Sitting of 12 July 1933

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

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
Dearne District Traction Bill [Lords],
Read the Third time, and passed, with Amendments.
Essex County Council Bill [Lords],
London Overground Wires, &c., Bill [Lords],
As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.
Dundee Harbour and Tay Ferries Order Confirmation Bill,
Read the Third time, and passed.
Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Chepping Wycombe) Bill [Lords],
Ministry of Health Provisional Order Confirmation (Mid-Glamorgan Water Board) Bill [Lords],
Read a Second time, and committed.
London Midland and Scottish Railway Order Confirmation Bill [Lords],
Second Reading deferred till Tomorrow.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  SPAIN (BRITISH SUBJECT'S FINE).
  Mr. RANKINasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what has been the result of the representations made by His Majesty's Ambassador at Madrid in connection with the appeal of the owners of the British steamship "Datchet" against the fine of £2,200 imposed for a technical breach of the Spanish customs regulations?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. Eden): Since the reply given to my hon. Friend on the 26th June the attention of the
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  Spanish Ambassador has also been drawn to this case, but so far as I am informed, the appeal has not yet been decided.

  MANCHURIA (MR. LENOX SIMPSON).
  Mr. MANDERasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will state the position with regard to the case of Mr. Lenox Simpson who was compelled to leave Harbin at the end of May; whether he is aware that the British Consul-General at Harbin, Mr. C. F. Garstin, rejected the evidence tendered by the Japanese police authority as insufficient to justify the forcible closing down of the Harbin Herald, and protested against the act as a violation of British treaty rights and extra-territoriality, and invited Mr. Simpson to take refuge on the Consulate premises; and what action is being taken to secure for Mr. Simpson the rights to which he is entitled as a British subject to remain at Harbin?
  Mr. EDEN: The reason given by the Manchurian authorities for their action against Mr. Simpson was that, contrary to the assurances given by him both to His Majesty's Consul-General and the police authorities, the newspaper of which he claimed to be sole owner, published partly in English and partly in Russian, continued to publish pro-Soviet and anti-Manchukuo propaganda. The Manchurian authorities did not tender evidence to the Consul-General but stated that they had decided to close Mr. Simpson's printing office and allow him one week within which to leave the country. His Majesty's Consul-General immediately protested and in order to prevent his forcible deportation gave Mr. Simpson asylum on the Consulate premises. Subsequently, with Mr. Simpson's consent, an arrangement was made by which the order for deportation was suspended for eight days during which time Mr. Simpson voluntarily left Manchuria to reside at Dairen in the Japanese leased territory of Kwantung, his duly constituted agents in Harbin being allowed to carry on his job-printing, bookselling and subscription library business in Harbin. Mr. Simpson left Harbin on 28th May. In the circumstances I think that all possible and appropriate action has been taken on behalf of Mr. Simpson.
  Mr. MANDER: Is the hon. Gentleman satisfied that the charges made against Mr. Simpson were justified; and, if not, will he state why Mr. Simpson is not allowed to go back to Harbin to live there as a British citizen and carry on his lawful avocation?
  Mr. EDEN: The hon. Member will recall that this matter was raised in the Debate of a few days ago, when my right hon. Friend said he was convinced that nothing which could very well have been done at the time had been left undone.
  Mr. MANDER: I asked whether the Government are satisfied that the charges were justified?
  Mr. EDEN: I think that question hardly arises here seeing that Mr. Simpson has left voluntarily.
  Mr. NEIL MACLEAN: Is it not the case that he left under duress; and will the hon. Gentleman inform the House why the Japanese can order a British subject to leave in this way?
  Mr. EDEN: Very full information on this case has been given to the House in the answer to this question and by my right hon. Friend in the Debate the other day. If hon. Members wish to ask further questions of detail, these might well be put down.
  Mr. LANSBURY: The hon. Gentleman will observe that in his answer to-day he has not told the House that the Japanese authorities convinced the Consul that this man had been guilty of any offence. Therefore, is it not the duty of the Government to find out why a British citizen has been dealt with in this way, without any charge having been revealed to the Consul?
  Mr. EDEN: A charge was revealed, and I am sure that the action of His Majesty's Consul-General in the matter was the best in the circumstances.
  Mr. LANSBURY: We shall raise this matter again.

  ARMS TRAFFIC.
  Mr. MANDERasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any action has been taken by the Council of the League of Nations to ask its states
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  members to place themselves in the same position to impose an embargo on the export of arms as the British Government occupies; and what the present position in the principal countries is in this respect?
  Mr. EDEN: No such action has been taken, but the members of the Council were invited, as already indicated in the reply given to my hon. Friend on the 26th April last, with reference to a specific case, to take action which would imply the possession by the governments of powers similar to those possessed by His Majesty's Government.
  Mr. MANDER: Does the hon. Gentleman know whether such action has been taken or not, and, if it has not been taken, will he raise the matter again at some council meeting?
  Mr. EDEN: A number of countries have taken action, including, I think, Italy.

  CHINA (PIRACY: CAPTURED BRITISH SUBJECTS).
  Captain PETER MACDONALDasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the latest information available to him with regard to the three British officers who were recently kidnapped from the steamer "Nanchang," off the Manchukuo coast?
  Mr. EDEN: I am informed that the Japanese and Manchukuo authorities are now taking new steps against bandits generally in the district where the "Nanchang" officers are held. According to reports not yet confirmed two of the officers managed to escape on the 7th July. Efforts are being made to locate them and to rescue the other captive also. The British consular representatives have impressed on the authorities concerned the danger to the officers of direct military action against their captors.
  Mr. KIRKWOOD: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether the engineer Blue, from Port Glasgow, is one of those who have escaped?
  Mr. EDEN: I am afraid I do not carry the names in my head. Perhaps the hon. Member will put down a question.

  ROYAL NAVY.

    SUPPLIES.
    Mr. GUYasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he is aware that a fleet order has recently been issued to the effect that orders for supplies for naval ships in British ports must not be given to private traders but must be placed direct with the Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes; and if he will take immediate steps to have this fleet order recalled?
    The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Sir Bolton Eyres Monsell): The Admiralty Fleet Order to which my hon. Friend presumably refers was issued to draw the attention of His Majesty's ships and naval establishments to the existing regulations in regard to the sources of supply of provisions for general messing. These regulations have been in force for many years and the issue of the order does not indicate any new policy on the part of the Admiralty. It should be understood that it is the duty of the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes to provide on all stations, with the exception of China, certain articles of foodstuffs, other than fresh provisions of a perishable nature, at a uniform price and of uniform quality. It will be evident that this system, which is of great benefit to the Fleet as a whole, can only be operated successfully if the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes are supported as regards these particular articles by all ships in home waters. The answer to the last part of the question is in the negative.
    Mr. HENDERSON STEWARTasked the First Lord of the Admiralty if the recent Fleet order referring to the ordering of supplies from the Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes will prevent units of the Fleet visiting Scotland during the present summer from purchasing any stores locally?
    Sir B. EYRES MONSELL: No, Sir. The recent Admiralty Fleet Order was issued to draw the attention of His Majesty's ships and naval establishments to the existing regulations in regard to the sources of supply of provisions for general messing. Units of the Fleet will continue to be able to purchase locally items of fresh provisions such as eggs, fish, fruit and vegetables.

    PENSIONS (PAYMENT).
    Sir BERTRAM FALLEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he will extend to naval pensioners the privilege now enjoyed by dockyard pensioners of having their pensions paid into a bank?
    Sir B. EYRES MONSELL: The Board of Admiralty are not satisfied that the majority of naval pensioners would regard it as a privilege to have their pensions paid into a bank instead of through the Post Office as at present, and the cost of a dual system of payment could not be justified. The dockyard pensioners themselves evidently do not all regard payment through a hank as being a privilege, for at this very moment the Admiralty have under consideration a request that they may be paid through the Post Office.

  KENYA (GOLDFIELDS).
  Captain P. MACDONALDasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what has been the total value of the gold obtained from the goldfields in Kenya during the first half of this year; and what is the present approximate weekly value of the wages paid to workers in these fields?
  The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Sir Philip Cunliffe-Lister): The half-yearly returns for the period January-June this year have not yet reached me, but from the beginning of the year up to the end of April, the output from the Kakamega field was 1,908 ounces, and from the rest of Kenya, 1,665 ounces. The Acting Governor has recently stated that production remains steady. The average weekly amount paid in wages during the second half of 1932 was £680.

  COLONIES AND PROTECTORATES (MARRIAGE LAWS).
  Miss RATHBONEasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, (1) whether his attention has been directed to paragraph 182, chapter 18, of the Criminal Code Bill, 1933, for Palestine, which proposes to fix a minimum legal age for the marriage of females at 13, but to permit marriage below this age under specified conditions; whether he is aware that the proposal to fix so low

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  a marriage age, and even then to make it subject to a wide range of exemption, is arousing dismay among many in Palestine who are anxious for the suppression of child marriage; and what action he proposes to take about it;
  (2) whether he will procure the appointment of a committee in Palestine, including representatives of medical opinion and of women's opinion, to investigate and report as to the extent and effects, physical and social, of child marriage in that territory?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: My attention has already been drawn to the provision in the Palestine Criminal Code Bill to which the hon. Member refers, and I am in communication with the High Commissioner for Palestine on the subject. No final decision will be taken until the matter, including the question of appointing a local committee, has been fully considered in consultation with the High Commissioner.
  Miss RATHBONEasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he will obtain and furnish the House with a return showing the minimum age of marriage and age of consent (inside and outside marriage), where these are legally prescribed, in all the Colonies and territories coming under the Colonial Office?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I am taking steps to obtain the information for which the hon. Member asks. It will necessarily take some time to collect.
  Colonel CLIFTON BROWN: What is meant by the words "inside and outside marriage" in the question?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I think my hon. and gallant Friend should address that question to the hon. Lady the Member for the English Universities (Miss Rathbone), who has put the question on the Paper.
  Miss RATHBONE: Is it not a well-known fact that the term "age of consent" refers not only to the age of consent of unmarried girls, but also refers sometimes to consummation of marriage in the case of married girls?

  CEYLON (PRISONS).
  Mr. DAVID GRENFELLasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether his attention has been called to
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  the Report for 1932 of the Inspector-General of Prisons in Ceylon; and what steps it is proposed to take in the matter of inadequacy of staff in the Prison Department?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I have recently received a copy of the report in question. I have however no information as to what steps the Government of Ceylon propose to take as regards the staffing of the Prisons Department. This is a matter for consideration in the first instance by the Executive Committee of Home Affairs of the State Council of Ceylon.

  PALESTINE (PORT OF HAIFA).
  Captain P. MACDONALDasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what steps he is taking to ensure the removal of as many restrictions as possible upon the movement of goods between Haifa and districts which might become dependent on that port in order to ensure that the maximum trade should be attracted to that port when the new harbour is opened in the autumn?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I am not aware what restrictions my hon. and gallant Friend has in mind, but I am sure we can rely upon the High Commissioner for Palestine to take such steps as may be practicable to secure the maximum traffic for the new port of Haifa.

  ST. HELENA.
  Mr. ALAN TODDasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether he has considered the petition addressed to him from the inhabitants of St. Helena dealing with elected representation on the Executive Council for the Colony; and what steps he proposes to take in the matter?
  Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: I have received a petition signed by certain of the inhabitants of St. Helena praying for the inauguration of a Legislative Council. After full consideration, I have felt unable to accede to this request, as it appears to me that the interests of the population as a whole are best served by the maintenance of the present system of Government, which provides for an expression of unofficial opinion through the Executive Council. The Executive Coun-

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  cil consists of the Governor and two official members, together with three unofficial members chosen from among the residents in the island.

  AVIATION.

    MACHINE NOISE.
    Mr. LOVAT-FRASERasked the Under-Secretary of State for Air if he will appoint a committee to inquire how the noise of aerial machines may be made less harassing and injurious to the community at large, and to make recommendations?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for AIR (Sir Philip Sassoon): The hon. Member's desire to limit the noise which is a general condition of modern life has my fullest sympathy. Much has already been done on experimental lines to reduce noise from aircraft, but the difficulty is that an effective silencer seriously curtails performance. This could not be accepted for fighting aircraft, and would have serious reactions on the commercial operation of civil aircraft. I hope, however, that we shall eventually attain a reduction of noise without a prohibitive sacrifice in other directions. As regards the suggestion for the appointment of a committee, my Noble Friend does not consider that the appointment of a new committee would advance matters, as a special aircraft noise sub-committee of the Aeronautical Research Committee has been engaged on the problem for some time, in collaboration with the National Physical Laboratory.
    Mr. LOVAT-FRASER: In view of that answer, I give notice that I will raise this matter on the Motion for the Adjournment to-night.

    LOW FLYING.
    Mr. SMEDLEY CROOKEasked the Secretary of State for Air if he is aware that in the vicinity of aerodromes devoted to teaching aircraft pilots serious annoyance is caused to residents by pilots not rising to 300 feet within the aerodrome area; and will he in future insist on an undertaking from all pilots that they will set a course at least 300 feet high over all houses, and that when pupils are under instruction the course shall be over open country?
    Sir P. SASSOON: Whilst my Noble Friend is anxious that no avoidable inconvenience should arise to residents in the immediate vicinity of aerodromes, the application of the rules suggested by my hon. Friend would often be impracticable for technical reasons and inadvisable from the point of view of safety in flying. They might, for example, necessitate inexperienced pilots under training making turns at a dangerously low altitude near the boundary of the aerodrome in order to gain height. I may add that my Noble Friend's information is that, in spite of these complaints, new houses are continually being built in the neighbourhood of aerodromes, so that it would seem that the annoyance experienced under existing conditions is not very serious.

  TRANSPORT.

    LONDON OMNIBUS SERVICE.
    Mr. LOVAT-FRASERasked the Minister of Transport (1) if he is satisfied that the new time schedules adopted by the London General Omnibus Company are being maintained without in any way endangering public safety;
    (2) if he is aware that since the speedup of London motor omnibuses three drivers have collapsed at the wheel and one died on the way to the hospital; whether the death and sickness rates among omnibus drivers have gone up since the speed-up; and whether the number of accidents involving omnibuses has increased?
    The MINISTER of TRANSPORT (Mr. Oliver Stanley): I am informed that the introduction of the full programme of new time-tables was spread over the period October, 1932, to February, 1933. Whilst there has been a slight increase in the number of collisions in the first six months of this year compared with 1932, the figures are appreciably better than for 1931. There appears to be no evidence to suggest that the new time schedules have in any way endangered public safety. I am also informed that the death rate amongst drivers was less in the six months ended June, 1933, than in the two preceding years, and although four drivers have died recently whilst on duty, I understand that in none of these cases was the nature of the work held to be responsible for the fatality. The

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    average sickness during the periods October-December, 1932, and March-June, 1933, was lower than any corresponding period for the previous three years. The incidence of the influenza epidemic in January and February last precludes useful comparison with the sickness in those months in previous years.

    ROAD PASSENGER SERVICES (SHENFIELD).
    Mr. THORNE(for Mr. McENTEE) asked the Minister of Transport whether, arising out of his decision to uphold the finding of the traffic commissioners for the eastern area to fix a minimum fare of sixpence on a service of saloon coaches between Bow and Chelmsford, Brentwood, and Romford, he can state whether any consideration was given to the position of the residents in the Shenfield area who, as a consequence, have been corn-polled to travel either in small omnibuses or in uncomfortable double-deck omnibuses when comfortable saloon coaches could have been available; and whether he can state the reason for granting short-stage facilities to the London General Omnibus Company, the London arid North Eastern Railway Company, arid the Eastern National Omnibus Company, whilst withholding them from the line in question?
    Mr. STANLEY: I am informed that the 6d. minimum fare in respect of the coach services operated by Messrs. Hillman on this route has not yet been brought into operation and that the services are still running as in the past. Coach services and omnibus services are designed to cater for different classes of passenger traffic and my predecessor decided on an appeal under Section 81 of the Road Traffic Act that fares of less than 6d. should not be charged on these coach services, but that passengers wishing to travel short distances only should be carried by the omnibus services which should, if necessary, be strengthened. In reaching his decision on the appeal, my predecessor had before him the whole of the representations made to the traffic commissioners at their public sitting and those made at the appeal inquiry on the 16th and 17th November last.

  GERMANY (MILITARY AIRCRAFT).
  Mr. MANDERasked the President of the Board of Trade if any licences for the export of military aircraft for police
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  purposes to Germany have been granted recently?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Dr. Burgin): No licence is required to export aircraft from this country to Germany. A licence would be required to export aircraft armament, but none has been issued.
  Mr. MANDER: May I take it that no such licence will be granted?
  HON. MEMBERS: Answer!
  Mr. MANDER: Will my hon. Friend answer my question I Surely no licence to export aircraft to Germany contrary to the Treaty of Versailles will be granted?
  Dr. BURGIN: Perhaps my hon. Friend will put that question, which is an entirely separate one, on the Paper.

  TRADE AND COMMERCE.

    FOREIGN-OWNED FACTORIES.
    Mr. MITCHESONasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will consider the desirability of applying to new foreign-owned factories the principles of control to be established in respect of certain food-processing factories under the provisions of Clause 6 of the Agricultural Marketing Bill?
    Dr. BURGIN: The provisions of Clause 6 of the Agricultural Marketing Bill will, under the terms of the Bill, apply to foreign-owned factories as To others, but there is no present intention of applying the principles of that Bill to industry generally.
    Mr. MITCHESON: May I take it that there is a difference of opinion between the President of the Board of Trade and the Minister of Agriculture on this matter?
    Dr. BURGIN: Certainly not.

    FURNITURE TRADE.
    Mr. MITCHESONasked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has considered the evidence in the recent proceedings undertaken by his Department against Osda, Limited, which indicates that certain furniture goods of Russian origin are offered for sale in this country at wholesale prices approximately one-third below cost of manufac-

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    ture in this country; and whether, in view of this evidence when entering negotiations for a further trading agreement with Soviet Russia, be will take steps to protect the British furniture trade from competition of this character?
    Dr. BURGIN: The foreign country of origin of the furniture was not established in the proceedings referred to, as the question did not arise. I have noted my hon. Friend's representations.
    Mr. MITCHESON: Is it disputed that the goods were made in Russia?
    Dr. BURGIN: The point is that the question was not discussed or dealt with, nor was any evidence on that matter given.
    Mr. MITCHESON: If I bring the hon. Gentleman the evidence, will he take the matter up?
    Dr. BURGIN: I will certainly consider any evidence that is submitted to me.

    CANADA (EXCHANGE DUMPING DUTY).
    Mr. MABANEasked the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs whether, in view of the fact that the pound sterling is no longer depreciated in terms of the Canadian dollar, he will at once make representations for the immediate removal of the special duties imposed upon imports from this country by Canada to compensate for the depreciation of the pound sterling in terms of the dollar?
    The SECRETARY of STATE for DOMINION AFFAIRS (Mr. J. H. Thomas): Exchange dumping duty is only leviable on goods imported into Canada from the United Kingdom which are entitled to entry under the British preferential tariff while the value of the £ sterling is below $4.25 Canadian. It has not in fact been levied since early in May.
    Mr. MABANE: Do I understand that no dumping duty is now levied?
    Mr. THOMAS: In the present position, No.

    HONG KONG (CHINESE DUTIES).
    Colonel GRETTON(for Sir NAIRNE STEWART SANDEMAN) asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will state how the new Chinese duties are affecting British trading interests in Hong Kong?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The Governor reports that the new Chinese tariff, involving increased duties on nearly all manufactured articles, is having a serious effect on the local manufacturers and entrepôt trade of the Colony.
    Colonel GRETTON: Can my right hon. Friend say what effect these duties are having on the entrepot trade, especially in cotton goods from Lanacshire?
    Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The right hon. and gallant Member perhaps did not hear my answer. I said that the Governor reports that they were having a serious effect both on local manufactures and on the entrepot trade.

  CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS ACT (DOCKYARD EMPLOYES).
  Sir B. FALLEasked the Minister of Health whether an established workman leaving His Majesty's Dockyard, Portsmouth, at the age of 60, on being pensioned, is required to stamp his National Health Insurance card in order to secure the old age pension at 65 years of age should he not be able to secure employment, or whether he will be granted the contributory old age pension at 65 years of age even though he has not been employed since leaving His Majesty's dockyard?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of HEALTH (Mr. Shakespeare): An Admiralty workman who has been continuously insured under the National Health Insurance Scheme for 10 years prior to his superannuation at age 60 will be entitled to old age pension on reaching the age of 65 if he can prove that since his retirement he has been continuously available for but unable to obtain employment.
  Sir B. FALLE: I am asking about an established workman, who does not pay any contribution?
  Mr. SHAKESPEARE: I should require notice of that question.
  Sir B. FALLE: It is on the Paper.
  Mr. BUCHANAN: Could we not have an answer to this question, which is on the Paper? It is of very great importance to a large number of these Government workers?
  Sir B. FALLE: Will the hon. Member send me an answer?
  Mr. SHAKESPEARE: I am afraid I aim not, conversant with the procedure in respect of established people, but I will certainly communicate with my hon. Friend.
  Mr. BUCHANAN: Seeing that the subject is of general importance, will the hon. Member see that it is circulated in the OFFICIAL REPORT?

  AGRICULTURE (IRISH CATTLE: IMPORTS).
  Mr. HERBERT WILLIAMSasked the Minister of Agriculture by what percentage the imports of live cattle from the Irish Free State have declined in the first five months of 1933 compared with the corresponding period of 1932; and by what percentage the total imports of beef have declined in the same period?
  The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Major Elliot): The decline in imports of live cattle for food from the Irish Free State in the period referred to is about 13 per cent. The corresponding figure for imports of chilled beef is about 9¾ per cent., and for chilled and frozen beef about 2¼ per cent. I must apologise to my hon. Friend for my answer in a contrary sense to his supplementary question on Monday last.
  Mr. MAXTON: In view of those figures, which are a matter of satisfaction, I have no doubt, to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman's Department, but are objectionable to the Minister for the Dominions, who is endeavouring to collect money from the Irish Free State, can some arrangement be come to between the two Ministers, so that these two aspects of Government policy will not be in conflict?
  Major ELLIOT: If my hon. Friend will examine the figures month by month, he will see that for January and February there was a decrease and in March, April and May, an increase, so that both of us have been met in this matter.
  Mr. CHARLES WILLIAMS: Can my right hon. and gallant Friend give us the figures of the cattle which were imported for fattening as apart from the cattle directly killed for food?
  Major ELLIOT: No. The returns the cattle imported for food in one category.

  COAL INDUSTRY.

    RINGROSE AUTOMATIC ALARM.
    Mr. TOM SMITHasked the Secretary for Mines when copies of the report on the recent pit trials of the Ringrose automatic alarms will be available?
    The SECRETARY for MINES (Mr. Ernest Brown): The printing of the volume of reports is now in its final stage, and I anticipate that copies will be available early next week.

    DISPUTE, BEDWAS (DISTURBANCES).
    Mr. CHARLES EDWARDSasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has given further consideration to the sentences of several months' imprisonment passed upon a number of persons of both sexes for breaches of the peace in connection with a dispute at the Bedwas colliery, Monmouthshire; and whether, in view of the circumstances and of the general good character of the persons concerned, he will now reopen the matter with a view to securing some mitigation of the sentences?
    The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Hacking): After a trial lasting four days at the Monmouth Assizes last month, the jury found 11 persons guilty of riot. Three of these persons received sentences of six months' imprisonment, six of four months, one of three months and one of one month. My right hon. Friend has received petitions on behalf of nine out of the 11 persons, but after full consideration of all the circumstances, he regrets that in none of the cases can he find grounds to justify him in advising interference with the sentence which the court, after hearing the evidence, deemed appropriate.
    Mr. EDWARDS: Owing to the nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment to-night or at the first opportunity that presents itself.

  JUDGES' SALARIES.
  Sir WILLIAM DAVISONasked the Prime Minister whether he is aware that an error has been committed in treating

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  the judges as servants of the Crown and subject to cuts in their salaries as though they were civil servants; and whether, in order to make clear the independence of the judges, as provided in the Act of Settlement and confirmed by the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, 1925, he will take steps to ensure that the judges' salaries shall be paid in full as before, especially as it is in the national interest that the remuneration of judges should be adequate to secure the acceptance of the office by the best men at the Bar?
  The LORD PRESIDENT of the COUNCIL (Mr. Baldwin): No, Sir.
  Sir W. DAVISON: Is my right hon. Friend aware that perhaps the greatest safeguard of the liberties of the people of this country under our Constitution is the complete independence of the judges of both the Crown and the Legislature; and does he think it desirable to continue to impose cuts in the salaries of the judges by Parliament as if they were part of the Civil Service administration?
  Mr. BALDWIN: I do not see why a judge should be excused his cut any more than I am.
  Sir W. DAVISON: Has my right hon. Friend's attention been drawn to the remarks of the senior High Court judge, Mr. Justice Avory, who, being about to retire, has no personal concern, in which he said that the judges were performing their duties under the shadow of a grievous wrong, and does he not think that this matter should receive further consideration at the hands of the Government?
  Mr. BALDWIN: That cannot be entered into fully by question and answer, but I shall be perfectly prepared to debate the question.
  Mr. LANSBURY: Are we to understand from the question and the statement quoted that the execution of justice by the judges of this country depends upon the amount of money they get?

  SCOTLAND (ILLEGAL TRAWLING).
  Mr. H. STEWART(for Sir IAN MACPHERSON) asked the Secretary of State for Scotland when he is likely to give his decision as to whether there is to be an inquiry into illegal trawling in Scotland, as suggested by the representa-
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  tions made to him by the hon. Member for Inverness-shire (Sir M. Macdonald)?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for SCOTLAND (Mr. Skelton): As my right hon. Friend indicated in reply to questions addressed to him on the 6th instant by the hon. Member for Inverness-shire (Sir M. Macdonald), the question of the effect of illegal trawling on the inshore fisheries in the north-western districts of Scotland is at present being inquired into by the Fishery Board for Scotland and he hopes to be in a position to make a statement to the House before the Adjournment.

  TROUT (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  Lords Amendment to be considered upon Monday next.

  MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
  That they have agreed to—

  Commercial Gas Bill, without Amendment.

  Rent and Mortgage Interest Restrictions (Amendment) Bill.

  Southern Railway Bill, with Amendments.

  Amendments to—

  Education (Necessity of Schools) Bill [Lords].

  Calvinistic Methodist or Presbyterian Church of Wales Bill [Lords].

  Rugby Corporation Bill [Lords].

  Torquay and Paignton Tramways (Abandonment) Bill [Lords].

  Worksop Corporation Bill [Lords], without Amendment.

  RENT AND MORTGAGE INTEREST RESTRICTIONS (AMENDMENT) BILL.
  Lords Amendments to be considered upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 148.]
ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.
  [17TH ALLOTTED DAY.]
  Considered in Committee.
  [Captain BOURNE in the Chair.]

  CIVIL ESTIMATES, 1933.
    CLASS IV.

      BOARD OF EDUCATION.
      Motion made, and Question proposed
      "That a sum, not exceeding £26,561,901, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1934, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various Establishments connected therewith, including sundry Grants in Aid."—(Note: £15,500,000 has been voted on account.)
      3.16 p.m.
      The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Ramsbotham): The Committee will appreciate that the year that has just gone has not been a particularly easy one for the administration of education, and I have no doubt that the Committee will regret as I do that my noble Friend, the President of the Board, is precluded from presenting the Estimates of his Department. His functions lie in another place, where it so happens that a Debate on an educational topic will be in progress shortly. I think that is evidence that, such is the popularity of education, it is able to attract two houses nightly. Had my noble Friend been in my place, he would have given, if I may say so, a lucid and masterly analysis of a difficult subject, but the lot falls upon me, and I should like to take the opportunity of saying how much the cause of education in these difficult times owes to the President. The Board of Education is under a deep sense of obligation to its late President, for in presenting the Estimates last year he laid down a policy of moderation designed to enable the Board to steer a course midway between the whirlpool of extravagance and the rocks of parsimony.
      When the national finances justify an ample expenditure, it is a comparatively simple task to make a display of statistical, if not of educational progress, and to bask in the warmth of the plaudits of
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      enthusiasts. When, as is the case today, those finances require the most careful nursing, it, would be equally tempting to elicit the cheers of those to whom expenditure on education is at best a regrettable necessity and often an unwarrantable extravagance. I hope to be able to show to the Committee that the Board has steered a middle course, courting neither the favour of those who measure advance by expenditure nor of those whose main idea of education is that there should be less of it. I hope that the picture which I shall present will in the main appeal to those who realise the vital importance of educating our young citizens, but who, at the same time, do not expect a coat to be cut in excess of the cloth available, and appreciate that the service of education is only one of many social services, and that within the limits of the resources at the disposal of the State it must be content with its fair share. Of course, if in the immortal words of an ex-Minister of Health "a nation can always afford what it wants," most of our difficulties would disappear, but in the absence of any confirmation of that comforting doctrine, I think on the whole, and I think the Committee will agree with me, that it is wiser for a. nation to confine its wants within the compass of what it can afford. I shall do my best to show the Committee that we have kept intact the fabric of education, have kept up the level of efficiency, have made considerable progress and, at the same time, have secured considerable savings.
      The Committee will remember that last year the Board's Estimates showed a reduction of some £5,500,000. In point of fact, the actual economies were in the neighbourhood of £6,000,000, but were reduced by an increase in the sum for teachers' pensions amounting to £350,000. This year the reduction shown in the Estimates amounts to £830,775. There, again, the actual estimated economies are in the neighbourhood of £1,250,000, but they also will be offset by the automatic increase in teachers' pensions, amounting to nearly £500,000. So it is clear that such economies as the Board may be able to make are rendered less conspicuous by the increase in pensions to which I have alluded. Mention of the word "economy" brings me to make one or

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      two points in regard to the possible, though not necessarily practicable, sources of large economies. I hope to prove to those—and they include occasionally some hon. Friends behind me—who seem to think that education presents an illimitable field for economy that the possible area is strictly limited, and by no means so large as some of them seem to think.
      There are four substantial sources of possible though not necessarily practicable economies—reduction of teachers' salaries, reduction in teachers' pensions, reduction in the number of teachers and reduction in the number of schools. Those are four items of potential economy. Take the first, teachers' salaries. I am not sure that it is always realised how very large a part of the cost per pupil in our elementary schools is attributable to the cost of teachers' salaries. In point of fact, it is about 63 per cent., or nearly two-thirds of the total cost of a pupil in the public elementary schools. The Committee will be well aware that after the events of 1931 teachers, along with other classes of the community, suffered a 10 per cent. cut in their salaries, and for the most part they made their contribution in the national emergency with very great loyalty. Leaving that field aside, what remains? There is an area of only 37 per cent. of the cost per child, and it is obvious that in such a narrow and restricted field anything in the nature of drastic economies is very likely indeed to interfere with the efficiency of education, and I am convinced that no economist, however stern or unbending, desires to do that. Therefore, broadly speaking, it is clear that large economies are: dangerous, and though I may be exhorted to continue to "cut out the dead wood" in doing so I may be getting dangerously near to the living tree.
      The second item is teachers' pensions. That is a statutory item. This year pensions amount to a total of £6,500,000, involving a net charge on the Board's Vote of about £3,000,000, or 7 per cent. of the total Vote. On account of the increasing number of pensioners this sum will rise in the next 35 years until the cost is pretty nearly double, and I am informed that in the next five years we may expect the cost to increase by about £1,000,000. Then I come to the third item, the number of teachers. Just before the Whit-
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      sun Recess there was a Debate on the staffing circular issued by the Board of Education, and the matter was fairly thoroughly gone into then. I would only repeat that the Board have no intention whatever of reducing staffs so as to impair efficiency, and intend to retain the standard at present in vogue, and which has been in vogue for some time, under which there will not be more than 50 pupils in a class in a junior school and not more than 40 in a senior school.
      On the other hand, as I pointed out in the Debate before Whitsun, investigation during the last year or two has disclosed a considerable variation and discrepancy in the standard adopted by various authorities, and the Board thought it right to review this standard with a view, as it were, to levelling the position and securing more uniformity, not on the basis of the worst local authority, but on the basis of the best. It is particularly desirable to carry out this review on account of the prospective fall in the number of school children in the next few years. As the Committee probably know already, by 1936, according to the Government Actuary's report, we may anticipate a fall of something like 350,000 in the number of school children, and by 1948 that number will have risen to 1,000,000. Clearly a factor of that kind is bound to affect the staffing in the various areas. I say "various areas," because we do not know how it will be distributed, and that makes it all the more necessary to have a, careful survey and to draw the attention of the local authorities to that point, because, after all, it is the business of an administrator in regard to the supply of teachers, to avoid if he can an over-supply, and to make, as far as he possibly can, a reasonable balance between wastage and recruitment.
      Our past experience has shown that most of those failing to get employment in the year of leaving college succeed in obtaining posts in the course of the next few months of the ensuing year, and I see no particular reason to think, as regards those who left the training colleges last July, that I need make any exception to that statement. At any rate, at the present moment only a comparatively small percentage of teachers are unemployed—very much smaller than is the case in any other profession. But

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      there is the future to consider, and that involves the future of the new entrants. The number of those who left training colleges last July was smaller than the number in 1931, but larger than the number in 1930, and this year will also be larger. We frankly admit that this problem is giving my noble friend and myself very great anxiety. We have considered it for a very long time. The Board have used, I think, all possible prescience to reduce over supply by the limitation of entrants into the training colleges, and I can only assure the Committee that that matter is under constant and careful consideration, and that, as far as I can see, by 1935 the number leaving should be reduced to something like the normal—below those of the years before 1929, when the numbers were increased in the expectation of the raising of the school-leaving age which, as the Committee know, did not mature.
      The fourth item is the number of schools. Undoubtedly the closing of redundant schools is a field of economy. The Ray Committee estimated that by closing redundant schools £1,000,000 per annum would be saved. That committee postulated full freedom of action throughout the country to close schools irrespective of the denominations concerned. To adopt such a proposal would involve raising the religious issue in an acute form, and would plunge us into controversy. The Government are not prepared to do that, particularly at a time when there is increasing good will throughout the denominations. As the Committee are aware, assent has been given by the House to the Education (Necessity of Schools) Bill, which does not go anything like as far as the Ray Committee proposed, and does not abolish Section 19 of the Act of 1921, which is the Section that safeguards denominational schools. What the Bill does is to make it possible, in the case of dispute, for the Board to decide the closure of a school where the attendance is over 30, provided that transfer can take place to a denominational school of a similar character and easily accessible.
      In a review of economy, not only the major but the minor economies must be considered, and I do not propose to go at length into them. There is one ques-
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      tion to which hon. Members often draw my attention, and that is the disparity in school costs. It has been pointed out to me that there are cases where that cost works out at £45 per child, and that in another area in the neighbourhood, which appears to be similar, it works out at £30 per child. The obvious answer is that, without further knowledge of the circumstances, it is difficult to pronounce in the matter, and that there are many factors which go to cause the disparity, such as difficulties of the site, difficulties of transport and so on. I can assure the Committee that the Board have this question of economy in school buildings under careful consideration. They make suggestions to local authorities and the sum, which they regard as the approximate figure to aim at, is £30 per school place. The local education authorities are co-operating with the Board's recommendation, and a circular has been issued, since when we are able to take, as the average figure for brick-built schools, a cost of £29 per place, and, for schools of lighter construction, £22 per place.
      We are now in a position to make a survey of the Estimate for 1933. The important figure to note is upon page 8 of the Memorandum to the Estimates, where it is stated that the estimated expenditure of local education authorities, upon which the Exchequer bases the grant, is £77,620,000, as compared with £79,000,000 for 1932, a reduction of £1,380,000. That is the real measure of the economies which it has been possible to make. The reduction consists of £1,095,000 for elementary education and £285,000, for higher education. The saving is shared between the Exchequer and the rates, as to £791,000 to the Exchequer and £589,000 to the rates. The Board also make direct grants to certain bodies other than local education authorities for the training of teachers, and in respect of direct grants to certain secondary schools, for scholarships, and for maintenance allowances. Those grants total £1,620,000, and the items range from £733,170 for the training of teachers to £150 for the Chelsea Physic Garden. That makes a total saving of £101,000 in direct grants over 1932.
      I will now give, very shortly, an analysis of the expenditure and, on the principle that economy like charity begins at home, I will start with the Board's administrative expenses, in regard to the

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      cost of inspection and of officials and so forth. The saving on those amounts to £18,000. That may not seem very large, but it has been made in a field which has been gleaned and re-gleaned. As a matter of fact, in 1914 the administrative and inspecting staff of all grades numbered 1,542, while to-day it numbers 1,287. Since 1914, we have been able to make a reduction of 255 in the personnel, or 16 per cent. in the total numbers. Nobody would suggest that there is less administrative work to do in 1933 than there was in 1914, and I think the Committee will agree that the figures which I have given are a striking tribute to the energy and efficiency of the Board's staff in being able to carry on the administrative work with such reduced numbers.
      With regard to local education costs, the figures show a reduction of £315,000 and, as local education authorities provide 80 per cent of the cost of most of their own administration and inspection, they have a considerable stimulus to reduce the cost, and that stimulus appears to have been effective.
      I come to the third item in the analysis, which is that of "other expenditure". It is the largest item in the estimated savings of the local education authorities, and amounts to £450,000. That figure covers the day-to-day maintenance of the schools, other than teachers' salaries, and represents 15 per cent. of the cost per pupil. It comprises items such as the repair of buildings, furniture, books, apparatus, care-taking and so on. Obviously, those figures cannot be reduced without very greatly damaging the efficiency of the schools, and I should not like to encourage the suggestion that reduction can go on in that direction to anything like the same extent as in other directions.
      The fourth item is "capital expenditure." The substantial reduction with which I shall deal affects public elementary schools, and includes a saving in regard to lower loan charges. Those charges show that the approved capital expenditure has decreased by about £2,750,000, in respect of public elementary schools. There is an idea in some quarters that there is a kind of blockade or embargo upon new school buildings, and there is also the idea that the Board of Education is adopting, in that regard, a policy in conflict with, or at any rate different from, the policy adopted by the
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      Ministry of Health. I hope to show the Committee that both those ideas are erroneous. In the first place, in regard to the idea that there is an embargo or blockade, let me point out that by the end of March, expenditure on new buildings of all kinds was sanctioned amounting to nearly £4,250,000. I shall be told at once that in 1930 the Socialist Government sanctioned buildings up to the 'amount of £13,000,000. I do not think that the Committee, in these times, will expect me to rival the figures of the care-free and opulent days of the Socialist Government. A truer comparison can be made with the years prior to 1929, and if that comparison is made, it shows that last year's approved expenditure was about the same as the average for 1919 to 1929, not excluding 1924, when, if I recollect rightly, the Socialist Minister of Education announced that it was his intention to go full steam ahead. In that year, however, he appears to have recollected that a steam engine runs on rails. Five year's later he forgot that, and met with the inevitable accident. As a matter of fact, I make this comparison with the years 1919–29 with some diffidence, for it may not be altogether palatable in the opinion of some of the economists who sit behind me.
      As regards the second allegation, that the policy of the Ministry of Health with regard to the sanctioning of loans for public works is less restrictive than the Board's policy. I would say, in the first place, that that is not the case, and, even if it were, there would be a very good reason for differentiating between the two policies. In the case of the Ministry of Health, the charges fall, with the exception, I think, of housing, on the rates, whereas in the case of the Board of Education the charges fall as to 20 per cent. on the Exchequer in relation to public elementary schools, and as to 50 per cent. in relation to secondary schools.
      The second point of differentiation is that the cost of new public buildings is mainly confined to the cost of loan charges, whereas in the case of schools the loan charges form but a very small proportion of the total costs. It is the maintenance, which is mainly represented by salaries, that really makes the large bill. I hope it will be clear to the Committee, in view of the figures I have given, that the Board are perfectly justi-

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      fied in their policy as laid down in Circular 1413, which gave ample discretion to deal with urgent repairs, black-listed schools, and urgent needs such as those created by new housing schemes and the need for reorganisation. I will give figures shortly to show how justified the board are in still maintaining the policy of that Circular. As regards higher education, we have been helping forward various important developments, especially in connection with the new technical colleges at Dudley and Coventry, and I foresee a number of similar projects this year.
      Part of the Board's expenditure on new buildings is concerned with reorganisation under the Harlow Scheme. We attach immense importance to this programme of reorganisation, and I think I shall be able to show the Committee that we have made striking progress in connection with it. The increase in the reorganised senior and junior departments during the year ending on the 31st March, 1932, is the largest since the Hadow Report was issued in December, 1926, and we have made progress since March, 1932. At that date there were about 37 per cent. of the children over 11 in senior departments, and I am informed that the number by December last had increased to a figure somewhere between 40 and 50 per cent. In the case of black-listed schools, considerable progress is being made in repairs and replacement work. During 1932, 154 of these schools were removed from the list, as compared with 145 in the previous year; that is to say, they are being removed at the rate of three a week. That seems to me to be some answer to those who airily say that education is at a standstill or is being put back 50 years.
      I come now to the question of large classes. These are being steadily reduced. In the 12 months up to the 31st March, 1932, the number of classes containing 50 or more was reduced by 585. The problem is admittedly a peculiarly difficult one, because of the "bulge" due to the children born in the years immediately after the War. This has caused exceptional difficulties. That "bulge" is now passing through the senior schools, and in the course of two or three years it will, I think, be much easier to cope with. At any rate, over two-thirds of the
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      classes containing more than 50 have been got rid of during the last 10 years.
      Turning to the subject of higher education, the Estimates show a saving in the expenditure of local education authorities of some £285,000. Here again the salaries of teachers form a very considerable proportion of the cost per pupil, amounting to about 60 per cent. We have given careful attention to the question of staffing, and before Whitsuntide we issued our Circular No. 1428, drawing the attention of local authorities to various factors which in our experience make for large staffing. We have not laid down any ratio; the problem is far too complex for that; but we have drawn attention, as the result of our experience, to certain factors which may be overlooked, and I think that local education authorities welcome the assistance which we are giving them in that respect.
      I should like here to say a word in connection with another Circular No. 1421, which occupied the attention of hon. Members for a certain period. Six months ago there was a very large number of extremely gloomy prophets as to the effect of this Circular, and as to the general conflict and disorganisation that would ensue. At the present moment I think those prophets are very much in the background, but it is clear that there are still some persons who are unconvinced. I am sorry to number among them the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones), because I observe that in March he stated that the money saved by this Circular was to be found at the expense of depriving secondary school children of the poorer classes of legitimate educational opportunities—a deprivation, he said, practised in the name of economy. I shall be surprised to be confronted with a single case where that has been the result of the Circular, and, if the hon. Member, when his turn comes to speak, is able to point out to me even one case where that has happened as a result of the Circular, I promise that I will give it my very earnest consideration.
      I think the Committee will bear with me for a few moments while I say something about the relation of education to the unemployment problem. The steps that are being taken in this connection can be divided into two categories. The first is to prevent the ill effects upon the

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      children of the unemployment of their parents, and the second is to mitigate the effect of unemployment on the children themselves after they have left school. With regard to the first category, if hon. Members will turn to the Estimates, they will see that we have somewhat increased the item for special medical services, and I would say now that the Board are prepared to approve of any urgently needed extensions when the medical arrangements are obviously incomplete. Another measure is concerned with the provision of meals. The Committee will see from the Estimates that we have made the same provision in this regard as was made last year. The reason is that, after the most careful examination, we do not find evidence of increasing malnutrition. There again, however, if the local authorities have good grounds for extending their arrangements for the provision of meals, they will find the board very sympathetic.
      I would like to say a word about the question of malnutrition among school children, because, obviously, this is a, question that must interest Members of all parties, and it is one to which the Board have given very close attention, because it is a field in which one might expect serious difficulties to arise. I observe that the Leader of the Opposition speaking in the House last February, said that
      "Medical officers of health are reporting a steady deterioration in the children attending the schools. That has been repeated in this House and no notice has been taken of it whatsoever."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 16th Feb., 1933; col. 1205, Vol. 274.]
      I have not had an opportunity in the House of taking notice of it until this moment but I propose to take notice of it now and to say that this statement that the medical officers of health have reported a steady deterioration in the children attending the schools in quite inaccurate. For instance, the Board's Chief Medical Officer, Sir George Newman, in his report last Autumn said that there was as yet no evidence of a lowering of health or of impaired physique. The report of the Chief Medical Officer was borne out by the reports of the school medical officers which we are receiving, brought up to Christmas, 1932, and, in point of fact, out of 268 reports which have been received up to date only 17 give any instances of increasing malnutrition. Take London. The report of the
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      School Medical Officer for London has recently been published. According to it, only one more in a thousand children was found to have sub-normal nutrition compared with 1931, and the report points out that this fractional increase was due to the effects of a widespread epidemic of measles which lowered the vitality of the younger children.
      The report goes on to show that the decrease in the percentage of sub-normal nutrition for 1932 is quite substantial as compared with 1925. In other words, 1932 shows a substantially better position as regards this problem of malnutrition than 1925. The report points out that the children of over seven were found to be in better condition in 1932 than in 1931. These figures include all children with nutrition below the average. They are not confined to children suffering from severe malnutrition. Figures are given showing that, out of 180,000 children examined, only 29 were found to be very ill-nourished. Malnutrition in a good many cases, is due to organic defects and not necessarily to inability to obtain food. With regard to other areas, many of them have suffered more distress than London, but none the less there is no evidence of diminution in health. For 1932, as compared with 1931, some areas show increases and others decreases and on balance there is practically no change. It is interesting to observe that decreases are shown in Glamorganshire, Monmouthshire, Cardiff and Newport.
      Broadly speaking, my information goes to show that, throughout the country as a whole, the number of cases of malnutrition have fallen from 11.2 per thousand in 1931 to 10.7 in 1932. I mention that percentage because only a week ago the ex-Minister of Health quoted percentage figures for 1925, 1930 and 1931 which showed that the incidence of malnutrition was on an ascending scale. It is rather a pity that he was not aware of this figure of 10.7, which completely destroys the whole of his argument. It appears on the whole that the tide has definitely turned.
      The next point that I will take is with regard to the second category of unemployment after leaving school. In many quarters one solution of this problem is to keep the children longer in the schools, and that proposal is often supported on the ground that it will provide more em-

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      ployment for adults. I think that argument should be received with the utmost caution. It is by no means certain that such a result would follow. Admittedly, the unemployment of children between 14 and 16 has a very bad effect, but that matter is engaging the most careful attention of the Ministry of Labour, co-operating with the Board of Education. The Board itself, when suitable courses and suitable accommodation are available, would be pleased to allow the children to remain. It is suggested sometimes that this problem could be solved by day continuation schools under the Fisher Act but, apart from the cost which would amount to millions, you could not limit it to unemployed juveniles only without special legislation. As regards the method at present in vogue, the method of juvenile instruction centres, the Minister of Labour is responsible and centres are conducted by local education authorities and so are brought in contact with the Board of Education. Where sufficient numbers do not exist to justify forming a centre, the Board and local authorities can and do arrange for evening classes to be available to those juveniles. The Minister of Labour has stated that the matter is under his earnest consideration, and I will leave it there.
      I am now able to review what I might call the key positions in the educational system, beginning with the organisation of the senior schools for three or four year courses, with a definitely practical bias. A striking instance of that practical bias was shown me yesterday in the reorganised rural schools in East Suffolk which I visited.
      Mr. COVE: The best example in the country.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: If bon. Members are nervous that the reorganisation of rural schools is going to urbanise the children and draw them away from the country to the town atmosphere, this area provides a demonstration exactly to the contrary. So far from encouraging the children to go to the towns, it provides a definite stimulus for them to remain on the land and they are given a definite education to enable them to earn a living on the land. I hope hon. Members who are interested in this problem of rural education will look at a pamphlet
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      issued by the Board of Education dealing with this experiment—it has only been in operation for three years—entitled "An Experiment in Rural Reorganisation." I should like to pay a tribute to the East Suffolk Local Authority, to the inspector of the district, and to the teachers, who have co-operated magnificently in working out the scheme.
      The secondary school is the core of the educational system. My Noble Friend the Member for 'Hastings (Lord E. Percy) has described it, rightly, as the spinal column of any educational system. The secondary school is a school for the pick of the boys and girls, the eventual leaders of commerce and industry and the professions. From the most academically gifted of these boys and girls the universities will draw a large number of their members. To a large extent these boys and girls enter the secondary schools as the result of competitive examination, the area of which has widened since the issue of Circular 1421. But one cannot help asking oneself the question: Is the method of selection of school children at the age of 11 working well? Is it an adequate test of the aptitude of the child for admittance to a secondary school? If it is not, then very serious results will eventually ensue. Readers of Professor Valentine's recent book describing investigations which he carried out, although those investigations cover a very limited field, will know that he found that there is very little correspondence between the order of merit in passing into the secondary school and the order of merit in taking the school certificate. He also examined the order of merit after the children had been in school a year or two, and found it corresponded closely with the order of passing out at the school certificate stage.
      The statistics are very limited, and we must not draw too much inference from them, but, according to these statistics, there is very little correspondence between the order of merit on passing in and on passing out, though there is very close correlation between the school order of merit in the first year or two and results in the school certificate. If that conclusion holds true over a wide field, it is a very serious matter, and the Committee will appreciate the importance of having the subject very widely and

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      carefully investigated. It might, perhaps, be worth bearing in mind the possibility of transfer from secondary schools to junior technical schools, for example, after a year's trial, and possibly of transfer of late developers from junior technical schools to secondary schools.
      At all events, I do not believe that the secondary school examination very often misses the really clever child. Evidence of that is shown by the record of the secondary school pupil in the field of academic scholarship. For instance, last year, out of a total of 565 open scholarships and exhibitions awarded at Oxford and Cambridge, no fewer than 305 were won by pupils from grant-earning schools, that is, nearly three-fifths, and of these, 58 per cent. were educated at public elementary schools. As regards the winners of State scholarships, all of these came from grant-earning schools, and about 70 per cent. from public elementary schools. Last year, 195 State scholars sat for degrees at the various universities, of whom 104 took second-class and 77 first-class honours. Practically the whole of them took either first-class or second-class honours. Of course, a comparatively small fraction of the secondary school population go to universities. Out of 450,000 pupils in our secondary schools, only some 4,000 to 5,000 a year go direct to the universities. The great majority leave the schools not later than 16½ years of age after taking the first school certificate examination.
      Last year, the Secondary School Examinations Council authorised the carrying out of an investigation into the first school examination, and the body of investigators appointed by the council have produced a report. They say two main things: First, that the first examination though passed at 16, or often much younger, is accepted by the various universities in place of matriculation, provided that it is passed up to a certain standard and in certain subjects. As the Committee knows, this matriculation certificate seems to have made a great appeal to employers, though I cannot quite see why, because many of the subjects are very wide of the needs of the employer, who would do far better, in my judgment, to select his pupils by paying more attention to the advice which the headmaster would give him. It is also alleged that the energies of the secondary schools
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      are too much directed to fulfilling the matriculation requirements of the universities, regardless of the fact that of those who matriculate, not one in four proceeds direct to a university.
      The report recommends, first, that the school certificate examination should no longer be an alternative to the university matriculation examination, and that pupils in secondary schools should not be allowed to take an external matriculation examination unless they are genuine candidates for admission to a university. But I shall not be expected to express an opinion upon that now. It is good to know that the matter is still receiving close consideration not only by the Secondary School Examinations Council but by the universities, local authorities and other persons concerned. As regards the school certificate itself as distinct from the matriculation certificate, in my judgment, and I think in that of the Committee also, that certificate should continue, because not only does it enable the Board to assess the general level of the boys and girls taking the certificate, but also avoids the evil of a multiplicity of external examinations by professional bodies, who at present accept the school certificate as a step in the preliminary qualification for admission.
      The fourth key position, in my view, concerns technical education. I think that there is no doubt that this country is becoming increasingly alive to the importance of that form of education. In the past, it used to be relegated to a position of inferiority, but that, I am glad to say, is a thing of the past, and we should now realise clearly that the technical colleges to-day provide a route parallel and alternative to the route of the university, and in many cases technical college diplomas are recognised, as they ought to be, as having equal status with the degrees awarded by the universities. Every child should have some training for the hand as well as the brain, no matter how academic his bent may be. It is good to know, that although secondary schools are sometimes charged with being over-academic, a charge which may be sometimes true, the further education of ex-secondary school pupils in technical colleges is rapidly increasing, and in some cases no less than 50 per cent. of the pupils in the technical colleges come from secondary schools.

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      If I may sum up, the key positions are these: First, the careful organisation of the senior schools, not only in the interests of the older but also of the younger children; secondly, the problem of the selection of the children best fitted for a secondary school education; thirdly, the lightening of the load of examinations; and fourthly, the growing importance of technical education and development of the power all through school life and after to use the hands and eyes as well as the brain. I know that the interest I take in the furtherance of technical education may provide material for accusing me of caring only for vocational education. At the same time, I think the Committee will agree that if education is not vocational, if it does not train for some calling in life, it is a poor, useless and anaemic sort of education, a skeleton devoid of flesh and blood. Suitable it may be for a few cloistered, sequestered individuals, but ruinous to an active and industrious race like ours. Yet I am well aware that the function of education is to train for leisure as well as for work, and I do not believe that either craftsmanship, citizenship or culture each by itself can reasonably be treated as the sole aim of education. On the other hand, no one can be considered to be adequately educated who has not learned to combine within himself good citizenship, good workmanship, and the mastery of his leisure.
      4.11 p.m.
      Mr. MORGAN JONES: I beg to move, to reduce the Vote by £100.
      I am sure that I may offer, on behalf of all Members of the Committee, without distinction of party, our most hearty congratulations to my hon. Friend opposite on the very delightful way in which he has discharged a very onerous task. He has made the Estimates of the Board of Education, and the story which surrounds those Estimates, most entrancing to us all, and, as his predecessor in his present office, I offer him my warmest congratulations. Having offered that by way of bouquet to the hon. Gentleman, I am afraid that I have exhausted my supplies. I fear that I am not able to accept the somewhat comforting story which he invited us to accept this afternoon concerning the work of the Board of Education, and, if it would be con-
      1100
      venient to the hon. Gentleman and to the Committee, I should like to follow briefly the story of the board's work in chronological order, as it were.
      In the first place, I would like to say that I am very sorry that the hon. Gentleman, in the course of his remarks, made no reference at all to the nursery school movement. He will know that we on this side of the Committee have paid very considerable attention to this movement, and attach considerable importance to it. I daresay his answer to me at a later stage will be that in times like these we cannot afford this, that and the other. I anticipate the answer at this point by saying that the nation cannot afford to be indifferent to the require-merits of children, not merely on the educational side, but the requirements of children at a delicate age before they enter upon the more formal course of instruction in the elementary schools. When I use the phrase "nursery school," it is not so much the school part that I emphasise as the nursery part, and if I understood the message that was given to the world by those two distinguished sisters Rachel and Margaret Macmillan, it was that children ought to be taken away at an early age, and put into some sort of association with their fellows, when their bodies might be cared for at an earlier stage than is now possible, and where they might be able to lay the foundations of a good, sound, healthy body.
      Apart from that consideration, I would like to add that, if I am not misinformed, the statistics which Sir George Newman so admirably presents to the country year after year indicate that children at the early stage of formal school life—I mean elementary school life—are often found by our very beneficent medical service to be in a condition, which, if attended to medically at an earlier age, would have avoided a good deal of subsequent expenditure of public money. I am very sorry, so far as I understand the situation, that this very mistaken policy of economy, which I call educational waste, has arrested the development of the nursery school movement, though, I hope, only for a very short time. I was interested in the observations of the hon Gentleman in regard to the degree of malnutrition which is said to exist among the elementary school children in the country. I have never vet, either in this

      1101
      House or outside, committed myself to the statement that there is a very large amount of malnutrition among our children, partly because I have not the information at my disposal, but I confess that I am surprised at the statement made by the hon. Gentleman this afternoon. I will make him a present of the fact that I was agreeably surprised, because I happen to know the area of South Wales pretty well where there is, as everyone knows, a very great amount of poverty and economic distress. I confess that I find it difficult to believe—and I do not throw any doubt upon the certificates received by the board from medical officers—that there is no distress or need for special provisions for feeding the children hi those areas. Last Friday the Minister of Health spoke in this House, and a passage of his speech is not inapposite to this discussion, namely, the reference which he made to the problem of malnutrition. It does not concern the Board of Education, but it is related to the subject, and that is why I make reference to it. This is what he said:
      "I will say one word which deserves the attention of local authorities. When you are looking for a place in the family where malnutrition will show itself, and where the bad effects of unemployment and depression will show themselves, look at the mother, look at the woman. It is impossible and beyond the power of any man to prevent a mother from depriving herself for the sake of her children."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th July, 1933; col. 657. Vol. 280.]
      The malnutrition of the mother does not concern the Board of Education primarily, except to this degree, that, if the case exists for the provision of nutrition for the child through the medium of the local education authorities, the feeding of the child in that way would save this degree of malnutrition on the part of the mother. This is how I relate the two points for the purpose of this Debate. If it be true—and I say, "if" advisedly, and I find it hard to believe, I confess—that the children in those schools are not suffering from malnutrition, no one is more glad than I, speaking, as I do, as an old teacher in those depressed areas. I pass from the nursery school movement and the question of the feeding of school children, hoping that the hon. Gentleman and his advisers at the Board will keep their eyes upon the question of the physical necessities of these children. I cannot believe that the future holds out any immediate hope
      1102
      in South Wales of a speedy improvement of financial conditions. Therefore, it is essential that a constant watchfulness should be exercised with regard to their physical condition.
      I come to the next stage in intellectual and educational progress, namely, the elementary schools. Here, straight away, we come up against the subject of the buildings or the housing of the children. The hon. Gentleman modestly said that he could not compete with a. Socialist Government in its exhibitions of exorbitant spending. The hon. Gentleman cannot compete with us in local government at all, so that he had beter give it up, but I think that he might attempt a little rivalry in the matter of school buildings all the same. At least he might show a little desire to compete with us, for rivalry in some things is not altogether undesirable; and rivalry in the matter of adequate school buildings is desirable. The hon. Gentleman will know that when we were in office from 1929–31 we stimulated, as best we could, the provision of school buildings, and that we did it in a very definite way. He has already this afternoon borne testimony to the fact that our device was very successful. We said that, "Up to now you have had a grant of 20 per cent. in respect of your school buildings, and in respect of the particular things which you contractually undertake between 1st September, 1929, and 1st September, 1932, we will raise the grant from 20 per cent. to 50 per cent." As a result, all sorts of endeavours were made by local authorities to get in on the ground floor, so to speak, with their plans and schemes for school building development, and the figures which the hon. Gentleman has given this afternoon show the remarkable success which attended that effort on the part of the then Government.
      I suggest to the hon. Gentleman that he should still continue to encourage local authorities in the matter of school building development, because no one can argue even to-day that we have achieved anything like perfection in the matter of school buildings up and down the land. I cordially and gladly admit that some of the new buildings constitute a revolution in school building provisions. One is filled with a sense of pleasure and pride as one looks upon the new buildings which local authorities have provided in various

      1103
      parts. I do not see why children in all parts of the country should not be able to participate in benefits of that sort. I need not enumerate the points which go to justify the case for adequate school building development at this point, but it is still well known that there are large numbers of small village schools in many parts of the country shamefully inadequate from the standpoint of modern standards. There are no drinking facilities, lavatory accommodation is scandalously inefficient and out-of-date, and class room accommodation is also subject to the same criticism. The case is doubly strong at this moment, for the reason that it is a time when we ought at least to be meeting as far as possible, the cry for work for our unemployed building workers. It is an odd policy to be throwing large numbers of men on to the unemployment market, when public necessities will compel us, in a few years anyhow, to provide more adequate school buildings than is now the case.
      I turn now to the size of classes. I frankly admit that the statement of the Parliamentary Secretary is undoubtedly true, that in the last ten years there has been a substantial and a gradual fall in the number of classes of over 50 in the country. But when we speak of a class of 50 we are not speaking of a standard of super-excellence, are we? Do not let us preen ourselves with the reflection that 50 is a desirable number. I know that we have to aim at some figure for the time being, but when we have reached that figure we must get another and a better figure if we can. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that the figure of 50 cannot be accepted as a decent standard for the size of any class. Therefore, the Circular to which he has already referred, and which was discussed here on the day before the adjournment for Whitsuntide, was a particularly ill-timed circular, because surely at this particular moment of all times we ought not to be encouraging people to think that we are extravagant in the matter of staffing in the country.
      I know that the explanation of certain figures which were given to me on the Thursday before we broke up is probably to be found in the fact that we have a bulge in population. What a delightful fact that is. Every educationist belong-
      1104
      ing to the Tory party has referred to the bulge with the utmost enthusiasm as if that explains all attempts at any sort of economy that may be undertaken. I dare-say that the bulge in population explains in some degree the figures which were given to me the day before we broke up, but having regard to the large numbers of students who emerged from college in the year before last, some of whom have not yet had work to do, and who emerged from college last year and are still unemployed, and who will undoubtedly emerge this year and will be unemployed, I suggest that now is a most inappropriate time to do anything but to proceed as rapidly as possible with the reduction in the size of classes in our various schools. I would like in passing to say this upon this point. The hon. Gentleman is perhaps not responsible and does not feel morally responsible in this matter, but I confess that I do. He said to my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove):
      "We come to the point mentioned by the hon. Member for Aberavon Mr. Cove) as to the effect of staffing upon the supply of school teachers. I do not wish to make a merely party point."
      But he did not forget to make it all the same.
      "We are much too good friends for that, but I am bound to say that the Administration of 1929 to 1931 'handed the baby' to the present Board of Education to carry."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd June, 1933; col. 2307, Vol. 278.]
      "Handed the baby!" Why, they snatched the darling from our arms, and they did it for the most base reasons too, because we were giving it too good' nourishment. Since then they have been busy reducing its stamina and physical well-being to such a degree that it is now a mere starveling.
      Mr. MICHAEL BEAUMONT: You were making it sick.
      Mr. JONES: I did not know that there could be such a thing as feeding it with food which was too good. I do not think that that was the case with our bantling. The Government in 1929, not merely invited—the appropriate word is a stronger word than that—but even brought a certain amount of governmental pressure to bear upon training college authorities to expand the accommodation of their colleges. We used Government prestige to induce young people to go into colleges,

      1105
      and, after all, when a Government deliberately invites young people to go to college, it implies that there will be some sort of security of a job on emerging from college. As a result of this inducement in 1929–30 thousands of young men and young women, it is no exaggeration to say, went into colleges at great expense to themselves and at great sacrifice in their homes, in order to qualify for the large number of posts which the Government said or implied would be available. Now, the Government have thrown them on the scrap-heap. The Parliamentary Secretary says: "I am not responsible for that. That was the work of your Government." That is true in a sense up to a point, but the hon. Member will not object to this observation, that my right hon. Friend Sir Charles Trevelyan indicated that he was busy making the engine work a little more easily in order to drive the machine a little faster along the road. Then the hon. Member came along, as a. political gangster, and put some boulders on the lines and our train was derailed, not because of bad driving but because of the dreadful and iniquitous impulses by which the hon. Member and his friends are sometimes moved.
      I feel strongly that the Government inveigled these young people, almost by false pretences, into the colleges in 1929–30. I should not be able to make such a point to-day were there no means of finding places for these young people, but seeing that so many large classes still exist it ought to be possible to find room for far more of them. I shall be told that you cannot put more than one class into a room. I know that that is sc, but as a shift for a time it ought to be possible to make certain adjustments, because every classroom is not occupied all the day long. With adjustments, we ought to be able to absorb these young people and make use of their services, if only to save them from the unemployment market.
      I turn now to the secondary schools. The hon. Member trailed his coat a bit on the question of the secondary school fees. He seemed to think that we had become ominously silent about their policy in regard to secondary school fees and invited me to give him a case or two. He said that if I would give him a case or two he would attend to them and verify
      1106
      them. I am much obliged for that generous offer, but I do not want to miss the wood for the trees. Let us look at Circular 4358, which gives the standard rate of tuition fees which have been agreed upon as a result of the famous or infamous Circular 1421. I travelled last Friday with two people engaged in educational work. They happened to be teachers. I cannot give their names and I did not take the precaution of taking down the details, but they told me that they knew of cases where children had qualified for places in secondary schools, but in view of the fact that certain fees must be paid the parents had abandoned the hope of enabling their children to prosecute a secondary school career. I give those facts for what they are worth.
      Let me deal with the general principle. Here is a case taken from page 3 of Circular 4358. Wallasey formerly charged no fees in two of its secondary schools, but now they have to pay fees of nine guineas. I shall be told that there are special places. That may be so, but I am not so much concerned to argue what may be the immediate scheme adopted by the Board of Education to avoid the worst effects of this Circular. I am mainly concerned with the direction which this policy is taking. Hon. Members opposite flatter themselves, I hope with justification, that we are facing a period of reviving prosperity. Let us hope that that is true. I make this proposition—I am open to correction and I am prepared to hear the argument against it—that this Circular makes it quite clear that we have left, finally, the principle of free secondary education in this country.
      Mr. M. BEAUMONT: I hope so.
      Mr. JONES: That is the hon. Member's point of view and he is honest and open enough to say so, but the Parliamentary Secretary will not say so. I give him the chance. He will not say that that is the policy of the Government, and yet it is so. Suppose we do get revived prosperity in this country, what will happen? Let me take an area like Merthyr Tydvil or an area like Glamorganshire, or any other area where grave depression exists, and where, because of the grave depression, unemployment is so rife, and where even the earnings of people who are still at work

      1107
      are so low that they are well below the margin of fees imposed by the Board of Education. The moment parents come above the margin of fees imposed, the tendency will be to depart from the principle of free secondary education. Hon. Members opposite may say that is right and justifiable, but from my point of view it is going entirely in the wrong direction.
      I see no difference whatever in principle between the provision of free elementary education and the provision of free secondary education. I hope to see the day when all the schools in this country will be made free but not compulsory to all who desire to avail themselves of the schools, whether they be elementary or secondary. In so far as this Circular indicates the imposition of a system of fees, the board has gone back from the policy of free education. That is amply proved in the case of Glamorganshire, where there are 27 schools, in nine of which no fees were charged. Now, they are to pay £7 10s. In Swansea there are four schools which have not charged fees, and fees are to go up to £12. In Wiltshire the fees are five guineas and six guineas, and they now go up to 12. guineas. In Sheffield no fees were charged in five schools, and now the fees go up to £7 10s. In Durham no fees were charged in 20 schools, but in those 20 schools fees of six guineas have been imposed. That is driving the progressive authorities backwards. It is putting a brake not upon the recalcitrant or reactionary authorities but upon those that want to go ahead. You are imposing fees in areas where for the most part parents cannot afford to pay them.
      Sir FRANCIS ACLAND: And those o cannot afford still do not pay.
      Mr. JONES: The right hon. Baronet is entitled to speak of what he knows in Devonshire.
      Sir F. ACLAND: In other places too.
      Mr. JONES: The right hon. Baronet is entitled to speak of what he knows in Devonshire, but I can assure him that in areas in many parts of the country it is possible for people, because of their poverty, to refuse to contemplate
      1108
      secondary school education under the new conditions if only because, even if fees are provided, maintenance allowances have gone.
      I come now to my final point. The Parliamentary Secretary made reference, and I was glad to hear it, to technical education. He has worked hard upon this matter, and I have followed with interest his speeches in the country on it. He has followed in the tracks of the Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) who also took a very strong line in regard to technical education. I am absolutely sure that if there be a gap in our educational system at this moment it is on the technical educational side. Many people have strong views concerning what is called vocational education. They have an objection to a system of education which implies that because a child happens to belong to a certain walk of life it should be fitted for that walk of life which happens to be that of its father or its family. In the long run, we all of us have to follow some form of occupation or other, or we all ought to do so, which is perhaps not the same thing, and our education ought to enable us in some degree to discharge our vocational duties more completely and also to discharge our civic duties more completely. Perhaps I would put the civic interpretation on the value of education more highly than on the vocational side.
      There are authorities who have made valient efforts to preserve their technical colleges. There are a number of such authorities in Lancashire, Yorkshire and, other parts of the country. There ought to be a much more comprehensive survey of our technical instruction facilities, having regard to the immediate future that lies ahead of the country. We aria living in an age of mechanisation, when there is almost an industrial revolution taking place before our eyes, and I am not at all certain that unless this country equips itself more adequately on the technical side that Britain is not going to lose her place of priority amongst the nations of the world. Some sort of comprehensive survey ought to be undertaken, either regional or national.
      Some time ago I had the privilege of presiding over a committee which examined the situation in South Wales, and we discovered there—not for the first time so far as some of us were concerned

      1109
      —that our technical education provision was hopelessly, almost shamefully, inadequate. There are one or two fine institutions, perhaps three at the outside, and advantage ought to be taken at this particular moment of the powers available to the Board of Education to survey the field by a competent committee, which might advise the board and prevent, what I apprehend may take place presently, the creation of innumerable small district committees each duplicating their functions and without any correlation of activities. I say more. I have a feeling that even where there are technical colleges doing the best they can under the help and guidance of the local authority, they are likely to be hampered by inadequate financial resources if they have to depend on the resources of one particular local authority. There ought to be correlation over a larger field, and I hope the hon. Member will be able to say that the Board of Education will examine this matter in the immediate future.
      I cannot pretend to the Parliamentary Secretary that my friends on this side of the House are satisfied with the trend of the policy of the Board of Education. If I have given that impression it is wrong; but I do not think I have conveyed that impression. The hon. Member may feel that we are making extravagant claims at a time like the present. I cannot accept that point of view. When the Government can afford £16,000,000, as is the case this year, to remove from the Budget the extra taxation imposed on drink and find £900,000 to provide a summer resort for the Territorials, the Board of Education ought not to confront this Committee with a statement in which they propose to cut down what is after all one of the most vital and fundamental services in the State. The Government can cut down education td-day, they can save money to-day, as they have done; but in the long run the Britain of to-morrow will pay for the educational folly of to-day.
      4.49 p.m.
      Sir PERCY HARRIS: I want to add my congratulations to those of the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. M. Jones) to the Minister for his clear, luminating and charming statement. I assure him that that is no empty compliment. It is customary when an hon. Member acts for his Department for the first time to say
      1110
      kind things about him, but his statement, really, was clear, comprehensive and full of enthusiasm for education. I felt when he was speaking—it is the best compliment I can pay him—that he was no reactionary, but a sincere lover of education. He may not go so far as some of us would like, but he is a man whose heart is in his job. It may be unfortunate that the President of the Board of Education is not a Member of this House. This is a great spending Department, which affects the daily lives of the people and the future of the nation, and it would be an immense advantage to have the President of the Board of Education in the House of Commons, but in this case we need not be too critical, because the Noble Lord the President of the Board was in this House for some years, and he has an excellent substitute to act for him.
      I hope that the statement of the Parliamentary Secretary suggests that then is to be a lull in circulars; a close time for circulars. Those who are in charge of education have been going through a very depressing time. There was, first of all, the cut, which diverted their attention from their real task; and then we have had the two circulars to which reference has been made. The staffing circular has already been discussed. I objected to both circulars. I was critical; but I am not going to attach too much importance to them now. We must look at the spirit behind the circulars. If the President and the Parliamentary Secretary are sincere in their enthusiasm for education, then their policy will not be a policy of reaction, and we will draw a veil over the circulars for the moment and see what happens during the next few months. I am glad, however, that the President has not listened to the reactionary advice of the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) contained in the famour Ray Report.
      Mr. COVE: He is getting it in bit by bit.
      Sir P. HARRIS: We must keep the Parliamentary Secretary in the straight path; and I think he made it clear today that he has no intention of going back but forward. I must congratulate the Department on their annual report, one of the best we have seen for many a long day. It is comprehensive, full

      1111
      of interest full of meat and information. There is an excellent chapter on Art Education, the kind of thing we want in an annual report. In his speech the hon. Member referred to the striking progress made in the work of reorganisation. The figures given in the annual report show that throughout the country great schemes, at any rate on paper, are coming into life, but I would warn the hon. Member not to attach too much importance to shuffling boys from one school to another, merely separating juniors from seniors. When these schemes are sanctioned they must be real schemes, they must be real senior schools. To break up the old traditions of a school is not good, and you can only justify it when you create a real senior school, a modern school, a new spirit and a new atmosphere, not merely a new building. As the Hadow Report recommended:
      "The instruction and equipment should approximate to the standards from time to time required by the board in schools working under the regulations for secondary schools."
      A very important thing is proper staffing and facilities for handicraft and science. The hon. Member will be the first to admit that the success of these new senior schools requires a four year's course, as was pointed out in the Hadow Report, who say that to make the scheme efficient and bring about the right results the students should be there for four years. It is no use talking about raising the school age, there is no chance of any Bill going through this Parliament to raise the school age.
      Mr. ANEURIN BEVAN: Why not?
      Mr. WALLHEAD: We must keep them up to scratch.
      Sir P. HARRIS: I do not think there is any possibility, and, at any rate, I cannot-refer to legislation on this Vote. At the moment we are faced with the problem of the bulge, the extra number of boys in schools due to causes beyond the control of the State. In London alone there will be thrown on the labour market at the end of July 63,000 boys as compared with 41,000 last year. They are to be poured into the labour market, already overcrowded; and the problem is how to deal with them in some way or other. It is a problem which will
      1112
      have to be faced by the State; by the Board of Education and the Ministry of Labour. I am glad to see that the London County Council have become conscious of the seriousness of the situation and have issued a circular to parents—
      Lord EUSTACE PERCY: I thought the hon. Member wanted a close time for circulars?
      Sir P. HARRIS: This is really a letter, in which they suggest to the parents that as there will be many thousands more boys leaving this year than last year it will be harder to place them in suitable jobs at once, and they suggest that the best thing for them to do is to retain them at school for the next term, unless employment is obtained of a suitable character at the Employment Exchange. I suggested to the Board of Education some time ago that a letter of this kind should be sent to education authorities throughout the country, especially to those in mining and industrial areas, where there is a large amount. of unemployment. The ordinary parent is not conscious that he has the privilege to retain his child at school from 14 to 16 years of age, and it is most advisable, as far as practicable, that parents should be persuaded to keep their children off the labour market.
      Mr. A. BEVAN: In colliery districts they can get employment quite easily on leaving school, but are thrown out again after about four or five months.
      Sir P. HARRIS: I quite agree that that is a very serious problem. We want to find out What the attitude of the Government is towards local authorities making use of their by-law-making powers in order to raise the school age in certain areas. Six authorities have already used these powers, and I think I am right in saying that they have done so with complete success. The hon. Gentleman referred to the great work that the East Suffolk authority has done for rural education, but he did not refer to another interesting experiment by this progressive education authority in using its by-law-making power to raise the school age to 15, utilising to the full the powers of exemption where the child receives a chance of beneficial occupation. The East Suffolk education authority is able to say that the result of using this power of

      1113
      reasonable exemptions has been completely to eliminate all juvenile unemployment since 1925. They have been able to stop boys and girls from going into blind alley occupations. That is the answer to be hon. Member who interrupted me.
      A great part of the difficulty of throwing boys into industry at 14, and then their being thrown on to the scrap heap at 16, would be prevented if this power were used. It may be argued that it would add to the cost of education. I do not know what additional cost would be incurred if it was limited to certain industrial areas. Although the hon. Member brushed the argument aside with a certain amount of contempt, I do suggest that keeping these young people off the labour market would in the end save the Unemployment Insurance Fund as well as the Public Assistance Fund. The two items must be balanced one against the other. At any rate the matter is worthy of consideration, and I beg the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education to consult the Minister of Labour, who is very conscious of the problem, and to see whether he is able, at any rate in distressed areas like Durham and parts of South Wales where unemployment is on a tremendous scale, to encourage local authorities, to give them some special stimulus in making use of their powers to keep children at school until they are 15, at any rate while unemployment is so rife.
      There is another machine that the Parliamentary Secretary referred to, and that is the machinery of the continuation schools. Great hopes were entertained of the setting up of a complete system of continuation schools. The failure in 1921 gave a great set-back to the idea. But I notice in many directions that there is a revival of a desire for something of the kind, for some use of the powers of the Act of 1921. I was rather surprised that the Parliamentary Secretary did not refer to the Committee on Education for Salesmanship, presided over by Sir Francis Goodenough. That Committee issued a remarkable report. One extract which is quoted in the report of the Board of Education for last year I will read:
      "It is impossible for a young man who attends school on three evenings a week and devotes at least another evening to study throughout the whole of the winter months, to give his best mind to both his work and his education, and where such an effort is
      1114
      made a most unfortunate position is likely to arise and to create bitterness and discontent at the smallness of results from so great an effort. To expect or to encourage such efforts is both unreasonable and uneconomic. If the organisation of commercial work does in fact make it impossible to allow promising recruits to attend courses which are necessary or advisable for the furtherance of commercial efficiency during their ordinary employment for one or more half days a week, we suggest that it should be ascertained whether the relief of promising recruits for continuous periods of some weeks would not present smaller difficulties."
      The following has special significance:
      "We have, however, to record with regret that hardly any progress has been made in this direction."
      The only important continuation school in London is that for Post Office servants, while the only one where there is a compulsory school is Rugby. The opinion of this most weighty and representative Committee is worthy of consideration, and I ask the board to take it into account. Meanwhile we are hesitating about any definite policy for dealing with either commercial education or technical education, Continental countries are going full steam ahead. I was surprised that the Parliamentary Secretary made no reference to a visit of two of the board's inspectors to the Continent. The right hon. Gentleman Sir Donald Maclean referred to it in his statement last year, and promised that the result of the inspectors' visit would be taken into account. Their report is a most remarkable document, and I recommend it to the study of every hon. Member. The inspectors visited four countries, France, Belgium, Czechoslovakia and Holland. In every case they tell the same story of a large expenditure of money, great building of schools and activity in every direction. It is difficult to select passages because there are so many passages that are pregnant with ideas and guidance to this country. One passage is very much to the point:
      "In each of these countries technical education is defined more clearly and organised more exactly than in this country."
      In Czechoslovakia, a new country starting at scratch on its own account, as it were, they were able to show wonderful progress since the War. In France, of course, they have been doing great things. Under the Loi Astier law of 1919 every employer is compelled to release young workers for not less than four hours a week to attend a course of technical in-

      1115
      struction. There are in France many exemptions from that law. But the machinery is there. There is a system of taxation under which every employer is taxed specially and every boy and girl in a factory has to attend some instruction in his or her employer's time.
      Sir WILFRID SUGDEN: In regard to technical or secondary education in France, would the hon. Baronet give a single example of a type of education that is comparable with anything that we have in this country?
      Sir P. HARRIS: The best thing the hon. Gentleman can do is to read the pamphlet.
      Sir W. SUGDEN: I have read it.
      Sir P. HARRIS: I really cannot give the hon. Member a lecture on French education. I have not the time, even if I had the will.
      Mr. WALLHEAD: To the hon. Member's examples of the activities of countries on the Continent there could be added the case of Austria. They are doing great things in the schools in Vienna in spite of the country's poverty
      Sir P. HARRIS: I know that that is so, and I might add also Germany, which I visited six years ago. They are doing great things in Germany. But I am referring to the report of the board's inspectors. The most interesting work of all has been done in Belgium, a very small country with a population of only 8,000,000. The inspectors say:
      "The authorities however regard the training of the artisan as a function of technical education which deserves serious consideration, and lavish expenditure of energy and money."
      What effect this will have on Belgian industry and its competitive power only time will show. With their population of only 8,000,000 they now have 600 trade schools, with 85,000 pupils and 9,000 teachers. Pupils are brought into contact with the realities of life under the guidance of the State. It is, of course, not under their Board of Education but under their Ministry of Labour, so much do they recognise the intimate association of education with industry and employment. The schools are largely equipped by up-to-date factories with the most modern appliances and the most
      1116
      expensive machines, so that they can be compared with the actual life of the workshop and the factory. In a school week of 48 hours the pupils spend 26 hours in the workshop. That may be contrary to old ideals of education, but it is a recognition of the practical side of life. Their trade schools annually provide 12,000 qualified workpeople for their industries and their écoles industrielles 6,000 men to provide their future foremen. The report points out that our junior technical schools send out only 8,000 annually, and our technical institutes only 8,500, although our population is five times as large as that of Belgium.
      The report says there is no doubt that full-time training is more general in Belgium than in this country at the junior stage. But the most important part of the report and the part which I want to emphasise is the recommendation of the inspectors. They paint a lurid picture of what our industrial competitors are doing on the Continent at this time of acute industrial competition. I remember that in 1906 Lord Haldane made a great appeal to the country to concentrate more on science and technical education and less on the tariff controversy. Whatever our attitude may be on the vexed question of Free Trade or Protection, if Protection is to succeed in its purpose we must have efficient and highly trained workers in our factories, men as efficient and as highly trained as those of our Continental competitors. So the inspectors recommend that, first, there should be an increase in the number of junior technical schools; secondly, an increase in the number of junior vocational schools; and, thirdly, that senior elementary schools should have more machinery of a simple kind. In other words, the senior schools should discharge their original function of training children in handicraft and equipping them for industry, and they should be brought up to date. The report concludes by saying:
      "In a modern industrial State it is no longer satisfactory to provide for technical education by means of evening classes attended by students who are tired after a day's work."
      The Parliamentary Secretary made a sympathetic reference to technical education and emphasised its importance and his words on the subject were very much

      1117
      to the point. But sympathy is not enough. He referred to two schools shortly to be opened in the provinces, but local authorities hesitate to take action when they have before them the various economy circulars issued by the board. If we are to bring our schools into line with modern ideas and Continental standards, the Government must be prepared to take their courage in both hands and to make reasonable grants or reasonable promises of grants and give sympathetic guidance to the local authorities. I believe that the nation is conscious of the need. It is now for the board, in conjunction with the Ministry of Labour, to take action, and, in this matter I would like the board to act as a real Board of Education instead of the responsible Minister sitting alone in solitary glory, divorced from his colleagues. I want to see him sit with the President of the Board of Trade and the Minister of Labour. There is a great opportunity for educational advance without a large expenditure of money. Some form of capital expenditure obviously would be necessary but the country would be rewarded tenfold for such expenditure in years to come by the increased efficiency of labour, the greater success of industry and, as I believe, a decrease in unemployment.
      5.18 p.m.
      Lord E. PERCY: I have not intruded previously during this Parliament in any Debate directly relating to the Board of Education, largely because I have had an uncomfortable feeling that the reminiscences of ex-Ministers about their own past represent a commodity of which the supply in this House considerably exceeds the demand. As I do not often address it, I hope the Committee will bear with me in a few general remarks on this subject. I do not yield to anyone in the Committee in my admiration of the work which has been done for the last two years by the Parliamentary Secretary. No Minister ever had a more difficult or thankless task to perform, and no Minister that I have ever known or heard of, has succeeded so well in steering among the reefs and shallows on the course which he has had to hold, or has succeeded better in doing, under most difficult and restrictive conditions, a very large work of progress and development in education. At the same time, I should
      1118
      like to emphasise on this occasion, as I have done on other occasions, the obvious fact that in this, as in almost every other department of home administration, the Government have been necessarily, living during the last two years in what, I think, the German Biblical critics call an interim ethic. They have been waiting and hoping that the dear dead days when there was plenty of money to spend might come back again. They have been hoping that we should get back to the happy days of the nineteenth or early twentieth century when the capitalist economic system was going full blast. Especially have they been waiting to see that process started off once more by the World Economic Conference.
      In those circumstances, the various home Departments of His Majesty's Government have been rather like the baggage animals in the centre of a square which is fighting in the desert. The square has moved forward and a great deal has been happening, under rather confused and smoky conditions, between the front line of the square and the external gentlemen. Meanwhile, the baggage animals have been huddled in the centre of the square and no one has paid any particular attention to them except the harassed camel drivers and muleteers who have had to try to keep them quiet. But the end is coming of the period of trying out every possible international remedy for our situation. The time is coming, with the end of this year, when, in the sphere of home administration, the Government will have to take a positive line. I am sure the Parliamentary Secretary himself must be conscious of the fact that at the present time he is in some danger of falling between two stools. He has not secured any great measure of economy. I think that general expenditure on education, leaving out of account all expenditure on teachers' salaries, is nearly £2,500,000 more this year than it was in 1928–29. It is true that the expenditure of the board is considerably lower, but the expenditure of local authorities and the burden on the rates is considerably greater.
      The percentage grant system, which used to be advocated by hon. Gentlemen opposite as the great palladium of educational progress and as a means of relieving the unfortunate local authorities from otherwise intolerable burdens, is

      1119
      now, in the hands of the Parliamentary Secretary, becoming a scientific instrument for withdrawing grants from local authorities and transferring burdens from taxes to rates. I do not in the least complain of that. Indeed, I have expressed the opinion on several occasions that it was necessary and inevitable in the present circumstances that there should be a progressive transference of burdens from taxes on income to taxes on consumption. I have tried to point out to my Socialist friends that if they clamour for production for use and not for profit, they must also contemplate taxation on use, and not taxation on profit. An argument so invincibly logical ought to carry conviction even to my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones).
      At any rate, the Parliamentary Secretary has not succeeded in securing a large measure of economy. On the other hand, he has, necessarily, been unable to secure any considerable change in the work of education in this country and what I particularly wish to suggest to the Committee now is that education in this country is becoming increasingly out of relation with the main problems with which we ought to be dealing. What is the most appalling problem among all those which face us? It is the great number of juveniles, of boys and girls between 14 years and 18 years, who are entering or trying to enter industries which are blindly groping in the attempt to adjust themselves to new conditions. The uncertainty which affects all employment at present falls with peculiar force and peculiar danger on the young school-leaver, the young entrant into industry, the young seeker after work. Whatever may be the merits of raising the school-leaving age by one year, and I cannot go into that question now, the great problem which I have just indicated would remain, even if we raised the school-leaving age. In this area between the ages of 15 and 18 we are witnessing at present the most appalling" and permanent wreckage of lives there has ever been seen in this or any other country. This is a problem to which the Parliamentary Secretary referred. He told us that it was under close consideration by the board and the Ministry of Labour.
      I cannot attempt within the Rules of Order to cover the whole of that field
      1120
      on these Estimates. I can, however, in order to put what I am going to say into the right setting, declare that, to my mind, nothing short of a policy of controlling the entrance of juveniles into all industry under schemes drawn up by industry; nothing short of the careful protection and regulation of all juvenile employment from the moment of leaving school; nothing short of the regulation of the moment at which the juvenile is to leave the school, by means of some system of labour permits such as is in force, for instance in America—nothing short of that will be adequate for the problem with which we have to deal. A policy of that kind, including the provision of educationry centres for the unemployed juveniles must be mainly in the hands of the Ministry of Labour. What is the part of the Board of Education? It is to see that the school structure out of which the juvenile enters into this hazardous battle is adapted to the life with which that juvenile will meet when he leaves school.
      We have made great advances towards that end by the organisation of our senior schools, and I would support everything that was said about the East Suffolk area schools among others in the country, but at the present time those schools are in the vaguest and most indeterminate position in relation to that other type of school which my hon. Friend mentioned, namely, the secondary school. If the secondary school is indeed the spinal column of our system of education, then dislocation between that spinal column and any other part is naturally serious. What is the position about the secondary school? We are told that it is the school which should supply the future leaders and intellectual heads of this country. But what is the good of talking like that about the secondary school as we know it to-day? The main function of the secondary school as we know it to-day is not in any sense selective of the highest talent. I do not deny that it does send up very good talent to the universities and to higher technical studies but the main function of the secondary schools in our social system is not, as it should be, that of a lift or a stairway to the higher storeys of the social structure.
      It is an intermediate school devoted to giving education up to the age of 16,

      1121
      an education, in turn, mainly devoted to cramming for a leaving certificate, and that function it performs no better but rather worse, in many instances, than the ordinary central school. [HON. MEMBERS: "Rubbish."] Well, such a central school as the intermediate schools of Sheffield, which gained a greater percentage of successes in school certificate examinations than the secondary school. If in referring to the function of the secondary school one uses exaggerated words, it is because one must put the matter in exaggerated terms to arouse the attention which it deserves. It is, so to speak, a social factory for turning the sons of clerks and shopkeepers into clerks and shopkeepers.
      Mr. MACQUISTEN indicated dissent.
      Lord E. PERCY: I am afraid my hon. and learned Friend has not been following my argument. If he will recall the Scottish system of education before it was corrupted by the English system, he will remember the rigidly selective ideal of secondary and higher education, and how all secondary and higher education was dominated by the university. All that I am saying is, not that the secondary schools, in giving a very nice finishing education for a leaving certificate to the ordinary rank and file, the general run of the middle class, is not performing a useful function; I am saying that it is performing no function which cannot equally well be performed by senior, central, or intermediate schools, which make no such pretensions as does the secondary school.
      I am not attacking any type of school. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] No, I am not attacking any type of school; I am only pointing out that we are moving inevitably, as the result of the reorganisation of our elementary schools, in the direction of one common intermediate school system lasting from the age of 11 to the age of 15½, an intermediate stage of education terminated, no doubt, by some form of leaving certificate, and thereafter, and only thereafter, at the age of 15½ or 16, for the last three years of secondary education, will commence the real secondary school. In other words, we are moving in the direction of a system not unlike the general system prevailing in the Scandinavian countries. I give that instance to show that it seems to me that the Board of Education ought
      1122
      to be thinking out at the present moment not a policy in terms such as my hon. Friend has given us, and very excellently given us, a policy stated in terms of the secondary, and senior, and junior technical schools, but a policy stated in terms of a highly differentiated system of intermediate education, consisting of an enormous variety of schools, with great varieties of bias—rural, agricultural, vocational; academical, practical, and so on—all directed to preparing the pupil who is going to enter at the age of 15 for the actual conditions and work that he will meet.
      Here I come for a moment to the question of technical education. I am, as my hon. Friend knows, as warmly in favour of technical education as anybody in this Committee can be, but I do wonder sometimes whether we are not going on repeating in our sleep the things that we heard 10 years ago. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) mentioned certain foreign systems of technical education, but I do not think he realises to what extent the French system of technical education is determined, not by, as appears on the face of it, the desire to secure better apprenticeship conditions, but by the desire to re-create the village craftsman, who is dying out in France; and if the village craftsman is dying out in France, to what extent has he died out and to what extent will he be required in this country? The hon. Member for Caerphilly mentioned his report about South Wales a propos of what he called the increasing mechanisation of industry, but surely his report was precisely in the opposite direction.
      Mr. MORGAN JONES: I did not comment on it at all.
      Lord E. PERCY: The hon. Member did mention the increasing mechanisation of industry, and he also mentioned his report, but I would point out to those hon. Members who may not have read that report that what he pointed out was that South Wales was far too exclusively devoted to mass production on a large scale of primary commodities like coal, and raw iron, and steel, and that South Wales would have to develop in the direction of finer and finer engineering, that is to say, generally in smaller and smaller units of employment, and that

      1123
      technical education would have to be devoted to that end. I feel that there is a tremendous danger at present of our basing our technical education on the. assumption of a continuance of inflation in the size of the employing unit and in the volume of the mass production of industry. On the contrary, I believe that the whole of our technical education—and, therefore, the whole of our education in our senior schools—may very well have to be conditioned rather by the prospect of smaller and smaller units of production for the great mass of our population, units of production so small as to come down in the case of many of our industries in the future almost to the conditions which exist in agriculture and domestic crafts.
      If this is the part which the Board of Education has to play in the protection of society from this most imminent danger of the wreckage of the young lives coming on in the next generation and entering the world, surely it is not sufficient at the present moment to carry on as we are doing now, to go on reorganising our senior schools, to carry on with the reduction of classes, to go plugging along on the same old lines of reform which we in this Committee always love so much to discuss, and to cast back and forth at each other's heads across the Floor of this House. Surely we want a very different type of approach to the whole problem of education, and a much more comprehensive one. Surely we need too, even to start with, some preliminary indication from the Board of Education as to how their minds are moving on the elementary anomalies in the present system.
      The hon. Member for Caerphilly mentioned the duplication of small technical schools. He is perfectly right. The organisation of our system of technical education in this country, split up among different local authorities, all competing with each other, is a perfectly absurd system. I think everyone agrees, without discussing the general question of percentage versus block grants, that direct block grants to certain central technical colleges, and the creation of those colleges into regional colleges not dependent on any one local education authority, is an absolute necessity. Well, we hear nothing about that, or have heard
      1124
      nothing about it. Perhaps my hon. Friend will enlighten us.
      There is also—this is merely an illustration—the question of the Burnham scale. After all, the clearest reflection of the absurdity of the present system is that you have teachers teaching in intermediate schools, preparing children for the half-yearly examination, and being paid on one scale of salary, and exactly similar teachers in an exactly parallel type of secondary school being paid on a completely different scale, the junior technical school being paid on the secondary scale, while the senior school, with a tremendously practical bias, is being paid on the elementary scale. These absurdities in the structure of teachers' salaries have been notorious for the last six or seven years. We have had a cut in teachers' salaries, and that cut has effectually extinguished the Burnham negotiating committee of teachers and local authorities for the moment. At least, it has not extinguished it in the sense of having abolished it, but it has reduced it to an innocuous desuetude, except, I think, for one meeting the other day. But no attempt has been made in the last two years, since this emergency cut was first made—at least, no attempt has been made which has emerged outside the walls of the Board—to consider a reconstruction of those scales, apart from what salaries in pounds, shillings and pence you are to attach to any particular grade in the structure.
      There again I think we are living too much in an interim effort, hoping no doubt against hope to get back to a position where we shall be able to restore the cut, and then be able to say to the Burnham Committee, "Now please start off at the point where you left off in the year 1931." Even if we do that, the Burnham Committee will presumably reach the same point as they reached in 1931, namely, a complete deadlock between the local authorities and the teachers. I do not complain of this marking of time up to now, and I do not suggest that the Government could have done anything else, or that it would have been wise to do anything else, but the time has now come when we shall have to construct the main lines of a permanent policy. The first step in that policy will no doubt be taken by the Government in the Unemployment Insurance Bill, in which we hope to see

      1125
      Clauses dealing with the juvenile problem which will adequately carry out the responsibilities of the Ministry of Labour. But what is the Board of Education counterpart to that policy? What steps can they take to prevent, to avert, the wastage and the wreckage of young life which threatens the whole future of this country and will, I thoroughly believe, destroy this country if it continues uncontrolled during the next five or 10 years? That is the question that we ask to-day, and it is a question, I believe, that many of the most loyal supporters of the National Government are determined to have answered.
      5.44 p.m.
      Mr. COVE: The speech to which we have just listened from the Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) has not been less interesting to many of us here than those speeches which preceded it. We found ourselves on this side very interested in the Noble Lord's speech, if only for the reason that on many occasions while he spoke we wondered what he really meant. As far as we were able to gather some of his objectives, we felt that he was clothing a thoroughly reactionary policy in many respects under a clever exposition. He said that he did not attack or say a bad word about any of our schools, but I should have thought that he did really say some very nasty things about our secondary system. I cannot imagine a much worse condemnation than he made of the secondary system of education of this country. I should like to ask the Noble Lord to explain one thing to us. Does not his policy mean a big contraction in the provision for secondary education? Does it not mean that at the present moment we are providing far too many places in the secondary schools, and, further that behind his educational lay-out to which he referred is a social policy of privilege?
      Secondary education, in the Noble Lord's mind, has to be more and more the preserve of the privileged few. He said: "Let us have an extension of our central school system; let us have this intermediate system," but I would have hon. Members remember that the central school system does not provide the opportunity and the amenity of the secondary school system. There are larger classes in the central schools; there are poorer
      1126
      buildings and less provision for literary and scientific teaching. There are exceptions, but I think it can be said that the process of reorganisation in the senior schools is a mere process, under the present administration, of mean economy rather than of educational efficiency. The board has prided itself on the rapidity with which reorganisation has taken place and that it has been faithful more or less to the Hadow suggestions, but in reality the board are not carrying out the suggestions of the Hadow Report because fundamental to the carrying out of that report is a full four years' course, which implies the raising of the school age. The Hadow Report also suggested that the size of the classes should be lowered, that the general amenities, such as playing fields, should approximate, if not be equal to, those provided in the secondary schools. So that, as far as reorganisation is concerned, the board can take pride in the main only in what has been done from the point of view of an economy which has been effected very largely at the expense of true educational development and higher educational efficiency.
      The Noble Lord seemed to jump into the future a great deal and suggested, as far as I could follow him, that our educational system should fit in with the new units of industry that he foresees. I understand from what he said to-day and from what he has previously said in the House and elsewhere that he envisages much smaller units of industry. I am not in a position to prophesy, but I would suggest that the Noble Lord is making a fundamental mistake if he thinks that, even if we get a smaller unit in the organisation of industry, that unit will be less technical and will use less machinery than the present unit of organisation. I should imagine that if we do develop into smaller units in the industrial world our technique will develop more and more, we shall have to use machinery more and more, and we shall have exactly the same problem as far as the people are concerned, namely, the problem of the unskilled labour which will be demanded even by the smaller size of the units of industry. I cannot see the force of the argument, unless it be looked at purely from a reactionary point of view, that the smaller the size of the unit of in-

      1127
      dustry the less education of a literary and cultural character will be required for our future citizens.
      Lord E. PERCY: I did not say that.
      Mr. COVE: Perhaps the Noble Lord will talk it over somewhere else, for I admit that it is a subject rather for a lecture than a discussion on the Floor of the House. I want to congratulate the Minister for the exceptionally able way into which he introduced the Estimates, but I do not agree with him that he unfolded a story of progress during the past year, nor did his Estimates give us any hope of progress in the future. Let us take one or two items. I will take, in the first instance, the question of school buildings. The Minister made reference, and the Estimates make reference, to the black list of schools and the progress that has been made in eliminating the bad schools on that list. Let me remind the Committee that about 1925 an inspection took place at our schools, which were divided into three categories—A, B and C, for the black, the blacker and the blackest schools. In these three categories a total of 2,827 schools was black-listed. In category A, which were very bad, which the Board agreed were absolutely incapable of improvement and of no earthly use at all, and should be razed to the ground, there were 679 schools.
      What has happened? In spite of the fact that it was then said that these schools were in too bad a condition even to be repaired, one-fifth of them have been patched up. The carpenter and the plasterer have been round, as it were, and have patched up these schools that were condemned as absolutely unsuitable for children to go into. Only two-fifths of these schools have been closed since 1925, and the other two-fifths, with their unremedied defects, are still in existence. Is that a tale of progress Schools dangerous to the health of the children, absolutely unfitted for them to be taught in, are still in existence by the hundred. I will take category B. I may shock hon. Members by the details which I am going to read, describing some of these schools. The schools in this category were supposed to need substantial improvement. Only one-half have been remedied since 1925. Category C needed
      1128
      minor alterations, but 60 per cent. of them have not yet been done. The bulk of the problem provided by the blacklisted schools has, therefore, still to be faced.
      I am going to read from an inquiry which has taken place with regard to these schools. I cannot read the whole of it, but I will read some of the reports that have come to me from various areas. Hon. Members will not expect me to give the names of the schools for many reasons, nor shall I say whether they are non-provided or provided schools. It is rather surprising to find that, as far as repairs and so on are concerned, these two classes of school are about keeping an even keel. This report says, referring to a case of dilapidation:
      "Some years ago H.M.I. put this building on the black list but took it off on account of the size of such list. In 1930 strong complaints re building were made to the local education authority following H.M.I.'s visit. Each year the county medical officer in his report condemns Rooms C and I) and the lavatory and cloakroom accommodation. The boys' cloak room is 11 feet 8 inches by 5 feet, and has window 18 inches by 24 inches which does not open. Sixty-two boys are on the roll. Room D has been added to at some time and is so badly built that a draught is felt in the corner where the joint is formed. The doors are in such state of disrepair that rats can easily run under them and children sit right by them. In windy weather, dust, straw and paper are blown through, covering desks, books arid everything. The spouting in broken away all round the school. The roof leaks so badly in the girls' cloakroom that a bucket is placed to catch the water. All floors need renewing."
      That is one example of a large number of badly built schools that exist in the country. I will give a report about the heating of a school, and I would like to impress on the Committee that, although this is seemingly a simple matter, ft is a matter fraught with great consequences to the children. I myself have taught in class rooms that were far too cold to be comfortable and in which it was not reasonable to expect the children to do their work. This report says:
      "Rooms seldom above 50 degrees on wintry days. Infant room charts have shown 32 degrees F. Ink has been frozen in ink wells once or twice in last seven years. No fault of caretaker—fires lighted early."
      These are extracts from the log book:
      "25th January, 1929. the classrooms are all very cold, 45 degrees average tempera-

      1129
      tore. 14th February, 1929, temperature has been 38 degrees only at mid-day. Ink was frozen in all class rooms. Attendance adversely affected on account of poor heating in the class rooms."
      I turn to what to me is almost revolting to read, but I am going to screw up my courage in order to do it. It almost makes me sick when I read some of these reports, but in the interests of the children I hope that the Committee will bear with me while I read one extract. This is the place to expose these things in the interest of the health and the good behaviour of the children. There are beautiful schools in this country where the children can be happy and do their work effectively, but there are other schools where the buildings are disgraceful and the sanitary conditions absolutely inhuman. Here is one extract describing the lavatories:
      "They have at some time been whitewashed inside and out, but are extremely dirty in appearance now. They are horrible little hovels and such that any clean child would avoid. The school cleaner empties the buckets once a week, throwing the contents over the wall not many yards from the house door of the school house, and while the process is going on an objectionable stink pervades the premises. The excreta remains to be removed every four or six months by the neighbouring farmer. In the meantime, a thin layer of dust only in the summer, and a few ashes in the winter, are thrown on to conceal the heap. Frequent complaints by the head teacher and several visits by the sanitary inspector have so far produced no results."
      I have other examples. The figures I have quoted show that there are numbers of schools where the buildings not only do not provide the opportunity for successful education, but where there is a positive menace to the health of the children, and where children have, as a matter of fact, owing to the bad sanitary conditions, refused to leave the classroom and have suffered dire physical results in consequence. I ask my hon. Friend to speed up the removal of all these schools from the black list. He should put his foot down, and say that those who are responsible for repairing them have had plenty of time in which to do it since 1925, and that the work must be undertaken speedily in the near future.
      Another topic raised by the Noble Lord was that of teachers' salaries. During the crisis, as he said, a 10 per cent. cut was inflicted. That 10 per cent. cut was
      1130
      not inflicted with the sanction or, I might even say, so far as I know from official reports, with the approval of the local education authorities. The board have taken up the position all along that teachers are in the employ of the local authorities, that they have control, and I think I can definitely say that the local authorities have by no pronouncement whatever sanctioned that 10 per cent. cut. It was expressly stated, in fact, that they had no part or lot in it, and that they disagreed with the amount and the manner of its infliction.
      Mr. M. BEAUMONT: For the purposes of accuracy, may I ask the hon. Member a question? Where have they said that they disapprove of the amount and the manner of its infliction? I would like to get that quotation. The hon. Member seems to be implying that the local authorities thought it was too little and disapproved of the whole thing.
      Mr. COVE: On 15th September, 1931, the Association of Education Committees sent a letter to the Prime Minister. It is signed by J. H. S. Aitken, President, and Percival Sharp, Honorary Secretary. In that communication they say they
      "desire to place on record that they cannot accept any responsibility for the amount of the reduction"
      Which was then 15 per cent., I admit
      "which local authorities will be required to impose upon the teachers, an amount which in the opinion of the Executive Committee is unduly severe."
      In another paragraph the Executive Committee express the conviction that the cut should be of the shortest possible duration, and that decisions thereon should be reviewed not later than 31st March, 1933. I think that justifies my contention that the cut was never sanctioned by the local authorities. There is an impression abroad that teachers are—well, paid like lords, that they earn a tremendous salary. There are still 34,000 teachers—22,000 of them fully qualified—who receive less than £3 a week. Take a young man coming out of college in London, where there is the highest scale in the country. He will be a young man who has been to a secondary school and has been three or four years in a college or university. He comes out at the age of 21 or 22, and he earns £3 3s. 2d. per week. Then he climbs, and the climbing is a very long

      1131
      process. In his 20th year of service, when he is over 40, that assistant master, climbing up the scale in London, will get £6 14s. 1d. I do not think any hon. Member will say that that is a fabulous salary, even at the maximum. I do not think any hon. Member would really say that the minimum in London is high enough to meet the conditions which obtain in London.
      I went into the budget of a teacher earning £3 or so a week. I found that he had bought a house. If I criticise teachers on one point it is that they are too careful; they are a section of the community prone, perhaps, too much to saving rather than to spending. This man had bought a house as a way of saving, and was paying for it at the rate of about 18s. a week out of his £3. His travelling expenses in London were 5s. or 6s. a week. I will not go in detail into all the items, but I think the Committee will agree that that minimum not only is not a princely salary but that it is rather on the side of being a beggarly salary. Anyhow, the cuts were inflicted, inflicted by the Government. I want to ask the Minister a specific question this afternoon. There is a great deal of fear about, and the fear is legitimate, because in the report of the Board of Education it definitely says that the Minister is taking into account the recommendations of the Ray Committee. Effect has been given to some of the recommendations—1421 was the result of one of the recommendations, and the Necessitous Schools Bill is a small instalment of the Ray recommendations.
      Now we are told the board are considering the recommendations of the Committee. One of those recommendations is directed to suggesting that there should be a further cut in the minimum scales of these teachers, that increments should be stopped and bars should be inserted. I want to ask the hon. Gentleman whether the Government still have the recommendation about teachers' salaries under consideration. Can we rest assured that there will be no further cut? Can we have it specifically stated this afternoon that the view of the Government now is the view which was expressed officially on behalf of the Government at the time of the cut, namely, that it was an emergency cut, that it was a cut which was
      1132
      not justified on the merits of the case, that it was a contribution to the national emergency Can we have it from the Government now, after these two years have passed, that they still take the view that it is an emergency cut? Another specific question I would like to ask is when the Government will provide such conditions as will allow the Burnham Committee to meet as it used to meet before the crisis, with the power to negotiate salaries as between local authorities and teachers, with a representative of the board there, and the Treasury, as it were, behind the scenes taking care that Treasury interests are fully looked after? Can the hon. Gentleman tell the teachers, through this House, that the cut is an emergency cut, and that the Burnham Committee will be able to meet under pre-crisis conditions?
      We have heard a lot about raising of prices. It would not be a bad thing, would it, to raise the price of a teacher? We have heard a lot about wise economy in spending, of an inflationary policy. It is said that purchasing power is wanted. Why not give a practical example in the salaries of teachers? If there is to be an economic revival I understand it is absolutely essential that prices should be raised and purchasing power increased. I put it to the Government that here they have a splendid opportunity of putting into practice the principles which they have enunciated from the Treasury Bench, and which have been subscribed to by their hon. Friends behind. I would like to combat another statement of my hon. Friend. I am not so satisfied as he is that there is not malnutrition. As a matter fact I am afraid that malnutrition does exist in an appreciable degree. I am disturbed owing to the fact that I have been in touch with a number of people and have been reading all the reports about it which I could find. I would refer only to one report, "Unemployment and the child," giving the results of an inquiry made by the Save the Children Fund. That is a non-political body, and apparently a very moderate and careful body, because the language is very carefully chosen and there is no over emphasis. I would direct the hon. Gentleman's attention to this:
      "The inquiry committee cannot get away from the feeling that there are many schools in which children really require extra nourishment and the arrangements for pro-

      1133
      viding it are either inadequate or nonexistent."
      I ask the hon. Gentleman not to rely—I say this without casting any aspersion—solely and wholly on the reports of local medical officers. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I ask him to tell his central officers to examine the position. He has some very fine men; I know some of them and they are exceedingly good men. It is the business of the central Government to see that malnutrition does not take place in the child life of this country. The responsibility is theirs, and they cannot shirk their responsibility or hide behind any local report. They themselves must be satisfied. Not only is it a central responsibility to examine the position, but a central responsibility to find the finance. The burden of feeding the children should not be thrown on the local rates. I am not with the Noble Lord. His view is in line with his general reactionary attitude.
      It is the responsibility of the Government; they must see to it that children get a breakfast, get a dinner and get a tea. On schooldays and holidays, right throughout the year, these children must be fed. It is a prime responsibility of the Government to feed these children. It is no use anyone telling me that the marks of continued unemployment are not to be seen on the children. Go up our valleys. The hon. Member for Neath (Sir W. Jenkins) will agree with me. You can see there the marks of this prolonged unemployment in the shoddy boots, the poor clothes, the pale faces. I am going to ask the hon. Gentleman to treat this as a most serious matter and not placidly to tell us that all is well, that there is no malnutrition except, as I understood from him this afternoon, to the extent of 10 per cent. He must get rid of that 10 per cent. It is his responsibility to get rid of it. I know that that would mean legislation, in order to make the raising of the school age compulsory. It is still the law of the land that it may be done. It is legally enacted that the school age can be raised by local authorities, and five or six of them have done so.
      I ask the Parliamentary Secretary what he has done to inspire the local authorities to deal with this problem, which they can deal with under the law as it exists at the present moment? It is a burning
      1134
      question, especially in some of our industrial areas. I would like to read a quotation which, I believe, gives the whole case for Government interference. It is an extract from an inquiry conducted by the University of Liverpool which has made a series of inquiries in various areas. I have been through the report and I have made one extract which, in my opinion, gives the whole industrial and economic case for the interference of the Board of Education in order to stimulate local authorities to do what they legally can do, that is, to raise the school-leaving age. This report says:
      "It is clear that a vast problem of unemployment will weigh on Merseyside for many years. But the most serious feature of it has yet to be stated. If the number of persons of pensionable age leaving industry be subtracted from the number of young persons due to enter industry from school over the five-year period 1932 to 1936, it is found that Merseyside industry will have to provide scope for the employment of some 76,000 new workers. This figure is about equal to the whole present labour surplus on Merseyside due both to world depression and to local conditions. Thus, even assuming an extensive recovery during the next five years, a recovery sufficient to permit shipping and distribution to reach their 1929 position, and all other groups to absorb their entire present labour surplus, there will still, at the end of the five years, he a surplus of labour greater than that which exists at present."
      That is the case in a, nutshell. There was a time a few years ago when child labour, coming out of school to take jobs, was not faced with a permanent problem of unemployment in the adolescent period, but that time has gone. There is now a problem of permanent unemployment, so far as large numbers of children are concerned. There are ins and outs, but the out period is getting longer than it used to be. Children used to get into blind-alley distributive occupations, but even those are now contracted. The blind-alley occupations are getting fewer, and the numbers that go into it are fewer and fewer. There is a huge problem of increased unemployment between the ages of 18 and 24. I ask the Minister this afternoon to face the problem—if he likes, in conjunction with the Minister of Labour—of demoralisation and tragedy with which tens of thousands of children leaving our schools are faced, of either having no occupation, or going into a blind-alley occupation.
      This Debate may have seemed empty and dry to many hon. Members, but I

      1135
      do not believe that there is a Department of State which shows more clearly than this Department the main policy of the Government. What the Government are driving at can be shown clearly in their educational policy. Educational policy should be directed towards securing full equality of opportunity, and should be a gradual drive towards an equalitarian State. No child should suffer in an educational manner because of the poverty of its parents, and it should be cared for physically and culturally. What do I find in these Estimates? It is no exaggeration or pictorial description to say that privilege is more entrenched and that secondary education is restricted and limited. Cuts are made even on the copy books of the children, in the amount of ink they use and in the furniture. There is reaction in the broad sense and in detail. The hon. Gentleman need only look at his memoranda and he will find a saving of, I believe, about £400,000—I am speaking from memory—on furniture and so on, and on repairs to schools. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] Those are reactionary cheers. The Parliamentary Secretary voices the opinion of those behind him, and it is reaction. We believe that this is a thoroughly unsound and uneconomic policy, and that the result will be seen in the deterioration of the physique, the crippling of the mental powers and the starvation of the general outlook of the children, youths and manhood of the future.
      6.22 p.m.
      Mr. CADOGAN: I wish to reinforce an observation which fell from the Parliamentary Secretary on the subject of secondary education. The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) seems to require us to measure our enthusiasm for secondary education by the number of chairs provided. He gives us the impression—I hope it is a false impression—that he and his colleagues on the Labour benches are measuring their enthusiasm for secondary education by the number of secondary-school scholars, rather than by the character of the secondary-school education and the purpose for which that education is provided. I have not had the advantage, which he has had, of professional association with the schools, but I have
      1136
      had considerable experience of what happens to secondary school scholars when they leave school and in endeavouring to place them in situations, and the few observations which I am going to make are the fruit of that experience.
      I do not know the latest figure of the number of secondary schools scholars who left school in the last year, but I know that it is a formidable one. I believe that the majority of those who leave secondary schools conceive the ambition of entering either a clerical or an administrative profession, and I cannot resist the suspicion that social status is the magnet which impels them in that direction. While admitting that it is a perfectly venial ambition for any young man to wish to raise himself in the social scale, I have never been able to understand why he should decide that it is only by entering the clerical professions that that desirable ambition is to be achieved. Be that as it may, there is no question that the type of education which the secondary schools provide fits scholars for very little else but the egregiously over-worked and underpaid professions upon which the majority of them can only just afford to depend for a livelihood, unless, as is the case with very few, their salaries are reinforced by private means or by the assistance of relatives.
      Furthermore, they have acquired little or no skill in that combination of hand and brain to which the Parliamentary Secretary alluded in his speech, and which is so desirable now. Those who have a wide and bitter experience of endeavouring to place applicants in clerical situations have known how difficult it is, in existing economic conditions and in view of the fact, to which I draw the Minister's attention, that accountancy is threatened with mechanisation, to find situations, in what are called the black-coated professions, for the deserving cases of boys who have worked their way up, by their own native ability, from the elementary school to the secondary school, and even to the university. I am afraid that that difficulty will persist, even if economic conditions improve. The great majority of those young aspirants ultimately have to be content, as I know, with situations for which the ordinary elementary school is competent to fit them, at a younger age and at a much lower cost to the nation. We are therefore confronted with a very serious difficulty in connection with

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      secondary education, quite apart from its expense or the adequate supply of fully-equipped teachers.
      Nobody who has the cause of education at heart would wish secondary education to assume a purely utilitarian form, but when we are faced with facts which are sufficiently patent to-day, and which enforce our correlation of the expenditure on any social service with our financial conditions, it is surely more than ever legitimate that those who contribute to the expenditure should endeavour to discover whether that social service is wisely administered and, if not, what the alternative may be. Members of the Labour party on both front and back benches have announced—I shall be corrected if I am wrong—that it is part of their programme that every normal child shall have full and free access to secondary education. We ought to discourage this forecast of their programme, to the extent of remembering that it may be some time before they are called upon to redeem so reckless a pledge. I remember the Minister telling us, in the Debate which took place on the subject of Circular 1421, that that programme would cost £60,000,000 a year. I am not concerned to argue the possibilities of such a programme coming into practical politics now, or at any distant date, but it is germane to our purpose to determine whether secondary education is an end in itself or a means to an end, and if the latter, what that end may be? If the Government regard it as a means, we must ascertain whether the end justifies the means.
      The supply of clerical and administrative situations is already considerably disproportionate in amount, and is likely to remain disproportionate. There is no purpose in the State increasing its commitments towards secondary education unless the characteristics of that education are modified. The only alternative seems to be that secondary education should be made to cater for much wider needs and also—which, I think, is still more important—for the encouragement of ambitious and able young men to take a less narrow view of what is considered a respectable career. The respectable career is too often mere drudgery, and per contra those careers which are considered derogatory to our social standing are very often of supreme importance to
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      the community. Surely, in view of this fact, secondary education, which now seems mostly to tend towards preparing boys for clerical situations, should be made to serve a different order of trades and professions.
      If my premises are correct, our whole sense of values as regards social status in relation to employment should undergo a change. Certainly, there has been a very marked change in this respect in what used to be called the governing class, many of whom now go from public schools into trades and professions, which not very long ago would have been considered inappropriate to their social standing. It is very difficult to understand why youths who sit in offices all day long mechanicaly making entries in ledgers, an many of whom stand very little chance of ever being called upon to do anything more useful than what is called donkey-work, should consider themselves to be of higher social standing than skilled mechanical workers who are far better remunerated, who are much more indispensable to the community, and who probably have a higher degree of intelligence and skill. There is more cant talked about social status than about anything else in the world. The drain from the skilled manual trades to the unskilled clerical professions should, therefore, if possible, be obviated.
      The solution is that higher education should take a much more practical turn than appears to be the case at present. I am aware of all the arguments against higher education assuming too technical, too practical a bias, and I am not unmindful of the provision that is made by the commercial and technical schools, evening classes, and so on, to which reference is made in the report which has just been placed in the hands of Members; but it is questionable whether the State, in existing circumstances, should be called upon to shoulder the burden which remission of fees entails, unless the curriculum in secondary schools is altered on the lines I have suggested. Mrs. Leah Manning, with whose views I am not generally in sympathy, but who represents the opinion of a large number of teachers, recently said in a public speech that she thought that the secondary school education was of too academic a type, and that no one would be more pleased than the teachers

      1139
      themselves if they were allowed a more variable course.
      In conclusion, let me remind the Committee that we live in a mechanised age. Nowadays a youth with a specialised training is much more in demand than one who has merely had the sort of academic culture which is acquired at the ordinary secondary school. Many inventions have opened up unexplored fields for those who seek a career through the medium of scientific instruction. If I may cite one extreme case, only a few years ago specialised training would hardly have been required for a youth who enlisted in a cavalry regiment, but to-day the Lancers and Hussars have both been mechanised, and a profession which, only a short time ago, demanded the very minimum of intellectual attainment, now requires a high standard of skill. That is some indication of the remarkable revolution which modern science has effected in our daily life. I hope that the Minister, if he replies to the Debate, will give us some assurance that the curricula in secondary schools will take on a more practical bias, in view of the circumstances to which I have referred.
      6.35 p.m.
      Mr. GODFREY WILSON: The Parliamentary Secretary, in his excellent and lucid statement, referred to the State scholarships to the universities, and to the very remarkable success which the State scholars have attained in the schools there. I can bear out from my own personal knowledge what he said in that respect. On Monday last, the 3rd July, I had the honour of introducing to the President of the Board of Education a deputation of university Members on the subject of certain regulations which affect these State scholarships. We were very grateful for the kindness with which he received us, and the patience with which he listened to our representations, but I should like, if I might without discourtesy to him, to take the present opportunity of bringing certain points before the attention of this Committee.
      Of the regulations affecting these State scholarships, there are two which are particularly in point. One is that only those boys and girls are eligible for State scholarships who have attended secondary schools in receipt of grants from the
      1140
      Board of Education; and there is a further regulation which says that the award of a State scholarship, and the amount of the award, shall be dependent upon the financial resources of the parents. The point that we wished to urge upon the President was that this latter regulation in itself should be completely effective, and that there was no reason or justification for limiting the eligibility of the boys or girls who apply to schools which are grant-aided.
      List 50, published by the Board of Education, sets out the names of all those schools which are inspected by the board and passed as efficient, and in that list a distinction is made between those schools which are grant-aided and those which are not. The list is exhaustive. It contains the name of practically every public school and practically every grammar school that I have ever heard of, as well as the names of a great number of schools where the fees are quite small, and which are attended by boys and girls whose parents cannot afford to send them to more expensive schools. The list discloses some very remarkable anomalies. In the same county there are schools where the fees are practically the same—schools which are largely attended by day boys; but, on the one hand, a school may be grant-aided, and its boys or girls eligible for these State scholarships, while other almost similar schools are not grant-aided, and, therefore, the boys and girls at those schools are not eligible for these State scholarships. As I have said, the President of the Board of Education was most kind in listening to the considerations which we placed before him, but he said that there were certain practical difficulties which prevented him from acceding at once to our request. I feel, however, that I cannot allow the opportunity of this Debate to pass without mentioning the matter.
      I think I shall receive support from the hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove), who said that children should not suffer because of the poverty of their parents. That is the only point that we wish to urge—that no distinction should be drawn between a child who is sent to a grant-aided school, and who thereby is already receiving some help from the public purse, and a child who is sent to a non-grant-aided school, provided that the parent shows the necessity for a grant,

      1141
      but that there should be a perfectly open competition and no favour should be shown. The State scholarships are most valuable in encouraging and helping boys and girls who could not otherwise afford to go to the university. The Parliamentary Secretary has indicated the remarkable success which these boys and girls have attained, and all that I would urge is that this point of view should not be lost sight of, but that equal opportunity should be given to all candidates, whether from grant-aided or from non-grant-aided schools.
      6.41 p.m.
      Mr. M. BEAUMONT: Before I enter into the waters of controversy which have risen during the Debate, I should like to add my small nosegay to the bouquet of flowers which has been thrown to the Parliamentary Secretary. Unquestionably, his presentation of the Estimates to-day, whether their contents are gratifying or the reverse, has afforded great pleasure in all quarters of the Committee. I want to take up the challenge which was thrown down by the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones). The Parliamentary Secretary has most skilfully, in very difficult times, steered the ship of education between two very dangerous rocks—between the sentimental idea that there must be more education at whatever cost and the foolish and, I believe, entirely erroneous notion that to spend more money is necessarily to increase efficiency, and to spend less is necessarily to decrease efficiency.
      I would not go as far as my hon. Friend does in believing that no further economy is possible. On the contrary, I believe that further extreme economies, of a different nature, are possible and desirable. I always regret that, when the great opportunity came in 1931, the economies effected took the form of a flat-rate cut in the teachers' salaries. Strange as it may seem to hon. Members opposite, I believe, on general principles, that there should be better paid teachers, though I believe that there should be fewer of them. I would like to see the salaries of the teachers increased, and their numbers decreased. I have always regretted the fact that the economies took that form, instead of taking the form of a revolutionary change in our educational policy, which I believe was then possible.
      1142
      Before I come to the basic point of difference in principle, I should like to add a word to what was said by my Noble Friend the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy), and by my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mr. Cadogan), on the subject of the secondary schools, and to ask the Parliamentary Secretary to realise that we are coming to a parting of the ways in this matter. I have never been a great believer in the Hadow Report. I thought that the enthusiasm for that report was greatly exaggerated. I was much relieved by what we were told about East Suffolk, but in my view, if you are going to establish a form of central school differing only in very small respects from the present secondary school—it is nonsense for the hon. Member for Aberavon to point to the difference in the size of the schools and in the buildings; that has very little to do with it; the curriculum will be very little different—it will simply mean that you will have two different schools doing identically the same work. The board has got to make up its mind whether it wishes to have the secondary schools as another step up the educational ladder, that is, as entrance schools to the universities, in which case they have got to be radically changed—a great many fewer secondary school places will be needed, because you will only want them for those children who are likely to go on to the university—or whether it will have them as a form of intermediate education, in which case the whole of the Hadow Report falls to the ground.
      Lord E. PERCY: Why?
      Mr. BEAUMONT: If you have both doing the same work, it is a complete waste of time and money. You want one or the other, and you have to make up your mind which. I hope the board will turn its attention to that at an early date.
      Now we come to the point raised by the hon. Member in his impassioned speech, greatly to the detriment of the brass-bound Box, telling us that this was a reactionary policy in that it meant less free secondary education, and that we were damping down the progressive authorities and encouraging only the backward and reactionary ones. The only progress of the kind that he has in mind is progress towards bankruptcy in pocket

      1143
      and ruin of character. [Interruption.] It is a statement no more wild than many that I have heard from the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan), and a great deal truer than many of them. I am willing to accept the name of reactionary if that is true of my policy. I am not frightened of words. I want to see the country get back to the old principle that the education and the upbringing of the child are primarily the duty of the parent and that the State should intervene only where the parent is too poor or, for any reason, unwilling to provide that education. I believe, in contradistinction to hon. Members opposite, that parents are only too willing and anxious to shoulder that responsibility. I am just as keen as the hon. Member to see that no child who would really benefit from them shall be deprived of educational facilities because his parents are too poor to afford them.
      Mr. M. JONES: How can you tell whether the child would benefit?
      Mr. BEAUMONT: I think it is up to the parent to prove that the child is worthy of being educated at the State's expense.
      Mr. JONES: How?
      Mr. BEAUMONT: The hon. Gentleman a great believer in competitive examinations. He greeted with loud cheers the statement of the Parliamentary Secretary that so many academic successes had been gained by children from secondary and elementary schools, apparently believing that those successes are a justification of our educational policy.
      Mr. JONES: I really cannot allow that. I merely applauded because of their remarkable triumph over the obstacles in their way.
      Mr. BEAUMONT: I am afraid, as on many other occasions, I must leave the hon. Gentleman with a complete difference of opinion from his point of view. I believe that Circular 1421 was a very good step in the right direction. I should like to go further. I should like to see it made possible—not necessarily obligatory—for every parent who can do so to pay fees in elementary schools. I believe most firmly that that is the way we can best help education. The crisis that we
      1144
      are talking about is not a temporary but a permanent one, and we have to cut our coat according to our cloth. Agreeing that a reduction of taxation and the utmost economy are urgently necessary, I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to investigate the idea of making more and more parents responsible for the education of the child where possible and putting less burden on the State, and, if what I may call the frills of education are wanted, they should be paid for by those who want them. If he will examine that line of argument instead of confining himself to cuts in teachers' salaries, he will attract into the teaching profession the best he can get, he will not skimp the payment of the people who have this most important work in the country, but will try to raise the money from those who get the benefit of it.
      6.52 p.m.
      Sir WILLIAM JENKINS: The Parliamentary Secretary made a very excellent speech, showing that he has his heart in the work. I have had considerable experience of local administration, and I find that the meaning of circulars which have been issued by the board does not always coincide with the arrangements between the board and the local authorities. In this great and important Department one looks for greater reliability and continuity of policy. Unless we have continuity of policy in the Board of Education, I do not know in what other Department we should look for it. If we are going to have changes such as we have had, we are bound to suffer considerably as the result. One instance of the change that I have in mind is in connection with the capitation grant to Glamorgan and, although the board made a considerable saving in one year on teachers' salaries, the authority had an additional expenditure of 2977. We are asking the board to meet the additional cost that has been put on the local authority. The closing of schools is rather an important matter, and it is sometimes considered that in that way some saving can be effected. An arrangement has been made in Glamorgan to close a school, but the conveyance of the children to another area means additional cost to the ratepayers. It is a small school. The estimated annual cost of maintaining it, including the salary of the head teacher

      1145
      and an uncertificated teacher, is £285 6s. and the grant amounts to £112 13s. The total cost of running the school is £172 13s. If it was closed, it would cost £218. The additional net cost to the ratepayers if the school is closed will be £45 17s. The ratepayer and the taxpayer combined would save the difference between £112 and £45 17s., namely, £66 13s. 6d. The taxpayer is safe, but the ratepayer would have to meet an additional cost. Why should the ratepayer suffer because we have not been able to get the board to meet this added expenditure?
      A fundamental change has been made by Circular 1421, and Wales has protested very strongly against it. The board is of opinion that, if the new arrangements are carefully considered and reasonably administered, they will operate without serious hardship. We had very short notice, and we appealed to the board to postpone its operation. The board said it would make no difference at all in Wales, and they sent one of their officers, which is quite an unknown thing, with a view to coercing the authorities. We were told that, unless we agreed, something would happen. I disagree absolutely with that method of approaching local authorities, especially at such very short notice. They say that a satisfactory increase in fee income will be secured without placing any obstacle in the way of the progressive development of secondary education. The fee is a low one, but the people are not in a position to pay for secondary education at present. The Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) on one occasion gave us additional free secondary schools in Glamorganshire, and we were very pleased, but when someone else came to the board there was a change, and the whole of the free secondary schools that we had were taken away from us. Now we have not a single free secondary school in the county. Then they say, in connection with capital expenditure, that we are not going to suffer.
      May I remind the Committee of what has been stated in the particulars that have been issued in Command Paper 4366? It says that, in cases where some increase in the accommodation has been inevitable, the work has been allowed to proceed on the understanding that there would be no increase in the number of
      1146
      pupils admitted to the schools annually until the board were in a position to sanction such increases. That is taking away from the local authorities some part of their rights. We must go to the board before we can get any increase in accommodation. That is one of the things about which we are seriously complaining, and it should not be allowed to continue. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to give us the same grants. I am afraid that we shall be curtailed in Glamorganshire this year, although that would be a very unfair way to deal with the county.
      Let me give an instance of a letter I received yesterday, and of which I feel very proud. Facilities have been given to young men, after they have left the elementary schools, to go to evening continuation schools and here is a letter from a young man who has been through the university and writes to the Education Committee after he has got his degree. He says:
      "For the last four sessions I have held a free studentship and I presume it has now terminated. At the recent degree examination I was successful in attaining a first-class in physics. I have now a double first-class honours degree. Last year I secured first-class honours in mathematics. I am proud to say that only 5½ years ago I was employed as a coal miner."
      I think that is very creditable. We want to continue to give that kind of assistance to young men who are able to take advantage of opportunities of this kind. We are giving loans to assist young men and women without charging any interest, and 99 per cent. of those who have received loans from the county repay the money immediately they get into employment. I am very proud indeed of that.
      Something has been said about raising the school age to 15. We have heard a great deal about the bulge in the number of children of school age, and I want to call attention to the figures given to us by the board's actuary. On 28th April, 1933, the board issued a Circular giving the figures relating to children of school age in the public elementary schools. It proved an over-estimate, and a fresh set of figures had to be prepared. May I call attention to the position of the county of Glamorgan? In 1933, we have in the elementary schools 68,182 children. The estimated number for 1934 is 65,856; while the estimated number for 1935 is 63,220; for 1936, 60,250; and for

      1147
      1937, 57,920. The estimated numbers show that we shall have a considerable reduction in the number of pupils attending the elementary schools. In reply to a question some time ago, the Parliamentary Secretary said that the number of additional school children, if the school age were raised on 1st April, 1934, would, in England and Wales, be slightly over 600,000, falling to 500,000 in 1937.
      I suggest to the Parliamentary Secretary that now is the opportune time to raise the school age to 15, thus assisting the local 'authorities to help those boys and girls who are now leaving school at the age of 14. We have the accommodation, or we can find the accommodation at very little expense, in the county of Glamorgan. May I suggest to the Minister that he should read carefully and digest the report of the Kent Education Committee, prepared by Dr. Salter Davies? It is an excellent document. I believe the major portion of the education authorities are keenly interested in raising the school age. Steps should be taken to compel every authority in the country to raise the age to 15 years at this very opportune time.
      Regarding Wales, I want to put in a plea for consideration of our difficult position. We are a depressed area, South Wales in particular being in a very depressed state. Some consideration should be given by the board to the added expenditure created by our geographical dufficlties. In the mining areas, we have villages in the valleys among the mountains, and the cost of the maintenance of such schools is high. We have an added expenditure on that account, and when we have to build a new school there have been instances in South Wales in which getting the foundations has cost as much as the building of a school in other parts of the country. The cost of removing soil in order to get a foundation has been so costly in some of these cases that we are not in a position to meet additional burdens, if they are placed upon us. I urge the board to give us some further financial assistance.
      May I further ask if there is not some other way in which the board can assist rural areas? The rural areas in Wales are suffering from the geographical conditions to which I have drawn attention.
      1148
      For that reason we may not be up to the standard of England. These rural schools should have some further consideration by the board. There is a rural areas report which asks the board, and various Government Departments, to give some financial assistance. I know schools in the county of Glamorgan where there is one teacher for the whole school, with perhaps a supplementary teacher. The children are compelled to remain with that one individual, with that one mind, and they have no opportunity of going outside it. That is really a hardship. It does not give these children fair play. There are other points with which I would have liked to deal, but time is limited. The Minister should really consider what further assistance he can give to Wales. I should have liked to say a word about the good work the board have done in connection with technical schools, had time permitted. There will be, I hope, some further good work done in connection with the report which has been prepared. With the assistance of the board, I hope we shall be able to do some competent work in that connection.
      7.10 p.m.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I think it will, perhaps, suit the convenience of the Committee if I make a short reply to the major part of the Debate. If I do not do so, I may not get an opportunity later on, and I understand it is the desire of right hon. and gallant Gentlemen opposite that they should take a Division on the reduction which has been moved. I shall he able to deal with only a small number of the points which have been raised, but I will not select the easy ones. I shall take the major points and, if I am not able to deal with the other points, I can assure the Committee I will give them, and all that has been said, very careful consideration. The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) raised the question of teachers' salaries. He wanted, I understood, to know whether the cut was still regarded as an emergency cut. There are two authoritative quotations on the subject which I will give to the Committee. The first one is by the President of the Board of Education at the time the cuts were made. He said that the reduction of teachers' salaries was occasioned by the national emergency, and should not be

      1149
      regarded as the view of the Government as to what should be the proper remuneration of teachers under less abnormal conditions, and that the position would be reviewed on its merits when the financial position of the country allowed. As far as I know, nothing has arisen to qualify that statement.
      The other quotation I want to mention is the statement by the Prime Minister last February, when he said:
      "The present financial situation offers no hope that it will be possible in the near future to restore the cuts in pay."
      With these two statements I think the hon. Member must be content. Then the hon. Member made reference to the Burnham Committee. The Burnham Committee is still in being. Nothing has taken place to cause it to be dissolved. Last March it agreed that the salaries of teachers should remain on their present basis until the following April.
      Mr. COVE: Will the hon. Gentleman say whether at this moment there is any intention to override the powers of the Burnham Committee; whether any independent action will be taken By the Government apart from the ordinary way through the Burnham Committee?
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: As I said, the Burnham Committee met last March and settled the rates of salary for the ensuing year. I was also asked to deal with the question of malnutrition. The hon. Member did not seem quite satisfied with the reports of the school medical officers which we have obtained from the local education authorities. The hon. Gentleman wants the Board itself to investigate each particular area and its own officers to make reports. The hon. Gentleman must realise that such a course is quite impossible. The Board of Education is bound to rely on the best information it can obtain from the most responsible officials in the various areas. The hon. Gentleman went into the question of the black-list schools and buildings. If the hon. Gentleman will subsequently give me the actual names and particulars, I will certainly have the matter looked into. In a number of cases they are voluntary schools, and the Committee is aware of the difficulty with the law as it stands. The power of the State to deal with the non-provided schools is strictly limited. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. M.
      1150
      Jones) turned once more to the charge over Circular 1421, a number which will be written upon his heart and upon mine if this sort of thing continues. I was not very much impressed with the evidence, although he qualified the evidence which he produced to justify or to explain his attitude towards the Circular. I learnt from the remarks he made that the matter caused disquiet. It used to be said that what the soldier said was not evidence, and I would say nor is what the teacher said evidence using the some parity of reasoning.
      Mr. MORGAN JONES: What the parents said.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAMI will deal briefly with the point raised in connection with Circular 1421. I gather that his argument was that it limited the chances of poor children. As a matter of fact, as regards the operation of the Circular, no single area in the country has, so far as I know, a smaller percentage of special places than of free places. On the contrary, the number of special places open as the result of competition exceeds the number of free places. The result of the Circular has been to narrow the area of fee payers, that is to narrow the limits within which a child can have access simply on account of the ability of the parent to pay fees, and to widen the competitive area to children whose chances of getting there depend upon their brains.
      Mr. JONES: Last week-end I saw a report of a debate which took place in the Norfolk Education Committee. Is it a fact that the Board of Education insist that in the list of special places allowed to a particular authority there shall be included places for the children of fee payers, as well as places for others? There was a very sharp discussion on this point in the Norfolk Education Committee. Are the number of special places limited to children whose parents can afford to pay or to those who cannot afford to pay?
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I am not sure that I have understood. Does it not depend upon the number of special places the authority awards? In some cases it is 25 or 50, and in others it is 100. I cannot say what it is in the case of Norfolk. The special places, I believe, are limited to 50 if there is a residue of fee paying

      1151
      places. In South Wales the position, I think, is that in all secondary schools the percentage of special places is 100 per cent. I hope that with that explanation the hon. Member will be satisfied.
      Sir WILLIAM JENKINS: It is not 100 per cent. for the whole of South Wales.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I think that in the areas where it was 100 free places before, it is 100 per cent. special places now. I was sorely tempted at times to enter upon discussion with my Noble Friend the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy), but I am going to remain in a state of quiescence, particularly if it should happen that the hon. Member for Aberavon is right, for the Noble Lord would be wrong.
      Lord E. PERCY: Obviously, he cannot be right.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I will not continue a discussion of that kind, although I have great respect for the arguments of the Noble Lord. In fact, I regard him as the H. G. Wells of education. The future of secondary education presents difficult problems. His method is to take up secondary schools by the roots and see how they are growing. We want to let them develop gradually. The hon. Member for Finchley (Mr. Cadogan) referred to the charge of bookishness and over academic education given in secondary schools. There is a great deal of force in what he has said, but I am inclined to think that the fact is becoming increasingly realised and the condition is disappearing. The Committee will forgive me if I make a reference to ancient history. The position to-day seems to be something like that of some 2,000 years ago when the great educational discovery was the importance of the physical culture of the body as a means of developing the mental attributes—probably one of the greatest discoveries ever made. But I am not sure that we are not making now another discovery in some way analogous. In the education of the children, no matter who they may he, in the development of their mental activity, skill with their hands and training of hand and eye are an absolutely invaluable adjunct to the mental capacity which we hope they will develop.
      Mr. CADOGAN: The point I was making was the need to encourage pupils
      1152
      to go in for other than academic subjects in secondary schools.
      Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I remember that point, but I think the hon. Member also made a point of general application that we were not regarding the practical side sufficiently in secondary schools. The position in the secondary schools is being increasingly realised and children are getting more of the practical education. I will conclude by reminding the Committee of a, quotation which I read the other day showing the experience of John Stuart Mill upon this very point, because it is interesting as showing the results which might happen as a result of an academic education. This is what he wrote:
      "I remained inexpert in anything requiring manual dexterity; my mind, as well as my hands, did its work very lamely when it was applied or ought to be applied to practical details."
      Therefore I think in all our schools, the senior schools and the secondary schools, a great deal more can be done for training the mental capacity of our children if they are given more opportunity of training in hand and in eye.
      7.24 p.m.
      Captain SPENCER: Perhaps it is not inappropriate that after the secondary school system has been subjected to the incantations of the Noble Lord the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy), acting as the witch doctor, and the applications of the leech in the shape of the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. M. Beaumont), the modest voice of one who has bad practical experience of active work in those schools should be heard in this Committee. I think that we may leave the Noble Lord alone for a time. My hon. Friend the Minister has dealt with him. But something should be said about the hon. Member for Aylesbury because he is a phenomenon so rare to-day. He is a picturesque survival of the days to which we shall never return. He belongs, if I may so put it, to the days of Lady Clara Vere de Vere, who thought that education began and finished by teaching the orphan boy to read, or teaching the orphan girl to sew, and then to pray Heaven for a humble heart. Fortunately, we see the hon. Member in action. People outside this House only read what he says, and not having the privilege, as we have, of seeing how the figure works, and it is

      1153
      apt to cause alarm and despondency in the hearts of many of those who have a. genuine interest in the cause of education.
      I like better the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mr. Cadogan) which showed a really practical interest in the work of the secondary schools and a real and genuine desire that those schools should fulfil their function and play their part in the educational system of the country. He deplored, as I deplore, the fact that practical work does not occupy so large a part in the curriculum as it might well do. Indeed, 15 months ago, speaking on the Education Estimates, I made a plea to the then Minister that more should be done for the child who can do things with its hands rather than concentrate almost entirely upon the child who is quick at assimilating facts and reproducing them on an appropriate occasion.
      To get to the root cause of the concentration upon the academic side we cannot overlook the requirements which have been made from the examination point of view. The whole of the work of our secondary schools, it is no exaggeration to say, has been conditioned now for some 10 years by the requirements of the school certificate examination and the matriculation examination. I welcome the report of the Secondary School Examinations Council and their recommendation that the two examinations should henceforth be separated. I hope that the board will lose no time in bringing about that much desired consummation, but that, in abolishing the matriculation examination as far as the schools are concerned, we shall not transfer all the blights and blemishes which flow from the matriculation examination and unload them on the school certificate examination. I hope that with the passing of matriculation we shall see the passing also of the invidious comparisons which are made between school and school, and the plotting of graphs to show the relative attainments of one school as against another and of one class as against another, or of one subject as against another. There is no doubt that such comparisons have resulted in competition which has not been to the good of the schools or to the pupils engaged in working in those schools. It has tended to turn our secondary schools into mass production factories which have concen-
      1154
      trated on the turning out of what may be called 45 per cent. mathematicians, 45 per cent. linguists, and 45 per cent. scientists, merely intent on scraping through their examinations.
      7.29 p.m.
      Mr. ERNEST EVANS: I wish to share with certain speakers to-day in the expressions of gratitude to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education for the extremely attractive manner in which he addressed the Committee, but I cannot join in congratulating him upon his speech as far as it affected the policy of the Board of Education. The bulk of his speech was addressed, not to those who are really interested in advocating the improvement of the educational system, but rather to those who have been complaining about the amount of money being expended upon education by the Government of the present time. I think it is singularly unfortunate—
      It being half-past Seven of the clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means, under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed without Question put.

  PRIVATE BUSINESS.

    ADELPHI ESTATE BILL [Lords.] (By Order).
    Order for Second Reading read.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
    7.30 p.m.
    Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: I beg to move, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words, "upon this day three months."
    In the absence of the right hon. Member for Tamworth (Sir A. Steel-Maitland) it falls to my lot to move the Amendment on the Order Paper. I had not prepared a preliminary statement of the actual facts with which the Bill deals, but they are set out in a statement which has been sent to every hon. Member of the House on behalf of the promoters, and, as far as I am able to judge the first paragraphs setting out the facts are substantially correct. The Bill, as stated in the Memorandum:

    1155
    "seeks to attain two principal objects, the repeal of statutory restrictions dating from 1771 limiting to a height of 20 feet any buildings erected on that part of the estate known as the foreground, which lies immediately in front of Adelphi Terrace, which is an area of approximately 30,000 square feet and, (b), the execution of certain street works as shown on the plan attached to the Memorandum."
    I am what I suppose would be described as an old-fashioned Tory. I strongly believe that a man is entitled to do what he will with his own property so long as he does not interfere with or injure the property or rights of others, but no such rule gives a man any rights over property belonging to the public. The public have valuable rights in the Adelphi which this Bill will take from them if it becomes an Act of Parliament. May I bring to the notice of the House a number of points which I think will substantiate that statement? The Bill will add a good deal more than one-third to the area of the site. I do not know whether hon. Members have had the plan which has been sent to me. The blue and pink part of the plan shows the site which is in the hands of the trustees, and which they correctly say is their own property and they can do what they like with it, subject to the observance of the London County Council's regulations regarding buildings, and the law of the land generally. With regard to the foreground, which is marked white and pink, it will be observed that it is rather more than one-third of the whole site and in accordance with the Act of 1771, when this property was allowed to be embanked out of the river, Parliament made the condition that no building should be erected on this part of the site of a greater height than 20 feet.
    It is that restriction which the promoters of this Bill desire to remove, so that they may build over the whole of the site, not only on the two-thirds which they hold, and where they have full rights, but also on the additional one-third of which they only hold the freehold subject to the condition that no building shall be erected of a greater height than 20 feet. That area, as I have explained, is 30,000 square feet. I submit that inadequate compensation is being paid for the acquisition of full building rights on this very large and valuable piece of land. The promoters say: "We are going to give you pieces
    1156
    of land to widen Adam Street on the one side and Robert Street on the. other, to 40 feet." If property is not asked for or desired it is no compensation for other property which is of great value. That is not my own idea. I have certain evidence, in support which I was only able to obtain this afternoon. It is the evidence given on behalf of the promoters before the House of Lords Committee. Mr. Leonard James Veit, who is the City Engineer and Surveyor for the City of Westminster, was examined by counsel for the promoters:
    "(Q.) I do not want to take you through a lot of the details that are already before the Committee, but just a question with regard to the existing streets. Are they adequate for their present purposes?
    (A.) For their present purposes, yes.
    (Q.) In your judgment; would they be adequate if the traffic were materially increased on account of rebuilding?
    (A.) No, I think not."
    Therefore, those of us who desire to keep this beautiful little piece of town planning known as the Adelphi in its present condition cannot accept a piece of ground forming part of the Adelphi property belonging to the trustees for the widening of a street which, in the evidence given by the Westminster City Surveyor, is not needed if the property is left as it is at present. Another question was raised as to the Terrace itself. The promoters contend, and they contended before the Committee that the public have no rights to a view. They say that the public have only a right to go along a thoroughfare for their business, if business takes them there, and that they have no right to a view.
    Carrying out that idea, in accordance with the scheme which is submitted, the promoters propose to take away that beautiful Adelphi Terrace looking out over the Embankment Gardens and the river and are placing it in a tunnel in the centre of their new buildings, subject only to a, sort of funnel or chimney in the middle, which will give it a certain amount of ventilation. I do not know whether the public have a right to a view or not, but I know that Parliament has always protected public rights, and we can make laws, and we can say that this is a street from which the public have had a view and we the Parliament of Great Britain are going to insist on the

    1157
    Public having that view in the future, as they have had in the past. There was some suggestion that this was only s, private right, or something of that kind. On that point I will quote further from the examination by counsel:
    "(Q.) One point as to Adelphi Terrace Are you able to tell the Committee when it became a public highway?
    (A.) No, not definitely. We have no record exactly when it was dedicated, but we have maintained it definitely, and, we have records since 1876.
    Mr. TYLDESLEY JONES, K.C.: You have maintained it since 1876?
    (A.) Certainly, that is definite. No doubt it was earlier than that, but we have no definite record of that."
    Therefore, since 1876 Adelphi Terrace has been maintained by the City of Westminster as a public highway and the public who have frequented that highway have had this view over the gardens and the river. I submit that the Adelphi in its present condition is a delightful piece of town-planning which it is most desirable that the public should retain, if they can do so. The Adelphi contains a good many buildings in addition to Adelphi Terrace. The Royal Society of Arts, who have recently purchased one of the gems of Adams' architecture in John Street, are just at the back. The whole place is a unique gem of town-planning, with most beautiful buildings and most beautiful interiors and fittings. It is true with regard to Adelphi Terrace that the building fronting the Terrace was slightly altered some years ago, but if so desired the cement then put on could easily be removed and the building would be as it was when originally erected by the Adams brothers. The two buildings at the end are still practically as they originally were when they were erected, except for the building of a room at one end.
    It is said: "The Adelphi Trustees are perfectly entitled to pull down the buildings fronting the Adelphi Terrace, if they so desire, as it is their own freehold." That is true, and I should not be standing here to-night seeking to prohibit them from doing it, if they so intended, but it is clearly understood, so far as I can gather from what was said in the House of Lords and what I have heard elsewhere, that they have no idea of pulling down Adelphi Terrace unless they can get this extra 30,000 feet of frontage. Then it would pay them to pull down the
    1158
    old buildings and to put up a huge block on the same lines as the Savoy Hotel and the Shell Mex building. If we approve the Bill to-night we shall be particeps criminis. We shall be participating in a very regrettable act, because unless we give them the control over the foreground they will not rebuild. They can rebuild if they like, but I submit that they will not rebuild the Adelphi. It is well let. I understand that there are no vacancies and that it is a very good property, of good rental value. Therefore, by passing this Bill we shall be playing into the hands of the trustees, and I think that most of us desire that the Adelphi should be kept as it is at present.
    Why should we give up our rights to this beautiful view over the river, quite apart from the buildings 1 I have dealt with the point as to whether the public have rights to the view. It is contended that owing to the growth of the poplar trees, which were put in to nurse the plane trees in the Embankment Gardens, the view over the gardens and the river is obstructed, especially when the trees are in full foliage. I have examined the place repeatedly. These old poplar trees should have been cut down long ago. They are very much mutilated—[Interruption.] If the Chief Whip does not know a good tree from a bad one he should go to the Forestry Commission. These trees are misshapen and mutilated, and while I am very fond of trees myself and do not like cutting them down, I would part with every one of these trees as trees, quite apart from any other consideration. In fact, these poplar trees will remove themselves in course of time; they are lop-sided and will fall to pieces if they are not removed very soon. That argument, in my submission, falls to the ground.
    This block is very near the northern exit or access of the Charing Cross Bridge of the future. Every hon. Member is convinced that not long hence it will be necessary for a new road bridge to be built at Charing Cross. Surely it would be an extraordinary thing, when there is no compulsion on this House, when this property is well let and when no grievance would be caused to any individual, that we should go out of our way to allow a great building to be put up which will certainly interfere with the freedom of those who have to plan an

    1159
    exit from the new Charing Cross Bridge. It is true that Sir Henry Maybury has given evidence that none of the proposals made so far have any roads going through this site, but town planning is a great deal more than the question of a road here and there. You have to take the whole immediate area, and this beautiful little village of Adelphi might be an important part of a town planning scheme in connection with the northern exit from the new Charing Cross Bridge.
    Another point that is urged is that the Westminster City Council and the London County Council, who presented petitions against the Bill, have withdrawn their objections. On the face of it that is, I confess, a strong argument; but I have made it my business this morning to see some able officials of local authorities in London, who are fully alive to these matters. I asked them whether if this had been in their area they could have considered the aesthetic point of view of the Adelphi buildings; and they said, "No. This is a matter which could only be considered in connection with town planning." The Westminster City Council and the London County Council have only looked at it from a rateable and building Act point of view. That is quite clear from the evidence. They could not do otherwise. There has been no town planning scheme by the London County Council in connection with this area; and if there is one thing which I should like to impress upon the House it is the urgent need that the London County Council should prepare a town planning scheme for this area. But are we now going to pass this Bill which will gravely interfere with any town planning scheme? There are two other pregnant sentences in the evidence which I will read; I saw them when I was reading the evidence a short time ago in the Library. If hon. Members will turn to page 35 and question 436, they will find these words:
    "I think there is only one other point. Something has been said here with regard to the question of town planning in this area."
    This is a question which is put to the Westminster City Council's surveyor:
    "If this Bill passes and this scheme is carried out by the Adelphi Trustees, would that in itself be a town planning scheme for this particular Adelphi estate area?"
    1160
    The answer of the city surveyor was: "Yes, I think so."
    Therefore, this House, without any adequate information, is being asked to pass a town planning scheme for the Adelphi estate area. if hon. Members will turn to page 39 they will find this question: Lord Alvingham asked:
    "Whether the promoters are in a position to say whether they have any ideas in their mind as to height?"
    That question was answered by Mr. Tyldesley Jones, leading counsel for the promoters, as follows:
    "No, my Lord. At the present moment there are no plans. We have not got any development plans at all prepared."
    We are told that this Bill will be equivalent to making a town planning scheme for the Adelphi area and at the same time are told that no plans for development have been prepared. The House of Commons will take a grave responsibility upon itself if they pass this Bill to-night with these facts in mind. Let me put one further point in regard to the amenities of the Embankment Gardens. It is true that this scheme takes a very small amount of land from the Embankment Gardens and gives another little bit of land in exchange. But in order to get any benefit—the only benefit I can find in the scheme is the continuance of the lower road which now goes past the Savoy Hotel and the Shell-Mex building up to York Buildings—in order to do that the Westminster City Council will have to take a considerable slice of the gardens and will probably have to remove that ancient monument, York Gate, which has an historic interest.. Therefore, while it is true that no material part of the Embankment Gardens is being taken away in order to do the only thing of material use, the carrying of this small lower road, you will eventually have to take a considerable slice of the gardens.
    Another argument put forward is that Parliament and the public have given up similar rights in the case of the Cecil Hotel, now the Shell-Mex building, and the Savoy Hotel, and that they have done this in the past surely they are going to do the same in this case. Really that reasoning would justify giving up land anywhere that because land has been given up to Mr. Smith, or Mr. Robinson, Mr. Jones, must, of course, have

    1161
    land given to him too. As a matter of fact, there is another piece of land which is a case in point. The Southern Railway were allowed to build on the foreground at Charing Cross on the express condition that the courtyard at Charing Cross should be left as an open space. They have often asked to be allowed to build on this available ground, but their application has been refused. If you say that because Shell-Mex and the Savoy Hotel have been granted certain privileges in the past, we must grant these privileges to the Adelphi trustees, you must also grant the same privileges to the Southern Railway. The argument is untenable, in my submission. Parliament must consider this matter on its merits. Even if the London County Council and the Westminster City Council had not been confined to tae question of rating and building Acts. I would still say that Parliament should sill express its opinion even if great, public bodies take a different view.
    Let me summarise my arguments. Why should the public give up Adelphi Terrace with its delightful view, and have foisted upon it in its place a tunnel passageway with a funnel in the middle? Secondly, why should the public reduce the size and amenities of the Embankment Gardens? They are used more and more every day. In the early morning they are used by children and by people coming from their offices and taking their lunch there, and by old people who sit out in the Gardens in the evenings. It is idle to say that to build a great building right up against them will not affect their amenities, of course it will. Why should we reduce the size of the Gardens and the amenities generally? In the next place, why should we interfere with the freedom to plan a dignified northern approach to Charing Cross bridge? I have read from the evidence that the Trustees have no plans. Why should we not wait until plans are submitted, and then make up our minds as to whether they are an improvement on the Old Adelphi or not. I submit that we are not in a position nor should we be willing to formulate a town planning scheme when the promoters themselves have no development plans. If we facilitate the pulling down of the Adelphi, one of the most beautiful little pieces of town planning which exists, this House will become par-
    1162
    ticipators in something which I really think it does not desire. For these reasons I hope the House will refuse to give a Second Reading to this Bill. No-one will be prejudiced. The Adelphi is a well-let building, the promoters of the Bill are getting substantial rents. We are not interfering with them in dealing with their own property. I therefore submit that we should not give up these public rights.
    7.58 p.m.
    Sir ARTHUR STEEL-MAITLAND: I beg to second the Amendment.
    The hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) has put the arguments, which in my opinion are overwhelming, against a Second Reading of this Bill so fully and forcibly and so convincingly that I need not detain the House very long. But I want to reinforce what he has said. I would ask anyone to take a walk, as I have done and have persuaded one or two other hon. Members to do, over Hunger-ford Bridge and then have a look at the north side of the Thames. They would see farther away the great sweep of Somerset House and coming nearer the Savoy Hotel, Shell-Mex building, and then the ground upon which Adelphi Terrace is situate. I do not profess to be an expert in these matters, and I hope that I am not extreme. In the Essex County Council Bill there was a Clause which I thought went too far in one direction and I opposed it, and brought down upon myself some criticism from societies who are interested in the preservation of amenities. But I think just what five out of every six ordinary, sensible men who wish to preserve London as a good fine place would feel as they walked over Hungerford Bridge. They would say that Somerset House was a magnificent stretch of building, far finer than the buildings put up since, and they would be really shocked if, on the stretch of land on which Adelphi Terrace stands, they knew that there was to be erected another great block of flats or offices to the height of the Savoy Hotel.
    The next thing I would ask anyone to do is to walk down the steps, to go into the Embankment Gardens, and go to the only place from which it is possible to get a real view of Adelphi Terrace, by climbing up the mound at the back. Of course, it has been overlaid and largely

    1163
    spoilt by the additions that have been made to the original Adams building, but there is no question whatever that the whole of the general structure and the chief features of the Adams building are there. It is easy to agree with the expert architects who say that, not at a tremendous cost, the whole of the cement and stucco put on 60 or 70 years ago could be removed and the old Adams building would be there in its original state. The view of it is obscured by the poplars which were planted long after the Adams building was built. I agree that they are not worth anything as trees. They could be easily pollarded or cut down, and replaced by trees far more suitable to that kind of garden, especially if the ground was made level. I would also make one further claim. Although the building was spoilt about 1870 or thereabouts, yet I think any ordinary person would infinitely prefer to have the building as it is than see a great block of new buildings in its place.
    I wish to reinforce one or two of the points made by my hon. Friend. It has been stated by those who support the Bill, and by promoters of the Bill, that leave to build above the 20 foot limit was given some time ago in the case of the site of what is now the Shell-Mex Building, and also in the case of the Savoy Hotel, and it is argued that leave should be given in this case to the owners of the Adelphi Terrace site. But really is it not absurd for people to claim in the first place that the Adelphi Terrace building is not worth keping because the Victorian taste of 60 years ago was so bad as completely to spoil the building, and on the other hand to say that Victorian action 60 years ago with regard to the Savoy Hotel site and the Shell-Mex site was so infallible that what was done then ought to be taken as a precedent to-day? They cannot have it both ways. Of course the Victorian age was not the greatest age of architecture, and the truth is that the Victorians of that time made a mistake in both cases. The mistake ought to be remedied in the case of Adelphi Terrace. We ought not to repeat the mistake made in the case of the Savoy Hotel and the Shell-Mex Building.
    There was a point which I think my hon. Friend did not mention. It has
    1164
    been stated that by the Bill power is being given to pull down Adelphi Terrace. It is pointed out by the promoters of the Bill that the owners of Adelphi Terrace have a perfect right to pull it down now if they wish. Of course they have, and any statement to the contrary is a mistaken one. The whole question is whether they would pull it down if they were not given power to build above the 20 feet, in other words if the restriction was not-removed which has existed from the time when this land was first rescued from the Thames. If the restriction were not removed, would they carry out the big scheme which we are told is proposed I ask the House to listen to the words of counsel for the promoters of the Bill. Mr. Tyldesley Jones, who was arguing the case before a Select Committee of the House of Lords, said:
    "The owners of this estate could pull down every house there To-day, and it may well be that these houses may have to go sooner or later, but you cannot develop that site well unless you are going to take into the scheme of development the land which lies below Adelphi Terrace and between the Terrace and the gardens."
    In other words it is quite clear that if we pass this Bill and give power to the promoters to build on that low ground, if we take away the present restriction, then indeed we may be sure that Adelphi Terrace will be destroyed. Whether or not it will be destroyed if that power is not given is indeed an open question. A great deal has been said about the principle of this Bill having been agreed by other bodies. I wish that before I spoke I could have heard the speech which I understand we are to have in favour of the Bill from the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray). There is no one who has not respect for what the hon. Member may say about London, for he is a very distinguished member of the London County Council. I wish we had had here to-night also the hon. Member for Maidstone (Mr. Bossom), who is also a member of the London County Council and an exceedingly distinguished architect. I think he is as anxious as anyone present for the preservation of Adelphi Terrace. If what I am about to say is not correct, perhaps the hon. Member for Richmond will correct me. It is perfectly clear that both the London County Council and the Westminster City Council have to see that London building by-laws are observed and that require-

    1165
    ments with regard to streets are satisfied. I wonder whether the hon. Member can now say whether the London County Council have considered the question from the point of view of the value of the architecture of the building itself and its effect on the aspect of the Embankment and the Gardens. I understand that no such claim can be made.
    Sir WILLIAM RAY: I will answer the right hon. Gentleman. Of course it is not the duty of any local authority to deal with architectural features and so on, La passing plans or whatever may come forward. But let me expand the point. If we had felt sufficiently justified in dealing with this matter as the right hon. Gentleman has stated, we should have taken exactly the same steps in regard to the Adelphi Estate, by town-planning it, as we took at 24 hours' notice in order to save Parliament Square. That would have been our action if we had thought that the occasion was so important as to demand that the town-planning of Adelphi Terrace should take place.
    Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I do not think I am abusing any confidence when I say that one of the reasons why the hon. Member for Maidstone would have liked to have been here was, as he told me, that he infinitely regretted that pressure of business had been such that as yet a town-planning scheme did not cover Adelphi Terrace. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) for intervening. We may differ on this Bill, but I have a great respect for his opinion. At any rate we know it cannot be argued that the withdrawal of objection to the Bill by the London County-Council and the Westminster City Council has given any cachet to the Bill or has justified it on architectural s
    grounds.
    Then there is the question of employment in the erection of new buildings. I have heard it said that here is a great scheme which will employ a great many men at a time when work is much needed. I should be the last to wish that employment should not be given. But anyone who takes a comprehensive and sane view of the employment question must realise that, whether or not employment is given in the building trade in the erection of flats or offices in London, depends upon the demand for flats and offices. If there was only one site in the whole of London that was suit-
    1166
    able, and that site was denied, and at the same time there was a great demand for flats or offices, it might be that employment would be withheld. Within a mile of Adelphi Terrace, however, there are over one-and-a-quarter million square feet of office space that has not yet been used at all. There are plenty of other sites available if there is a real demand for flats or offices; there are sites enough and to spare on which such buildings could be placed. The little backwater of Adephi Terrace need not be taken for that purpose.
    I sympathise also with any owner of land who wants to improve his property and get the best value out of it. I am both an urban and an agricultural landowner in a small way. I ask the House, however, to agree with me that we must determine our action in a matter like this by what we think is the public interest. As regards that, much as I respect, anyone who has a particular duty towards London like my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, the dignity and the beauty of London concern all of us. London is the capital of the Empire. We all care for it and we are all anxious to preserve its dignity and beauty. Up to the present we have had no authoritative opinion of any kind in favour of this Bill as being, from that point of view, worthy of support. All the authoritative opinion which we have had from architects and others goes to show that it would tend further to spoil the aspect of the Thames Embankment, already much spoiled, and that it would do away with a building which is of historic value in itself, and which is—though at present in the condition I have described—capable of restoration. I put it to the House: Are we going to pass a Bill which will, by abolishing this restriction, create a building value, a value which does not exist at present and has never existed since this land was reclaimed from the Thames. Are we going to make a present of it to those concerned in order to facilitate such hurt as I believe will be done to the amenities of London if the course proposed in the Bill is followed.
    8.17 p.m.
    Sir W. RAY: I must first express appreciation of the extremely kind tones in which the right hon. Gentleman the Mem-for Tamworth (Sir A. Steel-Maitland) has referred to those connected with the work

    1167
    of local government in London. His opinion of them appears to be just a little higher than that of the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison).
    Sir W. DAVISON: Not at all.
    Sir W. RAY: The hon. Member thought that both the Westminster Council and the London County Council were mainly interested in this project from a rateable value point of view. I assure him that that point of view is never taken into consideration in matters of this kind. I hope that we can rise superior to any charge that we would wilfully disfigure any part of London in order to enhance rateable value. Therefore, I take the kindly words of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Tamworth as some solace for what my hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington said.
    Sir W. DAVISON: I never suggested that the County Council or the Westminster City Council would think of disfiguring London in order to get additional rates. I am vice-chairman of an improvement committee and when a building scheme of this kind is submitted to us we certainly look at it from the point of view of rateable value as well as other points of view. We consider the question "If we put a building of this class on this site, will it interfere with the rateable value of adjoining property?" That is a perfectly proper consideration for an improvement committee to take into account. In fact, the London County Council only the other day sent to Kensington a proposal which they had had before them in order to know whether we thought the particular building was suitable, how it would affect the question of rateable value of the property as a whole.
    Sir W. RAY: I had great hesitation about joining in this Debate. If one has any sympathy in this matter it is in the direction of preserving in London any thing that is old—not ancient—and anything that has a claim to beauty. But, considering that the promotors had taken the trouble to negotiate with the local authorities and had eventually inserted in the Bill everything that the local authorities thought necessary for the protection of the interests of the people of London I felt that it would be rather cruel on my part if I did not stand up in
    1168
    my place and say so and give some measure of support to the Bill. I feel that the House is interested in what has been termed the dignity and beauty of London, but unlike the previous speakers I am prepared to leave the question of the dignity and beauty of this project to a Committee of this House. We are not asking the House to pass the Bill tonight. We are asking that this project, which has received criticism from other quarters, as well as in the House tonight, should not be adjudicated upon here and now in a House which is only about one-fifth full, and in which opinions are thrown about from side to side. I want to see all these criticisms rigidly examined by a Committee of the House selected for that purpose which, in due course, will report back to the House the result of its deliberations. That is all that is being asked to-night. We are not being asked to approve of the Bill.
    I regret that those who are opposed to the Bill are not prepared to let it go forward for detailed examination and criticism by a Committee of this House, just as it has been subjected to examination and criticism in another place. I remember a Bill some years ago in connection with Charing Cross which on its Second Reading got an overwhelming majority in this House but it was unanimously turned down by a Select Committee and that was the end of the project for that period, although I hope not for too many years to come. To-night I think it perfectly reasonable to come to this House and to say, "Here is a proposal in connection with the re-development of one of the most important sites in London. Surely, this proposal demands proper investigation, and those who are connected with the project have a right to expect that the House will give to the proposal that critical examination which it deserves." The more I look into this Bill, the more I am convinced that it wants examination and the more I believe that the view submitted by the Mover and Seconder of the Amendment will receive attention.
    It appears to me that in viewing this matter we ought to take into consideration the changed character of the Thames Embankment. I remember a time when the Embankment was dominated by Somerset House with Waterloo Bridge falling naturally into the great picture.

    1169
    To-day, the Embankment is dominated by the Shell-Mex Building, the Savoy Hotel, Unilever House, and, in the distance, Bush House. The whole domination of the Embankment has changed. We are left with one site on which the question of development is ripe for consideration. I am not arguing for or against it, but merely saying that it is ripe for consideration. That consideration is not to be given by the London County Council or the Westminster City Council, but should be given by a Committee of this House, and it is not the duty of local authorities to deal with matters of that kind.
    The object of the Bill is perfectly simple. The history of the reclamation of the foreshore as far back as 1771 and of the restriction placed by Parliament above 20 feet high is well known. It is ell known also that the Salisbury Estate got the restriction removed about 1865 or 1875 for the purpose of the land which was in front of the late Hotel Cecil, now Shell-Mex and the Savoy. Here an owner, without, I think, being liable to an accusation of selfishness, feels that he has a right more or less to develop his land on the lines which have been granted to other applicants, and I suggest that this House might do as the other place has done and consider the matter in a Select Committee instead of in a gathering such as we have here to-night. We feel that we have got from the promoters of the Bill some very valuable concessions. We have got John, Robert, and Adam streets to be widened to a width of 40 feet, and that is an enormous concession and one of which London will ultimately be very proud. There is to be a development of the lower road. Instead of the piece of the land which is to-day a disgrace to this great Metropolis, we are to have that lower road widened, and ultimately we shall find it running parallel with the Embankment, joining up to the street known as York Buildings, and finally debouching into the Strand.
    Mr. MOLSON: Has the hon. Member observed that York Buildings is so narrow that it would be impossible for the traffic to be carried by that narrow road to pass up into the Strand without there being congestion at York Buildings?
    Sir W. RAY: I would remind the hon. Member that there are such things taking
    1170
    place in London every day as street improvements, and if a road were constructed parallel to the Embankment which promised access to the Strand, I do not think the authorities concerned would hesitate very long about proceeding with the necessary improvements. That will be an enormous advantage to the traffic of London, which is going to be the problem of London in the near future and for many years to come. The hon. Member for South Kensington spoke of the tragedy that would occur by the giving up of a portion of the Embankment Gardens. It is a strip some five feet wide, and I hardly think it will destroy the amenities of the Embankment Gardens to an enormous extent, as we are going to get more than that in return. We are to get in all, thrown into the public way, some 23,000 square feet of land. That is the sacrifice that the promoters are prepared to make in order to reap the advantages which they hope to get. That land, valued at about £150,000, is to be handed over to the public, and the cost to the promoters for the development of that road will be about another £39,000, so that, so far as the London County Council are concerned, we have got from the promoters of the Bill everything which it was our duty to the public to insist upon getting.
    Consequently, I feel that I should be failing in my duty to people who have done their best to negotiate with us and meet us if to-night I could not make some stand in support of the action which they have taken. The argument about Charing Cross Bridge, frankly, leaves me rather cold. Perhaps it is because I have heard so much about Charing Cross Bridge in the last 10 years that I look upon it almost as something mythical; and I can say this, that we have been advised that the scheme now before the House would not interfere with any one of the six schemes which were submitted to the advisory committee set up by the London County Council. The House will remember that after it destroyed our Bill, the London County Council set up a committee consisting of its critics for the purpose of producing an agreed scheme. Six schemes were submitted to them, and so far as interference is concerned, I can say to the House, on advice, that this project of the Adelphi Estate Company would not interfere in any way with

    1171
    any one of the schemes which have been submitted.
    A point was raised with regard to town planning, and perhaps in my reply to the right hon. Member for Tamworth I did not make the position quite clear. Those Members of the House who are connected with local government work know that all these schemes, to whatever area they belong, have to run the gamut of committees and officials dealing with specific types of work. This scheme has been before our Building Acts Committee, from the point of view of conformity with the London Building Acts; it has been before the Town Planning Committee, from the point of view of amenities; and it has been before the Parks Committee, in regard to the alleged interference with the rights of the public so far as the Embankment Gardens are concerned. I wanted to make it clear that if our Town Planning Committee had felt the urgency of town-planning this little area because great damage would be done, it would have taken exactly the same steps as it did a month or two ago, when, on the very shortest notice, it town-planned Parliament Square in order that a building should not be put up on a site at the corner of George Street. I assume that our Town Planning Committee must have felt that there was not the urgency in this case that demanded them to take extraordinary action of that kind.
    In Clause 33 of the Bill provision is made in regard to the elevation, and there a Sub-section has been inserted which provides that drawings of the elevation of any building on the Adelphi foreground should be submitted to an architect, to be appointed by the President of the Royal Academy, for approval of the architectural treatment of the elevation, and in the event of disapproval by such architect there is to be an appeal to an advisory committee, consisting of three persons, one appointed by the architect, one by the trustees, and a third a qualified architect practising in the county of London.
    My only interest in the Bill is from the point of view that London development is proceeding. It cannot be arrested. I do not say that we shall not resist to the utmost any attempt to destroy what in London is deemed worthy of preservation, but this appeals to me as a matter of fair play more than anything else.
    1172
    When the promoters of the Bill have got their Measure through the House of Lords on a Division on Third Reading—and this is a significant fact—with a large majority in favour of it, when they have done their utmost to satisfy the local authorities concerned and have succeeded in doing so, when they are face to face with newspaper criticism and the criticism of distinguished men of aesthetic and artistic taste, I feel that, as a matter of fair play, the only real way in which such a vital subject can be dealt with—and it is vital to London in many respects—is to treat it, I will not say generously, but as a question of supreme importance, and let the pros and cons, let the criticism and the support, let everything connected with the Bill be subjected to the minutest criticism that expert evidence can bring to bear. I submit that then this House will on Third Reading have evidence before it such as it has not before it in the words of one speaker on one side or of another speaker on the other side. We are debating a matter about which the House is not and cannot be fully seized of all the arguments, and I suggest in the interests of fair play, be the result what it may, that the House should commit the Bill to a Committee, and then on Third Reading we shall have real grounds on which to cast our votes, yea or nay.
    8.38 p.m.
    The CHAIRMAN of WAYS and MEANS (Sir Dennis Herbert): As this is the first occasion in this Parliament when it has seemed to me my duty as Chairman of Ways and Means to intervene in a discussion on a Private Bill, perhaps I shall not be doing amiss if for the benefit of new Members I remind the House of the practice, which is well known to older Members, as to the part which the Chairman of Ways and Means has to play with regard to these Bills. Private Bills differ from public Bills by reason of the fact that they are not promoted by Members of this House, but are introduced on the petition of a suitor to Parliament. It is for that reason that the House of Commons has seen fit to place these Bills officially in the charge of and under the care of the Chairman of Ways and Means. My duty, therefore, is to see that the suitors to Parliament get their case fairly put before Parliament and that the machinery of the House of Commons is properly used to

    1173
    deal with their case, and. that the House is fully seized of all the points which are necessary in order to enable them to come to a fair decision. For that reason, therefore, as my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) has just said, no Private Bill should be refused a Second Reading in this House by reason of opinions which Members may hold on one side or another in regard to a matter which it is proper to fight out before a Private Bill Committee which, as hon. Members know, is in the nature of a semi-judicial tribunal.
    On the other hand, let me say at once that where some great question of principle arises it is not only within the competence and power of this House, but it is no doubt the duty of this House to consider it, and, if necessary, to pass judgment upon it upon Second Reading. Therefore, I make no complaint whatever that a Bill of this importance, which has aroused great interest, is brought up for discussion in the House. The first and most essential point is that the House should really understand what the Bid does in its main outline. It has been not incorrectly described by the three Members who have already spoken, and, taking those descriptions of the facts as correct, we come to this: that the petitioners to Parliament, the owners of the Adelphi Estate, are the absolute owners of certain property in regard to which they have the right to do, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) said, what they will so long as they do not injure public interest. For the purpose of doing what is reasonable in the development of their property—and I am not putting it too far in putting it in that way—they ask Parliament to remove a restriction which would prevent them from building anything more than 20 feet high on the front portion of their property.
    If Parliament gives them that right Parliament acquires, for the benefit of the public, certain other rights of which we have heard, such as the widening of the roads, and so forth. It is emphatically, as every Member will agree, a question for the Committee to decide as to whether that is a fair and reasonable bargain, but the point which really arises perhaps for consideration to-night, apart from Committee points, is the case which was put clearly and distinctly by my hon. Friend the Member for South
    1174
    Kensington, who said something to the effect that, though the owners have power to pull down Adelphi Terrace, they, in his opinion and in the opinion of many others, will not do so if they do not get the powers that are asked for by this Bill. That I will come to later. As I have said, the question of the fairness and otherwise of what is being given up by the promoters in exchange for what they are to get is obviously one for the Committee.
    I will deal with two other points which, I suggest are also points which should be sent to the Committee for consideration and determination. One of them is the question of possible interference with the Victoria Embankment Gardens. That obviously is a matter which requires the attention of Parliament and in which this House should protect the rights of the general public. But obviously, I venture to suggest, that again is a matter which is more proper to be inquired into by a Committee—as to how far, if at all, there is danger of those gardens being interfered with, so that the Committee may make or recommend such alterations in the Bill as may be necessary to protect the public interest. The other point is the one in regard to future development and a new Charing Cross Bridge. My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond has made a statement which shows clearly that an issue arises there between him and my hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington. One says the development of the Adelphi Estate may interfere with useful and ordered developments in connection with the new Charing Cross Bridge. The other hon. Member says definitely that is not so and that the point has been gone into most carefully. Surely that is a matter where the Committee should decide what are the real facts of the case. I heard an hon. Member make an interjection as to what the Committee are likely to do. I will pass from that for the moment, but I mention it now because I want to refer later to the powers of the Committee and the action which they will take if the House thinks fit to give the Bill a Second Reading. There is one other point made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington to the effect that no development plans have been prepared. There again I do not want to question the correctness or otherwise of that statement on his part.
    Sir W. DAVISON: It was a statement by Mr. Tyldesley Jones, B.C., on behalf of the promoters. It is in the evidence given in the other place.
    Sir D. HERBERT: Now the hon. Member tells me, I remember the fact. What I wanted to say in regard to that is that what is lacking is, so to speak, the final plans of the proposed new buildings. That, again, is a matter which I venture to suggest should not be allowed to interfere with the question of a Second Reading. It should be dealt with by the Committee. It has already been dealt with, to some extent, by the Committee in another place, with the result that Clause 33 has been inserted in the Bill containing certain provisions as to regulating what shall be the elevation of the new buildings. Let me now come to the question which I have already mentioned, the argument that although the owners of the Adelphi Estate have the right to pull down the present buildings this House can stop their doing so by refusing to give them the powers asked for in this Bill. I think it is my duty, in the interests of the promoters, to ask the House to consider this question very carefully indeed. Granted that this House may wish to preserve Adelphi Terrace as it is, and knowing that the owners have the right to pull down that property at any time—if they do not find it worth their while to do so immediately they may find it worth their while when the country becomes more prosperous—the question is whether, knowing these things, the House will, without very careful consideration indeed, on the slender possibilities of saving these old buildings by throwing out this Bill, refuse the petitioners to Parliament what they would have no hesitation in granting to them if they did not suffer from the fact that their property was one in which others who are not the owners feel, and feel properly and naturally, such a great interest?
    If it were a definite question of whether the present buildings should be pulled down or not, that would be one of those clear issues on which it would be contrary to my duty to take any side, but I do regard it as my duty to ask the House to consider very carefully whether they should throw out this Bill on Second Reading without its going to a Committee in the mere hope, the realisation of which is at least doubtful, that they
    1176
    will indirectly obtain something which they think it is desirable to obtain.
    The only other point with which I wish to deal is the future procedure on this Bill should the House see fit to give it a Second Reading. I heard an interjection just now—I am not sure, indeed, that it has not already been referred to—that this is an unopposed Bill, with no petitioners against it. That is true, but that does not mean, certainly after this Debate it will not mean, that the examination of this Bill by the Committee will be in the least degree less careful than if it were one of the most strongly opposed and most contentious Bills which ever came before a Parliamentary Committee. Hon. Members will know that unopposed Bills go, in the ordinary way, to what is known as the Unopposed Bills Committee, which consists of the Chairman of Ways and Means, the Deputy-Chairman, assisted by Counsel for Mr. Speaker and several other Members of the House. But the Chairman of Ways and Means has the right, in any case where he thinks it necessary or proper, to cause an unopposed private Bill to be referred to an Opposed Bill Committee, in exactly the same way as if it were an opposed Bill.
    If I thought, or if the House were to appear to express the view, that that should be done in this case I should naturally act accordingly, but I would like to tell the House that in my view the Unopposed Bill Committee is, perhaps, as useful a Committee if not a more useful Committee, for dealing with this particular Bill than an Opposed Bill Committee. In the first place, it has as ex officio members the Chairman and Deputy-Chairman of Ways and Means, whose business it is constantly to deal with these Bills, advised by the Counsel to Mr. Speaker, who is of the greatest assistance, and that they have all the powers which an Opposed Bill Committee would have. I have heard it said in conversation outside this House (which was not perhaps meant for the ears of the Chairman of Ways and Means) by those who are interested in promoting private Bills, that they would sooner be before an Opposed Bill Committee than before the Unopposed Bill Committee. That, at any rate, is, I think, a tribute to the way that the Unopposed Bill Committee does its work.
    Mr. REA: Can they hear evidence?
    Sir D. HERBERT: I am coming to that. There is the apparent disadvantage—or may I put it as the apparent difficulty?—that a committee, in a case of this kind, whether it be an unopposed. Bill Committee or an opposed Bill Committee, have before them only one side, there being no petitioners against the Bill. There is no one to be heard against it, and therefore, in a case of this kind, where the opponents of the Bill are people who would have no locus standi in the case of a private Bill, and whose opposition is based upon very proper grounds, which have been put before the Rouse to-night, it becomes the duty of the Committee to see that the case of those opposed to the Bill, or who wish to put forward any particular points, as has been clone in this discussion, is very carefully considered.
    The Committee have power to hear evidence. In a case of this kind, they have power to call before them indirectly, if I may put it in that way, any expert evidence of architects or artists that they wish. It is true that the Committee have not, in the first instance, the power to send for persons, papers and records, a well-known power in this House, but that Committee could and would report to the House—if it were so—that they required the power to summon certain persons before them in order to enable them to come to a proper and satisfactory decision on the points arising. That power would unhesitatingly be exercised by the Committee in this case, if it were necessary, but the probability is that the end would be achieved without the Committee having to come back to this House. The Committee would merely have to intimate—I put this as an example, and I am not going to say that it is exactly what would happen—to the promoters that they were not satisfied that a certain part of the Preamble had been proved. The promoters would say: "We have called before you our architect"—or accountant, as the case might be—"and he has given you evidence." The Committee would say: "We are still not satisfied. We want evidence from impartial witnesses. Will you please bring us an impartial and expert witness on this point?" By that method, the Committee would probably obtain and hear all the evidence that
    1178
    they required without having to come back to this House, but they could come back with a report to the effect that they required the power to send for persons, papers and records, and the House would, no doubt, unhesitatingly give them that power, if they asked for it.
    To sum up therefore, I do ask the House not to refuse the Second Reading of this Bill upon any point that would properly be inquired into by the Committee. The House, of course, will have a perfect right to oppose the Bill again on consideration on Report and on Third Reading, and to throw out the Bill if they are not satisfied with it after it has been before the Committee, or if they are not satisfied with the work that the Committee has done. It is obvious that there are certain matters here that ought to be thrashed out by what I may describe as a semi-judicial committee before the House comes to any definite decision as regards the Bill as a whole.
    There remains the question of the preservation, or otherwise, in its present condition, of Adelphi Terrace. I do not think that I am departing from the impartial position which I ought to take up in regard to any clearly defined and definite issue before this House when I ask the House to consider very carefully whether it would be right to refuse the Second Reading of this Bill merely on the slender hope that by doing so they might indirectly prevent the owners from pulling down this property, when they have no power whatever to restrain the owners—or I should put it more correctly in this way: when without coming to Parliament at all, the owners have, at the present moment, the absolute right, as has any other owner of the private house in which he lives, to pull down that house and to rebuild it, or to leave the ground without any building upon it.
    9.1 p.m.
    Mr. ATTLEE: It has never fallen to my lot in this House before to hear the Chairman of Ways and Means fulfilling one of his duties in this House by putting before the House the case of the petitioners for a private Bill. I think there are certain considerations in this matter which should lead the House to refuse this Bill a Second Reading. There are certain great principles involved. I speak in this matter not from any party point of view, but as a Londoner who has

    1179
    lived in London all his life, and has always found a very great pleasure in that sweep of the river that goes from this House to Blackfriars Bridge. I regard that, from the architectural point of view, as the greatest thing in London. If it is not as good as it ought to be, it is potentially one of the finest sights in the world. In parts of it it is worthy of the greatest city in the world. In that great sweep of buildings there have been a number of alterations and changes, some of which may be for the better and some may be for the worse. This House ought to deplore that there has not been a definite plan for that area. It is not merely a matter of the rights of private property. The hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) has put as strongly as anyone might the rights of a man to do what he likes with his own. I might not hold that view so strongly as he, but even after he said that he came down strongly on to the need for town-planning, and he finished up with a few references, which he is more qualified to make than I am, to the aesthetic value of this group of buildings, and to the need for preserving one of London's natural beauties.
    When the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) was speaking, I thought that he was rather out of court. He was speaking on behalf of the London County Council; as a matter of fact, the London County Council has neglected to plan this most essential, central part of London. That strikes me as inconsistent. The hon. Member first told us that the London County Council could not consider this matter from the aesthetic point of view, because they had to consider whether the promoters had fulfilled this, that and the other condition by giving up streets: and almost in the same breath he explained how in 24 hours the County Council, from aesthetic considerations, rushed in a plan for part of the area around Parliament Square. It really seems, therefore, that the hon. Member is out of court through his own neglect. The whole treatment of this particular embankment area has been, as I have said, very piecemeal. Nobody knows what will be the judgment passed 50 years hence on this generation. It is very easy to quarrel over these matters. I am particularly interested myself in that question, because it fell to me, when
    1180
    I was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, to make a decision with regard to Brettenham House, and whether I shall be hanged in effigy in the future or not I do not know.
    The whole of this matter requires to be considered as part of London from two points of view. One is that this is a most important part of London from the aesthetic point of view, and the other is that it impinges upon perhaps the chief point of traffic in all London, namely, Charing Cross. Therefore, it is not, to my mind, a matter which a committee can consider merely from the point of view of private interests, with perhaps a glance at certain aesthetic considerations. They must take a pretty wide view, and it seems to me that the planning of the central area of the capital of the Empire is a matter on which this House should pronounce a judgment.
    We have had an argument from the hon. Member for Richmond with regard to the treatment of this area, and his view of its future seems to me to differ entirely from that of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Tamworth (Sir A. Steel-Maitland) and of the hon. Member for South Kensington. Both of these hon. Gentlemen regard this area as something unique. They regard it as a little town-planned area designed by two great artists, the brothers Adam—as a little piece of old London which they think might be preserved. It may be said that there is no power at all to preserve it, that the owners can pull it down at any time; but that does not preclude this House from expressing an opinion, or, indeed, from taking action in the future with regard to it. The hon. Member for Richmond and the London County Council, on the other hand, obviously look upon this merely as a sort of traffic area. They want to open up to traffic these rather narrow, quiet streets, where so many distinguished people have sheltered; they want to run a road round Savoy Place up to the Strand, and to open up York Buildings, and in their view, as far as I can see, the proper development of this site means the sweeping away altogether Of all the Adam buildings, and erecting, possibly, another Shell-Mex House.
    I like to live in London. and not in Main Street. I do not want to see London consisting of a lot of beautiful, meretricious buildings in a row. I like

    1181
    the history of London, and I do not want the time to come when the old days will be swept away, when John Street, Adam Street, Robert Street, and Buckingham Street will no longer exist. Indeed I always regretted the passing of Alley. I may be very old-fashioned, but I do not want London swept away and re-planned as though it were a city in the Middle West of America. Is not that rather what we are tending to do here if we merely consider what is in the best interest of these private owners in developing their property? Indeed, it may not be in their best interest in the long run. It might be that they would be able to sell the area to someone who would value it from aesthetic considerations. But, in any treatment of the area it should surely be considered both from the point of view of the intrinsic merits of the building and from the point of view of its fitting into a general plan. I thought that the hon. Member for Richmond was rather unconvincing in his reference to Charing Cross Bridge. We have had a good many failures with regard to Charing Cross Bridge. The hon. Member said we had had six schemes, and no one of them came anywhere near this—
    Sir WILLIAM RAY: If I might interrupt the hon. Gentleman for a moment, I did not say anything of the sort. I said that the Advisory Committee set up by the London County Council had had six schemes submitted to it, and on examination it was found that these proposals would not interfere with any one of the six schemes. I never said anything such as the hon. Member indicated.
    Mr. ATTLEE: If the hon. Member had had a little more patience, and had allowed me to develop my argument, he would have heard that I was going to be perfectly accurate. I was saying that we had had six schemes—
    Sir W. RAY: You dropped your voice beforehand.
    Mr. ATTLEE: The hon. Member is a little too apt to interrupt. If he will allow the argument to go on, he will find that it is quite correct. He has said that six schemes were submitted, and not one of those schemes interfered with this area; but there have been many schemes in London, and we have no guarantee at all, as far as I can see, that any one of
    1182
    those schemes is going to be adopted. It is quite possible that the right scheme, when it eventually conies, may touch this area; but I think that that point was answered in advance by the hon. Member for South Kensington, who said that a bridge scheme is not simply a bridge, but requires to be related to the area round about; and the hon. Member for Richmond himself suggested that there was going to be a road opening up York Buildings into the Strand. We cannot have that without a general view of the traffic of the area, and, therefore it is quite clear to my mind that there should be a general scheme for the area. I suggest that the House will do well to take the advice of the hon. Member for South Kensington and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Tamworth. I do not think the House need be in the very least upset because this proposal has been passed by a Committee of the House of Lords, because it is always best to be reciprocal in these matters, and the House of Lords never minds throwing out anything which has been passed by a Committee of this House. I think the House should be capable of acting on its judgment. Although the Chamber may not be very well filled, it is a good deal better filled than it usually is at this time o of the evening. I hope that this question will be decided by people who have thought about the matter, and not by people coming in from outside. As a citizen of London, I hope that the Bill will be rejected.
    9.14 p.m.
    Mr. EASTWOOD: The hon. Member for Limehouse (Mr. Attlee) is apparently desirous, on the one hand, of keeping old London, and, on the other hand, of postponing the Second Reading of this Bill until some general scheme shall be brought forward. I can understand the first reason, and I can understand the second, but, surely, if any general scheme is brought forward for the development of this part of London, it is obvious that such a scheme would interfere to a very large extent with this part of old London which the hon. Gentleman seems so anxious to keep. When one comes to consider the objections to this Bill, and the objections that have appeared in the Press—and, after all, the Press is supposed to be to a certain extent the mouthpiece of the general public; whether it is

    1183
    or not is another matter—the objections that have appeared in the Press seem to be based on the necessity for the retention of Adelphi Terrace as an Adam masterpiece. I have been interested in looking at the elevation of this building as it was restored in 1870, and at the elevation of the building as it was originally when it was built by the Brothers Adam long before 1870.
    The curious thing is that one is tempted to say that, if Adam brothers were in this House to-day, they would support this Bill as strongly as possible in the hope that the building which now stands, which is credited to them, might at the earliest opportunity be pulled down. I am not saying it at all facetiously. The original Adam elevation showed on the ground floor every front door with different adornments, each equally attractive. The architect restoring in 1870 abolished all that and put in uniform doors. On the first floor the old Adam elevation showed most attractive iron work. The architect restoring abolished all that. On the second floor the windows were not uniform. Some were of one type and those in the middle of the building of another. The architect restoring made them uniform. Finally, having raised the roof of the old Adam building, instead of leaving the original plain frontage the architect restoring put in the middle of the building an erection—I do not know its architectural term but it is there to-day for Members to see it if they want to do so and, not being satisfied with that, he plastered the whole of the old brick over with stucco. That is why I say when it comes to considering the architectural interest of the building hon. Members ought to realise that, old though the original building may be, the building that stands there to-day is not the building that was put up by Adam and probably not the building that he would like to stand there if he were alive to-day.
    But surely there is another point that the House ought to consider. Parliament cannot stop this building being pulled down, however much it tries. That has been made clear by every speaker and by the Chairman of Ways and Means. The building is actually in the hands of trustees. Trustees cannot consult their own tastes. They have to do the best
    1184
    they can for those who benefit under the trust, and it may well be that, if this Bill is thrown out, these trustees will say: "If we cannot do what we want to do, we will pull it down and put up the most lucrative building that we can." As I understand it, they will be perfectly entitled to put up on the existing site a sky-scraper of large dimensions profitable to those who benefit under the trust. Surely, when one is up against a position like that, the sensible thing to do is to try to come to terms with the trustees and make the best terms that can be made for the benefit of the public whom we represent, to give the owners their full share and to give the general public as much protection as possible. The County Council and the Westminster City Council have driven a hard bargain with the promoters of the Bill. They gained this very large area of land and they gained a large contribution to the road-making which will be necessary.
    In spite of the modesty of the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray), who disclaimed any desire to say that they had been actuated by an artistic sense, in Clause 33, which I understand was put in in another place on the representations of one of these public bodies, these councils, who have been accused of looking at the matter through the spectacles of rateability rather than of artistry, have certainly safeguarded themselves and secured, as far as they can, that whatever building is put up shall receive the approval of artistic persons. Before any building can be started, an architect appointed by the Royal Academy has to approve it, and, if he disapproves, an advisory committee carefully appointed has to approve. It seems to me that the County Council and the Westminster City Council have done their best to ensure that whatever building is eventually put up, which they cannot stop being put up, shall conform as far as possible to artistic taste. With great temerity, as a very junior Member of the House, I make this suggestion. The County Council and the Westminster City Council, who are the people primarily interested in a scheme of this sort, have gone exhaustively into it, as the Bill shows, and when they have decided that the Bill is one which they can support and which is for the benefit of the public we, who have to consider subjects ranging over a far wider field than any local authority has to do, when

    1185
    we come to a subject in their special purview ought to pay great attention to the decision to which they have come. It is for that reason that I very much hope the House will adopt the suggestion of the Chairman of Ways and Means and send the Bill to a Committee where all these points can be properly investigated.
    9.23 p.m.
    Captain DOWER: As the owner of a small part of the Adelphi, which does not come actually under the operation of the Bill, and as one who has been interested in the Adelphi for a considerable time, long before the Bill was in contemplation, I should like to make a few observations which, perhaps, have not been mentioned in the Debate. Unlike Members of the Opposition, I am in favour of giving full support to private ownership and encouragement to owners to develop their estates. I am not going to say a word against the Bill because its object is private profit, but, when it comes to a question of encouraging private enterprise, we are entitled to look at the form that private enterprise is going to take and, when its effect is obviously going to be to wipe out one of the last remaining links with eighteenth century London and to pull down what are undoubtedly very beautiful Adam houses, I think the House is entitled to inquire into the rights and wrongs of the proposal.
    The other suggestion I should like to put forward is that if we can save the Adelphi without infringing the rights of the owners of this estate, this House should not hesitate to wonder whether they are doing the right thing to sanction the pulling down of the Adelphi which will certainly follow the passing of this Bill. Numerous hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Eastwood), said that the owners of the Estate could pull down their buildings if and when they so desired. That is true and, as a Conservative Member, I am not out to take away these privileges from them, but I do sincerely suggest from my own small knowledge of the Adelphi and of the value of the properties there that they will not actually pull down the Adelphi if they are unable to build on the foreground. I want hon. Members to realise that this is not a question of old or derelict property. It is a very valuable property. This is a
    1186
    property where if there is a vacancy there is a constant demand, and it commands a very fair rental. If you take the average house in the Adelphi I should be very surprised if it did not produce at least £500 a year net. This is not an old and derelict property, and I know if I possessed property in this part of the Adelphi and had not the right to build on the foreground I should certainly not pull down the present Adam buildings that exist there, because it would not pay me to do so.
    The second point that I want to put forward is that certain hon. Members have said that these properties are not beautiful, and I believe the hon. Member for Kettering also said that if the Adam Brothers were here they would not even recognise them. I cannot agree with him. I would like hon. Members to go to these properties—and I can give the numbers—where you will find the most beautiful ceilings, fireplaces and staircases, and, in addition, there is the still more beautifully characteristic and delightful shapes of the Adam rooms. I think hon. Members, whether they are for or against the Bill, will really agree that this is a unique part of London and probably one of the last existing really big developments of town planning by the Adam Brothers. I agree that the exterior was altered and stuccoed and so on, but we have the words of Professor Bolton that for a sum of £15,000 the original front could be restored. I, for one, feel very strongly on this point, that it would be a shame and that London would suffer an irreparable damage if this Adelphi estate was wiped out. We should lose the historic connection which it carries. I would like to take hon. Members to a property that I own, No. 10, Adam Street, and to go down not only to the basement but to the sub-basement, down the old original stone steps right to the bottom where you will find an old gateway that has existed since 1770 and has been used ever since then. If this Bill is passed it will be blocked up and destroyed. Out of that gateway you come into the old arches, and they are really a very unique portion of old London. I think it would be a great shame if those arches also were destroyed.
    I do not intend to weary hon. Members by going into details, but I want to be

    1187
    quite clear with regard to the view. Of course, in the winter you get a beautiful view of the river right away to St. Paul's. In the summer the trees do undoubtedly obscure it, but I think those hon. Members who say that it is not appreciated are those who had no knowledge of the Adelphi until they heard this Bill was coming before the House. The other point I want to make is this. I do not want to trespass upon the advice I gather we have received, but we are told that the public are going to have the benefit of the widening of these roads. I, for one, do not value that greatly. These roads as they now stand are ample for their present traffic, but if a large building is to be put up and a vast number of other people are interested in it, of course, these roads will have to be widened. I believe we can save the Adelphi, not by interfering with the rights of the present owners, which I should he distinctly against, but by not adding our weight behind it by giving them powers which they have not got at present. For that reason I do most earnestly ask the House to consider the grave responsibility that is going to rest on their shoulders. It has been said that a thing of beauty is a joy for ever, and surely there are heaps of early Victorian monstrosities we can get busy about. I do not think any of us would mind seeing these pulled down, but to sacrifice what we all consider and really believe is an architectural masterpiece and a memory that carries us back to days gone by is a very great mistake in order to pander to what I would call the modern craze for mammoth buildings.
    9.32 p.m.
    Sir KENYON VAUGHAN-MORGAN: The House has already listened at some length to the arguments for and against this Bill. Various estimates have been put forward of the advantages to be gained by the owners of property and those who are interested as the promoters of the Bill. Various estimates have also been put forward as to the public advantage. I would, however, ask the House to go back to the main principle which we are asked to determine now, and that is whether it is on the whole to the public advantage that the proposals of the promoters should be carried through, subject to amendments and improvements by this House in Committee, or should
    1188
    they be compelled either to leave matters as they are or to proceed, as they are at liberty to proceed, with a very much reduced and consequently imperfect scheme? The right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means, who favoured the House with his views on this subject and gave it the benefit of his guidance in a manner for which I think every Member present will feel indebted to him, pointed out that what the House had to determine was whether a great question of principle was involved and not matters which, however important, really belonged to the realm of detail. If I can see in this matter a great principle emerging, it will be that the House should make use of its machinery to render any scheme, however good it may appear to be to the promoters, as perfect in the interests of the public as the powers which the House can bring to bear can render possible.
    The House is asked to give this Bill a Second Reading, and I think that it can scarcely decline to do so. Certainly the House would be very ill-advised if it decided so to act. The history of this question is already a fairly long one. Its pros and cons have been very fully discussed and debated in another place. The scheme as we now know it is very substantially different from that which was first considered. Hon. Members who have read the report of the Debates in another place will be fully aware of the very great financial sacrifice which the promoters have been called upon to make at the instance of the great public authorities, and, consequently, in the public interest. I regret that I take a different view from that of one at least of the other Londoners who have spoken. I think that I am the third Londoner who has so far taken part in this Debate. My hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) and I find ourselves in agreement upon many things. We are both proud of the City, parts of which we have the honour to represent, and I share with the hon. Gentleman the Member for Limehouse (Mr. Attlee) in being a, Londoner, born and bred. If I take a different view with regard to this project it is because. however much I may agree with my hon. Friend as to the advantage which would have resulted if the whole of the area from Westminster to Blackfriars could

    1189
    have been laid out according to some great plan, and that it might have been a very much better development than that with which we are now concerned, the House is asked to deal with circumstances as they are now, and not with matters as they might have been if there had been more perfect conditions. If hon. Members will really consider the scheme as it is presented to them now, there can be no doubt that, however much hon. Members may belittle the advantage of widening streets and giving access to traffic, the public of London will substantially gain if the scheme is accepted subject to any details which may be discussed and debated, and determined in the Committee stage.
    Personally, I have one reservation to make with regard to my acceptance of the proposals. Everyone is anxious, that whatever building is put up, and whatever lay-out of the land of the area is ultimately determined upon, the amenities and the artistic characteristics of the river-side frontage shall not be sacrificed and that it will result in the erection thereon of a building which will conform to the best architectural standards of the day. Both in recent years and in past years buildings have been erected on important sites in London which many of us view, if not with 'distaste, certainly with very limited enthusiasm, especially many of those described as being of the Victorian era, and it is because one wants to see the present site developed in the best possible manner that upon it should appear a building conforming to the highest architectural standards of the time. In company with an hon. Friend I have put on the Order Paper an Instruction to the Committee, and I recommend that hon. Members should without hesitation give the Bill a Second Reading, and should rely upon the Committee, guided in the terms of the Instruction, to see that the amenities, the future perspective, the standard of building, and consequently the effect upon that area of London, are safely preserved and the standards which we desire to see are adequately maintained. After the advice which the right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means gave the House, I think that hon. Members cannot decline to give the Bill a Second Read-
    1190
    ing, and they might well be advised to be the more ready to give a Second Reading if they will, when the time comes, support the Instruction which I have taken the liberty of putting upon the Order Paper.
    9.41 p.m.
    Sir JOHN WITHERS: I was rather surprised to hear the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) and the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Eastwood) put forward the argument that in opposing the Second Reading of this Bill they are not receiving fair play. Surely the argument that, because the Bill was passed by the House of Lords, therefore we should, as a matter of procedure, without any discussion, let it go to a Select Committee, cannot be held here for a moment. We have rights and responsibilities. We have to pass the Second Reading of the Bill, and I am sure that the House will have within its recollection action taken recently on Private Bills which dealt with the matter very stringently. We were all very much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means for his kind advice in the matter, and his views. I am sure that he will pardon me if I transgess unintentionally beyond what he said.
    There are points of principle involved here which ought to be decided by this House before the Bill goes to a Select Committee. There are two points to which I should like to draw attention. The first is that these restrictions were imposed in the public interest many years ago, and I do not see that there is any good reason for their removal. The reverse is generally the argument. If there were really any reason in the public interest, not merely that we were getting a quid pro quo, the onus is upon those who want the restrictions removed. They ought to show that it is very much in the public interest that these restrictions should be removed. I hold that that onus has not been discharged, and that it is a matter for this House to consider.
    The second point is that I object strongly to the spoiling of this little bit of open-air amenity. According to the right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means, whether that would be spoilt or not would be a question for the Committee, but I venture to think that it is a matter which every Member of this House who is acquainted with the locality can and ought to judge for him-

    1191
    self. It is my custom to walk through that little piece of garden many times a day, and I am very much struck by the use that is made of it by various members of the community. The poor people come down from the Drury Lane district and take their children to play there in the mornings. In the middle of the day it is used by women clerks, who take their lunch out there, and in the evening the elderly people come and walk about and enjoy themselves in the gardens there. It is a very great amenity in crowded London.
    It is said that we shall be only giving up a strip of five feet. That may be so in the width of the ground, but instead of having a. space right away north, with only small buildings beyond, we shall have right up against us an enormous building which will interfere with the light and air that comes to this small piece of playground for the citizens of London. People say that in matters of this kind we ought not to be in any way guided by sentiment, but I think that sentiment is a very important thing, properly considered. Let us look at it in this way. Supposing, for commercial reasons, the Government promoted a Bill to pull down the Tower of London and to erect on the site some great sky-scraping building. Does any hon. Member say that we should not be guided by sentiment in that case? Of course we should. We should say that we would not tolerate such a thing for a moment. Sentiment is a very valuable thing, and I know of no body more able to judge proper sentiment than this House. I therefore ask the House to reject the Second Reading of the Bill.
    9.47 p.m.
    Captain SIDNEY HERBERT: I listened with very considerable surprise to the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge University (Sir J. Withers). As a Conservative and a member of the legal profession, I should have thought that he would have taken an entirely opposite view of the rights of the trustees of the Adelphi Estate. Let me recapitulate to the House the position. In 1771 the land was handed over, including the land that is now called the foreground, and vested in the Adam Brothers and their partners. The land is to-day equally vested in the
    1192
    trustees of the Adelphi. The foreground land has never belonged to the public, to the London County Council or to the Westminster City Council. It has belonged to, and it belongs to-day, to the trustees. All that was laid down at the time that it was granted to the Adam Brothers was, and all that remains today is, that no building higher than 20 feet should be erected on the foreground.
    Sir J. WITHERS: Am I not correct in saying that the foreground was an encroachment on public rights originally by enclosing a piece of the foreshore which belonged to the public?
    Captain HERBERT: I speak with diffidence before so eminent an authority of the law, but I am given to understand, and I gather from my reading of the evidence before the Select Committee, that that land does in fact belong to the trustees, and they are asking the leave of Parliament to rescind an ancient law which prevents them from erecting a building higher than 20 feet upon the foreground. Exactly the same condition applied to the land on either side. The same condition obtained in regard to the land now covered by the Shell-Mex Building, and the land now covered by the Savoy. Twice during the last century, in 1865 and in 1870, Parliament in its wisdom granted to the owners of that land power to build higher than 20 feet. How can we to-day, in justice, say that Parliament can deny to one set of individuals what it has twice, on two separate occasions in different years, accorded to others. Parliament has by that very alteration admitted that the objects for which the prevention had been put upon the owners ho longer existed. I think we should be doing an extremely unfair thing if because of an ulterior motive, however good that motive may be, we were to commit an act which in my opinion is inequitable and unjust.
    One word about the action of the Westminster City Council. The action of the London County Council has been most admirably described by my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray), than whom no one can speak with more authority. The position which the Westminster City Council took up in the matter is very much the same as that taken by the London County Council. They felt, as I feel, that they would

    1193
    dislike to see the Adelphi pulled down, for sentimental and aesthetic reasons, but they also felt that when there was a chance of this scheme going through, without any knowledge as to whether Parliament would pass it or not, their duty was to make the best bargain they possibly could on behalf of the public and the ratepayers. They have made a very good bargain, which has been described here to-night. They have got a bargain under which the roads are to be widened at the cost of the promoters of the scheme, that the land which now belongs to the promoters of the scheme shall be handed over to the City of West minster, both great advantages in themselves; and it is arranged by Clause 33—
    Captain DOWER: Will the hon. and gallant Member say what the public are going to lose?
    Sir W. DAVISON: Has not the City Surveyor of Westminster said that this is not required unless the building was polled down and a new building put up?
    Captain HERBERT: It is not necessarily required at the present moment, but who can say that in a few years or a few months it will not be required. Who is going to say that traffic will remain stationary, and not increase? The City Council would have been very unwise if it had not accepted every possible chance of widening and improving its streets, and how much more so when it can obtain both free in space and in money. If they had not taken those very wise steps they would not have been acting in the public interest. They will be sorry, and I shall be sorry, both from the aesthetic and the sentimental point of view, to lose the amenities of the Adelphi, but if that takes place we shall make quite certain that in its place there will be put up a building which in height will not the higher than the Savoy, therefore making a pendant to the skyline, that we shall have a building which will be passed by a committee of known and established tastes, that we shall have a little more cohesion in the general skyline of the Embankment at Westminster, and that if we do lose from the point of view of sentiment we shall largely, through the action of these two councils, have in London a more homogenous, architectural water front than we have at the
    1194
    present time. The ratepayers of Westminster, I do not despise it in the least, will get a higher rateable value and thank their council for the wisdom of the steps they have taken, whether this plan succeeds or not.
    9.55 p.m.
    Sir REGINALD BANKS: I rise to support those hon. Members who have moved the rejection of the Bill. The Chairman of Ways and Means, in a speech very clear, judicial, and impartial, has removed from our consideration certain minor points which I agree are properly matters for consideration by the Committee, but he left for our free discussion one point which he put in this form. Even if we reject the Bill there is only a slender hope that Adelphi Terrace will not be pulled down; if we pass this Bill it is certain that Adelphi Terrace will be pulled down; it is certain that those classic shades, in which some of us take an interest and where perhaps we find more inspiration in the great writers of the eighteenth century than in Blue Books which are obsolete in a fortnight's time, will have to go. If we reject the Bill there is a chance of them having the privilege to remain there a little longer. I do not know how long; but as long as I can manage to keep them there.
    There is no question of law in this matter. If there was a question of law I should not care very much. I do not pose as one of the great legal authorities in this House, but I know enough about it to be aware of the fact that in the past it has been invoked to obstruct progress and bolster up inequity. We are not here as a court of law; we are not pronouncing upon the rights of those who own the Adelphi; we are not considering a question of rescription in their case. We are being asked to give them a present, not in the interest of the public. As far as aesthetics are concerned, there is not a man of taste who will say that London is going to be improved by the destruction of this unique structure. Is anybody going to be healthier and happier? The owners of the estate are going to get something which by the wisdom of our ancestors they were forbidden doing. It is all very well to say that it is an old Statute of the eighteenth century. Perhaps our ancestors of the eighteenth century had a more aesthetic conception than we have to-day.

    1195
    Perhaps in their nightmare dream they saw what their descendants were going to do. I am told that there are precedents. Of course there are, very dreadful precedents, which anybody can see who in the course of his lawful occupation passes from the Temple to Westminster. There are the dreadful precedents of the Savoy Hotel and Shell Mex. The issue really is this. Are we going to follow bad precedents or create a good one? We are told that this must be decided on principle. I offer to this House this proposition of principle; that it is time that this flood of barbarism was stopped. There is some kind of proposal in the Bill to refer this matter to a Fine Art Commission—
    Sir K. VAUGHAN-MORGAN: The Bill provides that it shall be referred to a tribunal of architects.
    Sir R. BANKS: I hope the hon. and gallant Member will remember what some supposed architects did in the 10th century at Cambridge and Oxford. Those people who called themselves architects in those days have left works which we regard with abhorrence, and is it certain that architectural experts to-day will not leave behind them things which will be regarded with equal abhorrence by our descendants 40 and 50 years hence? An hon. Member who supported the Second Reading said: "Look at what has happened to the Embankment? See how it has changed. How it is dominated. The time is ripe for further development." Dominated! I should think it was. Further development! In plain English that means further abominations. Not only do they dominate it by day, as some of us who seek a breath of fresh air out of doors in summer time know, but they dominate it equally by night. When all things lovely and virtuous have decently retired to bed, when Westminster Abbey, St. Paul's Cathedral and Lambeth Palace are shrouded in darkness, these neo-Babylonian outrages even by night flood themselves with light and force their attentions upon us, like a lot of vulgar street walkers with painted faces who are still up and doing when all decent women are asleep.
    This may be a sentimental appeal. Is this House to turn a deaf ear to the voice of sentiment and taste, to the voice of historical sense? Are we always to be guided by the nauseating view of
    1196
    money and profit? Of course, it is right that a man should do what he likes with his own provided he does not injure other people. In the time in which my hon. Friend's mind dwells, 200 years ago, when architectural progress and intellect were rather backward, the first point of that proposition was stressed—that a man could do what he liked with his own. In 1933 we recognise the second point as more important—provided that he does not injure other people If this were a question of health and morals, if I thought that by tearing down Adelphi Terrace I could make one hundred working-class children happier, if I thought it was an obstruction to progress and recreation; I would tear down Westminster Abbey if I thought that could be proved about it. But it is not, it i9 nothing of the sort. It is merely continuing a very bad precedent of passing in this House, where we do not declare the law but make it, a Bill expensively promoted it is true, with great counsel, making a present to private people, and giving them the right to erect another of these abominations, in a district which is already sufficiently disfigured and degraded.
    I may as well make a personal autobiographical confession. In the brave days when I was 21 I had chambers in the Adelphi, not in Adelphi Terrace, because that is only part of the area which we are discussing. Adelphi Terrace is not the best part of the Adelphi. You have Robert Street, John Street, and Alliance Buildings, the finest work of the Adam Brothers, which is known throughout the world, and in America, and which will be known when Shell-Mex have gone into the limbo of forgotten things. In those days I wrote on my door, being somewhat interested in the Clasics, a Greek prayer to the Gods of Hellas to preserve from evil that sacred shrine. A succession of tenants have respected that inscription, I saw it there only a few years ago, but I cannot help thinking that some Philistine tenant has now effaced it.
    "Flectere si nequeo Superos Acheronta movebo."
    If heaven itself will not listen to me I must appeal to—Parliament. If I cannot appeal to an aesthetic sense, if I cannot appeal to a sense of history, then allow me, without offence to this distinguished House, to appeal to them on

    1197
    the lowest and most sordid basis. There are people called tourists. Some of them are Americans. What is it that attracts them to London? Some people say it is baths and sanitation and luxurious flats. It is not. The people who have catered for them on those lines are rapidly going bankrupt all along Park Lane. It is not the shops. They like the shops better in Paris, and will do so whether we remain Free Trade or adopt Protection. They come to London because they can see things here that they cannot find in Chicago or Cincinnati. Their appreciation of these things grows day by day and year by year. When we have doomed to death some beautiful historic house in England, they even go to the expense of taking the stones to America, and we curse them when they do it. We say, "There is another American millionaire erecting a beautiful Manor House in Illinois or Ohio. What right have they to do that?" They value more and more the things that we wish to see torn down and destroyed in our own historic cities. If I cannot appeal to aesthetic sense and the sense of feeling for history, let me ask the House to defeat the vandals, because vandalism does not itself pay.
    10.7 p.m.
    Sir FRANCIS FREMANTLE: I want to mention one or two points that have been left out of the discussion. We all feel with the bon. and learned Member for Swindon (Sir R. Banks) that where there is a question of taste concerned in national monuments and the national metropolis, it is high time that this Parliament had some idea of that and put some value on it as opposed to materialism pure and simple. But the hon. and gallant Gentleman has taken it for granted that there is only one thing to be considered in taste—
    Sir R. BANKS: It is pertinent to this question—"learned" and not "gallant."
    Sir F. FREMANTLE: I should have said the hon. and learned Member for Swindon, but he was also gallant, I like to remember. He and others who have spoken on taste have taken for granted what we naturally very often take for granted, that the standard of taste of the 18th century, or particular little bits which illustrate the artistry of that or other dates, must be preserved at all
    1198
    costs. That they should be preserved is obvious. But if we are considering these things from the one point of view that is necessary to Parliament in trying to over-rule the opinions of the local authorities, surely there is the other point of view, which is concentrated upon a standard of feeling and progress in an art which I am bound to say I think very few of us sympathise with, or are qualified to understand. The modern development of architecture is in a direction that very likely most of us in this House deplore. I am bound to say that I do not understand it myself. But it is not limited to this country. You find all over the Continent modern directions that are recognised in the new form of architecture, particularly that kind which my hon. and learned Friend stigmatised as Neo-Babylonian. But although we dislike it, people are taken and go to study that architecture, from this country and from all countries. They go to see the wonderful new architecture of Stockholm, Oslo, Denmark, Germany, Austria, France and Italy, all in the new Neo-Babylonian style.
    Even in this country, if we take the modern architecture in this city, is it in the style of the Adam brothers or in the Neo-Babylonian style? Much of it is in the Neo-Babylonian style, Yet that is the product of a profession of art with which apparently we are out of date. Are we going to say that our taste is right and that those whose profession it is to study and think out these things are wrong? We are apparently opposed to progress in one body of the art of this country with which we have no association. I hate the modern developments as much as most people, and I cannot help feeling that I am a back number. I say also that the hon. and learned Member for Swindon is a back number, and the whole of the House who are applauding the hon. and learned Member are back numbers also. We must look to development, and if we cannot do it we must leave it to others.
    Sir R. BANKS: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has misunderstood my argument. It is quite a debatable question whether the Neo-Babylonian style is right or wrong in buildings on new sites. My point with regard to the Adams Brothers was:
    "Others abide our question; thou art free."

    1199
    Do not let us tear these buildings down for an experiment.
    Sir F. FREMANTLE: We have the main body who are concerned in architectural taste, the Royal Institute of British Architects. They are about to erect a. temple of their own profession in Portland Street. What kind of building is it to be? I know it is to be a building largely in the modern style of architecture. What are we to consider The real beauty of this view of the River is not the beauty of one particular section. The real beauty is the magnificent sweep of the Thames as seen especially from Hungerford Bridge. I have been there frequently and went there last night to see it. We saw it to a large extent spoiled by the new Shell-Mex building. You have an obvious big vacuum to the left of the Shell-Mex building. Is that occupied by Adelphi Terrace? You look from Hungerford Bridge and you can hardly see the Adelphi Terrace.
    A great deal of what has been brought before us in this Debate has been brought before us in imagination. An hon. Member shakes his head. If the hon. Member goes to Hungerford Bridge he will find that he can hardly see the Adelphi Terrace. That is in the summer and it is in the summer mostly that people notice these things. After having been stopped by the guardians, we did as a matter of fact go by a little back path through some bushes and trees, so that we were able to see Adelphi Terrace. But even then we saw, underneath, vaults and courts which suggested another world entirely, a place not of beauty, but much more resembling what one expects mews or slum quarters to be. Where you can look, as if with a microscope, through spaces between the trees and get glimpses of the Adelphi Terrace, there is a great deal that is beautiful, although, as has been pointed out, it is not the beauty which the Brothers Adam originally suggested. Indeed most of that has been considerably spoilt.
    The argument is then advanced that that can be put right and that the building can be restored for £15,000. Who is going to find that £15,000.? Will any of the hon. Members who have spoken so loundly for art to-night come forward with that £15,000 to give us the beauty which they have been proclaiming? My
    1200
    hon. and learned Friend spoke quite rightly of the internal beauties of these houses, but what good are they to the public? Will he and other owners and occupiers of these houses allow us to see the true Adam beauties which are with in? Will they allow the public to go through the houses and see them. Of course they will not. Therefore it is a matter for private enterprise to maintain the beauties which are inside these buildings. Those beauties are useless to the public at present. It must he for those who like my hon. and learned Friend can make large sums by their magnificent professional services to subscribe in order to provide the public with the beauties which he wishes this Parliament by force of law to maintain.
    There is one thing that I want to see retained for the public and it can be retained by means of such a scheme as this, probably with the help of the Fine Art Commission. Anybody who goes to the Adelphi Terrace, as very few people, even lovers of the beautiful in London ever do, will find that through the trees it is possible to get fine views down into the Gardens below and over parts of the river. In winter I have no doubt the view is very fine although I have never been there in winter, with all my love of London and knowledge of London. I have no doubt that in winter not only can you get a very fine view there but you can also enjoy the health-giving breezes from the river. Therefore I would like to see the Adelphi Terrace retained in a new form and it would be quite possible to do so in compatibility with the new plan. It is suggested that a tunnel roadway should be made through the present Adelphi Terrace. That, to my mind, would be hateful and would deprive the public of a real advantage. I suggest that there should be introduced into the plan a roadway, level with the future front of the building, with arcading in between, so that people in vehicles and foot passengers would be able to enjoy those amenities of the Terrace to which I have just referred, under the new conditions.
    I do not think that we should put the brake of this House, upon a measure of progress which properly concerns the Westminster City Council and the London County Council as the elected representatives of the people. Some of my hon.

    1201
    Friends who have spoken against this Bill have over and over again spoken violently against restrictions placed upon trade by Governments. I think their position is most inconsistent. We cannot allow interference at the present time with ordinary measures of progress whether by private or public enterprise. What we must try to do is to preserve the real amenities and I suggest that what hon. Members have been speaking of tonight are sham rather than real amenities. The real amenity is being able to go on to the Adelphi Terrace and to enjoy the view from there. Therefore I think we ought to support the Second Reading of the Bill and have it referred to a Committee. I hope that an instruction will he given also, to have the matter referred to the Fine Arts Commission in order to get the wider view of the art aspect of the question, the only art view with which we ought to be concerned.
    10.20 p.m.
    Mr. GREENWOOD: I find in this Debate, in which we have not had the Chief Whip calling on Members to vote in a particular way, a freedom of expressing views and of voting that is unusual in these days, and I find myself to-night in strange company. I find myself in the company of the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison), whose company I have not shared in a Division Lobby, I suppose, since he and I entered the House. I do not believe that there has been a very strong argument put forward in favour of the Bill. The strongest plea has been that the Bill ought to get its Second Heading so that it could go to Committee and there be amended, if amendment were necessary. That would be true if the principles embodied in the Bill were to be accepted, but the Bill raises certain questions of principle on which a decision must be taken now. There is little point in sending it to a Committee to deal with these large questions.
    I am not going to stress unduly the sentimental argument which was put by the hon. and learned Gentleman. I remember, in 1930 or early 1931, having to decide whether an old Wren period house in Battersea should be retained or destroyed and the site used for housing purposes. Had it been Adelphi Terrace, I think it would have gone for housing, but there was not anything embodying
    1202
    that spirit in that area, and that house still remains. It is no good people speaking to me about progress, and it ill becomes the hon. and gallant Member opposite to speak about progress. It is a new phase that he should now be the embodiment of progress as represented by this neo-Babylonian architecture. The point is that if you destroy whatever there is of value and beauty in Adelphi Terrace, it is gone for ever. A Neo-Babylonian building could be erected on the site of, shall we say, Queen Anne's Mansions. That would be modern progress, and I should be in favour of it, but Adelphi Terrace is different, as there is something there that embodies a spirit which ought to be maintained. I am not stressing that side of it unduly, because I agree with the hon. and learned and, I believe, gallant Gentlemen, who said that if this were a question affecting the child life of this country, affecting vital human interests, it should go. I think that is the right view to take, but there is another aspect of this question.
    Some 300 years ago Christopher Wren was born. After the Great Fire of London, if Christopher Wren had had his way, if he had been able to carry out the vision and the plan that he saw, London and Greater London would have been a nobler piece of work than it is to-day, and the City of London would not be the collection of mean narrow streets that it is to-day. There would have been wide and noble thoroughfares, which would have set a standard for the growing districts outside, and the whole of London would have been an area to-day which might have been manageable, even with the necessities of modern traffic and modern transport. It did not happen, and modern London, with all its congestion, with all its traffic problems, with all its problems of building and housing, is very largely due to the fact that two and a-half centuries ago the men who had vision were not allowed to have a chance, and immediate considerations won the day. This Bill is an attempt again to make this House commit itself to immediate considerations instead of to something much larger.
    It is high time that the London County Council and the other authorities within the London area had a picture of the London which they think ought to be. It is high time there was a plan for the whole of the area of London, and that

    1203
    people were looking forward 50 years to the possibility of the London of that day. I remember being twitted in this House when I said that there was a town-planning report from Liverpool which referred in its opening sentence to 200 years from now. Surely the author of that report was right. One must look a long way ahead, and it is highly important that London should. Let us suppose that this little enclave round about Adelphi, coming to us from the 18th century, is destroyed. Let us suppose that two or three million pounds worth of big buildings are put up and that, 10 years from now, London finds that in the interests of London, and it may be of the country because of road facilities, there is a Charing Cross scheme which can be agreed upon and this enormous monument stands in its way. What is going to happen? The interests of London will be pushed aside because it will be said that 10 years previously Parliament gave its blessing to this.
    Sir F. FREMANTLE: It was reported to us that those in charge of the different Charing Cross Bridge schemes have definitely given it as their opinion that this scheme in no way affects the development of the Charing Cross Bridge.
    Mr. GREENWOOD: I heard what was said about that. I am saying that 10 years from now there may be wiser people. There may be a scheme, and that scheme may be one which will involve dealing with the area which it is now proposed to allow itself, on its own little miserable town planning arrangements, to come into existence. Is it not right that we should say in this House, having regard to all the problems that have been created by not thinking out these problems as a whole, that we cannot allow relatively small private interests to come along and say, "We are going to have our own little bit of town-planning," and to do that regardless of much wider considerations? I should have thought that Members of the House would agree to vote against this scheme, not because I know anything whatever about the promoters of the Bill; I do not; but I would suggest that Members should vote against it on the broad ground that we cannot do this kind of piecemeal reconstruction of London. It must be done on a general plan, and until that general plan is in
    1204
    existence any attempt to fill in details of the picture may conflict with what will be the general plan of the future. With this enormous congregation of over 7,000,000 people, with its needs not yet fulfilled, with possibilities which we do not know, it would be a great pity if, because London has not thought out what it wanted to be, we should permit this little area to take a step which might interfere with the London of the future. I hope that in the interests of town and regional planning, in the interests of the organised development of the country, the House will refuse to give the Bill a Second Reading, not because it is not interested in the development of London, but because this is surely the wrong way to try and bring it about.
    10.30 p.m.
    Mr. D. G. SOMERVILLE: After listening carefully to mast of the speeches in this Debate it seems to me those who have taken part are divided into two classes—the sentimentalists and those w-ho want to see progress and realise that we cannot stop the rebuilding and reconstruction of London. The right hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) was rather contradictory. First he made a plea for the beauty of the Adelphi, and asked for its protection, and then, in finishing his speech, suggested that in 10 years' time we might agree to a scheme for a bridge which would mean the destruction of Adelphi Terrace. We have had a great many speeches dealing with the sentimental aspect of retaining the Adelphi; we have had floods not of barbarism but of sentimentalism, and a good deal of criticism of the present-day type of architecture. I suggest that those who are so critical of present-day architecture should go out on to the Terrace and look along the river at the new buildings Shell-Mex House and the Savoy building. I suggest respectfully that those buildings have a certain majesty and a certain grandeur. The Adelphi as a place of peace and beauty is overshadowed by those buildings and we cannot retain it any longer. The arguments against the Bill are put forward from a sentimental point of view; I have not heard a single argument put up outside that point of view.
    Let us take the other side of the picture. The promoters of the Bill are offering to the public in this part of London

    1205
    a very considerable area; they have offered us new streets, increased circulation of traffic round there, and the public are going to benefit by that, and benefit very considerably, and they will also benefit by the views they will get from Adelphi Terrace. How many of the public go there at present—except a lucky few who happen to have a flat there or live in chambers? They are the only persons who get the benefit of the Adam architecture and decoration. If the new scheme is carried out there will be room for the general public. It will give them a chance of seeing the view of the river about Which so much has been heard. One last consideration is that this scheme holds out the prospect of a very large amount of work in that particular district; a sum of £1,000,000 or £2,000,000 or £3,000,000 is to be spent on new buildings to be erected there. The elevation and the planning of those new buildings will be looked after by the various authorities who have charge of architecture in London. It will mean a large amount of work for the building trade and other trades. We want to find employment to-day, and as long as that employment is properly directed I suggest this Bill should be given a Second Reading. The Chairman of Ways and Means, in an entirely neutral position, suggests that it should be given a Second Reading, and puts before us the safeguards the Committee will be able to consider, and I do ask the House to give the promoters a Second Reading.
    10.34 p.m.
    Mr. LOVAT-FRASER: Different Members of the House approach the question of the preservation of the Adelphi from different points of view. Some are interested in the Adelphi as a literary centre, some are interested in it from the commercial point of view, and some from the architectural point of view. I confess that my primary interest in the Adelphi is due to it being the creation of that remarkable man Robert Adam. May I recall, in passing, the fact that Robert Adam was a Member of this House? Imaginative Members can fancy his ghost standing beside the Speaker's chair, listening to this discussion as to the destruction of one of his finest works. The story of Robert Adam is interesting, and can be told in a very few words. He was a young and ambitious Scottish architect who was interested in Roman
    1206
    architecture. In the middle of the 18th century he went to stay at Spalato, in Dalmatia—a city which I had the pleasure of visiting last year—in order to sketch the remains of the famous Palace of Diocletian. While he was occupied in sketching the remains of the Palace of Diocletian the Venetian Governor of Spalato sent a message, telling him to stop his work. It so happened that the Commander-in-Chief of the Republic of Venice was in Spalato at the time. He was a Scotsman named Graeme, and Robert Adam appealed to him as a brother Scot. He came to the rescue and secured permission for Adam to complete the sketches. On his return, he published a book of his sketches, which was bought by all the aristocracy, and that laid the foundation of the Adam School of Architecture. Perhaps I may say, incidentally, that in building the Adelphi, Robert Adam employed Irish workmen. He was so dissatisfied by the progress made by those Irish workmen that he brought in a contingent of Scotsmen. A fierce battle between the Scottish workmen and the Irish workmen took place, and, strange to say, the Scots got the worst of it.
    The crux of the whole matter seems to lie in the question of the parallelogram of land in front of the terrace. That is the whole crux of the Bill. My feeling with regard to it is that the community, for the surrender of that piece of land, if it is surrendered, are not getting a satisfactory quid pro quo What the Adelphi Trust are offering to the community is not sufficient, and I intend to vote against any measures with regard to the Adelphi until a satisfactory quid pro quo is put forward for the parallelogram on which, at the present time, the Adelphi Trust cannot build.
    I began with a piece of history, and I will conclude with a piece of history. When the Adams tried to get their Bill for the reclamation of the land, they met with the most intense hostility from the City of London, because the City of London claimed the foreshore which the Adams appropriated. The Lord Mayor led the opposition to the Bill, and the opponents of the Bill were heard by counsel in Parliament. The feelings of the people of London were well expressed in a satirical song, two lines of which were:

    1207
    "Four Scotsmen by the name of Adam,
    Have stole the very river from us."
    It happened that the Scottish nation were very powerful at Court at that time. The Adams were Scotsmen, and they exploited that influence and they got their Bill. I would assure the House that the people of London long regarded the Adams as being thieves of property that belonged to the city. When the hon. and learned Member for Swindon (Sir R. Banks) was referring to the literary associations of the Adelphi, I heard an hon. Member on these benches ask, "What are the literary associations of the Adelphi?" May I recall one or two? Johnson and Boswell frequently visited the Adelphi; Garrick lived there; Gibbon, the historian, author of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," lived there; Rowlandson, the famous caricaturist, lived there; poor Tom Hood lived there; Thomas Hardy got his education in an architect's office in the Adelphi; Sir James Barrie lived there; Dickens, when a boy, played among the arches of the Adelphi. So that, on literary grounds alone, the House should pause before it agrees to the destruction of a building whose beauty so many of us admire.
    10.41 p.m.
    Mr. M. BEAUMONT: This Debate has witnessed some strange alliances. I am bound to confess that I never thought I should listen in this House to an alliance between the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood), and to a dispute between the right. hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield and the hon. Member for St. Albans (Sir F. Fremantle), two of the town planning trinity. It only shows that, when these matters of planning come to be decided one by one, the unanimity which occurs on general principles does not extend to individual cases. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Swindon made an impassioned and very eloquent speech on behalf of sentimentality. It struck me that he tried to have it both ways. On the one hand, be said that we should respect the wisdom of our ancestors, who not only were responsible for building this particular edifice, but were also responsible for passing the law to repeal which this present Bill is promoted.
    1208
    Later on, however, when I ventured to applaud his sentiment that a man could do what he liked with his own, he chided me for having a mind which rambled 200 years behind the present time. That is just about the time when those Bills were passed. Either that period was more wise than the present or it was not, but, if it was, I venture to suggest that those whose minds wander in that period are just as worthy of consideration as the Bills which were passed at that time.
    Let us consider exactly what this Bill seeks to do. If the owners of this property, beautiful as it is generally admitted to be, choose to pull it down, there is nothing whatever that the House can do to stop them. The only thing that the House can do is to decide whether the future development shall be along the lines which they now desire, and that power is only vested in the House because of the Act of 1771, which was passed to protect the foreshore. It is admitted on all sides that the conditions which led to the passing of that Act have long since disappeared. They extended to the sites of the Shell Mex building and of the Savoy Hotel, and Parliament, rightly or wrongly, when powers were sought from it in respect of the buildings on those sites, abrogated its right to prevent the erection of buildings there. Therefore, the conditions which were then expected to hold good no longer exist. It is suggested that, because of the particular virtues of this building, we should insist on a right which we have already abrogated.
    Let us consider what would happen if we were to pass this Bill. It might be that the building which those who oppose the Bill desire to retain would be immediately destroyed. I think it is very likely. But it is possible that it would not be destroyed. If it were not so, what was foreshadowed by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield would infallibly take place, namely, that in the course of a very few years this site, which is a unique corner in a little bit of London left behind the times by advancing development, which I deplore as much as anyone in the House though I have learnt only too bitterly that you cannot stand in the face of advancing development—sooner or later a town-planning scheme backed by some local authority would be brought forward which would sweep this thing away and put some

    1209
    monstrosity in its place. I support the Bill because I believe it is better that the owners should develop their own property than that a local authority should do it for them. I have always held that view. I held it at the time of the first Town Planning Bill and I hold it still. I believe this development will be better than that which will come in the future and, for that reason, I want to see the Bill passed into law.
    The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield talked passionately about preserving this as something which is unique and which should not be destroyed. If the public wish to preserve something of this sort, let them pay for it. There is no conceivable reason why the owners of this property should be prevented from developing it because of the sentimental attitude of the House.
    Captain DOWER: They are not prevented from developing it.
    Mr. BEAUMONT: Either my hon. and gallant Friend wishes to see it destroyed or he does not. I understood that he wished to see it preserved. If that is so, he wishes to put every impediment in the way of it being destroyed. If he wishes to see the owners inhibited from the chance of destroying it, it should be scheduled as a national monument, compensation should be paid and it should be treated accordingly. [Interruption.] If I am incorrect I apologise. In any case, if you are appealing on sentimental grounds, the owner of the property, who has to pay taxes on it, and whose taxes are not going to be lessened by the fact that you will not allow the property to be developed, should be compensated or else allowed to go ahead. I think this development is better than any that is likely to come in the future.
    10.49 p.m.
    Mr. MOLSON: The hon. Member who has just spoken repeated the argument put forward by the hon. Member for the Abbey Division (Captain Herbert) that in opposing this Bill we are interfering with the rights of property. The Act of 1771 was in the nature of a contract entered into by the Adam Brothers, who thought it was worth their while as speculators to obtain from this House power to reclaim a certain area of land and to develop it for building purposes. During the space of the last 160 years that building has proved to he extremely
    1210
    profitable to its owner. Now at the end of that time the proprietors of that estate are coming to this House and are asking us to relieve them from the restrictions which were imposed in 1771 which were known to their predecessors in the title and which were accepted by them. The position is not even that the contract has turned out to be unduly onerous and hard on the proprietors. It is and always has been an extremely profitable speculation and therefore they cannot even come to this House and ask as a matter of pity that we should modify the terms of the contract which was entered into in 1771.
    The right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means explained to the House that there were a number of matters which have been referred to which are subjects suitable for examination by a Committee of this House. He was careful to say at the same time that if there was a matter of principle which was raised, then it would, of course, be perfectly proper for this House to decide that in view of the matter of principle at stake it was not prepared to refer the Bill to the Committee. I venture to suggest that there is, as a matter of fact, a matter of principle. That principle is that there is no justification for repealing restrictions which were imposed in 1771 for the express purpose of enriching private individuals. We are told that at the same time the proprietors are prepared to build certain roads and to make over certain lands to the public, valued at £150,000. With regard to those roads, I would first of all point out that the widening of Robert Street and Adam Street is only necessitated by the fact that there is going to be a great building erected. Is it not unreasonable for the proprietors to say that it is desirable to have wider roads in that part when, as a matter of fact, it was proved before a committee of another House that there is only need for wider roads on the hypothesis that a very large building is actually built and is going to be their property?
    The hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray), in a somewhat apologetic speech, said that the promoters of this Bill had gone so far towards meeting the claims of the London County Council and of the Westminster City Council that he felt he must say a word or two in favour of

    1211
    the Bill. When the proprietors of the estate are coming to Parliament in order to obtain the rescission of certain restrictions and in order that they may make very large profits out of the lands which they already have under certain restrictions, it does not seem to me we are under any very great debt of gratitude to them that they should, in a prudent and careful way, endeavour to conciliate such opposition as there otherwise might be. Of all the arguments put forward by the hon. Member for Richmond the most original and remarkable one was that the Bill should be passed here, or at any rate, referred to a Committee because it was opposed at every stage in the other place. I make no apologies for saying that when this House is being asked to repeal some of these revisions of the 1771 Act, we should consider very anxiously what the effect upon the rights of the public is going to be. The Chairman of Ways and Means rather suggested that if we refused to refer this Bill to a Select Committee we should in some way be depriving individuals of their rights, but surely, as a matter of fact, the purpose of this Bill is to obtain entirely new rights that these individuals have never possessed in the past. On the other hand, we have to consider whether in giving these rights to the proprietors of the Adelphi Estate we are in any way injuring the amenities of the public. It was only a few years ago that this House
    showed itself extremely jealous of any attempts to reduce the open spaces in London and a Resolution was passed. to the effect that the House declined to sanction a private Bill in contravention of general public Statutes concerning open spaces for the express purpose of advancing the value of private estates.
    I am not ashamed to end up by an appeal to the House to do what it can to preserve the Adelphi Estate with its beauty. The hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Eastwood) said that the Adam Brothers would not recognise the Adelphi Terrace if they could see it to-day. If he will go to the Adelphi Terrace he will see at each end of the Terrace two old houses which are exactly as the Adam Brothers left them, and although there is no doubt that the Terrace is not as beautiful as the houses which have been left untouched, it is a great exaggeration to say that it would not be recognisable. Of the many pleasant backwaters of town life in London, said a writer, there are few more attractive to the lover of the 18th century than that, and I hope that the House by refusing a Second Reading of the Bill will endeavour to preserve to future generations that pleasant backwater which is reminiscent of the days gone. by.
    Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
    The House divided: Ayes, 117; Noes, 99.

    Division No. 261.]

    AYES.

    [10.58 p.m.

    Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel

    Ford, Sir Patrick J.

    Lloyd, Geoffrey

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

    Fremantle, Sir Francis

    Lockwood, John C. (Hackney, C.)

    Atholl, Duchess of

    Ganzoni, Sir John

    Lyons, Abraham Montagu

    Beauchamp, Sir Brograve Campbell

    George, Major G. Lloyd (Pembroke)

    McKie, John Hamilton

    Beaumont, M. W. (Bucks., Aylesbury)

    Gluckstein, Louis Halle

    McLean, Major Sir Alan

    Borodale, Viscount

    Gower, Sir Robert

    Maitland, Adam

    Boulton, W. W.

    Grenfell, E. C. (City of London)

    Makins, Brigadier-General Ernest

    Bowyer, Capt. Sir George E. W.

    Guest, Capt. Rt. Hon. F. E.

    Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.

    Brocklebank, C. E. R.

    Guy, J. C. Morrison

    Mayhew, Lieut.-Colonel John

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

    Hacking, Rt. Hon. Douglas H.

    Meller, Sir Richard James

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

    Hamilton, Sir George (Ilford)

    Merriman, Sir F. Boyd

    Buchan, John

    Harbord, Arthur

    Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)

    Cautley, Sir Henry S.

    Hartington, Marquess of

    Milne, Charles

    Cazalet, Thelma (Islington, E.)

    Heligers, Captain F. F. A.

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

    Chapman, Col. R.(Houghton, le-Spring)

    Henderson, Sir Vivian L. (Chelmsford)

    Morrison, William Shephard

    Clayton, Sir Christopher

    Herbert, Capt. S. (Abbey Division)

    Nation, Brigadier-General J. J. H.

    Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.

    Horsbrugh, Florence

    Owen, Major Goronwy

    Colfox, Major William Philip

    Howard, Tom Forrest

    Pearson, William G.

    Colman, N. C. D.

    Howitt, Dr. Alfred B.

    Potter, John

    Conant, R. J. E.

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

    Ramsay, T. B. W. (Western Isles)

    Cook, Thomas A.

    Hume, Sir George Hopwood

    Ramsbotham, Herwald

    Copeland, Ida

    James, Wing.-Com. A. W. H.

    Ray, Sir William

    Cranborne, Viscount

    Jesson, Major Thomas E.

    Roberts, Sir Samuel (Ecclesall)

    Cross, R. H.

    Joel, Dudley J. Barnato

    Robinson, John Roland

    Cruddas, Lieut.-Colonel Bernard

    Johnstone, Harcourt (S. Shields)

    Rosbotham, Sir Thomas

    Dalkeith, Earl of

    Jones, Sir G. W. H. (Stoke New'gton)

    Ross Taylor, Waiter (Woodbridge)

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

    Jones, Henry Haydn (Merloneth)

    Runge, Norah Cecil

    Eimley, Viscount

    Lamb, Sir Joseph Quinton

    Rutherford, John (Edmonton)

    Erskine, Lord (Weston-super-Mare)

    Lambert, Rt. Hon. George

    Salt, Edward W.

    Erskine, Boist, Capt. C. C. (Blackpool)

    Leckie, J. A.

    Samuel, Samuel (W'dsworth, Putney)

    Evans, David Owen (Cardigan)

    Llewellyn, Jones, Frederick

    Sandeman, Sir A. N. Stewart

    Sassoon, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip A. G. D.

    Spender-Clay, Rt. Hon. Herbert H.

    Wallace, Captain D. E. (Hornsey)

    Shaw, Helen B. (Lanark, Bothwell)

    Stanley, Lord (Lancaster, Fylde)

    Ward, Lt.-Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)

    Shaw, Captain William T. (Forlar)

    Stones, James

    Ward, Sarah Adelaide (Cannock)

    Smith, Louis W. (Sheffield, Hallam)

    Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray F.

    Warrender, Sir Victor A. G.

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

    Sudden, Sir Wilfrid Hart

    Wragg, Herbert

    Smithers, Waldron

    Summersby, Charles H

    Young, Rt. Hon. Sir Hilton (S'v'noaks)

    Somervell, Donald Bradley

    Thomson, Sir Frederick Charles

    Somerville, D. G. (Willesden, East)

    Thorp, Linton Theodore

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

    Spencer, Captain Richard A.

    Vaughan-Morgan, Sir Kenyon

    Lieut.-Colonel Sandeman Allen

    and Mr. Eastwood.

    NOES.

    Applin, Lieut.-Col. Reginald V. K.

    Graham, Sir F. Fergus (C'mb'rl'd, N.)

    Maxton, James

    Aske, Sir Robert William

    Graves, Marjorie

    Molson, A. Hugh Elsdale

    Attlee, Clement Richard

    Greenwood, Rt. Hon. Arthur

    Nunn, William

    Barfield, John William

    Grigg, Sir Edward

    O'Donovan, Dr. William James

    Banks, Sir Reginald Mitchell

    Groves, Thomas E.

    Oman, Sir Charles William C.

    Batey, Joseph

    Grundy, Thomas W.

    Parkinson, John Allen

    Bernays, Robert

    Hamilton, Sir R.W.(Orkney & Z'tl'nd)

    Pike, Cecil F.

    Bevan, Aneurin (Ebbw Vale)

    Hanbury, Cecil

    Price, Gabriel

    Bevan, Stuart James (Holborn)

    Hanley, Dennis A.

    Ramsay, Alexander (W. Bromwich)

    Bird, Sir Robert B. (Wolverh'pton W.)

    Harris, Sir Percy

    Ramsay, Capt. A. H. M. (Midlothlan)

    Bossom, A. C.

    Hirst, George Henry

    Ramsbotham, Herwald

    Broadbent, Colonel John

    Holdsworth, Herbert

    Ramsden, Sir Eugene

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

    Horobin, Ian M.

    Rathbone, Eleanor

    Brown, Ernest (Leith)

    Hunter, Dr. Joseph (Dumfries)

    Rea, Walter Russell

    Buchanan, George

    Hurd, Sir Percy

    Reid. James S. C. (Stirling)

    Burnett, John George

    Jenkins, Sir William

    Reid, William Allan (Derby)

    Cape, Thomas

    John, William

    Smith, Tom (Normanton)

    Caporn, Arthur Cecil

    Law, Richard K. (Hull, S.W.)

    Somerville, Annesley A. (Windsor)

    Christie, James Archlbald

    Lawson, John James

    Southby, Commander Archibald R. J.

    Cocks, Frederick Seymour

    Leighton, Major B. E. P.

    Storey, Samuel

    Courtauld, Major John Sewell

    Leonard, William

    Tate, Mavis Constance

    Cripps, Sir Stafford

    Lindsay, Noel Ker

    Tinker, John Joseph

    Crossley, A. C.

    Little, Graham-, Sir Ernest

    Touche, Gordon Cosmo

    Daggar, George

    Logan, David Gilbert

    Wedderburn, Henry James Scrymgeour

    Davies, David L. (Pontypridd)

    Lovat-Fraser, James Alexander

    Whiteside, Borras Noel H.

    Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)

    Lunn, William

    Williams, David (Swansea, East)

    Dower, Captain A. V. G.

    MacAndrew, Capt. J. O. (Ayr)

    Williams, Dr. John H. (Llanelly)

    Duckworth, George A. V.

    McEntee, Valentine L.

    Wilson, Lt.-Col. Sir Arnold (Hertf'd)

    Edmondson, Major A. J.

    McGovern, John

    Withers, Sir John James

    Edwards, Charles

    Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)

    Wolmer, Rt. Hon. Viscount

    Emrys-Evans, P. V.

    Magnay, Thomas

    Wood, Sir Murdoch McKenzie (Banff)

    Entwistle, Cyril Fullard

    Mainwaring, William Henry

    Goldle, Noel B.

    Mander, Geoffrey le M.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES—

    Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

    Martin, Thomas B.

    Sir W. Davison and Sir A. Steel-Maitland.

    Bill read a Second time, and committed.

    11.5 p.m.
    Sir K. VAUGHAN-MORGAN: I beg to move:
    "That it be an Instruction to the Committee to take into consideration the effect of the Bill on the architectural and artistic aspect and other amenities of the river front and, in the event of their approving the preamble of the Bill, to insert a Clause in it requiring that the plans of any new building which it is proposed to erect shall first be submitted for approval to the Royal Fine Art Commission."
    I have already addressed the House on the main object of the Instruction and, therefore, I think the needs of the occasion will be met if I formally move it.
    Sir PATRICK FORD: I beg to second the Motion.
    While it may have been desirable for good 'reasons to preserve the original buildings there was no possibility of getting a Second Reading for the Bill
    1214
    and at the same time secure that the buildings would be preserved, but if having given the promoters a Second Reading of the Bill we give this Instruction, we do secure that another body is called in, apart from the promoters and their own architect, to see that a building is put up which will preserve the amenities and character of the place. Many citizens of London take advantage of the gardens at lunch time and in the evening to take their leisure there, get some refreshment, and see the beauties of the site. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed!"] I do not believe in flogging a willing horse and, therefore, I will only say that I heartily commend the Instruction to the House.
    It being after Eleven of the Clock, and objection being taken to further Proceedings, the Debate stood adjourned.
    Debate to be resumed upon Monday next, at Half-past Seven of the Clock.

  SUPPLY.
  Again considered in Committee.
  [Sir DENNIS HERBERT in the Chair.]
  Postponed Proceeding resumed on
  Question proposed on consideration of Question,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £26,561,901, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will Dome in course of payment during the
  year ending on the 31st day of March, 1934, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various Establishments connected therewith, including sundry Grants-in-Aid."
  Question again proposed, "That a sum, not exceeding £26,561,601, be granted for the said Service."
  Question put.
  The Committee divided: Ayes, 32; Noes, 151.

  Division No. 262.]

  AYES.

  [11.11 p.m.

  Attlee, Clement Richard

  Greenwood, Rt. Hon. Arthur

  Mander, Geoffrey le M.

  Banfield, John William

  Grundy, Thomas W.

  Maxton, James.

  Batey, Joseph

  Harris, Sir Percy

  Parkinson. John Allen

  Bevan, Aneurin (Ebbw Vale)

  Hirst, George Henry

  Price, Gabriel

  Buchanan, George.

  Jenkins, Sir William

  Rathbone, Eleanor

  Cocks, Frederick Seymour

  Lawson, John James

  Smith, Tom (Normanton)

  Cripps, Sir Stafford

  Leonard, William

  Tinker, John Joseph

  Dagger, George

  Llewellyn-Jones, Frederick

  Williams, David (Swansea, East)

  Davies, David L. (Pontypridd)

  Logan, David Gilbert

  Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)

  McEntee, Valentine L.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES—

  Edwards, Charles

  McGovern, John

  Mr. John and Mr. Groves.

  Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)

  Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)

  NOES.

  Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel

  Hacking, Rt. Hon. Douglas H.

  Ramsay, T. B. W. (Western Isles)

  Agnew, Lieut.-Com. P. G.

  Hamilton, Sir R. W.(Orkney & Zetl'nd)

  Ramsbotham, Herwald

  Allen, Lt.-Col. J. Sandeman (B'k'nh'd.)

  Hanbury, Cecil

  Ramsden, Sir Eugene

  Aske, Sir Robert William

  Hanley. Dennis A.

  Ray, Sir William

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

  Harbord, Arthur

  Rea, Walter Russell

  Atholl, Duchess of

  Hartington, Marquess of

  Reid, James S. C. (Stirling)

  Banks, Sir Reginald Mitchell

  Heilgers, Captain F. F. A.

  Reid, William Allan (Derby)

  Beauchamp, Sir Brograve Campbell

  Herbert, Capt. S. (Abbey Division)

  Roberts, Sir Samuel (Ecciesall)

  Beaumont, M. W. (Bucks., Aylesbury)

  Holdsworth, Herbert

  Robinson, John Roland

  Bernays, Robert

  Horobin, Ian M.

  Rosbotham, Sir Thomas

  Bevan, Stuart James (Holborn)

  Horsbrugh, Florence

  Ross Taylor, Walter (Woodbridge)

  Bird, Sir Robert B. (Wolverh'pton W.)

  Howard, Tom Forrest

  Runge, Norah Cecil

  Borodale, Viscount

  Howitt, Dr. Alfred B.

  Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)

  Bossom, A. C.

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

  Rutherford, John (Edmonton)

  Boulton, W. W.

  Hurd, Sir Percy

  Salt, Edward W.

  Bowyer, Capt. Sir George E. W.

  James, Wing-Com. A. W. H.

  Samuel, Samuel (W'dsworth, Putney)

  Broadbent, Colonel John

  Jesson, Major Thomas E.

  Sandeman. Sir A. N. Stewart

  Brocklebank, C. E. R.

  Johnstone, Harcourt (S. Shields)

  Sassoon, Rt. Hon. Sir Philip A. G. D.

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

  Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)

  Shaw, Helen B. (Lanark, Bothwell)

  Brown, Ernest (Leith)

  Lamb, Sir Joseph Quinton

  Shaw, Captain William T. (Fortar)

  Buchan, John

  Leckie, J. A.

  Smith, Louis W. (Sheffield, Hallam)

  Burnett, John George

  Leighton, Major B. E. P.

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

  Caporn, Arthur Cecil

  Lindsay, Noel Ker

  Smithers, Waldron

  Chapman, Col. R. (Houghton-le-Spring)

  Little, Graham-, Sir Ernest

  Somerville, Annesley A. (Windsor)

  Christle, James Archibald

  Lloyd, Geoffrey

  Somerville, D. G. (Willesden, East)

  Clayton, Sir Christopher

  Lockwood, John C. (Hackney, C.)

  Southby, Commander Archibald R. J.

  Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.

  Lovat-Fraser, James Alexander

  Spencer, Captain Richard A.

  Colfox, Major William Philip

  Lyons, Abraham Montagu

  Spender-Clay, Rt. Hon. Herbert H.

  Colman, N. C. D.

  MacAndrew, Capt. J. O. (Ayr)

  Stanley, Lord (Lancaster, Fylde)

  Cook, Thomas A.

  McKie, John Hamilton

  Stones, James

  Copeland, Ida

  McLean, Major Sir Alan

  Storey, Samuel

  Courtauld, Major John Sewell

  Magnay, Thomas

  Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray F.

  Crookshank, Col. C. de Windt (Bootle)

  Maitland, Adam

  Tate, Mavis Constance

  Cruddas, Lieut, Colonel Bernard

  Makins, Brigadier-General Ernest

  Thomson, Sir Frederick Charles

  Dalkeith, Earl of

  Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.

  Touche, Gordon Cosmo

  Davison, Sir William Henry

  Mayhew, Lieut.-Colonel John

  Vaughan-Morgan, Sir Kenyon

  Dower, Captain A. V. G.

  Meller, Sir Richard James

  Wallace, Captain D. E. (Hornsey)

  Eastwood, John Francis

  Merriman, Sir F. Boyd

  Ward, Lt.-Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)

  Edmondson, Major A. J.

  Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)

  Ward, Sarah Adelaide (Cannock)

  Elmley, Viscount

  Milne, Charles

  Warrender, Sir Victor A. G.

  Entwistle, Cyril Fullard

  Molson, A. Hugh Eisdale

  Wedderburn, Henry James Scrymgeour

  Erskine, Lord (Weston-super-Mare)

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

  Whiteside, Borras Noel H.

  Evans, David Owen (Cardigan)

  Morrison, William Shepherd

  Wilson, Lt.-Col, Sir Arnold (Hertf'd)

  Ford, Sir Patrick J.

  Nation, Brigadier-General J. J. H.

  Wolmer, Rt. Hon. Viscount

  Gluckstein, Louis Halle

  Nunn, William

  Wood, Sir Murdoch McKenzie (Banff)

  Goldie, Noel B.

  O'Donovan, Dr. William James

  Wragg, Herbert

  Graham, Sir F. Fergus (C'mb'rl'd, N.)

  Oman, Sir Charles William C.

  Young, Rt. Hon. Sir Hilton (S'v'noaks)

  Graves, Marjorie

  Pearson, William G.

  Grenfell, E. C. (City of London)

  Pike, Cecil F.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

  Grigg, Sir Edward

  Potter, John

  Mr. Blindell and Major George

  Guest, Capt. Rt. Hon. F. E.

  Ramsay, Alexander (W. Bromwich)

  Davies.

  Guy, J. C. Morrison

  Ramsay, Capt. A. H. M. (Midlothlan)

  Original Question again proposed.
  Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to.—[Captain Margesson.]
  Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.
  The remaining Order was read and postponed.

  ADJOURNMENT.
  Resolved,
  "That this House do now adjourn."—[Captain Margesson.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Nineteen Minutes after Eleven o'Clock.

  GERMANY (MRS. TEBBITT, COMPENSATION CLAIM).
  GERMANY (MRS. TEBBITT, COMPENSATION CLAIM).
  PALESTINE (PROPOSED LOAN).
  PALESTINE (PROPOSED LOAN).
  MALAYA (WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION).
  MALAYA (WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION).
  GLASS BOTTLE-MAKING MACHI- NERY (IMPORT).
  GLASS BOTTLE-MAKING MACHI- NERY (IMPORT).
  SPECIAL CAMPAIGN PENSION.
  SPECIAL CAMPAIGN PENSION.