Sitting of 17 December 1929

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Astley Ainslie Institution Order Confirmation Bill.
Lanarkshire Traction Order Confirmation Bill.
Consideration deferred until Tomorrow.

MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDERS CONFIRMATION (No. 13) BILL [Lords]. (By Order.)
Order for Second Reading read.
HON. MEMBERS: "Object."
The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of HEALTH (Miss Lawrence): This is a Bill for the purpose of providing more employment by widening the streets of Exeter and Romford. The local authorities desire it urgently in order to provide work for the unemployed. [HON. MEMBERS: "Object."]
Second Reading deferred until Tomorrow.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  UNEMPLOYMENT.

    POOR LAW RELIEF, SCOTLAND.
    Mr. DAYasked the Secretary of State for Scotland the greatest number of destitute able-bodied unemployed in receipt of relief in any one week during 1929; and comparable figures for the same date in the previous years?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. Johnston): As the answer contains a table of figures, I propose to circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Mr. DAY: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether these figures include the lunatic poor in Scotland?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: The question deals with the able-bodied poor, and it is only able-bodied poor relief that is specified in the answer.
    Mr. WESTWOOD: Will my hon. Friend be able to give the figures for one day as well as one week?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: No, Sir. We cannot get weekly figures. We have monthly figures, and they will all be given in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following is the answer:
    No weekly figures as to the number of destitute able-bodied unemployed persons in receipt of relief in Scotland are available.
    From monthly returns received by the Department of Health for Scotland showing the number of destitute able-bodied unemployed persons on a given date, the number on the 15th January was the highest during 1929.
    The numbers on the 15th January, 1929, were:—

    Males.

    Females.

    Total.

    Dependants.

    24,289

    2,004

    26,293

    57,954

    The comparable figures for the same date in previous years were:—

    —

    Males.

    Females.

    Total.

    Dependants.

    1928

    …

    32,464

    2,381

    34,845

    70,445

    1927

    …

    36,421

    3,118

    39,539

    79,418

    1926

    …

    30,070

    2,967

    33,037

    81,906

    1925

    …

    19 967

    2,758

    22,725

    57,966

    1924

    …

    33,130

    3,512

    36,642

    91,477

    1923

    …

    40,296

    3,640

    43,936

    104,490

    1922

    …

    26,394

    2,273

    28,667

    71,795

    WORK SCHEMES, SCOTLAND.
    Mr. HARDIEasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is aware that the reduced valuation caused by de-rating is preventing certain local authorities from embarking upon schemes of work for the unemployed, and that from the same cause the building of houses will be retarded in many areas; and what steps he proposes to take to facilitate the provision of work for the unemployed?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: I agree with the hon. Member that the grant to compensate for de-rating does not take account of fresh

    1171
    rate burdens but, so far, my right hon. Friend has no information to show that de-rating hag to any material extent tended to prevent Scottish local authorities from undertaking schemes of work for the unemployed, or has at all affected the progress of housing schemes. In any event, he is not in a position to promise legislation on the subject of de-rating in the near future.
    Mr. HARDIE: If I provide the information of a certain local authority being in the position indicated in the question, will my hon. Friend seek measures in order to destroy the power that does that?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: My right hon. Friend will be very pleased indeed if the hon. Gentleman will supply us with information on that point.
    Sir ROBERT HAMILTON: May I ask if he will also consider an instance of this which I can give him in regard to the Burgh of Lerwick?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: Certainly. I have always said that, if hon. Members have any information, we shall be very glad to have it.
    Mr. SKELTON: Does the hon. Gentleman propose to answer the last part of the question?

    LANARKSHIRE.
    Mr. SULLIVANasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what is the number of unemployed being paid by the various parishes in Lanarkshire and the total sum paid in 1926, 1927, and 1928, respectively, and the effect of this expense on the rates?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: I am sending my hon. Friend a statement containing the information desired.
    Mr. SULLIVANasked the Lord Privy Seal what schemes have been submitted and the number approved for grant by the public authorities of Lanarkshire?
    Mr. THOMAS: Since the 1st of June, 1929, 15 schemes estimated to cost about£230,000 have been submitted to the Unemployment Grants Committee by local authorities in Lanarkshire, and schemes estimated to cost£200,000 have so far
    1172
    been approved for grant by the Committee. As regards roads, a programme of works estimated to cost£1,670,000 was submitted tentatively to the Ministry of Transport by the County Council on the 6th September. The terms and conditions upon which assistance would be given from the Road Fund to schemes approved for inclusion in the five years' programme were communicated to the Council on the 14th September and confirmed at an interview in Edinburgh or the 25th November. It is understood that the Council are now considering the formulation of a definite programme of road works.
    Mr. SULLIVAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman give me any details of the schemes for the county of Lanarkshire as distinct from the borough of Glasgow?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am not certain of the details, but, if the hon. Member will put down a question, I will give an answer.

    SOUTHWARK.
    Mr. DAYasked the Lord Privy Seal whether, in view of the numbers of unemployed at present in the borough of Southwark, he has any special schemes to relieve the unemployment during the coming winter in this district?
    The LORD PRIVY SEAL (Mr. J. H. Thomas): I have nothing to add to the reply given to my hon. Friend on 10th December.
    Mr. DAY: May I ask whether negotiations are going on with the Borough of Southwark at the present time?
    Mr. THOMAS: I do not know the state of the negotiations, but I know that there was an application.
    Mr. MILLS: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Southwark and many other constituencies near to this House have a very unpleasant habit of dumping their refuse in our Divisions in Kent, and could he not consider the erection of a refuse destructor such as the Labour council at Woolwich use, with profit for themselves and the ratepayers?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am sure that the influence of my hon. Friend will persuade his own local authority to make an application, which will be considered.
    Mr. MILLS: We already possess one.

    LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (RESOLUTION).
    Sir KINGSLEY WOODasked the Lord Privy Seal whether he has received a copy of the resolution recently passed by the London County Council approving of works for relieving unemployment in London and at the same time assisting workers in the transferred areas; and whether he will communicate the terms of this resolution to other authorities who have hitherto neglected to proceed on similar lines?
    Mr. THOMAS: I have not received a copy of the resolution, but I read in the Press with pleasure that it had been passed and that schemes would be put in hand which would give work not only to men from the depressed areas but also to unemployed men in London. In regard to the last part of the question I think the London County Council is giving a good lead to other areas, and I hope that its action will encourage any other authorities who are still holding back.
    Sir K. WOOD: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider communicating the terms of this resolution in certain cases, inasmuch as the whole of the London County Council, including the Socialist members, voted for it?
    Mr. THOMAS: If the testimonial I have given now is not sufficient I shall be delighted to add to it.

    LAND COLONISATION.
    Sir K. WOODasked the Lord Privy Seal whether he has sanctioned any works in connection with a scheme of land colonisation in Great Britain?
    Mr. THOMAS: I have nothing to add to the reply which I gave to the right hon. Member on the 5th November.
    Sir K. WOOD: The right hon. Gentleman will not forget this matter. Does he remember that the First Commissioner of Works has a great scheme of this kind and came down to my constituency and described it at great length?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am quite sure that the educational value of a speech from my right hon. Friend the First Commissioner of Works would be much appreciated in the right hon. Gentleman's constituency.
    Mr. W. THORNE: May I ask whether it is not the fact that private landlordism is hanging up all these schemes?

    TYNESIDE.
    Mr. WEST RUSSELLasked the Lord Privy Seal how many men have been employed in the area of the Tyneside local authorities on work schemes sanctioned and assisted financially by his Department and other Government Departments since June last?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am not able to give this information at the moment, but I will communicate it to the hon. Member in the course of a few days.
    Mr. SHIELDasked the Lord Privy Seal if, having regard to the great distress prevailing in Newburn-on-Tyne, due to the closing of the steel works, he will use his good offices to attract other industries to a district with so many natural advantages for industrial purposes?
    Mr. THOMAS: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply which I gave on the 26th November to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Woolwich (Sir K. Wood) on the subject of attracting industry into the distressed areas. I am sending my hon. Friend a copy of that reply

    STATISTICS (NEW SCHEMES).
    Colonel HOWARD-BURYasked the Lord Privy Seal whether he is now in a position to give the numbers of unemployed that have been engaged and taken on for work on the new schemes initiated by him during the past six months?
    Mr. THOMAS: I would refer the hon. and gallant Gentleman to the reply which I gave on the 10th December to the hon. Member for North Newcastle (Sir N. Grattan-Doyle), of which I am sending him a copy.
    Colonel HOWARD-BURY: Is the Lord Privy Seal satisfied with the results of the schemes, seeing that unemployment figures are rising so rapidly every week?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am never satisfied while there is any unemployment. It is quite true that the figures have risen, but it is equally true that they are nearly 200,000 better than they were on the 31st of December last year.
    Sir NICHOLAS GRATTAN-DOYLE: May I ask whether, since the date he gave the answer to the hon. Member for Newcastle North (Sir N. Grattan-Doyle), any new schemes have been sanctioned, and, if so, what has been the result?
    Mr. THOMAS: Yes, on Friday I shall be delighted to give the hon. Member the further information.
    Major Sir ARCHIBALD SINCLAIR: Is not a comparison of the figures of unemployment a fortnight before Christmas with the numbers unemployed a week after Christmas, a rather misleading comparison?
    Mr. THOMAS: It is because I have endeavoured to show the seasonal fluctuations that I have repeatedly stated that I would not allow the right hon Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) to judge unemployment on that basis.
    Mr. SKELTON: With regard to new schemes, may I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman has definitely and finally turned down land colonisation?

    BIRMINGHAM.
    Mr. LONGDENasked the Lord Privy Seal the reasons for the Government's delay in giving the essential financial guarantees to the constructive work and relief schemes of the Birmingham Corporation; and whether he can give the number of complaints that have reached him since the passing of the Development Bills of delay on the part of his Department?
    Mr. THOMAS: No scheme of work for the relief of unemployment was submitted by the Birmingham Corporation to the Unemployment Grants Committee prior to the 1st November. During November eight schemes were submitted, estimated to cost£270,000, and of these, the most important, estimated to cost£107,000 was only submitted on the 27th November. The schemes required examination by the Technical Departments, but the Unemployment Grants Committee hope to reach a decision upon some of them at their next meeting, which will be held on Thursday. As regards the second half of the question, if the hon. Member will supply me with particulars of cases where he has information as to delay, I will have them examined.
    Mr. ERNEST WINTERTON: May I ask whether it is true that the Unemployment Grants Committee have a staff of only eight mem—[HON. MEMBERS: "Order!"]

    MOTOR INDUSTRY.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHAasked the Lord Privy Seal if he can make any further statement with regard to his effort to expand the motor industry?
    Mr. THOMAS: I am not in a position to make any further statement on this matter at the present stage.
    Mr. L. SMITH: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman realises the difficulty of the motor trade in view of the McKenna Duties coming off?
    Mr. THOMAS: I realise that those engaged in the motor trade feel very strongly about the McKenna Duties, and I also know perfectly well that they feel equally strongly on a number of other subjects.
    Mr. SMITHERS: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that the most important factor in this matter is the uncertainty in the situation?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That question does not arise out of the question on the Paper.

    POLITICAL PARTIES (CO-OPERATION).
    Lieut.-Colonel HENEAGEasked the Prime Minister whether he proposes to invite representatives of the opposition parties to assist him in concerting measures to bring about a reduction in unemployment?
    Major HARVEYasked the Prime Minister what steps he has taken to consult the leaders of other parties with a view to formulating more effective schemes for the relief of unemployment?
    The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald): I would refer the hon. and gallant Members to the answer which I gave on the 18th November in reply to questions on this subject, there being no change in the situation since then.
    Major HARVEY: In view of the fact that the success of the schemes which have been, so far, formulated by the right hon. Gentleman and his party, has not been reflected in the figures of unemployment, has he taken any steps to consult with the Leader of the Independent Labour party?

  FISHING INDUSTRY.

    FLEET DISASTER (RELIEF FUND).
    Sir A. SINCLAIRasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether his attention has been drawn to the decline week by week in the amount of the subscriptions to the voluntary fund in aid of the sufferers from the recent fishing disaster and to the increasing public demand for a Government contribution to the fund; whether. His Majesty's Government have yet decided whether or not to make such a contribution; and, if so, on what scale?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. William Adamson): With regard to the first part of the question I am informed that the present total of the Relief Funds is about£21,300 and I would deprecate anything being said in the House which would tend to discourage further subscriptions from the public. In reply to the last two parts of the question I refer to the reply which I gave on Tuesday last to the hon. and gallant Member for Banff (Major Wood).
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that nobody has done more than himself to discourage subscriptions, and that it is the prevalent feeling in Scotland that, if only the Government would contribute towards this fund, additional private subscriptions would be obtained?
    Sir FREDERICK THOMSON: Will not the right hon. Gentleman seriously consider the granting of loans to fishermen at a low rate of interest as the best solution of this difficulty?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I ought to say, in reply to the first supplementary question, that I do not agree with the hon. and gallant Member, because we have had question after question put in this House which, in a way, has discouraged public subscriptions. [HON. MEmsEas: "No!"] Oh, yes. We had an hon. Member shouting across the Floor of the House that they did not want charity, and we had another hon. Member asking if—[Interruption.]
    Mr. SPEAKER: I think we had better not pursue the question of liability for discouragement any further.
    Mr. ERNEST BROWN: We do not accept the statement all the same. It is most unfair. [HON. MEMBERS: "Answer!"]
    Sir F, THOMSON: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer my supplementary question?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I have been examining this difficulty from every point of view, and the point mentioned by the hon. Member is, I can assure him, under my consideration.
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: If these loans are issued at a low rate of interest, is the voluntary fund to be used to pay the interest?
    Major McKENZIE WOODasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what arrangements he proposes to make for administering the Fishermen's Relief Fund; and whether he will consult the fishermen and others in the different areas before finally deciding upon a definite scheme?
    Mr. ADAMSON: As the result of a communication addressed to me by the Lord Provost of Edinburgh a meeting of the Lord Provosts which I shall attend, together with representatives of the Fishery Board, is being held on Saturday next to consider the question of coordinating their relief funds and consequential administrative arrangements.
    Major WOOD: Are we to understand that this conference is only going to be attended by representatives of the Fishery Board and Lord Provosts? What is going to happen? How are the fishermen going to make their views known?
    Mr. DUNCAN MILLAR: Will the right hon. Gentleman see to it that all those burghs where funds are being raised will be represented at this conference, and that a public statement will afterwards be made to inform the public as to the methods to be adopted in distributing the fund?
    Mr. ADAMSON: It is a preliminary meeting, and I have informed the hon. and gallant Member who are to be at the meeting—the Lord Provosts and the representatives of the Fishery Board. I hope to be able to attend myself.
    Mr. BOOTHBY: Will the right hon. Gentleman summon, at any rate, the Provosts of the principal fishing ports to this meeting as well as the Lord Provosts of Edinburgh and Glasgow?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I have already intimated who will be invited to the preliminary meeting.
    Major WOOD: Will the right hon. Gentleman give us a pledge that nothing will be done that cannot be reviewed without giving these fishermen and the people engaged in the industry an opportunity of putting their views?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I think, on reflection, that the hon. and gallant Member will see that it is impossible for me, as an individual, to give him any pledges.
    Major COLFOX: Will the right hon. Gentleman make sure that Scotland does not get an unfair advantage?
    Mr. MILLARasked the Secretary of State for Scotland the total sum now raised by the various relief funds instituted in connection with the fishing disaster off the East Anglian coast; and what arrangements have been made for the administration and distribution of the funds?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I am informed that the present total of the relief funds is about£21,300. In reply to the last part of the question, I refer to the reply which I have given to the hon. and gallant Member for Banff (Major Wood).
    Mr. BOOTHBY: In view of the total inadequacy of the fund that is being raised, will the right hon. Gentleman reconsider his decision not to give any assistance?
    Mr. SPEAKER: Hon. Members are worrying the subject almost to death.

    NETS AND GEAR (INSURANCE).
    Mr. MILLARasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has instituted any inquiries as to the insurance of fishermen's nets and gear; and whether he can make any statement on the subject?
    Mr. W. ADAMSON: Inquiries into this matter are proceeding, and I am awaiting a report on the subject.
    Mr. MILLAR: Is the right hon. Gentleman in communication with the various
    1180
    interests associated with insurance in regard to this matter, and has he any scheme to put forward?
    Mr. ADAMSON: Inquiry is still proceeding on the points mentioned by the hon. Member in his question on the Paper.
    Mr. MILLAR: Has the right hon. Gentleman put forward any proposals of his own at this stage?

    HEALTH AND PENSIONS INSURANCE.
    Major WOODasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether health and pensions insurance contributions are required from share fishermen in respect of a fishing which has resulted in a financial loss; and whether he will issue instructions to guide fishermen and others in this matter?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: My right hon. Friend is advised that the legal position is that health and pensions insurance contributions are payable in respect of share fishermen engaged on a fishing venture which has resulted in a financial loss. As regards the second part of the question, an explanatory memorandum has already been issued by the Department of Health on the general question of the insurability of share fishermen in Scotland, and the Department will be prepared in individual cases brought to their notice to consider any difficulties that may arise.

    CREDIT FACILITIES.
    Major WOODasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has given consideration to the urgent need and to the pressing demand, prior to the recent disaster in East Anglia, for improved credit facilities to enable fishermen to replace their worn-out gear and boats; whether he is aware of the danger of a collapse in the fishing industry if the matter is not taken in hand at once; and whether he has any proposals to bring forward to deal with the emergency?
    Mr. W. ADAMSON: During the Parliamentary Recess and the preceding period I spent considerable time in examining the circumstances of the fishing industry in Scotland, and while I received many representations as to the need for repairs and extensions of the fishery harbours and for remission of their debt burdens, the information which I obtained does

    1181
    not warrant the hon. and gallant Member's anticipation of a serious collapse in the industry. In particular no request for credit facilities was made to me by the representative deputation from the herring fishing industry which I received, together with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries on the 30th of July.
    Major WOOD: Did the right hon. Gentleman expect a deputation which came to him on the question of markets to deal with the question of worn-out gear, and, because they did not deal with worn-out gear, is he to understand that there is no question about credit facilities in respect of worn-out gear?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I do not think that I thought anything of the kind. I said that no representations were made to me at that meeting on the question of credit facilities, or by any of the deputations that I have met in connection with the fishing industry during the last few months.
    Major WOOD: Are we to understand that the right hon. Gentleman wishes the House to understand that there is no demand for credit facilities of this kind? If so, will he say what he meant by the promise to increase credit facilities which he gave during the election campaign?
    HON. MEMBERS: Answer!
    Major WOOD: May I have an answer to my question?
    Mr. SPEAKER: We really must get on with the questions.
    Major WOOD: On a point of Order. I put down a question about credit facilities for worn-out gear and beats, and the answer that I have received is an answer about credit facilities in respect of harbours. There is no mention of harbours in the question.
    Mr. ADAMSON: I did not confine myself to the question of harbours. It was an answer to the hon. and gallant Member's question in regard to credit facilities. I have no intention of going into election programmes.
    Mr. E. BROWN: Worn-out gear.

    SCOTTISH HARBOURS (DEBT REMISSION).
    Mr. BOOTHBYasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury why no remissions of debts owed by the Scottish fishing harbours to the Public Works Loan Board have been made?
    The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Pethick-Lawrence): Loans granted by the Public Works Loan Board require the specific authority of Parliament for remission and for writing them off from the Local Loans Fund. In this they differ from those granted by the Development Commissioners, which can be remitted by administrative action. The Act which established the Local Loans Fund provides that loans from the fund shall only be written off when irrecoverable. As stated in the note contained in Command Paper No. 3447, certain of these loans are now under consideration with a viéw to the necessary provision being made in the next Public Works Loans Bill.
    Mr. BOOTHBY: Is the bon. Gentleman aware that as these loans form by far the larger part of the liabilities of these harbours, the present proposals of the Government really go no distance towards solving their financial difficulties, and will he in that situation agree to the remission of these loans in the next Consolidated Fund Bill?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: I do not know whether the hon. Member heard the last part of my answer, but I think that really meets a great deal of his case. In so far as it is possible to do it, it will be seen to in the next Public Works Loan Bill.
    Major WOOD: Are we to understand that harbours which have got their loans through the Public Works Loan Board are put at a disadvantage as compared with those which have got them through the Development Commissioners?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: It depends on the circumstances, to which I refer in the answer that I have given.
    Major WOOD: That is to say, we are at a disadvantage?
    Mr. SMITHERS: Are the Development Commissioners mentioned in the hon. Gentleman's answer, the Commissioners

    1183
    acting in virtue of the powers given them by the Act passed last July—the Development Act?

  SCOTLAND.

    LANARK COUNTY COUNCIL (LARGE BURGHS).
    Mr. HARDIEasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is aware that under the Local Government (Scotland) Act, 1929, the 36 members of large burghs as members of the Lanark County Council will have no deliberative vote in the framing of standing orders or appointment of chairman; and whether the Government propose to make such Amendments to the Act to alter this situation?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: The position is as stated by the hon. Member. In view of the limited purposes for which large burghs are represented on the reconstituted county councils my right hon. Friend can give no undertaking as to legislation to amend the Local Government (Scotland) Act at the present time.
    Mr. HARDIE: Is it to be regarded as a principle that, because business may be small, democratic representatives of the people who are there are not to have the right to vote for the framing of any of the rules or for the appointment of the chairman?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: No, Sir, but we are bound, as the hon. Member knows, by Statute in this matter, and we have not at the present moment Parliamentary time to enable us to amend it.
    Mr. HARDIEasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is aware that the education committee for Lanarkshire county is to be limited to a number that cannot he more than 42 out of 91 members of the county council, and that large burghs will thus be deprived of 50 per cent. of their representation on the one question on which they can speak and vote; and will he take steps to alter this situation?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: The scheme for the constitution of an education committee for the county of Lanark has not yet been submitted by the county council, but I am afraid the Statute does not re-
    1184
    quire that any specified proportion of members from large burghs should be appointed to the education committee.

    LAND DRAINAGE.
    Sir A. SINCLAIRasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is now in a position to announce the terms of the Government's land drainage scheme for the current year?
    Mr. W. ADAMSON: Progress is being made with the arrangements for a new land drainage scheme and I hope to be able to make an announcement at an early date.
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: Does the right hon. Gentleman not realise that farmers are being badly held up by this delay, and that manufacturers are being held up, and that they do not know how much will be available until Parliament has come to a decision?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I am as well aware of the situation as the hon. and gallant Member.
    Sir A. SINCLAIR: How soon shall we know what the right hon. Gentleman is going to do?

    SMALL-POX.
    Mr. FREEMANasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he received information regarding the small-pox cases that occurred in Glasgow and other Scotch towns as the result of the outbreak on the steamship "Tuscania" in April last; and, if so, whether he will state how many eases occurred and the vaccinal condition of each case?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. As regards the second part, 17 cases in Glasgow and one case in Aberdeen were traceable to the steamship "Tuscania." I propose to circulate the details of the vaccinal condition of these cases in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Mr. FREEMAN: Can my hon. Friend say how many of these cases of smallpox had previously been vaccinated?
    Mr. JOHNSTON: My hon. Friend will get all the detailed information in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following are the details:

    SMALLPOX IN GLASGOW—APRIL, 1929.

    Vaccinal Condition of Cases.

    S.—success or successful.

    N.—unsuccessful.

    Case.

    Age.

    Date of sickening.

    Vaccination.

    Previous Vaccinations and results.

    Recent

    Result.

    1

    29

    April 1

    March 31

    N.

    (a) Infancy: S.

    (b) 1919: N.

    2

    48

    April 3

    March 31

    Modified

    (a) Infancy: S.

    S.

    (b) Several times since: N.

    3

    22

    April 4

    April 1

    Modified

    Infancy: S.

    S.

    4

    30

    April 4

    March 31

    Modified

    (a) Infancy: S.

    S.

    (b) 1925 alleged: no evidence.

    5

    24

    April 5

    April 1

    N.

    (a) Infancy: S.

    (b) August, 1928: N.

    6

    37

    April 5

    April 1

    Modified

    (a) Infancy: S.

    S.

    (b) June, 1927: N.

    7

    24

    April 5

    April 1

    N.

    Infancy: S.

    8

    50

    April 5

    April 1

    N.

    (a) Infancy: S.

    (b) 1900: N.

    (c) 1926: N.

    9

    41

    April 7

    April 1

    N.

    This man stated he was vaccinated in infancy and in 1928. There is no scar or other evidence
    of vaccination. If he had been successfully vaccinated as recently as in 1928 there would be a
    visible scar

    10

    35

    April 11

    April 1

    Modified

    (a) Infancy: S.

    S.

    (b) 1928: N.

    11

    20

    Tonsilitis since April 5

    April 1

    Modified

    Infancy: S.

    S.

    12

    27

    April 7

    April 1

    Modified

    Infancy: S.

    S.

    13

    27

    April 8

    April 1

    N.

    (a) Infancy: S.

    (b) 1927: N.

    14

    34

    April 13

    April 1

    N.

    (a) Infancy: S.

    (b) 1927: S.

    15*

    28

    April 9

    April 9

    N.

    Infancy: S.

    16

    34

    April 12

    April 1

    N.

    Infancy: S.

    April 10

    S.

    17

    35

    April 18

    —

    —

    Infancy: Modified S.

    18

    57

    May 5

    —

    —

    Infancy: S.

    * This case occurred in Aberdeen.

    POTATOES (EXPORT TRADE).
    Mr. MILLARasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has received representations as to the situation created in Scotland owing to the difficulty of marketing potatoes at a reasonable figure; and whether he is prepared to take any steps to meet the views expressed by the representatives of the industry whom he has met, and to rewove the difficulties at present standing in the way of the export trade to Canada and the United States of America?
    Mr. W. ADAMSON: The reply to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. I have, on various occasions, urged the representatives of the industry to adopt measures to improve existing methods for the disposal of agricultural produce and I understand that movements are now in progress with this object in view. With regard to the last part of the question the difficulties in connection with the export trade to Canada and the United States have been receiving my consideration for some time past in consultation with my right hon.

    1187
    Friend the Minister of Agriculture. I am afraid, however, that I cannot hold out any expectation of relief to the potato growers through this suggestion.
    Mr. MILLAR: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the extremely serious situation which has developed in his own county of Fife, as well as in other parts of Scotland, and is he not prepared to make a definite offer to reopen the whole question of export trade with Canada and the United States?
    Mr. ADAMSON: I am well aware of the position of the agricultural industry in Fife and elsewhere, and I am making efforts in various directions in order to assist the agricultural industry. [HON. MEMBERS: "What are they?"] In answer to a question a fortnight ago, I gave particulars to the House of our programme in regard to agriculture.

    CHANNEL TUNNEL.
    Mr. LOUIS SMITHasked the Lord Privy; Seal (1) whether, in view of the national importance of the Channel Tunnel question and the need for providing as much work as possible during the winter months and stimulating trade, he will cause additional facilities and technical assistance to be placed at the disposal of the Channel Tunnel Committee with a view to expediting their Report;
    (2) when the Report of the Channel Tunnel Committee may be expected; and whether, if this cannot be ready before Parliament reassembles after the recess, he will ask for an interim report to be presented by that time?
    Mr. THOMAS: The Channel Tunnel Committee hope to submit their Report by the time that Parliament reassembles after the Recess. There will be no delay on the part of the Government in considering the Report. Additional facilities and technical assistance have already been placed at the disposal of the Committee.

  TRADE AND COMMERCE.

    UNSAWN MAHOGANY LOGS (IMPORT).
    Mr. ARTHUR MICHAEL SAMUELasked the President of the Board of
    1188
    Trade whether, seeing that during recent months there has been a decline in the importation of unsawn mahogany logs and an increase in the importation from the United States of sawn mahogany planks and boards, he will say what steps he has taken to encourage the importation of mahogany unsawn logs to be sawn here for use and re-export instead of importing from the United States sawn mahogany planks and boards which have been imported into the United States as logs, then sawn and re-exported to us?
    The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. William Graham): An examination of the details of imports of hewn mahogany and of sawn mahogany month by month during the last three years does not appear to me to bear out the statement that sawn timber has been increasing at the expense of hewn.
    Mr. SAMUEL: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman means that the reply refers to the imports from the United States?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I think it does, but I will undertake to send the hon. Member the actual statistics which he will observe bear out exactly the reply that I have given.
    Mr. SAMUEL: I am much obliged to the right hon Gentleman, but will he allow the question to be examined by the Timber Committee of the Imperial Institute?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I cannot pledge myself as to the exact form of the inquiry, but I will consider the hon. Member's suggestion.

    MOTOR TYRES (DUTY).
    Mr. REMERasked the President of the Board of Trade how many new factories of foreign origin have been erected in this country since the imposition of the motor tyre duty; and if he can give any indication as to the number of men employed at those factories?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: According to my information six factories have been established by foreign interests since the imposition of the duty on motor tyres in April, 1927. One of the factories was commenced before that date. The five of these factories that are now working employ approximately 5,500 men.
    Mr. REMER: Is not that a very favourable result?
    Mr. GRAHAM: The hon. Member is now on very debatable ground?
    Mr. MANDER: Is it not a fact that one of these factories was started under Free Trade and entirely as a result of Free Trade conditions in this country?

    EXPORTS (RUSSIA).
    Mr. COCKSasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will give the figures of British exports and re-exported to Russia for the years 1923, 1924, 1925, 1926, 1927 and 1928?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: With my hon. Friend's permission I will circulate the figures in the OFFICIAL REPORT as the more convenient course.
    Mr. COCKS: Will my right hon. Friend say whether there is a great reduction of these exports after the year 1926–27, and can he give any reason for it?
    Mr. GRAHAM: There certainly was a reduction following 1925–26, but it would be impossible for me to give reasons in reply to a supplementary question.
    Sir AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Would it be possible for the right hon. Gentleman to give us any figures as to the trade with Russia which appear in our export figures as trade with Germany—going to Hamburg and thence to Russia?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I am not sure whether from the statistics as they stand that is possible, and, obviously, the right hon. Gentleman would not expect me to reply without notice, but I shall certainly make inquiries.
    Sir WILLIAM MITCHELL-THOMSON: Has the right hon. Gentleman any figures about United States exports to Russia?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I have no doubt that from the United States official returns, some of which I have seen, the figures could be got, but I am not aware that that is part of my duty.
    Following are the figures:
    The following table shows the total declared values of merchandise exported
    1190
    and re-exported from Great Britain and Northern Ireland, consigned to the Soviet Union (Russia) during each of the years 1923 to 1928.

    Year.

    Exports consigned to the Soviet Union (Russia).

    Produce and Manufactures of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

    Imported Merchandise.

    £'000.

    £'000.

    1923

    …

    2,492

    1,989

    1924

    …

    3,860

    7,212

    1925

    …

    6,240

    13,017

    1926

    …

    5,858

    8,543

    1927

    …

    4,509

    6,781

    1928

    …

    2,716

    2,085

    NOTE.—From 1st April, 1923, the figures given above relate to the trade of Great Britain and Northern Ireland; prior to that date they relate to the trade of the British Isles as a whole.

    DYESTUFFS ACT.
    Mr. REMERasked the President of the Board of Trade if it is the intention of the Government to continue the Dyestuffs Act after the expiration of that Act?
    Mr. MANDERasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can now state the policy of the Government with reference to the Dyes Act when it expires at the end of 1930; and whether it is proposed to take any action?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: The matter will receive consideration in due course.
    Brigadier - General Sir HENRY CROFT: Would the right hon. Gentleman say whether, in view of the consideration that he has promised, he has yet been able to get out the figures of the number of persons in employment in this industry?
    Mr. GRAHAM: No, Sir. My hon. and gallant Friend had better put that question on the Paper.
    Mr. MANDER: Will the right hon. Gentleman not consider the many advantages of doing nothing in this matter?
    Mr. GRAHAM: The whole subject, of course, is at present under a form of review. It is much too early to make

    1191
    any statement of policy, but I can assure hon. Members that everything will be borne in mind.
    Mr. REMER: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware of the uncertainty that the absence of an announcement is causing?

    FOREIGN TRADE.
    Mr. SMITHERSasked the President of the Board of Trade to what extent our foreign trade has increased or decreased since the Government took office?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: The total declared value of merchandise registered as imported into and exported from Great Britain and Northern Ireland during the six months, June to November, 1927, 1928 and 1929, was£1,017,000,000,£1,012,000,000 and£1,015,000,000, respectively. Average import and export values have fallen since 1927, and the figure stated for 1929 therefore represents some increase in the volume of imports and exports in the most recent period over that of the two earlier periods.
    Sir H. CROFT: Is it not a fact that, in spite of the present Government, the safeguarded trades also show a great increase?

    TRUSTS (ROYAL COMMISSION'S RECOMMENDATION).
    Mr. MANDERasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, in order to present profiteering, the Government is prepared to adopt the procedure of investigation and control recommended by the Royal Commission on Trusts in 1919?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: I can add nothing at present to the answers which I gave to questions in this House on 5th November, of which I am sending the hon. Gentleman a copy.
    Mr. MANDER: Would the right hon. Gentleman say whether one of the articles which is to be investigated will be coal?
    Mr. GRAHAM: In the statement that I made on 5th November I indicated clearly that the Government had taken a most comprehensive view of its duties on this point, and I think that nothing which is material to the ordinary day-to-day life of the community will be overlooked.

    SILK EXPORTS (IMPORT DUTY, UNITED STATES).
    Mr. CADOGANasked the President of the Board of Trade whether his attention has been called to the decision of the United States of America's Treasury to levy an anti-bounty duty on manufactures of silk or artificial silk imported from the United Kingdom; if he will state whether this country is a party to any commercial treaty which denies to it the same right to impose countervailing duties as has been exercised by the United States of America; if so, by what treaty or treaties is our freedom of action so limited; and what steps he proposes to take in order to counteract the effect upon our trade of this decision on the part of the United States of America's Treasury?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: Treaty arrangements with practically all the most important commercial countries make it impossible for countervailing duties to be placed on goods, which are the subject of a direct or indirect bounty, originating in these countries. With regard to the first and last parts of the question, the decision of the United States Treasury, to which the hon. Member refers, was published in the Board of Trade Journal on the 28th November. I have not received 'any representations from manufacturers on this subject, but shall, of course, be happy to consider any views they may wish to lay before me.
    Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what is the provision in these multifarious treaties of ours which prevents our putting on a duty to countervail a bounty?
    Mr. GRAHAM: This matter raises the large question of the ordinary most-favoured-nation treatment. The matter is very complicated and not material for a supplementary question, but that is the difficulty.
    Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Have we not a most-favoured-nation Clause in our Treaty with America?
    Mr. GRAHAM: Yes, Sir.
    Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Then if they can do it, why cannot we?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I can only say that I am afraid much larger questions arise.

    1193
    I have investigated this matter very carefully, and, as the right, hon. Gentleman knows, it really turns upon a flat rate drawback on re-exported silk, which they regard as a bounty, and on which they, of course, make a decision.
    Mr. CADOGAN: Was it not contended that we were to be debarred from placing anti-bounty duties on German cereals imported into this country because it was inconsistent with the most-favoured-nation Clause?

    FINANCE AND INDUSTRY (COMMITTEE).
    Dr. VERNON DAVIESasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will extend the terms of reference of the Macmillan Committee on Finance and Industry to inquire and to accept evidence showing the effect, if any, of the weight of taxation on industry contributing to a high costs level?
    The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER (Mr. Philip Snowden): No, Sir.
    Dr. DAVIES: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, if the impression gets abroad that this Committee will not receive any inconvenient evidence, the value of its report when published will be very much depreciated?

    IMPORT DUTIES.
    Mr. D. G. SOMERVILLEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether to help unemployment and relieve the uncertainty which is prejudicial to trade, he proposes in the financial statement he intends to make before the Recess to announce the specific intentions of the Government with regard to the McKenna and Safeguarding Duties?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: No, Sir.
    Mr. THORNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, if the Governments of other countries had as much common sense as this Government, there would be no need for Safeguarding?
    Sir H. CROFT: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to the fact that the trade unionists in four of these industries have recently made great protests?
    Mr. SNOWDEN: No, Sir.

  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.

    ENEMY DEBTS DEPARTMENT.
    Captain PETER MACDONALDasked the President of the Board of Trade the number of persons employed, directly or indirectly, as at 1st December, 1929, by the Clearing Office of Enemy Debts, and the approximate expenditure in relation to salaries, wages, rent, and various other expenditures necessary for carrying on the Clearing Office of Enemy Debts at its branches in England and abroad; and will he state to what extent, if it is not the whole, the expenditure incurred is defrayed by a percentage deducted on the amounts distributed by way of dividends on accepted proved claims of British nationals?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: On 1st December, the staff of the Clearing Office (Enemy Debts) at home and abroad comprised 388 men and 25 women. The estimated cost of the office for salaries and other expenses for the current financial year is£133,385, for details of which I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the printed Estimates. The whole cost of the Department has been more than covered by commissions charged on payments of admitted claims and on the proceeds of ex-enemy property realised.

    CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
    Captain Sir GEORGE BOWYERasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether any conscientious objectors have been promoted, since the Treasury circular of 10th September last, over the heads of civil servants who served in the forces during the War; and, if so, how many, and in what Departments?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: There have been three such promotions.
    Sir G. BOWYER: When we compare the respective records of these two sections of civil servants, can the hon. Gentleman give me one single reason for the preferential treatment of the conscientious objectors?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: That question does not arise out of the question on the Paper. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] It has no connection with it, and I have already answered on a previous occasion.
    Sir G. BOWYER: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, when the House was not sitting on 10th September, his Government reversed the decisions of all previous Governments since the end of the War; and does he not now consider that he ought to give one reason for this reversal of policy?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: I would point out that it is not the practice in this House to answer a question which does not arise in any way from the question on the Paper.
    Major COLFOX: Are we to have no reason from the Government for this action?
    Mr. BENSON: May I ask—
    Sir G. BOWYER: May I—[Interruption].
    Mr. SPEAKER: I called the hon. and gallant Member for Buckingham (Sir G. Bowyer).
    Sir G. BOWYER: I beg to give notice that I shall call attention to this question on the first possible opportunity.

    SAFEGUARDING DUTIES (ADMINISTRATION).
    Mr. MANDERasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury what extra staff has been appointed at the various ports and elsewhere since the introduction of Safeguarding and other protective duties for the purpose of dealing with goods affected by these duties; and what is the annual cost involved?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: The information asked for by the hon. Member cannot be supplied as it is not possible to separate the fluctuations in staff occasioned by the operations of particular duties.

    CONSUMERS' COUNCIL.
    Mr. W. B. TAYLORasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will give consideration to the inclusion of representatives of the producers of home-grown food upon the Consumers' Council now in process of preparation?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: As I have already stated, the composition of the Consumers' Council will receive most careful consideration. Meantime I can add nothing to my statement of 5th November.
    Mr. TAYLOR: Is my right hon. Friend aware that both the working farmer and the farm worker are practically engaged in a sweated industry, and that they, therefore, need representation on this Consumers' Council?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I do not for a moment, dispute the very difficult position of agriculture, but it is much too early to make a further statement on the question. There have reached me innumerable representations, all of which will be considered.

    CINEMATOGRAPH FILMS ACT.
    Mr. DAYasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he can state the reason why his Department has re fused to register for quota purposes under the Cinematograph Films Act, 1927, the film entitled a Song of London, which is a five-reel film of 7,000 feet, made by a British company in London with an entirely British caste of artistes?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: I have this matter under consideration.
    Mr. DAY: Will my right hon. Friend also consider that the non-registration of this film, made by a small British company, may mean a very serious handicap to this company?
    Mr. GRAHAM: That is part of the material before me in the case.
    Mr. DAY: Will my right hon. Friend allow one of his representatives or the Advisory Committee to see the film before coming to a decision?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I understand that the Advisory Committee have already expressed an opinion on the film.

    MERCANTILE MARINE (HELM ORDERS).
    Mr. WEST RUSSELLasked the President of the Board of Trade the names of the British representatives at the recent International Conference regarding the alteration of orders to helmsmen; what instructions were given to them before they left this country; and whether any attempt was made before they left to consult representative British opinion on the issue?
    Mr. W. GRAHAM: I am sending the hon. Member a list of the 14 representa-

    1197
    tives of the United Kingdom at the International Conference on Safety of Life at Sea held in London this year. The instructions left them a discretion as to their action on this proposal. Steps were taken before the Conference to ascertain the views of the interests concerned, but I am not prepared to state the nature of the instructions given to the Government delegates which in accordance with the usual practice must fidential.
    Mr. TINNE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the steamship "Avance" hit the breakwater when leaving port at Copenhagen recently in consequence of confusion about these new helm orders; and will he take such steps as will avoid the forcing on the British mercantile marine of orders which are entirely against their views?
    Mr. GRAHAM: I am not familiar with the facts of the individual case, but, as I have pointed out previously in replies to questions on this subject, the whole matter must come before Parliament in the form of a Bill, and there will be ample opportunity for consideration.

    LEAGUE OF NATIONS.
    Captain CROOKSHANKasked the Prime Minister if he has delegated to any member of the Government besides the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs permanent duties in connection with the League of Nations?
    The PRIME MINISTER: The answer is in the negative.
    Captain CROOKSHANK: Do we understand that Lord Cecil of Chelwood is not permanently connected with the League of Nations on behalf of the Government, in spite of what the Foreign Secretary said yesterday?
    The PRIME MINISTER: What the Foreign Secretary said yesterday, the hon. and gallant Member may assume is absolutely correct.

  NATIONAL FINANCE.

    TAXATION.
    Mr. SULLIVANasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the amount of
    1198
    taxation per head of the population in England, Wales and Scotland for the years 1926, 1927 and 1928?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: I regret that this information is not available.
    Lieut.-Colonel HENEAGE: Having in view the importance of the information available, will the right hon. Gentleman—
    Mr. SPEAKER: The right hon. Gentleman has stated that the information is not available.

    FIGHTING SERVICES (EXPENDITURE).
    Major the Marquess of TITCHFIELDasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he can state what is the estimated saving in the Fighting Services during the next year?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: No, Sir.

    DEATH DUTIES.
    Mr. TINKERasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is in a position to state the amount of Death Duties derived in the years 1926, 1927 and 1928, respectively, from estates where the persons left to participate in such estates have not been sons and daughters, wife or husband; and, if not, will he take steps to ascertain these figures?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: I regret that the information asked for by my hon. Friend is not available, but he will find certain relevant statistics in the Annual Reports of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, such as the classification made in Tables 14, 28 and 29 of the Seventy-First Annual Report.
    Mr. TINKER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the information asked for would be useful to him in enabling him to determine what extra taxation will be brought in by way of increasing the Death Duties?

    MOTOR DUTIES.
    Captain BENNETTasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what amount of revenue would be produced by an excise duty on motor-cars manufactured in this country equivalent to the existing import duty of 33⅓ per cent.?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: I regret that I am unable, in the absence of adequate data, to form a reliable estimate. The British Manufacturers' Section of the Society of

    1199
    Motor Manufacturers and Traders recently put the value of their annual output at£75,000,000. Making certain necessary allowances for export drawbacks and the like, an excise duty at the rate of the existing Customs preferential duty of twenty-two and two-ninths per cent. ad valorem might yield a sum of about£10,000,000. But this estimate is very speculative and conjectural.
    Captain BENNETT: Does not my right hon. Friend think that such an arrangement would be at once acceptable to hon. Members on the other side and also give us what we want?
    Mr. SPEAKER: That is a very hypothetical question.

    PERPETUAL PENSIONS (COMMUTATION).
    Mr. FOOTasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the number of years purchase adopted in the commutation of the perpetual pensions abolished in the course of the past 10 years?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: The only transactions of this character were in 1924 and 1925 and were both on the basis of 21 years' purchase.
    Mr. FOOT: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to adopt the same practice as to the remaining perpetual pension—the same basis of settlement?
    Mr. SNOWDEN: If application be made for the commutation of this pension, I can assure the hon. Member—who has for so many years taken a keen interest in this matter—that we will get the best terms possible.

    PRE-WAR PENSIONERS.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHAasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his attention has been called to the fact that at a meeting of 200 Members of this House it was decided to ask him to receive a deputation in connection with pre-War pensioners; and whether it will be convenient to receive such a deputation, representative of all parties in the House?
    Mr. P. SNOWDEN: The hon. Member has called my attention to this fact, and, as I have informed him on two occasions, I do not think that any useful purpose would be served by my receiving a deputation.
    Mr. HORE-BELISHA: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the feeling on this matter is exceptionally widespread in all parts of this House, and that many Members of all parties desire to lay certain aspects of the case before him; and does he not think it a pity that the traditional and constitutional practice, whereunder Members of the House have always had willing access to Ministers, should be departed from in this case?
    Mr. SNOWDEN: I do not think that any deputation could put before me any facts relating to this matter with which I am not perfectly familiar. We dealt with this matter when we were in office in 1924, and we said then, and we still hold the view, that it cannot be reopened.
    Lieut.-Colonel HENEAGE: Does the right hon. Gentleman remember Clause 4 of the Unemployment Insurance Bill?
    Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: Can the right hon. Gentleman say if there is any precedent for the Chancellor of the Exchequer refusing to receive a deputation from a meeting of 200 Members of this House?
    Mr. SNOWDEN: I have said in this House on many occasions that I do not pay a great deal of regard to precedents. Every case must be considered on its own merits.
    Major COLFOX: If the Clydeside group were to exert their influence, would the right hon. Gentleman—
    HON MEMBERS: Order!
    Mr. HORE-BELISHA: I beg to give notice that I shall raise this matter on the first available Parliamentary opportunity—if possible, on the Consolidated Fund Bill.

    ITALIAN ART EXHIBITIONS.
    Mr. ANNESLEY SOMERVILLEasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he is aware that a request was received from the committee

    1201
    of the Italian exhibition shortly to be held in the galleries of the Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, for the loan by the trustees of the British Museum of suitable Italian prints or drawings to be included in the Burlington House Italian exhibition; and will he give the reason for the trustees of the British Museum stating that the interests of students and the public visiting the Museum would be injured by loans of British Museum property to the Italian exhibition?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: No such request has reached the trustees of the British Museum. They propose to hold an exhibition of Italian drawings at the Museum simultaneously with the exhibition at Burlington House; and, in their opinion, students and the public will benefit by being able to see the drawings as a separate exhibition, apart from oil paintings, and without payment of an entrance fee.
    Mr. MILLS: Could representations be made to the authorities, in view of the short time that this unique collection will be in the country, that extra hours of opening should be available for the large number of people who would like to see it?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: That does not arise out of the question.

    MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT (LATE SITTINGS).
    Lady CYNTHIA MOSLEYasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he is prepared to recommend to the House that Members who are forced to hire taximeter cabs to get home because they are detained by Sittings of the House after ordinary means of transport have ceased to run should be accorded the same facilities for obtaining refund as departmental civil servants required to be in attendance in the official gallery?
    Mr. PETHICK - LAWRENCE: The terms of the Vote under which travelling expenses of Members of Parliament are payable do not admit of the refund of expenses of the kind indicated in the question.
    Lady MOSLEY: Would it not be possible for the hon. Gentleman to go into the question that I did raise in my question?
    Sir N. GRATTAN-DOYLE: Will the hon. Gentleman consider the desirability of communicating with the multimillionaires on his own side who have motor cars?

    INDUSTRIAL ASSURANCE (LAPSED POLICIES).
    Sir BASIL PETOasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he can now state the decision arrived at on the question of advertising the rights of lapsed policy holders under the Industrial Assurance Act, 1929, in the post offices throughout the country?
    Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: I have carefully considered this suggestion, but as at present advised I do not think that it would effect the result desired, and accordingly I do not propose to adopt it.
    Sir B. PETO: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Royal Liver Friendly Society, under the heading "Notice of Forfeiture or Lapse Notice," are issuing claims on their contributors which state that, if within 28 days—
    HON. MEMBERS: Speech!
    Mr. SPEAKER: There is too much writing about that supplementary question.
    Sir B. PETO: Am I not entitled, for greater accuracy, to quote the exact words of a very important document about which I wanted information from the Financial Secretary to the Treasury? [Interruption.] I wish to point out that I cannot quote from a document which is necessary without quoting that document.
    Mr. SPEAKER: Questions are put in order to obtain information, not to give it.
    Sir B. PETO: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that certain insurance companies are issuing notices to the people who—
    HON. MEMBERS: Speech!

    LLANBERIS QUARRY (ACCIDENT).
    Major OWEN(by Private Notice) asked the Secretary for Mines whether he can give particulars as to the causes of the accident at Llanberis Quarry yesterday, which resulted in the death of three men?
    The SECRETARY for MINES (Mr. Ben Turner): I regret that I am not in a position to give the House any detailed information about the unfortunate event referred to, which occurred last night. His Majesty's Divisional Inspector of Mines for the district received notification of the accident this morning, and a senior inspector is on his way to the scene of the accident. I will supply the hon. and gallant Member with full details as soon as I receive them.

QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS.
Lieut.-Colonel Sir A. LAMBERT WARD: I desire your guidance, Mr. Speaker. For several days I have attempted to put questions to the Minister of Labour on the subject of the dismissal of the tramwaymen in Hull, but I have been informed that questions on that subject cannot be allowed, and I desire your guidance as to what action I can take, in view of the importance of the question, in view of the apparent intimidation and victimisation, and in view of the fact that your predecessor in office on several occasions allowed similar questions to be asked.
Mr. THORNE: Before you reply, Mr. Speaker, may I ask if you are aware that I put down a question yesterday as to the victimisation of these men during 1926?
Mr. SPEAKER: Seeing that the responsibility rests entirely with the Hull Corporation, no Minister here is responsible, and consequently no questions can be addressed to Ministers. Further, I am credibly informed that legal proceedings are pending, in which case it would not be advisable to ask questions here.
Sir A. SINCLAIR: Did not the Prime Minister of the last Government give an undertaking on behalf of his Government that he would see that these men were not victimised, and, if he has no responsibility, how could he honourably give such an undertaking?
Sir A. LAMBERT WARD: May I call attention—
Sir A. SINCLAIR: Before the hon. Member puts that question, may I have an answer to my question?
Mr. SPEAKER: Whatever responsibility the late Government incurred in this respect, I do not think it remains with subsequent Governments for all time.
Sir A. LAMBERT WARD: May I call your attention, Mr. Speaker, to a question which your predecessor allowed the hon. Member for St. Helens (Mr. Sexton) to ask on the 24th November, 1926, as follows:
"Mr. Sexton asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that some hundreds of men lately employed by the employers in the milling industry in the Mersey district are still being victimised for their action during the General Strike, notwithstanding an agreement between the men's organisations and the employers and a promise on the part of the latter that all employés should be reinstated in accordance with the Prime Minister's suggestion when the General Strike closed; and if he can do anything through his Department to help to secure the recognition of this suggestion?" (OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th November, 1926; col. 391; Vol. 200.]
That question was answered by the right hon. Gentleman the then Minister of Labour, who is now the Member for Tamworth (Sir A. Steel-Maitland).
Mr. SPEAKER: That may be quite true, but that was a comparatively short time after the event, and I do not understand that whatever undertaking was given holds good for ever. No Minister is responsible for what the Hull Corporation does, and I do not see how he can be.
Mr. BEAUMONT: Are we to understand, from your Ruling, that this House has no control over the local authorities, and that they can do what they like without any redress or without the subject being raised in this House?
Mr. SPEAKER: That is rather a wider question. It is conceivable that in some cases the responsibility of the Government might arise, but hon. Members can easily understand that local government would come to an end if this House interfered with the delegated powers of local authorities.
Mr. HORE-BELISHA: If a Prime Minister gives a pledge on behalf of the nation, is it not in order to ask his successor whether he proposes to continue that policy; and, if it is not in order, is not the respect to which this House is entitled from the public involved?
Mr. SPEAKER: Certainly, that would be quite a proper question to put to the Prime Minister.
Mr. BRACKEN: I put that question to the Prime Minister yesterday, and it was not admitted.
Mr. HORE-BELISHA: In view of your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Prime Minister whether he proposes to implement the undertaking given by his predecessor that there would be no victimisation arising from the General Strike?
Mr. SPEAKER: I think that notice ought to be given of that question.
Mr. THURTLE: May I ask if it is not a fact that no pledge was given, but that the Prime Minister of the day merely made an appeal to the employers of the country, and that such appeal in many cases fell on deaf ears?
Mr. SPEAKER: I cannot be expected to give any opinion on that subject.

NEW MEMBER SWORN.
David Gilbert Logan, esquire, Borough of Liverpool (Scotland Division).
EDUCATION (SCHOOL ATTENDANCE) BILL,
"to raise to fifteen years the age up to which parents are required to cause their children to receive efficient elementary instruction and to attend school; and to make provision for maintenance allowances in respect of children attending school up to that age who are over the age of fourteen years," presented by Sir Charles Trevelyan; supported by Mr. Arthur Greenwood, Mr. Pethick-Lawrence, and Mr. Morgan Jones; to be read a Second time upon Tuesday, 21st January, and to be printed. [Bill 100.]

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Motion made, and Question put,
"That the Proceedings on the Report: of Supply of the 16th December be exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House)."—[The Prime Minister.]
The House divided: Ayes, 281; Noes, 162.

Division No. 107.]

AYES.

[3.55 p.m.

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

Cluse, W. S.

Grundy, Thomas W.

Adamson, W. M. (Staff, Cannock)

Clynes, Rt. Hon. John R.

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

Addison, Rt. Hon. Or. Christopher

Cocks, Frederick Seymour

Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)

Altchison, Rt. Hon. Craigle M.

Compton, Joseph

Hall, Capt. W. P. (Portsmouth, C.)

Alpass, J. H.

Cove, William G.

Hamilton, Mary Agnes (Blackburn)

Ammon, Charles George

Daggar, George

Hamilton, Sir R. (Orkney & Zetland)

Angell, Norman

Dallas, George

Harbord, A.

Arnott, John

Dalton, Hugh

Hardie, George D.

Attlee, Clement Richard

Davies, E. C. (Montgomery)

Harris, Percy A.

Ayles, Walter

Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)

Hartshorn, Rt. Hon. Vernon

Baker, John (Wolverhampton, Bilston)

Day, Harry

Hastings, Dr. Somerville

Baldwin, Oliver (Dudley)

Denman, Hon. R. D.

Haycock, A. W.

Barnes, Alfred John

Devlin, Joseph

Hayday, Arthur

Bellamy, Albert

Dickson, T.

Hayes, John Henry

Benn, Rt. Hon. Wedgwood

Ede, James Chuter

Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Burnley)

Bennett, Capt. E. N. (Cardiff, Central)

Edge, Sir William

Herriotts, J.

Bennett, William (Battersea, South)

Edmunds, J. E.

Hirst, G. H. (York W. R. Wentworth).

Benson, G.

Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwellty)

Hoffman, P. C.

Bevan, Aneurin (Ebbw Vale)

Edwards, E. (Morpeth)

Hollins, A.

Blinded, James

Elmley. Viscount

Hopkin, Daniel

Bowen, J. W.

Foot, Isaac

Hore-Belisha, Leslie.

Brockway, A. Fenner

Forgan, Dr. Robert

Horrabin, J. F.

Bromfield, William

Freeman, Peter

Hudson, James H. (Huddersfield)

Bromley, J.

Gardner, B. W. (West Ham, Upton)

Hunter, Dr. Joseph

Brothers, M.

Gardner, J. P. (Hammersmith, N.)

Hutchison, Maj.-Gen. Sir R.

Brown, C. W. E. (Notts. Mansfield)

George, Rt. Hon. D. Lloyd (Car'vn)

Isaacs, George

Brown, Ernest (Leith)

George, Major G. Lloyd (Pembroke)

Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)

Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)

George, Megan Lloyd (Anglesea)

John, William (Rhondda, West)

Brown, W. J. (Wolverhampton, West)

Glbbins, Joseph

Johnston, Thomas

Burgess, F. G.

Gill, T. H.

Jones, F. Llewellyn- (Flint)

Burgin, Dr. E. L.

Gillett, George M.

Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

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

Glassey, A. E.

Jones, Rt. Hon. Leif (Camborne)

Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel (Norfolk, N.)

Gosling, Harry

Jowett, Rt. Hon. F. W.

Caine, Derwent Hall-

Gossling, A. G.

Jowitt, Rt. Hon. Sir W. A.

Cameron, A. G.

Gould, F.

Kedward, R. M. (Kent, Ashford)

Cape, Thomas

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

Kennedy, Thomas

Carter, W. (St. Pancras, S W.)

Gray, Milner

Kinley, J.

Charleton, H. C.

Greenwood, Rt. Hon. A. (Coine)

Knight, Holford

Chater, Daniel

Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)

Lambert, Rt. Hon. George (S. Molton)

Church, Major A. G.

Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)

Lang, Gordon

Clarke, J. S.

Groves, Thomas E.

Lansbury, Rt. Hon. George

Lathan, G.

Owen, H. F. (Hereford)

Smith, Tom (Pontefract)

Law, Albert (Bolton)

Palin, John Henry

Smith, W. R. (Norwich)

Law, A. (Rossendale)

Paling, Wilfrid

Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip

Lawrence, Susan

Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)

Snowden, Thomas (Accrington)

Lawson, John James

Perry, S. F.

Sorensen, R.

Leach, W.

Peters, Dr. Sidney John

Spero, Dr. G. E.

Lee, Frank (Derby, N.E.)

Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.

Stamford, Thomas W.

Lee, Jennie (Lanark, Northern)

Phillips, Dr. Marion

Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)

Lees, J.

Picton-Turbervill, Edith

Strachey, E. J. St. Loe

Lewis, T. (Southampton)

Pole, Major D. G.

Strauss, G. R.

Lloyd, C. Ellis

Ponsonby, Arthur

Sullivan, J.

Logan, D. G.

Potts, John S.

Sutton, J. E.

Longbottom, A. W.

Price, M. P.

Taylor, R. A. (Lincoln)

Longden, F.

Quibell, D. J. K.

Taylor, W. B. (Norfolk, S.W.)

Lovat-Fraser, J. A.

Ramsay, T. B. Wilson

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

Lowth, Thomas

Rathbone, Eleanor

Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)

Lunn, William

Raynes, W. R.

Thurtle, Ernest

Macdonald, Gordon (Ince)

Richards, R.

Tinker, John Joseph

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

Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)

Toole, Joseph

McElwee, A.

Riley, Ben (Dewsbury)

Tout, W. J.

McEntee, V. L.

Ritson, J.

Townend, A. E.

McKinlay, A.

Romeril, H. G.

Trevelyan, Rt. Hon. Sir Charles

MacLaren, Andrew

Rosbotham, D. S. T.

Turner, B.

Macpherson, Rt. Hon. James I.

Rothschild, J. de

Vaughan, D. J.

McShane, John James

Rowson, Guy

Wallace, H. W.

Malone, C. L'Estrange (N'thampton)

Runclman, Rt. Hon. Walter

Viant, S. P.

Mander, Geoffrey le M.

Russell, Richard John (Eddlsbury)

Walker, J.

Mansfield, W.

Salter, Dr. Alfred

Wallhead, Richard c.

March, S.

Samuel, Rt. Hon. Sir H. (Darwen)

Walters, Rt. Hon. Sir J. Tudor

Marcus, M.

Samuel, H. W. (Swansea, West)

Watkins, F. C.

Markham, S. F.

Sanders, W. S.

Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)

Mathers, George

Sandham, E.

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

Matters, L. W.

Sawyer, G. F.

Wedgwood, Rt. Hon. Josiah

Maxton, James

Scrymgeour, E.

Wellock, Wilfred

Messer, Fred

Scurr, John

Welsh, James (Paisley)

Millar, J. D.

Sexton, James

Welsh, James C. (Coatbridge)

Mills, J. E.

Shaw, Rt. Hon. Thomas (Preston)

West, F. R.

Milner, J.

Shepherd, Arthur Lewis

Westwood, Joseph

Montague, Frederick

Shield, George William

Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.

Morgan, Dr. H. B.

Shiels, Dr. Drummond

Whiteley, Wilfrid (Birm., Ladywood)

Morley, Ralph

Shillaker, J. F.

Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)

Morris-Jones, Dr. J. H. (Denbigh)

Shinwell, E.

Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)

Morrison, Herbert (Hackney, South)

Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)

Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)

Morrison, Robert C. (Tottenham, N.)

Simmons, C. J.

Wilson, J. (Oldham)

Mort, D. L.

Simon, E. D. (Manch'ter, Withington)

Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)

Moses, J. J. H.

Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John

Winterton, G. E.(Leicester, Loughb'gh)

Mosley, Lady C. (Stoke-on-Trent)

Sinclair, Sir A. (Caithness)

Wise, E. F.

Mosley, Sir Oswald (Smethwick)

Slnklnson, George

Wood, Major McKenzle (Banff)

Muff, G.

Sitch, Charles H.

Wright, W. (Rutherglen)

Murnin, Hugh

Smith, Alfred (Sunderland)

Young, R. S. (Islington, North)

Nathan, Major H. L.

Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)

Noel Baker, P. J.

Smith, Frank (Nuneaton)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

Oliver, George Harold (Ilkeston)

Smith, H. B. Lees (Keighley)

Mr. T. Henderson and Mr. Whiteley.

Owen, Major G. (Carnarvon)

Smith, Rennie (Penistone)

NOES.

Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel

Bullock, Captain Malcolm

Dugdale, Capt. T. L.

Albery, Irving James

Burton, Colonel H. W.

Eden, Captain Anthony

Allen, Sir J. Sandeman (Llverp'l., W.)

Butler, R. A.

Edmondson, Major A. J.

Allen, W. E. D. (Belfast, W.)

Cadogan, Major Hon. Edward

Elliot, Major Walter E.

Atholl, Duchess of

Carver, Major W. H.

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

Baillie-Hamilton, Hon. Charles W.

Castle Stewart, Earl of

Everard, W. Lindsay

Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley (Bewdley)

Cayzer, Sir C. (Chester, City)

Falle, Sir Bertram G.

Balfour, Captain H. H. (I. of Thanet)

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

Ferguson, Sir John

Balniel, Lord

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

Fermoy, Lord

Beaumont, M. W.

Chapman, Sir S.

Fison, F. G. Clavering

Bellairs, Commander Carlyon

Christie, J. A.

Forestler-Walker, Sir L.

Berry, Sir George

Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston Spencer

Ganzoni, Sir John

Bevan, S. J. (Holborn)

Cohen, Major J. Brunei

Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton

Birchall, Major Sir John Dearman

Colfox, Major William Philip

Gibson, C. G. (Pudsey & Otley)

Bird, Ernest Roy

Colman, N. C. D.

Glyn, Major R G. C.

Boothby, R. J. G.

Colville, Major D. J.

Gower, Sir Robert

Bourne, Captain Robert Croft

Cranbourne, Viscount

Grace, John

Bowater, Col. Sir T. Vanslttart

Crichton-Stuart, Lord C.

Graham, Fergus (Cumberland, N.)

Bowyer, Captain Sir George E. W.

Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.

Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.

Boyce, H. L.

Crookshank, Capt. H. C.

Gunston, Captain D. W.

Bracken, B.

Croon-Johnson, R. P.

Hamilton, Sir George (Ilford)

Bralthwaite, Major A. N.

Cunilffe-Lister, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip

Hartington, Marquess of

Brass, Captain Sir William

Dairymple-White, Lt.-Col. Sir Godfrey

Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)

Briscoe, Richard George

Davies, Dr. Vernon

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

Brown, Col. D. C. (N'th'l'd., Hexham)

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

Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel Arthur P.

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

Davison, Sir W. H. (Kensington, S.)

Howard-Bury, Colonel C. K.

Buchan, John

Dawson, Sir Philip

Hurd, Percy A.

Buckingham, Sir H.

Duckworth, G. A. V.

James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert

1208

1209

King, Commodore Rt. Hon. Henry D.

Ormsby-Gore, Rt. Hon. William

Spender-Clay, Colonel H.

Knox, Sir Alfred

Peake, Capt. Osbert

Stanley, Maj. Hon. O. (W'morland}

Lamb, Sir J. Q.

Penny, Sir George

Steel-Maitland, Rt. Hon. Sir Arthur

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

Percy, Lord Eustace (Hastings)

Stuart, J. C. (Moray and Nairn)

Leighton, Major B. E. P.

Peto, Sir Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)

Sueter, Rear-Admiral M. F.

Lewis, Oswald (Colchester)

Pildltch, Sir Philip

Thomas, Major L. B. (King's Norton)

Lleweilln, Major J. J.

Pownall, Sir Assheton

Tinne, J. A.

Long, Major Eric

Ramsbotham, H.

Titchfield, Major the Marquess of

Lymington, Viscount

Remer, John R.

Todd, Capt. A. J.

McConnell, Sir Joseph

Roberts, Sir Samuel (Ecclesall)

Train, J.

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

Ross, Major Ronald D.

Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement

Maitland, A. (Kent, Faversham)

Ruggles-Brise, Lieut.-Colonel E. A.

Turton, Robert Hugh

Makins, Brigadier-General E.

Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)

Vaughan-Morgan, Sir Kenyon

Margesson, Captain H. D.

Salmon, Major I.

Ward, Lieut.-Col. Sir A. Lambert

Marjoribanks, E. C.

Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)

Wardlaw-Milne, J. S.

Mitchell, Sir W. Lane (Streatham)

Sandeman, Sir N. Stewart

Warrender, Sir Victor

Mitchell-Thomson, Rt. Hon. Sir W.

Savery, S. S.

Waterhouse, Captain Charles

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

Shepperson, Sir Ernest Whittome

Wayland, Sir William A.

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

Skelton, A. N.

Wells, Sydney R.

Morrison, W. S. (Glos., Cirencester)

Smith, Louis W. (Sheffield, Hallam)

Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)

Morrison-Bell, Sir Arthur Clive

Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Klnc'dlne, C.)

Wilton, G. H. A. (Cambridge U.)

Muirhead, A. J.

Smith-Carington, Neville W.

Wolmer, Rt. Hon. Viscount

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

Smithers, Waldron

Womersley, W. J.

Nicholson, O. (Westminster)

Somerset, Thomas

Wood, Rt. Hon. Sir Kingsley

Nicholson, Col. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Ptrsf'ld)

Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)

Nield, Rt. Hon. Sir Herbert

Somerville, D. G. (Willesden, East)

TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

Oman, Sir Charles William C.

Southby, Commander A. R. J.

Major Sir George Hennessy and Sir Frederick Thomson.

Resolution agreed to.

SHARING-OUT CLUBS (REGULATION).
Mr. D. G. SOMERVILLE: I beg to move,
"That leave be given to bring in a Bill to ensure the proper financial control and management of sharing-out clubs."
I do not think there is any need to stress the necessity for a Bill of this description. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed!"] One has only got to read any newspaper just now to come across cases where the treasurer or secretary of one of these small loan or slate clubs has misused the money. One also reads of cases where the unfortunate man, rather than face the members of his society or the auditors, has put his head in a gas oven or taken prussic acid. Recently the attention of the House was called to the statement of a magistrate, who pointed out that there were some 20 cases of suicide of these treasurers or secretaries within the last few months. On the 13th I read in the "Daily Mail" that a sum of£581 belonging to the Nag's Head Mutual Loan Club had disappeared. There was the case of an inquest on a man called Cave, who had misused a sum of£100. Then 400 men of the National Omnibus Company, Watford, met the other day to receive the sum of£400 which was to be shared out, and they were informed that this money had disappeared.
These are instances taken at random. There are any number of other cases. During the winter of 1925–26, 32 com-
1210
plaints were received at the Metropolitan Police Courts alone. The 'attitude of the Government, when this matter has been brought up before, is that these cases are too small and too difficult to check. There are so many of these clubs; they spring up in a day, last for three or four months and then disappear. This Bill endeavours to remove the temptation from these men, and the method which I propose in this Bill, which, I may say, is supported from all sides of the House, is that the money be banked in the names of two of the contributors, also in that of the secretary, and that no money can be withdrawn except on the signature of one of the two members and the secretary. I do not think there will be any difficulty in enforcing this Bill, because it is not likely that three members will conspire together to cheat the members of the club. If they did, they would certainly not be trusted again. I agree that it is not an absolute remedy for offences of this sort, but it certainly will reduce the number. These men, who, unfortunately, commit such defalcations, and then commit suicide rather than face their fellow-members, show that they are men with conscience. There are many cases where their relatives have offered to find the money which these men have pilfered.
Then I want to put in a plea for the unfortunate people who have subscribed to these slate clubs. They are certainly very poor people who have not got a banking account, and, unless they sub-

1211
cribe so much every week, they are not at all likely to have anything extra to spend for Christmas. I do hope, therefore, that the House will give a First Reading to this Bill and pass it, and so do away with a scandal which has been prevalent in this country for many years past.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. D. G. Somerville, Mr. West Russell, Rear-Admiral Beamish, Mr. Oliver Baldwin, Mr. Bromley, Mr. Hore-Belisha, and Dr. Morrie-Jones.

SHARING-OUT CLUBS (REGULATION) BILL,
"to ensure the proper financial control and management of sharing-out clubs," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Friday, and to be printed. [Bill 101.]

WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION (No. 2) BILL.
Reported, with Amendments, from Standing Committee B.
Report to lie upon the Table and to be printed.
Minutes of the Proceedings of the Standing Committee to be printed.
Bill, as amended (in the Standing Committee), to be taken into consideration upon Friday, 2nd May, and to be printed. [Bill 103.]

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
That they have agreed to—
Expiring Laws Continuance Bill, without Amendment.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  COAL MINES BILL.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. William Graham): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
  I must ask for the indulgence of the House in presenting what is for any Government a very difficult and intricate subject. I know that from time to time during the speech which I am afraid I must inflict on the Chamber, Members of different parties will wish to ask questions or seek explanations. The Bill is complicated and highly technical, and I am going to ask the indulgence of hon. Friends in all parts of the House while I do my best to expound this subject, knowing that in subsequent stages the fullest information will be given before the Division is taken on Thursday night.
  May I very briefly recall the circumstances which have led up to the introduction of this Bill? Very soon after we came into office on l0th June of this year, we were in consultation with representatives of the Mining Association speaking for the great bulk of colliery proprietors in this country, and the representatives of the Miners' Federation, with a view to ascertaining what steps should be taken to fulfil the pledge under which this Government lay with the miners, and, at the same time, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister indicated, to provide for the better organisation of this industry in Great Britain. During the intervening months, with the exception of our period at The Hague, there has hardly been a week in which we have not been engaged in these discussions, and, as a result of prolonged and careful examination of many aspects of the problem, this Bill, of which I now move the Second Reading, is submitted for the acceptance of the House of Commons.
  There are certain preliminary points of great importance that we must bear clearly in mind in dealing with this question. Let me mention first of all the international aspect, as summarised by a representative committee under the League of Nations some time ago. It was clearly shown in that committee's report that world output and consumption of
  1246
  coal had settled down, over a comparatively fair period, at about 1,200,000,000 metric tons yearly. Normally about one half of that output is produced in the United States of America, and, save in certain times of crisis or difficulty in Europe, there is no appreciable American export either to this or other European countries. The other half of that total, approximately 650,000,000 metric tons, is produced in Europe; and if we take a line through the circumstances of recent years we shall find that output, and, of course, for all practical purposes, demand, have become static; in other words, we are not dealing with an industry in which you have the ordinary economic process of increased output, due to increased efficiency, leading through a lowering of price to an increase in the demand and the better expansion of the market. In this case the whole tendency of the evidence is against what is the ordinary experience. In other words, the tendency of demand makes it extremely improbable whether, even if the fall in the price was more severe, there would be any increase in the demand at all, at all events only an increase within very narrow limits. That is a fundamental consideration in dealing with this question.
  Many hon. Members would say, "Why don't you leave this industry alone and let it work out its own salvation?" That is the view taken by a certain number, a minority, of the coal owners themselves as regards marketing schemes in this country, but, of course, we must realise the plight of the mining districts and the very large sums which have had to be paid from public funds in dealing with the problems that arose in connection with coal, and the fact that the position of this industry, while improving, is still serious and calls for measures of coordination and organisation. I make that perfectly clear because here, whatever may be our party faiths, whatever divides us in economic policy as between an individualist and a Socialist policy, does not really apply. We are not dealing with an industry which responds to the ordinary economic tests. The demand is not elastic. Even if there was an improvement in industrial conditions, it is by no means clear that there would be any appreciable increase in the total quantity of coal consumed.

  1247
  That report to which I have referred, which was prepared with very great care under the auspices of the League of Nations, directed attention to some very remarkable facts. What is it that has contributed to this static demand? Very clearly, of course, there is, in part, the widespread dislocation of industry, exchanges and the rest which followed the War; but there have also been grave industrial changes, strengthened to some extent by the heavy depression or loss which has fallen upon industry during and since the War, leading in the case of Germany to an economy of at least 10 per cent. in the use of coal, and probably, for all I know, to even greater economy in other countries; and further there has been the adaptation of perhaps 38 to 40 per cent. of the world's mercantile marine to the use of oil fuel. In other words there has been a transfer of demand to different forms of fuel which, together with that industrial depression, has contributed to this static element which is the basis of a very large part of this case. That does not mean that I rule out the prospect of improvement. Very far from it. I trust there will be improvement, but I must warn the House that the great burden of evidence is to the effect that at best it will be an improvement in demand within limits. In short, this is not an industry responding to ordinary economic tests.
  Let us turn to the circumstances in our own country prior to the War. I suppose the peak point in output was 287,000,000, or about 290,000,000 tons a year. In any case that has fallen and has settled down within recent years to something between 245,000,000 and 250,000,000 tons. I am glad to think that according to our Board of Trade statistics up to the end of November, in all probability the figures for 1929 will be a little better, and that we shall probably touch 255,000,000 tons. For that every Member of this House will be grateful; but in any event we are about 30,000,000 to 35,000,000 tons worse than at the best in pre-War days. The static condition which I have described in the case of European coal is also true, of course, of the British position. In other words, over the past five years we have been moving around a figure of 240,000,000, 245,000,000 or 250,000,000 tons. There has been a certain fall in the home
  1248
  demand, but far more important and far more critical from another point of view is the fall in the exports of British coal and the great change which has overtaken our place in important European markets. Excluding bunker coal, we probably got rid of 70,000,000 to 75,000,000 tons a year before the War. To-day we are finding it difficult to export more than 50,000,000 to 55,000,000 tons, and the tragedy of a great deal of that export is that it has been effected on terms of either no return at all or on what is frankly a non-remunerative basis. That is conceded by every authority on any side of politics who has applied his mind to this important part of the problem of the industry.
  I am not going to suggest that we must sit down to-day and take a gloomy view. I am satisfied, after talking with many of the highest experts in British coal production, that if they are given a chance, if there is some kind of order instead of chaos, they will win their way back in those European markets, not, perhaps, immediately to the full extent that we enjoyed in pre-War times, but at all events to some extent. The importance of this for our shipping industry and the bearing of those outward freights on the return cargoes to this country and the easing of the general price level, apart from the great export considerations which are involved, must be plain to every Member of this Assembly.
  So much, in very brief outline, for the economic background of our task. The whole object of this introduction has been to ask for complete impartiality, in the interests of this industry and all depending upon it, and for a fair and a reasonable view of what is not an ordinary or normal proposition. The coal industry has been the subject of investigation on previous occasions. There was the Sankey Commission in 1919. There was the Macmillan Inquiry directed to a specific point in 1923. There was the Report of the Royal Commission in 1925 over which my right hon. Friend the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel) presided, and I would like to join in the innumerable tributes which have been paid to the work of that Commission. And since that time there has been a good deal of inquiry, and more particularly for the purposes of this Bill this afternoon the inquiry which was virtually delegated by

  1249
  the Royal Commission to the Lewis Committee on selling agencies or marketing schemes devoted to coal. The Royal Commission on the coal industry indicated to us that there were grave weaknesses in the disposal of the commodity, that better prices could probably be obtained, but that they were impressed by the unremunerative level to which prices had fallen, and that the subject should be investigated. As a result of that recommendation, the Lewis Committee was set up under a very distinguished business man and containing in its ranks representatives of the coal owners and also representatives of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain. It is of vital importance that the House should clearly recall the tenor of that Report this afternoon.
  I am afraid that this speech, however short I try to make it, will occupy some time, because the House will agree that it is of great importance that I should explain what I believe to be the facts and the principles of the Bill. I will try to use as few statistics as possible—rather difficult for me—and put the case just as attractively as a case of this kind can be put. What was the burden of the recommendation of the Lewis Committee? There is not the least doubt that they were impressed by the experiences on the selling side of the coal industry of the Rhenish-Westphalian scheme. They showed that you had there the disposal of very large quantities of coal by a relatively small number of organisations. That organisation parted with the output of coal to an associated syndicate for disposal in terms of something like order and organisation, and was so designed as to get a remunerative or fair price level. The majority of the members of the Lewis Committee said there ought to be every effort to set up these selling agencies or marketing schemes by owners themselves, and that if, after a reasonable time, that was not done, and provided you could get the support. of 75 per cent. of the owners in any particular district, it should be for Parliament to consider—this is the important point—whether any measure of compulsion should be introduced.
  To that broad recommendation, with all the relevant evidence which was supplied, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Mr. Hartshorn) and my friend Mr. Frank Varley, whom many Members of this House will remember
  1250
  with affection, signed a minority statement in which they expressed the view that this optional or permissive period was really dangerous, and while they agreed that perhaps some time should be given, they were definitely of opinion that a measure of compulsion was essential. Those two reports were really parts of one report, because the majority report was signed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore and his colleague, and they only added that other part as an addition expressing their views. To that report there was a minority statement signed by three coal owners. I do not think I am doing an injustice to that minority statement when I describe it as one of the most hardened individualistic messages of the time. For all practical purposes they resort to the argument, "Let this industry alone. A certain measure of recovery will come." It is a very remarkable thing that the leading figure who signed that minority statement in 1926 is one of the signatory parties to the South Wales scheme which proposes compulsion at the present time. There is hardly anyone whom I have met in recent times who is prepared to say that that minority statement is any use at all in the circumstances which have now emerged. Beyond the shadow of a doubt there has been a great change in the opinion of this industry as regards those marketing schemes otherwise the proposals which have been brought up to this point during the preparation of this Bill would never have been possible.
  We have to consider how Tar this measure is in conformity with the recommendations of the majority of the Lewis Committee, and whether what is proposed in our measure of compulsion is justified. What have the owners themselves told us? I want in the discussion this afternoon, so far as I am concerned, to wipe out all recriminations. I am not going to apportion blame for what happened in 1926 or before, or after, or anything like that. That is of no use in this controversy. Our whole object is to try to come together to frame, if we can, a scheme for the recovery of the British coal industry at least on its marketing side, and that is our main consideration. I fall back upon the case which the owners themselves have put up for the organisation of this industry, and I ask the House first of all to note what has

  1251
  been overtaken before this scheme was put before them. When the owners recognised that things could not remain as they were in different parts of the country in 1928 proposals were submitted on voluntary lines. The chief of these was the five-county scheme in Yorkshire covering in fact nine counties in all, including Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Cheshire, Warwickshire and other parts of the Midland coalfields. In due course on voluntary lines that organisation covered some 90 per cent. of the output in what is undoubtedly one of the most efficient and one of the most productive parts of the British coal-fields.
  Of course it contained proposals which will have to be brought into line and altered if a Bill of this kind is to be passed; but in substance, on that voluntary basis, it got all its membership to agree, to the application of a basic or standard tonnage to their pits, and to the application to that standard tonnage of quota, and beyond that power to levy for the express purpose of assisting the export trade in coal and for other steps which were taken as the objects of the Central Counties Association. In South Wales there was a scheme which was by no means so complete. Broadly speaking the South Wales scheme only came as a certain regulation of minimum prices, but it covered a very large part of the South Wales output of coal.
  In Northumberland and Durham there was also a scheme which was very largely in the nature of minimum prices fixation, and all this is true largely of the 1928 position. There was a scheme which covered 90 per cent. of Scottish coal production which was based on two levies, one of 6d. per ton on other than export coal and a somewhat higher levy related to a differential price for public utilities, and out of the product of that it provided the fund for what was in that case the temporary extinction of what are described as uneconomic mines. The Scottish scheme broke down for two reasons among others. It was not related to basic tonnage under a quota system. The result was that while they got no product in many of the uneconomic units the production tended to increase in the others and the scheme defeated itself.
  1252
  The other reason was that in the early part of this year there was a cold spell which gave a temporary stimulus to the industry in this country, and one of the remarkable features of this industry has been that whenever it has got any artificial stimulus, whether it was the occupation of the Ruhr or the destruction of French mines or this cold spell, the organisation has tended to fall back and disappear for the time being, and that is the situation with which we are confronted. The five-county scheme has remained in substance, but we know that some partners in the scheme have given notice to withdraw from it as from the 31st December this year. Anyone who studies the details of this scheme will see that the promoters were driven to make one concession after another because they were operating on a voluntary basis. At the present time these temporary efforts in the direction of marketing have, to all intents and purposes, excluding the five-county scheme, either broken down or got no where at all. We were then confronted with what the owners themselves had to meet when we came into office in June. I believe that if we could have understood each other many of the difficulties with which we were subsequently confronted would have disappeared.
  It may be argued that the Government could impose schemes of this kind on the lines that the Government wanted in every coalfield in Great Britain. I do not believe that that is practical politics for a single moment. I have never in any way altered my own economic view, or abandoned any other large industrial proposition, in this sense that I am perfectly satisfied that the inevitable tendency of industry is towards large scale organisation, and beyond that, to public corporations, but I recognise that that is not before us, and we have not yet won a majority for that in this country. We could not act in defiance of the owners themselves. We were satisfied that the terms were fair, and that there were reasonable safeguards, and the scheme contained the elasticity essential to these proposals. The owners themselves, in almost their first interview with the Prime Minister and members of the Cabinet Committee on this subject, said that they were taking steps to deal with the marketing of coal, but they were satisfied that they would not be able to

  1253
  complete their arrangements unless they had compulsory powers. By that they meant powers to bring in a minority in any district where that minority proposed to remain outside. That is the view of the owners. That is, of course, the hardest part of such schemes as have already been attempted. We said that we would be prepared to do everything in our power to co-operate in that effort, and a large part of the discussion in the intervening period has been directed towards the preparation or approval of schemes and proposals which we felt could be brought within an Act of Parliament. This present Bill, which is a comparatively small element in a large proposition, does nothing more than indicate the kind of machinery, national and district, which, in our view, 10 essential for this purpose.
  Let me tell the House what has been overtaken so far by the owners. They have prepared schemes in practically all the large coal-producing districts. There is a scheme in South Wales, which is, I think, the best of the schemes so far, and which is closest to the terms of this Bill. It covers, I am informed, 86 per cent. of the output in that area. There is a scheme for Yorkshire and the adjacent counties in which even a higher proportion is covered. There are schemes for Northumberland, Durham, and other areas, which have the support, not of so high a percentage, but of a substantial percentage of the owners, if I exclude the difficulty in Durham at the present time. Scotland has not produced a scheme up to the present. I regret that my countrymen should be diffident in a, matter of this kind, but we are a cautious race, and I suppose they are waiting in Scotland to see the terms of the legislation, to see what progress is made by the House of Commons, and what attitude is adopted by hon. Members. I hope very much, however, that they will submit their scheme, because there are important parts of the Scottish demand and of the Scottish output which are bound up with the export trade, and, if schemes were in force in all parts of the coalfields in this country, it would, in my judgment, be quite impossible for Scotland to remain outside. I feel sure that, the moment the economic advantage is apparent, my countrymen will come in. That is the progress that we have made.
  1254
  I have undertaken not to worry the House with too much technical detail, because I assume that, in the case of an important Bill of this kind, hon. Members have read, not only the Memorandum, but the text of the Bill, and I will summarise it as briefly as I possibly can. Broadly speaking, there is set up an inter-district or national scheme for the purpose of co-ordinating the district schemes. The national scheme is representative of the owners in all the ascertainment areas in Great Britain. It is the duty of that national body to arrive at what in their view is the aggregate demand for British coal, or the amount of coal for a reasonable period ahead which, in their judgment, could be sold. Then they make the district allocation, that is to say, an allocation to the different districts of the country in terms of what those districts have been doing, and the operative part of this Measure then passes to the owners in the 21 districts which are specified in the Schedule to the Bill. These are the wages ascertainment districts of this country, and from some points of view there are advantages in having areas which are familiar to the owners and to the men. But I want to make it perfectly plain that, if I were a free agent in this matter, or a dictator in dealing with coal, I would reduce these areas to four, five, six, or a very much lower number. The great advantage of reducing the number of areas would be that you would have less difficulty in co-ordinating the national machinery and far less prospect of doubt or confusion or conflict of interest among the districts themselves. Hon. Members will, however, observe that the Bill provides for the amalgamation of districts, and I am advised by the highest authorities in this country that there will be an inevitable tendency in the direction of the amalgamation of those districts for the purposes of more effectively and efficiently working this proposal.
  I pass now to the district machinery. The operative part of the district machinery is a district association of the owners, who are charged with the duty of fixing the standard or basic tonnage for every pit or undertaking within the area. They then apply the quota to arrive at the amount which is passed on to them from the national or co-ordinating machinery. They provide for independent arbitration if any owner within

  1255
  the district is dissatisfied with his basic tonnage, which I will call now the standard tonnage, or with his quota, or with any other conditions or terms which are part of the scheme. That, broadly speaking, is the national and the district machinery. There is provision for arbitration in the national machinery, as there is in the districts themselves.
  The House will observe, and I do not disguise it for a single moment, that a large responsibility has been laid upon the owners, subject to the terms of this Bill, and that they form the operative part in the districts, largely because of the importance which we attach to securing their agreement to taking this responsibility. There is, of course, the fundamental safeguard that all these schemes must be approved of in addition by the Board of Trade, and, as I shall show later in dealing with the possibility of abuse under these schemes, that approval may be withdrawn, and, in the last resort, the Board itself has the power to put in a scheme, although I want to make it perfectly plain that I trust that, with good will and co-operation, the necessity for such a state of affairs will never arise. I hope that there will be a desire to work this plan amicably in the interests of a great industry, and that everyone will contribute to that object.
  So much for the national and district machinery. I want to pass now to some of the most important questions which I have not the least doubt are in the minds of hon. Members on the official Opposition benches, and which are certainly raised in the Liberal reasoned Amendment for the rejection of this Bill. I firmly believe that in terms of the explanation which I am going to give this afternoon a very large part, if not the whole, of that difficulty will be removed. Of course, I make it perfectly plain that this is a Measure which will necessarily have an acute Committee stage, in which the Government will welcome every constructive contribution to its improvement. It is a technical proposal, and there is not a single hon. Member on our benches who would maintain that we have said the last word on this subject. Very far from it. One of the powers which it is proposed to confer is a power to fix minimum prices. I do not think I need unduly detain the House this afternoon
  1256
  on that point. There are many critics who suggest that, if you get an accurate basic or standard tonnage—I will allude to that matter in a moment—and if the quota applied to that is also accurate, the price fixation may be left to take care of itself; that, in other words, the output and quota will be so complete that prices would be regulated of themselves.
  From some points of view there is a good deal to be said for an argument of that kind, but I am advised that, even if you had very accurate figures, even if you had attained that measure of perfection which I do not think is given to us in human affairs, it will still be possible to find weak sellers within a district, and the presence of a very few weak sellers would undermine the scheme in that area, and would perpetuate the very vices which have shown themselves in some schemes in different parts of Great Britain. In the South Wales, scheme, which may be taken as a test case—it is a great export area, which is in the grip of industrial distress, and so on—the power to fix minimum prices is definitely taken, and I think I can say with safety that there is no scheme propounded from any part of the country in which the same element does not figure. I am speaking from memory, and am subject to correction, but that is my reading of every scheme, and I have examined the details of practically all of them. That is the fixing of the minimum price below which coal classified in the terms proposed in this Bill, and classified not only as regards the quality of the coal but as regards the destination of the coal, shall not be sold. That is a very important consideration. Minimum price regulation is fixed in terms of classification on the lines provided in Part IV of this Measure.
  Let me now turn to a very difficult and intricate subject, namely, the question of standard tonnage and the quota applied to it. When the Five Counties Scheme set out on its campaign of regulation, it necessarily had to make al] kinds of concessions to get people in, and it took, for the purposes of standard tonnage, any year in the 15 years down to the 31st December, 1927. The difficulties of a long period of that kind are plain in the kind of problem which is now under discussion. The South Wales scheme which is now before us

  1257
  proposes to take any one of six quarters up to the middle of 1928, or a month in the early part of this year, subject to certain problematical conditions with which I must not trouble the House, and to make that the standard tonnage basis. But beyond all question the ideal method of approaching this problem is to take an approved recent period for the purposes of standard tonnage, provided that we are satisfied that it represents fairly and equitably what the particular colliery has been doing, and I press that point with very great emphasis in this Debate. A large part of the problem of the so-called uneconomic mines, which is now so acute, will disappear if, under this Measure, in the different districts, there is a proper fixing of the standard tonnage. When that is done, and the quota is applied to it, the question of the uneconomic mine will be, I do not say wholly, but very largely, removed.
  That is the position as regards the basic tonnage, the quota, and the fixing of the minimum price. Let me turn to another very important consideration raised in the Amendment which has been put down by hon. Members on the Liberal benches, and which also, I think, is supported so far by some of the criticism which I have seen offered by Members of the official Opposition. There are, as I happen to know, many hon. Members on the Unionist benches who consider that some scheme of this kind is necessary. They may have their doubts, hut they know that you cannot go on selling coal at an unremunerative rate, and that some kind of order must be introduced into the matter. Other hon. Members on the Liberal benches make similar concessions, but dislike or are afraid of the method which is proposed. But part of the criticism has been directed to what is called the subsidy—the levy that is proposed on coal raised for the purpose of assisting either the export trade or, it may be, the supply of coal to the depressed industries in Great Britain. Let me deal very frankly and as clearly as I possibly can with that problem.
  First of all I would say to the House that they must bear clearly in mind that, if that element disappears from this Bill, if we refuse to give, in the case of these district schemes, the power to make an arrangement of that kind, it would still be open to district coalowners organised in this country, but on volun-
  1258
  tary lines, for that purpose, to make a levy of that description. The difference would lie in this, that they would have no power to compel a minority for such purposes, and, when we seek to bring the minority into this scheme, we must specify the purposes in the actual scheme, so that it can be applied, perhaps, over a large part of coal production, or over a scattered part, or in some smaller shape or form. Of course, I do not adopt that as by any means a final argument on that policy. I think also that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about the term "subsidy" itself in this connection. If this industry had been able to arrive at some method of working out what is called in other industries a differential price, that is to say, charging a certain price to a particular class of demand, either inside the country or outside, such as the market can bear, and easing the price to other classes of demand, probably very little would have been heard of the "subsidy" argument at all; but the fact remains that it was put in this form in the Five Counties Scheme, it figured in the temporary scheme in Scotland, and it is included in most, if not all, of the other schemes which the owners put forward for the purposes of this Bill.
  5.0 p.m.
  I must make plain an important consideration. This is not proposed, even if the Bill went through in its present form, for the purpose of placing coal on European markets at a loss, or in terms of the ordinarily accepted meaning of a subsidy at all. The real object of this proposal is to enable the coal industry in Great Britain to compete at the world price, and for this purpose that is the European price. If I can make that abundantly clear during this Debate and during the Committee stage, I think that much of our difficulty will be removed. Hon. Members might say that there is a certain improvement in the export trade, and that is true. I am glad to think that our exports of coal are 10,000,000 tons better to the end of November this year than they were in the corresponding period last year. But it is also true that we shall have the greatest difficulty in recovering more than a portion of the export trade that we enjoyed before the War, and I do not want, at this stage at all events, to rule out a proposal of this kind if we can find one that is sound and

  1259
  on equitable lines. That is the state of affairs. It is not proposed to subsidise coal in the ordinary sense, but merely to enable the industry to compete at the world price and to get its share of European markets if they can possibly be recovered at all. So much for that stage of the problem; but I am quite prepared to rest the case on another and, as I regard it, a much more hopeful proposal. What has been going on in Europe within recent times in the discussion of these markets? Poland has acquired a very great advantage, largely at the expense of Great Britain, in the Scandinavian markets. Germany has had certain advantages in other directions. Only within recent times has there been a discussion between the representatives of the Five County Scheme and German and Polish producers. There are some proposals for the allocation of the European markets, which are not acceptable to many of the coal producers in Europe. There are other proposals which seek to arrive at some kind of price agreement in order that those countries may make up their minds not to undersell one another, not to offer coal at a loss in what is practically a suicidal competition.
  What is the difficulty of making progress along those lines? If we take Poland and Germany to-day we shall find that a very large part of their export trade is concentrated. In this country it is very largely scattered, and it is plain, from an analysis of these detailed discussions, that until we have some kind of organisation enabling us to present a united front in Great Britain to German and Polish and French or other Continental coal in competition, we have little or no chance of getting an effective place in international agreements. The owners have said in the plainest terms in the five county scheme they do not like this so-called subsidy any more than we do. My own belief—and I quite realise the difficulties of the so-called retaliatory argument—would be that the very presence of the power to use it would make it certain that it was never used and that, in fact, the ability to enter into those discussions in terms of this co-ordination on something like lines of reasonable equality would strengthen the hands of these pioneers—because they
  1260
  are pioneers, in British industry—who have conducted those discussions and widened them to include in our representation representatives of the Mining Association itself.
  I am not going to say here, having lived with this subject for five or six months, that the path of international agreement is easy. I should absolutely mislead the House if I said anything of the kind. But I say that, in the absence of some plan of this kind, the difficulties are very greatly increased, and already there are signs that, the moment a plan of this kind is practical politics and is accepted in Great Britain, there will be a movement in those European countries of a very valuable character to Great Britain, because they have been impressed by the aggregate static demand for European coal in terms of that 650,000,000 metric tons to which I alluded earlier in my speech. That is a thing that can be analysed in great detail and I will give additional information during the Committee stage.
  I want to turn now to another very important point in the Liberal Amendment. It is suggested there that, under this scheme of fixation of a basic tonnage and a quota, you are giving a vested interest to the uneconomic mine. In other words, you confer upon it the right to the production of coal which probably it could not produce at the present time and, when you pass to any scheme of coordination, you have to expropriate for probably a substantial sum the rights which this legislation will confer on the weaker units. It is a perfectly fair argument and I want to meet it in the frankest and fullest possible manner. First of all, if the standard tonnage is accurately fixed, a very large part of that difficulty will disappear. If that standard tonnage is related to a recent short period, if it has regard to what has been actually happening in coal production, then I do not agree that you are going to confer on those units some advantage, or fictitious advantage, and moreover I want to make it perfectly plain that, if that standard tonnage is so applied, all the evidence shows that it does not follow that these collieries are going to produce at a profit. It may reduce their loss in existing conditions, but it does not guarantee that, if the conditions of the industry change, they

  1261
  will become prosperous propositions. So that the basic tonnage or the standard tonnage itself is a very large part of the remedy. But it is also common ground that it is very difficult indeed to define uneconomic mines. There are certain mines to-day losing money which are thoroughly up-to-date in equipment, which have all the latest electrical and other plant and which, with the best will in the world, cannot raise coal at a remunerative level or at a profit. I could take hon. Members to other mines which have antiquated machinery and are out of date in nine out of ten parts of their equipment and they are producing coal at a profit. It is not a test of either the equipment or of the finance of the undertaking.
  The uneconomic mine is something which is not a good proposition to-day because of some difficulty either in the seams or in the market—something extraneous or something within the industry or within the mine. To-morrow those circumstances may change and it becomes an economic proposition. But I am not going to suggest for a moment that that removes the very practical difficulty which all along I have recognised in this connection. It is very difficult indeed to define the uneconomic mine but, broadly speaking, we know that the aggregate capacity of this country, with the existing plant, is about 330,000,000 tons, and that the aggregate amount the industry is producing, and the market can absorb, is about 250,000,000 to 255,000,000 tons. In other words, a great excess of capacity exists over the amount of coal for which you can find disposal on almost any terms at all.
  How do we propose to try to meet that situation? I quite agree, in terms of the Amendment, that you would not help the industry if there was no way of progressively getting rid of these uneconomic propositions once you have proved them to be truly uneconomic. What is the contribution that we propose to that end? First of all, this standard tonnage and quota are applied to the undertaking. Speaking from memory there are probably 3,000 pits belonging to about 1,500 undertakings, but there are 500, 600 or 700 undertakings producing over 90 per cent. of the output and about 86 per cent. of the output is concentrated in 300 or 350,
  1262
  or some number of undertakings of that kind. I beg hon. Members to observe that that standard tonnage and quota are applied to the undertaking and that the undertaking will be itself the owner of a certain number of collieries which may reach up to a fair, although in no case within my knowledge a very large number.
  What will be the tendency of the Bill? For the first time, you are bringing the owners together in these district schemes. You are making them all part and parcel of a district organisation. That in itself would be no mean achievement. But there is allocated to the undertaking a certain amount of coal which it has to raise and which it is itself free to raise as it pleases. Surely there will be a very strong pressure, to put it no higher, on the part of that undertaking to concentrate its output on its most efficient unit. There must be a tendency of that kind, and to that extent an immediate contribution is offered. But, of course, there are other tendencies which are not less important. Here you have a district board operating an organisation of the owners. Let us assume that, in the application of the quota, the output of certain pits is reduced in order to bring them within the terms of this scheme.
  This Bill provides, and the district schemes provide, for a transfer of quota. That is, they may purchase, even temporarily, or it may be permanently, from the quota that belongs to other pits, and I suggest that over a very considerable part of the field there will be transfers of quota and, therefore, another contribution will be the concentration of output on the most efficient proposition. Of course, hon. Members will say that that constitutes a burden on the more efficient pits. They have to purchase that quota. That is true, but in the absence of a scheme of this kind do you get rid of that problem? That uneconomic pit may remain on the map, and the extraordinary thing about this industry is that it does remain. The uneconomic propositions would be forced out, it may be, by sheer pressure, but so long as they can keep going at all, so long as they can keep their heads above water, and sometimes not even above water, they carry on, and the moment there is any improvement they appear again upon the

  1263
  scene, as they did in the Scottish scheme, where they again came into the field, and you lose all the advantage of your organisation.
  You do not therefore get rid of the problem of the uneconomic unit by merely saying the transfer of this quota will be a burden on other pith and, in any case, if the weak unit were to be exterminated it could only be exterminated in some terms of compensation or recognition of its assets in the capital of the amalgamated company. So that in amalgamation plans for any district in this country there would still be a question of making provision within the industry—because no one suggests a contribution from public funds; that is quite out of the question—for the expropriation of those pits. Therefore, the net test before us is a test of transfer of quota and temporary payments on the one side, which may shade into permanent suspension, and a definite capital charge, on the other, involved in buying out and getting rid of the competition of the undertaking with other mines. That is the essence of that part of the problem. I suggest that there again you have a case which is worthy of investigation, which in fact meets the arguments addressed to us.
  I will make another proposition to the House. The Scottish scheme contained a very interesting proposition. Part of the levy that was raised from two sources in Scottish coal while that scheme was in use was devoted to the extinction of uneconomic pits, temporarily, largely in that case, permanently in some cases. But, for the reasons I have given, that scheme broke down. There was no quota. They had no proper regulation, the increase of production was not stopped and the whole thing was hopeless. Now it may be that you can devise a method of making some kind of levy, and paying part of it to the extinction of these uneconomic units within the industry. If so, I have not a single word to say against it. I welcome any constructive contributions on those lines. I am prepared to consider anything at this stage which moves along what virtually is a common road towards the more effective large scale organisation of coal production.
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  The Royal Commission, over which my right hon. Friend presided, said that there were far too many separate undertakings in Great Britain. He and his colleagues contrasted that large number of undertakings with the far smaller number in Germany and in other European coal producing countries. I have not a single word to say in opposition to that view. There is over the whole industry, or over a large part of industry in Great Britain, a growing concentration. Many Members have said that we have virtually achieved a trust. We have international arrangements in steel and in other great commodities, and, in my view, that process will continue and will probably be accelerated in its effects. It is a remarkable fact that we have made very little progress in coal. The Royal Commission in 1925 took a definite line against compulsory amalgamation. They said that they would prefer to do it on voluntary lines, but they also indicated that it should at least have a trial run, and the Act was passed on a permissive basis by our predecessors in office in 1926. Are the Government exposed to any charge of losing time on this problem? I submit that on the following facts they are not. In the statement which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister made to the House of Commons, he clearly indicated in his first important speech after the General Election that we were going to embark upon what contribution we could make to the co-ordination of the coal industry.
  In our discussions with the coalowners that point was raised, but we had to concentrate, first of all, and, I think, quite properly, on these marketing schemes which were designed to stop the sale of coal at a loss or at an unremunerative level and to get into this industry some co-ordination for the purpose of improvement and for the legitimate and just amelioration in hours and working conditions which we had promised, and in my judgment rightly promised, to the depressed mining community in Great Britain. Not only did we take these steps and make that inquiry, but the Royal Commission itself said that there should be a period of two or three years. I ought to say, in passing, that the Liberal Industrial Report adopts for this purpose very largely the Majority Report of the Lewis Committee, and also to a very large extent these proposals

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  for amalgamation of the Royal Commission, with the further proposal that Commissioners should be set up for the purpose of framing a scheme if voluntary methods did not succeed.
  We have had two Reports under the Mining Industry Act, and I suggest this afternoon that we could not reasonably have acted until we had had at least two Reports showing what had been done, and having satisfied ourselves beyond a shadow of doubt that progress was not going to be made on voluntary lines. The first Report was issued in November, 1928, and the second Report I issued to hon. Members from the Board of Trade yesterday. Those two Reports show beyond a shadow of doubt that progress in mines amalgamation is negligible in this country. It does not cover one-seventh or one-eighth of the industry, and even the returns in those Reports are to some extent redundant. Beyond a few amalgamations we are not making any progress in this matter. The fundamental controversy is whether we are to continue on voluntary lines, or apply a method of compulsion. I am satisfied now that the voluntary basis has broken down, and accordingly the Government wish to make it perfectly clear this afternoon, that without any addition to this legislation at all but, as I am at present advised, on the powers that we possess under the Mining Industry Act, 1920, particularly Section 22, and other legislation we can set up a Committee or Commissioners, not for the purpose of dilatory inquiry or anything like that, but for the preparation of a scheme which is designed to work out the district for a colliery amalgamation, th6 collieries which would be amalgamated, to indicate the terms and basis of what will necessarily be a difficult and technical undertaking to embark on, and complete that task at the earliest possible moment. We undertake that that will be later embodied in legislation and will be offered for the approval of this House.
  The real question is: Is that the most rapid method of achieving this end? I think that hon. Members will agree that if this is to be compulsory, we have to face, I am afraid, the opposition of a considerable section in the industry. There is not the least doubt about that. I would prefer to do things by agreement. That is my whole disposition and temperament, but you are not dealing with
  1266
  an ordinary proposition. The most rapid way of preparing teat scheme is on the lines I have indicated. You have two great forces running side by side, the tendency to amalgamations inevitably fostered by the proposals of this Bill, and the accelerated voluntary amalgamations which, I believe, will follow when this Bill is passed, together with the knowledge that the preparation of the amalgamation scheme is going on. The preparation of that scheme will complete the field insofar as it is not already accomplished, and then become an appropriate matter for the consideration of this House. So there, I submit to hon. Members who have doubt about the uneconomic units and about the amalgamations, is a programme just as complete and as rapid as it can possibly be made. I beg hon. Members also to remember that every colliery that is closed leaves either a village or a derelict community or a social problem behind. The House must recognise that every effort should be made to provide work in other occupations, but we all know in our hearts, whatever may be our party politics, the supreme difficulty of overtaking a task of that character, in view of foreign competition in the markets of the world, and changing conditions following the War and great burdens upon industry and commerce. That is the point regarding amalgamations.
  I want to say a word or two about another difficulty which has arisen regarding the price level of British coal, land I will try to put this part of the case as briefly as I possibly can. Quite plainly, if we set out to increase prices by four or five shillings a ton according to the fantastic figures of some newspapers—it is round about midnight when these leading articles are written and that is not the time for scientific study—we should deserve to be driven from office at a little more than an hour's notice. But do let the House face the situation. Can anyone believe that this industry itself would propound a scheme which was going to encourage at a stroke the use of alternatives which already compete so strongly, and contribute to the further depression of British coal. That could be the only effect of any fantastic increase of the price level on these lines. Already there is grave competition with oil fuel. The whole of the coal industry is aware of that fact. The burden of this

  1267
  part of the Bill is not to sell at terms which may rightly be regarded as an extravagant profit, but to stop the sale of coal at a loss, to get a good average price in those parts of the market which can bear that price, and to relieve the price in other parts of the, market. This should be accomplished if this industry is to be saved. Nobody disputes that between 35,000,000 and 40,000,000 tons of coal are going to public utility organisations in Great Britain which in a large part of that area is not obtaining a remunerative or even an economic price. The same is true of certain parts of the export trade. As regards that export trade, there are people interested in coal on the North-East Coast at the present time who are going into these markets and selling coal at a dead loss, or on terms with which owners cannot possibly compete, for certain temporary advantages. There is no method of dealing with that under existing conditions.
  I will, however, concentrate for the moment on the home market. As regards those public utility organisations, I say not a single word in criticism of their work this afternoon. We on these benches, perhaps as much as any party in the House—I will not put it higher than that—have had a regard for them as being regulated public utilities. Electricity is regulated under two great Acts of 1919 and 1926. Gas is regulated under a whole series of Acts of Parliament. Railway companies are regulated under the Act of 1921, there are public institutions of one kind and another. These are industries which have either some form of guaranteed return or a monopolistic nature, or have the power of passing on to consumers increased charges. On the other side, you have the coal industry, exposed to grave difficulty on the home front, and still greater difficulty in the export trade. An unsheltered industry: if ever that phrase could be used it is true of coal.
  I have discussed this matter with members of those industries who know bow difficult that position is. They do not dispute that it is only fair that they should pay a reasonable price for their coal. I know that they have made a protest, as they were bound to do, but the fact remains that you cannot go on selling coal on that basis, and there is no method of stopping it until these
  1268
  schemes come into operation. This is part of the plan which this Bill applies. But as regards home consumers and other classes, and more particularly the heavy industries, the definite desire is to give them coal on the best possible terms, whether that is done by the ordinary differential price without any contribution, or is done in terms of that contribution. I ask the House to ask itself this simple question. The whole burden of the Royal Commission's Report in 1925 showed that unless those heavy industries recovered, there would not be restored the domestic demand for British coal. Is the coal industry, which is bound up with iron and steel, going to cut its own throat by penalising those industries? A mere statement of the case is sufficient. Moreover, the amount of coal that is bought abroad for iron and steel plant is limited. A great deal of coal goes to foreign railways and to public utility concerns. In any case in these foreign countries, as in this country, the coal is closely associated with the iron and steel trades, because proximity is the very essence of the economic processes in these industries. I hope that I have said enough to remove a great deal of doubt on this point.
  Then, still dealing with the consumer, there is the machinery of the Bill. There is the machinery of these Committees consisting of representatives of miners, owners and the public with an independent and impartial chairman. That is a representative committee for the express purpose of dealing with problems, sent to them from any district. There may be difficulties, there may bee even abuses in some part of a district scheme. We have there a Committee which can investigate that upon the spot, which has power to call for information from the local association and which after consideration can, if necessary, send the complaint on to the Board of Trade. We on our part will do everything in our power to secure the amendment of the scheme. In this case it would be a question of price, although I hope that will not occur, at any rate, not very frequently. After a period, in which a voluntary scheme may continue—if it conforms to the national scheme, and has been approved by the owners and the Board of Trade—the Board of Trade has power failing that to submit a scheme

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  itself. I do not believe that the owners in any district will willingly pursue a path which will lead to that. Part of their great difficulty under this Bill was that they regretted the necessity of Government regulation and control. We have taken sufficient power of regulation and control, but, apart from that machinery, the great underlying safeguard is the mass of coal competing with other forms of fuel, and beyond that, any step which this Government would certainly take under the powers of the Consumers' Council, if there was definite abuse as regards retail price. Of course, I must make it plain to the House that this Bill does not touch other legislation which may come at a later date—I cannot make any specific promise about it this afternoon—which may be required to settle a problem of this kind.
  This is not an industry that can ever be reorganised in the terms of one Act of Parliament. There is a gulf between the pithead price in this country and the price which the consumers have to pay. There is far too great a drop. That was analysed at considerable length by the Royal Commission presided over by the right hon. Member for Darwen. Apart from what I have said about abuse, and the pit-head price, and apart from what I have said about the power of the Consumers' Council in this matter, into which I cannot go this afternoon, there is now an important movement going on which can only be accelerated by this measure between the owners on one side and the Coal Merchants' Federation of Great Britain on the other, when the owners are organised in the terms of this Bill. They themselves have recognised the danger and the force of public criticism applied to that gap between pit-head and retail prices, and they are even now in discussion with the coal merchants for the express purpose a getting rid of a substantial part of that intermediate element. I see no chance whatever of effective progress being achieved on these lines if the owners remain scattered and fighting with one another in their different districts, in the absence of the co-ordination which this Bill provides. It is true that you leave them a certain amount of elasticity, but when you have your standard tonnage and your quota, it becomes the common interest in that district to see that they get the best price at the pit-head, and that they do
  1270
  not get unfair treatment by the retailer. A large part of the criticism that I have heard expressed in many quarters against the mining community springs from this abuse of retail prices which has little or nothing to do with the pit-head price of coal which, over a large part of the field, has been too low.
  I am afraid that I have very much exceeded my time—[Host. MEMBERS: "Go on!"]—and I want to be very brief with the other two parts of the Bill. With regard to hours of work there is, frankly, a direct division of opinion between us. In 1919 the seven hours' day was introduced in Great Britain and that continued until 1926, when our predecessors in office passed legislation that enabled an eight hours' day to be worked in the coalfields of this country. We made it plain at that time that we were strongly opposed to such a Clause. The mine-owners in their evidence before the right hon. Gentleman's Commission made proposals on these lines: to reduce the cost of production of coal by reducing the miners' wages, by adding one hour to the working day, by reducing the charges for railway freight, and certain other things. That was a rather desperate solution that they offered to the Royal Commission—a Royal Commission which did not include a single member who held our economic views. The Royal Commission in its chapter on the subject of wages unanimously rejected that recommendation. It is true that it suggested a certain reduction in wages, and many other proposals, but, having regard to all the circumstances, it said that the working day was, in effect, long enough in this country, and it proposed to allow it to remain. Our predecessors in office took another view. We were pledged to restore the seven hours' day at the earliest possible opportunity, and we offer half of that pledge this afternoon. I make no apology whatever for doing that together with a scheme of co-ordination, because they are bound up together. Only a fool would submit that they are not all bound up together. You cannot separate one from another in an industry like this.
  What, is the case that is presented against this proposal? First of all, let the House remember that over Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, and for the hewers in Northumberland and Durham, in respect of over 100,000,000 tons of

  1271
  250,000,000 tons of output at the present time, you have a seven and a-half hours' day, plus one winding time, so that the time, with winding time, as the winding time is averaged out at 35 minutes, makes a working day of rather more than eight hours, largely underground. We all recognise that that is a long day. There is also the problem of accidents and the difficulties of work, with which many hon. Members on these benches and in other parts of the House are more familiar than I am, than I can claim to be. It is true that a large part of that coal output is not, except to a comparatively small extent, related to the export trade, but if there is anything like goodwill even in the export districts this half hour can be covered without reduction of wages.
  My hon. Friends on the benches opposite say, and I do not object in the least: "Look at de-rating." We on these benches have always said that many of these charges should be national charges. The essence of our complaint was the way in which it was done, and that de-rating was given to prosperous and unprosperous industries. I am advised that it makes a contribution to railway freight charge at the pits of probably something between 7d. and 9d. per ton in the cost of production at the present time. We will say that there will be 1s. 6d. a ton extra cost of production relating to this reduction of one half hour, although that is a high figure and one which has been challenged in many responsible quarters.
  In the case of South Wales—and one can give credit to the Government in regard to this—we have orders for 1,000,000 tons of coal for the Italian State Railways for three years from 15th November of the present year. That was achieved by the Chancellor of the Exchequer at The Hague Conference. In the next place, there is a progressive improvement in the export of coal. I have already reminded the House that in this respect we were 10,000,000 tons better at the end of November than at the corresponding date of last year. To crown all, there is a better price level for the coal which is being sent abroad, and I have every reason to believe that that improvement will be maintained. So that we are having a variety of contributions, which, in my judgment, whatever may be said on the other side, would enable, with good
  1272
  will, this half hour reduction to be covered without any inroad on the present level of wages, which I have never heard a single soul defend on any side of the House, which run down to something like 35s., 38s. and£2 a, week, or very little more than that, except for certain classes of coal production, all bound up with distress and humiliation in these colliery districts which no words of mine this afternoon could properly describe. I know that some of the owners, men who own a large part of the area, are officially against this view, but I am betraying no secret when I say that some of the most representative owners in this industry have said to me: "We are with you. You can carry this, and, in our judgment, it is a proposition to which you can stand if you put it on that basis." I know that right hon. Members on the Front Bench opposite and our Liberal friends recognise that they are in agreement with us on that issue.
  I come to the national agreement. What is the difference in the relations of the two sides to that question? There was a national agreement prior to 1926. The Mining Association has said in all these discussions: "We are not prepared again to recognise the Miners' Federation of Great Britain. We are prepared to negotiate on terms with the district councils, with their independent chairman, but we cannot go back to the National basis." The Prime Minister and others have said over and over again to the owners: "Can you continue indefinitely in an attitude of that kind?" Officially they remain of that view. Some of the most powerful industrialists in this country have urged that there is everything to be gained by that national basis and by this reduction of differences, and I want to pay my tribute to the courage and devotion with which they have advocated that view. Questions will arise in the districts, they may be questions of hours, wages or whatever the difficulty may be, and we have taken the broad analogy of the Railway Act, 1921, and propose to set up a National Board representative of the owners and the miners, the Employers' Confederation, the Federation of British Industries and Chambers of Commerce, the Co-operative Union and the Trades Union Congress, with an independent chairman, and it will be the duty of

  1273
  that National Board to consider any large question bearing on the position of things that may be sent up to it.
  The owners say, in that case you will never get agreement in the districts. I do not agree with them. We have made it plain to them, and they know that hon. Members on this side of the House who know the industry will do everything in their power to work the district agreements, to which they rightly attach a great deal of importance. There will be no desire to send up any petty or trifling points to the national body. It will be the large propositions and the substantial problems which will be so sent. Moreover, you have in this body a representation of industry as a whole. If ever there was an industry which is fundamental to British prosperity, this is the one. The public, too, are represented, and there is an independent chairman. The board is also fortified by periodical "reports from the various districts. It gives its opinion, and there is not the least doubt that the opinion of a large and representative body like that would have very great moral weight. Of course, hon. Members will ask, how do you suppose to enforce its opinion? I will be perfectly candid on that point. You can only enforce a view of that description if you are prepared to cross the border-line into compulsory arbitration. Neither side of the industry is prepared to accept that proposition, and in the last resort on all these great questions they reserve on the one side the right of lock-out, and on the other the right to withdraw labour. But you can contribute, from a great public and authoritative body, viewing a problem dispassionately, an opinion, a kind of guidance which will be of the highest value in directing and guiding the Government of the day in any action they may take if, unfortunately, any future crisis arose.
  I must apologise to the House. I have occupied far too much time already, but I am perfectly sure that hon. Members will forgive me having regard to the great importance of this industry and to the fair and impartial manner in which it should be discussed. I will add only this very human note in conclusion. Some years ago the hon. Member for Aberdare (Mr. G. Hall), now happily associated with us in the Government, took me down one of the largest and deepest collieries
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  in South Wales, and one could see at close quarters, not only the grave risks and dangers under which these men perform their daily task, but also in the surrounding neighbourhood the social environment in which they have to live. I do not think one could ever forget the scene. I saw, as every hon. Member must see, the distress of those villages and mining communities. Judge this Bill impartially and you will find, although it may not be without defect, that it is an endeavour to see that the output of these men, in conditions where they are facing sudden death, is given a fair chance in the markets of the world. I am proud, in an utterly inadequate way this afternoon, to have tried to make some contribution to improve their conditions, and happy to-day to be the steward and trustee of this Measure.
  Sir PHILIP CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I beg to move to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question, to add the words "upon this day six months."
  The House is indebted to the right hon. Gentleman, as it always is, for a very clear and lucid speech. He did not deal, however, with all the points which are likely to be raised in criticism, and, lucid as was his speech, it seemed to me to run parallel to his Bill rather than to deal with what exactly is in the Bill. I am not surprised. When we pass from his exposition to that which he had to expose, few of us can pay as sincere a tribute to what is in the Bill as to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman. I make no complaint on the length of his speech. He said that it was so complex a subject that it could not be introduced in a speech of less length, and that on some parts indeed he would have to curtail what on another occasion he would have to say to the House. That is true. But is not that a far stronger argument than anything we have used on this side of the House for asking that we should have more time to consider this Bill? No small part of his speech was devoted to explaining that he was quite ready to recast Part I of the Bill, which occupies the greater half of print, into a different form. That is a somewhat unusual method of introducing a Bill, and is an additional reason why we should have longer time for criticism.

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  Anyone who deals with the coal problem has a very difficult task; and that task is not made easier when you are confronted with a pledge very casually given, which you have not the least intention of redeeming—[Interruption.] I will prove that statement up to the hilt. The right hon. Gentleman slid very quickly over the question of the pledge this afternoon, but I am sure it was very definitely in his mind. It is certainly in the minds of most hon. Members of the House. But what did happen? An absolute and categorical pledge was given by the Government that the Eight Hours Act would be repealed as the first act of the Labour Government—[Interruption.] There is no doubt about the terms of that pledge. In "Labour and the Nation" this was said:
  "The disastrous Act by which the Tory Government added an hour to the working day of the miners must at once be repealed."
  The Miners' Federation, desiring to have from the Prime Minister a very specific undertaking, not a general pledge, asked for further and better particulars; and they got them. In a letter which was published in the "Miner" on the 18th May, written by Mr. Lindsay, Secretary of the Parliamentary Labour Party, this was said:
  "Undoubtedly it was agreed that in the first Session of the Lahour Government a Bill would be introduced to reduce the working hours of the miners. All that is outstanding is the decision as to the form that Bill should take"—
  There is no suggestion of doing it by instalment—[Interruption.] I am quoting the words:
  "whether, for instance, it should he a simple repeal of the Tory Government's Act, or whether it should provide for seven hours hank to bank."
  That was the absolute plain and specific pledge given at the General Election. Those were the terms of the prospectus on which the faithful or the credulous, subscribed their votes; and this is the Bill they are getting. That was before the General Election. After the Election they found, if indeed they did not know it before—I am sure the President of the Board of Trade knew it before and was not a willing party to any such pledge—that they could not redeem that pledge when they came into office and so, after
  1276
  the General Election, after they had got votes by that specific promise, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who always has a soothing effect upon the more extreme members of his party, was selected to carry to them the good tidings that they were not going to get a repeal of the Tory Act after all. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, speaking at Leicester last October said, in equally categorical but very different terms to those used at the time of the General Election, that:
  "An immediate return to the seven-hour day would inflict grievous disaster on the industry, pits would close down and miners would be thrown out of work."
  —[Interruption.]
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Go and learn your manners.
  Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Mr. Robert Young): The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade was given a good hearing, and I hope that hon. Members will give an equally good hearing to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hendon (Sir P. CunliffeLister).
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The right hon. Gentleman, in introducing his Bill, gave a general review of the whole history of the subject and I propose to reply, and with the consent of the House to say everything that is in my mind in criticism. I shall get through it much quicker if I am allowed to develop my argument. If the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been made at the time of the General Election it might not have been quite so fortunate, electorally, to the party opposite but they would have found themselves in rather less difficulty to-day. However, we have the Bill; and there is obviously no intention of carrying out the pledge to repeal the Eight Hours' Act. Indeed, I must congratulate the right hon. Gentleman because in the national interest it is far better he should break a pledge than break an industry.
  6.0 p.m.
  The right hon. Gentleman has sought to justify this Bill on very general grounds, not all of them strictly relevant to the Bill. In deciding whether we should give a Second Beading to a Bill of this kind two principles should be followed. You can only justify action of the kind proposed by this Measure if you can prove, and prove beyond any doubt,

  1277
  that Government action is absolutely necessary and that a Government scheme is better than anything the industry can do for itself. Another proposition, which is not less important and one which will find even wider acceptance, is this, that if a Government does seek to intervene and control an industry, it owes a very peculiar duty to the community at large. I do not know how many times, when we were sitting on the Government Front Bench and one question after another was raised, that we were not asked "What are you going to do to protect the interest of the consumer?" The President of the Board of Trade, for all the length and clarity of his speech, did very little to explain what was being done in this Bill to protect the interest of the consumer. In presenting his case he said that he regarded the question of hours, and his marketing proposals, as he was pleased to call them, as interlocked. And so they are. But they have to be considered separately as well as together.
  Let me take hours first. There is nothing novel in the regulation of hours in this industry. Everyone would prefer that the industry should work 7½ hours rather than 8, subject to two conditions. The first condition is that the industry can stand it, and the second, which is bound up with that, is that by working 7½ hours rather than 8 you are going to make the worker better off. If you cannot establish those two interlocked propositions you are doing a disservice alike to the industry and to those engaged in it. I do not believe there is anyone who would dissent from this statement—certainly not anybody with the least interest in the industry—that the maintenance, and if possible the improvement, of wages, is a far more essential thing and far more in the interest of those in the industry than the shortening of hours.
  At the present time the wages which are paid in the mining industry, though certainly no one would suggest that they are too high, are in fact much higher than the wages which are paid in any European mining country, with the single exception of the Netherlands, which is not a very substantial competitor. The League of Nations has conducted two inquiries into the question
  1278
  of mining wages, and has published a very interesting table which is given in the "International Labour Review" for last October. That table gives the comparative wages in coal mining in this and other European countries. They take Great Britain as 100, and they give both the earnings per day and the average annual earnings. I think it is fairer to take the annual earnings for comparison. If you take the rate of day wages the comparison is even more favourable to this country. I take the yearly earnings, and these are the figures: Great Britain, 100; the Netherlands, 96; the Ruhr, 89; the Saar, 70; Germany (Upper Silesia), 68; France, 62; Belgium, 56; and Poland, varying from 39 to 44.
  In face of those figures a very strong case has to be made out by a Government which is going to interfere with hours, in order to show that wages, which are already so much higher than those of our competitors, can at least be maintained and can be maintained without any undue cost or improper cost to the consumers of coal in this country; because in all this, though you may say what you like about miners and miners' wages, the Government have a wider responsibility even than that—they are trustees for the whole country, and they have to consider the interest of consumers as well as the interests of the miner or the mine owner.
  Mr. POTTS: Would the right hon. Gentleman say what is the actual date of the figures which he has given?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: They apply to 1927.
  Mr. SCRYMGEOUR: What was the cost of living then?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The figures are for 1927. They are, I believe, the latest publication that there is, but no doubt the President of the Board of Trade could say whether there are any material alterations either in this country or in foreign countries that would lead to any substantial changes in the figures that I have given. My impression is that the figures are substantially correct to-day. Is not that so?
  Mr. W. GRAHAM: I should not like to pledge myself on the point, for at the

  1279
  moment I cannot recall whether there is a later collocation. Broadly the percentages are on the lines stated.
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I am obliged. That is a complete answer. With regard to the cost of living, there is another table which worked out wages in teams of purchasing power, and again the comparison is very favourable to this country, although in the other countries the purchasing power of money is rather higher. But I shall not trouble the House with the second table, and will merely say that the conclusion is proportionately the same. In order to justify the proposal it is important to see what was the effect of increased hours upon working costs. There is not the least doubt—I am sure that the President of the Board of Trade would not deny this—that the extra time which was worked under the Act of 1926 has greatly reduced working costs. It has enabled the industry to pay higher wages than it would otherwise have been in a position to pay, and it has improved the industry's competitive powers.
  I agree that we should debate these matters with as little controversy as possible. In order to prove my statement I shall give the figures, official Board of Trade figures, from the quarterly returns. They are certainly very remarkable. Cost per ton of coal, commercially disposed, in the March quarter of 1926 was 17s. 2d. for the whole of Great Britain, and 19s. 9d. for South Wales. I have taken Great Britain as a whole, and I take also South Wales because it is the largest of the districts that is working an eight hours' day at present. If you compare those figures with what I think is a fair standard for comparison, the March quarter of 1929, you find that the cost per ton in Great Britain had fallen from 17s. 2d. to 13s. 3d., and in South Wales from 19s. 9d. to 14s. 7d. You get, therefore, a reduction per ton of 3s. 11d. in Great Britain and of 5s. 2d. in South Wales.
  Let me take the corresponding wages paid in those two quarters. Here I would remind the House that the wages paid in March, 1926, included the subvention, for at that time there was a very large subsidy paid in aid of wages. Wages per shift, in March, 1926, were: Great Britain, 10s. 4¾; South Wales, 10s. 9d.
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  In the March quarter of this year, with no subvention, the figures are: Great Britain, 9s. 2¾d.; South Wales, 9s. 4¼d. There was a fall in earnings per shift of only 1s. 2d. in Great Britain and 1s. 4¾d. in South Wales. Therefore it is a simple mathematical calculation to see that the fall in costs, other than wages, due to working the extra time, in Great Britain as a whole was 2s. 9d. a ton, and in South Wales as much as 3s. 9¼d. a ton.
  That, without any question, is the result of increased hours. Yet an Act which enabled that to be done is fantastically described as an iniquitous Act and has other epithets applied to it. From these reduced costs there was the natural result that was to be expected and to which the President of the Board of Trade has referred. The result of these reduced costs, due to the extra working time, was an increase in output and an increase in exports. In the first nine months of 1929 we produced 190,000,000 tons, as against 176,500,000 tons in the first nine months of last year. Our foreign coal shipments, including both exports and bunkers, were 60,500,000 tons for this year, and 52,750,000 tons for the first nine months of last year. The output per man per shift of course increased as well.
  If these figures be correct—I know that the President of Board of Trade will not challenge them—in face of that increase in production and in output, in order to justify their proposals for reducing hours the Government must prove that the industry can stand it, while maintaining wages and maintaining the industry's power to compete in the export trade. I gather, from something that the President of the Board of Trade said, that he is not prepared seriously to dispute that a reduction of half-an-hour a day in working time in those districts where eight hours is being worked a day, might be as much as 1s. 6d. per ton.
  Let me say, at this stage, that if any reduction of hours can he justified, would it not he much wiser for the President of the Board of Trade, instead of having a flat proposition that in every district the working time be reduced by half-an-hour a day, to make some suggestion that the reduction of working time should be averaged out over a week or a fortnight? There cannot be the least doubt that when you come to consider the effect

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  of working costs and wages it might be much easier for the industry to stand a working fortnight of 90 hours, or even a working week of 45 hours, than a compulsory working day of 7½ hours. I suggest that not only might that be economically much sounder, but that socially it might be a better proposition also. Apart altogether from the fact that, naturally, everyone would be more interested in making sure of higher wages instead of making sure of shorter hours, I think many men would be much keener to work the eight hours on the days when they were at work, if they knew that they were to get a very short Saturday shift or no Saturday shift at all.
  I seriously commend to the Government the consideration of an average fortnight, or possibly an average week, rather than the utterly inelastic proposal which they have put before the Rouse. It is plain that the industry as it stands to-day is barely able to pay the wages which are being paid at the present time. I say nothing of the great deficits which have been piled up, though I have seen statements—and I have every reason to suppose that they are correct—to the effect that the deficits which have been piled up in paying the minimum wage during the last two years amount to something like£20,000,000 over the whole of the coal industry. The minimum wage which is paid to-day is, of course, greatly in excess of the agreed percentage and, even in this year, a year in which the coal trade has done much better than it did in the past two years, when costs and proceeds are averaged out and set the one against the other, there is only one quarter in which there is a credit balance. I think there was a credit balance of 9¼d. per ton in the first quarter. In the second quarter there was a deficit of 3½d. per ton and I see the right hon. Gentleman's estimate of the third quarter is that they will about level out and that there will not be either a debit or a credit balance.
  The right hon. Gentleman will remember that in those accounts which he takes out and publishes the items included as working costs are by no means all the charges which fall upon a colliery undertaking. No allowance is made, for example, for interest on bank overdrafts and many of these collieries are operat-
  1282
  ing under large bank overdrafts for which they have to pay large sums in interest. In addition, the only allowance which is made for depreciation is the strict Income Tax allowance. I think he will agree that if he were advising an undertaking like a colliery, with a risky and wasting asset, he would advise it to put to depreciation a great deal more than the strict Income Tax allowance. In the face of these figures and facts—and I think I put them quite fairly having taken every single one of them from the official published figures—is it not plain that the Government have made out no case for reducing the hours as they propose to do in Part II of the Bill unless they are able to show that the proposals in Part I of the Bill will very much more than counterbalance the increased cost due to a reduction in hours. I think the right hon. Gentleman will admit that they have to stand or fall by Part I of the Bill. If Part I does not justify his claims, then the reduction of hours is not justified. Therefore it becomes all the more necessary to scrutinise very closely the proposals in Part I both from the point of view of the coal industry itself and the point of view of the consumers of coal at large.
  Before I come to the details of the proposals in Part I I must say something about the National Board. I do not find it easy to express a final opinion upon that board. A very easy prima facie case can be made out for it, and the right hon. Gentleman paid an eloquent tribute to the advantages which he thought might flow from it. I am not so sure. If it was such a happy thought it is a remarkable thing that it never found expression until the right hon. Gentleman had got to the eleventh or twelfth—or was it the thirteenth—draft of this Bill. During the first five months gestation to which the right hon. Gentleman has referred this brilliant thought did not occur to him. Apparently what happened was that the Miners' Federation representatives came to see him. No doubt they had a word or two to say about not getting the Eight Hours Act repealed and then, I gather, they said that they must have something and so the right hon. Gentleman had the happy thought of producing the National Board. We ought not either to accept it or reject it, simply because it is a last minute

  1283
  thought and a gesture to cover up something else. What the House will want to consider is this: Is this Board going to serve a useful purpose?
  The right hon. Gentleman cited the Railway Board, but there is no real analogy between conditions affecting railway companies and the conditions affecting the mining industry. The railways are of like character, one with another, and while the conditions vary, each has to meet the same variety of conditions and therefore a board is quite competent to give advice and make recommendations and come to decisions affecting all these railway companies, because they have the same problems and the same conditions to face. But in the mining industry the conditions in the districts differ greatly. Certainly the wages in each district have to be settled and governed by district conditions. I believe that you could not do anything worse for the mining industry than go back to national wage agreements or awards in place of the district wage agreements or awards. If you attempt to do that, it is unfair as between the districts, and it is unfair to employers and employed. If you try to get the highest common factor of wages to cover the whole industry it will be too low for the prosperous district and too high for the districts where the working is more difficult. Wages have to be settled as they are to-day by district agreements and I do not believe that the right hon. Gentleman would for a moment wish to go back on that system.
  If that be true then it is of the utmost importance to get the fullest and frankest discussion in the settlement of these district agreements. You want, first of all, in such negotiations to have all the cards on the table. You want neither side in district negotiations to hold anything back. If they know that a settlement is to be reached in the district I believe you will get that full and frank discussion; but if both sides have it in mind that in all cases there is going to be an appeal to some central tribunal, then there is a real danger that each side will keep something back, and you will not get that open and free discussion which is so essential if we are to secure effective agreements. If that is likely to be the effect of setting up a National
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  Board, I am very doubtful whether a National Board is going to help. I am also doubtful if you are to have a board of arbitration, or quasi-arbitration, whether six coal owners and six miners from other competing districts with two or three or four independent people added would constitute the best form of tribunal to adjudicate on a district dispute. I am not sure that you would not get better results from a tribunal on which the miners and mineowners of the competing districts were not represented, and I should like to hear what the right hon. Gentleman has to say on that point. As I say, it is the kind of proposal which requires to be considered impartially. We must consider it simply and solely from the point of view of what is most likely to produce full and frank discussion and satisfactory agreements in the different districts.
  I pass from that point to what the right hon. Gentleman has called the marketing scheme. I do not think that term is a very felicitous description of what he is doing in the Bill. Part I is headed "Production, Supply and Sale of Coal," but there is very little about marketing in the Bill. What the Bill does is to fix quotas of production and minimum price. It does not deal at all with the way in which the coal is to be marketed and that is one of the great condemnations of this part of the Bill. The Government are taking, as they must take when they produce a Measure of this kind, full responsibility for the Bill as it stands and the Government are compelling, or are proposing by this Bill to compel, every mine in the country to come into this scheme. It must have occurred to many of us when the right hon. Gentleman was speaking that it was a rather remarkable thing that this Government should be introducing a Bill of this kind. I well remember how in the last Parliament I used to be asked almost every Tuesday at Question Time when were the Government going to introduce a Bill to deal with trusts. I put forward the view, subsequently endorsed by the Balfour Committee, that the best way of dealing with trusts was to wait until you got full information—to wait until you had something about which to inquire.
  We were told by the First Lord of the Admiralty on many occasions, and I think he said so in his evidence before

  1285
  the Balfour Committee, that one of the first acts of a Socialist Government, whenever they got into office, would be to introduce a Bill to deal with trusts. I think indeed the right hon. Gentleman told the Balfour Committee that such a Bill was in draft—an Anti-Trust Bill. What is the first Bill they have introduced? It is indeed a Bill dealing with trusts and a very remarkable Bill it is. Another remarkable thing must have occurred to many Members. The right hon. Gentleman has repeatedly said in answer to myself and to others that this was a Free Trade Government and that no matter how harassed or depressed any British industry might be never would they dream of countenancing any form of Protection.
  What is Part I of this Bill? It is the negation of Free Trade. It is the most extreme form of Protection, and it is more than that; it is protection of an industry which is a largely sheltered industry. It is no good the right hon. Gentleman saying the coal trade is an unsheltered industry. An unsheltered industry means an industry subject to foreign competition at all points, but the coal trade is only subject to foreign competition when it goes abroad and meets it in a foreign market. Where is the foreign competition which is coming into the coal trade in the home market? This is plainly a Bill to protect the coal industry, and through an hour and a quarter the right hon. Gentleman explained to us just why he thought it was necessary to protect the coal industry. This is not only a Bill to protect the coal industry, but it is a Bill to protect the coal industry without in the least degree assuring that it is going to become more efficient. It is a Bill to protect the coal industry without any regard to the interests of the consumer.
  Where are all the speeches which hon. and right hon. Members opposite made about the Safeguarding procedure? When an industry which was an unsheltered industry applied for a duty and had to go before an impartial tribunal to inquire into its conditions, it had at any rate to prove that it was conducted with reasonable efficiency and economy, and in every case the right hon. Gentleman and his Friends were very ready to come forward and consti-
  1286
  tute themselves the defenders of the consumer. Really, where do all those speeches and those arguments stand to-day, when the right hon. Gentleman brings forward Part I of this Bill? And more than that. Not only is the right hon. Gentleman going to give the most drastic form of Protection—I will show how drastic in a moment—to this industry, but it is going to he a drastic form of Protection to a raw material, a raw material of all industries. But what is the right hon. Gentleman's answer going to be to the other industries which use this raw material?
  Take the steel industry, for example. If the steel industry says, "Our coal is costing us more to-day because of the protection which you have given to this industry, and not only is it costing more in itself, but perhaps it is costing us more even than it would under your price-fixing scheme because of the levy for foreign exports as well; it is costing us doubly more," what on earth is going to be the answer of the right hon. Gentleman to the steel industry when it asks for some countervailing form of protection to compensate it for the protection which the right hon. Gentleman is giving to this trade? When they produce a scheme of this kind, the Government make themselves responsible for the financial failure or success of the scheme. You cannot divorce yourselves from that. You cannot come in and control and conduct an industry without making yourselves responsible to that extent. But what matters much more to me is that you make yourselves responsible for the price of every ton of coal which is sold in this country. Not a ton of coal can be mined except with your approval, under a scheme which the President of the Board of Trade is going to approve. What is more important, not a ton of coal can be sold at a price lower than that which the President of the Board of Trade is going to approve. Protection? Trust? Was there ever a more extreme form of Protection and of monopolistic trust than that?
  I should have thought that if the Government were determined to create so drastic a monopoly and so exclusive a trust, they would at least have tried to create the best kind of trust possible. What should be your objective in any dealings which you have with the mining industry? Surely it should be this, to

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  get the maximum of efficiency and economy, both on the production side of this industry and on its distribution side. What do you do in this Bill to improve production? Absolutely nothing. There is not one word that I can find in the Bill from start to finish which is going to encourage more efficient production in this industry. I listened with the greatest possible care during the whole of the hour and three-quarters of the right hon. Gentleman's speech, and I could not find one word which led me to suppose that there was anything in his Bill, or that there was anything going to flow from it when it is in operation, if it ever comes into operation, which will increase the efficiency of production. Indeed, I think the opposite may not improbably result.
  It may be difficult for us to define with precision what is an inefficient or an uneconomic pit, but somehow we know it when we see it, and we know that there are efficient and economical pits, and that there are those which are not, but your inefficient pit is under this protective trust going to be stabilised and endowed. However inefficient it is, it will have a quota. It is apparently going to keep a quota for all time, unless somebody comes along and buys it out, in which case it becomes a rentier, and it is going to be secured in its price. I am sure that anyone who had any experience of control during the War will agree with this, that once you go in for a system of price control, even when apparently, as in the War, you try to run your price control in the interests of the consumer—this is going to be price control in the interests of the producer—even then you have to regulate your prices by the cost of production of the less efficient. Therefore, this inefficient pit, stabilised and endowed, is going to have a perpetual quota and a perpetual price, which must on the whole, I think be based upon cost of production. I looked throughout the whole of that long speech for any indication, and I found none, of how the Government propose to deal with an efficient pit or an efficient colliery that proposes to go in for a policy of development. I cannot find that in the Bill, and I shall be very much interested to know where I am going to find it.
  So much for production. Now what about distribution? The right hon.
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  Gentleman, as I say, has called this a marketing scheme, but I say it is nothing of the sort. It is a price-fixing scheme, not a marketing scheme. If you are really going to set up a trust for marketing, what should you try to get? You should try to get efficiency in the grading of the coal sold, in its transport, in the pooling of wagons, in the dealings with merchants, whether they are home or export merchants; you should try to get economy in selling charges, by eliminating unnecessary personnel, unnecessary depots, unnecessary offices; you should try to get elasticity in being able to respond quickly to any variation, any expansion in the market demand. That is what you should try for, I should have thought, on the distribution side. That is what I mean by efficient marketing. Is that what you are giving us? You are giving us nothing of the sort. All that you are proposing is a crude price ring. That is what this Bill establishes. It is not marketing at all, except so far as the inevitability of gradualness is going ultimately to evolve some marketing proposal from it. You are going to set up a crude price ring, with drastic machinery which gives a quota to every pit and a minimum price for all coal.
  Where is the safeguard for the public in this? If you have a monopoly and a trust, the one safeguard which the public can look for, and your only justification for having such a trust, is that the public will get more economical and a more efficient service, and that they and the industry together will share in the benefits which flow out from it, but there is not a word about that in this scheme, and there is nothing to encourage it. I am going to show, if I am not delaying the House too much, why exactly the opposite is what is likely to flow from this. I know that there is a Clause somewhere tucked away in this Bill for the protection of the consumer, and that there is going to be a committee of investigation. There is going to be a central committee of investigation, and it is going to have two miners and two mine-owners, and somebody from the Federation of British Industries, and somebody from the Co-operative Union, and two other gentlemen, with an independent chairman, and there is going to be a miniature committee of investigation, composed on the same lines, in each

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  of the districts. Does the right hon. Gentleman really think that is going to be an adequate protection for the consumer? Just see what will happen.
  To begin with, I do not know how, if there are many complaints, this committee will hear them, because there is only one committee for each district, and it cannot divide itself into many. But let me take the kind, of point that probably will arise. Someone, whether it is an industry or a mere domestic consumer, who has, I suppose, still got some rights under this Bill, is going to complain that too high a price has been fixed for his coal, and he lodges a complaint, say in November. What happens? The committee has to be got together. Then the district board, the colliery executive board which runs this trust, is required to produce evidence and accounts, and I have no doubt that a great deal of correspondence will take place. We all know just how long it takes to get that kind of information before an inquiry. And then it comes before this committee, with an independent chairman, and two consumers, and a coal-owner and a coal-miner, and the hearing takes place. For once the coal-owner and the coal-miner will really be united. The lion and the lamb will sit down together. I have no doubt that they will lunch together.
  Obviously, there is going to be a conflict of interests, because they are to be there to argue for the producer, and the two other people are to be there to represent the consumer, and this not very harmonious inquiry is likely to go on some time. We have all been at this kind of arbitration, where one arbitrator is appointed by one side and another arbitrator is appointed by the other side, and an umpire is appointed by them both. It is really the worst kind of court you can get. You would much better dispense with the two arbitrators, who only serve to prolong the discussion, and refer it at once to the umpire. Everybody who has had anything to do with arbitration knows that if you want a, quick way out of an arbitration, you should dispense with the two arbitrators and leave it to the single umpire to decide. Then this board sits, and ultimately it makes a report. It will probably make three reports. There will probably be a report by the chair-
  1290
  man, a report by the mine-owner and the miner, and a report by the two consumers.
  But that is only the beginning. What happens to the report? It goes to the Board of Trade, and the Board of Trade consider it, and the Board of Trade consult with the parties interested. That means the people who have made the complaint and the colliery undertaking or the colliery board, which is alleged to be at fault, and the Board of Trade may themselves hold a further inquiry, if they think necessary. When they have come to a conclusion, they take it up with the district board. I suppose by this time we shall have passed from November to May, and the Board of Trade will have come to the conclusion in May that the prices which were charged to the household consumers last November were too high. What are they going to get out of it? Compensation? Not a bit of it. The President of the Board of Trade is going to alter the scheme. Really, if he thinks that that is protection for the consumer, he has a very queer idea of protection. The less real this safeguard, the more serious the weaknesses of the scheme, and the more necessary it is that they should be corrected. Look at some of the advantages which are absent from the scheme, and the things which it leaves undone. On the production side it does nothing, and on the distribution side with which it professes to deal, where in the whole of this scheme is anything done to ensure that there will be economy in the distribution or in the selling of coal?
  Will the right hon. Gentleman tell me one part of the Bill which will ensure that coal is distributed cheaply There is not one. There is no pooling of agencies or of depots. Every colliery is still left perfectly free to sell coal in competition with its neighbour in any way, provided that it does not sell it below the minimum price. You will have difficulties as to the fixing of the minimum price itself. I can imagine that it will be quite a difficult thing to fix at a pit a minimum price which is fair to collieries in the same district. There may be a colliery which is 50 miles from its principal market, the local industrial centre, and there may be another colliery 20 miles off, and to fix a common minimum price for the two collieries is not fair to the colliery which is 50 miles away and has a higher railway rate to pay. If the coal of both these

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  collieries were sold through a single agency, you might very easily be able to adjust difficulties of that kind.
  Then as to the grading of coal. There is some indication in the Bill which may be construed into a pious aspiration that coal will be graded. You will not get an efficient grading under this Bill. It can be done only in one of two ways, either by amalgamation of collieries or through large selling organisations, which will see that the coal which they sell is properly graded. You are certainly not going to do it by a price-fixing scheme of this kind. The right hon. Gentleman said that there was a good deal of room—and he is quite right—for the coalowners to get together with the merchants in order to see that the margins of profit or expenses which the merchants charge are not excessive. There is a great opening here, and a large undertaking or a large selling organisation can do that, but what is there in this Bill to ensure that the owners and the merchants will get together?
  What does this Bill do for transport? Absolutely nothing. If you get a large amalgamation or a big selling organisation, automatically that deals with transport in two ways. The coal is taken from the colliery which is most conveniently situated for the purpose, in order to be taken for disposal at the most convenient point of sale, but it goes much further than that. The right hon. Gentleman will very soon have to express his view on the pooling of wagons. It is a difficult proposition to get a satisfactory pool of wagons if every colliery has an independent and divergent interest, but it is a simple thing to get a pool of wagons, and you automatically get it if you dispose of your coal through one selling organisation, for the wagons belonging to all the collieries will be used to the common advantage automatically. There is no elasticity in this Bill; you must have quick arrangements to deal with sudden demands for coal. The right hon. Gentleman probably remembers that in the Five Counties' Scheme, there was a sudden demand for shipment of coal, which could not be met because the scheme was not elastic enough.
  You cannot work this kind of thing properly in a cumbrous scheme where, in order to increase the district quota, they
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  have to go to the centre and get special permission, and the centre, having decided that one district may have a little more, that district has to allocate that between the different collieries. I do not think that you can work like that. On the other hand, if you are dealing with large entities, they will make, as an ordinary matter of business, arrangements which can deal quickly with any sudden demand that comes forward. I have tried to enumerate some of the patent objections to this scheme, and to point out the things which are in it, and the things which are left out of it; and I think that, as it has been drafted and presented to the House, it does nothing for production, nothing for efficient marketing, but affords every inducement to the coal industry to raise the price without economising. What you ought to try to establish is the lowest common denominator of price; what you are going to establish is the highest common factor of price. That is not only bad for the consumer, but bad for the coal trade, which ought to be encouraged to put its house in order.
  Let me say a word about the levy. It is amazing that power should be given to give that statutory sanction. It is one thing to have a business undertaking which, if it thinks it wise, charges a differential price; one would not object to that so much. Independent businesses conduct their affairs in the way they think hest, but that is not the proposal here. This Bill sets no an exclusive, monopolistic trust into which everybody is compelled to go whether they like it or not, and to stay in whether they like it or not, and this statutory trust is being given the authority to charge a levy in order to subsidise exports. That is a very different proposition from a firm selling at a differential price. I am not at all sure that the powers you give may not be very unfair as between one colliery district and another. If you had a majority of districts on the Central Board, who thought it would be good in their interests to subsidise export, you give that Board the power to order a levy on the whole of the coal of the dissenting districts. You might very well get a minority of coal districts which were opposed to a levy, and which said that a levy could do them no possible good. Yet you put it in the power of a majority of the coal districts, which will

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  get a benefit from the levy, to make that levy upon districts which strongly object. If that be at all a possible position, you have indeed an example of the maxim that minorities must suffer.
  I object to it much more on the ground that this may be very prejudicial to the British consumer of coal. He certainly may suffer through this, and he may suffer not only once, but twice or thrice over. He is going to suffer by the ordinary rise in price which the price ring is going to put on. In addition, he will suffer from an extra rise in price which is to be put on to meet the levy, in order to enable coal to be sold cheaper abroad. If he is a domestic consumer, he will suffer a third time because there will be such an outcry from the unsheltered industries, who will say that they really cannot stand this further charge put upon them. Then the domestic consumer, who in the coal trade is always the easiest man to be bled, will very likely suffer three times in order to provide this subsidy on export coal.
  I believe that these are fair criticisms of this Bill, of what it does and of what it leaves undone. It sets up the extreme protection of a permanent statutory penal price ring, without any regard for efficiency, and with a complete disregard for the interests of the consumer. It does nothing whatever to encourage efficient production or to enforce economical selling. It does nothing to pro- mote amalgamations of producers or combined selling organisations. The right hon. Gentleman made an appeal for a Second Reading of this Bill in order to bring peace and prosperity to this industry. We all desire to see peace and prosperity in this industry, but the way in which that will be obtained is by following the path of efficiency. It is because I believe that this Bill does not lead us along that road, that I beg to move its rejection.
  Sir HERBERT SAMUEL: In the observations which I shall address to the House, I do not propose to deal with the particular Amendment that has been moved, or the other Amendment that stands upon the Order Paper, or to discuss the Parliamentary situation in connection with this Bill, although I may have a few questions to address to
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  the Government which may have a bearing on that situation. I shall address myself entirely to the merits of this Bill, and, I am afraid I must say, to the demerits. With regard to the part of the Bill to which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hendon (Sir P. Cunliffe-Lister) mainly directed his criticisms, the Section dealing with hours, we find no grave cause for quarrel. The expressions in ordinary use—the seven hours' day and the eight hours' day are, in fact, misnomers. There has never been a seven hours' working day in the mines, and there is not now an eight hours' day. When you speak of seven or eight hours, people think that that is the daily period of work below ground of the miner. It is not so. It is a purely arbitrary technical term used for purposes of Acts of Parliament, as meaning the period that has to elapse from the time when the last man on the shift goes down, until the time when the first man on the shift comes up.
  As a matter of fact, since the winding time averages half an hour, the miners are working now over the greater part of Great Britain 8½ hours, and over the rest of Great Britain 8 hours. The workers have some recompense in a shorter Saturday. In this matter we are much concerned with the hours worked in competing countries of Europe. It is difficult to make a comparison, but the Royal Commission, with the assistance of the Mines Department and the Labour Department, secured a comparison on a really comparable basis. Since that date there have been some minor alterations. I will give the House the figures as they are, based on the tables in the Royal Commission's Report. In Great Britain, over most parts of the country the daily hours of miners are 8½, in France they are 7½, in Belgium 7½, in Holland 8, in Germany (the Ruhr) 8, in Upper Silesia 8, in Czechoslovakia 7¾ to 8, in Poland (Upper Silesia) 8, and in Dombrova and Cracow 8½ with a statutory half-hour for meals. The 8½ hours applies in Great Britain over the greater part of the country and those hours are not compensated for by the exceptions on Saturdays.
  7.0 p.m.
  I observe in to-day's "Times" that Mr. Evan Williams, the President of the Mining Association, takes me to task on

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  this question of hours and gives some figures. Those figures are based on the average hours in the country. I was, of course, referring to the maximum statutory hours for the greater part of the country. You have here that fallacy of averages which so often dogs the footsteps of unwary investigators. It is no answer to the South Wales miner who is working 8½ hours and complains that he is working longer than miners on the Continent, to tell him that he is not really working as long as that because if his day was averaged with that in Yorkshire it would be found to be somewhat less. This country formerly was a pioneer in the shortening of hours of labour and particularly in the most arduous forms of it—labour underground. With a better quality of coal, shorter railway haulage and excellent sea-board facilities, we ought to be able to compete on equal terms with the Continent, even if our hours were somewhat shorter. In any case let the House remember that the present statutory extension of hours passed by the last Government was a purely temporary Measure. They did not enact that the old so-called seven-hours' day, which was really 7½ hours, should be extended in perpetuity. They enacted that after five years the old Act of Parliament should revert into operation and, therefore, the present lengthening of hours without any further legislation would come to an end in 1931. The Conservative Government of that day, therefore, contemplated that the extension of hours they enacted should be purely temporary. The present Government propose that the shorter hours should be reverted to in two stages. Whether the industry will in fact be able to undergo the further shortening will have to be considered later by Parliament.
  The other part of the Bill to which here we do not take exception is that which proposes the establishment of a National Industrial Board. The Royal Commission went carefully into this subject and strongly recommended that there should be a national authority in these matters for the mining industry. Every other great industry of the country which is organised and has a system of collective bargaining has a national authority to supervise these arrangements, and we fail to see any
  1296
  reason whatever why that which is found to be practicable and workable in other great trades of the country should not be practicable in this case. There are national elements in the fixing of wages which ought to be taken into account as well as district elements for the district boards.
  And we found—and it is, indeed, common knowledge—that when the mine owners and the miners got together by themselves to settle wage questions there was frequently an absence of that sweet reasonableness which is so eminently desirable in negotiations of that character. We suggested that it was very advisable that there should be brought in a neutral element with an independent chairman to bring the bodies together and inculcate a more reasonable frame of mind. We proposed that, and the Government propose it. They do not propose compulsory arbitration for the reason convincingly given by the President of the Board of Trade, and I think they are very wise not to do so.
  Now I come to what I regard as the crux of the whole matter. The Royal Commission found that the industry was most urgently in need of re-organisation. We found that there were far too many producing units. To-day, if you leave out the smaller pits altogether and limit yourself to the mines that employ more than 100 men—and it is right to do so because they account for more than 99 per cent. of the whole output —if you do that, and take into account that many pits are grouped in single undertakings, there are still no less than 584 separate producing units, many owning several pits. The Royal Commission recognised that this did not conduce to the efficient working of the industry, and came unanimously to the very definite conclusion, as the chief conclusion of our very long inquiry, in which we had the advantage of the most expert evidence from all quarters, and highly skilled assessors and advisers, that the industry must be concentrated in a smaller number of units. We were convinced by the experience of the mines already combined that this would conduce to efficient management. It would—and this is an important matter—conduce to the more scientific preparation of the coal for sale. It would help to get rid of the shocking wastefulness of our present transport

  1297
  arrangements, with little toy trucks wandering about the railways, 750,000 of them belonging to 5,000 separate owners, each making only two journeys per month. That is immensely wasteful in comparison with Germany, where they get more than twice the user from their rolling stock that we do. We have a waste of something like£30,000,000 of capital in unnecessary wagon costs, about 10 per cent. of the capital of the industry.
  That was our main recommendation—re-organisation based on amalgamation—and when the right hon. Gentleman mentioned the Lewis Committee, and said they recommended a system of marketing, let me remind him of two passages in the Report. It was a highly competent committee of business men whose advice is worth listening to. They said:
  "Organised marketing presents considerable difficulties, but we cannot believe that with experience and goodwill these difficulties could not in time be overcome. We do not suggest, of course, that the transition can be effected quickly or easily. There is no royal road by which a large number of colliery companies can pass smoothly from a state of unregulated competition to an effective marketing organisation. They can only do so by building from the bottom and by groupings…."
  When they come to state the conclusions of their Report, they say:
  "But we feel that a serious impediment lies in the present lack of consolidation in the industry; and we are convinced that the full development and benefits of organised marketing within the industry cannot be realised unless the industry can be consolidated by amalgamation into a much smaller number of units."
  That is an expression of opinion of great importance, and I will give the House two others. Here is an article written about a year ago by Sir Adam Nimmo, Chairman of the Scottish Coalowners. He said:
  "Whereas in a time of rapid growth and expansion the number of operating units matters little and may even be defended as having certain material advantages, in times of economic reaction the large number of operating units may become an industrial menace an I different methods may have to be adopted. Otherwise the whole industry may have to be imperilled—as it is at present."
  The other authority I will quote is Sir Richard Redmayne, formerly Chief Inspector of Mines, and now a leading consulting engineer, who said recently on the very marketing schemes now before the country:
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  "The colliery owners have commenced at the wrong end. Cheaper production should have been their first aim, and this can only be secured by amalgamation, modernization and better selling and distributing organisation."
  Let me point out, also, the experience of the countries with which we are in competition. We here produce about 250,000,000 tons per year and we have 584 undertakings. In Westphalia, the great German coalfield, at the time the Royal Commission was making its inquiry, produced 100,000,000 of tons from 70 undertakings; to-day they have about 120,000,000 from 50 undertakings. In the Pas de Calais they were producing 20,000,000 from 16 undertakings and now 25,000,000 from 15. These fields are now producing more than half the total output of Great Britain, and they do it by 65 companies. Here we have 584. Let me take another authority which ought to be welcomed by hon. Members opposite—"Labour and the Nation" which is always a source of useful information:
  "The present disorganisation of the coal industry with its 4,000 mineral owners, 1,400 colliery companies and 25,000 distributors, with its antiquated and inefficient system of production and distribution, its wasteful methods of consumption and its deplorable indifference to the interests of posterity and the possibilities of scientific treatment of coal, which is rapidly progressing in other countries, is by general consent intolerable."
  That is the declared view of the Labour party. I have dwelt on this at some length, because it is the very essence of the whole matter, and I hope hon. Members in all parts of the House will regard it as established that the reorganisation of the industry is essential. How is it to be accomplished? The Royal Commission made two recommendations. We suggested that the mineral itself should pass into the possession of the State. This is the only important coal producing country, except the United States, where the mineral is in private unregulated ownership. In the United States the industry is disorganised and is subjected to great fluctuations, and frequently to violent industrial disputes. The Government have told us they are going to introduce a Bill for the nationalisation of royalties. Obviously the President of the Board of Trade does not attach much importance to that Bill, or rely much upon its prospects, for in the

  1299
  course of a speech which gave him scope for dealing with many points he did not, if I remember rightly, say a single word with regard to the second portion of the Labour party's policy, the Royalties Bill which we were told at one time was to be introduced in the course of this Session.
  We proposed nationalisation of royalties because we thought the State could use the landlord power in order to secure proper planning of the coalfields. Secondly, we recommended that there should be legislation to facilitate amalgamations, and we urged that where owners of mines wished voluntarily to amalgamate that should be facilitated, and that if a minority objected to conic into the scheme that that minority should be overridden. We considered very carefully whether we ought not to recommend immediate compulsory amalgamation in all cases. We were most anxious to make a report which would not be resented by the industry and which would secure some general measure of acceptance, and we arrived ultimately at this conclusion, that while there ought not to be compulsion straight away and the industry should be given time to effect its own amalgamations, legislation ought to be passed—with a suspensory power to come into operation at the end of, say, three years—under which if the industry had not then reorganised itself, the State should intervene and in the national interest enforce it. When the right hon. Gentleman said the Royal Commission did not recommend compulsion he was in error. We did recommend it, but it was to be in the form of a suspensory power, and we thought that if that power were in the background but inscribed in an Act of Parliament it would greatly conduce to make the industry move and secure agreement by voluntary action.
  The last Government passed an Act in 1926, following in part the recommendation of the Royal Commission, to facilitate amalgamations, but they did not include this particular compulsory provision. The action that has been taken since then is, as the right hon. Gentleman says, negligible—that is his own word. In the first two years, as the first Report showed, 54 undertakings had combined into 14, employing 126,000 men. Last year 23 undertakings combined into
  1300
  eight, employing 43,000 men. Many of those amalgamations are not really industrial amalgamations but financial amalgamations, and sometimes, I am afraid, over-capitalised, and the day will come when it will be as necessary to pump water out of the capital as out of the mines. At the present rate of progress it would take 15 or 20 years before the industry became properly organised, even if the process went on uninterruptedly, but there is no guarantee that it will do so. It is now 1929, three years after that legislation was passed. The period recommended by the Royal Commission has, in fact, elapsed, but the compulsory powers which we recommended should be now on the Statute Book and available are not there. I look at this Bill and find that they are not there either.
  The right hon. Gentleman says, in answer to these contentions, that the Government intend to take action. He is somewhat late in the day in making the announcement. He is going to appoint, commissioners who are to go about the country and to prepare schemes of amalgamation. It appears to me that those commissioners will have no effective powers of any sort or kind. He quotes the Act of 1920 establishing the Mines Department. I looked carefully at that, and I have had legal advice on the subject, and it certainly appears that those commissioners will have no powers to require the co-operation of owners in the framing of schemes for compulsory amalgamation, any more than they would have power to go about the country to prepare schemes for the nationalisation of the mines. It was never contemplated by the Act of 1920, and is not covered by that Act. When those commissioners go about the country they will, I am afraid, be treated by the coal owners as well-meaning visitors with no authority of any sort for preparing schemes which are not authorised by any present legislation, and which may or may not be authorised by same future legislation.
  An this is entirely contrary not only to the declarations of "Labour and the Nation," but also to what has been described as the immediate policy of the Labour party in relation to coal. At the Blackpool conference in October, 1927, the Labour party passed a special resolution on the

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  mining situation. It was moved by the present Prime Minister himself and seconded by Mr. Herbert Smith. While reaffirming that the object of the Labour party was the nationalisation of the mines, it declared that it was necessary to have an immediate programmeimmediate!—and in this immediate programme were included
  "compulsory grouping and amalgamation of mines so as -to secure the advantages of unification, the establishment of a selling agency on each coal field, either by the State or by public utility societies, and legislation to enable local authorities to undertake the sale of coal."
  That was the immediate programme. The right hon. Gentleman now comes to us and says: "How could we propose compulsory amalgamation in this Bill? We had to wait until we had two Reports to show whether amalgamation was going on adequately under the Act of 1926." Everyone knew that it was halting, hardly moving at all, "negligible," in his own words. It did not require special reports or a delay of six months to know that, and the declaration of the Labour party in the special Resolution moved by the Prime Minister was that the immediate policy of the party was to be a Measure intended to secure better organisation of the mines. Now all that the right hon. Gentleman proposes is that, without any legislative authority, but by administrative action he shall appoint some commissioners who will struggle as best they can to prepare schemes, without any authority, for some future legislation which may or may not be introduced.
  My right hon. and hon. Friends around me are very keenly interested, and have been so for years, in this aspect of the question. On their behalf I desire to ask the Government these questions in order to elucidate the matter, and as some Member of the Government is to speak to-night it would be a great convenience if, before the interval between the two days of this Debate, we could have answers to these questions. Is it proposed to introduce any Clauses in Committee in order to establish the principle of compulsory amalgamation and to give powers to the -commissioners who are to be appointed? That -would not require any great provision, for Part I of the Act of 1926 sets up the whole of the machinery, and it would be only necessary to adapt it and to extend it by
  1302
  fresh legislation. I think that such Clauses would probably be within the title of this Bill. If not, would the Government be prepared to introduce another Bill, before the House parts with the present one, to deal with this vitally important matter and to secure, as far as they can secure it, that such Bill should pass into law before the end of the present Session? Are they prepared to make the provisions of the present Bill—to which we have very great objection, as I shall point out in a moment—the provisions regarding marketing, quotas, prices and so forth, temporary, merely to tide over a difficult period, with a time limit, and a short time limit?
  Are they prepared to secure that if amalgamations take place those amalgamations shall be on the basis of the present valuation of the mines, the real value- of the mines, and not exaggerated values, as they will be exaggerated if the provisions of this Bill come into operation? Are they prepared to secure that if powers are given to bodies to control prices, to fix prices, that there shall be a really effective control of prices in the public interest? Those are my questions, and I trust that we may have definite replies to them.
  So far I have been dealing with the provisions which ought to be in this Bill but which are not there. I am rather like an Irish Member of this House who is reported to have said: "When I examine the Bill the most important Clause I see in it is the one that is not there." The omissions from this Bill are its chief defect, but the Clauses themselves are also subject to grave criticism. I cannot attempt to cover the whole field, but I will ask the House to follow me on three points. They are the three main questions which arise in connection with the so-called marketing scheme. Will this be a step that will assist re-organisation or will tend to hinder and hamper reorganisation? That is the main point. The right hon. Gentleman has told us that the coal mines of this country have a production capacity of about 330,000,000 tons a year, and that only 250,000,000 or 255,000,000 tons are required. The plan of this Bill is that all pits are to be allotted a standard tonnage. The principle on which the tonnage is to be allocated is not fixed. It is to be left to the framers of the scheme. The right hon.

  1303
  Gentleman suggests that it would be based to some extent on the actual output in any recent period, presumably chosen by the coal owner—that was the Welsh scheme—who will naturally choose the period at which his pit was at its maximum production. That having been fixed, in order that the production shall not exceed the demand, quotas, being a certain proportion of the standard output, are to be allotted to the pits. This is the vital Clause in the Bill:
  "The quota fixed … shall be the same proportion of the standard tonnage … for all coal mines in the district."
  That is to say you are to have an arbitrary level not distinguishing between pits in respect of their efficiency or in any other respect. Every pit is to have its 80 per cent. or 90 per cent., or whatever it may be, of the standard tonnage that has been allotted to it. We consider that that introduces a very great element of danger. No one is to be permitted to produce a ton more than his allotted quota unless he can purchase somebody else's quota—I shall come to that in a moment—and if he does he is liable to heavy penalties. Let us examine this closely. The right hon. Gentleman, in his very able and lucid introductory speech, seemed to me to skate rather lightly over this part of the ice, and perhaps he had good reason for doing so.
  Let us assume that the various pits are all producing according to their quota without buying from other people and that the scheme is operating apart from subsequent adjustments. It is wrong in principle. The whole purpose should be not to secure an all round reduction but a concentration of production. Concentration should be the purpose to be aimed at, and not all round reduction. What will be the effect upon the well-organised pits? They will have their quota cut down, and they will be working short time, and consequently they will be producing less than their usual economic output, and as a consequence of that they will have excessive overhead charges. From the economic point of view, it is far better to have 30 pits working five or six days a week than to have 50 pits working three days a week, and I am told by a well-known authority that the difference in the cost of production between working three days and four days a week would amount to about 1s. 6d. per ton. It
  1304
  would no doubt vary in different cases, but it would be sufficient to make all the difference between a profit and a loss.
  Let me take another aspect of this question. There has been a movement in the last 20 or 30 years towards what are called vertical combinations. Coal mines, to a large extent, are in the same ownership as iron and steel works; in fact, that is a natural course of development, and certainly the State should do nothing to hinder or thwart that tendency. Mark the position in respect of one of these collieries when the Act comes into operation. A scheme is made. That colliery is allotted its standard output, and the committee supervising the scheme declare that every one of the collieries in the scheme must cut down its output by 10 or 20 per cent. Instantly, the pit which is producing the coal needed to supply its own iron and steel works finds that it is working uneconomically. That pit is not concerned with market prices, and the general state of the industry has no direct effect upon it. That colliery is concerned only with its own immediate group, but, nevertheless, it is called upon to cut down its production, which has been specifically so arranged as to supply regularly the needs of the industry with which it is connected. The result would be that this particular colliery, with its own iron and steel works, would see its own pits compelled to work short time, while at the same time they would have to buy, at an enhanced price, the coal they required to make up the deficiency. That result would be brought about by the deliberate action of this legislature.
  The President of the Board of Trade says: "Yes, but the Bill provides for transfers of quotas." The Bill does not provide for transfers. It only permits them. You cannot ensure transfer of quotas. The large pit which has its production cut down is permitted to buy the quota from some other pit, but it cannot be sure of getting it, and, if it did get it, what price would it have to pay for it? There is going to be created for the first time a statutory vested interest for all these small backward pits, and the prices will have to be raised in order to suit those pits. Those small pits can say that they cannot produce except at a certain price, and consequently pressure will be put upon the other pits to raise prices in order to suit

  1305
  them, and on account of their number they will have a powerful influence with the committees that determine these matters. The consequence will be that the continuance of those pits will be encouraged, and they will not be encouraged to "give up the ghost," as was suggested by the right hon. Gentleman, because they will find that their position has been greatly eased by the rise in prices which will be the inevitable result of this Bill. Last week we heard an exceedingly interesting speech made by the Minister of Transport on electricity, and I heard him say:
  "I want the electricity supply industry to adopt a policy of push and go and to reject the policy of high prices, quick profits and a quiet life."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th December, 1929; col. 527, Vol. 233.]
  The Minister of Transport, in the matter of electricity, last week, suggested the rejection of the policy of high prices, quick profits and a quiet life, but to-day the President of the Board of Trade, in relation to the coal industry, is offering to the mineowners that very policy of high prices, quick profits and a quiet life. As the President of the Board of Trade has said to-day, it is a remarkable thing that, whenever the coal industry shows some readiness to take a step forward and reorganise itself, if there comes about any adventitious circumstance like the destruction of the French mines, the occupation of the Ruhr, or even a cold spell of weather, instantly they lapse again into lethargy. In my opinion, the coal industry will never have such a good excuse for re-lapsing into lethargy as they will have when the high prices guaranteed under this Measure come into operation. What will be the cost? Imagine the scheme in operation. The efficient pits will have to cut down their production and work short time, and they will be obliged to buy somebody else's quota in order to carry on their work economically. You will at once establish an active competition for quotas, and the inefficient pits, when prices have been raised, may still enjoy their quiet life, waiting for the competition to become more and more keen. The sellers of the quotas will command the market.
  The result will be that the good and progressive pits which we wish to encourage will be compelled to spend large sums of money with nothing to
  1306
  show for it in the end, before they can be in the position of producing 100 per cent. of the output. The result of all this must be reflected in the prices charged to the consumer. The President of the Board of Trade may tell us that this effect will also be produced by amalgamation, that amalgamation amounts to the same thing, because you have to buy out the other pits, and you have consequently a dead-weight of capital which is not represented by any effective assets. There seems much truth in that, but there is this great and fundamental difference, that when you are amalgamating under a principle of compulsion you will be paying the real value of the mine either as a going or a moribund concern, having regard to its future prospects. But this Measure gives a statutory right to all those pits, and you will have to pay a very inflated value based upon what they are able to extort for the purchase of their quota. It may be worth while to give an organ grinder sixpence to go away from your window, but, if he has a statutory right to play in front of your window, you would have to pay much more than sixpence to go away. It will be very convenient for the moribund pits and their creditors, who are a very important element in this connection, but very deleterious to the success of the economic conduct of the industry.
  Efficiency? This is the endowment and entrenchment of inefficiency. Rationalisation? This is the irrationalisation of the coal mines.
  I will now deal with the proposals affecting prices. The Bill provides that the mine-owners organisation shall have power to fix prices. The words of the Bill are that schemes may provide:—
  "For the determination of prices below which every class of coal produced in the district may not be sold or supplied."
  Penalties are provided against anyone who does not conform to that provision. By these proposals we are told that the public interest is protected, but let us see if that is so. Cluase 4 of the Bill is a long clause providing for a committee of investigation upon which the consumers are represented. The House would like to know if that is a court of appeal from the decision of the Mine-owners Committee. By no means. It is an authority which

  1307
  can investigate and hear complaints, and their sole powers are limited to reporting to the Board of Trade. What is the power of the Board of Trade? The only power the Board of Trade can impose is capital punishment. They have a right to stop the scheme altogether, to dissolve the whole organisation and appoint other people.
  Under this Bill, you cannot use that terrific power on a mere question whether the price of coal is 6d. too much or 6d. too little. Is it intended that there should be some control of prices, and, if so, why does the Bill not say so? Why all this verbiage in the Clause? Why not provide in a few simple words what is the intention of the Government? The history of this Clause may be guessed from its contents. I have no special information, but, after reading this Clause, I gather that it represents a compromise between two contending factors, the Government urging that there ought to be control over prices and the coal-owners insisting that there ought to be independence. At last, they seem to have reached a compromise, and it is that the Government shall have a semblance of control, and the mine-owners shall have the reality of independence. The President of the Board of Trade told us that if this was not enough there is to be a Consumers Council some day to deal with coal as well as milk, bread, and other things. When will this Consumers' Council be set up, and what will be its powers? In my view the right time to impose a check on a function like this is when you set up the monopolistic power, and in this case that time is now.
  The right hon. Gentleman said that he was dealing with the present situation, and that we must bring prices up to a remunerative level. Now the whole cry is to bring prices up to a remunerative level, but in two or three years' time the whole nation may be aroused at the result of establishing a monopoly in complete control. That is what happened in Germany where a large syndicate was formed, and, after its formation the Government of Prussia was engaged for 10 years in a struggle against that syndicate, in an attempt to protect the public against the prices which the syndicate imposed. But even if there were an effective control of prices, even if the
  1308
  Bill did give complete power to the President of the Board of Trade to see that prices will not be more than will provide a reasonable profit above the cost price, that would not be an adequate remedy, because it would be easy to prove that the backward collieries could not produce below a certain figure, and all they would have to do would be to put up the figures to suit their needs. Prices, therefore, must rise. My last quotation is from a colleague of mine on the Royal Commission, Sir William Beveridge, who, without any communication with me, wrote this to the "Times" not long ago:
  "The industry is not simply to be left, but to be drugged, into remaining just as it is, and the difference between present costs and prices is to be taken out of those consumers who cannot escape. They are to pay for the continued irrationalisation of coal."
  It is to my mind certain that the effect of this Bill must be a considerable rise in the price of coal. That is, indeed, as we all know, its very purpose, and I do not envy the President of the Board of Trade in his conversations with other industries—the much-depressed cotton industry, for example—when he has to persuade them to acquiesce in this deliberate increase of prices; also the iron and steel industry, and perhaps the gas industry, which, in industrial centres, provides from 25 to 50 per cent. of its product for industry. I do not envy the Minister of Agriculture when he meets the farmers—[HON. MEMBERS "He will not meet them!"]—who say to him, "We are a depressed industry, and we are compelled by Act of Parliament to pay statutory rates of wages. You will not protect us; you will not agree to raise the prices of foodstuffs, because you say it is oppressive to the poor; and yet by Act of Parliament you are raising the price of coal—you are giving to this other industry an advantage which you deny to us." I do not envy hon. Members opposite and in all parts of the House who are keenly interested in the welfare of the poorer districts of this country, and who honestly and sincerely spend their lives trying to raise the conditions of the poorer classes of our community. The cost of their living is a vital matter to them, and yet, again by Act of Parliament, you are likely to raise—you will raise—the price of coal and also of gas to the poorest of the population.

  1309
  If a Conservative Government had introduced these proposals, I can imagine the fierce denunciation with which they would have been met. They would have been told, "You are creating a coal-owners' monopoly, with power to fix prices at their own will, prices which the poorest must pay." Then the Government say, "Yes, but how are you going to deal with the present situation of coal being sold below the cost of production?" The cost of production is not something fixed and absolute. The cost of production depends upon the efficiency and the organisation of the industry. Concentrate your industry, work the pits full time, adopt modem methods of coal getting, eliminate waste in transport and the great waste in the cost of retail distribution, and then you will have one level of cost of production and supply. Leave the industry unorganised, with short time and high overhead costs, or compel them to buy at heavy charges quotas from mines that are thrown idle, the inefficient Setting the standard of prices, let transport and distribution also be wasteful, and then, indeed, you will have another and a very different standard of cost of production.
  The consumers will have to pay more, but there is one class of consumer who is not to have his prices raised. There is one class of consumer for whom the price is to be lowered—and now I come to my third and last point on this Bill —namely, the manufacturer abroad, with whom our manufacturers are engaged in vital competition. A strange, inverted form of Protection! We hear from some hon. Members on these benches that we ought to tax the foreigner for the benefit of the Briton. I wish we could do it, but we cannot; at least, we think that we cannot. But what can be done by this House is to tax the Briton for the benefit of the foreigner, and that is precisely what will be the effect of levying a charge upon all the consumers of coal in this country in order to give a bonus for export. The right hon. Gentleman said that it is not intended to sell the coal at a loss, that it is to be sold at the European price. What does he mean by that? If it is not to be sold at a loss, where is the necessity for any subsidy or any levy? I fail entirely to understand the bearing of the observations which the right hon. Gentleman made in that connection.
  1310
  Look at the general economic condition of this country. Always the economic history of Great Britain has dwelt upon the fact that this country owes its industrial development mainly or very largely to the fact that Nature has given us vast deposits of coal under our soil—deposits still sufficient to last for many centuries, of unrivalled quality, and easily accessible. On that we have built up our great industrial system, and have secured a standard of living higher than that of any neighbouring countries which have not been so favoured; and in the world competition we have been able to meet them on these terms. Now, by this provision, we are deliberately to surrender that advantage which has been given us by Nature, and we are to say to our foreign competitors, "We think it so hard upon you that we should have the advantage of high-quality coal which you have not got, that we will now subsidise your purchases of it at the expense of ourselves as a nation."
  Those are my three points of criticism on this Bill. There is no warrant for this scheme in the Report of the Royal Commission; it is, indeed, contrary to the whole spirit and purpose of that Report. It is true that we recommended co-operative selling agencies, and very advisable those co-operative selling agencies will be. But they were to be voluntary, open to competition, not in the nature of a monopoly; and we certainly never contemplated statutory protection for the inefficient, and the cutting down of the product of the efficient. I deeply regret that the Government have not proceeded in this legislation on the lines of their own declared policy. The published policies of these two parties have been substantially the same, and gladly would we have joined with the Government in carrying into effect what we thought was the common purpose. They cannot justly complain if, having put aside their own policy, we do not do so also.
  The position now is very much the same as it was in 1926, just before and at the time of the General Strike. Let hon. Members opposite cast back their memories to that time. Then the miners refused to acquiesce in the proposals of the late Government, because they said that reorganisation, which was essential to the industry, was being postponed and was doubtful, while the reduction of wages

  1311
  was immediate and certain. To-day, it is the increase of prices that is immediate and certain, and the reorganisation is again postponed and doubtful. For a time the late Government took the easy course of meeting the then difficulties of the coal industry by a subsidy at the expense of the taxpayers; now the present Government is taking what seems to be, though I am not sure that it will be, the easy course of meeting the needs of the industry by raising prices at the expense of the consumer. In both cases the public pays. It is thought by some people in the nation that the position is hopeless for the consumer, with the miners, the mineowners, and the Government all combined against him. But he has one resource; he has this House; and this House must not turn a deaf ear to the legitimate case that may be made on his behalf.
  I regret very deeply that it has been my duty to speak in terms of criticism of this Bill. When the policy of the Government was first announced, when it appeared in this year's King's Speech, I fully expected and hoped that I and others of my right hon. and hon. Friends would be able to co-operate with the Government in carrying out the policy which they themselves had declared; and we should still welcome an opportunity, if they were to return to their own proposals, of securing, by general consent of the whole of Parliament, the sending to this industry and to its workers, so long and so sorely tried, of a message of help and of hope.
  Mr. T. WILLIAMS: This subject must be viewed from two diverse angles. In the first place we must ask ourselves whether we want the Bill. The only approach to the subject is: Shall we pursue a policy of doing nothing, or shall we attempt a constructive policy; and, if the latter, is this Bill the best of all policies? If, during the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel), I had had the misfortune to be suffering from physical blindness, and if I had not heard him speak before, I should have been led to imagine, long before he concluded his speech, that he had migrated from the Clyde, and that he was one of the extreme left-wingers of the Socialist movement. I could not
  1312
  have made myself believe that any supporter of private enterprise, who believes that to be the be-all and end-all of an economic system, could have been suggesting to the House that the duty of the Government was to insist upon compulsory amalgamation, to insist upon compulsory selling agencies, and to insist upon the coalowners of the country doing several things that many of us who sit on these benches have been saying-should have been done some 20 or 30 years ago.
  The right hon. Gentleman submitted a number of points during his speech. The first was with regard to compulsory amalgamation, and he quoted one or two documents and authorities. He suggested that the President of the Board of Trade was adopting a halting policy. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, if he will go back to the Commission of 1925, that, had it not been for the halting policy recommended by the Commission of which he was the illustrious chairman, there would have been no necessity for compulsory amalgamation to-day. The Commission approached this problem in a very tremulous manner, when one bears in mind the experiences subsequent to the War, all the accumulated evidence of 1919 and subsequent years, and the knowledge accumulated by the Commission during their examination of the question in 1925, for they recommended, not compulsory amalgamation, except it were to-morrow or next year or some time or never, but they recommended, at least for a period of three years, voluntary amalgamation. I recollect that hon. Members who are now sitting on these benches, and who were then sitting on the opposite side of the House, were strong supporters of the application of compulsory amalgamation at that moment, and, if my memory serves me, the majority of those with whom the right hon. Gentleman is associated were averse from compulsory amalgamation at that time, and have always pursued a policy totally adverse to the suggestion of compulsory amalgamation as recommended by the right hon. Gentleman to-day. The question of the quota, to which he has referred, does, indeed, need very careful consideration, and any hon. Member who has any acquaintance at all with mining life could probably make out a very good case, assuming that he commenced from the point of view of damaging criticism and without

  1313
  any desire for helpfulness at all, against the transfer or sale of the various quotas.
  8.0 p.m.
  The right hon. Gentleman made a very important statement which ought to be refuted. I should like to recall my personal experience. I represent a division which contains within its confines seven or eight of the largest and newest collieries in Yorkshire. The majority of them are exceptionally efficient, but in spite of the latest electrical and mechanical devices utilisable for the production of coal, for a period of 18 months to two years they have been working invariably, not six days a week but somewhere in the region of 4¼ days, so that if the right hon. Gentleman's suggestion as to the quota transfer takes place, the efficient pits will have their working days reduced, their output reduced, their overhead charges remaining the same, the charge of production with a reduced output will be increased by a shilling to 1s. 6d. per ton. That is not a fear for the future. That is the exact position from which at least the Yorkshire miners have been suffering for two years or so. As my right hon. Friend has said, the difficulty is that the apparently inefficient mines refuse to die and go out of production and, if the Government have to do anything at all, what they do they must do in the light of existing circumstances and not in the light of some flight of fancy which has no material relation to the problem at all.
  The right hon. Gentleman's second point was the question of prices. Can he explain how and why it is that during the last few weeks there has been an upward tendency? In my part of the country consumers are paying from a shilling to four shillings increase per ton for their coal. That is the situation that exists at the moment, and not a mere figment of one's imagination, or a possibility for the future. There are no powers to curb the disgusting demands suggested by the right hon. Gentleman for high profits. There is nothing to prevent the coalowners from adopting that policy to-day. Therefore, the question of what the price may he under the terms of this Bill ought to be related to what the price might be to-day, assuming that the Government did nothing and continued to pursue the policy of their
  1314
  predecessors, so that year by year at Christmas time we shall have the "Daily Mail" appealing for funds to provide for miners' families. With regard to the argument of existing prices, hon. Members on these benches have from time to time declared that it is a false philosophy to suggest that we can afford to allow mine workers to produce coal which we are sending abroad at a price less than it costs to produce. We have always taken that stand. In spite of the practical knowledge of those who have had any connection with mines, the fact of the matter has been that for years before the War we were selling coal abroad at a price much less than that which we exacted from our home consumers. Therefore, this would be no change in the policy of the British mineowners. They would be merely pursuing the same policy that they pursued when the right hon. Gentleman was an illustrous member of a Liberal Government. Some of these arguments may appear very specious if we ignore the conditions that obtain at the moment. It seems to me that the late President of the Board of Trade might very well have left his speech until the Committee stage when the comparatively small points he raised could have been dealt with by the present President of the Board of Trade.
  May I try to review the question from the point of view of the man who works in the mine and the four or five million people who are dependent upon him? They could take this very narrow point of view if they wished and could say to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen, or to hon. Members above the Gangway, "What is a reasonable time to expect a miner to remain in the bowels of the earth?" It may be said seven, seven and a half or eight hours. If the miner descends and performs his duty during the requisite number of hours, the next question is, What is a wage capable of enabling a miner who has done his job to live a decently civilised standard of life? Having determined what is a reasonable wage, the third question is, How are you going to secure that wage? Obviously, you can only secure it when you sell the commodity that the worker produces at a price which will produce the wage. The miner would be justified in merely taking that point of view, because hon. Members above the below the Gangway

  1315
  have always adopted the philosophy that the owners of industry are entitled to retain absolute power over their own industry.
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen will remember in 1919 when nationalisation was spoken about. The then National President of the Coal Association, Lord Gainsford, when some joint control was spoken about, declared on behalf of the Association that unless the mine owners are left with full power, undisturbed by any element of workers' control, they would have nothing to do with the coal-mining industry at all. Therefore, if the mine worker is divorced from either a managerial or a commercial function, at least he is entitled to demand of the State that, after having performed his duties, he is going to enjoy that wage and that standard of life that civilised miners to-day are entitled to expect.
  The history of the coal-mining industry has been such that we ought not to have been suffering from the present problem. For 30 years preceding the War profits were too easy in the industry. The normal increase in the demand for coal was approximately 5 per cent. Anyone who had any money to invest knew that a big profit was always available so long as he invested it in coal mines. The demand continued, increased output continued and profits continued to increase. Whereas profits in 1900 were somewhere about B¾d. a ton, by 1913, when we reached the maximum output of 287,000,000 tons, profits arrived at the nice figure of 1s. 6d. a ton. While those conditions remained there was no necessity for the coal owner to have any other philosophy than that suggested by the right hon. Gentleman of high prices, big profits and a quiet life. They adopted that philosophy before the War and during the War and for some years after the War. It was only when it was realised that drastic changes had taken place in Europe, and in all parts of the world, and that the demand for coal was not continuing year by year, and that we had outstepped the normal demands, that artificial methods of some kind had to be used if mine workers were to be guaranteed a respectable living wage. As the Economic Committee declared at Geneva in the first quarter of this year,
  1316
  the world capacity and the world demand for coal indicates the cause and measure of the problem that is facing us and other nations.
  The question of coalowners being left with full power has been tested out, and their calculated stupidity for a large number of years at least ought to satisfy everyone that nothing the Government could do would be unjustified so long as their general desire was to place the industry on a firm foundation and to provide for the workers a reasonable standard of existence. We have reached the stage when profits have almost gone. Wages certainly have gone, and no one in the country can be satisfied now that the industry is on the verge of collapse. The Report of Commission after Commission has been totally ignored. It has been very aptly said that the coalowners have been members of a suicide club, to which no one would have objected but for the fact that they have almost destroyed the miners in the process. So, in spite of any number of expedients since the War, we find we have, by legislative action, to compel the coal-owners to do what would not have been done voluntarily, although there appeared to be no hope of rehabilitating the industry and establishing it on a firmer foundation.
  The two Oppositions attack the Bill from totally different angles. I was very interested to hear the ex-President of the Board of Trade demanding of the present Minister that he should establish selling agencies, and do all kinds of things which would restrict the normal efforts of private enterprise. I expected long before his speech had been concluded he would be developing Socialist tendencies were he not extremely careful. Of the three special points in the Bill, dealing with hours first, I think no one can disagree with the suggestion. At least the British mineworker will be down the mine as long as any miner in Europe. After the Bill becomes an Act the hours may be reduced from eight to seven and a-holf, which means actually somewhere about eight hours and a few minutes. No one can complain of that particular part of this Bill. The marketing proposal may be attacked, I repeat, from various angles, but, if there is a desire on the part of hon. and right hon. Members who are speaking in this Debate

  1317
  to help this industry to a state of prosperity, they must view the suggested Clause dealing with marketing from the point of view of what will be the ultimate result once the Act is in operation, when quotas have been determined, prices have been fixed, and totally inefficient mines have been eliminated from producing coal. The right hon. Gentleman indicated a short time ago that inefficient pits are to be compensated, but what are we to do with them to-day? They suggest no other policy than a policy of amalgamation.
  The marketing scheme embodied in this Bill will be the first real step that will make amalgamation absolutely certain within a very short period. The only question that comes to one's mind is that, when fixing prices below which coal shall not be sold, every district will be confronted with the usual difficulty. You will have, as is well known, differential conditions, not only in every district, but almost at every mine in every part of the country. You have collieries actually making losses at the moment, other collieries producing coal at 3d. per ton profit, and other collieries producing coal at 3s. per ton profit. When the price fixing committees settle down to determine the price for a period, how can they possibly determine an equitable price without either making collieries which are producing a small profit lose money, or, on the other hand, making it possible foe collieries which are really producing fairly gigantic profits, to make an increased profit over and above what they are receiving at this moment? Once the price-fixing machinery comes into existence and the quotas have been applied, and we know exactly how many collieries are required to produce the requisite tonnage in accordance with the allocation for any period, the investigating committee will know how many collieries are making huge profits, how many are making medium profits, and how many are making comparatively small profits. When this information is obtainable will be the time that the President of the Board of Trade ought to insist upon amalgamations and upon the high profit colliery joining forces with the small profit colliery, and upon a price being fixed and settled for the period for the district which will at least ensure that the consumer is not going to be fleeced for the purpose of
  1318
  making gigantic profits for any colliery company in this country.
  I want to ask my hon. Friend a question, to which I hope he will give a reply. When fixing the price, will an attempt be made to fix it at a figure which will enable those collieries which can produce the requisite tonnage at an economic price to do so, leaving other collieries to go entirely out of production If so, the next obvious question is: How long shall we be before amalgamations are made compulsory, and when shall we finally determine what is a reasonable profit? Wages have been in dispute until this moment. The two Front Bench spokesmen from above and below the Gangway opposite have been indicating that the next thing the Government will have to do will be to support fixing profits. It would appear that the coal owners are thought to be worse than what ex-mine workers think them to be. Therefore, it seems to me that the restriction of profits will come right into the forefront of politics in a comparatively short time.
  We have had an experience of marketing in Yorkshire, and I want to pay my tribute to the progressive individuals among the Yorkshire coalowners who have seen the absolute necessity of the ultimate and only solution of this problem. That will be found when we reach a stage when European regulations can take the place of the county regulations upon which we are insisting in this Bill. They have at least, in the Five, Seven, or Nine Counties Scheme, had some little experience with mines, but three vital factors have not emerged from the scheme which has so far been applied. It may be that this is due to the partial application of the scheme. This new scheme produces what the Five Counties Scheme has so far failed to produce, namely, scientific selling agencies. We are anxious to see the price of coal reduced to the consumer, and we want to see an improvement in the status of the workers, but the Fve Counties Scheme has failed to produce any of these things.
  That brings me to the question of selling agencies. I want to ask my hon. Friend, when he replies, to tell us whether the selling agencies, of which already six exist in this country, are collieries or combines who are merely transferring all their coal to an artificial selling agency which is part of the same

  1319
  organisation, and that for every ton they sell, which is merely a paper transaction performed by one or two ordinary clerks, they receive 6d. per ton. There is, for instance, the Doncaster Collieries Association which disposes of the coal produced by five of the largest collieries in Yorkshire, and, for every ton of coal sold, they receive 6d., though that 6d. per ton does not find its way to the ascertainment, and consequently there is a difference between the pit top price and the ultimate price and the miners receive no benefit whatever. There are also the Rotherham Collieries Association, the Tredegar Coal and Iron Company, Powell Duffryn Company, Limited, Ocean Coal and Wilson Limited, and Guest, Keen and Nettlefold, Limited. These associated selling agencies are merely agencies which are attached to colliery combines employing one or two clerks, and they dispose of the coal after fixing a certain profit per ton. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will bear in mind that the price received for the coal should be part of the colliery ascertainments in the future and that no illicit profits either by artificial selling agencies or by any other organisation set up by the colliery companies, should be used for the purpose of exploiting either the workers or the consumers of this country.
  I should have liked to have seen another thing emerge from the deliberations which have been taking place over a period of five or six months. I am certainly the last person to suggest that time has been wasted. I know the difficulties of attempting to produce a Bill which can secure the co-operation and the good will of the mineowners of this country, and at the same time receive the good will of the mine workers, and any sort of a welcome from this House. The right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues who have been responsible for this Measure have not only not wasted time but have done extremely well to have gone as far as they have gone in this Bill. But I should have liked to have seen some national body set up to undertake the onerous task of acquiring minerals, including the full aggregating of mineral assets and the re-apportioning of coal values, the promoting of selling agencies, providing for the consumers that safeguard which we all feel they are entitled to expect, enforcing
  1320
  desirable amalgamations, bringing together the two indispensible sources of production, namely the employer and the worker, and providing the worker with that status to which any man who works down a coat mine is entitled.
  Further, I would like to see that national body exploring the question of oil extraction, the pulverisation of coal, and low and high temperature carbonisation. Such a body could be small in number, while representative of the industry as a whole, consisting of representatives of the owner, the worker, the consumer, together with the technician and the accountant. If they were vested with the power to direct inquiries into the industry, I am convinced from our past experience that they could produce a working scheme which would be beneficial to the worker, to the general community and to the State as a whole. We have not yet reached that stage. While there may be some doubts about portions of the Bill, I as representing a mining division welcome the Bill for what it is worth. Although the mineworkers of Yorkshire will not have one single minute taken off their working day, and there is no guarantee of one penny piece going on to their wages, because the Government have made a really constructive effort, because they have moved out of the lethargic condition which dominated their predecessors and have brought forward proposals for putting the industry upon its feet, I welcome the Bill.
  Major LLEWELLIN: I rise, as I suppose everyone in this House has done who addressed it for the first time, with a considerable degree of diffidence, but in the six months that one has been a Member of this House one has learned that the opening remarks of any new Member are always greeted with great kindness and courtesy from every bench. I am quite certain that I can rely upon that kindness and courtesy to-night. I make no apology for speaking for the first time on so important a Bill as this, because it not only affects the miners and the mine owners but every consumer, and I represent a constituency which is quasi-industrial and quasi-residential. There are these two classes of consumers to be considered with reference to this Bill, but before I come to the part of the Bill which most largely deals with them, I want to refer to another of the three parts into which the Bill is divided.

  1321
  I will deal with that part which sets up the National Board. The hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) said that the ex-miners have not a very good opinion of the coal-owners. A large number of us who are not connected with the mining industry regret the two sides that seem to exist in the mining industry, the miners having one point of view and the mine owners having another point of view. When one looks back, one sees that both parties are probably in part to blame. In considering the industrial conditions of this country, and the question of limited liability companies, we find that we are suffering from loss of the old personal touch. That old personal touch still exists in the agricultural districts between the farmer and his men, but in the limited liability companies, unfortunately, it does not exist, and I blame very largely the directors of these limited liability companies for not going down more often among the men and getting to know the men. It is because I believe so strongly in that personal touch that I am 'opposed to the third part of the Bill, because that puts us one degree further away from the personal touch. It sets up a National Industrial Board, which puts us further beyond the District Committees, which ought to be able to settle their own difficulties. I would like to see the difficulties settled in the individual mine. You have a far better chance of settling any difficulties that there may be in a district if you have not a National Industrial Board existing, because when such a Board exists people will say: "We have that still to go to." They will not be so inclined to come to agreement if that state of things exists.
  What does this National Board do? It consists of 17 gentlemen, the Chairman and the Secretary, who are to be paid out of the taxes, and 18 other gentlemen who are to get their travelling and sustenance allowances. What are they to do when they have met to discuss the problems that are brought before them? They are to record any agreements. We already have places in this country where agreements are recorded. We have, for instance, the British Museum, and we have the Mines Department, and it seems to me that there is no necessity for this particular Board simply for recording agreements. It is merely doing something that the Secretary for Mines
  1322
  ought to do and I presume does at the present time. The second thing' that it does is to report when it has made its findings. To whom? Back to the owners and the workers, one of whom has presumably taken a point of view adverse to that upon which the report is being made. What does it get back when it has reported? The secretary of the trade union or the secretary of the mining company will acknowledge the communication, with thanks, with the intimation that it will be brought before the next meeting of the trade union or of the company. This National Board has no power. It is merely there giving some hope to somebody, preventing them from settling their disputes earlier, and not bringing any single person one whit nearer coming to an agreement in the coal mines. That is why I object to part three.
  In regard to Part 2 of the Bill, the question of hours, no one wants to see a miner working longer hours than are necessary in the pit in order to make the industry pay. No one wants the miners to work longer hours. Indeed, we do not want them to work longer hours than we work in this House ourselves, and very many of us have been voting consistently against the longer hours which the Government would have us work. The only reason why the hours were permitted to be longer, not compulsorily but by agreement, was that at that moment the mining industry was not paying, and this was one way, without reducing wages considerably, by which the mining industry could be put hack on its feet. The root trouble of 1926 really rested in the agreement that was made in 1924, a boom period in mining, after which came the dreadful slump on the Ruhr evacuation. What I fear is that hon. Members opposite will again interfere with this industry and will again bring upon us some such cataclysm as happened in 1926.
  It is quite obvious from the speech of the President of the Board of Trade that there is going to be an increase of 1s. 6d. in the cost of raising a ton of coal owing to the half hour that is taken off. Someone will have to pay for that. Nobody thinks, and it has not been suggested, that the mineowner himself can pay that extra sum. It is going to come either, from the miners or from the consumers.

  1323
  There le nothing in this Bill to prevent wage agreements being made for less rates of wages, with the miners forced to accept these agreements when the Bill has become law. The person on whom it is contemplated that this charge will fall is the consumer of coal in this country. Oddly enough, industries abroad are going to get their coal cheaper than the industries of this country. The hon. Member who spoke last said that this is happening to-day. I accept that from him, but it is a very different matter when an individual mineowner is doing it than when we adopt it as a national policy.
  There is one other thing I wish to say about prices. The idea is to put the extra price on the consumers. The President of the Board of Trade talked about the electricity industry, the gas industry, the railway companies and public departments. Let us exclude the public departments. If their coal costs them more it will mean more taxes. Take the electric, gas and railway, undertakings. All these three will put it back again on the private consumer, and worse still on the consumer who is a producer of goods in this country. Quite a large percentage of gas sold in this country goes to industrial concerns, and a large percentage of the electricity supplied also goes to such concerns. The railway companies are, I suppose, one of the largest consumers of coal, and if they have to pay a great deal more for their coal they will be bound to go before the Railway Rates Tribunal and ask permission to put up either their freight or their passenger rates. It seems to me that in trying to make the coal trade a sheltered industry you are embarking upon a vicious circle. Then, there are many poor homes throughout the country which will he affected if you are going to put up the price to the private consumer. I do not see much distinction in the household budget. If you put up the price of coal or of food you are doing much the same sort of thing. Hon. Members opposite very often put up the cry against us when we advocate Protection, that "Your food will cost you more." Now your coal will cost you more. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir Samuel) said that if we had brought in this Bill hon. Members opposite would have said that the Conservative party were
  1324
  organising this for the mineowners. In saying that the right hon. Gentleman I think was right. What I would like to ask him is, what in those circumstances his vote would have been if this Bill had been brought in by the party who sit on these benches?
  I want to deal now with the part of the Bill which takes up 13 pages, but the main parts of which are Subsection (2) of Clause 2, which limits the maximum output for a district and Sub-section (2) of Clause 3, which says that a price may be made below which coal may not be sold. Those are the points at which, on behalf of the consumers in this country, I am at variance with the Bill. The hon. Member for the Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) said that a large number of mines were in an inefficient condition now and that they were not being placed in any worse position by the Bill. But they are; because they will be recognised and stabilised in that inefficient condition by the action of the Government. If you have a quota then, once the quota is fixed, it is rather difficult to change. The President of the Board of Trade said "Oh, this is all right; if you get a fairly recent period that comment against the Bill will go." In coal mining, as in other industries, you get some good concerns and some pretty bad concerns. The good concern wants to bring its mine up to date, to buy new machinery so that it may expand, get more coal, and keep its workers working under better conditions. It has to spend money on new machinery, but when this Bill becomes law, if it ever does, that mine will have to pay for another thing. It will have to pay for the quota of the thoroughly inefficient mine, which must be added to the cost of keeping the efficient mine up to date.
  One result of this Bill will be to put extra cost upon the consumer of coal. The Investigation Committee will be a quite useless body, in my submission. It is a Committee that is to look into any complaints that are brought before it. When it has done that it is to make a recommendation to the Board of Trade, and the Board of Trade in turn is to send the recommendation to the district, and if it is not adopted in the district the Board of Trade is to scrap the old scheme and bring in a completely new scheme.

  1325
  But that will be years after the complaint has been brought forward by the consumer. Another vice about the Bill is that it deals with the price of coal only from the time of "getting" to the time of leaving the pithead, and does not deal with the rise in the price between the pithead and the poor householder. It is the latter price that ought to be dealt with by law. When coal is produced at about 19s. a ton at the pit-head, and is sold in London at 42s. or 43s, or more, it is time for Government action. The Government are dealing with the producer and not attempting to tackle the middleman. If the Government had brought in a Bill really to tackle the middleman and to bring down the price of coal to the consumer, I should have supported that proposal.
  Let me summarise my reasons for opposing the Bill. First of all, it puts another charge, though only the small one of£33,000, upon the taxpayer, and it does it for nothing, for I hold that the National Board and the 22 investigation committees will he quite useless and, if I may use the expression, merely camouflage. Secondly, the whole method of the introduction of this Bill by the President of the Board of Trade, and the promises that he made of future legislation, will not help the mineowner. What the mineowners want is confidence; they want to be allowed to get on with their jobs without interference from politicians. I refer to interference in the sense that there is to be another Bill next year and a third Bill the year after that. There is no confidence in going ahead if the Government say that within a few months they may bring in something quite different from the present proposals. Thirdly, there is in the Bill no guarantee at all to the miners. In some districts, not Yorkshire, it is quite true that there will be half an hour less to work per day, but there is no guarantee whatever that the taking off of that half-hour will not have its effect on employment, that it will not put some miners out of work or have some effect upon wages in the exporting coalfield. Finally, from the point of view of the consumer this is a monstrous Bill. It allows prices to be put up without any restrictions at all. It encourages the export of coal so that manufacturers abroad can purchase it at a lower price
  1326
  than British manufacturers who are producing the same articles as the foreign buyers. I for one certainly intend to vote against the Second Reading of the Bill.
  Mr. E. EDWARDS: I want to congratulate the hon. Member who has just spoken on a very able maiden speech. I am sure that we shall look forward to future debates in which he will take part: In rising to make a statement on the Bill, I want to make it quite clear that I view it from a different point from that of other speakers. I speak as a member of a miners' executive, as one who represents at least 1,000,000 men and one-twelfth of the whole population, and I feel that it is necessary to make a statement on the question. It is significant that this is the first time that the coal industry has been discussed on the Floor of this House free from a great national crisis in the coalfields. In 1912, 1921 and 1926 there were crises in the industry. To-day there is no crisis, and to that extent I believe it is to the advantage of the House in discussing this important question. There is a conception abroad, however, that but for this Measure everything would be well in the industry. I can assure the House that but for the introduction of the Bill by this Government we would have been passing now through as great a crisis in the industry as has ever occurred in its history.
  What are the facts? Whatever your schemes are going to do, from our point of view they must raise the status of the miner out of the slavery in which he exists at the present time. As a result of the late Government's proposals, our men have worked an hour longer per day. In my own district it is one and a half hours more. In addition to that wages have fallen 1s. to 2s. 4d. per day in the industry. Moreover, there are now 200,000 fewer employed in the industry. The late Government abolished the National Agreement, and to-day, as stated by the leader of the opposition to the Bill, we have a huge deficiency to wipe off. That in itself condemns the alterations made by the late Government in the industry.
  In view of this Measure, the Miners' Federation recommended that its members, while they were committed to work for the national agreement, should ask

  1327
  the districts to carry on, and that was not all. When the skeleton plan of this scheme was presented, when it was known to the miners that only half of the time of which the late Government had robbed them was to be restored, when they knew that there was to be no addition to wages, no national agreement and not even a guarantee that the existing starvation wages would be maintained—in face of all this the Miners' Federation advised its members to accept the plan while seeking to carry in this House such Amendments as would be necessary. Therefore as far as the Federation is concerned, we are giving our support and the miners' Members in this House are supporting the Second Reading of the Bill. That is more than a compromise; it is a sacrifice on behalf of the miners, in order that this industry at least may be approached by members of all parties in this House with a view to raising the standard of the miners.
  9.0.p.m.
  I pass from that aspect of the question to make it quite clear that while the Miners' Federation is lending its support to the Second Reading of the Bill the Bill does not embody the policy nor the proposals of the Miners' Federation for the re-organisation of the industry. The Bill leaves the bases of capitalism intact as before. It is not a fundamental solution of the problem of the mining industry. Yet the question to be debated on the Floor of the House will not be how far short this Measure is in its application to Socialism, but how far it is a Measure tending to continue the control of private ownership. Therefore I want to deal with the questions of distribution, organisation and selling prices, because those matters are in the hands of the coal-owners and it is right to state that the miners have no voice in regard to these questions of production and distribution and therefore ought to have their wages guaranteed, if the control of these matters is left quite outside their province. After all, the difficult problem in regard to this industry has not been faced. I wish to give a quotation, not from "Labour and the Nation," not from any Socialistic propaganda literature, but from Sir Adam Nimmo to show what he regards as the problem in the industry:
  1328
  "The problem, briefly put, is that there is, and has been for some time, too large a capacity for output existing in the country; control of markets has, therefore, become impracticable under the existing organisation, there are too many competing units for the trade that is available; and, in such circumstances, as the result of the limitation of outlet, the values of coal have been brought down so seriously as to become unprofitable."
  I wish to give another indication of the chaos existing in this industry, and I direct attention to this quotation:
  "There was the greatest cause for anxiety about the future of the industry.…District schemes, valuable and important as they were, must not be regarded as more than the first steps towards the solution of the main problem. It was an open secret that at present the Midlands were competing with Scotland, and Scotland with Durham and Northumberland, while coal sent by rail from this area to the South was competing with sea-borne coal from the other East Coast ports. The Firth of Forth, the Tyne, and the Humber, without the slightest co-operation, were simply fighting each other like wild cats in markets which were common to all of them. We never should recover our export trade unless all the exporting districts were willing to take united action. Output must be scientifically regulated so as to make it meet demand and no more."
  That is from Mr. A. W. Archer, reported in the "Colliery Guardian" of 22nd March. That was before this Bill was proposed, and he is the vice-president of the Yorkshire Coalowners' Association. Those two quotations indicate the real problem in regard to the value of the coal itself. While the volume of trade may be a pressing question, the value of the commodity on which miners' wages are regulated is equally important. Figures have been given on behalf of the Opposition, and I wish to state in passing that, while those figures are accurate, we must have regard to the period in regard to which they are quoted. One can prove anything by figures. One can prove that more people die abed than anywhere else, and that therefore it is more dangerous to be abed than anywhere else. If we take the wages in Great Britain and relate them to pre-War conditions and compare them with other countries, I say that the miners' wages to-day are very little more than miners' wages on the Continent. Wages of miners in Great Britain to-day are only 42 per cent. over 1914 in the country as a whole, and in my district they are not 21 per cent. over 1914, while the cost of living stands at over 65.

  1329
  The Ruhr has been quoted. Their wages have gone up 65 per cent. and the cost of living 54 per cent. When we come to Poland, their wages have gone up 23 per cent., but their cost of living is 18 per cent. below that of 1914. So when we are dealing relatively to 1914, the British miners' wages are worse than those of any other miners in Europe. But that is not all. It is interesting to note that these people who are talking about the consumer were prepared from April, 1926, to April, 1927, to pay£49,461,566 for foreign coal to beat the British miner, and they paid£2 15s. a ton for it, and the selling price at home was only 15s. 9d. a ton when the stoppage took place. They paid to the foreigner£2 15s. for over 20,000,000 tons, and at that time, when the miner was locked out for reductions and increase of hours, the average selling price was less than 15s. 9d. We are told about foreign competition. Some 2,972,000 tons of our imports came from Poland. Therefore, those people who are talking about British commerce and exports were prepared to import from our competitors at three times the price of British coal to defeat the Britsh miner. In addition, when we are dealing with the question of coal to the consumers, what are the facts?
  The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel) indicated to us that this House could deal with the consumer. I hold in my hand the first report that was ever issued on the question of consumers' prices, and who are the people who are condemned there? It is the middlemen, for raising the price 9s. a ton without a farthing increase in pithead prices. I have in my hand a price list issued by the Tyne Main Coal Company in London, and it ranges from best to hot stove coal, from 52s. to 38s. The average of every ton of coal offered by that distribution firm in London is 44s. 9d. a ton. That is the average, while the pithead price for Great Britain for the three months ended June, 1929, was only 13s. 10d. a ton, and in my own district only 11s. 5d. Whatever this Measure may do, even if it is only an advisory board, on which there are consumers and miners, that at least will have a force that will prevent the exploitation of the consumer, and our people could have six hours, let alone 7½, and maintain
  1330
  the same wages, and if the distribution to the consumers were organised as it should be organised, they could still have a reduction in the price of the coal.
  Let me deal with the question as to what has been given to this industry. We are told it is all a question as to what the industry can pay. Let me take the March quarter of 1925, before there was any subvention to this industry, and the June quarter of 1929, the one with a seven hours' day, the other with an eight hours' day, and what are the facts? In the March quarter of 1925, with seven hours a day and with wages 2s. higher, the profits in the mining industry of this country were 6.13d. per ton. In the June quarter of this year, with an hour longer a day, with wages 2s. less, and with thousands fewer employed in the industry, you have a loss on the industry of 3.43d. What is the reason? The reason is that while wages costs have gone down 3s. 8d. a ton in these two periods, while in addition to that costs other than wages have gone down 5.16d. per ton, while all the sacrifices made in wages and hours equal 4s. 1d. a ton, the employers have delivered the coal at 4s. 11d. less. All the sacrifices in hours and in wages by our men have been given away owing to this intolerable competition.
  We say that the time has arrived for a change, and that is why we are supporting the Second Reading of this Bill, in order that there should be some regulation in the disposal of the commodity that our men produce. Our contribution has been to stave off fighting against what our men are now suffering. In my own district 60 out of every 100 take less than 35s. a week home, and right hon. Members opposite imagine that but for this Measure there would be tranquility and peace in the industry. Weak as it is, let hon. Members opposite, if they are not satisfied with it, give us an alternative, not a mere negative, as they are doing. A. mere negative to this proposal is to ask that the slavery should continue. We protest, and we ask that this Measure may have its Second Reading. That will be the thin end of the wedge to a greater development in this industry.
  Mr. de ROTHSCHILD: On making this my maiden speech to the House, I crave the usual generous indulgence which is extended by other Members on

  1331
  such an occasion. I have listened with great interest to the Debate as it has gone forward up to the present time, and I may say at once that there is nothing that I have heard put forward by the Members who have spoken from the Government benches which has in any way interfered with my judgment that this is a bad Bill. This Bill, to my mind, is dammed, dammed in and around by the vicious principle which underlies almost every one of its Clauses, and not all the cataract of figures and statistics launched by the right hon. Gentleman can break through that dam. If ever there was an occasion on which the Council of State, of which we have heard so much but seen so little, could have been called into consultation, surely a Bill on coal was that occasion, but, as happened on the subject of India, when the Government consulted the leaders of the other parties and disregarded their opinion, and misgoverned, to misquote the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for India, so, on this occasion again, we find that the Government consulted the other party leaders and once more flouted their views and opinions.
  They have, however, the approval of two great bodies. They have the approval of the Miners' Federation, though I do not think that the Government are doing very much by this Bill for the individual miner; but still, they have to swallow some of the gruel prepared by their cook. They also consulted with the Mining Association, and on that occasion I fear that they did not have a long enough spoon, and did not get much of the broth. I do not wish to lay too much stress on the Clauses which refer to the miners and to the National Wages Board, but to say that this Bill does not do very much for the miner. It is true that it takes half an hour off his time, and very few people in these islands will complain about that. There are few people who do not realise the difficulties and the dangers of this trade, and few who will grudge this extra 30 minutes in the miner's day. A cursory perusal of the Samuel Report would have enabled a harassed Minister to acquaint himself with what can be done to improve the relations between the miners and employers. There is nothing in this Bill about a really effective national
  1332
  board, nothing about district councils, nothing about pit committees, nothing about family allowances, and nothing about the extension of the Miners' Welfare Fund.
  I will not trouble the House with the Clauses which concern the miners and the Board; they occupy only three out of 16 pages of the Bill. I want to put to the House, however, that this far-reaching and important Measure has the backing only of the Minister who is introducing it, of the Attorney-General, and of the Minister of Mines. Where is the name of the Prime Minister, where is the name of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and where are the names of the principal Secretaries of State? I have had a small experience of Parliament, but I believe that I am justified in saying that in the past no Bill of this far-reaching importance has had such a small and slender support. We do not know whether it means that these right hon. Gentlemen have only a lukewarm approval of this Bill, or whether it means that the right hon. Gentleman who has introduced it is not going to get very much more support from his Front Bench than did the right hon. Lady the Minister of Labour in her last venture in this House.
  Coal has been, and I trust that it will continue to be, one of the most important assets of our industrial pre-eminence; it is essential to us, not only because of its existence underground, not only because it can be exported and help our shipping, and because we can get in return food and raw material, but it is important, and it has been important in the past, because it has been a handy and a cheap medium of power for our basic industries. Because of its cheapness, we have been able to compete and to contend with the nations abroad. When the coal industry has been suffering an eclipse of about 10 years, this Bill is brought in to remedy the difficulties under which the industry is labouring, and the first thing that it does is to make coal, not cheaper, but dearer.
  The main object of this Bill is to help the exporters of coal, but who is going to decide how far the home industries are to benefit? By this Bill the home industries will be entitled, as much as the foreign trade, to a rebate. Will the Minister have the right of deciding whether the iron and steel industry, or

  1333
  whether the cotton industry is going to benefit by this rebate, and if he lends a willing ear to the blandishments of the iron-masters and the cotton-spinners, will he turn a blind eye to the charms of the other industries, to the charms of the gas works and of the electric power stations If it is not left to him alone, if he can only act through the committees which are to be instituted, is it going to be left to the sole judgment of the coal owners? Are they going to decide how far the cotton industry, the iron industry, and the steel industry can pay for their coal?
  Ultimately, it comes to this, that either our industries will get expensive coal and will not be able to compete with their rivals abroad, or they will be given cheap coal in the same way as the foreign competitor, and the onus of this levy will fall on the domestic consumer. What of the agricultural labourer? He works for a wage of 30s. or 32s. a week. I see no hope for him of getting a rich and soft seam, and of seeing his wages computed and calculated on a percentage basis. His life is as hard as that of the miner; it may not be as dangerous, but it is as hard. He does not work in the uniform climate and temperature of the mines; he is exposed to the rigours of the climate, and he works in rain and wind, in mud and slush, and when he comes home at night after a long day, tired and rheumatic, his wife will say to him that she has not been able to cook him a hot dinner because coal is too expensive. What about the 1,200,000 unemployed, for whom the Lord. Privy Seal is every day failing to find work? Have they not homes and fires to keep up? What about the many hundreds of thousands of poor people whose votes put the hon. Gentlemen opposite into their seats in Parliament7 Are the Government dealing fairly with our people?
  I should like to express the point that the bounty is not going to attain its end. Let us take the example of the Ruhr coalfields. In order to compete with British exports into Germany, the Ruhr coal syndicate has instituted a, 2s. umlage which has cost them several millions every year. It cost them about 45,250,000 in the first six months of this year, and the syndicate is wondering whether it is worth while. This money which the Germans are paying is what one German is getting from another,
  1334
  whereas in our case, when we subsidise foreign exports, it will mean that a British consumer will be paying for part of the coal which is sold to the Germans. Supposing we capture the foreign trade, the first thing that will happen will be that the foreigners in those countries, which were our best customers before the War, will tax us and will not allow our imports into their country. Next they will be competing with our own coal, which will be expensive to our own consumers in this country. Let me give a quotation. This is what was said by the president of the Institute of Gas Engineers, who is also the general manager of the Leeds Corporation Gas Undertaking, in an address recently:
  "Although there is no such thing as a protectionist association for all consumers of coal, it must be remembered that public utility undertakings can continue to get perfectly satisfactory supplies of coal from abroad, and they were, in fact, compelled to do so during the general stoppage of 1921 and 1926."
  The next thing we have to expect from the coal trade and from the coal-mining community will be the protection of coal. I do not think that is any more fantastic than this Bill. The recovery of the coal industry by statutory organised restrictions is, indeed, surprising after the terrible failure which occurred both in the cotton and the rubber industries. The Stevenson rubber scheme failed lamentably because those countries where the output and the price were unrestricted improved their production and reduced their costs in such a manner that they were able to compete and to oust to a great extent our own rubber-growers, who were secure and asleep behind the barricade of restricted output and fixed prices. The same thing will happen about the coal trade. Our coal-owners will go to sleep and the miners will think themselves secure, but the Germans will keep up their watch in the Ruhr.
  To revert to the Samuel Report, I should like to remind the House that if in 1925 the uneoonomio pits had been eliminated, the large pits by their profits would have been able to pay for the losses of the medium pits, and the subsidy of£23,000,000 paid by the taxpayers of this country would have been unnecessary. Today the Labour Government are asking us to pay another subsidy—a more cruel subsidy than the lasts be-

  1335
  cause it will not fall on the shoulders of the taxpayers, but on the shoulders of those who are least able to pay it. As regards unemployment, I should also like to point out that this proposal is of no real use. It does not give any really reassuring prospects. The big pits will have to restrict their tonnage and output, and that will mean that they will be idle for at least one day or two days a week more than they otherwise would be. If that is all that a Labour Govern-men can do, all I can say is—hands off the industry! For years and years it has worked out its own salvation and eked out its own living, and I believe, if left to its own devices, it would be more able to do so now than under this particularly nefarious Government Bill, which is brought in without giving any of the adequate safeguards which we demanded and without helping to create the compulsory amalgamations which were laid down in the Samuel Report.
  It would be better if this Government interference ceased, and we were able to carry on without hurting the community by this legalised and codified blackmail of the consumer. I think it were better to reorganise the coal industry on a sound basis, as we have heard advocated to-night by the right hon. Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel). A modernised industry will be able to cut the cost of production and distribution and with the revitalised industrial activity of this country we may get once again the British workman re-entering the workshop and the factory. In conclusion, may I read a passage which puts far better than I could my own view of the situation:
  "The manhood of the nation are at the mercy of economic interests, immensely strengthened by the action of the Government. The mining industry has become more and more a trust, and in the Bill—the inadequate Bill—produced by the Government, no step has been taken to safeguard public interests."
  That very lucid and explicit statement was made on 8th December, 1926, by the present Prime Minister when he was leading the Opposition. In every word it is applicable to the Bill which is now before us, but the views of the right hon. Gentleman have been blown away like gossamers by the election zephyrs which wafted him into office. What remains of those views has been definitely
  1336
  dispersed by the trade winds. A few weeks ago the Prime Minister returned from America and gave us a very interesting and lucid account of his visit. He told us that all he had brought back from there was hope. The Prime Minister was too modest. He forgot to tell us that he had also brought back the technique of the Chicago gunmen. This Bill is nothing but a gigantic holdup of the community, but I fear that the amateur gangsters opposite have not acquired the perfect technique of the American gangsters. They do not try to hold up a crowded and full station, they concentrate on one train, and I would like to say to the right hon. Gentleman opposite that if they concentrate on the Riviera express or on the train de luxe they may possibly succeed, but trying to hold up 40,000,000 people is bound to be a failure.
  Colonel CLIFTON BROWN: It falls to my lot to congratulate the hon. Member for the Isle of Ely (Mr. de Rothschild) on his maiden speech. We may not have agreed with all he said, but anyhow it was a first-class fighting speech, and I am perfectly certain that the House will look forward to his future interventions in Debate with the greatest interest. I have risen because a colleague of mine for Northumberland made a speech just previously, and I also wish to say a word or two on behalf of the north-east coast. I confess that I was a little astonished when I heard the hon. Member for Morpeth (Mr. E. Edwards) give the full Miners' Federation programme, because I recollect that Northumberland was the last county in England to come inside the Federation, and ever since it has been inside things have been worse and not better. As a matter of fact, even under the reduction of hours Northumberland hewers are still losing the hours which they worked 16 years ago. The hon. Member gave us all kinds of figures to prove that miners could get better wages out of the existing prices of coal. Mr. William Straker, the very respected and honoured miners' leader in Northumberland, told us only this month that there could be no improvement in wages without an improvement in trade, and it is perfectly foolish of Members for mining constituencies to hold out hopes which cannot possibly be fulfilled and to mislead the miners in that way.

  1337
  Thank goodness, our trade in Northumberland has been steadily improving, and I would like to give some figures to show the rest of the country that determination and good management can in the course of time make improvements even in this difficult trade and in such a difficult field as the North of England. Northumberland is about the oldest coalfield in the country. It has long passed its zenith, conditions are difficult, some of the mines are not too safe, and the coalfield has no home market in which to sell its coal, but has to compete with the foreigner by selling abroad. Although in the first two years since the great stoppage there was a trading loss, after wages had been paid, of something like£960,000, since the beginning of this year, in the first 10 months, a profit of£230,000 has been made after paying wages. Really it was a surplus and not a profit, because there are many items to be set against that figure. In the month of October alone there was a surplus of£50,000 in that one coalfield. Mr. Straker says in his report the prospects for the coming months are considerably better and that at last there is a prospect of miners' wages being increased. The surplus for the first 10 months of this year represents 4¾d. per ton. Curiously enough in the first 10 months of this year the de-freighting scheme passed by the late Government was in vogue. That is what defreighting did for the export county of Northumberland. De-rating came in in October, and, as I have said, the surplus for October amounted to£50,000, or 9½d. per ton. That was the effect of defreighting plus de-rating. The month off December will show better figures still. We can, I feel, have no better testimony to the value of the scheme passed by the late Government.
  Now let us turn to see what will happen in the future. For better or for worse, the cost of one half-hour will be added to the cost not of the hewers', but of the other men's wages. That is equivalent to something like 1s. per ton, and instead of there being a surplus of 9d. a ton to swell the wages fund in order that wages may be increased, there will be a deficit of 3d. per ton and the prospect of wage increases will disappear. That is our miners' point of view on the North-East coast. The first effect of this will be to make an increase
  1338
  in wages, which I think would have been bound to happen next April, now a matter of very remote possibility.
  There are other aspects of the situation from the North-East coast point of view with which I would like to deal. We are an exporting area—rather more so in Northumberland than in Durham; we export the greater part of the coal that is won. What is going to happen to that export trade with shorter hours if the prices go up and if the burden is placed upon the home consumers of coal? I would like to know how it is possible for the North-East coast to prosper under those conditions. I am sure they cannot do it, because they export between 60 and 70 per cent, of their coal production. Some other adjacent counties export a very large proportion of their coal production, and they will be seriously affected by this Bill. It is not a question of levying one shilling, but several shillings. Those in the centre of England are the people who will have a say as to what levies are to be raised, and it is absurd that the people of Yorkshire should have to put a tax on their own coal in order to subsidise the export coal of Durham and Northumberland. I think the state of the coal industry will be considerably worsened by this Bill.
  I would like the House to consider another aspect of this Measure. The President of the Board of Trade referred, in his interesting speech, to the shipping of coal at all sorts of prices. We have been in the habit of shipping coal from the North-East Coast to London and the South-East Coast, but, if you subsidise coal, we shall lose some of our exports because prices will be increased. In the past Northumberland and Durham were able to send coal to London by sea, and we were able to make up our losses in that way. I think that is fair competition, and it is the only safeguard which the London consumer has in regard to coal prices; otherwise, the price of coal in London might have soared up to any amount. By this Bill you prevent the shipping of coal by sea from the North-East Coast and the consumer in London will have to pay more for coal.
  The President of the Board of Trade held out as a result of this Bill and this district arrangement that it might be possible to come to an agreement with Poland and Germany with reference to

  1339
  the export of coal. I daresay that is possible now, because we know perfectly well that three years ago Germany made many long contracts for the supply of coal from the North-East Coast and other exporting districts in this country. Our export trade in coal has been steadily increasing since those contracts came to an end, and we have been winning back some of our export markets. Naturally, under these conditions, our competitors would like to come to an agreement with us based on the tonnage system, because Germany, by exporting brown and soft coal, is bound to have an enormous advantage on the tonnage question alone. Although we wish to export our coal all over Europe, if we are to be successful, we shall have to have regard to the people who are entering into competition with us. The British coal industry has to face the competition of the world, and yet it is well known that we have better conditions for our miners than anywhere in the world. If we enter into any international combine, we shall find that continental standards will be set up in this country and the working conditions of miners will be worsened thereby.
  There is one other point about this Bill to which I wish specially to refer. In the North of England we have our great steel industries. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) has referred to some of the difficulties with which the steel industry would be faced under the quota system, and I wish to put forward one or two other considerations. In Durham the steel-makers stand out, because they command the coal markets which give them coal free from any levy, and there is no pressure of any kind upon them. I think it is important that they should have preferential treatment in that way. If you are going to relieve people from their difficulties, however important they may be, as is proposed under this Bill, where are you going to stop? What protection is there for the unfortunate householder who has to buy coal to cook his dinner?
  There is another point which I should like to mention. I am the only member of the Conservative party who, in the last Parliament, opposed the safeguarding of steel. I know that some of my colleagues did not approve of my action., but I would just like to say that, although we have not had safeguarding of steel, since
  1340
  that proposal was made the steel industry has steadily been making headway. Why have they been making headway? Because they have studied the needs of their biggest consumers, the shipbuilders, and have said that, if the shipbuilders guaranteed to place their orders in this country, they would give them reduced prices. If this Bill be passed, however, they will not, owing to the increased costs, be able to do this, and they will lose many of the orders which the shipbuilders are at present giving. In that case the steel industry arranged a scheme of marketing and selling their goods at the right end, getting the good will of the consumer. Why cannot something of the same kind be done in the coal industry It is perfectly true that the coal industry cannot ask people to buy coal from them instead of buying from abroad, but surely it would have been possible for the coal industry, by an arrangement in the districts, to say, as regards big consumers like power companies, gas companies, railways and so on, "Why scramble one after the other for orders? We will arrange that at the last minute, when you are holding out, we will not come in and quote a lower price." They could also have guaranteed regularity of supply, and have made arrangements that orders should not come in at the end of the year, when there was a big scramble, but more regularly. I think they might have started at that end, and thus have saved a great deal of extra cost and waste which now occurs in some parts of the coal industry.
  The quota system reduces both the good mine and the bad mine to 80 or 90 per cent. of its production; it falls on the just and on the unjust, like the rain. But let it be remembered that half-time or part-time in any industry has been found to be a convenient way of refusing to face facts, and also that it has its worst effects in industries where wages are none too high; and, after all, the wages of many of our surfacemen in the North are none too high. When the mines are only working three or four days a week, instead of full time, there is inevitably a certain amount of underemployment, and, indeed, the Five Counties Scheme did lead to underemployment, and social reformers who are interested in trying to improve the conditions in some of our villages and

  1341
  towns will tell you that under-employment is a more insidious, a more demoralising, and a more intractable evil even than unemployment itself. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel), at the end of his Report, spoke about leadership in the coal industry. I have not a word to say at the moment about the leadership of the miners; that is their own affair; but it seems to me, as far as the mineowners are concerned, to be a great pity that more of the real capitalists among the mineowners are not on the Central Board of the Mining Association. I was brought up in the Army, and I know that it is all very well to have young staff officers or subordinate officers at headquarters, but really it is necessary to have the big "bosses" there.
  10.0 p.m.
  There is one further point that I want to make, and this is the last charge that I have against the Government. I cannot help thinking that those owners who stand out against the scheme of the present Government, which, by shortening the hours, will impose great difficulties upon them, although I believe they are determined to win through and maintain our trade, are showing greater courage and greater vision than those who are content to arrange a ring and fix prices and put up the cost to the consumer. To my mind they show a more courageous spirit, and I am prepared to support their point of view. The Government are going to support those owners who have not this courageous spirit, and I do not think that this combination of the Government, the miners and the less courageous owners in the mining industry will be to the advantage of the country.
  Mr. JAMES BROWN: I must confess that the speeches to which I have listened in this Debate leave me in a deeper Egyptian darkness than ever. To get up and lecture the Labour party because of its weakness is one of the hugest jokes that I have ever listened to during the whole time that I have been in the House of Commons. I speak from the miners' point of view, and I think that, if hon. and right hon. Gentlemen will glance back at the history of coal-mining during the last 10 years, they will realise that a great many of their arguments fall to the ground. I remember the great betrayal of 1920, when we were forced, before the
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  agreement expired, to accept terms from the then Coalition Government. I remember the greater betrayal of 1926. I remember that, when we were endeavouring to keep the hours as they were, and to resist a reduction in wages, some trade union leaders, after the general strike was over, took their courage in their hands, in the face of great opposition from their own people, but all that they received was the jeers and sneers and taunts of those whom they tried to help.
  I remember when, with a voice vibrating with anxiety, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bewdley (Mr. S. Baldwin) asked the people of this country, and especially the miners, to trust him and to give him a fair deal. They did trust him, but did we get a fair deal? I submit to every Member of this House tonight that we did not get a fair deal then. We were attacked in a way that no trade union has ever been attacked before, in the middle of a great struggle, and, at the behest of the coalowners of this country, the Government gave them what they could not have got by fair fight in an open field. Then, when our wages had been reduced and we had had to accept longer hours, they came forward and told us that this had to be done in order to preserve the coal trade of this country. There was not a miner, there was not a miners' official, who was not as anxious to preserve the coal trade of the country as the Government were, but they wanted to do it by honourable means. We believed that it was wrong to attack us at that time, and we believe that still, but, while the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hendon (Sir P. Cunliffe-Lister) speaks against the taking off of the half-hour, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel) blessed that, but cursed the other parts of the Bill. So that we are between the devil and the deep sea, or perhaps I should say Scylla and Charybdis. It would look as though the Labour party had abdicated all idea of looking after the interests of the ordinary people of the country and the Liberals had taken up our role and were going forward to gain the confidence of all the electors. That will fail. Hon. Members opposite, both above and below the Gangway, are vying with each other as to who is Coddlin and who is Short. They want people to believe that they only are interested in agricultural

  1343
  workers, they only are interested in the very poor of the land and they only are interested in getting improved wages and conditions for the people.
  I have hardly even heard one human note struck during the whole Debate. The Opposition above the Gangway are against their friends the owners. "Here is a conspiracy, here is a combination of miners and the Government and the owners in order to defraud the poor public and to penalise the very poorest of the land." I wish some of them would go to the country with these stories that they only are anxious, and that the Labour party are not anxious to do everything they can. We stand for the Second Reading of the Bill. We think it is a reasonable way to make a beginning, at any rate, with the bigger things which we hope to see put upon the Statute Book later on. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen was quite right. It is not only a seven and a half hours' day. In some districts it is nearer a nine hours' day, because there is the winding time, which often means something like 50 minutes. In spite of all that is said against the miners, the coal getters go down early and come up late, and many of them work S to el hours a day.
  After all, the miner is a human being who deserves well of his country. He did as much as hon. Members opposite or their colleagues when the country needed him in her defence. They went to fight the battles of the country, and now we are told that this is not a Bill that will suit the miners at all, but it is a Bill to bolster up the coal trade and increase its profits. I have used the time allotted to me. I am sorry I have so little time to say what I ought to say, but I plead with the House to remember that this is a Bill to help the mining industry, along with the agricultural workers and the poorer classes in all grades of the community, and to remember that we have tens of thousands of miners who are also very poor and broken down. Again, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen. You may make up your averages. You may take your directors' fees and managerial salaries and make a fair average, but that does no good to those who for weeks on end are not taking 30s. clear into the home. Whatever defects
  1344
  there may be in the Bill, whatever mistakes may have been made in the past, or even in the present, I want the House to remember that it is for the miners and their families that we are trying to legislate and that we are trying to make their conditions better so that they may be able to lead a clean, upright, honest and God-fearing life.
  Colonel LANE FOX: I am very sorry the hon. Member curtailed his speech in any sense to make way for me. I know that the House is always anxious to hear him. There is no man on that side of the House who is more respected and whose speeches are more moderate and more acceptable. He challenged us to go to the country with some of the stories that have been told against the Bill. I can assure him that there will be no difficulty about that. Before many weeks are over, the country will be knowing a great deal about the Bill which it has not yet had an opportunity of learning, and the effect as regards the prestige of the Government may be of a very disastrous character. I must not delay the House too long either, if only for the reason that I do not want to stand in the way of the Secretary for Mines, who has very important questions to answer and who is in a very responsible position. It may, indeed, be that the position at the end of the Debate may depend on whether he ends up as a man or a mouse. Greater responsibility never fell upon a junior Minister than to have to answer the devastating questions which have been put to him by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel). On those questions possibly the fate of the Bill, possibly even the fate of the Government, may turn. Of all the really brilliant and devastating pieces of criticism I have heard during the many years I have sat in the House, 'I do not think I ever heard a speech of greater brilliance than that of the right hon. Gentleman. Whatever line of politics we may follow, to whatever party we belong, I think all who heard the speech will agree with that remark.
  I feel in almost a parental position to the right hon. Gentleman because I was, Secretary for Mines at the time when the Conservative Government invited him to become Chairman of what has since become known as the Samuel Commission,

  1345
  and no better choice was ever made. The country can be really grateful to him for the splendid work which he put in and the very great care and trouble that he took throughout the investigation, for the immense amount of labour and industry that he put into it and the clarity of his criticism tonight in the knowledge he gained on that Commission. That speech alone will limit the remarks I have to make. As I listened to his speech, I recognised point after point that I thought possibly I might have a chance of making. I will not spoil them by trying to make them again after the effective manner in which the right hon. Gentleman made them.
  I feel that, at any rate, we ought to be fair to the Government. We ought to remember that this is a compromised Bill. Hon. Members opposite went to the country in a very light-hearted frame of mind. They scattered their promises wide and broadcast. Their I.O.U.'s are flying all over the country, and this is their effort to redeem them. It is the half-a-crown in the pound which the bankrupt is compounding. We do not expect very much from that. They promised that they would immediately repeal the Eight Hours' Act. They are not repealing it. They promised that they would give a national wages agreement, instead of which they are giving a National Industrial Board. The Industrial Board may or may not be useless, but it certainly is not the same thing as a national agreement. They have the comforting shade of the suggestion of nationalisation, that old-time remedy which the party opposite seem almost to have forgotten in this connection. In regard to other election promises which were made, they seem to be covered by the general assurance that other Bills are to follow. We know the bustling business and the busy-ness of the present Government, but if all the other Bills which have been promised in that connection ever come here, this Government will be busier in the future than they have been in the past.
  What chance has this unfortunate industry of prosperity or of settling down with all these different transactions looming in the future? How is it possible to look forward, and how is it possible for that industry to be revived if you are threatening it with a series of inter-
  1346
  ventions with regard to its operations? Part I of the Bill is very disappointing to those who have really worked for and want to see better conditions in the mining industry. The Government have chosen a line which is going to mean the raising of the cost of production of coal, and in order to meet that position they are to give the industry a chance of raising prices. It has been said over and over again in this Debate that in this Bill we find no serious trace of the real need of better amalgamation, better economics, care for the interests of the consumer, better development, and to anybody who has really studied and followed this industry, this seems to have been a great opportunity missed.
  I am not going into all the criticisms which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen made on this Bill. I should like to refer, as he did, to the fact, and to remind the House of the various points which he made Against it, namely, that there is a standard tonnage under Part I for each pit, irrespective of the merits of the pit, that there is a quota, the same proportion of that standard tonnage, to each pit, irrespective of the merits of the pit, and, thirdly, there is the unfairness of the limit placed on the output of the big developing pit with its great overhead charges, as compared with the smaller pit, which has the same quota. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the reduction of the quota of the pit which is supplying a steel works, and he referred to the inducement that quota confers on certain other pits to hang on instead of going down. He referred to the difficulties in the way of amalgamation in all these matters.
  Years ago, when first I went to the Mines Department, one of the first subjects which I found myself always arguing with various coalowners was this subject of better marketing, and they treated me much as one speaks to a nice child who is asking questions regarding a thing that one knows it is better he should not know much about. After a bit, they became more ready to argue, but they always said: "It is not easy for an amateur to talk about these things, As if they are easy of accomplishment. You do not appreciate the thing, you cannot, unless you have been in the trade all the time, as we have." I saw then, what has been mentioned to-night, the internecine struggle of an enormous number of small

  1347
  undertakings. One saw constant underselling, very often to the middlemen, between one pit and another, and one saw prices ruling which were often well below the coat of production, because the owner of the pit had to get his coal away in order to keep his pit working, and he had to get what he could for it. One saw, in consequence of that state of things, depressed wages and short time for the worker, which resulted in bad conditions.
  The Royal Commission over which the right hon. Member for Darwen presided recommended amalgamations and selling organisations. There was some opposition at the time by the mining industry, and this is where I think the right hon. Gentleman was not quite fair to the last Government. We did introduce an element of compulsion which, at the time, was thought by many persons to be extremely shocking. It was a considerable advance on anything that had been done previously. We made it the law that those who wished to form an amalgamation could bring in unwilling neighbours and force them into an amalgamation, on terms, by going before the Railway and Canal Commission. Of course, the Railway and Canal Commission were to secure fair terms for them. We did not insist on selling organisations apart from amalgamations at the time, but we set up the Lewis Committee to investigate the very difficult process of selling organisations, and how best they could be carried out. The Lewis Committee reported very strongly in favour of selling organisations. I should like to quote from their Report the portion which deals with the question of possible economies between producer and consumer. These are the main things which the Committee reported in that connection. They said:
  "The economies which have been represented to us as attainable by a general system of organised marketing fall under the following heads:

  (a) From pooling of wagons and traffic co-ordination generally;

  (b) From centralisation of selling staffs, commercial travellers, etc.

  (c) From co-ordinated and more effective bargaining with the distributing trades;

  (d) From a measure of assignment of orders and markets to the collieries and districts most favourably situated to execute them, and from the consequent saving of cross freights.

  1348
  They also said:
  "These economies of marketing would only he fully attainable by a system of pooled sales. The economies possible under a price output control organisation "—
  which is exactly what the present Bill is suggesting—
  "leaving each colliery to continue its own sales, would necessarily be narrower."
  The Report went on to say that the Committee were not prepared to recommend anything in the nature of general compulsion. Two Members of the Labour party were on that Commission, and they made a reservation. They disliked the suggestion that general compulsion should not come into effect at once, or soon. These Gentlemen were the late hon. Member for Mansfield, Mr. Varley, and the right hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Hartshorn), who is to speak to-morrow. I should like to know why the right hon. Gentleman for Ogmore, who three years ago was absolutely convinced that within two years some form of compulsion would have to be applied in order to set up a selling organisation in this country, is, I understand, on Thursday night going to support this Bill, which is in favour of having no such organisation in existence. Three years ago he thought it would be absolutely necessary in two years' time. Three years have passed, and the right hon. Gentleman, apparently, is going to support a Bill which does not insist on what he thought was absolutely necessary three years ago.
  I believe the country is quite willing to pay a fair price for coal; and I am sure that nobody wishes to exploit the miners. But before the price of gas is raised to gas companies, electricity undertakings, for domestic purposes, and all that is implied in these undertakings, we must have an absolute guarantee that some rise in price is absolutely necessary and that every possible economy has been practised beforehand. That is what the Bill does not give. The chief feature of the German cartel was the efficient selling organisation, and when the right hon. Gentleman tells us that this Bill is framed on the lines of the German cartel at any rate in that aspect it is inadequate. There is one advantage which, I think, might be achieved through this Bill, some day it is bound to come, and that is there will be some international arrangement. At the present moment if a subsidy is given in

  1349
  one country it is countered by a subsidy in another. A reduction of wages in one country is countered by a reduction in another; but in time we shall have to have some kind of international agreement. That has been the weakness in this country. Some years ago some intelligent Germans came over and talked with us on this matter, but it was impossible to find anyone in this country able to represent the coal industry as a whole and make any arrangement. It was said that their coming over here was a sign of weakness, that they were losing the battle; but we shall all lose in the end, because the time may come when it will be really necessary for the countries to get together and make some sort of agreement among themselves.
  I should like to say a few words on Part II of the Bill. Everybody will welcome shorter hours for miners, on certain conditions. The conditions are that the industry, as the President said, is able to stand it and, in the second place, that wages are not going to suffer. I have no hesitation in saying that I would far rather demand the extra half-hour than I would ask the miners to suffer a real serious reduction in wages. During recent years there have been serious losses in the industry, but during this year there has been a recovery, due to the longer hours that are being worked and to a reduction in the cost of production. Already this year, for the first time since these bad times began, in one district in Warwickshire there has actually been an increase in wages above the minimum. That is the first that has taken place. There is no doubt that in other districts also increases were coming. This reduction by half an hour will probably just have the effect of tipping the balance and making it impossible for the increases to continue. I think it is a mistake on the part of the Government to introduce the Bill, not for the benefit of the industry, but merely to justify election pledges lightly given and not fully considered.
  I do not wish to go into detailed figures showing what an improvement was beginning to show in the industry. We are promised a reduction of half an hour a day. The Yorkshire miners, however, are to get nothing, although every Socialist who went before them told them that they were to get an immediate return to the seven hours day. No doubt
  1350
  they will have a great deal to say about that at the next election. What is to be said about the constant suggestions that further changes are to be made in the industry? How is the industry ever going to settle down? How is anyone to make future contracts or to know what the prospects of the industry are to be? How can we ever have peace if the Government announce at this moment that there is to be a half-hour reduction in the working day, while in Clause 9 they suggest that the Eight Hours Act, which was never more than a temporary Act, is coming to an end next year and that further changes will take place then?
  Let me draw attention, finally, to what I regard as a foolish speech made recently by the Secretary for Mines. I am sorry to say anything critical of an old Yorkshire friend with whom I sat for years on the West Riding County Council and against whom I certainly have no personal feeling. The hon. Gentleman, at a meeting near Sheffield, used these words:
  "The Eight Hours Act was passed in anger and conceived in revenge, and had no successful result in operation."
  That was a foolish statement. I would only remind the hon. Gentleman, if he does not already know it, that this was not the case of a dramatic blow by an avenging Government. The Eight Hours Act was passed merely because, misled by their leaders, the miners absolutely refused to adopt the suggestion of the Commission of the right hon. Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel), that there should be a temporary reduction of wages. After some six weeks of a devastating strike, when it was impossible to get a settlement on any other ground, the only chance of getting a reasonable wage paid to the miners was to increase the hours to eight. It was not revenge; it was an Act which was of the greatest help and advantage to the industry at the time. To talk of it as an act of revenge is a travesty of the facts.
  We know that our very interesting and elusive Friends of the Liberal party have put down an Amendment. We do not know, of course, what they propose to do about it. But it is always interesting to know what is said of any party from the inside. This afternoon I happened to read the "Manchester Guardian," which had a very interesting comment to make on the tactics of the

  1351
  Liberal party. I am sure that no one will wish to criticise the absolute Liberal orthodoxy of that newspaper. It said:
  "It is very difficult now to ascertain how the Liberal party will vote. The majority of them are in favour of the Liberal Amendment, but to vote for the Conservative Amendment, though its effect would be the same, would look different."
  I am sure we are all very much concerned with the appearance of the Liberal party, and it is quite natural that we should consider, for the moment, that looks do count. It is interesting to realise that even in their own party that view obtains. This Bill has been criticised so severely that I doubt, even if it gets a Second Reading, whether it can survive the Committee stage. Those of us who have long wanted to see better marketing will not find in this Bill the real advantages that are to be gained by better marketing and selling organisations. We very naturally feel great sympathy for an industry which has passed through very difficult times, but we must remember that this is only one of many industries in this great population of ours, many of whom are living in great distress, trouble and difficulty. We cannot afford, for the sake of one industry, however great, to scrap the interests and scrap the chances of reasonable comfort in life of all the others. I believe that this Bill will not be of real or permanent advantage to the industry and I believe it will be a danger to the country.
  The SECRETARY for MINES (Mr. Ben Turner): I desire before I begin my other observations to answer the pertinent questions put by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Darwen (Sir H. Samuel). He asked first: is it proposed to introdues any Clauses into the Bill in Committee for setting up machinery for the appointment of Commissioners and for the procedure for dealing with compulsory amalgamations? The reply is that, as stated by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of trade, he thinks he has sufficient powers under existing legislation for that purpose. If it is found that this is not so, he will ask for them while the Bill is in Committee. A second question was put but, of course, it does not now arise. The third question was whether it was proposed to limit the operation of the marketing provisions to
  1352
  a temporary period. The view of the Government is that marketing schemes will be necessary even after large scale amalgamations are enforced, but if the Commissioners reported otherwise the necessary changes would be made when the further legislation is before the House. The fourth question was whether the valuation of pits for purposes of amalgamation would be based on present values, and not on exaggerated values produced by the operation of this Bill. The Government are definitely of the opinion that there will be no added value and that this question will not arise. In any event, the Commissioners will be asked to report on the principles of valuation when they will have regard to this among other considerations.
  Sir H. SAMUEL: What about the definite control of prices?
  Mr TURNER: That matter will certainly be borne in mind and possibly some observations made during the Debate on Thursday. Anyhow, that is the position on the four questions put down for answer. It is very interesting to learn that this Bill, which is a Bill of many parts, has received very little consideration in its prime or main part. It deals with an industry that is and has been in a very sad condition, full of unrest and full of trouble. It has bothered Commission after Commission, and in every case there have been propositions and suggestions made that have not been accepted by the House of Commons or by the Governments of the day in general. In the discussion to-day there has been little said about the human factor in the industry. That has been somewhat side-tracked, yet this is an industry in which brave men are at work day by day for a famine wage, as has been proved by a statement made by a representative miner on the Government's side of the House a short time ago. The returns show that the wages paid were, for everybody, including the big wage men and the smaller wage men, 50s. a week for 1925, 43s. 6d. a year ago, and 45s. during the last year, and the ascertainments themselves, bad and good, show that there is a desire on the part of the people concerned in the mines to do all the work they possibly can, because the output by the men has increased for even the same hours of labour as have been applying for a few years back.

  1353
  I have here a miner's pay note. It is from a mine in the North of England, and the man was paid a total wage of£1 19s. 3d. for six shifts—not half time nor short time, but for six shifts—and when he drew his wage on the Friday, with all the deductions taken off, which included 8d. for water and 6d. for fire coal, he drew£1 14s. 8d. This is what his wife says, and the wife is the burden bearer in every household where there are short wages coming in:
  "I now feel that I must sit down and write. I am a miner's wife, with seven children, who have fought hard to make ends meet, but these times have made me a broken-hearted woman."
  These broken-hearted women have not been thought about much in the House to-day. It has been either marketing or the National Board, but very little of the human side, where women like that and their families are affected. That, to me, is one of the biggest parts of this Bill, this attempting to meet the human factor in connection with this legislation. We have heard the statement that miners are an idle race of people, but it goes beyond dispute that they are among the most energetic people in the industrial world. They do not go down the pit to play at marbles. The results that we have before us now shew that individualism has failed, and the policy of past Governments has also failed to produce bread and meat for the miners. I think that in this case there is something in this Bill that will give the miners a little bit more sustenance than they have had before. [Interruption.] At least, that is my belief, that is my faith, that is my hope. What has been tried before has failed to do it. When you gave the miners the eight hours day, you lowered their wages by 1s. 2d. a day, you starved them 1s. 2d. a day. Is it fair that these men's labour should be undersold?
  Is it fair that they should be below sheltered industries like railway works, gas works and the ancillary concerns? It is a well-known fact with regard to many ancillary concerns and by-product plants that the coal is sold below cost price. If it is sold below cost price, it is sold at the expense of those children and of that woman whose letter I read. I have lived among these hungry folk, and I want to help them. This Bill will help them. [HON. MEMBERS: "How?"] Examine the Bill and you will learn how!
  1354
  I do not mean to deal with the parts of the Bill concerning marketing and so forth, because I can find supporters of this policy on the Front Government Bench and in Members of past Governments. I have been looking through the OFFICIAL REPORT of 24th May, 1928, when my predecessor made a statement in the House in support of a policy of this kind, and he said:
  "It is a very important and a very definite step in the right direction."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th May. 1928; col. 2140, Vol. 217.]
  It is only wrong to-night because the wrong folk are bringing it forward. In the Command Paper 3214 of 1928, he also declared that
  "of the various measures of co-operation, by far the largest in scope and in potential bearing upon the future welfare of the coal industry as a whole are the district arrangements which have recently been initiated in certain large areas of the coal fields to deal with over-production, regulate competition and prices and develop export markets."
  Then again the Lewis Committee declared in favour of these things. This has been called a dear coal Bill. That is a manufactured cry; it is a flash line heading of the newspapers. It is called a dear coal Bill, and the opposition comes from newspapers controlled and run by those who have the most money. It is contended that, as a result of this scheme, all consumers will be forced to pay increased prices for their coal. As a result of competition between pits, there has been very severe undercutting of prices during the past few years, particularly for industry and public utility concerns, where prices have been unjustifiably low. There can be no justification for the sale of coal below the cost of production, but there is not an hon. Gentleman who does not know that coal has been sold to gas works, to electric light works, to byproduct plants, and to many other concerns at a price below which it could not be produced to make a profit or to pay a decent wage.
  Viewed from that aspect, I suggest that this is not a dear coal Bill from the point of view of the observations made by those who raised the cry. But there are dear coals in the kingdom. They are household coals. Household coal represents about one-eight of the coal sold in the kingdom. Household coal is dear. I married many years ago when

  1355
  the price of household coal was 11s. 6d. a ton. Thirty-nine years ago I bought my first ton of coal in the town in which I now live at that price. Now it is 49s. Where hat) the difference gone? The collier has not got it. That is where the dear coal is. It is not so in the case of the gas works, electricity works, and by-products plant. It is in the household coal only that it is dear. The President of the Board of Trade is making arrangements to stop that ramp. Those on the other side of the House did not attempt to stop it, but let it go on. [HON. MEMBERS: "Which Clause?"] Coming back to the point of view of the miners, I think the miner is a great man. I have seen him at work, and I want to see him well paid. I know what a great man the miner is because I live among miners, and have been down their pits. I can give them a better testimony than that. This was said in a speech of the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) a few years ago:
  "I have seen the miner in various spheres. I have seen him down in Wales. I have seen him as a worker, and there is no better. I have seen him as a politician, and there is no sounder. I have seen him as a singer, and there is no sweeter. I have seen him as a footballer, and he is a terror. But in all capacities he is loyal, earnest and courageous."
  That miner is sweated to-day because of the conditions in the coal industry, which we are trying to reorganise and lead in the right direction. However, one need not bother about that. One may look at the Amendments on the Order Paper. There has been a great deal of calculation and observation of one sort and another, obscurities and mysteries, in the last few days. What are these Amendments about? There is one brought forward by the Liberal party that deals with amalgamations. I am very glad they have the wisdom to support two-thirds of the Bill, and if they thought about it again they might support the third part. Anyhow, it is open to their consideration to do so. What is the proposition of the late Government? It is a policy, as we say in Yorkshire, of doing "nowt." The industry is in a deplorable position, but there is no suggestion of doing anything whatever to restore it. They may say they are not the Government, and it is not their business, but they have been
  1356
  the Government and it got worse and worse as years went by. [Interruption]. I beg your pardon, it went from worse to worse as the years went by. The proof of that was seen last winter, when these brave men and their wives and children had to beg clothes and spare boots from here, there and elsewhere. The very fact that the Lord Mayor's Fund had to be started, and£1,000,000, roughly, raised to help to feed and clothe these people, is a proof that the policy of the past has failed and that some new system has to be tried to assist the industry to recover.
  Dr. VERNON DAVIES: It was not our policy.
  Mr. TURNER: Whose policy could it have been but your policy? [HON. MEMBERS: "Cook's policy."] If it was not your policy you had no policy, and that is worse still. The President of the Board of Trade made a statement about the hours of labour. The hours of miners in Great Britain are longer than in any other country, except one, on the Continent.
  Dr. DAVIES: Per week?
  Mr. TURNER: Per week, per day, and per understanding of common folks. France's working day is 4 hours. We work 8 hours 35 minutes and the proposal now is to take off half an hour per day of the hour put on by the late Government. My dear old Friend the right hon. and gallant Member for Barkston Ash (Colonel Lane Fox) quoted a very nice speech which I made near Sheffield some few months ago. I do not withdraw a single word. I may be wrong, but I do not think I am. I think the miners' Eight Hours Act was born in anger, conceived in revenge and put in operation for mischief. Anyhow, the miners are entitled to the half-hour off and the trade can afford it. Think of the gifts which have been made to the trade in the past few months, gifts of 7½d. per ton on freightage and 4½d. per ton on de-rating. They have been gifts for the good of the coalowner.
  Dr. DAVI ES: From the Tory Government.
  Mr. TURNER: This half-hour is going to be our gift to the miners, who need it and deserve it, and in the interests of the trade. There is one point in the Bill which has not been stressed, and that

  1357
  concerns the National Board. I am a great believer in machinery to preserve and promote peace in industry. I have been occupied for some year or two, with unfortunate speeches in between, I expect, largely in promoting machinery to bring about peace in industry. I want it, and I believe that this industry, which in Yorkshire has experienced 42 lock-outs and strikes in 40 years, requires new machinery for dealing with trade disputes. It has been suggested this afternoon that this plan will not work because those concerned would rot accept a district decision as final seeing they could carry their case to another place in the hope of another decision. That does not apply in the case of the railway tribunal or in many other industries with which I have been associated. They hammer out all the points they can in the districts, or in the sections of the trade, and they very rarely send a case to headquarters or to the final tribunal. Without this provision there would he no machinery at all if the employers and employés in a district failed to agree, and there needs to be that further machinery, not for use in the case of an ordinary dispute, but for the big apprehended dispute, in order to ensure that everything possible can be done to secure peace.
  It being Eleven of the Clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
  Debate to be resumed upon Thursday.

SUPPLY.
REPORT [16TH DECEMBER.]
Resolutions reported.

CIVIL ESTIMATES, SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATE, 1929.

  CLASS V.
  1. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding£3,500,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1930, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Ministry of Labour and Subordinate Departments, including the Exchequer Contribution to the Unemployment Fund, Grants to Associations, Local Education Authorities, and others under the Unemployment Insurance, Labour Exchanges, and other Acts; Expenses of the Industrial Court; Contribution towards the Expenses of the International Labour Organisation (League Of Nations); Expenses of Training and Trans-
  1358
  ference of Workpeople and their Families within Great Britain and Oversea; and sundry services, including services arising out of the War."
  2. "That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding£10,650, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1930, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Department of Health for Scotland, including Grants and other Expenses in connection with Housing, Grants to Local Authorities, etc., in connection with Public Health Services, Grants in Aid of the Highlands and Islands Medical Service, Grants in Aid of Benefits and Expenses of Administration under the National Health Insurance Acts, certain expenses in connection with the Widows', Orphans', and Old Age Contributory Pensions Act, 1925, and certain Special Services."
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
  Captain AUSTIN HUDSON: I wish to make one or two remarks on the Report stage of this Estimate. Unfortunately, this Estimate was brought on very late last night, and I was unable to say what I wanted to say. It is important that we should discuss this matter not at any great length, but still we should discuss it because it has a very vital bearing upon what has been taking place during the last few years. In my opinion, this Supplementary Estimate which is the estimate for the No. 1 Bill which we had in the House of Commons last July is the beginning of what I might call turning the unemployment scheme into a relief scheme. I noticed a particular phrase which the Minister of Labour used last night in the few remarks which she made on this Estimate. She told us that the House had passed the Bill to which I have referred without a Division, and therefore she did not consider it necessary to say much upon this Supplementary Estimate. I think we are entitled to look at the result of that Measure for the reason that we did not go very fully into its merits upon a former occasion. That Measure was the first step towards unlimited State money being put into the unemployment scheme changing the insurance principle and making it a dole. That principle was developed worse and worse in the Bill which passed its final stage in this House yesterday.
  I hope hon. Members will not think that I am wasting time if I say a word

  1359
  or two on the subject of this Measure. There is one question that I particularly want to ask. When this Bill was first taken in the House, the unemployment figures were comparatively low. Since then the figures have risen. Certain figures were given last night, particularly by the Financial Secretary, which I wanted to study, but, unfortunately, the Debate took place so late at night that. the figures were not in the OFFICIAL 'IMPORT this morning. That shows the inadvisability of taking these Debates after Eleven at night, if it can possibly be avoided. The figures were low then, and have risen ever since; and I saw to-night on the tape machine that the figures have risen by yet another 6,000. I would point out that always, for the last few years at any rate, the unemployment figures have fallen considerably before Christmas, and particularly the figure corresponding to the one that we have had to-night, because of what is known as the Christmas trade. That has invariably been followed by a considerable rise, as all these people who had been taken on for temporary work at Christmas have lost their temporary jobs again and have had to sign on at the Employment Exchanges. This Christmas, however, for some reason, the unemployment figures have risen very considerably instead of going down, and I am afraid that, because of that, in a week or two we shall find that the figures, after the temporary work for Christmas has come to an end, will rise again to an almost unprecedented height. I have heard it said that the figure might go up to as much as 1,500,000. That I do not know, but anyhow it is bound to rise, unless this year is different from any other that we have had.
  I want to ask whether account has been taken of the fact that the figures, instead of dropping, have risen before Christmas, and are bound to rise still further after Christmas, and, if so, whether this Supplementary Estimate is enough to cover the increased number. Personally, I had hoped that by this time the Government would have thought of some better scheme than either the No. I or the No. 2 Bill to deal with this matter, and I am afraid that this Supplementary Estimate will be useless for this purpose. I do hope, however, that the Government, instead of bringing forward another Supplementary Estimate even
  1360
  bigger than this—and it must be bigger for the No. 2 Bill—will really set their minds to the problem of trying to divide up unemployment insurance and relief schemes, and so avoid these Supplementary Estimates. The question to which I particularly desire an answer is, whether the Government have realised that this year has been different from every other year and that the unemployment figures are bound to go up considerably in a week or two, and whether this Estimate, which was made in July, when the figures were very much lower, will adequately cover what will, I am afraid, be the unemployment figure in a few months' time.
  Commander WILLIAMS: There are two or three questions which I think we ought to ask of the Financial Secretary at this time. The first is, is the hon. Gentleman quite certain that the figure in the Estimate is accurate? I am not. It will be seen that the original Estimate was£11,998,000, and now it is£15,498,000. The additional sum that we are voting is£3,500,000. I am not in the least sure that that sum is accurate, and I will give my reasons. I am not certain that, coming at this particular time, that sum is the requisite and proper amount to carry us over until we next meet, and I think the hon. Gentleman ought to tell us very clearly whether this is really the proper sum, or whether he may not yet, even before we rise for Christmas, have to come to the House for yet another Estimate.
  The next question that I wish to raise is this: Last night the hon. Gentleman was asked why he did not bring in this Estimate earlier, and he gave the most astonishing answer that it was because it was not wanted. The whole argument for bringing in the Estimate earlier is that, as was pointed out to-day, there is a very great disadvantage in bringing forward Votes such as this, which bear very heavily on the taxpayer, at a late hour and late in the Session. If this Estimate had been brought in early in November, we could have had adequate time to discuss it, and we should not have had what was so much condemned by the President of the Board of Trade in his opening speech this afternoon, namely, the discussion of important matters at an hour getting on for midnight, to which I particularly object. Then I want to

  1361
  know precisely what is the amount in the Fund, what is the deficit, and how much the hon. Gentleman anticipates he will have by the end of January, when presumably he will have to bring forward an Estimate. Last night he intimated that this sum of£3,500,000 was rather in the nature of a transfer. We are in a difficulty, because we have not the OFFICIAL REPORT which gave us the points last night. Perhaps he will tell us what was the position he took up last night. Is it something in the nature of a transfer, that is to say, that you relieve the loss in the Unemployment Fund by a national grant? If it is that, the position of the House is perfectly clear in regard to this Estimate. All we are doing is granting a very large sum of the taxpayers' money to this fund, and the result of that is not to 'do any good, not to help anyone but that so many tens of thousands of people will be thrown out of work. To put it into simple language, it means roughly that 20,000 people at£3 10s. lose a job, and that is the contribution the Government are asking us to make. I am thoroughly convinced that the policy of the Government is unsound and I think the Estimate needs explanation.
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of LABOUR (Mr. Lawson): I think it is necessary to remind the House what we are really asking for in this Supplementary Estimate. In July last, the House decided that the State should make a one-third contribution towards the Insurance Fund. That principle being accepted by the House on the Second and Third Reading, the next step is to give effect to it. We have heard a good deal of the Blanesburgh Report in the last week or two. This is one of the principles that the Blanes-burgh Report laid down very clearly. The hon. Member asked me how long this was to last? Were we quite sure it would keep the fund going until the end of the year? I may tell him that it was stated from this box last night that this contribution of£3,500,000 will keep the Fund going until February, when there will be another Supplementary Estimate needed.
  Commander WILLIAMS: Of how much?
  Mr. LAWSON: That is a matter which we cannot tell just yet. When that Supplementary Estimate comes on, we shall then be able to discuss the reason for the Estimate, which will involve the figures dealt with by the hon. Member opposite. That is really the position. This is the£3,500,000 which implements the Bill passed by the House of Commons without a Division on a principle which was accepted unanimously in the House. When we come to the further stage—that will be next year—I think it will be permissible to discuss the need of the money in relation to the figures of unemployment. One could do that to-night if it were necessary, but I would point out to the House that those figures have no relation to the£3,500,000. I do not think it is necessary to throw any further light on this particular matter. One could say, if it were permissible to discuss the figures, that perhaps the figures arise because of better registration; because there are men on the fund who have been disqualified in the past and who have become, in some cases, an unjust charge on the Poor Law. I do not want to go into that matter to-night, because I do not think those figures have any relation to the present sum for which we are asking. I ask the House to give us this Vote, because the matter has been discussed at various stages. It was discussed in the earlier part of the year on the Second Reading, the Committee stage, and the Third Reading of the Bill, to which I have referred, and it was discussed last night. The principle has been accepted. When the Supplementary Estimate comes up in February, the whole of the facts and figures can be dealt with at that time.
  Mr. GEORGE BALFOUR: In what a pathetic position we find ourselves tonight: The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour said, in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Torquay (Commander Williams), that this Vote will carry us to February, and that at that date a further Supplementary Estimate will be introduced. He has put this Vote, in fact, in the position of being a mere token Vote. [Interruption.] That really is so. We are asked to-night, so far as unemployment insurance is concerned, for a token Vote of£3,500,000, which it is estimated, will carry us until February next, and we are asked to pledge ourselves to an unlimited liability

  1363
  in the future. That is as I see the position. We are asked to-night at this late hour to say that we will give£3,500,000 on the Report stage of this Vote—the taxpayers' money—without any explanation as to what is the liability of the country. I do not ask the hon. Gentleman to explore this subject and go into it in all its ramifications, but I think he should give us an indication, that, while to-night we are asked to Vote£3,500,000 to carry us up to February, the Government estimate that the additional charge will be, roughly, say£5,000,000,£15,000,000 or£50,000,000 or whatever is the sum. Let us know the forecast of the amount to which we are committing ourselves in this House. If there is one function that this House has to discharge it is that of guardian of the public purse. We are here to watch strictly and to protect the public exchequer. Hon. Members opposite will admit that that is one of the primary functions of this House, yet the Parliamentary Secretary passes off with a phrase this Vote for£3,500,000 by saying that it will carry us over until February, but as to the amount for which we stand committed by the Act which was passed last July, there was not one word of guidance: not one word to indicate the liability to which we are committed. While I make no quarrel as to whether this Estimate is right or wrong, I do say that we are entitled to more guidance from the Government as to the commitments to which we are pledged.
  Major GEORGE DAVIES: I think that the explanations given so briefly by the Parliamentary Secretary, so far from relieving our minds, has rather added to our disquietude. My hon. Friends have pointed out the feeling of uncertainty in which this leaves us. It is all very well for the Parliamentary Secretary to say that this Supplementary Estimate is in order to carry out a Vote of this House in regard to the State bearing an equal third with the other parties as contributors to the Unemployment Insurance Fund, but it seems to me that this is merely an example of what we might call Socialistic finance in connection with this matter. We have heard, in speech after speech from hon. Members opposite, that not only this Bill but other Measures are only instalments, which is a phrase coined
  1364
  to soothe the rather ruffled feelings of hon. Members behind them. If ever there was a case of an instalment this has been proved to be so out of the mouth of the Parliamentary Secretary. We are asked to pass an instalment that is to carry us over the Recess. We have the word of the Prime Minister that he can carry out his political duties much more efficiently when this House is not sitting than when it is sitting, and here we are asked to vote something when we are about to break up for the Christmas Recess. We are asked to hand over to the Prime Minister and his colleagues a sum which is going to carry them over the time when the Prime Minister can work more efficiently. This question of an instalment does not merely finish with the question of carrying out the Measure which this House passed and which alters the contributions to the Unemployment Insurance Scheme, so that the State contributes one-third, in common with the employers and the employed. As we have seen from what has happened during the last few days the whole basis of that Act can be altered. The Insurance Act has been changed from an Insurance Act into a Benefit Distributing Act, and there seems to be no reason why, at any moment, the State, which now contributes one-third equally with the other parties, may not be asked to pay a constantly increasing share of the contributions. In other words, when we have once committed the country to departing from the strict insurance basis, it matters little whether the Supplementary Estimate whereby the taxpayers are to be mulcted in an extra burden is to carry us over to February, or whether it is to bear a half share or whether the Exchequer is to be requested to make grants-in-aid to a bankrupt fund. In these circumstances we are entitled to a more intelligent forecast and to the amount we shall be called upon to provide when we reassemble in January.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."
  Captain BOURNE: There is one small point on this estimate—I am not objecting to it—to which I want to draw the attention of the House. This is a Supplementary Estimate to carry out the terms of a Bill which has not yet received the assent of both Houses of Parliament. So far as this Bill is concerned I understand that it is a Money Bill and that it is very improbable that another place will make any amendment, but I should like to be assured that the Bill will receive the assent of another place in time to receive the Royal Assent simultaneously with the Consolidated Fund Bill. This is a very undesirable procedure because we know that we are never quite certain that a Bill will necessarily go on the Statute Book in exactly the same form as it left this House, and cases have arisen where a Supplementary Estimate has been introduced and passed in respect of a Bill which was not then passed, and the Lords have subsequently made Amendments in it. Consequently, we have had to alter the Estimate in order to meet the Amendments made. I hope this Government will not follow the bad example of introducing a Supplementary Estimate before a Bill has passed both Houses of Parliament, and the terms of the Measure are certain. I realise that in this case there is urgency in the matter, and I do not wish to push my objection any further.
  Lieut,-Colonel HENEAGE: May I ask why these words are inserted: "Any balances made or unexpended up to March, 1930, will not be liable to surrender to the Treasury" I should like an explanation why they are there. It is rather an unusual form of words, and perhaps we ought to send for the Lord Advocate to explain them.
  The SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. William Adamson): The hon. and gallant Member for Oxford (Captain Bourne) is quite right in saying that the Highlands and Islands Medical Services Bill is practically a Money Bill and therefore very unlikely to be altered in another place. I would remind him that the Bill was agreed to by all sections of the House, and no Amendments were made in Committee stage. I would remind the hon. and gallant Member that this is not the first time that a thing of this kind has been done. We have precedents. In 1924, under similar circum-
  1366
  stances, there was an Estimate of this kind, and only last year there was an Estimate in exactly the same category. With regard to the point raised by the hon. and gallant Member for Louth (Lieut.-Colonel Heneage), the principle to which he drew attention is a principle that has been in the Highlands and Islands (Medical Service) Acts since 1913, and no change has been made. As there is urgency, I hope the House will see their way to give me the Report of this Estimate.
  Commander BELLAIRS: We have been told that this is practically a Money Bill. May the House know whether it is a Money Bill or not? If it has been certified I think we ought to know.
  Mr. SPEAKER: I am not yet sure whether it is or not.
  Major ELLIOT: I respectfully suggest to the Government that it is most undesirable to take Supplementary Estimates, both Committee and Report stages, after Eleven o'clock at night. We did not prolong the Debate on the previous Estimate as we might have done, in view of the fact that the Minister in charge then said that we should have time to discuss it at greater length. This Estimate is a matter of urgency and we desire it to go through but in any case to take Supplementary Estimates after Eleven o'clock is scarcely giving the House that opportunity of review to which it is entitled. I am sure that the Secretary of State would not have taken it to-night if he could possibly have avoided it. From the point of view of Scottish Members, it is most undesirable that Scottish business should always be taken in this way, when it is impossible for them to go into matters in the way that all Scotsmen desire.
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. Johnston): One word on the point of the hon. and gallant Member's protest. He is aware that this Bill is an agreed Bill, and that it is common ground with all parties. This money must be got if the doctor and nurses engaged in this service are to get their salaries. He is aware also that we have been trading upon unexpended balances since the end of the War, and that on every occasion when this Bill has been before the House or the, Standing Committee it has been unanimously approved.

WAYS AND MEANS [16TH DECEMBER].
Resolution reported,
"That, towards making good the Supply granted to His Majesty for the service of the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1930, the sum of£5,416,670 be granted to His Majesty out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom."
Bill ordered to be brought in upon the said Resolution by the Chairman of Ways and Means, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer and Mr. Pethick-Lawrence.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 1) BILL,
"to apply certain sums out of the Consolidated Fund to the service of the year ending on the thirty-first day of March, one thousand, nine hundred and thirty," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to he read a Second time Tomorrow, and to be printed. [Bill 102.]
The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.
It being after half-past Eleven of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned at Twenty-five Minutes before Twelve o'clock.

TRADE AND COMMERCE.
  AUSTRALIA (TARIFFS).
  AUSTRALIA (TARIFFS).
  FOREIGN COMPETITION (SWEATED LABOUR).
  FOREIGN COMPETITION (SWEATED LABOUR).
  SHIPBUILDING (TRADE FACILITIES).
  SHIPBUILDING (TRADE FACILITIES).
  TARIFFS.
  TARIFFS.
  RUSSIA.
  RUSSIA.
  EXPORTS.
  EXPORTS.
  WHEAT AND WHEAT-FLOUR (CANADIAN SHIPMENTS).
  WHEAT AND WHEAT-FLOUR (CANADIAN SHIPMENTS).
  STATISTICS.
  STATISTICS.
  SPAIN.
  SPAIN.
  CANADA (TARIFFS).
  CANADA (TARIFFS).
  BUILDING MATERIALS (IMPORTS).
  BUILDING MATERIALS (IMPORTS).
MERCANTILE MARINE.
  SEAMANSHIP, TRAINING.
  SEAMANSHIP, TRAINING.
  TONNAGE.
  TONNAGE.
  ALIEN MASTERS AND OFFICERS.
  ALIEN MASTERS AND OFFICERS.
  BREAD (PRICE).
  BREAD (PRICE).
  FISHING INDUSTRY (RUBBER BOOTS).
  FISHING INDUSTRY (RUBBER BOOTS).
  LOCAL EDUCATION AUTHORITIES (CAPITAL BORROWING).
  LOCAL EDUCATION AUTHORITIES (CAPITAL BORROWING).
  BRITISH GUIANA (SECONDARY EDUCATION).
  BRITISH GUIANA (SECONDARY EDUCATION).
SCOTLAND.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, ROGART, SUTHERLAND.
  SMALL HOLDINGS, ROGART, SUTHERLAND.
  EXECUTIONS.
  EXECUTIONS.
  DEAF AND DUMB.
  DEAF AND DUMB.
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
  PREMISES, MARYLEBONE.
  PREMISES, MARYLEBONE.
  ENEMY DEBTS DEPARTMENT.
  ENEMY DEBTS DEPARTMENT.
  TEMPORARY WOMEN CLERKS (EXAMINATIONS).
  TEMPORARY WOMEN CLERKS (EXAMINATIONS).
  MINING, CORN-WALL.
  MINING, CORN-WALL.
COAL INDUSTRY.
  PRICE AND WAGES ASCERTAINMENTS.
  PRICE AND WAGES ASCERTAINMENTS.
  EXPLOSIVES (COST).
  EXPLOSIVES (COST).
UNEMPLOYMENT.
  BENEFIT (PAYMENT, CHRISTMAS).
  BENEFIT (PAYMENT, CHRISTMAS).
  DOMESTIC WORK.
  DOMESTIC WORK.
  WOOLWICH.
  WOOLWICH.
  ELECTRIFICATION, LONDON AND NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY.
  ELECTRIFICATION, LONDON AND NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY.
  EXPORT TRADE.
  EXPORT TRADE.
  BERKSHIRE.
  BERKSHIRE.
  RIVER LEE (FLOODING).
  RIVER LEE (FLOODING).
  ESTON.
  ESTON.
  COTTON INDUSTRY.
  COTTON INDUSTRY.
  WAGES (INTERNATIONAL INFORMATION).
  WAGES (INTERNATIONAL INFORMATION).
  TRADE BOARDS.
  TRADE BOARDS.
  WORKING CLASSEIS, PURCHASING POWER.
  WORKING CLASSEIS, PURCHASING POWER.
  ALIENS (CRIMINAL PROCESS).
  ALIENS (CRIMINAL PROCESS).
  MECHANICAL SLAUGHTERING IMPLEMENTS (ACCIDENTS).
  MECHANICAL SLAUGHTERING IMPLEMENTS (ACCIDENTS).
BRITISH ARMY.
  ARTILLERY PRACTICE, BRACKENBURY FORT.
  ARTILLERY PRACTICE, BRACKENBURY FORT.
  RUSSIA (MILITARY ATTACHÉ).
  RUSSIA (MILITARY ATTACHÉ).
  RECRUITS (CIVILIAN CLOTHING).
  RECRUITS (CIVILIAN CLOTHING).
  RHINELAND EVACUATION.
  RHINELAND EVACUATION.
HOUSING.
  RENT RESTRICTION ACTS.
  RENT RESTRICTION ACTS.
  LIGHT CASTINGS.
  LIGHT CASTINGS.
  CANCER.
  CANCER.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE FUND.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE FUND.
  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS.
  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS.
TRANSPORT.
  OMNIBUS AND RAILWAY ACCIDENTS.
  OMNIBUS AND RAILWAY ACCIDENTS.
  TRAMCARS (VESTIBULE FRONTS).
  TRAMCARS (VESTIBULE FRONTS).
  UNDERGROUND RAILWAYS (OVERCROWDING).
  UNDERGROUND RAILWAYS (OVERCROWDING).
  MOTOR VEHICLE HEAD-LIGHTS.
  MOTOR VEHICLE HEAD-LIGHTS.
POST OFFICE.
  TELEPHONE STAFF (CHRISTMAS DUTY).
  TELEPHONE STAFF (CHRISTMAS DUTY).
  LOST PACKETS AND PARCELS.
  LOST PACKETS AND PARCELS.
  BOOKS OF STAMPS (PRINTED INFORMATION).
  BOOKS OF STAMPS (PRINTED INFORMATION).
  OVERHEAD TELEPHONE WIRES.
  OVERHEAD TELEPHONE WIRES.
  Ex-SERVICE MEN (EMPLOYMENT).
  Ex-SERVICE MEN (EMPLOYMENT).
  POSTAL FACILITIES, KENT.
  POSTAL FACILITIES, KENT.
  POSTAL DELIVERY, GWAENYSGOR,
  POSTAL DELIVERY, GWAENYSGOR,
  WIRELESS RECEIVING LICENCES.
  WIRELESS RECEIVING LICENCES.
  PART-TIME EMPLOYÉS.
  PART-TIME EMPLOYÉS.
  BROADCASTING (ALTERNATIVE PROGRAMMES).
  BROADCASTING (ALTERNATIVE PROGRAMMES).
  NAVAL POWER (GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND ITALY).
  NAVAL POWER (GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND ITALY).
  SINGAPORE NAVAL BASE.
  SINGAPORE NAVAL BASE.
  OLD AGE PENSIONS.
  OLD AGE PENSIONS.
  INDIA (OPIUM, MALWA STATES).
  INDIA (OPIUM, MALWA STATES).
Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR): My Lords, before the ordinary business is commenced, as I see Lord Beauchamp is present I would remind him that we have already indicated that we want to sit after dinner to-morrow night in order to go on with the Committee stage of the Road Traffic Bill. I do not know whether it would be convenient to begin earlier to-morrow than the usual hour. There is no judicial business this week and therefore if it were convenient to the House—I will endeavour to ascertain—we could sit at three o'clock to-morrow. It would certainly be a saving of time.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: Will the noble Lord the Leader of the House be good enough to tell me this? I am quite agreeable to sitting after dinner. I think it is the proper thing to do, but supposing we do not get through this Bill to-morrow night would he be prepared to sit after dinner and go on with it on Thursday night?
LORD PARMOOR: Or on Friday morning? That might be a convenient day. Of course, if convenient we can sit after dinner on Thursday. I am quite willing to ascertain and to follow what is the convenience of members of the House generally.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I think the noble Lord would be wise if he followed the suggestion which he has just made. It is very difficult to say until we reach the end of the proceedings to-day or to-morrow what ought to be done, but I venture to think that he will find some difficulty in sitting after dinner on Thursday to take the Road Traffic Bill because we shall be occupied with an even more important Bill until dinner time.
LORD PARMOOR: Of course the Unemployment Insurance Bill must go to
1378
a Second Reading. We cannot interfere with that in any way. I do not know how much time will be required for that Bill. It is a very important Bill, but I have indicated generally what I think would be the best course and that can be adjusted if circumstances vary. I only desire to meet the convenience of the House and at the same time to get through our business. I do not know whether the noble Marquess heard my suggestion, that inasmuch as there is no judicial business to-morrow we might meet an hour earlier if it were convenient and thus have longer time in which to deal with the Road Traffic Bill as well as other business?
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Unless the noble and learned Lord has heard any objections from any quarter of the House I should see no objection to meeting earlier to-morrow.
LORD PARMOOR: Then I should propose that we meet to-morrow an hour before the usual time.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Presuming we do that I hope we shall not be kept here until a late hour at night.
LORD PARMOOR: The noble Lord does so much to help us forward with the business and to save our time that of course we wish to do everything to meet him.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I think it is clear that we must take into consideration what would be for the general convenience of the House, whether we sit on Friday or on Monday. Much time has been occupied with the Road Traffic Bill and it is clear that we must finish it before Christmas.
LORD PARMOOR: Then we will meet at three o'clock to-morrow.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Perhaps the noble and learned Lord, and his colleague, who has managed the course of this Bill so admirably, will allow me to confer with them later, and perhaps the noble Earl above the gangway will also confer with us?
LORD PARMOOR: Of course I should welcome such a consultation.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Of course it is quite understood that Lord Stanhope has first place to-morrow?
LORD PARMOOR: Of course.

MENTAL TREATMENT BILL. [H.L.]
Amendments reported (according to Order).
Clause 1:
Power to receive voluntary boarders.
(2) Any unmarried person under the age of eighteen whose parent or guardian is desirous of submitting him to treatment for mental disorder may, if the parent or guardian makes a written application for the purpose accompanied by a medical recommendation, be received as a voluntary boarder under this section, but such a person shall not be so received on his own application.
(4) Any person received as a voluntary boarder under this section may leave the institution, hospital, home or place upon giving to the superintendent or other person in charge, or to the person with whom he is residing in single care, seventy-two hours' notice in writing of his intention to do so, or if he is an unmarried person under the age of eighteen upon such notice being given by his parent or guardian.
If any voluntary boarder by or in respect of whom such a notice has been given is not allowed to leave the institution, hospital, home or place at the expiration of the notice, he shall be entitled to recover as liquidated damages from the person in charge of the institution, hospital or home, or the person with whom he was residing in single care, ten pounds for each day or part of a day during which he is detained.
(5) For the purposes of this section, the expression "parent or guardian" in relation to an unmarried person under the age of eighteen includes any person who under takes or performs towards that person the duty of a parent or guardian.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (EARL RUSSELL)THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (EARL RUSSELL) moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "unmarried." The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is to meet the point that was raised in the discussion as to minors between sixteen and eighteen. It must be read with the next Amendment. The effect of that will be to reduce the age at which these people can be treated at the request of their guardians from eighteen to sixteen. In those circumstances it is unnecessary to keep the word "unmarried" because now by law they cannot be married under
1380
that age. This, I think and hope, will meet the objections that were raised in Committee.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 15, leave out ("unmarried").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 15, leave out ("eighteen") and insert ("sixteen").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the next two are only drafting Amendments.
Amendments moved—
Page 2, line 4, after ("shall") insert ("(a)")
Page 2, lines 8 and 9, leave out ("a medical recommendation under this the last subsection,") and insert ("such a recommendation").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
LORD DANESFORT: My Lords, the next Amendment, in subsection (3), to leave out "this," is covered by the last Amendment of the noble Earl. I therefore do not move it.
EARL RUSSELL: There are two further drafting Amendments. I beg to move.
Amendments moved—
Page 2, line 11, leave out ("Such recommendation shall,") and insert ("and (b)")
Page 2, line 13, after the first ("person,") insert ("and").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
LORD DANESFORT LORD DANESFORT moved, after subsection (3), to insert as a new subsections:—
"(4) The medical recommendation referred to in the last two subsections shall cease to have effect on the expiration of fourteen days from the last date on which the person to whom the recommendation relates was examined by the medical practitioner."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the object of this Amendment is to ensure that a young person shall not be sent to an institution on a recommendation of a doctor which is old or out of date. It is founded upon the analogy of Clause 5 (5), which makes provision for putting a man into a place of mental treatment if he is incapable of volition. The recommendation of the doctor under Clause 1

1381
has to state that the person is likely to benefit under treatment for mental disorder. That might be true at or very shortly after the time when the person is examined, but if the recommendation were used a month or two months after the examination, the statement might be quite untrue, because he might have recovered and, possibly, no longer be likely to benefit by being put in a place for mental treatment. Therefore my proposal is that the medical recommendation shall cease to have effect at the expiration of fourteen days from the last date of examination.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 16, at end insert the said new subsection.—(Lord Danesfort.)
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, this Amendment is perfectly proper. The object is to avoid a stale recommendation, but we want a little alteration in the words. Perhaps the noble Lord will accept it in this form:—
"The medical recommendation shall cease to have effect for the purposes of this section on the expiration of fourteen days from the last date on which the person to whom the recommendation relates was examined by the medical practitioner for the purposes of making the recommendation."
I would move it in that form.
LORD DANESFORT: I accept that.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 16, at end insert as a new subsection:
("(4) The medical recommendation shall cease to have effect for the purposes of this section on the expiration of fourteen days from the last date on which the person to whom the recommendation relates was examined by the medical practitioner for the purposes of making the recommendation.") (Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, in subsection (4), to leave out "superintendent or other person in charge, or to the person with whom he is residing in single care," and to insert "person in charge." The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is the first of a series of Amendments which are purely of a drafting character. The object is to substitute in each case the words "person in charge," who is defined later in the Bill, for the words in the subsection defining particular persons. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 19, leave out from ("the") to ("seventy-two") in line 21, and insert (" person in charge").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, there is an Amendment which is not on the Paper, but is purely formal. It is simply to omit in line 22 the words "an unmarried" and to insert "a."
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 22, leave out ("an unmarried") and insert ("a").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the next Amendment is consequential.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 23, leave out ("eighteen") and insert ("sixteen").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, in subsection (5), to leave out "eighteen includes any person who undertakes or performs towards that person the duty of a parent or guardian," and to insert "sixteen includes any person having the charge of the person under sixteen." The noble Earl said: My Lords, these are all drafting Amendments.
Amendments moved—
Page 2, line 29, leave out from ("charge") to ("ten") in line 31.
Page 2, line 34, leave out ("parent or")
Page 2, line 34, leave out ("an unmarried") and insert ("a")
Page 2, line 35, leave out from ("of") to the end of the clause, and insert ("sixteen includes any person having the charge of the person under sixteen").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 2 [Notice of reception, death and departure of voluntary boarders and provisions as to boarders who become incapable of volition]:
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the first two Amendments in my name are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 2, line 43, leave out from ("the") to the end of subsection (1), and insert ("person in charge").
Page 3, leave out line 8, and insert ("person in charge").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, after subsection (3), to insert as a new subsection:—
"(4) If a person who is under the age of sixteen and who has been received as aforesaid ceases to have any parent or guardian, or if his parents or guardians are incapable of performing, or refuse or persistently neglect to perform, their duty as such, the person in charge shall send to the Board of Control a report as to the circumstances of the case and the condition of the boarder, and the Board shall forthwith consider the report and give such directions with respect to the case as they think fit."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this deals with the question of the parents and guardians which was raised in Committee. I think the subsection we propose meets the point that was raised. The Board of Control will accept the guardianship.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, after line 19, insert the said new subsection.—(Earl Russell.)
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Perhaps I ought to thank the noble Earl for having met that point.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3 [Visitation of voluntary boarders]:
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the Amendment in my name on this clause is drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 31, leave out from (" the ") to end of line 33, and insert ("person in charge").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 5:
Provision for treatment without certification of persons temporarily incapable of volition.
(3) The application shall be accompanied by a recommendation in the form set out in Part II of the First Schedule to this Act, signed by two registered medical practitioners, of whom one shall be either the usual medical attendant of the person to whom the application relates, or a person who has been approved for the purpose of making recommendations under this section either by the Board of Control or by the local authority within whose area the said person then is.
(12) Where it is anticipated that a person who is undergoing treatment as a temporary patient under this section will not recover within the period of six months, but his early recovery appears reasonably probable, that period may from time to time be extended
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tended for further periods of such length not exceeding three months as may be specified in directions given by the Board of Control upon the application of one of the persons mentioned in subsection (2) of this section, accompanied by such evidence or recommendations as the Board may by rules prescribe, provided that such further periods shall in no case exceed six months in all.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, in subsection (3), to leave out "either" and to insert "a medical practitioner (not being the usual medical attendant of the person to whom the application relates) approved by the Board of Control for the purpose of making recommendations under this section and the other shall be, if practicable." The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is intended to meet the question that was raised as to an additional safeguard in this clause. It now sets out that one of the medical practitioners shall in any case be a person approved for that purpose by the Board of Control, and therefore a perfectly independent person so far as the patient is concerned. It will merely be a doctor who from the point of view of the public protection is an official person, who has no interest except his proper official one. I hope that will meet the point raised in Committee.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 38, leave out ("either") and insert the said words.—(Earl Russell.)
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, the original drafting of the Bill said it should be the family doctor, or if not, then a person approved by the Board. In the event of there being no family doctor, are two doctors approved by the Board?
EARL RUSSELL: I think the clause will read that it shall be a medical practitioner approved by the Board and if practicable a family doctor.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: And if there is no family doctor?
EARL RUSSELL: Then it will be any doctor that can be obtained.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: My Lords, the noble Earl will not imagine he has met all my objections to this particular clause, but the Amendment is an improvement on the original drafting.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, I should like to say that I am sure that

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the noble Earl is justified in what he is doing. I was very much surprised yesterday among various communications from medical men to receive one from a medical man with, I suppose, as large a private practice as there is in relation to matters of unsound mind and defective mentality, endorsing the insistence that there should be some additional safeguard. I hope this additional safeguard will be thought sufficient.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendments moved—
Page 4, line 40, leave from ("relates") to the end of subsection (3).
Page 5, line 28, leave out from ("the") to ("to") in line 3D, and insert ("person in charge")
Page 5, lines 37 and 38, leave out ("medical superintendent, or such other person as aforesaid") and insert ("person in charge")
Page 5, lines 41 and 42, leave out ("such medical, superintendent or other person") and insert ("person in charge").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment on the Paper.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 18, leave out from ("the") to ("but") in line 21 and insert ("person in charge").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendments moved—
Page 6, line 28, after ("11") insert "subject to the provisions of this section").
Page 6, line 29, leave out ("Subject to the provisions of this section")
Page 6, lines 30 and 31, leave out ("save as hereinafter provided").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, after subsection (11), to insert as a new subsection:—
"(12) A person received as a temporary patient shall not be detained as such for more than twenty-eight days after the date at which he regains volition unless in the meantime he again becomes incapable of volition."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is to give effect to Lord Cranbrook's proposal to ensure that a temporary patient shall be discharged twenty-eight days after recovering volition unless he relapses in the meantime. The effect is to give him more avenues of discharge than any other patent. The Amendment
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has the same effect as that moved by Lord Cranbrook, but it is in a simpler form. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 21, line 32, at end insert the said new subsection.—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved in subsection (12), after "section", to insert "made in such form and." The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a drafting Amendment, but I ought to sell your Lordships that the Schedules row at the end of this Bill will require a little recasting before Third Reading. They are not now applicable to the changed conditions.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 41, after ("section") insert ("made in such form and").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I beg to move the next Amendment standing in my name.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 43, after ("rules") insert ("made under Section three hundred and thirty-eight of the principal Act."—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved to insert as a new subsection:—
"(16) Section one hundred and sixteen of the principal Act (which relates to the extent of the administrative powers of the Judge in Lunacy) shall have effect as if there were added at the end of subsection (1) thereof the following new paragraph:
(g) To every person received as a temporary patient under Section five of the Mental Treatment Act, 1929."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is an Amendment which your Lordships may remember I withdrew in Committee because it wanted re-drafting. It is now in the proper form. The words of my Amendment are intended to give persons who come under this Bill the benefit of that section of the principal Act.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 17, at end insert the said new subsection.—(Earl Russell.)
LORD DANESEORT: Could the noble Earl tell us briefly the purport of Section 116 of the Lunacy Act?
EARL RUSSELL: It is a section that gives an opportunity for protecting the property of a person who is under treatment.

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It applies now only to person specified in that section, and it is desired to apply it also to protect the property of people treated under Clause 5 of this Bill.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 7 [Provisions as to visiting committees];
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, this is a drafting Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 19, leave out ("of") to ("so") in line 20, and insert ("that authority").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 15:
Power to make rules.
15. The power of the Board of Control to make rules under subsection (1) of Section three hundred and thirty-eight of the principal Act shall include power to make rules for any of the purposes specified in the Third Schedule to this Act.
Earl RUSSELL Earl RUSSELL moved to insert as a new subsection:
"(2) The following shall be substituted for subsection (6) of the said Section three hundred and thirty-eight:
"(6) Rules made under this section after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and thirty-one, shall be laid before both Houses of Parliament forthwith, and if an Address is presented to His Majesty by either House of Parliament within the next subsequent twenty-one days on which that House has sat after any such rules have been laid before it, praying that a rule may be annulled, it shall thenceforth be void, but without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done thereunder or to the making of a new rule."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this Amendment puts in a more appropriate place a subsection which was accepted in Committee.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 26, at end insert the said new subsection.—(Earl Russell.)
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD VISCOUNT BRENTFORD had given Notice of two Amendments to the proposed new subsection—namely, to leave out "after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and thirty-one" and to insert at the end:—
"Provided that where any such rule modifies or adapts this Act or any other enactment the rule shall not come into force or have any effect unless within the said period of twenty-one days it has been approved by a Resolution passed by each House of Parliament.
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"(3) Subsection (2) of this section shall come into operation on the passing of this Act".
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I hope the noble Earl will accept the first of my Amendments to leave out the words "after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and thirty-one." The point I want to put to him is that we have now decided, or we shall decide if we pass this subsection, that rules made under this Bill shall be submitted to Parliament after it comes into operation in 1931. I think lawyers in the House will bear me out in saying—I am afraid the noble Earl must have forgotten Clause 37 of the Interpretation Act, 1889—that power to make rules begins before the Act otherwise comes into operation.
Amendment to the proposed Amendment moved—
In lines 4 and 5 of the Amendment leave out (" after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and thirty-one").—(Viscount Brentford.)
EARL RUSSELL: I will accept this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment to the Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: My Lords, the second Amendment to the Amendment which I have on the Paper raises a point which my noble friend who moved the original Amendment for me at the Committee stage reserved. The noble Earl would not accept the Amendment then, but my noble friend reserved my right to bring the matter up again if I thought fit on Report. I want to ask the noble Earl seriously to consider whether it ought not to be accepted. My Amendment provides that the rules which not only the Minister but, under other clauses, the Board of Control are empowered to make, shall not come into force where any such rule modifies or adapts this measure or any other enactment until the rules have been approved by each House of Parliament.
Parliament and the country are getting increasingly jealous of the power given to State Departments to make rules, but here we are giving power to make rules altering the very Bill which we are now passing. The only proviso we make is that they shall be laid on the Table of both Houses of Parliament for twenty-one days. I do not know what is the

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practice in your Lordships' House, but I do know that in the other House it is almost impossible to get a debate on rules laid on the Table of the House. I see the noble Earl opposite agrees with me on that point. While I agree that in the case of ordinary rules which are necessarily made by the Board of Control or the Minister dealing with the administration of institutions, with the forms which have to be filled up in institutions, and so forth, there is no need to get the assent of Parliament, I think that where you are actually giving power to alter clauses of the very Bill you are now passing you are going too far. If we want to alter it, now is the time to make the alteration ourselves and not leave it to the Minister or the Board of Control to make those alterations.
I do not see the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chief Justice, here, but certainly if in the face of his recently published book we pass an Act giving power to the Minister not only to make rules which will have the binding force of law, but to alter the very Act of Parliament itself, I think the noble and learned Lord would bring out a new edition with a special chapter on, I will not say the stupidity but the incapacity of your Lordships to benefit by the advice he has given. I really think that both from the legal and Parliamentary point of view we ought to preserve the right of making alterations in our own legislation.
Amendment to the proposed Amendment moved—
At end of the Amendment add ("Provided that where any such rule modifies or adapts this Act or any other enactment the rule shall not come into force or have any effect unless within the said period of twenty-one days it has been approved by a Resolution passed by each House of Parliament.
"(3) Subsection (2) of this section shall come into operation on the passing of this Act").—(Viscount Brentford.)
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the noble Viscount said that this rule-making power which it is proposed to give will enable us to alter the very Bill we are passing. That is not so. My Amendment is intended to give power to adapt the old Act. The only object of this so far as it alters an Act at all is to adapt an old Act to the present conditions, as
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I told your Lordships in Committee. It does not give power—
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Will the noble Earl allow me to say that if he looks at Clause 22 of this Bill he will see that subsection (2) reads:—
"For the purpose of enabling this Act to be carried into effect….the Board of Control may….make such adaptation, and modifications of the provisions of this Act as they may consider necessary."
I beg my noble friend to believe that I did not make the statement without having read the Bill.
EARL RUSSELL: Neither did I make my statement without having read it. The noble Viscount left out rather material words—the words "by order." If this stands there will be no rules made altering this Bill and when we come to Clause 22 I shall be able to show that "by order" means temporary adaptation to local conditions and docs not involve any rule-making power. It docs apply only to adapting the old Act. The matters referred to in Clause 22 are only of local interest. Orders will be made in connection with the hospitals boards. We do not really mean regulations to change anything except details applicable to the conditions of the locality. By his Amendment the noble Viscount requires an affirmative Resolution of both Houses of Parliament. I should not mind accepting the last two lines of his Amendment.
It is true, as he says, that rules can be made before the Act otherwise operates and that is why I accept the first part. But here we are asked to wait for an affirmative Resolution, which is really very unusual, and that Resolution applies only, I think, to a rule which "modifies or adapts this Act or any other enactment." It would be very difficult to divide the code of rules into two parts, one making some adaptation of the Act of Parliament and the other merely making ordinary working rules. This would be difficult and might even prove impracticable. To require a positive approval really makes an unnecessary demand, as we think, upon Parliamentary time. The rules are laid upon the Table and it is open to anybody, either in this House or, I understand, in another place, to move that they be disapproved of and

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annulled, and then they come to an end. To require a positive Resolution of Parliament is a thing that is hardly ever done except where you are making new laws in some sense, or effectively limiting the Act with which you are dealing. The rules under this clause, apart from the administrative rules, which would not come under the noble Viscount's Motion, will not be making new laws. They will be the most trifling adaptations of an old Act to new circumstances. They will not in any sense alter anything that Parliament has agreed to. They will only make it make sense in new conditions. I hope the House will not insist on this Amendment.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: My Lords, I hope the House will insist upon this Amendment. I have spent many years in the House of Commons and I can confirm that which my noble friend Lord Brentford says as to the protection, or supposed protection, that a rule should lie so many days on the Table of the House being absolutely illusory. The matter can come on only after eleven o'clock, it is very difficult to keep a House and it is very difficult to find out whether there are any rules lying upon the Table or not. It took me many years before I knew, where to look and see if there were any rules or not. I do not believe five members of the House of Commons know where to look, or what to do if they find that new rules have been laid. If they do, they cannot do anything except after eleven o'clock, and the consequence is that nobody stays, the Government keep a House and whoever endeavours to alter a rule or to see that a Resolution is passed is met by a solid phalanx of Government supporters who have been told to stay and see that no harm is done—no harm, I mean, from the Government point of view.
Why has the noble Earl, Lord Russell, changed so suddenly in the last two or three days? It was only two or three days ago that he told me that he could not possibly forbid a boy of sixteen to drive a cycle because, under an Act of ten years ago, he was allowed to do so now, and we could not alter the old Act. My noble friend below me now wishes to prevent the alteration of an Act, and the noble Earl says: "You must alter it; it will be a trouble if you accept this Amendment in favour of an affirmative
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Resolution." I do not understand these sudden changes. They seem to me to be very curious. One day the noble Earl is a protector of property and of the rights of the community and of Parliament and will allow nothing retrospective, and another day he is all for making changes and allowing the Minister to do whatever he likes. In those circumstances I hope that my noble friend will insist upon his Amendment.
LORD DANESFORT: My Lords, the noble Earl has spoken as if the power to make rules is only a power to make rules adapting the former Act to the purposes of this Act, but he will see that this power is not only one of adapting the old practice but also of modifying. This is expressly stated in the clause that is under consideration, which says that the Board of Control shall have—
"power to make rules for any of the purposes specified in the Third Schedule to this Act."
If you will look at the Third Schedule, you will find, in the fourth paragraph, that rules may be made "modifying and adapting…the principal Act." I could understand the argument if it were suggested that rules merely adapting the old practice to this Act need not be laid upon the Table and obtain the approval of Parliament, but the "rules modifying this Act "—which means altering the Bill that we are now passing—ought surely to be sanctioned by Parliament. Possibly my noble friend might alter his proviso, if he thought fit, so that it would merely read:—
"Provided that where any such rule modifies this Act…."
and so on.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: My Lords, I wonder whether with the indulgence of your Lordships, I might call the noble Earl's attention to another Act of Parliament. This same question arose in regard to the Local Government Act of this year, in which a very important power was given to the Minister of Health to make rules modifying the previous Act "so far as may appear to the Minister necessary." This provision caused, if I may use a colloquial expression, a great disturbance in another place. Probably my noble friend Lord Passfield remembers that. Parliament decided that—

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"Every Order made under this section shall come into operation upon the date specified therein….but shall be laid before Parliament as soon as may be after it is made and shall cease to have effect upon the expiration of a period of three months from the date upon which it came into operation"—
unless it has been approved by Parliament. That, of course, is a via media which enables the rules to come into operation but, if they modify or alter the Act of Parliament, while they may still for purposes of convenience come into operation, they must not last more than three months. That is the precedent that I would bring to the noble Earl's attention. They cannot be continued unless during that period the Minister has a Resolution passed by both Houses of Parliament. I speak with great deference, but if the Minister wants to make rules of his own motion that are not merely administrative rules but which do modify the Act and alter it (for modification means alteration) the least he can do is to agree—I am offering this as an olive branch to the noble Earl—to a clause similar to that which I have brought to your Lordships' attention. I should be prepared to agree to that.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, I hope that the noble Earl will see his way to accept the last suggestion. It does seem to me a reasonable compromise after the discussion that has taken place. We had an important de-bate on this matter when the Local Government Act, 1929, was before us. I think it was the view of all of your Lordships that some provision of the character referred to should be introduced. I regard it as a very salutary clause, and I hope that the noble Earl will accept it.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, I too hope that the noble Earl will see his way to accept this, on more than one ground. It is quite true, I think, as the noble Earl has said, that what is proposed here is within narrow limits, but there are strong reasons of principle, as many noble Lords think, against permitting, and still more against encouraging, the administrative Departments to take upon themselves the exercise of legislative functions. That is the business of Parliament. Many pro tests have been made on this score. It
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is quite true that there have been many mistakes that have escaped attention. The noble Viscount has called attention to this proposed mistake in good time. Really that which is proposed to the noble Earl is not a difficult proposition. All that it involves is that at some time within three months, if it is a common-sense proposal, it shall be subjected to a single vote in each House of Parliament. Those who have more recent recollection of the House of Commons than I have will know whether there is any greater difficulty than there used to be in His Majesty's Government saying to their followers: "This is a matter of common form; we are going to propose it and it must not be opposed." Nobody else would have the courage to oppose a common-sense proposal. So far as your Lordships' House is concerned, I cannot conceive what difficulty there can be in bringing forward a Resolution to sanction rules. If it is a common-sense Resolution it will be adopted at once in the same generous spirit as that in which the noble Earl's excellent proposals have been received in amendment of this Bill.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I can only speak again with the leave of the House. The Minister does take a very strong view about this. I really think that your Lordships have exaggerated it. If you look at the Third Schedule and the matters to which it applies you will see, as the noble and learned Lord said, that the matters really are very trivial.
LORD MERRIVALE: I did not say trivial; I said within a limited area.
EARL RUSSELL: I see that the feeling of the House is that some other provision should be made than we have made. Would your Lordships allow this matter to stand over until the Third Reading and I could consult the noble Viscount opposite? We have been so successful in satisfying him in other matters that I think we might possibly meet him on this and draft a proposal which would be workable and at the same time meet the constitutional position in which your Lordships feel so much interest. If your Lordships would accept that I would undertake that words should be brought up on Third Reading which would meet this point.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: My Lords, I can only speak again with the leave of the House; but I have been into the noble Earl's parlour once and the spider got the better of the fly entirely. My proposal here is approved by the noble Marquess and by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Merrivale. I think and hope that your Lordships' House is prepared to accept the suggestion I have made in this case and I think that the noble Earl ought to accept it. The mere verbiage, I agree, could be altered on Third Reading, but I think he ought to accept the principle of the Local Government Act of 1929.
EARL RUSSELL: I am afraid I cannot say any more on the point.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Does that mean that he will accept it or not?
EARL RUSSELL: What I mean is that we must be allowed to consider it before Third Reading—I hope in conjunction with the noble Viscount.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Then I hope the House will accept my Amendment.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD SANKEY): Does the noble Viscount insist upon his Amendment?
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: It must be so. I understood that the noble Earl would not resist it.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: In order to consider whether he will adopt the noble Viscount's verbiage or not.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: If the House accepts it, as I think it intends to do, in the form I have given it. I am willing to give the noble Earl the option between now and Third Reading of amending it on the lines of the Act of 1929.
EARL RUSSELL: Hear, hear.
On Question, Amendment to the Amendment agreed to.
On Question, original Amendment, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 17:
Amendment of Section 338 of principal Act.
17. Subsection (6) of Section three hundred and thirty-eight of the principal Act shall cease to have effect, and the following subsection shall be substituted therefor:
(6) Rules made under this section after the Mental Treatment Act, 1929, comes into
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operation shall be laid on the Table of both Houses of Parliament, and if an Address is presented to His Majesty by either House of Parliament within the next subsequent twenty-one days on which that House has sat after any such rule has been laid before it praying that the rule may be annulled, the rule shall be annulled and it shall thenceforth be void, but without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done thereunder or to the making of a new rule.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD VISCOUNT BRENTFORD moved to leave out Clause 17. The noble Viscount said: My Lords, this is possibly an omission on the part of the noble Earl, and I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 17.—(Viscount Brentford.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 22 [Interpretation and adaptation]:
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved to insert in subsection (1):—
"The expression 'person in charge' in relation to a person received under this Act or any local Act as a voluntary boarder or as a temporary patient in an institution, hospital, or home, means the medical superintendent or other person in charge of the institution, hospital, or home, and in relation to a person received as such into single care means the person with whom he is residing."
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is the definition of "person in charge" to which I called your Lordships' attention before. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 26, at end insert the said new definition.—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD VISCOUNT BRENTFORD moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "order" and insert "rules made under subsection (1) of Section three hundred and thirty-eight of the principal Act." The noble Viscount said: My Lords, if your Lordships will look at subsection (2) of Clause 22 you will see that for the purpose of enabling this Act to be carried into effect in certain areas
"the Board of Control may by order make such adaptation and modifications of the provisions of this Act as they may consider necessary."
I agree that it is only for a particular purpose relating to the institutions in two of the Northern Counties. At the same time to give the Board of

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Control, which is an authority non-ministerial, power, not by rules laid on the Table of the House but by a simple order from which there is no appeal, and which needs no sanction from any quarter whatever, to make adaptations and modifications in this measure, is really going too far. Any Minister, any authority, still more any Board of Control wanting to adapt and make such modifications in the provisions of an Act of Parliament as they consider necessary ought really to do it by rule and not by simple order. I hope your Lordships will stand for the rights of Parliament to control these bodies even in a small matter like this. If you allow such a body to make orders and modify Acts there is no telling where the mischief will end. I beg to move and I hope the noble Earl will accept the Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page18, line 1, leave out ("order") and insert the said new words.—(Viscount Brentford.)
EARL RUSSELL: This really refers to a very trifling matter. It is simply power in connection with joint hospital boards to make the Act fit the purpose. The effect of the noble Viscount's Amendment will be that any order made under this Act will have to be approved by an affirmative Resolution of Parliament—that will be the net result—on this trifling and local matter. I think that it is unnecessary and I am afraid that I cannot accept it. Of course I think it is of no use, in view of the line that has been taken, my asking your Lordships not to accept this. We take the view that an order is a far more proper means of dealing with trifling and local matters of this sort than a regulation which ought to be of general application. As I say, if your Lordships take that view I do not propose to waste any more time in discussing it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Third Schedule [Matters with respect to which rules may he made by the Board of Control]:
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, my Amendment to the Third Schedule is simply to enable the sections of the principal Act which apply to absence on trial and change of residence of single patients to apply. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 34, after ("received") insert ("Sections fifty-five and fifty-six (which relate respectively to absence on trial or for health and to the change of residence of single patients) ").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS (MEDICAL SERVICE) ADDITIONAL GRANT BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment.

ROAD TRAFFIC BILL. [H.L.]
House again in Committee (according to Order):
[The EARL or DONOUGHMORE in the Chair.]
THE EARL OF COTTENHAM THE EARL OF COTTENHAM moved, after Clause 22, to insert the following clause:—
".For the purpose of preventing and detecting offences by the drivers of vehicles against the provisions of this Part of this Act as to driving and offences in connection therewith, and as to accidents and of punishing offenders, it shall be the duty of the chief constable of police in every police district to employ and equip with suitable motor vehicles specially trained constables in order that they may patrol the roads in their respective police districts and caution the drivers of vehicles against committing any such offence and may stop any driver committing or whom they suspect of having committed any such offence and may arrest any driver who is liable to arrest under this Part of this Act for any such offence."
The noble Earl said: This Amendment provides for the formation of motor police patrols. It is a very drastic Amendment. Indeed, with the exception of the abolition of the speed limit, it is probably the most drastic question that has come before your Lordships' House on the Committee stage of this Bill. I feel that an Amendment of this kind, which, if it meets with your approval, may have very far-reaching effects on road safety in this country, needs to be presented by one whose command of language and ability to turn a phrase is more, in accordance with the traditions of your Lordships' House. But I shall do the best I can, and I hope my shortcomings as a speaker will not influence your Lord-ships

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against it. I do not for a moment believe that the abolition of the speed limit will produce that orgy of speed upon the roads that the scaremongers predict. The twenty miles an hour limit has been disregarded so long that its passing, when it comes, will be almost unnoticed in practice if not in theory. At least that is my humble opinion. Every sane motorist wishes to see the few irresponsible drivers, who may be encouraged for a time by the abolition of the speed limit to use the speed of their cars in dangerous places, driven completely off the road. If they cannot be brought to see the errors of their ways, then I hope most sincerely that the provisions of this Bill will make motoring in this country impossible for them.
There is a grave danger in this righteous enthusiasm for safety first which is now sweeping through your Lordships' House, that the sheep may be herded with the goats. There is every possibility that good drivers may be subject to annoyance because, the police may not be able to distinguish between good driving and bad. How then shall they judge between dangerous and careless driving? To be a judge of driving at all it is not only necessary that the police officer should be able to drive a car himself but he should be able to drive it well. In fact I would regard it as absolutely essential that he should have made a close study of the causes of accidents, of different kinds of road surfaces, and of the characteristics of different makes of car. In fact he would have to be a specialist. I submit that mobile police patrols mounted on motor cycles and side-cars provide a solution of many of the problems connected with road safety which are occupying your Lordships' minds at the present time.
I have reason to believe that police patrols have been utilised with success in the West Riding of Yorkshire. Certainly in the City of Edinburgh they have done most invaluable work. I was up there for some time this year and watched these men at work. They were very good indeed, but I felt they were in a somewhat experimental form and did not perhaps possess that very specialised knowledge which I have ventured to recommend to your Lordships. I would like to quote some figures in connection with the work these men have actually done. I take them from
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the "Report on the State of Crime and the Police Establishment of the City of Edinburgh, 1928." page 20:—
"The traffic patrols exercise an indispensable check on fast and dangerous driving throughout the City…. From the return of offences dealt with by the traffic patrols it will be seen that during the year 10,244 offences were detected. Of these 3,705 cautions were administered at the time of the offence, or later by letter, while 1,539 offenders were reported for process."
Your Lordships will notice the very great saving on the already overworked police courts. These figures show that, out of 10,244 offences, only 1,539 ever reached the police court.
"The traffic patrols found 358 motor vehicles being used on the public highways with defective brakes. These machines were thoroughly tested and 240 owners or drivers were cautioned while 118 were reported…. Special attention was given to drivers failing to keep as near as practicable to the left-hand kerbs while passing over crossings. This offence was a very prolific cause of street accidents, but owing to the strict enforcement of the regulations it is becoming rare. While 623 drivers were cautioned for this offence 251 were reported."
I do not think I need quote any more from that, but I have some figures here from the same Report. They show that in 1926 there were 1,801 traffic accidents in Edinburgh, in 1927 there were only 1,336, in 1928 there were only 1,089. That represents a decrease of 465 for 1927 and 247 for 1928. It is stated in the Report that this result is primarily due to the efficient work of the traffic patrols and the spread of safety first knowledge. As may be expected, a very up-to-date method has been adopted of cautioning pedestrians for acts likely to lead to street accidents, and 249 men were cautioned, 131 women, 942 boys and 76 girls. The Edinburgh police have been acting on the right lines in experimenting with these motor patrols. The figures I have quoted must prove conclusively that safety has gone up by leaps and bounds, while the strain imposed upon the courts by the hearing of a lot of unnecessary motor cases has been very materially decreased, as has also the strain on the voluntary hospitals which are frequently called upon to deal with these motor cases with no hope of their ever receiving any payment for it. I am sure your Lordships will feel, as I do, that the people of Edinburgh have very good reason to be proud of their police patrols.
It is essential that any motorist or motor cyclist who is stopped and cautioned or reported by a police patrol should realise that the two men (because they work in pairs) who have stopped him know as much (or more) about motoring as he does himself. In fact, the men who form these police patrols must be able to drive a car very much better than the ordinary driver and ride a motor cycle very much better than the ordinary motor cyclist, because in their acknowledged superiority as motorists would lie at least 70 per cent. of their power and authority. In addition to the ordinary training of a police constable, they would need to be proficient in first aid and map reading, and their knowledge of the topography of their own particular area should be accurate and extensive. They should make a survey of all the cars and drivers that pass through their area frequently, with a view to tracing stolen cars and work of that kind.
One cannot deny that the formation of patrols such as I have ventured to suggest would in the ordinary way involve considerable expense to the State, but I think it might not be as bad as it sounds. The spread of automatic traffic signalling in the towns throughout the country seems to me to be proceeding far too slowly. In Edinburgh, where I have made quite a considerable study of the whole question, I believe I am right in saying that where automatic signalling devices have been put up and men relieved of point duty, these men have been trained as traffic patrols, and so really there has been no increase in the personnel of the police force. I am perfectly convinced, as these figures seem to prove, that the presence of these patrols on the roads is going to save lives. If that is so, then some small expense is surely more than justified, and it would be false economy not to incur it. I have made several notes about the special training these men should receive, but I have already taken up so much time that I will not read them now. I hope, however, that your Lordships will very seriously consider the bringing into being on the roads of this country of mobile police patrols, consisting of highly specialised, disciplined, honest and kindly men, devoted to the interests of all classes of road users,
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and determined to raise to the highest possible pitch the standard of safety with which His Majesty's subjects, whether men, women or children, motorists, cyclists or pedestrians, may use the roads of this country on their lawful occasions.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 23, at end, insert the said new clause.—(The Earl of Cottenham.)
EARL RUSSELL: Twenty years is a short time in the history of a country, but a long time in the development of motoring, and where we may be twenty years hence I do not know, with the increase of motor cars on the road, and the improvement of our roads. It may well be that long before that time it may be desirable to set up not only mobile police but even what I have heard advocated several times lately, special traffic courts, manned by people acquainted with motoring sufficiently to distinguish between grave and less grave offences, and to administer suitable punishment. That may very well become necessary, but I am afraid that the Amendment of the noble Earl is not really very suitable in this Bill. I sympathise with his object. It is, I think, a very good object, and I think that police of this sort may very likely be extremely useful. If he were at some time or other to put down a Resolution in this House that the establishment of such a force is desirable, we could have a discussion upon it and ascertain the feeling of the House; but it is not usual, I think, for Parliament to instruct chief constables how to carry out their duties.
The police are a local force and under the control of the chief constable, who, in his turn, is under the control of the standing joint committee, and I do not think it is usual for Parliament to tell the police what men they shall employ, how they shall employ them, and how they shall carry out their ordinary police duties. For this reason I am afraid that the proposed new clause is inappropriate here, and I am not prepared to accept it. It is in any case a Home Office matter. It is a thing which might very well be included in a circular of suggestions to chief constables, but that Parliament should order chief constables to do this would be, I think, a new departure. The purpose and the words of the clause are that it shall be the duty of the chief

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constable of police to employ and equip. That would be contrary to precedent, and from that point of view, and not from any want of sympathy, I am obliged to resist the Amendment.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: It seems to me that the proposal is a very good one, although it has one or two drawbacks, and I do not understand why the noble Earl rejects it. What the noble Earl says is that the Home Office may do this, or issue a circular which will instruct the chief constables to do this, but that Parliament must not. It is again putting a Minister and a Department above Parliament, and that is one of the things to which I strongly object. Parliament is the proper authority to do it. The only objection that I can see to the proposal is that I am afraid that if we employ not only skilled drivers and policemen, but skilled mechanics too, it will cost a great deal of money, and I do not think it is necessary to have a police constable with a car, who is told if he sees a motorist in distress to put the car right for him. All that is necessary, I think, is that he should see that the motorist is not driving dangerously. With regard to that, I saw with horror this morning an advertisement in The Times or the Morning Post, which said this:—
"Our new model. You can proceed gently at a walking pace. You put your foot on the accelerator gently and immediately jump to eighty miles or more."
The noble Earl thought that in all probability under this Act motorists would not go at greater speeds than they do now.
THE EARL OF COTTENHAM: If I may correct the noble Lord, my point is that when they are corrected they shall be corrected in the right place. If they desire to drive at a speed that is considered very far above the present legal limit, they shall be allowed to do so unless they endanger any one else by so doing.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I am afraid it seems to me that when you are driving you touch the accelerator and at once spring to eighty miles an hour or more.
THE EARL OF COTTENHAM: Where does the noble Lord obtain that car? What is the name of it? I have been searching for such a car for years.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: The Rolls Royce—well, that is what the advertisement says. In these circumstances I am inclined to think it is really necessary to have some patrol on the roads who will see that the people who buy these cars do not accidentally touch an accelerator and go up to eighty miles an hour. Because if you are going at eighty miles an hour and meet another car, like the noble Earl's, coming in the other direction at eighty miles an hour and your foot touches the wrong pedal—which is not impossible—two heavy vehicles going at that speed may meet. Then what remains either of the cars or of the people who are in them?
EARL RUSSELL: I am afraid the noble Lord did not catch what I said. I did not say that the Home Secretary would instruct the chief constables. It is no part of the Home Secretary's duty to instruct the chief constables. They are independent officers locally appointed. I said that the suggestion might be included in a circular. I suggested that it would be extremely unusual for Parliament to instruct chief constables, and I would prefer that such a precedent as this should not be established. I am quite sure it is contrary to all precedent in our legislation.
EARL HOWE: I did not gather from the noble Earl's reply whether he was going to take any definite steps to impress this point particularly on the Home Office. I am quite certain that one of the first things he will find when this Bill is passed will be that it will become increasingly necessary to have a body of police specially trained for work on the highways. Whether they are mounted on motor-cycles is a matter for consideration by the chief constables in each case. These specially trained police will be able to appreciate the problems involved. More than one chief constable already—including my own progressive chief constable—have taken this step. It has been taken in Buckinghamshire. I hope that the noble Earl, if he cannot accept the Amendment in this form, will pass on the suggestion to the Home Office as being an extremely good one.
EARL RUSSELL: I have already said that I think that that is a very good idea, and I think it extremely likely that chief constables will adopt it, but this is not

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the way to do it. As to my communications with the Home Office, I will take the noble Lord into my confidence at a later stage perhaps.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 23:
Power to highway authorities to authorise on specified highways carriage of greater weights,
23. A highway authority may as regards any road for the maintenance of which they are responsible permit any trailer specified in the permit drawn by a heavy locomotive or a light locomotive on the road to carry weights specified in the permit notwithstanding that when conveying such weights the trailer does not comply with any regulations as to the weight laden of trailers or as to the maximum weight which may be transmitted to the road or any part thereof by trailers, and where such a permit is given it shall not be an offence in the case of any such trailer to carry on that road weights authorised by the permit by reason only that the trailer when conveying them does not comply with such regulations as aforesaid.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM moved to leave out Clause 23. The noble Lord said: The effect of this clause, as I understand it, is this. Certain regulations may be made as to the weight that trailers can carry, but when these regulations are made a highway authority may come forward and say: "Never mind about, those regulations: we shall make other regulations which will permit you to carry a different weight." I presume it would be possible to permit them to carry either a heavier weight or a lighter weight. The result might be that a locomotive, with a trailer might start in the district of one highway authority with a weight approved by the regulations. When it gets into the district of another highway authority it has to unload part of its weight because the weight in this other district has been altered by the highway authority. I think we should have one authority—or rather. I should prefer everything to be laid down by Act of Parliament.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 23.—(Lord Banbury of Southam.)
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Lord has said that he is not in favour of innovations, and I think he has not always accepted my reference to authority. If he will look at the margin of the clause he will see that this provision is over thirty years old—it is not a new thing at
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all. If he will also look more carefully at the clause he will see that it is not a case of making regulations, it is a case of giving a special permit for a special vehicle in special circumstances. There are occasionally very large pieces of machinery, among others such things as transformers for the modern electrical developments, which weigh as much as 80 tons in the one piece. They cannot sometimes conveniently be carried by railway. They have to be carried from where they are manufactured to the port of shipment, or to the place where they are going to be used in connection with the grid transmission, or something of that sort. If you were not able to carry them occasionally by road with a special permit yon would interfere with trade, which would be very regrettable.
I had an example of the kind of thing before me in a Select Committee two years ago where we were so much impressed with the difficulty of dealing with these huge things that we actually allowed a new level crossing for the purpose of getting into the works to be made across a public highway. Even in that case a special cane had to be brought to lift the thing on to the truck, and it is sometimes necessary to carry them. This refers by no means to a general regulation. It refers to a special load for some special purpose. Of course, you might put the Minister in as the person who gives the authority, but it is generally more convenient that it should be the highway authority, because these things generally go, if possible, to the nearest and most convenient port.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I understand now the reason, but it seems to me there is a new terror on the road. My noble friend Lord Howe who, I think, goes at a fairly good speed, may suddenly meet on the road one day some locomotive drawing 80 tons behind it. I hope he will not run into it, because I am quite certain that, if anything happened, it would not be to the 80-ton load. These loads of 80 tons will destroy the road as well as imperil any vehicles that they come in contact with. But I sup-pose we have got to live and learn in these days, and I will not press my Amendment.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
Clause 23 agreed to.
Clause 24:
Power to prohibit the use of bridges by motor vehicles.
24.—(1) Whore the bridge authority of any bridge over which a road passes are satisfied that the bridge is insufficient to carry weights above a certain amount they may, by a conspicuous notice in the prescribed form placed on or near the bridge, prohibit the use of the bridge—

(a) by heavy locomotives and light locomotives, or by heavy locomotives; or

(b) by motor vehicles and trailers whereof the weights or the maximum permissible laden weights indicated by marks placed thereon in accordance with any Act, order, or regulation for the time being in force are greater than such as may be specified in the notice:

Provided that no weight specified in the notice shall be less than five tons.
(2) If a motor vehicle or trailer is driven or drawn across a bridge on or near which such a notice is displayed in contravention of the notice without the consent of the bridge authority, any person who so drives or draws or causes or permits it to be so driven or drawn shall be guilty of an offence without prejudice, however, to any civil liability of that person in the case of damage being caused to the bridge:
Provided that a person shall not be guilty of an offence under this subsection if he proves to the satisfaction of the court that at the time of passing over the bridge the total weight or weights of the motor vehicle, or the motor vehicle and trailer, as the case may be, did not exceed the weight specified in the notice.
(3) Any person or body of persons aggrieved by any restriction or prohibition placed on the use of a bridge under this section, may appeal to the Minister, and the Minister, if he considers that the bridge is sufficient, as the case may be, to bear heavy locomotives and light locomotives or heavy locomotives or to bear weights greater than those specified in the notice, after considering any representations made by the bridge authority, may order the restriction or prohibition to be removed or to be varied in such manner as he may direct, and the authority by whom the restriction or prohibition has been imposed shall comply within such time as may be specified in the order of the Minister with that order, and if they fail to do so the Minister may cause the notice to be removed or varied so as to comply with the order and recover the expense summarily as a civil debt from the authority by whom the notice was placed as aforesaid.
(4) The Minister may determine any appeal under this section either as arbitrator or otherwise at his option, and where he determines any such appeal as arbitrator, the provisions of the Regulation of Railways Act, 1868, respecting arbitrations by the Minister, and the enactments amending those provisions, shall apply as if they were herein re-enacted and in terms made applicable to the decision of appeals under this section.
(5) An order of the Minister under this section with regard to any bridge shall not prevent the imposition of any restriction or prohibition with regard to the bridge at any future time if the authority empowered to impose the restriction or prohibition consider that it is necessary to do so having regard to any change in the circumstances of the bridge or the traffic, but the imposition of any such restriction or prohibition shall be subject to appeal under this section.
(6) The Minister may refuse to consider any appeal under this section with regard to any bridge if the question raised by the appeal has already been considered by him under a former appeal.
LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE had an Amendment on the Paper to move, at the beginning of subsection (1), to leave out "Where." The noble Lord said: This is the first of a series of Amendments which I have put down on behalf of the Dock and Harbour Authorities Association. I do not intend to press any of them if the noble Earl cannot see his way to accept them. The Ministry of Transport is, of course, the Department responsible to Parliament for docks and harbours and the association is perfectly satisfied that the interests of docks and harbours are in good hands. The only object in putting down these Amendments was to draw the attention of the Ministry to certain provisions which affect the docks and harbours. So far as the first two Amendments that I have put down are concerned I understand there is no chance of the noble Earl accepting them and as I do not want to take up the time of the House uselessly, I do not move them.
LORD LOVAT LORD LOVAT moved to omit the proviso to subsection (1). The noble Lord said: In some rural districts, certainly many rural districts in the Highlands of Scotland, a great many of the bridges are quite unsuited for carrying a weight of more than that of the ordinary motor car, and in the County of Inverness a considerable number of bridges bear a notice to that effect. I have just received a telegram from the district of Skye where, at the present moment, there are 185 bridges which, even to meet existing requirements, are scheduled to be under repair. If the local authorities are unable to post a notice to the effect that these bridges are unsuitable for heavy traffic very serious accidents would occur there. It is quite obvious that in a county like Inverness where the road rates are already 3s. in the £, it would

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be quite impossible to undertake the construction of this number of bridges which, as I have shown, is for one district alone of Inverness, 185, and that County has eight districts in it. I know from my own knowledge that what is the case in Inverness-shire applies more or less to the same extent in all the sparsely populated districts, which have roads and bridges that are suitable only for the traffic that is likely to use them.
I am quite aware that to a certain extent this objection might be made under Clause 42, but that is surely a very cumbersome method. To build each of these bridges there would have to be an inquiry. A petition would first have to be lodged by the county council, and then a public inquiry would have to be held. Furthermore, in a sense, Clause 42 applies to roads but not to bridges, and unless some modification of Clause 42 can be made I do not see how the necessary prohibition could be used to enable heavy traffic to be stopped from going over bridges of second- and third-class roads which are quite unsuitable for such heavy traffic. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, leave out lines 12 and 13.—(Lord Lovat.)
VISCOUNT NOVAR: Perhaps the noble Earl will permit me to confirm what has just been said by my noble friend Lord Lovat. The conditions which he has described are by no means restricted to Inverness-shire, but prevail equally in Ross-shire, the neighbouring County, in which I live. I would add this to what my noble friend has said that, if it be replied to him that it is time these bridges were made to support heavier weights, it should be remembered that, owing to the extraordinary rating conditions which prevail in the Highlands, an increase in the rate must fall heavily upon the comparatively few who do pay rates. There is a great deal of force in what my noble friend has advanced.
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: I should also like to confirm what Lord Lovat has said. In the South of Scotland, in my own County of Selkirk, the same conditions prevail. If this clause is passed in its present state it will mean to my own knowledge that bridges, which at the present moment are able to preclude heavy traffic over, I think it is, three tons, will immediately have to be repaired
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paired and strengthened at the cost of the ratepayers and without any advantage to the ratepayers. I am sure there are many other places in Scotland which would fall within the provisions of this clause, and I hope the noble Earl will be able to take this into his very serious consideration.
EARL RUSSELL: I am rather surprised by the appeal that has been made to me because noble Lords have entirely disregarded the existing state of the law. Under the existing law and the regulations a notice restricting the use of a bridge cannot apply to vehicles whose aggregate laden weight is less than five tons. I am told, as a matter of historical interest, that five tons was fixed originally without any regard to motor cars, but on the idea that it was the largest and heaviest load that would ever be carried by a wagon. Therefore it was fixed at five tons, and these bridges are all supposed to be able to carry five tons, and they certainly ought to be able to carry it. If there is a case of ancient bridges that are worth preserving and that ought not to be rebuilt, then the Minister can be applied to under Clause 43. It does apply, in our view, to bridges as well as to roads, but the roads of this country must be made fit for ordinary traffic—such traffic as there has been in the past going up to five tons on bridges. I would remind noble Lords who have spoken that the Ministry is quite prepared to consider favourably any applications to reconstruct bridges at this moment, and has given public notice of that. Scotland is not generally backward in coming to the Ministry when there is any grant to be obtained. I hope noble Lords instead of opposing this clause will, where proper, rebuild the bridges. It would be out of the question to accept the Amendment.
LORD LOVAT: I do not think the noble Lord has quite got my point. It is this, that in the clause as it stands there will have to be such a large repair of bridges in certain districts as to make it quite impossible that it should be undertaken without involving a very great increase in the rates. I have quoted a case from Inverness-shire where a rate of a penny in the £ brings in only £800. In view of the number of bridges which would have to be repaired your Lordships will easily see that if this regulation was enforced

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we should have to add perhaps two shillings or three shillings to the rates for a period of years. I cannot think that that is the wish of the noble Earl. Furthermore, a great many of these bridges have never had a five-ton lorry on them and are never likely to. Is it essential that we should make such bridges to a little group of crofters' cottages to which the heaviest vehicle that ever goes is a pony cart? Surely that is carrying the thing to a degree never contemplated. We have not got one or two such bridges, but I understand that on third-class roads in that county alone there are over 500 bridges. Surely it is not right that we should be forced in these sparsely populated districts, which are desperately poor and already overburdened, to impose this taxation merely to get uniformity? I do not wish to run counter to the noble Earl on a subject on which he is much better informed than I am, but in Inverness-shire we have had notices put up with the assent of the Minister of Transport notifying that certain bridges will not bear a weight of five tons. I think the noble Earl must have been referring to canal bridges which were taken over by railway companies. In that case it was laid down that they should be capable of bearing a load of not less than five tons. I hope the noble Earl will reconsider his reply.
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Lord has not in the least dealt with what I said. He speaks as if this was something new, but I have pointed out that this is not a change in the law. This is the existing law. If there are such bridges as he refers to leading to crofters' cottages, I agree that it would be ridiculous to have a bridge capable of bearing five tons, but the appropriate course then is to go to the Minister of Transport and ask for an order to restrict traffic on the road, which, of course, could be obtained.
LORD DANESFORT: May I ask the noble Earl whether the existing law says that all bridges must be so constructed as to carry five tons? There must be a great number of bridges, especially on by-roads, not constructed to carry five tons, and in those cases the law does not compel the owners or the persons responsible to rebuild them so as to carry five tons. The noble Earl, I think, does admit that there are bridges of that sort, but he says let them apply to the
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Minister for power to reconstruct. Surely that is rather hard on them, because although the Minister may be willing to give them some grant it would certainly throw a good deal upon the rates. The Minister would not give them enough money to reconstruct the bridge. My noble friend beside me suggests that money is forthcoming for everything. I wish it were in some cases. May I ask the noble Earl whether, where there is no obligation whatever to carry weights of five tons or anything like it, under this Bill nobody would be able to put up a notice restricting the weight of vehicles going over it to under five tons?
EARL RUSSELL: Yes.
LORD DANESFORT: Well, that is very hard.
LORD LOVAT: May I make a suggestion? If this is the law of the land, why not leave it out of this Bill?
EARL RUSSELL: We have been very careful in drafting this Bill—it is not saving us time, and in fact I think we are being punished for it—not to legislate by reference. We have repealed and re-enacted everything and when you look at the Bill you find everything in it.
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: I am afraid I did not quite catch all that the noble Earl said, and I should like to ask him whether it would be possible, after a special inquiry by the Minister, to put up a notice board restricting the weight to under five tons?
EARL RUSSELL: I should not like to answer that off-hand, but it is possible to restrict the entire road if it is not suitable for heavy traffic, and that, of course, would include the bridge.
VISCOUNT BRENTFOKD: Perhaps I ought to come to the help of the noble Earl in this matter. This is really a codification of the existing law which has been in existence thirty or forty years.
EARL RUSSELL: Since 1861.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I am afraid my noble friend opposite does not appreciate that it only applies if a bridge authority or highway authority wants to close a road to heavy traffic that is likely to come upon it. I have had the privilege of motoring in Inverness-shire and I know something of the County, though

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of course I have nothing like the knowledge of the noble Lord. These bridges have in some cases existed for one hundred years or more and until there is a likelihood of heavy traffic the high way authorities have not put up a notice. The question of crofters' cottages was raised by my noble friend. Certainly those cottages are never likely to be visited by a 5-ton lorry, but local authorities have not power at the present time to limit the use of these bridges to vehicles under 5 tons. That is the present law, and I think it is only right that I should support the noble Earl in that matter. If Parliament had wanted to alter the law, or if there had been any real mischief in the existing law, my noble friend or someone else would have come to ask for an alteration of the law. They have not done that because it has not been necessary.
LORD LOVAT: We have had notices specifying a lower weight.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Yes, I know local authorities have done that, but Parliament has not authorised it. Such notices have often warned off people, but that is not the law. My noble friend or his county council may have put them up, if I may use a colloquial expression, as a try-on, and when that is done it generally effects its purpose. I do not think, however, that we ought to alter the whole law without full inquiry. Parliament passed the Bridges Act only last year and I think it would be a little retrograde to alter an existing law which has not worked badly.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, in subsection (2), after "draws," to insert "it." The noble Earl said: This is a drafting Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 17, after ("draws") insert ("it").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM moved to leave out subsection (3). The noble Lord said: This subsection provides that—
"Any person or body of persons aggrieved by any restriction or prohibition placed on the use of a bridge under this section, may appeal to the Minister, and the Minister, if he considers that the bridge is sufficient….to bear heavy locomotives and light locomotives or heavy locomotives—"
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and so forth, may order the bridge authorities to remove the restriction or prohibition. The result seems to be that any person who owns locomotives and moves heavy goods about the country, who may find that some of the bridges over which he generally passes have notices which would not allow his vehicles to pass over, could go to the Minister, and the Minister might say: "Oh, yes, I will investigate, the matter." I suppose he would send down some official and then the official would say: "Oh, yes, I do not see why this bridge should not carry the weight that the person aggrieved asks for and I shall make the order." What is going to happen if the official sent down by the Ministry is wrong and the bridge breaks down? Who is going to repair it? It seems to me that this is a very dangerous clause, especially in view of the statement made by the noble Earl a short time ago that weights of 80 tons and more might possibly in certain circumstances be carried on the roads. I think it would be much safer to omit this subsection. We have done very well without it in the past and—I am now going to say something which, I am sure, will appeal to the noble Earl—this is an alteration of an old law; do not let us alter the old law. Let us remain as we are.
Amendment moved—
Page 20, line 23, leave out subsection (3).—(Lord Banbury of Southam.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is the duty of a highway authority to provide roads for people to use. The bridges are part of those roads. It is therefore the duty of the highway authority to provide bridges that are equal to the traffic that the road carries.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Any traffic?
EARL RUSSELL: The highway carries certain traffic. The weight borne by the bridges can be limited—your Lordships have just heard of certain cases—so long as it is not limited to anything below five tons. Surely it is perfectly right that anybody who thinks that the local authority is deliberately stating too low a weight—it may be to prevent lorries from cutting up their roads and causing expense in mending them, and not for the legitimate reason that the bridge is

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not strong enough—it is surely right that any trader who is aggrieved should have the right of appeal. The noble Lord says that some official will go down and look at the bridge, as if he meant that somebody unfit to judge would produce a careless result. But the persons who would carry out that sort of inquiry would be competent engineers, who would consult with the people on the spot, hold an inquiry if necessary and state whether the bridge could carry more weight than the local authority thought it could. I think that perfectly reasonable. We talk about encouraging the trade of the country. We cannot have that trade held up at bridges which are marked with incorrect notices and could really carry heavier loads, and, let us say, lorries carrying agricultural produce and heavy loads could safely use them. Surely we do not want to do anything to stop trade. All that this clause says is that, if a local authority has deliberately marked the bridge with less weight than it can bear, a person aggrieved can appeal to the Minister of Transport to put the matter right, I do not see why your Lordships should have any objection to that.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: The noble Earl says that this might interfere with the trade of the country. Does not the noble Earl know that there are railways in existence, and that these goods which are too heavy to be carried on the roads and which are going to cut up the roads—I am now quoting the noble Earl—at the expense of the ratepayers, who are already very much overburdened, can be carried equally well and probably with greater facility on the railways? In those circumstances I do not think he is correct in saying that the trade of the country is going to be injured. I say that this does not affect the trade of the country, except that it may put increased burdens upon the ratepayer which, by diminishing the money which he has to spend in trade, may reduce the trade of the country.
LORD DANESFORT: I should like to ask the noble Earl one question. Supposing a bridge authority says that a bridge cannot carry more than eight tons, that there is an appeal to the Minister and the Minister says that the bridge can carry fifteen tons. Suppose somebody goes over it with fifteen tons and it is
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smashed up, and perhaps the person who goes over is smashed up too. Is there, in such a case, any compensation to be made to the owner of the bridge? He turns out to be right in saying that the bridge cannot carry more than eight tons, the Minister has ordered him to allow fifteen tons to be taken over and the bridge is broken. Who is to pay the bridge authority for the loss? It seems to me that the Minister has committed a wrong, but I doubt whether, if the Minister were sued for it, he would have to pay. Perhaps the noble Earl will tell me what remedy the bridge owner has when it is proved that he is right and the Minister wrong.
EARL RUSSELL: I have no idea what remedy the bridge authority would have, but I do not think you generally give a remedy when a person who has to administer an Act of Parliament under Parliament makes a mistake. If you did there might be a good many more actions than there are.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Then I understand that there is no remedy, that the person injured in the fall of the bridge has to take his chance? The only remedy, as I understand it, is that an engineer would be sent down. I do not think I am misrepresenting the noble Earl. I have not the same faith in officials that the noble Earl has. I do not think that all officials are by any manner of means competent. On the contrary, I think they are very often incompetent, and so I do not think that this is much of a safeguard. But since, apparently, the noble Earl has the majority of noble Lords on his side—at least I have not heard any noble Lords express approval of my Amendment—I will not press it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL RUSSELL: My next two Amendments are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 20, line 32, leave out ("heavy locomotives and")
Page 20, line 33, after the first ("or") insert ("to bear").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM had given Notice to move to leave out subsections (4), (5) and (6). The noble Lord said: I do not propose to move this Amendment.
LORD HANWORTH: May I, on behalf of the noble Lord, move to leave out subsection (4)? I do so in order to try to get sonic sort of indication of what the clause means. I feel certain that the noble Earl who is in charge of the Bill will, on reflection, think that it requires some elucidation. Let us just consider what is says. The contemplation is that there should be an appeal in the case of aggrieved persons. That is referred to in the third subsection of this clause. If a decision is given on the lines which the noble Earl has indicated to us—which may be right enough—there may be an appeal. Then subsection (4) says:—
"The Minister may determine any appeal under this section either as arbitrator or otherwise at his option…."
I do not quite know what that means. Does it mean that the Minister himself is the arbitrator? And what docs "otherwise" mean? Does it mean not as an arbitrator or a judicial person? Can the Minister decide in some other capacity? I am not sure. Then we have the words "at his option." The Minister, then, is to determine whether he will be the arbitrator or the other person who is to determine the appeal.
Then the subsection goes on to say:—
"and where he determines any such appeal as arbitrator, the provisions of the Regulation of Railways Act, 1868, respecting arbitrations by the Minister, and the enactments amending those provisions, shall apply as if they were herein re-enacted and in terms made applicable to the decision of appeals under this section."
I am quite uncertain what that means. Who makes it applicable and what terms are applicable? My question arises under the Act to which reference is made. The Regulation of Railways Act, 1868, provides two cases in which arbitration is considered. Under Section 25 of that Act—
"where a person has been injured or killed by an accident on a railway, the Board of Trade, upon application in writing made jointly by the company from whom compensation is claimed and the person if he is injured, or his representatives if he is killed, may, if they think fit, appoint an arbitrator, who shall determine the compensation (if any) to be paid by the company."
That is the provision under Section 25. Under Section 30 there is a different method of arbitration:—
"Whenever the Board of Trade are required to make any award or to decide any difference in any case in which a company
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is one of the parties, they may appoint an arbitrator to act for them, and his award shall be deemed to be the award or decision of the Board of Trade."
It will be observed that in both those cases, in the first case where both parties agree and in the second case when the Board of Trade are required to make an award or to decide any difference, it is not the Minister who makes the award or sits as arbitrator. What the Minister then does, or rather what the Board of Trade are required to do, is this. They may appoint an arbitrator. If you will turn back to the clause with that knowledge you will see that it runs in this way—
"The Minister may determine any appeal under this section either as arbitrator or otherwise at his option…."
I am not complaining at all of the purpose of the clause, but I think I shall have the concurrence of your Lordships and of the noble Earl in particular when I say that this clause ought to be redrafted. We ought to be told what are the sections that are intended to apply. It would not be very difficult to find out what are the enactments amending those provisions which it is intended "shall apply as if they were herein re-enacted."
More than that, I think that the words "in terms made applicable to the decision of appeals under this section" are too loose. If they mean that in the case of an appeal it is not the Minister who may determine but that the Minister may appoint some person to determine the appeal as he can under Section 30 of the Regulation of Railways Act, and if there are some provisions which are known and which amend those provisions, let those things be put into the clause and then we shall know something about what we are enacting. Finally, I think that those words "in terms made applicable to the decision of appeals under this section" are too loose. I am not moving this Amendment in any hostile spirit. I am really moving it in the interests of clarity in order that we may know what the clause means. I cannot help feeling that it is not beyond the competence of draftsmen to explain more fully and more clearly, and with less possibility, it may be, even of litigation, what is the purpose of this clause. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 21, line 3, leave but subsection (4). (Lord Hanworth)
EARL RUSSELL: It may be a distinguished position to have to deliver a short legal lecture to the Master of the Rolls, but it is certainly a very embarrassing one and I occupy it with some timidity. I thought when I saw it that this clause did not seem new in shape and I find on inquiry that it has been in this form since 1907 and that you can go back a good deal further than that. I have here the Locomotives Act of 1898, in which Section 7 (3) says this:—
"The Local Government Board may determine any appeal under this section either as arbitrators or otherwise at their option and, where they determine any such appeal as arbitrators, Section sixty-three of the Local Government Act, 1888…."
as amended by some other Act shall apply. That is very similar to this.
LORD HANWORTH: I beg the noble Earl's pardon. What is the Act?
EARL RUSSELL: Section 63 of the Act of 1888, "as amended by the Local Government (Determination of Differences) Act, 1896, shall apply for that purpose." As I understand the object of this clause, it is fairly evident. If you will look at subsection (3) at line 31 on page 20 you will see that the Minister—
"if he considers that the bridge is sufficient, as the case may be, to bear heavy locomotives and light locomotives or heavy locomotives or to bear weights greater than those"
then he may make an order. What is the process he is to adopt to arrive at this decision? He will make some inquiry and it will be in the nature of an appeal by the aggrieved person from the decision of the local authority. As I understand this, it seems to me fairly simple and I think it is rather common form. He may determine the appeal either as arbitrator or otherwise. I take it that "otherwise" means that he may determine it as a Minister; that is to say, he may receive reports and consider them, or he may hear the parties or take their written representations and then determine it. No doubt in the great majority of cases it may be he could determine the matter simply on letters. The local authority might write and say that they agree that the weight might be raised to seven tons. Then he determines it in that way. But he may, if he chooses, determine it as arbitrator. If he does that he has to sit as arbitrator under
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certain provisions as to arbitration, and these provisions of the Act of 1868 would apply.
LORD HANWORTH: Which of them?
EARL RUSSELL: What the provisions are I really do not know.
LORD HANWORTH: There are several.
EARL RUSSELL: I cannot tell the noble and learned Lord; at the moment it is rather more his department to know that sort of thing than mine. Apparently, he does not know without looking it up. But one assumes and supposes that there are provisions as to the way in which the arbitration is to be conducted and as to costs and things of that sort. He may either determine it as Minister on the information he has received or he may sit as a rather formal arbitrator and hold an arbitration, not necessarily sitting by himself. I suppose he might sit by deputy, but he will sit in a judicial manner with counsel before him and so on. That I understand to be the meaning of this. I do not think it is at all unusual in form.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: I do not think the noble Earl has altogether appreciated the point that my noble and learned friend was driving home. It is a pity because the noble Earl has shown throughout in this Committee so sincere a desire to improve the form of the Bill that is in his hands. I understand that my noble and learned friend wishes to avoid legislation by reference with its uncertainties and to put everything into the Bill which requires to be put into it. Therefore, I hope the noble Earl will take time to consider this clause and be advised about it with a view simply of clearing up what seems to me to be obscure on its face. I must confess that I never before heard of either of these two sections that my noble and learned friend has read and, therefore, I am speaking as a layman. But he read out two separate provisions in the Regulation of Railways Act, 1868, respecting arbitrations, and asked the question, which of these two it is intended should apply in this Bill.
Neither of them can refer to arbitrations by the Minister because the Minister in this Bill is a very different person from any one who existed under the Regulation of Railways Act. Therefore

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some kind of adaptation is necessary. Surely it would be simplicity itself to refer to the sections in the Act—I am afraid that would be legislation by reference—and to set out the sections if necessary so that any one reading subsection (4) might know under which provisions he would come, and which provisions would have to be adapted to the decision of appeals under this clause. I cannot say that I very much like the expression "and in terms made applicable to the decision of appeals under this section." It is rather too much like the favourite phrase mutatis mutandis which leaves as much as possible to the taste of the person concerned. As the person concerned in this case will be a judicial officer and it is not referred to any one in the Department to settle what the application is to be, I dare say that will produce no great difficulty—simply the substitution of the name of one Minister for the name of another Minister and that kind of thing. If there is any possibility of doubt as to what provisions of the Act of 1868 are to be applied here and what the enactments amending those provisions may be, surely, to make, if I may use the expression, a good job of it the noble Earl will take the opportunity on Report of touching this up.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I should like to thank my noble and learned friend for moving my Amendment and for making a much better speech than I should have made myself.
EARL RUSSELL: I could wish for no better draftsman than the noble and learned Lord who has just spoken and, if he will undertake to assist me in drafting this clause, I should be very glad. I shall certainly look into it between now and Report, and if he will not draft it, I hope he will "vet" it when it is drafted.
LORD HANWORTH: The fact that such a clause is found in the Statute of 1907 is no excuse for its continuance. Indeed, it is high time we altered it and made a better one. I may say, as a matter of personal history, that I was not in Parliament in 1907 or I should have been very glad to have moved such an Amendment as this when I found such a clause in existence.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE moved to insert the following new subsection:—
"(7) Where in pursuance of the powers conferred by or under any enactment repealed by this Act, a conspicuous notice has before the commencement of this Act been placed on or near a bridge prohibiting or restricting the use of the bridge by all vehicles of weights or axle weights greater than such as are specified in the notice, or by vehicles of any particular class or classes of such greater weights or axle weights as aforesaid and such class or classes of vehicles include any class or classes of motor vehicles and trailers within the meaning of this Act, this section shall have effect as if the notice had been placed on or near the bridge in pursuance of this section and related to all motor vehicles and trailers within the meaning of this Act or to motor vehicles and trailers of such last-mentioned class or classes."
The noble Lord said: This subsection has relation to the placing of notices and it is really a question of expense. Without this it would appear to throw an unnecessary expense on dock and harbour authorities amongst others, and I move my Amendment in their interests.
Amendment moved—
Page 21, line 23, at end insert the said new subsection.—(Lord Ritchie of Dundee.)
EARL RUSSELL: As I understand it, the object of this subsection is to obtain a privilege. But I would point out that this really is a very trifling expense and that the notices would in any case have to be altered because they would be inapplicable in their present form under this Bill. Under the Bill you do not deal any longer with axle weights but with total laden weights, or with the pressure on a given area of the road surface. The existing notices would be inappropriate, and I hope the noble Lord will not press his Amendment but will allow these notices to be brought up to date.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: As I understand that the clause will be redrafted with the aid of my noble and learned friend, I do not propose to move my Amendment to leave out this clause.
Clause 24, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 25 agreed to.
Clause 26:
Weighing of motor vehicles, &c.
26.—(1) Subject to any regulations, it shall be lawful for any person authorised by a highway authority, or for

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any police constable authorised on behalf of a highway authority by a police authority or a chief officer of police, on production of his authority, to require the person in charge of any motor vehicle to allow the motor vehicle or any trailer drawn thereby to be weighed, either laden or unladen, and the weight transmitted to the road by any parts of the vehicle or trailer in contact with the road to be tested, and for that purpose to proceed to a weighbridge or other machine for weighing vehicles, and if any person in charge of a motor vehicle or a trailer refuses or neglects to comply with any such requirement he shall be guilty of an offence:
Provided that it shall not be lawful for any person or police constable so authorised to require the person in charge of the motor vehicle or trailer to unload the vehicle or trailer, or to cause or allow it to be unloaded, for the purpose of being weighed unladen.
(3) Where a motor vehicle or trailer is weighed under this section, a certificate of weight shall be given, and the certificate so given shall exempt the motor vehicle and the trailer, if any, from being weighed so long as it is during the continuance of the same journey carrying the same load.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), after "weighing vehicles," to insert "erected by or under the control of such highway authority not being more than one mile from the place at which the requirement is made". The noble Earl said: On behalf of my noble friend Lord Brentford I beg to move this Amendment. The purpose is to enact that the weighbridge referred to in this clause shall be a public weighbridge. It also says that the driver ought not to be required to go more than a reasonable distance—namely, one mile—off his road in order that he may be weighed in order to find out whether he complies with this clause or not. I hope the Minister may see his way to place this limit of one mile, or some reasonable limit, upon the distance a driver may be required to go.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 2, after ("vehicles") insert ("erected by or under the control of such highway authority not being more than one mile from the place at which the requirement is made").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I think it would be clearly impossible to accept the limit of one mile. In a sparsely populated district there might be no weighbridge within three miles. As to the protection
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of the driver from hardship, is not the driver protected by the requirement in subsection (2) which provides that, if he is made to drive more than one mile to the weighbridge by the highway authority and the weight is found to be correct, then the highway authority have to pay compensation for the loss they have caused? That is sufficient protection for him. We know highway authorities are not likely to be unreasonable and, if there was one that was unreasonable and made a man travel three or four miles to a public weighbridge where his weight was found to be correct, then this provision making the highway authority pay compensation would be an effective check. I do not know why he should insist upon the weighbridge being erected by or under the control of the highway authority. If you have a convenient weighbridge in a station yard, why not use it for the purpose if both parties are satisfied it is correct? I do not know why you should put the highway authorities to the expense of erecting a new weighbridge when they can hire one already erected for this purpose, or if there is one in the market place open to any one who pays a toll, only erected by the city and not by the highway authority. I hope the noble Lord will not press the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK THE EARL OF CRANBROOK moved to add to subsection (1):—
"Provided also that it shall not be lawful for any person or police constable so authorised to exercise the powers of this section with respect to any public service vehicle within the meaning of Part IV of this Act while on service."
The noble Earl said: As I read this clause, while it is not lawful for a constable to require a lorry carrying goods to unload, it would be lawful for him to require a char-a-bancs to disgorge all its passengers in order that the unladen vehicle might be weighed. This Amendment is intended to stop that.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 10, at end insert the said proviso.—(The Earl of Cranbrook.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not know what the noble Lord means. If the Amendment means what he really says, does not it come to this, that you would be unable to weigh it at any proper time to see if it was within the proper rate until the

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owner chose to lay it up at the end of the season? He gave a caravan as an instance—
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK: No, I said char-a-bancs.
EARL RUSSELL: I am sorry. It seems reasonable enough, but I hardly think it is necessary. The House would hardly believe that a local authority would stop a public service vehicle conveying passengers between two distant points and insist on it being weighed then and there.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK: If it is necessary to protect a vehicle carrying goods, it is equally necessary to protect a vehicle carrying passengers.
EARL RUSSELL: No, it might be in quite a different county from that in which it was licensed. If these words were inserted it might even extend to the three or four hours when the vehicle is at rest.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK: Will he consider it?
EARL RUSSELL: I shall certainly consider it and bring it up if necessary on Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment moved—
Page 22, line 21, after ("given") insert ("to the person in charge of the vehicle").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 26, as amended, agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, after Clause 26, to insert as a new clause:—
Taking motor vehicle without owner's consent or other authority to be an offence.
" .—(1) Every person who takes and drives away any motor vehicle without having either the consent of the owner thereof or other lawful authority shall be liable—

(a) on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds;

(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding twelve months, or to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds, or to both such imprisonment and fine;

Provided that it shall be a defence to proceedings under this section if the accused proves that ho acted in the belief that he had lawful authority, or in the belief that the owner would, in the circumstances of the ease, have given his consent, if he had been asked therefor.
(2) If on the trial of any indictment for stealing a motor vehicle the jury are of opinion that the defendant was not guilty of stealing the motor vehicle but was guilty of an offence under this section, the jury may find him guilty of an offence under this section and thereupon he shall be liable to be punished accordingly.
(3) Any constable may without a warrant take into custody any person reasonably suspected by him of having committed an offence under this section.
(4) For the purposes of this section the expression 'owner,' in relation to a vehicle which is the subject of a hiring agreement or a hire purchase agreement, means the person in possession of the vehicle under that agreement."
The noble Earl said: Now we come to what I mentioned to your Lordships on Second Reading, the clause preventing the stealing of motor cars. It is taken from the Vehicles (Prevention of Unauthorised User) Bill now before the House of Commons. It was thought better it should be in this Bill and I agree with that view because this is in a sense a code of motor law and it is better to have it here and not in a separate Bill. The clause is a long one and it is fairly simple. It says that:—
"Every person who takes and drives away any motor vehicle without having either the consent of the owner thereof or other lawful authority shall be liable"—
then follows the penalties. It is a defence if the accused believes he had lawful authority or that if the owner was asked he would have given his consent. For instance, a kind friend who removed your motor ear from a spreading fire would reasonably be presumed to have had your consent if he had had time to ask it.
The second subsection provides that if on the trial on an indictment the jury are of opinion that the defendant was not guilty of stealing, but was guilty of an offence under this section, they may find the defendant guilty of an offence under this section instead of stealing. Sub-section (3) further provides that a constable may without a warrant take into custody any person reasonably suspected by him of having committed an offence under this section. That, of course, is very important. People steal ears and drive away in them. Our very active and intelligent police have reason to believe the car is stolen, "from information received," and of course it is reasonable that they should be able to arrest and keep the man in custody until

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they have verified the facts. Then the expression "owner" is defined, so as to refer to the person actually in possession of the vehicle, although it may be only temporarily under a hiring agreement. I think this clause deals with what has been a growing offence, which really does require checking. Your Lordships have seen reason for it in the fact that over and over again the magistrates have had to hold that it was not obvious, and not proved, that there was any intention permanently to deprive the owner of the car. If the defendant was caught before he had had an opportunity of selling the car he always said he was going for a joy ride, and no doubt a great many undoubted thieves have in consequence got off. This clause is intended to meet that difficulty.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 2, at end, insert the said new clause.—(Earl Russell.)
VISCOUNT SUMNER: There is one passage in this new clause which I think the noble Earl will probably agree with me is not very happily phrased, and I can suggest an Amendment which possibly he may be willing to accept. It comes at the beginning of the proviso. The proviso is for the purpose of enacting that there shall be two defences open to the person accused. They are separate defences. They are: (1) if he proves that he acted in the belief that he had lawful authority; and (2) in the belief that the owner would, in the circumstances of the case have given his consent, if he had been asked therefor. I can quite understand that it is proper that when the accused establishes his belief that he had lawful authority—though I believe that it should be reasonable belief, and not merely capricious, or because he is silly—it should be an answer, but why should it be an answer for some silly fellow—the typical joy rider as I think he is called—to say "Oh! I feel sure that the owner would in the circumstances of the case have given his consent. He is a good fellow, and it was a fine night, and if he had been there he would not have objected."
It is quite possible that the accused believed that, and some tender-hearted magistrates might say: "He is a young man, or she is a good looking young woman, and we had better take his or her word for it." I suggest that those
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are questions not for the person accused and his belief, but for the opinion of the persons who try the case. Therefore I suggest the better words would be "if in the opinion of the court of summary jurisdiction, or of a jury in the case of a trial on indictment, as the case may be." Then, if the accused can induce the justices or the jury to believe for themselves that the complacent owner would have said "Take the car, I hope you will enjoy yourselves," it is a defence. Otherwise you would have this defence set up every time, sincerely or insincerely, and you would have the same difficulty over and over again, that the tribunal, the court of summary jurisdiction, would be in doubt as to what it ought to do. I cannot see why the foolish and unfounded belief of a silly and unscrupulous person is to act as a defence to the new charge which is set up by this Bill. I hope I have expressed my meaning properly, and that the noble Earl will consider that what I have suggested would improve the clause.
LORD DARLING: I do not know that I can altogether agree with my noble and learned friend. It seems to me that the evils would be met if that were done in this clause which I think it requires—namely, if the word "reasonable" wore put before the word belief in each of the lines where "belief" occurs. The proviso would then read—
"Provided that it shall be a defence to proceedings under this section if the accused proves that he acted in the reasonable belief that he had lawful authority, or in the reasonable belief that the owner would, in the circumstances of the case, have given his consent, if he had been asked therefor."
I do not think it is enough to say that if the person acts upon his belief and satisfies the court that he really did believe that he was acting lawfully and properly, therefore he should be acquitted, because some people can persuade others to believe all sorts of nonsense.
There are some silly persons who still believe that the world is flat, and in some respects it is. I think that the accused should be obliged to satisfy the court not only that he believed that he had a right to take the car, or whatever it was, but that it was a reasonable belief. Then, when you come to the other branch, we need not say that the court should think that it was reasonable that he should

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believe, but that he should have to satisfy them that he did reasonably believe it, by which I mean that he had reasonable ground for believing. If the noble Lord, or any other noble Lord, think that the proper expression should not be "reasonable belief" I suggest that the proper words should be "has reasonable grounds of belief." Then another Amendment, it seems to me, would have to be introduced, so as to make it a defence equally in a court of summary jurisdiction or on a trial upon indictment, because if the noble Earl will look at subsection (2) it only alludes to indictment, and there is no provision that this should be a defence before the justices at petty sessions. It seems to me that if either of these alternatives is to be a defence it should be a defence in whatever court the charge may be brought.
EARL HOWE: I should like very strongly, if I may, to support what the two noble and learned Lords have said. It seems to me that the points which have just been raised would have also a very important effect in the case of a car taken under a genuine mistake. There is one thing which I would like to submit to the noble Earl in charge of the Bill. In the House of Commons another Bill was introduced besides the Bill introduced by the Home Secretary. That Bill, a Private Member's Bill, provided, first of all, for the offence of taking a car, and, secondly, brought into its ambit the man who induced any individual to take the car, as well as any individual accompanying the man who took the car. I cannot help thinking it would strengthen and improve the present clause if it were possible for the Minister to include the man who incites to taking a car and anybody who accompanies him in the car.
Furthermore, the penalties provided in the Private Member's Bill in the House of Commons were considerably more severe than those provided in the Government Bill. The penalties provided in that Bill were, I think, on summary conviction, imprisonment for a period not exceeding six months, instead of three, and a fine not exceedingly £200, instead of £50; and, on indictment, to a term not exceeding two years, and a fine not exceeding £200. There was a further provision in the Private Member's Bill which
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was of some importance to the owners of motor cars who happen to lose them in this way—namely, that the fines paid should be paid over to the owner of the car in cases where the car has been abandoned and damaged, and that this should not be a bar to civil proceedings. The Bill also laid down that, if the man who took the car had a driving licence, that licence should automatically be suspended. I submit those points to the noble Earl, because I think they are all valuable points in the Private Member's Bill; but perhaps there was some very good reason why they could not be included in the Amendment put down by the noble Earl.
EARL RUSSELL: I am sorry to say I have not got the noble Earl's knowledge of the Private Member's Bill in another place, but I have no sympathy with the car thief, and any proper methods that can be applied to him I shall be glad to consider. I am grateful to the two noble and learned Lords who have spoken, and their suggestions will be carefully considered, and we will see whether they can be adopted.
LORD ATKIN: I think the noble and learned Lord, Lord Darling, was referring to subsection (2) under a slight misapprehension. It looks to me as though subsection (2) ought to extend not merely to a trial on an indictment, but to a charge, before a court of summary jurisdiction. Very often indictable offences can now be tried before a court of summary jurisdiction. They are not tried on indictment; they are tried by the consent of the accused person if the magistrates think he can properly be tried there. That is a class of case where the court trying a man charged with stealing a motor car should have power to amend the charge.
LORD SWAYTHLING: IS it necessary to include subsection (4) in the clause, as the definition of "owner" is included in Clause 107, to apply right through the Bill?
EARL RUSSELL: I will consider all those points. It may be, that it has been lifted bodily from the existing Acts.
EARL HOWE: If I move an Amendment on the Report stage to incorporate some of the provisions of the Private Member's Bill introduced in another place,

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will the Minister be able to give a little consideration to them with a possibility of including them?
EARL RUSSELL: If the noble Earl does not find on the Report stage any Amendment from the Government to satisfy his view the Government will consider any Amendment that he puts down.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 27:
Restrictions on persons being towed by getting on to or tampering with motor vehicles.
27. If any person otherwise than with lawful authority or with reasonable cause—

(a) takes or retains hold of or gets on to a motor vehicle or trailer while in motion on any road, for the purpose of being drawn or carried; or

(b) while a motor vehicle is on a road enters the vehicle or tampers with the brake or other part of its mechanism,

he shall be guilty of an offence.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in paragraph (a), to leave out "motor." The noble Earl said: The purpose of this Amendment is to make the Bill apply to all vehicles. For instance, you frequently find small children or others who will hang on to tram cars or trolley omnibuses; in such cases they are just as likely to cause a fatal accident as is any one who hangs on to a motor vehicle. One of the most frequent causes of fatal accidents among children has been through children hanging on the back of horse-drawn vehicles. If this Bill could be made to apply to all vehicles, not only motor vehicles, I think the clause would be improved.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 4, leave out ("motor").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I explained to the noble Earl before that this Bill is not intended to apply either to tramcars or horse-drawn vehicles, and therefore I cannot accept the Amendment. So far as concerns children hanging on to motor oars, that, I think, can be covered under the Towns Police Clauses Act. It certainly is in London.
EARL HOWE: I beg leave to withdraw.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in paragraph (a), to leave out" while
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in motion." The noble Viscount said: If your Lordships will carefully consider the wording of this clause I think I shall be able to persuade you that these words are not necessary. What the clause says is that if any person gets on to a motor vehicle while in motion for the purpose of being carried he shall be guilty of an offence. Supposing there was a block of traffic and a person got on to the car and was carried on, I do not think he could be proceeded against under the clause. As the clause now stands the car must at the time of the getting on be in motion.
Amendment moved—
Page 23, line 5, leave out ("while in motion").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: I considered this point very carefully in going through this clause, and the Amendment is not-necessary. The noble Viscount has not attached sufficient importance to the words "or retains hold." If he gets hold of the trailer while it is in motion it has to be "for the purpose of being drawn or carried." If he does so while it is stationary it also has to be for the purpose of being carried, and the moment the vehicle puts itself in motion and he retains his hold of it, then he commits an offence under the clause. The words are quite sufficient to cover all possible cases.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: If the noble Earl is quite convinced of that I will withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 27 agreed to.
Clause 28:
Regulations.
28.—(1) The Minister may make regulations for any purpose for which regulations may be made under this Part of this Act, and for prescribing anything which may be prescribed under this Part of this Act, and generally as to the construction and use of motor vehicles and trailers and otherwise for the purpose of carrying this Part of this Act into effect, and in particular, but without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing provisions, may make regulations with respect to any of the following matters:—
(a) the width, height and length of motor vehicles and trailers and the load carried thereby, the diameter pf wheels, and the width, nature and condition of tyres, of motor vehicles and trailers;

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(g) the number and nature of brakes, and for securing that brakes, silencers and steering gear shall be efficient and kept in proper working order, and for empowering persons authorised by or under the regulations to test and inspect, whether on a road or elsewhere, any such brakes, silencers or steering gear;
and different regulations may be made as respects different classes or descriptions of vehicles or as respects the same class or description of vehicles in different circumstances.
(2) Before making regulations, under this Part of this Act the Minister shall consult with such representative organisations as he thinks fit.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW THE EARL OF ONSLOW (on behalf of Viscount Cecil of Chelwood) moved, after paragraph (g) of subsection (1), to insert as a new paragraph:—
" (h) the provision of appliances whereby the speed at which the motor vehicle is travelling may be automatically shown so as to be clearly visible to police officers or others on the road and for empowering persons authorised by or under the regulations to test or inspect whether on a road or elsewhere any such appliances;"
The noble Earl said: My noble friend, who has gone away, asked me to move this Amendment. He wanted to read in the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow the reasons why the noble Earl was not able to accept it. He will then possibly be able to raise it again on the Report stage.
Amendment moved—
Page 24, line 7, at end insert the said new paragraph.—(The Earl of Onslow.)
EARL RUSSELL: This is a charming idea, but I really think it is not practical politics. I thought we discussed this last year on the noble Viscount's own Bill. It would be very nice to have a large clock showing exactly the speed at which anybody is going. I think it would be extremely amusing, but it would probably have to be large enough to hide most of the view of the country. I cannot regard it as a serious proposal.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "this Part of." The noble Earl said: This Amendment is to require the Minister to consult the representative bodies on all matters connected with them before he makes regulations under the Act. It is thought that consultations of this kind would remove many of the
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difficulties and that the duty to consult should be extended to all regulations and not merely those made under this Part of the Bill.
Amendment moved—
Page 24, line 36, leave out ("this Part of").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This clause is dealing with this Part of the Bill, and therefore the regulations to be made under it deal with this Part of the Bill. If the noble Earl wants other words in somewhere else he had better put them in, if he thinks they are proper, when we come to the Part of the Bill which more or less deals with them. The regulations here dealt with and contemplated are made in Part I of the Bill under which the Minister does say he will consult with proper representative organisations. I think there has never been any complaint that the Ministry of Transport have not fully consulted.
EARL HOWE: In those circumstances, I will not press the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD NEWTON LORD NEWTON moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "such representative organisations as he thinks fi" and insert "organisations representative of persons affected by the proposed regulations." The noble Lord said: It is obvious what this Amendment is. I am not sure whether I understood from the noble Earl that he was going to adopt it—that is to say the principle of it. I imagine these words express his intention in any case. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 24, lines 37 and 38, leave out (" such representative organisations as he thinks fit ") and insert (" organisations representative of persons affected by the proposed regulations ")—(Lord Newton.)
EARL RUSSELL: I think we are entitled to ask that the Minister should exercise his discretion. There are all kinds of organisations, some of them with the larger titles though the less numerous adherents. The Minister is the proper person to decide which organisations in his view are representative, and those he will consult. I must resist these words.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I am sorry the noble Earl has not accepted this Amendment, for it seems to me to be a most reasonable one. Why should

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we leave everything to the chance ability of the Minister? I suppose we know who the Minister is now, but we do not know who he will be, perhaps, after next week. We certainly do not know who he will be in three or four years time. In those circumstances, I think the Amendment of my noble friend is very reasonable and I hope the noble Earl will accept it.
LORD NEWTON: The noble Earl, if I understood him rightly, said he was in favour of the principle of the Amendment. That being so, I cannot see what the objection is to these words being put into this clause. In fact I feel disposed to divide the Committee on the subject if he resists.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: I do not think my noble friend appreciates that his Amendment will not make any difference. If he puts in the words "organisations representative of persons affected by the proposed regulations" it means some organisations, it does not say all, and who is to choose which the "some" are to be? The person who has to consult them. So that it is left exactly where it was before. If I may say so, with little respect for Ministers of any Party, I think on the whole when they are taking advice it is for them to consider whom they will consult.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
Clause 28 agreed to.
Clause 29:
General law relating to carriages to apply to motor vehicles.
29. Any motor vehicle shall be deemed to be a carriage within the meaning of any Act of Parliament, whether a public general Act or a local Act, and of any rule, regulation or by-law made under any Act of Parliament, and if used as a carriage of any particular class, shall for the purpose of any enactment relating to carriages of any particular class be deemed to be a carriage of that class.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK THE EARL OF CRANBROOK moved to leave out Clause 29. The noble Earl said: I do this in order to ask the noble Earl to explain the objects of this clause.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 29.—(The Earl of Cranbrook.)
EARL RUSSELL: This really is as old as the legislation relating to motor vehicles. It came in first in 1896 when a motor was first allowed to run and was declared to be a carriage within the meaning
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of any Act of Parliament. There are many objects. I will tell the noble Earl one or two. The provisions as to the rule of the road are contained in the Highways Act, 1835. The Highways Act, 1835, applies to carriages. Motor vehicles did not exist then. It contains rules as to the obstruction of the highways. In the Highways Act they apply to carriages. If you do not declare a motor car to be a carriage, it would be a question for argument in each case whether it did properly come under the Highways Act or not. It has always been declared to be a carriage and there is no reason for making any change.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 29 agreed to.
Clause 30:
Provisions as to Northern Ireland drivers' licences.
30.—(1) If the Minister certifies that satisfactory provision is made by the law of Northern Ireland for the granting of licences to drive motor vehicles, it shall be lawful for the holder of such a licence, unless he is disqualified under this Act for holding or obtaining a licence to drive and be employed in driving a motor vehicle in Great Britain, notwithstanding that he is not the holder of a licence under this Part of this Act:
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (1), after "licence" where that word first appears, to insert "subject to any restriction with respect to the driving of any class of motor vehicle." The noble Viscount said: These words appear in Clause 4, subsection (3), and it occurred to me it might have been a draftsman's slip not to have included them in this clause. I put them down on the chance that the noble Earl would accept them.
Amendment moved—
Page 25, line 8, after ("licence") insert ("subject to any restriction with respect to the driving of any class of motor vehicle").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not quite know what the noble Viscount means. These must be restrictions imposed by the licensing authority of Northern Ireland. It would refer to restrictions in this country.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: These people are allowed to drive here if they have a licence in Ireland. Suppose they

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are limited in Ireland to a certain class of vehicle, then I do not think they ought to be able to drive any other class of vehicle in this country.
EARL RUSSELL: If that is the noble Viscount's intention, I think perhaps it will want redrafting. It is reasonable. If a licence is granted in Ireland restricting it to an invalid carriage or some specially constructed motor vehicle, then the holder of that licence should have a similarly limited licence here. I am not sure whether words are necessary to do that, but if so I think the words of the noble Viscount would have to be redrafted. This clause, as the House will appreciate, has of course been agreed with the Government of Northern Ireland, and I should have to consider any Amendment with them. It is hoped this will be a reciprocal clause so that motor vehicles will be able to drive in each country with the one licence. But I will have the point looked into.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: If the noble Earl will move something on Report, I shall be satisfied.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 30 agreed to.
Clause 31:
Savings.
31.—(1) Nothing in this Part of this Act shall authorise any person to use on any road any motor vehicle so constructed or used as to cause a public or private nuisance, or affect the liability, whether under statute or common law, of the driver or owner so using such a vehicle.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved in subsection (1), to leave out "motor." The noble Earl said: This is an Amendment on the same lines as others I have moved to induce the Minister to make this Bill apply to all vehicles on the road. Why cannot we make this Bill apply to all vehicles and have a real code of the highway? I understand the Minister has indicated that in the code he is going to publish when this Bill has become an Act he will refer to all classes of traffic and to all users of the highway. Therefore I venture again to move an Amendment to try to bring other vehicles besides motor vehicles into the ambit of the Bill.
Amendment moved—
Page 25, line 34, leave out ("motor").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I am afraid I cannot accept this Amendment.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: Might I ask the noble Earl why the Menai Bridge is selected of all the suspension bridges?
Earl RUSSELL: I have not the least idea, but that again is traditional. It started as far back as 1903, if not before. The Menai Bridge always has had a special clause. There is something special about it.
EARL HOWE: May I say that at a subsequent stage, when we get to the end of the Bill where it is proposed that this Act should be cited as the Road Traffic Act, I shall move an Amendment to call it the Motor Act? It is that and nothing else, and I give that notice to the noble Earl.
EARL RUSSELL: Of course the noble Earl has a right to move any Amendments he likes, but I do not promise to accept them.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
Clause 31 agreed to.
Clause 32 agreed to.
Clause 33:
Obligation on owners of motor vehicles to hold insurance policies or other security against third-party risks.
33.—(1) Subject to the provisions of this Part of this Act, it shall not be lawful for any person to use, or to cause or permit any other person to use, a motor vehicle on a road unless there is in force in relation to the vehicle while being so used such a policy of insurance or such a security in respect of third-party risks as complies with the requirements of this Part of this Act.
(2) If a person acts in contravention of this section, he shall be liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both such fine and imprisonment, and a person convicted of an offence under this section shall (unless the court for special reasons thinks fit to order otherwise and without prejudice to the power of the court- to order a longer period of disqualification) be disqualified for holding or obtaining a licence under Part I of this Act for a period of twelve months from the date of the conviction.
A person disqualified by virtue of a conviction under this section or of an order made thereunder or holding or obtaining a licence shall, for the purposes of Part I of this Act, be deemed to be disqualified under the provisions of that Part.
(3) Notwithstanding any enactment pre scribing a time within which proceedings may be brought before a court of summary jurisdiction, proceedings for an offence under

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this section may be brought either within one year from the date of the commission of the alleged, offence or within three months from the date on which it came to the knowledge of the prosecutor that the offence had been committed, whichever period is the longer.
(4) This Part of this Act shall not extend to vehicles owned by local authorities, by police authorities or by the Receiver for the Metropolitan Police District, or to invalid carriages.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE, who had given Notice to move the deletion of all the clauses in Part II of the Bill, said: I am asked to move my first Amendment—[to leave out subsection (1)] by the motoring associations who, while they support the idea that insurance against third-party risks should be universal, object to Part II of the Bill because they have not had an opportunity of considering in detail the insurance schemes involved by these clauses.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I am sorry to interrupt the noble Earl, but if he is going to move that Part II of the Bill be omitted that is not an Amendment in a form which your Lordships are in the habit of discussing. That is why Amendments have been put down to leave out each clause of this Part of the Bill in the name of the noble Earl, as he will see. It is in accordance with our procedure to amend first and then to omit, and there fore it would be better to take the detailed Amendments first. Then I would suggest to your Lordships that there might be a discussion on the question whether Clause 33 shall stand part of the Bill. If that clause is omitted on the Motion of the noble Earl then the various other clauses of this Part of the Bill would fall, as there would have been an indication that the view taken was that the whole of Part II should be struck out. I would suggest to the noble Earl that, unless he does not wish to move his first Amendment—
EARL HOWE: That is what I was going to do.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I am sorry, then, that I interrupted the noble Earl, but he seemed to be objecting to the whole of Part II.
EARL HOWE: Yes, objection is taken to the whole of this Part of the Bill, but at the moment I am only moving to leave out subsection (1) of this clause. I was proposing, however, to submit the
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whole argument which would really apply to the other Amendments, but if I ought to do that at another stage—
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I am entirely in the hands of the Committee if your Lordships prefer to have a discussion now on whether Part II of the Bill should stand.
EARL RUSSELL: I think we had better take it now.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: Perhaps it would be better. I am sorry I interrupted the noble Earl. I understand that the discussion now will be on the Amendment to leave out subsection (1) and that if subsection (1) is omitted the rest of this Part of the Bill will go.
EARL HOWE: The view taken by the motoring associations is that while insurance companies have been consulted by the Minister—that has been stated by the Minister himself—the scheme for dealing with third-party insurance has not yet been disclosed. There is no safeguard whatever, and the noble Earl was not able in fact in the Second Reading debate to indicate that there was any safeguard against an increase in insurance premiums. The insurance companies would almost be put by this Bill into the position of motor licensing authorities. The view is also taken that compulsory insurance would be effected on the vehicle under subsection (1) of Clause 33, but that reinsurance would depend upon the action of the driver. The motoring associations would also like to know whether it is clear that a vehicle driven by a thief or unauthorised person would still carry insurance to compensate any person injured by the vehicle. I alluded to the point in the Second Reading debate, and the noble Earl said ho did not understand the point I was trying to make.
EARL RUSSELL: I did not. What I said was that we had not attempted to insure a car driven by a thief.
EARL HOWE: What I am anxious to try to bring out—I am afraid I put the point so badly that my meaning was not clear—is whether a person injured by a motor car in such circumstances will in fact get nothing as the result of the insurance policy attaching to the owner of the car? I submit that an injured person would not get any compensation

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unless the policy attached to the vehicle itself. Furthermore, the motoring associations would like to know what arrangement is made in the case of owners of large fleets of vehicles who carry their own risks by making adequate financial provision. I believe there is some sort of arrangement, and perhaps the noble Earl in charge of the Bill would indicate what it is. They would also like to know if the insurance scheme would involve two separate policies, one for third-party risks and one for other risks against which prudent motor owners now insure. They would like to know whether the Government, before finally passing this Part of the Bill, will bring insurance companies and motoring associations together. I would submit most earnestly to the Committee that there is very considerable anxiety on the part of many people about these particular clauses in the Bill.
With the principle, I think, there is entire agreement that we should have some sort of third-party insurance, but we do most emphatically want to know what arrangement the Minister has made with the insurance companies. We want to know whether we cannot have some guarantee against an unreasonably increased premium. The noble Earl during the debate on the Second Reading, if I remember correctly, did state that the insurance companies had indicated that there might be in time an increase in premiums. But he did not say what it was, and undoubtedly a great number of people are alarmed at the prospect that their insurance premiums may go up under this Bill. The motor car now is the vehicle of some of the most humble members of society who are definitely not in a position to face any large increase in third-party insurance premiums. Therefore I hope the noble Earl will be able to give motoring associations and the motoring world generally some ray of hope in his reply. With those few remarks I beg to move the Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 26, line 31, leave out subsection (1).—(Earl Howe.)
VISCOUNT SUMNER: I also hope that the noble Earl will be able to give your Lordships a good deal more information than we have at present, because I do not think that in the present state of our knowledge we are really in a position to
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discuss in detail and to take the responsibility of assenting to clauses which are novel and complicated and probably as important as any clauses in the Bill. Your Lordships will have perceived that there are two principal points. The first is that it is proposed to disqualify persons from driving motor cars on the road at all unless they have third-party insurance effected and in effective operation. In other words, a person who cannot get himself insured goes off the road. That may be an admirable thing. I do not say one word against the policy of thinning them out in that as in many other ways. The next point is, what is the kind of benefit that is to be derived from this compulsory third-party insurance, not by the motor owners as the noble Earl seems to think—I do not think the Bill or the Government are very much concerned with them—but by the persons injured in a motor accident whom the public desire at present should look to such insurance to pay them for their loss and suffering? The Bill itself tells us very little about the second point, and it leaves us in the dark on a very serious point regarding the first.
I shall put what I have to say as briefly as I can, because I want to indicate to the noble Earl, who, I have no doubt, has gone over all this repeatedly, the points upon which it seems to me that the House must desire information. First of all, I do not gather that this Bill purports to change the law of insurance at all, except, I think, in one inconsiderable respect. It provides that something happening after the accident is not, if the policy has provided for defeasance in that respect, to make the defeasance operative. Does the, public understand that all that this Bill does for them is to give them the benefit, if they can get it, of such right of recovery as the owner of the car or the insured driver may be able to assert against his own insurance? Do they appreciate that all the provisions of the law about liability for accidents will still apply to their own disadvantage? I am quite sure, from the letters that I have read in the Press, that most people think of a bleeding and maimed victim in the road crying aloud to have his wounds staunched and asking that the first thing to be given him shall be an effective policy, followed up by a cheque. That

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is what they want, and I am afraid that that is what they think they are going to get.
It is very undesirable that the public should be in any doubt about this. It must be clearly understood that the third-party insurers will have a defence to any claim upon the policy, arising either from the fact that the assuree, their own client, would have a good defence for an action brought, or from the fact that the policy itself is, by its terms, already exhausted. If the accident happens and the matter is put in the hands of the insurance company, they are entitled to say: "You can recover nothing from us, since the person injured, who claims to make you liable, cannot do so because he was himself, either in whole or in part, the cause of the accident. If it is all his fault ho cannot recover against you; and if it is partly his fault, by contributory negligence, he cannot recover against you." They are entitled to set up against him these answers, and he will go away un-compensated.
Then again, so far as this Bill is concerned, there is nothing in it that enables the injured person to sue the company direct or to require that any money paid by the insurance company to its customer, their insured, shall be applied totally to the satisfaction of his injuries. The money becomes part of the assets of the person who is insured, and if he is bankrupt it is distributed equally among his creditors. I am aware that there is a Bill in another place which has proceeded, I think, at a leisurely rate, as far as Committee—whether it has emerged from the Committee room or not I am not sure—which, I think, in that respect purports to be intended to alter the law. The result is that this will not be a code. It will be incomplete until we see what alterations in the law are made in this separate Bill.
What the uninstructed public really thinks that it is going to get is a free accident insurance in its own favour, paid for by motor owners and called a third-party insurance. I am afraid that if that idea, which I am quite sure I have fairly described, is the general expectation that prevails, there will be a mighty amount of disappointment when these people realise how little has been done in their favour; and then, I am afraid, the next thing will be that we shall be
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told that there must be some compulsory national contributory insurance based on contributions from the Treasury, which is the last thing in the world that I suppose even members of the Government in this House will desire to see. But it is a serious thing to raise hopes and then to disappoint them.
On the other hand, the point about the premiums seems to me to be very formidable. There will be a great increase in the number of third-party insurances, and therefore there will, of course, be a big premium income. I do not mean to say that it is not possible that the increase of new business will be so great that it will not involve any increase in the premiums charged. But we ought to know what the underwriters have to say about that. All that I remember being said in the debate on the Second Reading was that they have promised not to take advantage of their opportunity to raise premiums unless they have to do so. But you see what the effect of raising premiums is. It is that every motor driver and motor owner who insures himself, and generally gets a rebate off his premium at the end of the year because there has been no claim, will have to pay a bigger premium than he would otherwise have paid because there are a multitude of careless persons whom this Bill will have compelled to insure themselves. It is not fair that the part of the motoring public that does not knock people down should be compelled to pay extra premiums that they would not otherwise have to incur in order to carry the burden of people who do run over their fellow creatures.
On the other hand, you have the fact that these premiums, especially if they are increased, will be a burden which many motorists cannot face. I do not think that the majority of people now insure themselves against third-party risks. Prudent people with plenty of money and big cars probably always do so, but the people who buy a second-hand car on the instalment principle for £70 and run it until it breaks down, do not, I feel sure, take out this insurance. There are multitudes of cars of all sorts—any kind of motor vehicle is included in this provision—as to which it is quite ridiculous to suppose that the persons who own them either in the ordinary course do so insure or are able so to insure. But the result is that a man cannot

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have his licence unless he resorts to the alternative of giving security, or getting some approved company to give security for him, which would be just as dear and just as much out of his power. How long do you think people will stand that, and how soon shall we have another shout against the motoring laws, demanding that they should be altered once more in favour of the person who demands speed at any price?
It seems to me that, unless the information of the Government is much more copious than anything that has been revealed to us, they are laying up for themselves two very serious sources of difficulty in the future, and not in the distant future. One is the bitter complaint of the motorist who cannot motor because he cannot afford to pay a premium; and the other is the bitter complaint of the injured person who finds that, owing to the laws not having been altered to suit his particular convenience, he has to abide his own wounds, probably because of his own fault, and gets no compensation, but only sympathy. I suppose that this has been fully enquired into somewhere. I should have thought that there ought to be some kind of public inquiry into the whole subject of insurance against motor accidents, with a report, as the foundation for a Rill like this. At any rate, I suppose that the Government has informed itself in some way by doing something more than make mere communications with the underwriters. It must have obtained or formed some sort of estimate as to the effect on the market, as to premiums and so forth, and I think your Lordships ought to have that information before you can really be asked to deal with this set of clauses. In themselves they are interesting, and in principle I do not propose to say anything against them; but it seems to me to be our business to make them as good as we can while we have the opportunity. I do not know how we are to do that unless we have more information.
LORD SWAYTHLING: I feel that I must support the noble Earl who moved the omission of this subsection as part of his proposal to leave out the whole of Part II of the Bill. While there is much to be said for some method of third-party insurance, I feel that there is even more to be said against it in the manner in which it is suggested in the Bill. If one
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is to have compulsory third-party insurance, there would appear to be two methods by which it might be arrived at. The first is the method employed in this Bill, under which the vehicles themselves are covered in order that their drivers may be insured against what are known as third-party risks. The second method, which appears to me to have more advantages, is to insure each individual driver against third-party risks. That is to say, that the cover should be removed from the vehicle to the person. The method whereby I think it might be worked is that no driving licence should be issued until the applicant had produced a suitable policy covering him against third-party risks for the whole period during which the licence was to be in force.
A grave defect which was mentioned on Second Reading, and has been referred to this evening, in the system adopted in this Bill affects a large number of accidents which are caused either by stolen motor cars or people joy-riding in somebody else's car. Under the method adopted in this Rill, persons who suffer damage either to themselves or their property in this way will have no redress. If the alternative method which I have suggested were adopted, it is possible that numbers of these thieves or joy-riders would possess driving licences which would protect their victims. It may well be said that a number of them would not have even a driving licence, and I admit that those who were unfortunate enough to be injured by the few of whom that could be said would be unprotected; but I submit to your Lordships that the vast majority of cars would be covered.
It might be said that the cost of this personal third-party insurance, if I may call it so, would be a hardship on those who drive for their living. I do not think that this would be the case. The employer, no doubt, would pay this insurance, as it would mean that the premium en the ordinary insurance on his vehicle would be reduced by that part of the premium which represents the third-party risk carried at present. There is another argument, I think, in favour of this form of third-party insurance. If an insurance company were to refuse at present to cover a motor vehicle whose owner was considered a bad risk—one, that is, who has had many claims against

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him—the owner can put the vehicle in the name of his wife or of someone else in order that the risk may be covered, and can himself continue to drive it. Under the alternative method I have suggested arrangements of that nature would be impossible. There is another advantage in the method of personal third-party insurance. If the policy covering the driver had to be produced before he was given his driving licence, the mere fact that the driving licence was current would be proof that the third-party risk was covered and there would be no necessity for the certificate of insurance to be carried and to be produced as laid down in Clause 39.
EARL RUSSELL: This general discussion before entering upon the clauses themselves is probably very useful, because I dare say there has been a good deal of misrepresentation about these provisions. I agree with what was said in almost the whole of the earlier part of the speech of the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Sumner, and I will endeavour to put quite shortly before your Lordships the situation as I see it. First of all, what is the grievance that we are attempting to remedy? The grievance is that when people have recovered damages lawfully, to which they were entitled, from people who were liable to pay those damages, they have not received those damages owing to those people not having money. That is the grievance and that is the only grievance that we are proposing to remedy.
It is true, I am afraid, that there is a sort of impression abroad, as the noble and learned Viscount said, that what this Bill does it to give a free insurance policy to every pedestrian. That, of course, is not what it does. It does not alter in any sense, except the tiny one which he pointed out, the general law of legal liability. It does not alter the general law of insurance. If a pedestrian is knocked down through his own fault and is to blame, he will not recover anything under this Bill. It is true, perhaps, that there has been a misapprehension outside about that, but I see no reason for it. Certainly there has never been in our minds and I do not know that there has been in the mind of anybody, a suggestion to make motorists liable when they have not committed any tort. That would be a case for compensation like workmen's compensation and not a case of
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insurance or damages. The Bill does not cover any case except those where the motorist is to-day legally liable, and we must be perfectly clear about that.
Then the accidents which the Bill covers, as your Lordships know, are injury to life and limb. The noble Earl asked me what difference it would make to the conduct of an insurance business. I think the answer is that it need make hardly any difference. In any case, where a person takes out the ordinary comprehensive motor policy, as it is called, which covers damage to his car, stealing his rugs and all sorts of things, including third-party insurance now, he will continue to take out exactly the same policy in the future if he desires to do so. The only difference it will make is that he will be provided by his insurance company with a card called a certificate of insurance which is to be carried on every car to which the insurance relates. That is the only difference—that he will get another card to carry on his car. If a person desires to make any particular conditions such as he makes now—the condition that he alone shall drive in consideration of a reduction of premium, or that the owner and one named person only shall drive, which is sometimes put in a policy, or any other condition of that sort—he may still make that condition. He may still have a policy with that condition in it, subject only to this, that the condition must be shown upon the insurance card which is carried on the car so that it can be seen when anybody is driving the car whether he is within the limited terms of the policy, if it is a limited policy. The obligation imposed upon him is a separate obligation apart from the licence, and it is imposed by the first clause in the Part of the Bill which we are now discussing.
So far as the increase in premium is concerned, I thought I made that perfectly clear, but I will tell your Lordships again the view that was taken by the insurance companies. What they said was:" We are not going to raise our premiums right away as a protest against this Bill or as a suggestion in advance that it must raise our premiums. "They said, as the noble and learned Viscount has said," We think it will probably increase the number of claims and we think it will very likely increase the quantum, the amount, of

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each claim. Therefore it may happen, we thsink it probably will happen, that we shall be actuarially justified and compelled to raise our premiums." To that extent no doubt premiums may be raised, but I have no reason to suppose that it will be by very much. To that extent it may be that they will have to raise their premiums. If that is justified actuarially, no one can make any complaint about it. The noble and learned Viscount seemed to think it would be a grievance to those who drove carefully that they had to pay for those who drove carelessly. That is exactly what happens now. I have paid premiums for the last three years without having any accidents or getting any benefits. Those premiums went to pay for those who did not drive so well. The same thing happens in all forms of insurance. The premiums go to meet the losses of the minority and I do not see any distinction in this case.
The noble Viscount went a great deal too far when he talked about persons not being able to bear the premium. Anyone able to afford a motor car or motor cycle will be able to afford this premium for third-party insurance. I am told the figure is something like 15 s. for the insurance of a motor cycle in respect of injury to life and limb to an unlimited extent, which is the usual thing. In the worst case it will be 30 s. For motor cars it will be something higher and it depends, of course, as it does to-day, on the size and horse power of the car. The premium for the motor cyclist, who is represented as a poor man who will not be able to pay it, will be quite insignificant. The effect in the end is going to be this that, where motorists are properly and legally liable for accidents, then the person injured will receive damages. It is no scheme of comprehensive insurance, no scheme of compensation like the Workmen's Compensation Act, and the pedestrian who is injured through his own fault will not receive damages then any more than he does now. I do not see any moral or legal reason why he should. The grievance we set out to remove was the grievance that, where people had a legitimate claim for damages and had succeeded and proved their claim, they did not get the money. Then, as I said, there is a Bill on the stocks which will in due course reach your Lordships' House providing against the anomalous face that in a bankruptcy
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the insurance money is paid over to the liquidator and not to the insured person. It is said that the obligation of the insurance company is to pay the money to the insured and not to the injured person. That is perfectly true and I put that question to the representatives of the insurance companies because it seemed to me that the insured might take the money and make away with it, but they told me that their invariable practice is to pay the money to the injured person and get the receipt from him. I presume that they take power in their policies to do that.
It may be of interest to noble Lords to know, while I am speaking of policies, that in their policies they will still retain the power to make the insured bear the first £10, the first £20 or the first £'50, as the case may be, of any loss if they think proper to do so. The only alteration will be this, that, vis-a-vis the public, the full insurance is taken by the insurance company. The recovery of the excess is a matter between them and their insured. The man injured on the road is covered, but the man who is insured is sued for the excess unless he voluntarily contributes it. The one thing we have to avoid is that there should be any doubt as to the payment of compensation to the insured person where it should be properly paid.
There was a question as to how those who carry their own insurance will manage. The answer is that the scheme is not fully worked out yet. It will require a code of regulations. We have the general idea in our minds and I do not see why it should not work. There will have to be a scheme by which someone will give them a bond, in the case of commercial vehicles up to £25,000, and when they have got that bond it will be a guarantee that they will pay any loss they suffer. The reason is obvious. The London and North Eastern Railway, for instance, is not likely to fail to pay-its claims; it may be that there are other people who are not likely to pay their claims. It is obvious, however, that neither the Minister nor any other official person can be expected to make a list of those who can be trusted and those who cannot, and therefore you must apply to them some simple rule which matches them all. The rule is the obtaining of this bond. That bond, of course, has to be kept up. If any accident is

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not met, then, until the bond is made up again, they would not be insured. All these people who carry their own insurance would, with the minimum of trouble, be able to come into the scheme. I have no reason to think it will cause any difficulty.
Then there is the bogey of which we have heard so much, the private insurer, the man who cannot get insured. I have often heard of him but I have not met him. I asked the insurance companies and they could not give me an instance. They said they did not know of any man who had been definitely refused insurance. I doubt whether there are very many more than a minute number of instances. The noble Lord talked about the car driven by the thief and said what a serious breakdown it was in a complete system. I do not think that the ·5 or ·2 per cent. of accidents due to this cause is a breach of the system. It is one of those theoretical objections. I never said it was complete; it does not profess to be complete. The noble Lord feared that there might be some system in the future of compulsory insurance of a man whether he ought to be paid or not. I do not know, but it is not part of this scheme. The scheme before your Lordships to-day is intended simply and solely to provide for the case where under the present law, insured as most people are at present, a man becomes liable to pay damages to a third party and fails to pay them. This scheme is intended to meet that case and to provide that that failure shall not occur. That, I think, covers the whole of the scheme.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: Will the noble Earl clear up a matter which he mentioned? He said he was instructed by the underwriters, as I understood, that the premium on the motor cycle is 15 s. Just see what that means. A carelessly driven motor cycle may cause a Rolls Royce full of opulent magnates without any fault on their side to smash into a wall and to break up the whole lot of them. They have all got to be paid, those who survive, for their injuries and suffering. Are we really to believe that all that can be got for 15 s.? If so, how many times in the course of one year on one and the same policy will this death dealing instrument be able to repeat the operation? Surely there must be something wrong about a premium of 15 s. being
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charged. Or else it must be because the whole burden falls upon the innocent. It cannot be done out of 15 s. or out of any multiple of 15 s. and it must therefore be that the whole burden of insurance is going by law, by this Bill and not by voluntary insurance, to be plastered over all the innocent persons.
EARL RUSSELL: I do not understand what the Bill has got to do with this. This is what is obtaining now. I shall obtain rates for the noble Viscount, but I can safely say that from 15 s. to 30 s. is the amount of the risk at the outside for the motor cycle. I shall get him quotations as he is perhaps not very familiar with the premiums charged. The whole principle of insurance is that the majority pay for the minority. You club together so that when a loss falls it is spread over a large number.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: That is a reason against making it compulsory by law.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: Is the provision about the bond actually in the Bill?
EARL RUSSELL: Yes, it is.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I happened to see the other day a case where the driver of a motor cycle, on being asked what his means were, stated £1 a week. I should say that there are a good many riders of the ages of sixteen and seventeen who certainly would not be earning more than £1 a week. Is it possible that they are keeping up their insurances, or that the insurance companies will insure them for the premium stated?
EARL HOWE: There is still one question which I would like to ask the noble Earl, and that is on the question of a possible increase of premiums. I took down the words which he used, and they are as follows: "I have no reason to suppose that the increase will be so very large." I would like to ask the noble Earl what really is going to happen supposing the premiums do rise? Have the Government got any safeguard, or can they do anything? Have they provided in anyway against an increase of premiums? If, as a result of the passage of this Bill, the hopes of the insurance companies are not found to be justified in fact, and they do find that they have simply got to raise the motor premiums, what is going to

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happen? It seems to me that there would be a very large section of the population, who are not very well off but who own motor vehicles, and who are entitled by law, to-day, to use them, who would be absolutely unable to do so, although they have not been parties to any of the accidents which have brought about the increases of premiums.
EARL STANHOPE: Am I not right in thinking that it is not the property of the private person which is insured but it is only life and personal injuries?
EARL RUSSELL: That is so. The Rolls-Royce does not come in. It is only life and personal injury and not property. The Government is not taking control of the insurance companies. If the premiums rise it will be for actuarial reasons, and people will have to pay the increased premiums. I would remind the noble Earl that the premiums for third-party risks have already risen in the last few years by 25 to 40 per cent., owing to the increase in claims. If they rise further it will have nothing to do with the Government, any more than a rise in the price of any other commodity. The Government are not undertaking to control the insurance companies.
EARL HOWE: Does it mean that the Government are going to stand by without doing anything, or having any safeguard inserted in the Bill against a possible rise in premium? It does not matter to me, of course, what happens to the Government, but it seems to me that if this thing happens the Government would be faced by an extraordinarily difficult situation. In any event the motor world has very justifiable grounds for great anxiety upon this point. I would like to remind your Lordships that the representatives of the great motor organisations have not been consulted by the noble Earl in any respect, and therefore they are justifiably very anxious about this matter. If, as a result of this Bill, a rise in premiums does take place, and a number of people are not able to use their cars, will it not have its repercussions in industry as a whole? I think we ought to have some safeguard against a large rise in premiums.
EARL RUSSELL: There was once a complaint against a Government or a member of a Government that they "made the price of bread and Lollards
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rise." This may, or may not, make premiums rise, but I do not know what it is suggested that the Government should do. It is nothing of our business to interfere with the business of the insurance companies, unless it is proposed to nationalise it. If the noble Earl is prepared to lead a crusade for that purpose, then perhaps we might join him.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD ATKIN: I am not moving an Amendment, but I am not quite satisfied at present that the wording of subsection (1), which incorporates, of course, the provisions in Section 34, is quite sufficient to meet what is intended. The subsection reads:—
"It shall not be lawful for any person"—
that includes the owner-driver and chauffeur—
"to use or to cause or permit any other person to use"—
that is the owner who allows his chauffeur or servant to drive—
"a motor vehicle on a road, unless there is in force in relation to the vehicle while being so used such a policy of insurance, or such a security in respect of third-party risks, as complies with the requirements of this Part of this Act."
It seems quite clear, as far as that is concerned, that a man would not be committing a breach of the clause if he permitted a person to use a motor car in respect of which there was a policy, even although the person using it would not expose the owner to a liability. I think that is so. I want to make quite sure that it is not so.
The words are "in force in relation to the vehicle while being so used." That covers any policy that is in existence in relation to that vehicle. You want words which make it quite plain that the owner of the vehicle is exposed to liability for negligent user of that vehicle by the person who is then using or about to use it. It is a very subtle point, but it does not seem to me to be made quite plain by the words of Clause 34, which requires that the policy
"must be a policy…which insures such person, persons or classes of persons as may be specified in the policy in respect of any liability which may be incurred by him."
We want to be quite certain that this policy does cover a liability to a third person for an accident caused by the

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negligence of the person using the car. I am not quite sure that the words cover the intention of the draftsman of the Bill. Perhaps the noble Earl will consider whether an Amendment is necessary.
EARL RUSSELL: I confess that I find no difficulty in construing the clause to mean what it is intended to mean, but I will, of course, consider what the noble and learned Lord has said.
LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE moved, in subsection (4), after the second "authorities," to insert "by harbour or dock authorities constituted by Act of Parliament." The noble Lord said: The object of this Amendment is to give the same exemption to harbour and dock authorities as to local authorities and police authorities.
Amendment moved—
Page 27, line 21, after ("authorities") insert the said words.—(Lord Ritchie of Dundee.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is perfectly true that most of these bodies are not bodies working for profit, but I think they are not quite in the same position as local authorities. These authorities ought to have no difficulty in doing what the great railway companies and the great motor omnibus companies do—obtain a security for their insurance. After all, the exemption of a local authority is rather a special thing. A local authority is part of the general government of the country. I do not think you can put a commercial undertaking, even if it does not work technically for profit, on the same footing. If we accepted the Amendment, I am not sure what other kinds of undertakings might think they ought to be included.
LORD RITCHIE OF DUNDEE: I do not press the Amendment.
LORD ATKIN: Clause 33 again extends the period of limitation, and the noble Earl has a similar provision in Clause 7 (5). I drew attention to the fact that proceedings for an offence might be brought within three months from the date at which it came to the knowledge of the prosecutor that the offence had been committed. It might extend the period of limitation to six, seven, or eight years, so long as the particular prosecutor might be proved not to have known of the offence at the time, but
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learned of it within three months of the date of prosecution. That obviously is a flaw in a limitation period in respect of an offence. The noble Earl promised to look into it in respect of Clause 7 (5). Perhaps he would be able to look into it here.
EARL RUSSELL: It is the same point?
LORD ATKIN: Yes.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (4), after "District," to insert "or to a vehicle owned by a person who satisfies the Minister that he makes adequate financial provision for meeting any liability that may be incurred by such person in respect of any injury or damage occasioned by such vehicle." The noble Earl said: This Amendment is moved as an invitation to the Government to tell us the precise passage where we can find out what is to be done in the case of large undertakings which carry their own insurance. The Amendment is moved on behalf of some of the biggest organisations in the country, such as the London General Omnibus Company, Carter, Patersons, and others, and I hope the noble Earl will be able to indicate exactly where we are to look in order to find this.
Amendment moved—
Page 27, line 22, after ("District") insert the said words.—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Earl will find it in Clause 35. I do not really think the London General Omnibus Company are going to take any serious exception to this provision. We have been in touch with them.
EARL HOWE: I do not wish to misrepresent them. They merely wanted this Amendment moved in order to clarify the position, if possible.
EARL RUSSELL: I will go into it fully when we come to Clause 35.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD SWAYTHLING LORD SWAYTHLING moved, in subsection (4), to leave out "or to invalid carriages." The noble Lord said: On referring to the First Schedule, it will be noticed that the maximum speed limit for invalid carriages is sixteen miles an hour. It is apparent that an invalid carriage going at this speed can do an appreciable

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amount of damage. It might mount the pavement and knock people over. If third-party insurance is to be made compulsory, it seems to me that invalid carriages should be included.
Amendment moved—
Page 27, lines 22 and 23, leave out ("or to invalid carriages").—(Lord Swaythling.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not know whether the noble Lord has any evidence that this happens. I have not. An invalid carriage cannot weigh more than five cwt. It is really not very much more than an animated bath chair. I doubt whether it could do anybody any serious damage. I suppose it would very seldom travel at a speed of sixteen miles an hour. We do not think there is any ease for this.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK: I do not know whether the noble Earl would like to be hit by a 5 cwt. vehicle travelling at sixteen miles an hour. I have seen them myself going at a considerable speed. I hope the noble Earl will consider this Amendment.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: It does not include an ambulance?
EARL RUSSELL: No, under the definition the vehicle cannot weigh more than 5 cwt.
LORD SWAYTHLING: An invalid carriage weighing 5 cwt. and going at sixteen miles an hour can do considerable damage, particularly to children. It might knock over a perambulator. The noble Earl stated that third-party risks for motor bicycles could be covered for 15s. or 30s. It would seem to me that if that is the case invalid carriages could be covered for that or even less. I do not think it is any hardship on the owner of an invalid carriage to pay for third-party insurance. I really think that the noble Earl might accept this Amendment.
EARL RUSSELL: When you consider the class of people who have to use invalid carriages I must say I am very reluctant to impose upon them any unnecessary financial burden. Probably they would not be able to pay themselves; probably some institution would pay, and I really do not think there is any case for it. If the noble Lord could give us any statistics then it would be reasonable to consider it.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: I do not think the noble Earl need feel too great a sympathy with the owners of invalid carriages, because any one who can afford a motor invalid carriage can afford this expense.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD ASKWITH LORD ASKWITH moved, at the end of the clause, to insert "nor shall this Part of this Act apply to tram-cars or trolley vehicles the use of which is authorised or regulated by special Act of Parliament or by an order having the force of an Act, unless the special Act or order so provides." The noble Lord said: This is somewhat different from the Amendment moved by the noble Earl, because it is intended to apply to tramcars or motor trolley vehicles, the use of which is authorised or regulated by special Acts of Parliament. Some of these Acts have schemes of insurance in them. Others have their-money regulated altogether by the terms of a special Act, and the general Act may have the effect of over-riding those special clauses in a way that may make it difficult to deal with in the future.
Amendment moved—
Page 27, line 23, at end insert the said words.—(Lord Askwith.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is not intended that this Part of the Act should apply to any vehicles other than those to which Part I is applicable. I will do one of two things, whichever the noble Lord prefers: either accept this Amendment now, and redraft it afterwards, or bring in a drafting Amendment to make it perfectly clear; but, of course, it is not intended to apply to tramcars or trolley vehicles.
LORD ASKWITH: I would rather that the noble Earl accepted it now.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 33, as amended, agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: I am very grateful to your Lordships for having sat so long enabling us to get so far with the business.
House resumed.

BIRMINGHAM CORPORATION (GENERAL POWERS) BILL [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
The LORD CHANCELLOR The LORD CHANCELLOR acquainted the House, That the Clerk of the Parliaments had laid upon the Table the Certificate from the Examiners that the
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Standing Orders applicable to the following Bill have been complied with:
Ministry of Health Provisional Order (Gosport Extension).
The same was ordered to lie on the Table.
House adjourned at eight o'clock.