying to be heard by Counsel against the Bills to be heard as desired, as also Counsel for the Bills.

THORNE COLLIERY RAILWAY AND WHARF BILL. [H.L.]
Committed: The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
EASTBOURNE CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Committed: The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.

BUDLEIGH SALTERTON GAS ORDER, 1927.
Special Order proposed to be made on the application of the Budleigh Salterton Gas Company:
Laid before the House (pursuant to Act) and referred to the Special Orders Committee.

UXBRIDGE, MAIDENHEAD, WYCOMBE AND DISTRICT GAS ORDER, 1927.
Special Order proposed to be made on the application of the Uxbridge, Maidenhead, Wycombe and District Gas Company:
Laid before the House (pursuant to Act) and referred to the Special Orders Committee.

EARBY AND THORNTON GAS ORDER, 1927.
Special Order proposed to be made on the application of the Earby and Thornton Gas and Lighting Company:
Laid before the House (pursuant to Act) and referred to the Special Orders Committee.

SEAHAM HARBOUR ELECTRICITY SPECIAL ORDER, 1927.
Report from the Special Orders Committee that no Petition has been presented praying to be heard against the Special Order, that they have received and considered a report from the Ministry of Transport upon the Order, and that there is nothing in this Order to which they think it necessary to call the attention of the House: Read, and ordered to lie on the Table.
COQUETDALE ELECTRICITY SPECIAL ORDER, 1927.
  EAST DEREHAM ELECTRICITY SPECIAL ORDER, 1927.
  Report from the Special Orders Committee that no Petition has been presented praying to be heard against the Special Orders, and that there is nothing in these Orders to which they think it necessary to call the attention of the House: Read, and ordered to lie on the Table.
HASTINGS ELECTRICITY (EXTENSION) SPECIAL ORDER, 1927.
Report from the Special Orders Committee, that they have examined the Special Order as required by the Standing Orders of the House, that a Petition against the Order has been presented by the Hastings and St. Leonards Gas Company, and that having considered the points referred to in subsection (6) of Standing Order 191, they are of opinion that there is no necessity for a further inquiry by a Select Committee: Read, and ordered to lie on the Table.