Sitting of 25 June 1940

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

DEATH OF A MEMBER.
Mr. SPEAKER made the following communication to the House:
I regret to have to inform the House of the death of Sir Richard James Meller, late Member for the County of Surrey (Mitcham Division), and desire to express our sense of the loss we have sustained and our sympathy with the relatives.

NEW WRIT.
For the Montrose District of Burghs, in the room of Colonel Charles Iain Kerr, D.S.O., M.C. (Manor of Northstead).—[Mr. Munro.]
PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  BOURNEMOUTH GAS AND WATER BILL.
  Lords Amendments considered.
  The Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Dennis Herbert): Some of these Amendments are to protect various authorities, and the others are all of a purely drafting nature.
  Lords Amendments agreed to.
  Private Bills [Lords] (Standing Orders not previously inquired into complied with),
  Mr. SPEAKER laid upon the Table Report from one of the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, That in the case of the following Bill, originating in the Lords, and referred on the First Reading thereof, the Standing Orders not previously inquired into, which are applicable thereto, have been complied with, namely:
  Saint Mary Magdalene Hospital (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Bill [Lords].
  Bill to be read a Second time.

  FARNHAM GAS AND ELECTRICITY BILL [Lords].
  Read the Third time, and passed, with Amendments.

  SOUTH-EASTERN GAS CORPORATION LIMITED (ASSOCIATED COMPANIES) BILL [Lords].
  The Chairman of Ways and Means: I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
  In moving the Second Reading of this Bill, it is right that I should refer to certain points which I raised on the Bill notice of which appeared on the Votes on Wednesday last. The points arise from their not being provided for by the existing Standing Orders. The Bill is one promoted by what is called a parent company, a company controlling through its holdings some 24 other companies. Most of these companies are statutory gas companies; but some of them are gas companies which are registered under the Companies Acts. The Bill asks for powers, not for the promoting company itself, but for those controlled, or subsidiary companies. The powers asked for are quite ordinary ones in the case of gas companies, but the point is that, being promoted by a company which is not in itself a gas company, but only a controlling company, there are no provisions under the Standing Orders requiring, for instance, the holding of what is known as Wharncliffe meetings, in order to get the consent of the proprietors of the companies concerned. There are similar points, as, for instance, that unless special steps are taken—and those steps are not provided for under the Standing Orders—powers might be obtained which might affect consumers without the consumers having notice of the application for the Bill.
  There are considerable advantages in this form of Private Bill legislation. For instance, in this case, if the Bill were not promoted by the controlling company, it would mean that every one of the 24 subsidiary companies would have to promote a Bill. Many of them are very small, and the expense of promoting a Parliamentary Bill would be heavy and, indeed, in some cases almost beyond the possibility of the company. I have consulted the Lord Chairman of Committees in another place, and we have acted together on the same line in this matter. Perhaps I cannot do better than tell the House the line which was taken on the Bill in another place. It was referred by the Lord Chairman of Committees to a Select Committee. That Committee reported that

  273
  "having regard to the present national emergency and the statement made on behalf of the promoters, that before the Bill became law ordinary meetings of all these subsidiary companies would be held, and having regard also to the special financial position of the promoting company relative to the subsidiary companies, in their opinion the Bill should be allowed to proceed."
  The Bill has passed through all its stages in another place and comes down to this House. I have no doubt that the House will pass the Second Reading of the Bill—I see no reason why they should not do so, as it is in this particular case quite innocuous—and, moreover, Wharncliffe meetings have already been held by special arrangement in this case of all the subsidiary companies, so that in this case the difficulties have been got over. But, as this will be a precedent and one which may be followed in other cases, I should like to tell the House that I propose to appoint a small expert Committee to consider this type of Bill and advise me as to what alterations should be made in the Standing Orders relating to Private Bill legislation in order to deal with a Bill of this kind. When I get the report of that Committee, I shall have to ask the House in due course to pass revised Standing Orders.
  Mr. Thorne: This seems to be a complete departure from Parliamentary practice, and I think that the Chairman of Ways and Means has some doubt in his own mind as to whether the Bill should be passed or not. As he has stated that he is setting up a Committee for the purpose of advising him for the future, I have no objection to the Second Reading of the Bill.
  Mr. Graham White: The reasons given by the Chairman of Ways and Means seem to be sufficient for allowing the Bill to proceed, and the fact that meetings of the subsidiary companies will be held before the Bill reaches its final stages seems to be an adequate safeguard. But the Bill does, in fact, create an important precedent. I am interested to know whether the subsidiary companies have gone to the Board of Trade and asked for any observations from them.
  Mr. Levy: I have been dealing, in company with a number of other hon. Members, with Private Bills for a good many years; and this is a departure. I will not make any comment with regard to the
  274
  passing of the Bill, but, as the Chairman of Ways and Means has said, it is one of great significance and may lead to abuses. There are many Private Bills where the promoters seek to obtain powers which are peculiar to their own area.
  Mr. Neil Maclean: Would it not be advisable that a Bill of this kind, establishing quite a precedent, should be withdrawn until the Committee has been set up?
  It being Three of the Clock, the Debate stood adjourned.
  Debate to be resumed To-morrow.

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.
  CIVIL DEFENCE.

    EVACUATION.
    Mr. Henderson Stewartasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is aware that billeting officers, who are voluntary workers, in Scotland, are determined not to carry on their duties if evacuation is made compulsory; and whether he will instruct the police or some other such service to perform these duties if compulsory billeting is ordered?
    The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Ernest Brown): I am confident that if conditions arise in which it is necessary to put the evacuation plans into operation in Scotland, very few householders will adopt an attitude calling for the exercise of compulsion. I do not accept the statement in the first part of the Question, and it is not practicable to adopt the suggestion made in the second part.
    Mr. Stewart: Is my right hon. Friend aware that most of those voluntary workers hold positions, either as teachers or otherwise, by the good will of the general public, and that to ask them to undertake this most unwelcome job would be to place an impossible burden upon them?
    Mr. Brown: I do not think that. The representations I have received lead me to think that what is really wanted is more guidance through the local authorities on the exercise of the powers, and I have this weekend issued a new circular,

    275
    which I will place in the Library of the House, so that hon. Members can see it.
    Mr. Stewartasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has considered the representations made to him by the hon. Member for East Fife regarding the need for amending the list of reception areas for the purposes of evacuation in the county of Fife; and what action he proposes to take?
    Mr. Brown: I have noted my hon. Friend's representations in connection with the classification of Scottish areas for evacuation purposes. As he will be aware, this question is constantly under review in the light of developing circumstances.
    Mr. Stewart: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that all the evidence, military and otherwise, which has reached me points clearly to the fact that many of the areas in Fife are highly dangerous, and that to take children there would be to expose them to great risks which I do not think Scotland is ready to accept?
    Mr. Brown: Perhaps my hon. Friend will read between the lines of my answer or have a talk with me afterwards.
    Miss Rathboneasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, in order to stimulate the evacuation of children, and also to provide against the danger of the crowding of the roads by refugees in the event of enemy attack, the Government will consider making it clearly known that, in the event of such attack, the civilian population will be prohibited from leaving their home towns or using the roads and railroads; and will he further make preparations for enforcing this prohibition?
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Home Security (Mr. Mabane): Full instructions to the civilian population on this matter are contained in the notice issued recently to all householders. This notice also states that in the event of invasion by parachute, aeroplane, or ship, orders relating to movement of the civilian population will be given by the Commander-in-Chief.

    12-BORE SHOTGUNS.
    Mr. Robertsonasked the Home Secretary whether he will consider prohibiting the sale of 12-bore guns and ammunition throughout the country?
    The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Peake): My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War recently issued to the public an appeal for the loan of shotguns, to which there has been a good response. There would not appear to be any need at present for action such as my hon. Friend suggests.
    Mr. Robertson: Is it not a fact that General Sir Edmund Ironside, addressing Local Defence Volunteers on 5th June, stated that for Metropolitan defence 12-bore shotguns are more efficient than high velocity rifles and also more efficient for woodland defence? Having regard to the enemies of Britain who are here, should not the sale of these guns and ammunition be prohibited?
    Mr. Law: The mere prohibition of the sale of these guns would not contribute very greatly to the object my hon. Friend has in view. We have also to consider the interests of agriculture, and of keeping down vermin of all kinds throughout the country.
    Mr. Garro Jones: Having regard to the greatly increased value of these guns in modern warfare, will the hon. Gentleman not consider bringing them under a system of registration, so that the Government shall know where to put their hands on hundreds of thousands of these guns now held throughout the country?
    Mr. Law: I will certainly consider the suggestion.
    Mr. Lipson: Will the Minister represent to the Secretary of State for War whether it is desirable in the interests of national security to have guns exposed for sale in these days?
    Mr. Law: I will convey that suggestion to my right hon. Friend.

  PETROL RATIONING.
  Mr. Silkinasked the Secretary for Petroleum whether, with a view to conserving the supply of petrol, he will take steps to review more frequently the issue of supplementary rations of petrol?
  The Secretary for Petroleum (Mr. Geoffrey Lloyd): Supplementary rations are reviewed at intervals of two months, except in the case of large industrial users, where the period is one month. On balance, I do not think that a more frequent review would be advantageous.
  Mr. Garro Jones: Will the Minister say what he means by "review"? Is a long list quickly scanned by an official, or are those to whom supplementary rations are issued communicated with and asked to establish their cases?
  Mr. Lloyd: In some cases, if the case is clear, an allowance is made, but in other cases there is a more detailed investigation.
  Mr. Silkinasked the Secretary for Petroleum whether, with a view to eliminating the use of petrol for pleasure purposes and otherwise conserving the supply of petrol, he will make provision that no petrol be supplied except to those who prove to the satisfaction of his Department that a supply of petrol is reasonably necessary to them having regard to existing circumstances?
  Mr. Lloyd: The greater part of the petrol allowed to private motorists is in the form of supplementary rations, which are authorised only after investigation of the consumer's needs. The small basic ration allows of less than six miles travel per day, and, after meeting necessary domestic purposes, cannot give any appreciable surplus for misuse.
  Mr. Silkin: Does not the hon. Gentleman think that some such step as this is necessary in order to make people realise that there is a war on?
  Mr. Lloyd: I gave an answer on that subject last week.

  OVERSEAS EVACUATION.
  Colonel Wedgwoodasked the Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs whether the children of German Jews in this country are included in the benefits of the Dominions evacuation scheme?
  The Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs (Mr. Shakespeare): No, Sir. The scheme applies only to the children of Allied refugees.
  Colonel Wedgwood: Why does it not apply to those who are in greater need than we are?
  Mr. Shakespeare: My immediate task is to administer this scheme in harmony with the wishes of the Dominion Governments.
  Colonel Wedgwood: Are we to understand from that reply that the Dominions make this distinction, and not the hon. Gentleman?
  Mr. Shakespeare: No, Sir, that is not so; but in the discussions it was generally agreed that the first group should come from the children of Allied refugees.
  Miss Rathboneasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that many parents who are anxious to send their children to a British Dominion or to the United States of America at their own expense, are prevented from doing so by the impossibility of sending funds abroad to cover the cost; and, in order to encourage such evacuation, will he consider a scheme whereby the Government of the receiving country could be asked to advance on loan the cost of the children's maintenance, the parents simultaneously paying the cost into a trust fund in this country out of which the loan could be eventually repaid?
  The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Kingsley Wood): Hon. Members will be aware of the Government scheme for the evacuation of children overseas, particulars of which were announced by my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal on the 19th June. They will also be aware that this scheme is designed to afford equal opportunities to a representative cross-section of the child population between the ages of 5 and 16. In so far, however, as parents wish to make their own arrangements for the evacuation of their children from this country, I must make it plain that the imperative necessity of conserving our dollar resources to meet other essential demands makes it impossible to allow the remittance of funds for the purpose in question to Canada and the United States of America. No such restriction exists, however, in the case of British Dominions other than Canada.
  As regards the latter part of the Question, I am glad to have the opportunity

  279
  to acknowledge with gratitude the generosity of the offers of hospitality already made by the Governments of the several Dominions and by private organisations in the United States of America. I think it will be obvious, however, that any further initiative in the matter must come from the receiving countries themselves.
  Miss Rathbone: Would it not leave vacant places under the general scheme if parents who are able to pay the full cost of sending their children to friends were enabled to do so?
  Sir K. Wood: I do not think so, because I think others would probably desire to take their places, and in any case the paramount necessity of conserving our dollar resources must prevail.
  Commander Sir Archibald Southby: May I ask whether there is any restriction in regard to Newfoundland?
  Sir K. Wood: I will inquire upon that point.
  Captain Sir Ian Fraser: May I ask whether a war pension payable normally all over the world could be paid in, say, Canada in the case of a severely disabled person wishing to go there at his own expense?
  Sir K. Wood: I shall be glad if my hon. and gallant Friend will put that Question on the Paper.
  Sir Francis Fremantle: Cannot the right hon. Gentleman make some arrangements by which well-to-do parents in this country could send their children over to the other side if the money, paid in advance, were kept here against eventual payment after the war?
  Sir K. Wood: That is the suggestion made in the original Question, but I have pointed out that our dollar resources have to be conserved.

  BANKRUPTCIES.
  Commander Locker-Lampsonasked the President of the Board of Trade how many bankruptcy petitions have been filed and receiving orders made in the United Kingdom during the last six years ended May, 1940?
  The President of the Board of Trade (Sir Andrew Duncan): With my hon. and gallant Friend's permission, I will circulate particulars relating to the period mentioned, in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
  Following are the particulars:

  Statement showing the number of Bankruptcy Petitions filed and the number of Receiving and Administration Orders made in England and Wales,* during each of the calendar years 1934–1939.

  Calendar Year.

  Number of Bankruptcy Petitions filed.

  Number of Receiving and Administration Orders made.

  1934

  …

  4,435

  3,623

  1935

  …

  4,268

  3,523

  1936

  …

  4,010

  3,249

  1937

  …

  3,944

  3,123

  1938

  …

  3,823

  3,105

  1939

  …

  3,197

  2,667

  * The Bankruptcy Acts do not apply to the whole of the United Kingdom, but to England and Wales only.

  The number of receiving and administration orders made during the five months January to May, 1940, was 826.

  ECONOMIC WARFARE (RUSSIAN IMPORTS).
  Mr. Manderasked the Minister of Economic Warfare the position with regard to the passage of supplies through Vladivostock destined for Germany?
  The Minister of Economic Warfare (Mr. Dalton): I informed the hon. Member for Bilston (Mr. Hannah) on 22nd May that there had recently been a decline in the import of war materials through Vladivostock. According to my latest information, this decline has continued. I am, however, still keeping a constant watch on this traffic.
  Mr. Mander: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that he is co-operating in the closest possible manner on this subject with his hon. and learned Friend His Majesty's Ambassador to Moscow?
  Mr. Dalton: Yes, Sir, I can readily give that assurance. This is, of course, one of the matters which my hon. and learned Friend will already have raised with the Soviet authorities.

  BRITISH ARMY.

    LOCAL DEFENCE VOLUNTEERS.
    Mr. Cocksasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will consider permitting women who can use a rifle to join the Local Defence Volunteers?
    The Financial Secretary to the War Office (Mr. Richard Law): No, Sir.
    Mr. Cocks: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that hundreds of women in this country who are expert in the use of a rifle are absolutely furious because they are not allowed to join the Local Defence Volunteers?
    Mr. Law: I hope that they will understand the position.
    Dr. Edith Summerskill: Could the Minister give a reason for this refusal?
    Mr. Law: Apart from any question of principle which may be involved, there are all sorts of questions of organisation which make it impracticable.
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: Is not the female of the species more deadly than the male?
    Mr. Ralph Ethertonasked the Secretary of State for War what provisions exist for reasonable expenditure to be made by group and company headquarters of Local Defence Volunteers on their local organisation, including accommodation for men on duty, travelling, petrol, telephones, postages, etc.; whether notification of such provisions as exist has been circularised to local units; and whether there is any sanction for local authorities to make advances in aid of such expenditure in proper cases?
    Mr. Menderasked the Secretary of State for War what arrangements have been made to supply units of the Local Defence Volunteers with the necessary financial assistance?
    Mr. Law: Grants were made some time ago to commands and to zone and group organisers to meet necessary administrative expenditure. But it was felt that the machinery could be more effectively worked through Territorial Army Associations who are accustomed to dealing with questions of this kind. Instructions have accordingly been issued to all concerned, and associations will take over the
    282
    administration of Local Defence Volunteers and the necessary funds are being placed at their disposal.
    Mr. Etherton: Will my hon. Friend say when the notification was issued to these units that they had money available?
    Mr. Law: The instruction was issued only quite recently, and I have no doubt that by this time it has been used.
    Mr. Mender: Can my hon. Friend give an assurance that any leaders in the Local Defence Volunteers who feel called upon to make certain expenditure in order not to delay the work will be reimbursed from War Office funds later on?
    Mr. Law: I do not think any member of the Local Defence Volunteers will be out of pocket in respect of any expenditure that is reasonably incurred.
    Major Sir George Davies: Is my hon. Friend aware that, in spite of the expressed desire to keep this organisation as simple as possible, it is inevitable that as time goes by the work thrown upon company and larger units is increasing, that the files and letters, both secret and general, are increasing, and that the staff work is constantly increasing, in spite of every effort to restrict it; and will my hon. Friend appreciate that this throws additional expenditure on the staffs which have to cope with this increasing correspondence?
    Mr. Law: Yes, Sir, I appreciate that, and, of course, the financial arrangements have been modified to meet the points which my hon. and gallant Friend has raised.
    Sir F. Fremantle: And to meet also the travelling expenses, which have been out of keeping with the amount allowed?
    Mr. Cocksasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will take steps to accelerate the supply of instructions, armlets, guns, petrol coupons and legitimate financial resources to units of the Local Defence Volunteers; whether it is the policy of the War Office to encourage the development of this force in every possible way; and whether it is intended that it should officially form a part of the Territorial regiments of the Regular Army in the various areas concerned?
    Mr. Law: It is the policy of the War Office to encourage the development of the Local Defence Volunteers in every way, and issue of all the items mentioned in the Question is being made as rapidly as possible. It is not intended that the Force should form part of the Territorial regiments of the Regular Army.
    Mr. Cocks: Is the Minister aware that in certain areas there is a lack of complete satisfaction with the present arrangements?
    Mr. Law: As the hon. Member knows, the Local Defence Volunteer Corps are being organised throughout the whole of the country, and I think it is a little too much to expect, at this stage, that there should be complete satisfaction everywhere. However, I can assure the hon. Member that every effort is being made to remove the grounds for dissatisfaction where they exist.
    Mr. Silverman: If these people are not members of the Regular Forces, what is their status in international law?
    Mr. Law: They are members of the Armed Forces of the Crown.
    Mr. Lawson: Is the Minister aware that if there is not some more definite organisation for these units as part of the Armed Forces, there is a great danger of their usefulness being dissipated? Has the War Office considered the value of despatch riders?
    Mr. Law: Yes, Sir. The War Office has consideration of that matter.
    Mr. Manderasked the Secretary of State for War to what extent personal or motor-car licences belonging to members of the Local Defence Volunteers are affected by the membership thereof; and what steps they should take in case of doubt?
    Mr. Law: Any member of the Local Defence Volunteers, who is authorised to use his car on duty, will receive mileage allowance, provided his car is licensed and insured for the purpose. In cases of doubt, the insurance company should be consulted. The use of a car by a member for private purposes is not affected.
    Mr. Mander: Is there any Army authority, such as the Secretary of the Territorial Association, to whom application may be made for guidance in case of doubt?
    Mr. Law: The simplest way is to apply to the insurance company.
    Sir T. Moore: Would it not be a good thing to hand over many of these non-licensed and laid-up cars to the headquarters of the Local Defence Volunteers for general utility? There is widespread feeling about that.
    Mr. Law: I think that would raise very wide questions of organisation and also administrative difficulties. Certainly, if a state of acute emergency arose, that course would be followed.
    Sir T. Moore: But that would be too late.
    Mr. Law: I do not think there is any need for it at this stage, because there is no shortage of motor-cars.
    Mr. De la Bère: Is it not a very sound suggestion? Why do we have to have these stereotyped and meaningless answers?

    INSTRUCTORS (EX-SERVICE MEN).
    Mr. Cocksasked the Secretary of State for War whether he will consider utilising the services of ex-soldiers who fought in the last war to act as Army instructors and giving them a short course of training for that purpose with a view to a great acceleration of the process of enrolling and training all citizens up to the age of 40 who have not yet been called up?
    Mr. Law: Voluntary enlistment is open to ex-Service men up to the age of 57 years who are considered to be suitable to act as instructors.

    RECRUITS (TRAINING AND INTAKE).
    Mr. Ralph Ethertonasked the Secretary of State for War when it is intended to start training men in the age-groups 24 to 28; and whether he is aware of the public concern at the slow rate of intake to the Army?
    Mr. Law: I am informed by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour and National Service that good progress has been made in calling up the age-groups mentioned in the Question. As regards the latter part of the Question, it has already been stated, in answer to previous Questions on the subject, that the intake is being greatly accelerated.

    ACCOMMODATION, LONDON RAILWAY TERMINI.
    Mr. Robertsonasked the Secretary of State for War whether he is satisfied with the welfare arrangements for soldiers in Euston, King's Cross, St. Pancras and Liverpool Street stations?
    Mr. Law: Adequate provision of rest-rooms, washing and lavatory facilities and food canteens at King's Cross station will be available almost immediately. At Euston, St. Pancras and Liverpool Street stations progress is necessarily slow owing to the congested nature of the stations, but accommodation is available in the neighbourhood and efforts are being made to improve accommodation in the stations themselves.
    Mr. Robertson: Is it not a fact that night after night and day after day, thousands of soldiers are lying on the platforms and in mail vans, that there is no adequate rest accommodation, and that the catering facilities are forced out to the extremity of the station?
    Mr. Law: I can only repeat to my hon. Friend that very serious efforts are being made to improve the accommodation in these respects.
    Mr. Robertson: Having regard to the fact that this state of affairs has gone on for over nine months, I beg to give notice that I intend to raise this question on the Adjournment at the first opportunity.

    TRANSFER TO NAVY.
    Mr. Ralph Ethertonasked the Secretary of State for War whether, when a man who has been called up under the National Service (Armed Forces) Act, 1939, and has expressed a preference for service in the Navy, is called up inadvertently or otherwise for the Army, it is the practice of his Department to refuse to transfer him to the Navy unless he has had seafaring experience; whether it is the practice not to consult the naval authorities on such cases; whether the Board of Admiralty have been consulted as to this practice and approved thereof; and whether he will reconsider his decision on the case of a man from Urmston to which the hon. Member for Stretford has directed his attention?
    Mr. Law: The general procedure was explained to my hon. Friend by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of
    286
    Labour and National Service in reply to a Question last Thursday. Unless there is reason to suppose that a man has been erroneously posted to the Army, the War Office would not be disposed to reopen the matter. The War Office practice has the concurrence of the Admiralty, and I regret that I can see no reason to vary the decision in the case to which my hon. Friend refers.
    Mr. Etherton: Is it not a fact that in the case of the man to whom I drew attention, he had not been called up for the Army properly, but erroneously? Is not that the case?
    Mr. Law: I have been unable to find any evidence to show that.
    Mr. Etherton: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I intend to raise this matter on the Adjournment at the earliest possible moment.

    AUTOMOBILE SPECIALISTS.
    Mr. Robert Gibsonasked the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that, in October, 1939, an offer was made to the War Office to submit the names of members of the Institute of Automobile Assessors willing to serve in the capacity of automobile specialists; that so far the offer, though acknowledged, has not been taken advantage of; and whether he has any statement to make on the subject?
    Mr. Law: I have seen an offer made by the Institute last April, in reply to which they were informed that all posts of the character referred to are filled by means of the Central Register of the Ministry of Labour and National Service, and they were accordingly advised to communicate with the Ministry. I understand that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour has informed the Institute that he will be glad to take advantage of the offer should the opportunity arise.
    Mr. Gibson: Can the Minister say when that information was laid before the Institute by the Minister of Labour?

    MOTOR CAR IMPRESSMENT OFFICERS.
    Mr. R. Gibsonasked the Secretary of State for War how many motor salesmen from London firms handling only private motor cars have, since the out-

    287
    break of hostilities, been given commissions with the acting rank of captain as impressment officers charged with the duty of impressing all classes of motor lorries; and what steps have been taken to have such officers replaced by men with the appropriate technical qualifications and experience?
    Mr. Law: So far as can be traced, the answer to the first part of the Question is "None," and the second part, therefore, does not arise.
    Mr. Gibson: Is the Minister aware that this has been a matter of very great concern to assessors who have expert knowledge of this subject?

    LIEUT. H. J. SHADBOLT.
    Major Milnerasked the Secretary of State for War (1) whether he is aware that Captain H. J. Shadbolt, who had a distinguished career in the last war, being commissioned at the age of 18 years, and serving on all fronts, was wired to report on 7th September, 1939, forthwith re-commissioned, and posted to headquarters, home forces, but was shown in the "London Gazette" of 7th November, 1939, as having relinquished his commission; whether this officer has relinquished his commission; whether such relinquishment is in writing; and whether he is aware that the announcement in the "London Gazette" was made without previous complaint or notification, or compliance with King's Regulations, Appendix 23;
    (2) whether he is aware that as a result of Captain H. J. Shadbolt being gazetted without his knowledge or acquiescence as having relinquished his commission, this officer was arrested and convicted of wrongfully wearing His Majesty's uniform; that, although he has notified the War Office of his desire to appeal, in accordance with the Army Act, no such appeal has been granted and the officer is now in Pentonville Prison; and whether he will secure his release pending the hearing of his appeal;
    (3) whether he will set up an independent court of inquiry to inquire into the non-compliance on the part of the War Office with the Army Act and King's Regulation in the case of Captain H. J. Shadbolt, resulting in this officer being arrested, prosecuted and imprisoned?
    Mr. Law: I have made full inquiries into the circumstances in which the emergency commission granted to Lieut. H. J. Shadbolt (he does not hold the rank of captain) was terminated, and I am satisfied that there has been no omission to comply with any provision of the Army Act or of the King's Regulations, and that there is no case for a court of inquiry. The officer was informed of the termination of his commission, and it was notified in the "London Gazette." He is entitled to appeal against the termination of his commission, and there has been no refusal to consider such an appeal. The prosecution for wrongfully wearing uniform was a civil prosecution, and the matter is not one in which I have any jurisdiction.
    Major Milner: Is the hon. Gentleman not aware that there would have been no grounds for civil prosecution had the War Office not reported, or put into the "London Gazette," that this man had relinquished his commission? Would the hon. Gentleman answer my Question—did he, or did he not, relinquish his commission as stated in the "Gazette"?
    Mr. Law: The Army Council ordered this officer to relinquish his commission. The order was conveyed to him, and accordingly the notice in the "London Gazette" was effective.
    Major Milner: Is it within the province of the Army Council to put into the "Gazette" that I—or any other officer—have relinquished my commission when, in fact, I have not done so?
    Mr. Law: Yes, Sir, it is within the competence of the Army Council to order an officer to relinquish his commission, and having given that order, the commission is thereby relinquished.
    Major Milner: Has any proof been forthcoming of that instruction? In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I shall raise the matter at the earliest opportunity.

    OFFICERS (WAR SUBSTANTIVE RANK).
    Colonel Sir Edward Ruggles-Brise (for Colonel Arthur Evans)asked the Secretary of State for War whether he is now in a position to state the result of the consideration which has been given to the recommendation made by the

    289
    appropriate section of General Headquarters, British Expeditionary Force, to grant war substantive rank to all officers who were offered, in writing, and accepted such rank, before taking up particular appointments and commands?
    Mr. Law: Instructions on this subject are in course of preparation and will be issued shortly. I will let my hon. and gallant Friend have particulars as soon as they are ready.

  WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION BILL.
  Mr. Gordon Macdonaldasked the Home Secretary the policy of the Government regarding legislation to amend the law relating to workmen's compensation?
  Mr. Peake: The Government have given consideration to the question of proceeding with the further stages of the Workmen's Compensation Bill, which received a Second Reading on 30th April last, before the war entered upon its present phase and before the formation of the present Government. The Bill did not receive the general approval of the House, and many hon. Members voted in support of a reasoned Amendment. It is obviously most undesirable that there should be acute division, and possibly acrimonious debate, in relation to any Measure brought forward by the Government at the present time, and the Government have therefore made some inquiries with a view to estimating the prospects of arriving at some accommodation in the matter. Those preliminary inquiries have led them to the view that it would he desirable for the time being to suspend progress with the Bill pending the result of further discussions. The Bill was intended to come into operation on 1st July, and it is regretted that some disappointment must inevitably be caused as a result of this decision. The Government will, however, proceed at once to consult with the representatives of industry whose views were obtained before the present Bill was introduced, and will also be glad to receive informal representations coming from any quarter of the House.
  Mr. Macdonald: In order that injured workmen will not be penalised, will the Government consider making the new Bill operate from 1st July?
  Mr. Peake: I shall certainly do my best to secure speedy agreement, but it is very doubtful whether agreement can be secured and a Bill carried through all its stages by 1st July.
  Mr. Macdonald: I agree that it will take time to get the Bill through, but is it not possible for its provisions to operate from 1st July, although it may be the end of July before it is through?
  Mr. Peake: I think we had better discuss that point in the meetings which I have proposed in my answer.
  Mr. T. Smith: Do I understand that, apart from the discussions with various interests, the hon. Gentleman will be willing to talk this matter over with Members of the House?
  Mr. Peake: I am very anxious that that course should be followed.
  Mr. Higgs: Will my hon. Friend consult with non-tariff companies and mutual insurance companies as well as the tariff companies before coming to any conclusion?
  Mr. Peake: I will bear that point in mind.
  Sir T. Moore: As it was the intention that this legislation should come into effect from 1st July, the proposed Bill cannot be given retrospective application?

  NATIONAL WAR EFFORT.

    GREYHOUND RACE MEETINGS.
    Mr. R. C. Morrisonasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that on greyhound racing evenings in North and East London women munition workers, after a 12-hour day ending at 7 p.m., are unable to get conveyances home; and whether he will now take action to close down greyhound racing for the war period?
    Mr. Mabane: I am aware that there have been difficulties in the transport of workers in the circumstances indicated in the Question; but since the hon. Member put down his Question the National Greyhound Racing Society have taken steps to secure a very substantial reduction in the number of meetings. As from yesterday, no track will race on more than one day in each week: this

    291
    involves a reduction of about two-thirds in the number of meetings held hitherto over the whole country. In the London area there will be only 15 meetings instead of 40. The track authorities are to fix their meetings at such times as will avoid so far as practicable other peak loads. Careful watch will be kept on the working of these arrangements: if the hon. Member hears of any further difficulty and will let me have particulars, I will have inquiry made.
    Mr. Morrison: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that only on Saturday evening last many of the 3,000 women working in a North London factory, after working 12 hours and leaving at 7 p.m., had to walk two or three miles home because all the coaches and conveyances were filled with people going to greyhound racing? Will the hon. Gentleman say how serious the position must become before anything is done?
    Mr. Mabane: It is considerations of that sort which have led to the drastic reduction in the number of meetings.
    Mr. Morrison: Will the hon. Gentleman take some steps to ascertain that this sort of thing is causing serious discontent among thousands of women who are working long hours every day for seven days a week?
    Viscountess Astor: Is it not time that the Government took the lead instead of waiting for these vested interests to decide to do things?
    Mr. Higgs: Why not stop dog racing?
    Mr. Lawson: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the President of the Mining Federation only last Saturday appealed to the Government to stop these meetings?
    Mr. Mabane: My right hon. Friend indicated in his reply to the hon. Member for West Birmingham (Mr. Higgs) on 13th June that he is keeping in the closest touch with the Minister of Labour on this matter.
    Sir Joseph Lamb: May I ask, Mr. Speaker, whether there is any way in which the House can express its opinion on this matter?

    MEMBERS' COMMITTEE.
    Mr. Woodsasked the Prime Minister whether he will move to set up a Committee of this House to examine the many suggestions for the more effective prosecution of the war that are being made, the Committee to have direct access to and consultations with technical advisers concerning any suggestions regarded as of practical value?
    The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. Attlee): No, Sir. I do not think it is necessary to set up a Committee such as is suggested by my hon. Friend. Any suggestions which may be put forward for the more effective prosecution of the war receive the most careful consideration of the Ministers concerned.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: If the right hon. Gentleman cannot set up this Committee, will he set up a Committee to see that these suggestions are not pigeon-holed?

    GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
    Mr. Vernon Bartlettasked the Prime Minister whether, in order to lessen delay and confusion in existing Government Departments, and to avoid disappointment and discontent among individuals anxious to contribute ideas for the more effective prosecution of the war, he will consider the advisability of establishing an office, with liaison officers in every Government Department, to which suggestions for this purpose from all quarters can be sent for examination?
    Mr. Attlee: I do not think that the creation of a new office would make for expedition, as the matter would ultimately have to be dealt with by the appropriate Department, but if my hon. Friend has in mind any particular difficulties and will let me know I will make further inquiries.
    Mr. Bartlett: Is it not a fact that all Members of the House receive a great number of suggestions, some of which are good, and that they do not always know to which Department to send them, do not know whether they specially concern the Air Ministry or the War Office, and does the right hon. Gentleman not realise that it would be very helpful if there were a central committee to which these proposals could be sent?
    Mr. Attlee: If the hon. Member sends on a suggestion to one Department and it is found that it does not concern that Department, it can always be passed on.
    Mr. Bartlett: But does not that involve great and unnecessary delay?
    Captain Sir William Brass: How long does it take to get it to the other Department?
    Mr. Aneurin Bevan: Could there not be a sifting committee, who could dispose of the very large number of suggestions which are quite nonsensical and then submit to the appropriate Departments the remaining suggestions which are regarded as of value? Does the right hon. Gentleman not realise that his formal reply does not meet the realities of the situation?
    Mr. Attlee: A very large number of suggestions are received, and hon. Members will realise that the task of sifting them would call for not only wide technical knowledge but also a knowledge of what has already been done and what is being clone, and that this work is much better done in the Departments than by an ad hoc committee.
    Mr. Hannah: Should not these suggestions be taken up in secret?

  FOOD SUPPLIES.

    ARGENTINE CATTLE (GIFT).
    Mr. Thorneasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food whether he can give any information in connection with the Argentine cattle owners' present of 5,000 cattle for Empire soldiers?
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Mr. Boothby): A committee of prominent Argentine cattle owners has launched a scheme to present His Majesty's Government as a token of confidence and friendship with live cattle to be consumed by soldiers of the Empire, and a total of 5,000 head of cattle is anticipated. It has also been arranged that the cattle shall be slaughtered in the Argentine at below cost. A message conveying the great appreciation of His Majesty's Government has been conveyed to the committee through His Majesty's Ambassador at Buenos Aires, and I am glad to have this opportunity of express-
    294
    ing publicly my Noble Friend's gratitude for this gift and the spirit which has prompted it.

    POTATO STARCH.
    Mr. R. Gibsonasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food how much potato starch and kindred products he proposes should be imported during the current season?
    Mr. Boothby: No such imports are in contemplation.
    Mr. Denman: Do the Ministry propose to limit the use of starch, as was done in the last war?
    Mr. Boothby: No, Sir, not at present.

  MINISTRY OF SUPPLY.

    TIMBER.
    Mr. Parkerasked the Minister of Supply the exact scope of the work of the new Timber Supply Board; and what are its relations to the Forestry Commission?
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply (Mr. Harold Macmillan): The Timber Control Board will, subject to my right hon. Friend, be responsible for all questions relating to timber supplies and production. The Board includes the Timber Controller and the Chairman of the Forestry Commission, and under the chairmanship of Mr. George Dallas it will direct the work of the Timber Control and the war-time work of the Forestry Commission and will pay particular attention to the development of home-grown timber production.
    Mr. Parker: Will Questions in reference to the development of forestry during the war be put to the Minister of Supply or to the representative of the Forestry Commission?
    Mr. Macmillan: As far as planting trees is concerned, that will remain the function of the Forestry Commission, but the cutting of trees will be under the Timber Board.
    Mr. A. Edwards: Is the Supply Board responsible for importing timber?
    Mr. Leonard: In order to conserve timber will the hon. Gentleman take steps to see that Government inspectors do not bore holes in completed munition boxes in order to ascertain the water content?
    Mr. Edwards: May I have an answer to my question?
    Mr. Macmillan: The Supply Board has as one of its members the Timber Controller, who is responsible for importing timber.
    Mr. Edwards: Is the Minister aware that people in Canada wishing to supply spruce through this Board are refused the opportunity of doing so, with the result that a company controlled by a member of the Board supplies it at 50 per cent. more than is offered by the Canadian company?
    Mr. Macmillan: These are all questions which will be reviewed by the Timber Control Board.

    WASTE SALVAGE.
    Mr. Caryasked the Minister of Supply whether he will now introduce legislation to make it compulsory for local authorities to collect household refuse in such a way as to secure the conservation of the useful material it contains?
    Mr. Harold Macmillan: My right hon. Friend has decided to apply the principle of compulsion to the collection by local authorities of certain materials most urgently required. The form of the directions to be given under the Defence Regulations is under consideration, and my right hon. Friend hopes to issue them almost immediately.

  GREAT BRITAIN AND MEXICO.
  Mr. Thorneasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he can now give any information in connection with the declaration of the Mexican Government that they are now willing to resume diplomatic relations with the British Government?
  Mr. Lipsonasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is aware of the official declaration recently made by President Cardenas, of Mexico, that he is ready to resume diplomatic relations with this country, and what reply His Majesty's Government propose to make?
  The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Butler): The invitation from the Mexican Government is receiving careful consideration, but I am
  296
  not yet in a position to make any statement regarding the nature of our reply.
  Mr. Thorne: Will not the Government speed up this matter and get a settlement as early as possible? We do not want any more enemies.
  Mr. Butler: His Majesty's Government fully realise the importance of the matter.

  NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES.
  Mr. Parkerasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is now the situation in the Dutch East Indies; and what discussions, if any, have taken place either with the Japanese Government or with the United States Government, or with both, concerning any possible developments arising from the removal of the Dutch Government to London?
  Mr. Butler: There is nothing to report from the Netherlands East Indies, where the situation is normal. Following upon interchanges of view which have taken place between the Governments concerned, His Majesty's Government have made known their desire that the status quo in the Netherlands East Indies should be preserved. Declarations in the same sense have been made separately and independently by the Governments of the United States and Japan.

  CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICAN AIR ROUTES.
  Mr. Parkerasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what air routes in Central and South America are directly or partially under German ownership and/or control?
  Mr. Butler: I hope to be able to send the hon. Member particulars very shortly.
  Mr. Parker: Will this matter be watched carefully?
  Mr. Butler: Yes, Sir.

  RUSSIA (TRADE NEGOTIATIONS).
  Mr. G. Macdonaldasked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he is now in a position to make a statement in regard to the negotiation of a trade agreement with Russia?
  Mr. Butler: Exploratory discussions are at present in progress, but the hon. Member will readily understand that it is not possible to make a more detailed statement at this stage.
  Mr. Macdonald: When is it likely that a statement can be made?
  Mr. Butler: As soon as possible, but negotiations must take a little time.

  HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT (JOINT SITTINGS).
  Major Braithwaiteasked the Prime Minister whether in view of the serious position, he will take such powers for the Government as will permit all Ministers of the Crown to sit and speak in the House of Commons; and whether he will consider whether it is practicable for the two Houses of Parliament to sit together on urgent secret national affairs?
  Mr. Attlee: In present circumstances I am not in favour of taking action such as is suggested by my hon. and gallant Friend.

  HOUSE OF COMMONS (SECRET SESSIONS).
  Mr. Stokesasked the Prime Minister whether he will consider devoting one day of each week to a secret Session, at which it would not be necessary for all Ministers to attend, so that Members may be free to express their views on the immediate situation as it occurs without danger to the common good, and without giving the wrong impression that a special sitting is likely to do?
  Mr. Attlee: No, Sir. I think it best that arrangements should be made for a secret Session to take place when there is a general desire for a Debate on a specific subject.
  Mr. Stokes: Do the Prime Minister and the Lord Privy Seal realise that it takes time to go "through the usual channels," and that as the war gets nearer home it will become imperative that Members shall be able to come to this House and speak their minds openly, without fear of giving any information to the enemy?

  NATIONAL FINANCE.

    AGRICULTURE (BANK LOANS).
    Mr. De la Bèreasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has any figures to show the approximate total
    298
    amount in aggregate which was lent by Barclays, National Provincial, Midland, Westminster and Martins Banks, to agriculturists at the 31st December, 1939, or 1st January, 1940?
    Sir K. Wood: Perhaps my hon. Friend would be good enough to defer this Question until next Tuesday.
    Mr. De la Bère: Am I to understand from that answer that neither the Treasury nor the Ministry of Agriculture has any approximate figures on this matter?
    Sir K. Wood: No, Sir.

    AGRICULTURAL LAND (ACQUISITION).
    Mr. Stokesasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer under what circumstances the profit made on the sale of agricultural land for aerodrome or War Department purposes is regarded as a revenue profit or a capital gain?
    Sir K. Wood: The broad distinction is between the carrying on of a trade or business and the realisation of capital assets.
    Mr. Stokes: Will the Chancellor of the Exchequer say whether, when agricultural land hitherto regarded as valueless is sold at a high price, that is regarded as a capital appreciation or a revenue appreciation?
    Sir K. Wood: My hon. Friend had better put that question on the Paper.

    WAR FINANCING.
    Mr. Stokesasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will give an assurance that, for the rest of the war, the people will not be required to pay interest on their own credit by interest bearing loans; and whether he will undertake that the war shall be financed by the Government creating their own credit, strictly rationing all essential commodities and strictly controlling the price of all goods and services?
    Sir K. Wood: The answer to both parts of the Question is in the negative, as it would be impossible to finance the war successfully without borrowing. It is, of course, already the policy of the Government to take all practicable steps to secure economy in private expenditure by taxation, by rationing the supplies of commodities and by the control of prices.
    Mr. Stokes: Does the Chancellor of the Exchequer realise the bad example that has been set by the issue of the recent loan, and that it is no inspiration to the country to make sacrifices if people are to be required to pay interest on the country's own credit? Is it not about time this stopped?
    Sir. K. Wood: I do not think anyone will agree with the hon. Member.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: Does not the Chancellor think that the banks have already made enough without making more in war-time?
    Sir K. Wood: That is another question.

    MORATORIUM.
    Commander Locker-Lampsonasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that a moratorium was introduced at the outbreak of the war in 1914 although the financial condition of the country was not as precarious as on the outbreak of the present war; that little protection is being given under the Courts Emergency Powers Act to small people who have been sued and summoned; that hundreds of soldiers overseas have had their lives complicated by debts which would not have existed had a moratorium been introduced; and will he now introduce a moratorium?
    The Attorney-General (Sir Donald Somervell): I have been asked to reply. The moratoria introduced at the beginning of the last war were before the then Courts Emergency Powers Act, which was regarded as replacing them, and they in fact were not extended beyond November, 1914. I think the hon. Member under-estimates the value of the protection given by the Courts (Emergency Powers) Act, but I would refer him to the Courts (Emergency Powers) (Amendment) Bill now before the House. If the Bill is read a Second time, it is proposed to move Amendments which will afford further protection to debtors, particularly in certain cases to those who are serving in the Forces.
    Commander Locker-Lampson: While thanking my right hon. and learned Friend for his answer, may I ask whether he is aware that there are soldiers who have been made bankrupt since they have been serving overseas?
    The Attorney-General: I shall be very glad indeed if my hon. and gallant Friend will send me particulars of any case that he has in mind. This is a difficult question and we shall be glad to give any information in a case such as that to which he referred.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
Mr. Lees-Smith: Has the Lord Privy Seal any statement to make about the business of the House to-day and to-morrow?
Mr. Attlee: I regret that it was found necessary to postpone the Debate upon Children's Overseas Reception, but I hope that the Debate will take place next week. We propose to take, instead, the Ministry of Pensions Vote, which had previously been noted as a subject which many hon. Members desired to debate. There was no opportunity to announce the change to the House before the Adjournment last Thursday; a statement was, however, issued on Friday, and hon. Members will therefore have known about the Debate on the Ministry of Pensions Vote. In addition to the business announced for consideration to-day, we propose to ask the House to-morrow to take as the first Order, and pass through all its stages, the India and Burma (Emergency Provisions) Bill, which is being submitted to-day by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for India. Copies of the Bill will be in Members' hands this evening.
Mr. Hore-Belisha: I understand that the Prime Minister is to make a statement on the position in France in reply to a Question. I wish to ask whether it would not be possible, in connection with events of such magnitude, to make such statements upon the Adjournment? It seems to me that the rights and authority of Parliament should be preserved. I am sure that my right hon. Friend would be the first to respect the necessity of carrying Parliament with him on every such occasion.
Mr. Attlee: An endeavour is always made to meet the wishes of the House in these matters, but I understand that there has been no desire for a general Debate.
Mr. Hare-Belisha: I was not raising the necessity for a general Debate, but just

301
a matter of custom. There may be occasions when Parliament itself may have something to say on matters of importance, and I suggest that Ministers should make these statements so that other Members may, if necessary, speak on them.
Mr. Attlee: The fact is, that sometimes these statements are made in reply to a Question and sometimes on the Adjournment, according as to whether the House wants to have a Debate or not.
Major Milner: Is it not important that the promised new pensions Warrant should be available in the Debate to-day?
Mr. Attlee: I think the hon. and gallant Member will find that the new pensions Warrant will be ready to-morrow.
Sir Henry Morris-Jones: I desire to ask a Question on the internal arrangements of the House, as to whether in future sittings of the House in Secret Session it will be possible to indicate to hon. Members outside the Chamber the name of the hon. Member or right hon. Member who is speaking in the House?
Mr. Speaker: I have considered the Question which the hon. Member sent to me, and have come to the conclusion that it would be a mistake to do as he suggests and that it would be quite contrary to the principle of secrecy on which such sittings are conducted.
Mr. Gallacher: Would it not be very desirable that, in all Debates, Members should, as far as possible, remain in the House?

NEW MEMBERS SWORN.
Henry Urmston Willink, esquire, for the Borough of Croydon (North Division).
Rt. Hon. Ernest Bevin for the Borough of Wandsworth (Central Division).

WAR SITUATION.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill): The House will feel profound sorrow at the fate of the great French nation and people, to whom we have been joined so long in war and peace, and whom we have regarded as trustees with ourselves for the progress of a liberal, cultured and tolerant civilisation in Europe. There is
302
no use or advantage in wasting strength and time upon hard words and reproaches. We hope that life and power will be given to us to rescue France from the ruin and bondage into which she has been cast by the might and fury of the enemy—[An HON. MEMBER: "And by the politicians"]—and from other causes. We hope, however, that the French Empire, stretching all over the world, and still protected by sea power, will continue the struggle at the side of its Allies, that it may become the seat of a government which will strive steadfastly for victory, and will organise armies of liberation. These are matters which Frenchmen alone can decide. We find it difficult to believe that the destiny of France and the spirit of France will find no other expression than in the melancholy decisions which have been taken by the Government at Bordeaux. We shall certainly aid, to the best of our ability and resources, any movement or any action by Frenchmen outside the power of the enemy, to work for the defeat of Nazi German barbarism and for the freedom and restoration of France.
What our relations will be with the Bordeaux Government, I cannot tell. They have delivered themselves over to the enemy and lie wholly in his power. He may do much by blandishments or by severities, by propaganda, and by the choosing of pro-German Ministers to make our relations difficult. We do not know whether we shall be allowed to have any British representative in the restricted region called "unoccupied France," because that is entirely surrounded by and under the control of the enemy; but, relying upon the true genius of the French people, and their judgment upon what has happened to them when they are allowed to know the facts, we shall endeavour to keep such contacts as are possible through the bars of their prison. Meanwhile we must look to our own salvation and effectual defence, upon which not only British but French, European, and world-wide fortunes depend. The safety of Great Britain and the British Empire is powerfully, though not decisively, affected by by what happens to the French Fleet.
When it became clear that the defeat and subjugation of France was imminent and that her fine Army, on which so many

303
hopes were set, was reeling under the German flail, M. Reynaud, the courageous Prime Minister, asked me to come to Tours, which I did on 13th June, accompanied by the Foreign Secretary and the Minister for Aircraft Production, Lord Beaverbrook. I see that some accounts have been given of these conversations by the Bordeaux Government which do not at all correspond with the facts. We have, of course, a record kept by one of the Cabinet secretaries who came with us, and I do not propose to go into this now at any length. M. Reynaud, after dwelling on the conditions at the front and the state of the French Army, with which I was well acquainted, asked me whether Great Britain would release France from her obligations not to negotiate for an Armistice or peace without the consent of her British Ally. Although I knew how great French sufferings were, and that we had not so far endured equal trials or made an equal contribution in the field, I felt bound to say that I could not give consent. I said that there would be no use in adding mutual reproaches to the other miseries we might have to bear, but I could not give consent. We agreed that a further appeal should be made by M. Reynaud to the United States and that if the reply was not sufficient to enable M. Reynaud to go on fighting—and he, after all, was the fighting spirit—then we should meet again and take a decision in the light of the new factors.
On the 16th I received a message from M. Reynaud, who had then moved to Bordeaux, to say that the American response was not satisfactory, and requesting the formal release of France from her obligations under the Anglo-French Agreement. The Cabinet was immediately convened, and we sent a message, of which I do not give the exact text, but I give the general substance. Separate negotiations, whether for Armistice or peace, depend upon an agreement made with the French Republic and not with any particular French administration or statesman. They, therefore, involve the honour of France. However, in view of all they had suffered and of the forces evidently working upon them, and provided that the French Fleet is despatched to British ports and remains there while the negotiations are conducted, His Majesty's Gov-
304
ernment will give their consent to the French Government asking what terms of armistice would be open to them. It was also made clear that His Majesty's Government were resolved to continue the war, altogether apart from French aid, and dissociated themselves from such inquiries about an Armistice.
The same evening, the 16th, when I was preparing, at M. Reynaud's invitation, to go to see him, and I was in fact in the train, I received news that he had been overthrown and that a new Government under Marshal Pétain had been formed, which Government had been formed for the prime purpose of seeking an Armistice with Germany. In these circumstances, we naturally did everything in our power to secure proper arrangements for the disposition of the French Fleet. We reminded the new Government that the condition indispensable to their release had not been complied with, the condition being that it should be sent to a British port. There was plenty of time to do it, and it would have made no difference to the negotiations: the terms could hardly have been more severe than they were. In order to reinforce the earnestness with which we held our views, we sent the First Sea Lord and the First Lord as well as Lord Lloyd to establish what contacts were possible with the new Ministers. Everything was, of course, fusing into collapse at that time, but many solemn assurances were given that the Fleet would never be allowed to fall into German hands. It was, therefore, "with grief and amazement"—to quote the words of the Government statement which we issued on Sunday—that I read Article 8 of the Armistice terms.
This Article, to which the French Government have subscribed, says that the French Fleet, excepting that part left free for the safeguarding of French interests in the Colonial Empire, shall be collected in ports to be specified and there demobilised and disarmed under German or Italian control. From this text it is clear that the French war vessels under this Armistice pass into German and Italian control while fully armed. We note, of course, in the same Article the solemn declaration of the German Government that they have no intention of using them for their own purposes during the war. What is the value of that? Ask

305
half a dozen countries what is the value of such a solemn assurance. Furthermore, the same Article 8 of the Armistice excepts from the operation of such assurances and solemn declarations those units necessary for coast surveillance and minesweeping. Under this provision it would be possible for the German Government to reserve, ostensibly for coast surveillance, any existing units of the French Fleet. Finally, the Armistice can at any time be voided on any pretext of non-observance, and the terms of Armistice explicitly provide for further German claims when any peace between Germany and France comes to be signed. Such, in very brief epitome, are the salient points in this lamentable and also memorable episode, of which, no doubt, a much fuller account will be given by history.
The House would naturally not expect me to say anything about the future. The situation at the present time is so uncertain and obscure that it would be contrary to the public interest for me to attempt to pronounce or speculate upon it, but I may well have more to say should the House permit me to make a further statement next week. In the meantime, I hope that the House will continue to extend their full confidence to His Majesty's Government and will believe that neither patience nor resolution will be lacking in the measures they may think it right to take for the safety of the Empire.
Mr. Hore-Belisha: Has not the state-merit to which the House has just listened shown the absolute necessity in these times of carrying Parliament with us at every stage? Is it not inconceivable that this great surrender could have been made had the French Parliament been in session and public opinion, as expressed through the Press, not been subjected to a rigorous censorship? Will my right hon. Friend assure us, as I am sure he has this matter in mind, that in this country Parliament and a free Press will be maintained, so that the Government may not be cut off from the stimulus and inspiration of these patriotic elements in the country?
Mr. Churchill: It was certainly not the fault of the French Parliament—
Mr. Hore-Belisha: I agree.
Mr. Churchill: —and it was certainly not the fault of the French Press, that they were not able to comment on these matters. They were driven, pell-mell, from their seat by the rapid advance of the enemy. I trust that the measures which we shall take will prevent any similar experiences overtaking my right hon. Friend or the British Parliament. Arrangements are being made—which I cannot conceive will be necessary, but are very carefully worked out—to enable Parliament to continue to be the guide, director and support of His Majesty's Government, and for the Press also to fulfil its function in all the grave vicissitudes which may lie before us.
Mr. Maxton: The Prime Minister indicated that this was the only statement that we were to have on this particular happening until the historians came along. [HON. MEMBERS: "Next week"]. Is the Prime Minister able, at this moment, to explain more fully what he dealt with only in a word, namely, how the Reynaud Cabinet was removed and from where the Petain Cabinet derived its authority?
Mr. Churchill: I could not explain that, and certainly not in a word. It is a very difficult matter to understand the politics of another country. It is sometimes even very hard to understand the politics of one's own country.
Mr. Stokes: The Prime Minister has told us on two occasions that it was due to lack of appreciation of the position by the French High Command that the British Expeditionary Force and the rest of the French Northern Armies were not withdrawn after the break-through at Sedan. Will the Prime Minister tell us whether General Gamelin was in favour of their withdrawal, or in favour of their maintenance in Northern France?
Mr. Churchill: I do not think I could attempt to disentangle the relative responsibilities of the French High Command.
Sir Percy Harris: Can the Prime Minister give an assurance that, at an early date, there will be an opportunity for a full, free and frank discussion of the situation?
Mr. Churchill: I am very much in favour of such a discussion. I hope it will be possible.
Mr. Gallecher: Is the Prime Minister aware of the fact that the events in France have given rise in this country to the most terrific demand for a further re-organisation of the Government, in order to bring about a real people's Government, and will he take any notice of that terrific feeling which exists in the country?
Mr. Churchill: Our relations with Russia are in so agreeable a condition that I do not permit myself to make the obvious retort.

BILL PRESENTED.
  INDIA AND BURMA (EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) BILL,
  "to make emergency provision with respect to the government of India and Burma," presented by Mr. Amery; supported by the Attorney-General; to be Read a Second time To-morrow, and to be printed. [Bill 65.]

ARMY AND AIR EXPENDITURE, 1938.
Resolved, That this House will, Tomorrow, resolve itself into a Committee to consider the surpluses and deficits upon Army and Air Grants for the year ended 31st March, 1939, and the application of surpluses to meet Expenditure not provided for in the Grants for that year.—[Captain Margesson.]
Ordered, That the Appropriation Accounts for the Army and Air Departments, which were presented upon the 24th January, be referred to the Cornmittee.—[Captain Margesson.]

CIVIL ESTIMATES (SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1940).
Estimate presented, of a further sum required to be voted for the service of the year ending 31st March 1941 [by Command]; referred to the Committee of Supply, and to be printed. [No. 137.]

EMERGENCY POWERS (DEFENCE) ACTS.
Copies presented, of Orders in Council, dated 19th June 1940:
308

(1) amending Regulations 9, 18 and 62 of, and adding Regulations 23C, 23D, 40AA, 57A, and 62B to, the Defence (General) Regulations, 1939;

(2) adding Regulation 54AA to the Defence (General) Regulations, 1939; and

(3) amending the Defence (Armed Forces) Regulations, 1939

[by Act]; to lie upon the Table.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.
That they have agreed to—

Lochaber Water Power Order Confirmation Bill, without Amendment.

Wey Valley Water Bill, with Amendments.

That they have passed a Bill, intituled, "An Act to authorise the Mid-Wessex Water Company to execute works and acquire lands and easements; to confer upon the Company further capital and borrowing powers; and for other purposes." [Mid-Wessex Water Bill [Lords].

MID-WESSEX WATER BILL [Lords].
Read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

NATIONAL EXPENDITURE.
Seventh Report from the Select Committee brought up, and read; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 139.]
Eighth Report from the Select Committee brought up, and read; Report to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 140.]
Sir John Wardlaw-Milne reported from the Select Committee pursuant to the Order of the House [29th May], That the Co-ordinating Sub-Committee of the Select Committee had addressed a further memorandum to the Prime Minister for the consideration of the War Cabinet.
Report to lie upon the Table.

ORDERS OF THE DAY.

  SUPPLY.
  [14TH ALLOTTED DAY.]
  Considered in Committee.
  [Sir DENNIS HERBERT in the Chair.]

  SUPPLY.
    CIVIL ESTIMATES, 1940.
      CLASS VIII.

        MINISTRY OF PENSIONS.
        Motion made, and Question proposed:
        "That a sum, not exceeding £23,120,000 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, 1941, for the salaries and expenses of the Ministry of Pensions, payments in respect of war pensions, gratuities and allowances, sundry contributions in respect thereof and other services."—[Note: £14,500,000 has been voted on account.]
        4.7 p.m.
        The Minister of Pensions (Sir Walter Womersley): I am glad to have this opportunity of presenting the Estimates of my Department, because it enables me to give the Committee an account of the Ministry's work and of its wide and extending responsibilities. Eleven years have elapsed since we had a Debate on the Estimates of the Ministry of Pensions, and I think it is high time that the Minister of Pensions should have the opportunity of giving not only a full statement of the work done by the Department but an account of his own stewardship. Up to September last, the expenditure of the Department had been gradually decreasing, year by year. Possibly that is the reason why there have not been any Debates upon the Estimates. But immediately after the outbreak of war, we had to extend our activities to a much wider field. We had to take under our wing the question of pensions, not only for the Army, Navy and Air Force, but also for the Mercantile Marine, the fishing fleets, A.R.P. volunteers, auxiliary firemen and the gainfully occupied civil population. Hon. Members will, therefore, realise how much the work of the Department has expanded.
        It is very often the case that a Minister when introducing Estimates has to quote
        318
        a large number of figures, but as I have many interesting things to relate to the Committee, I am sure I shall be excused from giving a long list of statistics. Hon. Members will, no doubt, prefer to hear about what we are actually doing. It is necessary, however, that I should give a few figures. I propose to deal, first, with the pensions arising out of what is known as the Great War, of 1914–18. Almost 26 years have elapsed since the outbreak of that war, and during that time, since the Ministry of Pensions came into being, a sum of £350,000,000 has been paid out in pensions and allowances. At this stage, 21 years after the conclusion of the last war, we are still spending about £38,000,000 a year in pensions and allowances—a figure higher in proportion to the population than that of any other country which was engaged in the last war. I would also point out that the cost of administration is little more than 4d. for every £1 spent on benefits, which I claim is a lower figure than that shown by any other country. Although it is 21 years since the end of the last war, we are still receiving claims for death or disablement pensions in respect of service in that war and during the past financial year, I am glad to be able to say, we were able to make new awards of all kinds in some 649 cases. I think that is an answer to any complaints which may be made that we are not giving due consideration to these belated cases. That is what some hon. Members allege from time to time. I wish to state that we give consideration to all and not merely to some. It is true that we cannot accede to every request made by an hon. Member on behalf of a constituent, but I can assure hon. Members that every case which is sent forward either by a Member of Parliament or through the usual channels of our regional offices is given the closest consideration and I can assure the Committee that it is a pleasure to me when it is possible to award a pension.
        Mr. Tomlinson: The hon. Gentleman said that 649 new awards have been made. How many applications were there?
        Sir W. Womersley: I have not got that figure.
        Mr. Tomlinson: That is the figure that matters.
        Sir W. Womersley: If I can possibly get it, I will let the hon. Member have it. I would point out, however, that there are cases in which we have received as many as 28 applications relating to one claim. I do not know whether the hon. Member wants the total number of applications or the total number of individuals who have applied. On 31st March the approximate number of pensioners and dependants of the Great War still on our books was 846,000, which was a reduction of 3.5 per cent. on the figure of the preceding year. It is not possible to give the final figure of expenditure for the year ended 31st March, 1940, but it is estimated that the Ministry spent £38,174,240, and of this amount £36,407,600 was spent on pensions and allowances to officers nurses and other ranks and their dependants, while the provision of medical services cost slightly more than £1,000,000.
        I would like to say a few words about medical services. This is a very important part of our work. I would say, generally, in the first place, that our expenditure under this heading has increased to a certain extent. That is because in these services certain new war cases are being dealt with. The other question of the provision of pensions and allowances will come up at a later time, when the figures are available. We are expending now, however, on new war services an increased amount. At the outbreak of the present war there were nine Ministry hospitals, with a bed strength of 1,833. To meet the circumstances of the present war the bed strength has been increased and is at present 2,366. Moreover, we are making structural additions to all our hospitals, and the potential bed strength, with the completion of extensions and the establishment of three new hospitals, will be 5,517. That figure is likely to be increased by the acquisition of further accommodation. In addition, certain new hospitals now being erected by the Ministry of Health will be administered by my Department, in conjunction with the Ministry of Health, as part of the emergency hospital scheme.
        With regard to hospital staffs, the total number of medical staff at present is 209, consisting of 152 doctors employed whole time and 57 employed part time, while 426 nurses are employed. Let me say how glad I am that our appeal for medi-
        320
        cal men to come into our service met with such a very good response. I am satisfied that we have now medical men who, with a period of training in our particular form of work, will be able to cope with the amount of work which it is anticipated will come our way, and will be able to deal with it effectively. During the year under review, in-patient treatment was given to 6,030 cases, while 2,801 cases received treatment as out-patients. Home treatment was provided in 1,867 cases; and, in addition, 5,600 nurses, officers and men received treatment in mental hospitals. It is very sad to think that there are so many nurses, officers and men, injured in the last war, having to be treated in mental hospitals; but, against that, one must take into account the enormous number engaged in the last war, and the number of those who have passed through our hands and have been cured and discharged. It will be agreed then that the figure is not so alarming as it appears to be at first sight.
        During the last two years before this war came upon us, my Department was deeply concerned to do all it could for the welfare of those ex-Service men who came within its ambit. I will mention one matter, which may appear very small but is very important. That is a scheme for assisting our pensioners who have the misfortune to be unemployed or unable, because of sickness, to follow any employment, to keep themselves in full benefit under National Health Insurance and other social service schemes. We could not do that out of our own Votes, without coming to Parliament specially; but there is what is known as the King's Fund, which was raised during the last war and has been subscribed to since. I hope that generous people will continue to subscribe to this fund, of which I, as Minister of Pensions, am trustee. It gives me an opportunity of dealing with many cases where distress is apparent, and which cannot be dealt with under Royal Warrant. We devote some of this fund to enabling these men to keep up their subscriptions and to keep their benefits intact. We have had splendid helpers in both the British Legion and the British Red Cross Society. They have devoted their own funds to this purpose, and it has proved a boon to the men concerned. If a man falls into arrears, and then dies, not as a result of anything

        321
        which occurred in the last war, there would otherwise be neither pension nor benefit for those whom he left behind.
        We have started another little scheme which is worth recording. This is the Pensioners Savings Scheme. It was thought that some men, fortunate enough to get employment, would like to go in for a systematic savings scheme. We did not expect a great response to the idea, but we certainly have got quite a good response. The idea was that if a man liked to give a 1s. or 2s. a week out of his pensions, we would put it into either the Post Office Savings Bank or a trustee savings bank or National Savings Certificates. That scheme started in August, 1936; and up to 31st May last 13,185 pensioners had taken advantage of this scheme, including 820 who have joined since the outbreak of the present war. The gross amount of savings up to 31st May last was roughly £400,000.
        Mr. Glenvil Hall: What is the object of this scheme?
        Sir W. Womersley: The object is that pensioners may draw the money at any time if their circumstances change. While this is a Department which does not help anyone with a keen sense of humour, such as I have been charged with, I will give the Committee one instance which it may appreciate. I have had a letter from a pensioner, who wrote:
        "Dear Sir, Your savings scheme is marvellous. The man who thought of it ought to be given some high distinction."
        [Interruption.] It was not I who thought of it.
        "I have just received a statement of accounts, and I now find that I have just enough to get a divorce, what I have wanted a long time."
        Mr. Glenvil Hall: Does the Department pay interest on this money? If not, would it not be better to tell the pensioners to put it into the Post Office?
        Sir W. Womersley: I have just explained that we put this into the Post Office Savings Bank or a trustee savings hank, on behalf of the pensioner. He draws the interest on it, and if he wants the money, he can have it at any time.
        Mr. Collindridge: What generosity.
        Sir W. Womersley: I do not know what the hon. Member means by that. We have done this in order to enable the men to save; and it is evident that they appreciate it, by the extent to which the scheme is being used. I now come to the Estimate itself. The total amount is £37,627,000. This shows a decrease of £757,000 on the Estimate of the preceding year. The normal level of annual decline is between £800,000 and £900,000, and, as far as can be foreseen in connection with these Great War pensions, it is likely to remain at about that level for the next few years. The normal annual decline is, however, disturbed when, as in 1940–41, we happen to have 53 pay days. That makes a little difference to the Estimates. Pensions and allowances for the year, totalling £35,889,100, absorb approximately 95 per cent. of the total Estimates for pensions. The cash benefits for disabled officers and men account for £20,897,100 of this sum, while £14,992,000 is allocated to widows and other dependants of deceased officers and men. The overseas expenditure—that is, money paid out to our pensioners who have gone from this country overseas—amounts to approximately £1,200,000. Of this sum, £580,000 is in respect of pensioners resident in Canada and the United States. I might remind the Committee that we have pensioners in almost every part of the known Globe. Indeed, I receive a surprising number of letters from places which I have myself to look up on the map, in order to find out where they are. We have pensioners from the Arctic to the Antipodes.
        A question of rather serious import is that of our pensioners in enemy countries and in countries occupied by the enemy. I am glad to say that arrangements have been made with the United States for the part payment of pensions to some of these pensioners, and it is hoped that in time the arrangements will embrace all the countries concerned. With the rapid change in affairs in Europe, it will be realised what difficulty we have in dealing with these men. I can assure the Committee that we are dealing with the problem as rapidly as we can; and we hope to save these men, at any rate, from destitution and starvation. The Committee will be anxious to know about the number of pensioners who have written to me offering to relinquish their pensions for the duration of the war.
        Mr. Glenvil Hall: Is Lord Nelson one of them?
        Sir W. Womersley: He does not come under my Department. The hon. Member had better ask my right hon. Friend about him.
        Mr. George Griffiths: Has he a blind eye, then?
        Sir W. Womersley: He may have two, for all I know. I should like to take this opportunity of expressing publicly the Government's appreciation of the action of these pensioners, many of them widowed mothers and dependants of men who died during the last war, who have relinquished or loaned their pensions to the State, as their contribution to the national cause. I receive quite a number of letters making such offers day by day. Up to date, 168 pensioners have relinquished pensions of an annual value of £6,340, while 57 pensioners have loaned their pensions, or part of their pensions, free of interest for the duration of the present war. I should like to read a letter which I have received from one of these mothers. I have many other letters, including one from a pensioner living on an island in the Pacific, who said that after hearing a broadcast from the Prime Minister he felt that the only thing he could do was to give up his pension of £48 a year. But this lady comes into a different category. She deserves as much publicity as I can give to her splendid patriotic action. She comes from Yorkshire. She writes:
        "Since the last war a generous Government has paid, as a token of gratitude to me for the loss of my son, killed in action, the above pension—9s. a week. Now that age prevents me from doing work of national importance, I have made up my mind to offer this pension to my country as my contribution.…I am sincerely anxious to do this, and it will give me joy in the knowledge of your acceptance. I remain, Yours sincerely, a loyal citizen of the best country in the world."
        It is signed by the lady. She gives her age as 74. That dear old lady has set an example to some of our wealthier people that I hope they will follow to the full. I hope that we shall get for that dear old lady's sacrifice some publicity in the Press, although she asked me not to mention her name.
        That is my story of what the Pensions Department has tried to do, and what it has done, for those who suffered in the last war and for the
        324
        dependants of those who gave their lives. I assure the Committee that when I took over this office some six or eight weeks before the present war broke out I realised that it was my duty to do all that I possibly could on behalf of those who served in the last war and suffered. I had had considerable experience as a member of a local war pensions committee over a long number of years, and as a member of the British Legion almost since its formation. I had some knowledge of the problem, but I felt desirous when I took office to do something really tangible on behalf of these men. There were many schemes that I had intended bringing forward—and I would have liked to have had the pleasure of bringing them before this House—which have had to stand on one side because of the grave new responsibilities which I now have to pursue. I assure hon. Members that my whole sympathy is with the man who is a genuine claimant, but, as one who knows a little about soldiering myself, I am very much inclined not to be quite so helpful to those who are definitely trying to defraud the Revenue, and I am sure that hon. Members will agree that that is an attitude that one must take up in dealing with this very difficult problem.
        As regards the present war, hon. Members will remember that I had to bring before the House a new Warrant. It had to be done in a hurry because we could not leave for one moment those who have been disabled in the war, or the relatives of those who have died in the war without some pension or allowance. It was necessary to get that Warrant through at once. We had several discussions about that pensions Warrant, and there is no doubt that it was severely criticised. I am not going to deny that for a moment, because hon. and right hon. Members were present and heard the criticism, but it will be remembered that I then made a statement that I was prepared to reconstitute the Statutory Advisory Committee in order to go carefully into the whole of the Warrant, because it was no use trying to bring forward an amended Warrant until the other had been thoroughly searched through, and the House accepted that as a fair statement. I am glad to say that Members of this House agreed to serve on that Committee, and we appointed

        325
        representatives of all parties in the House, and there were representatives of the British Legion and of the war pensions committees. They were men who had had long experience in dealing with pensions matters and represented all phases of opinion on the question of whether the Royal Warrant was good, bad or indifferent. There were 15 meetings of that Committee, and I want here to pay a tribute to those who served upon it. They did their work thoroughly; they neither spared themselves nor the time at their disposal in advising me on matters included in the Royal Warrant. I want to record here that I appreciate to the full the valuable work that they did and the reasoned suggestions which they put before me. I think that really we went through that Royal Warrant with a fine tooth-comb. Time after time Members of this House wanted to know when we were going to report. I asked them to be patient and wait, because I realised that it was no use coming to this House with an amended Warrant that was likely to meet with anything like the criticism with which the original Warrant was met. In order to be sure of getting a Warrant that one could defend, it was very necessary that it should be gone through clause by clause and line by line, and so it was; and again I want to repeat that I am very grateful to those who assisted me in that matter.
        I want also to pay a tribute to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. When I brought forward the recommendations of the Committee I did not find that coldness of heart that some people ascribe to the Treasury and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In all cases, where I myself thought that the case was a good one, I obtained their consent to include the amendments in the new Warrant. Later, I am going to speak about the amount of pensions, which is a very important point, and I think the Committee will find that, even on that point, the present Chancellor of the Exchequer at any rate has been very reasonable. A little delay occurred in this way, and I noticed that my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South-East Leeds (Major Milner) put a question to the Leader of the House this afternoon as to why the Warrant was not presented to the House before this Debate took place. I am sure that my hon. and gallant Friend will realise that, from my point of view, it woud be far
        326
        better to discuss this matter with the new Warrant itself in front of each hon. Member, than that I should be able to tell them about it and then say that they will get their copy later on. The position is, that we redrafted the Warrant, including the Amendments which I have mentioned, and then, on the change of Government, I felt it to be my duty to submit it to the new Government. All that I had done up to then had been under the direction, or with the sanction, of the old Government. Although I must pay my tribute to the speedy manner in which it was handled by those who are now responsible for this country, still it meant that they had to consider it, and that meant that there would be some delay.
        This further point has to be borne in mind also. It is rather a voluminous document, and it has to be printed by the Stationery Office. Although I had hoped to have had it here to-day so that Members could have dealt with it in their speeches I am sorry to say that it will not be available for a few days yet. That is the explanation. Hon. Members know that if they want a Debate on the matter, it can be arranged through the usual channels either on the Adjournment or on some other occasion, but I have to do my best to explain what has been done without the Warrant actually in front of me or in front of hon. Members.
        Mr. James Griffiths: The Minister says that it will not be available for a few days. Will it be this week or next week?
        Sir W. Womersley: I would have liked to have said that it would be available on Thursday, but on inquiry this morning I was told that it was not absolutely certain that it would then be available. That is why I said that it would be available in a few days. I hope that it may be available on Friday—if not then on Monday.
        Mr. Tinker: When it is printed, will it show the difference between the new Warrant and the old Warrant?
        Sir W. Womersley: That could not be done in a Royal Warrant, but it is possible to show the difference. I am glad to say that the hon. Member for Leigh (Mr. Tinker) was a valuable member of my Committee. He has a copy of the agreed Amendments which shows the difference

        327
        between the old Warrant and the new Warrant. Perhaps they would be of value to Members.
        Mr. Tinker: I know about it, but I want other Members to have the same privilege.
        Mr. Glenvil Hall: Would it not be more informative if the figures for the last war were put down instead of the figures of the last Warrant, with which we are all familiar?
        Sir W. Womersley: I am afraid that my hon. Friend does not know what he is talking about when he speaks of the last war. He really means the 1919 Warrant.
        Mr. Ellis Smith: May I raise a point of Order, Sir Dennis, not in a factious spirit, but with a view to facilitating the consideration of this matter? Those of us who are desirous of considering the question are handicapped because we have not before us the information which the Minister is to present, and would it not therefore be better to postpone consideration of the Royal Warrant until Members have had it before them, when they will be able to deal with it in the same manner as the Minister is doing. The second point is whether it is in keeping with the business of this House that a Minister should deal with a document which has not yet been published and which hon. and right hon. Members have not had an opportunity of considering? Is it good parliamentary taste for that to be done?
        The Chairman: The hon. Member has put his question in two parts, but I think the answer to both is the same. We are not discussing any document at the present moment. We shall no doubt be discussing proposals which the hon. Member will make in the course of his speech, and those hon. Members who may wish to debate the Royal Warrant when it is available will no doubt reserve their remarks for that occasion.
        Sir W. Womersley: I would say to the hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. E. Smith) that I do not wish to burke any crisicism, nor do I fear a debate on the amended Warrant, but I think it is due to the Committee and to people outside and those who are interested in this matter to let them know what improvements I have
        328
        made. When the Warrant itself is in the hands of hon. Members, and if they still desire a debate to take place, there is no one who would be more pleased than I shall be. May I suggest to the hon. Member that if he looks at my speech to-day in the OFFICIAL REPORT he will probably find in it much more material for his speech than he will in looking through the Royal Warrant. That is the only suggestion that I have to make.
        May I now mention one or two important amendments which have been made? Under the original Warrant, in the provision relating to parents' pensions, the whole question of the grant of a pension was based entirely, without any qualification, on two conditions—need and incapacity—and there was the term "incapacity for self-support." When my attention was called to that term, I am bound to say that I did not like it. We propose in the amended Warrant to do away altogether with the term "incapacity for self-support" and to introduce instead a condition where need, broadly interpreted, still comes in, but consideration is to be given to what the son allowed either before or during his service, or what he might have contributed to his parents' support if they were subsequently in need. I gave a statement on this in answer to a Question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Deritend (Sir Smedley Crooke) on 13th March.
        We put this into operation. I know that this House will never disapprove putting a thing into operation that means a benefit to those who are claiming pensions, and although I have to include it in the amended Warrant, I obtained the consent of the Treasury to put it into operation at once. Therefore, I am in the position of being able to tell the Committee what has been the actual result of putting this amended regulation into force. We had two conspicuous cases with which to deal. Two of our great warships were lost on which there were a large number of young, single men. They had in many cases widowed mothers, and in many other cases both father and mother, and I was in the unfortunate position that, under the terms of the Warrant of September, I had to refuse a large number of applications for dependants' pensions. As a result of this amendment I have had all these cases reviewed. I

        329
        have not waited for renewed applications—with the result that I have been able to award pensions in 470 cases that otherwise would not have been accepted under the terms of the Warrant that is now being amended. Moreover, there are over 700 cases where the parent or parents have been informed that they have established their case. It is not a question afterwards of having to say, "I claim a pension." They have established their title, and they can at any time make a further application to the Ministry if there should be any adverse change in their circumstances. If they can show they come within the term of need, as broadly interpreted, I, as Minister of Pensions, will make an allowance in accordance with what the man would have been likely to contribute. If they do fall on evil times because of old age, or ill-health, or need assistance, that assistance will be forth-coming—
        Mr. Tomlinson: If they establish a case, have they that assurance in writing?
        Sir W. Womersley: I will explain the point. I issued instructions that there should be added the words:
        "They can make further application to the Minister if there should be any adverse change in their circumstances."
        They can make further application towards pension on title already established as and when adverse changes take place. Then, I was able to get agreement on a further Amendment, which I am sure will meet with the approval of the Committee, to enable me to pay a pension to parents of a married soldier if it can be shown that they were actually dependent upon him to a substantial extent for a reasonable period immediately before his death. If a married man had an aged father and mother, and out of his own resources allowed them a sum of money, I am in a position to consider a claim because that son has contributed to their maintenance—
        Mr. G. Griffiths: What do you call a substantial contribution?
        Sir W. Womersley: It is rather difficult to give a complete explanation of that, but it is a matter which I am carefully considering, and I can assure the hon. Member that I shall make it work reasonably.
        Mr. Gallacher: This pension to a parent will not affect the pension to the widow?
        Sir W. Womersley: No, it is an addition. I went into this very carefully. Although this is a matter I did not mention to the Committee, it was something they strongly recommended, and I have had it inserted. I think it has been worth while persuading the Treasury to do it. I took the liberty of putting another matter into operation before the amended Warrant was brought before the House, namely, the question of children. Under the Warrant of September last payment of allowances to a disabled man was confined to three children in one family. What the poor fellow was to do if he had eight or 10 children or more I do not know, but at any rate I took that matter up at once and now there is no limit whatsoever. When I give the figures of the amended pension scale to the Committee, hon. Members will see that a married man with a large family will have a substantial amount of money due to him, which he will receive. A further condition was laid down in the Warrant that where the wife of a disabled man was under 40 years of age, and had no children, her husband would not receive any allowance on her behalf. I suppose the idea behind that was that if a woman was of that age, without children, she might possibly be following some occupation. But I took the view that if a man was disabled he wanted some extra attention and who is the best person to give it to him but his wife. I followed the advice of my Committee and put the matter forward to the Treasury—that the husband should not be debarred from claiming on behalf of his wife whatever her age—and I am glad to say it was accepted.
        There is another matter—the acute controversy known as the seven years' limit. The time limit of seven years has been modified to enable belated claims to be dealt with by agreed lines of working. I am not in a position to announce that there will be no seven years limit under the amended Warrant, the reasons being as follow: Under the present system I think I can say, without fear of contradiction, that no case which medical evidence has shown it was right and proper to reopen has ever been denied. It has not been since I took over this job and will not be so long as I am the Minister.
        Mr. James Griffiths: That is a pledge?
        Sir W. Womersley: That is a pledge, although I cannot pledge my successor. What the hon. Member should do is to see that I stay in office. Although I cannot see my way, for many good reasons, to withdraw this seven years limit at the moment, I am here giving the pledge that it is my intention—and I must put in the proviso, if I am still responsible as Minister—to deal with any cases arising from this war on lines not less favourable than the present practice. I am prepared to carry on the present practice and hon. Members with any experience of pension matters know that they cannot go far wrong with that sort of pledge.
        Mr. Tomlinson: The hon. Gentleman has said something in regard to where medical evidence reveals the necessity. To whom is the medical evidence to reveal the necessity and which medical evidence? The Minister has already told us that he has signed up a new batch of doctors and is training them in his own way. Whose medical evidence is to be decisive?
        Sir W. Womersley: I did not say I was training doctors in my way.
        Mr. Tomlinson: In the Ministry's way then.
        Sir W. Womersley: The hon. Member misunderstands. What I meant was the administration. A man is left to himself so far as his medical skill is concerned, but in the question of administration there are certain things in every Department. [An HON. MEMBER: "A wangle."] I protest against that. I do not believe for a moment that there is any wangling at all, but a doctor has to know how to deal with cases. Any doctor will tell you that it is very necessary. He must know procedure. I shall take into account the medical evidence that is furnished by the claimant.
        Mr. Tomlinson: The Minister said a moment or two ago that special training was needed by a medical man if he is acting as a referee. If the medical evidence about which the hon. Member previously spoke was that a man could have a medical referee to decide I am quite willing to accept it but, with all respect, I doubt the Minister's capacity to judge medical evidence.
        Sir W. Womersley: The hon. Member is anticipating. On this question I take the evidence that is brought forward by the man or woman who is claiming. Of course, I ask the opinion of my own medical staff on the matter, but in deciding whether a case shall be re-opened there is no case, where the evidence shows that a man is suffering disability, which is not re-opened. Even if a case is rejected afterwards it can be reconsidered.
        Now we come to the question of appeals, a matter which has aroused a good deal of interest in this House and which has formed the subject of many speeches. I wish here and now to repeat that in my own view some right of appeal to an independent body will be essential after the war. I have made this statement before, and I repeat it, that when the time is ripe for bringing these appeal tribunals into being that shall be done, because it is in the interests of those who are claiming. But to establish these tribunals, as hon. Members know, means a tremendous amount of work. You have to set them up in every centre throughout the country, because you cannot have people travelling to London to have their cases heard. You have to have paid Members of that staff, and medical men detached from work of great importance, and it also means an enormous amount of work in the Department itself. It is not a practice I have introduced, and I am not saying this as a little "puff" for myself. It has long been the practice that where an appeal is made and a full statement of the case is given, all favourable points must be made to the person who is claiming, so that he knows the grounds on which he can press his case and the grounds on which the Ministry is opposing. That means an enormous amount of work, and one of the complaints is about the delay, even now, in settling cases. I do not want to take a large number of my staff off their essential work to deal with this particular work. I am satisfied that it is better from the claimant's point of view that a Minister should deal with a case quickly, but I have made this provision because I realise that during the war it would be absolutely impossible to set up these committees and have people travelling up and down the country. There is, however, a safeguard against likelihood of any real error. In something over 90 per cent. of the cases in dispute,

        333
        where there is a difference of opinion, appeals are on medical grounds. A man's doctor sends in a statement of what he thinks is the matter with the claimant, the Ministry's doctors go into it and give their opinion, which is sometimes contrary to that of the man's doctor. It is not for a layman to decide between two doctors, I should fear to tread that path.
        It has been the practice in cases of grave doubt to refer them to an independent medical specialist, that is a man high in the medical profession. These specialists have not been selected by me, but have been nominated by the President of the Royal College of Physicians, when it is a case of disease, and by the Royal College of Surgeons, when it is a surgical case. I have a panel of such specialists who will decide between the two medical authorities. I felt it was my duty to make this part and parcel of the Warrant itself always provided that the Ministry has the right to say that the review shall take place. I believe that this system of review by an independent medical specialist has the full approval of most people who have had to deal with war pensions and I am certain that it has the approval of the British Legion.
        Mr. J. Griffiths: The Minister has mentioned a panel of specialists drawn up by the appropriate organisations. Is it proposed that these cases should be submitted to a single medical referee or to a board of referees?
        Sir W. Womersley: It is to a single medical referee. I believe in the principle, which is not very often carried out, that the best committee is a committee of one in dealing with matters of opinion between two people.
        Now I come to an important part of my proposals, the rates of pensions. It was quite clear to me from the Debates in this House and by the large correspondence I have had, that the rates in the 1939 Warrant are regarded as too low in comparison with the rates in the Warrant of 1919. It is true that the 1919 rates were based on a very high cost of living, 215 points, and it was provided that they could be reduced when the cost of living fell. The cost of living fell in the course of time, but in 1928 this House in its wisdom decided that there should be no reduction in the 1919 rates, with the proviso that they were not to be regarded as standard rates for all time for
        334
        sufferers in a major war. The Chancellor of the Exchequer said some weeks ago that the Government were keeping down the cost of living by subsidies. Whether the cost of living is ever going to reach 215 points one cannot say, but the present Government feel that to leave the rates as they are inscribed in the Royal Warrant of September last is not defensible in view of the already increased cost of living. Although it has not gone up to the extent which many people thought it would, at any rate it has gone up, and the Government have decided, I am glad to say, that the rates should be increased accordingly.
        The Government have authorised me to announce to the Committee their decision to increase these rates on this basis. The new Warrant will give to a totally disabled private soldier 34s. 2d. instead of 32s. 6d.—the 2d. comes in because it is for the convenience of the Department, although it is a little beyond the percentage increase. But that is not the most important concession. Hon. Members who are members of my Advisory Committee will remember that in the case of the allowances to a disabled man's wife and children it has not been a question of following these percentage rates at all. We have departed from them and have included in the Royal Warrant figures for peace-time allowances from the Army, Navy and Air Force. All these rates have been brought right up to the percentage figures, and in the case of the wife of a disabled man instead of 5s. you get 8s. 4d., and instead of 5s. for the first child and 3s. 4d. for the second and all other children you now get 6s. 3d. for the first child and 5s. for the second and all other children. I think that is a very substantial increase.
        Major Milner: Will the Minister explain a little further what is the basis? Is it the cost of living or is some other factor involved?
        Sir W. Womersley: We have taken it on the cost of living figure at the end of May this year.
        Mr. J. Griffiths: Will the Minister give us the figure?
        Sir W. Womersley: It is 181, as compared with 215 in 1919. All the other rates will, where necessary, be correspondingly increased.
        Captain Sir Ian Fraser: Is it now stabilised at these new rates? Does it follow that as the cost of living rises this new figure will rise?
        Sir W. Womersley: It is not intended to stabilise the figure. These rates will be liable to adjustment in accordance with the provisions made for this purpose in the 1919 Warrant, where provision was made that if there was an average increase or decrease for a year pensions would be adjusted. It is intended that these rates should follow the 1919 Warrant in that regard. I must point out that for administrative as well as financial reasons any adjustment can only be undertaken after sufficient evidence has been gained to make it clear that it is called for by a rise in the cost of living of a prolonged character. Hon. Members will know that pension books are issued for a certain period for a year or two years. What I should like to do is to make it possible that any increase in pension should coincide with the issue of the new book. In dealing with the present cases I am not going to do that because, fortunately, we have not so many cases to deal with as we anticipated after nine or 10 months of war. We are going to call the pension books in and to issue new ones without any delay. In the ordinary way breaking into the middle of a pension book would create difficulty, but I can assure hon. Members that that difficulty will be dealt with and reviewed from time to time if the cost of living increases to any substantial extent.
        Mr. Stephen: Does that mean that if the pension book of a man starts at a different time from others he will be getting a different pension?
        Sir W. Womersley: No, we are calling in all the books and re-issuing them, and all will be treated alike.
        Mr. R. J. Taylor: I should like to submit that in calling the books in many of the pensioners will lose a week's money.
        Sir W. Womersley: We shall have the new books ready, and there will be no question of anyone losing a week's money. I know how the average housewife wants to have her money on the Friday in order to do her shopping. I
        336
        am going to see that she shall not be kept waiting. I give the Committee that assurance. Let me add that the disabled pension allowances in respect of services in the Navy and Air Forces will follow this Warrant. I am dealing now with the Army, and what applies to the new rates will apply to the other Services and to other services which come under my jurisdiction. Now as to the date. The new rates of pensions and all the other concessions will date from the nearest pay day to 1st June. They will be adjusted as soon as they can, but hon. Members will understand what a terrible amount of administrative detail is involved in calling in the books and re-issuing the new ones. Everything that is humanly possible will be done to see that no one is left for one week without his pension.
        Then as to the Mercantile Marine. A great deal of interest has been taken in the Mercantile Marine scheme and I have received many deputations about it. We have entered into agreement with the Board of Trade and the Ministry of Shipping to pay pensions to members of the Mercantile Marine and the fishing fleet injured by enemy action, and to dependants of those killed by such action, on the lines arranged for the fighting Services. The conditions of the new Warrant for the Armed Forces will be applied to these cases. It is a little difficult to deal with these cases. I have made arrangements that the three Services will continue the family allowances for 13 weeks after the death or the assumed death of anyone, and that enables me to get the pension cases dealt with and completed long before the widow ceases to draw her allowance. That has prevented a good deal of hardship.
        I was hoping to get something of the same thing in regard to the Mercantile Marine, as the shipowners had offered to continue payments for four weeks in the case of survivors of ships lost through enemy action, 50 per cent. being paid by the Exchequer. In the case of a ship being lost in the ordinary way, payment to the dependants ceases at once and the case automatically comes under Workmen's Compensation. We have to get something done for these people quickly so that they have not to wait for their pensions. I have made arrangements with the port and hospital authorities to inform my Department with-

        337
        out delay when injured men are landed, and my local officers visit them or their dependants and get into contact with them. So far I am glad to say this is working remarkably well. I have received a letter from a shipowner complimenting my Department on the expeditious manner in which the staff of the Ministry has dealt with the dependants of those who have lost their lives in fishing vessels. He says:
        "We have never had cases handled so well before and on behalf of the dependants we beg to tender theirs and our best thanks for your kind attention to these cases."
        That is a tribute to the staff of the Ministry, and after all those who have done this work so loyally and so well should have the praise which is due. The only difficulty that confronts me is that, while I have this agreement in respect of the Mercantile Marine, I am sorry to say that up to now I have not been able to get a similar arrangement working with the fishing vessel owners. The vast majority of them have promised to come into a similar scheme, but one or two are standing out, and holding back the scheme. In the meantime, we are making special efforts to see that no one who suffers injury on a fishing vessel, or the dependant of a person lost on a fishing vessel, is kept waiting for his or her money. It would be very much better if all of them came under one scheme.
        Mr. R. J. Taylor: In cases where a vessel has been lost at sea without any evidence as to how it was lost—cases of presumed loss—have the Department come to any conclusion as to what is a reasonable time after which a widow is entitled to claim her pension?
        Sir W. Womersley: In those cases, we have to depend entirely on the Board of Trade reporting to us, and immediately we receive from the Board of Trade a report that a vessel is presumed lost, we take up the matter at once; but in the meantime, we have an arrangement with the Unemployment Assistance Board that they pay an allowance to the woman, so that she is not left without money.
        Mr. R. J. Taylor: Has the hon. Gentleman's explanation now any relation to his former reference to a period of 13 weeks?
        Sir W. Womersley: The period of 13 weeks applies to the Services only. As
        338
        regards the Mercantile Marine, if some award cannot be made promptly for any reason, the woman has a right to go to the Unemployment Assistance Board and to receive an allowance which will at any rate give her some money to go on with until the matter is settled.
        Mr. Tomlinson: Is it always assumed that when a vessel is lost, it is lost as a result of enemy action?
        Sir W. Womersley: We have to take the position as it is reported to us by the Board of Trade. If they say that a vessel is lost as a result of enemy action, we have to deal with the cases. If the vessel was not lost through enemy action, the dependants of those lost have a right to compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Act. They are not left without compensation from one source or the other.
        Mr. Tomlinson: The position I have in mind is this. In a case where a vessel is lost as a result of an accident resulting from the black-out, no responsibility for any enemy action is accepted. It is regarded as an accident and left to workmen's compensation. Does the same principle apply to losses of ships where no proof of enemy action can be brought?
        Sir W. Womersley: If it is presumed lost by enemy action, we take the cases over. If the loss is not due to enemy action—for example, if the vessel is lost in a storm—the cases come under workmen's compensation. Of course, if a vessel strikes a mine, we know that the loss is due to enemy action; it is a matter for us, and we take it over. Perhaps it will interest the Committee to know that up to date we have awarded 600 pensions or allowances for disablement in the Mercantile Marine and the fishing fleet and over 600 pensions to widows and dependants. I should like here to pay a very great tribute to the men of the Mercantile Marine and the fishing fleet for the splendid way in which they have responded to the call for service. Until some two months ago, according to the records of my Department those men bore the brunt of the war.
        I should like to refer briefly to Civil Defence volunteers and the scheme for civilian injuries, in which certain hon. Members are very much interested. There are two further classes of the population to deal with—Civil Defence

        339
        volunteers and what are known as gainfully occupied persons. Any members of the general public following an occupation—in other words, gainfully employed—are insured under this scheme against enemy action. When I introduced the scheme in the House, I said that it was something unique in the history of the world, and to my mind it is something of which we can be proud. The scheme is working very well. There has been a little misunderstanding at times about this compensation, and therefore, I should like to give a brief explanation of the position. There are two different forms of compensation. There is what is known as the injury allowance for incapacity of a temporary character, such as when a man is off for two, three, or four weeks as the result of injury caused by enemy action. There is then the question of continuing illness or continuing disablement and death, and there the matter of a pension comes up. The pension is paid on the same terms as a pension is paid for war disability. The injury allowances are framed with due regard to the payments under schemes of social service, such as health insurance benefits and workmen's compensation; and I can tell the Committee that the rates, which were based on a sort of combination of the two, are now under further review. I am not altogether satisfied with those rates. I am sure hon. Members will realise what a very heavy task I and the Parliamentary Secretary have at the present time, and we are getting on with this task as rapidly as possible.
        The pension rates are based broadly on the provision made for private soldiers under the Royal Warrant, and I think that is the best the country can afford to do. We cannot have any rank or distinction in regard to these pensions, but must pay to all who are injured, and where it is a case of death, to those who are dependent on the person killed, the same rates as we pay to private soldiers. Of course, the new Warrant rates will, generally speaking but not in every instance, as nearly as possible be incorporated in the amended scheme in connection with civilians which I shall bring forward before very long. We shall try to improve the scheme as far as we can.
        I think the Committee will be interested to hear some figures in this connection.
        340
        We have made payments in 5,300 cases for injury, mostly in respect of Air-Raid Precautions workers and auxiliary firemen who have sustained accidents in the course of practice duties and while on patrol duties. I should like to pay a tribute to the local officers of the Assistance Board, to whom we are greatly indebted for having placed their organisation at our disposal so that these matters could be dealt with quickly. I am glad to say that in the great majority of cases the incapacity has disappeared after a short period. The number of disablement pensions granted represents only a small fraction of the total injured, amounting to just over 30 at the present time. The number of claims in respect of deaths resulting from injury is about go. Most of the deaths occurred while the men were on duty in the black-out. In regard to this part of our activities, I should like to say that the staff we have used in preparing the machinery have done their work remarkably well, and I am confident that the system we have adopted will prove satisfactory, and will deal with all cases promptly. I have been asked to say something about the Local Defence Volunteers. The Secretary of State for War has announced in the House, in answer to a Question, what will be the compensation rights of members of the Local Defence Volunteers. I expect my Department will be asked to take over the administration of this, and although we are pretty full up with work we shall not refuse to do another job in the best interests of the country.
        With regard to the War Service Grants Advisory Committee—
        Mrs. Adamson: Before the hon. Gentleman proceeds, will he say something regarding the position of housewives under the scheme? In a former Debate, he said that he would look into certain points which I raised in this respect.
        Sir W. Womersley: I did so, and I also received a large deputation consisting of representatives of women's societies. After giving the matter very careful consideration and going into every detail, I came to the conclusion that it was far better to leave the position as it was under the first scheme, namely, that the disability allowance in the case of a wife should be paid in cases where help is

        341
        brought into the house to relieve the woman of work at any rate during the time she is recovering from her illness or injury. I think that is the soundest way of dealing with the matter. We know that in many working-class households the mother will strive to carry on in spite of whatever disability she has, and thus retard her recovery. Provision is made that where help is engaged to do work which the woman would ordinarily do in the household, we make a payment. That is the form of compensation provided for a married woman who is not gainfully employed.
        With regard to the War Service Grants Advisory Committee, since last December my Department have been responsible for dealing with this, and up to 31st March last, we paid out £438,900. We have dealt with a large number of cases, and we have dealt with them fairly and squarely. Up to date we have had claims amounting to 150,000. Fresh claims are coming in now at a reduced rate. They come in at the rate of something like 600 a day, but there was a time when the figure was 1,000 a day. I am glad to say that at long last the weekly output greatly exceeds the intake. We have every reason to believe that we shall be able to get over that period of waiting which has caused great annoyance to many people. It was not the fault of my Department; in many cases it was due to the fact that we were not able to get the records from the pay offices, and in many other cases the people concerned did not fill in the forms in the proper way, or sent the forms to the wrong place. I am glad that I am now in a position to assure the Committee that it will not be very long before we shall have no arrears. I should like here to say that when the Parliamentary Secretary was appointed, I welcomed her offer to take responsibility for this Committee's work. She will make a statement on this matter when she speaks later in the Debate, and consequently, I shall not say anything more about this. What I will say that, although my hon. Friend has been at the Department for only a week or two, she is certainly making an appreciable difference in the work of that section, and I am very grateful to her for all that she has done already, and in anticipation of favours to come, I will say that I hope it will lead to better work in future.
        Mr. F. Anderson: Will the hon. Lady's statement deal with the general principle of war service grants? Will it deal with the question of low wages, apprentices, and so on?
        Sir W. Womersley: I can assure the hon. Member that the statement will deal with those points. He will find that many of the things he has raised have been dealt with already.
        Mr. E. Smith: Am I correct in understanding that the Minister and the Government have approved the Royal Warrant? If not, before it is put into its final form, will the Minister take into consideration the points that are raised in this Debate, so that the Royal Warrant may be further improved, if possible?
        Sir W. Womersley: The amended Royal Warrant has been approved by the Government and by me, so that I cannot make any promise to alter it now. It is in print, and I hope that it will soon be in the hands of hon. Members. I do not think there will be many subjects raised in the course of the Debate which have not been dealt with by my Advisory Committee.
        Mr. E. Smith: Do we understand from that that the Minister has accepted most of the proposals which the Advisory Committee have made?
        Sir W. Womersley: There are many members of that Committee in the Committee to-day, and I hope they will take part in the Debate. I will leave it for them to deal with their work.
        Mr. Kingsley Griffith: As one of the members of that Committee, may I ask the Minister to say a word in regard to Article 5 (2), because when the September Warrant was issued there was no subject which caused so much alarm and despondency among Members of this House, and members of the British Legion, as the working of this provision.
        Sir W. Womersley: It was Article 5, I think, which was very severely criticised during the course of that Debate. It was regarded as being too tightly drawn, especially in comparison with the cases which arose from the last war. We discussed this matter very fully with the result that it was agreed there should be a modification. My hon. Friend the

        343
        Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. K. Griffith) will remember how we discussed it for a considerable time. Within my recollection the provision was that the Minister was fully justified in warning both claimants and members of the interested public that the determination of title to pension must depend mainly on evidence as to the circumstances of disablement and the origin of it. At the same time it required that other good and sufficient evidence must leave no doubt in the mind of the certifying medical authorities that the disability was due to Service. That was regarded as far too severe. It was agreed that the words "leave no doubt" in the minds of the certifying authority should be omitted, and the Warrant is being amended accordingly.
        When war broke out I had a staff of 3,118, of whom 824 were employed in hospitals. Additional staff, numbering about 3,000, has since been engaged, of which 1,074 are employed in the War Service Grants Branch. It has meant a big increase in staff, but I am sure that hon. Members will agree it was necessary to deal with 150,000 cases. In view of the Minister's responsibility for compensation in respect of Defence Volunteers and for civil injury as a result of enemy action, there has been the necessity for co-operation between the Civil Regional Commissions and the Ministry's regional officers. The Ministry's regions have therefore been adjusted to coincide with those of the Civil Commissions. I mention this because some hon. Members have been accustomed to go to their regional officers on matters connected with pensions, and they may have been told that their district has been altered. We have a scheme now in operation for close liaison between Civil Commission organisations and our regional organisations. This arrangement, I am glad to say, is in effective operation, and we have at present 14 full-time regional officers, two major sub-officers and 11 part-time sub-officers. As far as possible we are dealing with every district in a thorough and businesslike manner so that there is no difficulty for those wishing to make claims or obtain information. My Department is keeping in close touch with the work being done throughout the country.
        344
        I wish to pay a tribute to the members of my staff, from the chief at headquarters down to the messengers away out in some part of England where they have been evacuated. All of my staff have given me loyal support. It has been my pleasure to visit their quarters and address a representative meeting, and when I have asked them to do that little bit of extra work which meant saving someone from waiting for a pension or allowance I am happy to say that they have always responded. I fear that I shall have to ask them to do even more in the future, and the great appeal which has been made to every citizen of this country for greater effort must apply equally to the Civil Service. I wish this to apply in my Department, and I know they will not fail, because we must deal with cases expeditiously. It is said that he who gives quickly gives twice, but, at any rate, in the case of my Department, speed saves a great deal of trouble and difficulty for those entitled to pensions.
        I wish also to pay a tribute to the 159 war pensions committees, scattered throughout the country, who give their services on a purely voluntary basis. They are doing a splendid job of work on behalf of those who apply for disability pensions and for those who apply for pensions as dependants of men who have been killed. I also pay my tribute to my old organisation—the British Legion. They fight the battles of the ex-Service men strenuously, but they fight them fairly. As a Minister I am bound to say that when a case comes before the British Legion for investigation they deal with it thoroughly before they bring it forward to my Department. The large number of what are called "wins," or the cases they have successfully managed to steer through my Department, surely proves that they have exercised great care before bringing them forward. When I was not a Minister I had a visit from a man who thought he ought to have a pension. I suggested that his wisest course would be to put his case before the British Legion rather than that I should take it up with the Ministry of Pensions. "Oh, I have done that, and the Legion have turned me down," was his reply. I am afraid that Members of Parliament are very often victims of similar episodes. After trying all other sources claimants then come to the Minister But it is my duty as Minister to take note of every case

        345
        that is brought forward, either by a Member, or from an outside source. Certainly I have particular regard to those cases brought forward by a Member, and I am only too delighted when I can send him a letter reporting that his case has been successfully dealt with.
        In conclusion, I would repeat what I have already said. I was invited to become Minister of Pensions by the ex-Prime Minister. I did not undertake the job with a very light heart, because I realised the heavy task facing a Minister of Pensions. At the time the war clouds were looming over us, and I realised that even if there was no war the question of dealing with men disabled in the last war and their dependants was not a job to be treated lightly. But I did feel it was my duty, having been so interested in this matter before for so many years, to accept the office I felt it a great privilege to have the chance to act as Minister of Pensions, and I have tried to carry out my job faithfully and well. But it must be remembered that it is not the most cheerful of Departments, although I used to belong to a Department where I could exercise that little bit of native humour of which I am proud, because humour helps one to carry on in these days. Above everything else, I am convinced that whoever is Minister of this Department must administer it with humanity. We must remember that while it is my job to deal sympathetically with claims, there is also my responsibility to the taxpayer. It is my duty to see that justice is done and all have a square deal. That is what I have tried to do, and if I have succeeded then I think, it has been well worth doing. If I have not succeeded, it is open to Members to tell me so. I do not resent fair and constructive criticism; I welcome it, because it is only by searching criticism and examination that one can find out defects in any scheme which is brought forward.
        5.41 p.m.
        Mr. James Griffiths: I am sure that every Member of the Committee would desire me, first, to thank the Minister for the very full and comprehensive statement which he has given us to-day of the work of his very important Department. I do not think he need apologise to those Members who have been interested to listen to the Debate for having taken up the time of the Committee. We cannot give too much
        346
        time or attention to the very human problem with which his Department is concerned. I, therefore, would express my personal thanks and the thanks of other hon. Members, to the Minister for his very full and comprehensive statement. We look forward with great pleasure to the statement which is to be made later by the Parliamentary Secretary. May I offer her our heartiest congratulations upon her appointment, and express the hope that she will—as I am sure she will—give the great qualities she possesses to dealing with this very great problem? If there is one thing above all others that this country desires it is that the House of Commons should give the most generous treatment possible to those disabled in war, and to the dependants of those who have made the supreme sacrifice.
        I am sure the Minister's statement will be welcomed by the country and by this Committee, although, no doubt, some hon. Members will wish to point out certain defects and make some criticisms of the scheme he has put forward. I was very gratified—and, I think, it is a great compliment to the Ministry, to the Minister, and his staff—to learn that the administration of this work is being carried out at such a low cost. It is a tribute to all those concerned that the administrative cost is only 4d. to every of benefit. That is a record I should like to commend to other Departments. That the great human work of this Department is administered at such a low cost, reflects great credit on those concerned, and is an indication of what a State service can do. We were all very interested to hear of the voluntary efforts connected with the Department, such as the fund for the protection of social insurance rights of disabled men. I will not argue about whether the protection of social insurance rights should depend on charity. If at any time, however, this fund proves inadequate to protect fully the rights of these men to their social insurance schemes and of their wives to pensions, I hope the Minister will not hesitate to come to the House and have the position remedied. It will be a great shame if, because of any inadequacy of any private charity, the rights to social insurance of disabled men were lost.
        We were also very interested in the Minister's statement about the pensioners of the last war, of whom he mentioned

        347
        168 who had written to the Department indicating their willingness and desire to relinquish their pensions during the emergency as their contribution to the national effort. This is a gesture which makes us all feel very humble. The action of men who have borne the burden of the great war, who carry its marks and who have paid a price in human suffering, and of the mothers of men who lost their lives, in offering to relinquish their pensions, is an example to all of us and to other State pensioners who have much more to give to the State. It is an example to the whole country and one which, I hope, will be followed by other people. We have heard from the Minister that there are others who have written offering to lend their pensions to the country. These are facts that will be very much welcomed in the country, and we would like to join the Minister in paying our tribute to these people for the noble example they have set in making such generous offers.
        The main part of the Minister's statement, which, I am sure, will be the theme of this Debate, concerns the provisions of the new Royal Warrant. It is a pity that we have to discuss the matter without the Warrant before us, but we are the victims of circumstances. This is not the Debate that was arranged for to-night. Another Debate had been arranged but it had to be postponed because it involved the attendance of Cabinet Ministers who could ill spare the time.
        Mr. Silverman: Will my hon. Friend say why this particular service should be so much regarded as the Cinderella of the discussions in this House that, whenever we have nothing else to do, a Debate on it is arranged irrespective of whether we have the material on which to conduct the Debate or not?
        Mr. Griffiths: This Debate had been scheduled for one of the Supply days next week, and as we are working against time in regard to Supply days, it was necessary to have it to-day. There can surely be created an opportunity of discussing the new Royal Warrant on a later occasion, such as on the Adjournment Motion, which is becoming one of the recognised methods of discussing all matters in the House of Commons. The Debate on the old Royal Warrant in October took place on the Adjournment
        348
        Motion, and I am sure I shall be expressing the desire of the Committee, if I say that a further opportunity should be created for discussing the new Warrant. This Warrant has been made possible by the action of the House of Commons. It is due to the Debate last October in which the Warrant of September, 1939, was subjected to keen and merciless analysis from members of all parties, who revealed its defects and criticised its shortcomings. The new Royal Warrant is, I think, a tribute to the effective work of the House of Commons and one more example of the necessity of maintaining Parliament in full session even during a period of this kind.
        I would like to deal with some of the defects which the Minister has sought to remedy. First, in regard to parents' pensions, the Minister has announced what he has described as fairly substantial improvements in the conditions under which pensions will be awarded to dependants. I do not think he made any statement, however, on whether the amounts of the pensions to be awarded to parents were to be increased.
        Sir W. Womersley: We have obtained the approval of the Treasury to increase the amount in exceptional cases to one parent up to 15s. and for two parents up to 17s. 6d., which is a 5s. increase in the rates; and there will be a 5s. minimum instead of 2s.
        Mr. Griffiths: That is an improvement which we shall welcome. The Minister said that the amount would depend upon what the son had contributed to the family—
        Sir W. Womersley: Or was likely to.
        Mr. Griffiths: I am glad the Minister has made that qualification because hundreds and thousands of young men are being called to the Services at 21 years of age who, since they left school, have been serving their apprenticeships or have been attending training schools and colleges. Cases have been brought to my attention. An example is the case of a widow who was anxious that her son should be trained as a teacher. She borrowed money to send him to college. In July last he completed his two years' training and was able to secure two offers of appointments as a teacher. Then the war came and he was called up. An

        349
        application was made for a dependant's allowance and it was turned down because the boy had not been contributing to the home. An application was made to the Special War Grants Advisory Committee and an allowance was obtained. In that case there was no dependence but there was prospective dependence. A case was made, and, I think, rightly made, for a grant, and I am glad to hear that in future, when discussing whether parents shall get pensions or not, the question of prospective dependence will be borne in mind.
        I am sorry, since the Minister has moved so much forward in this matter, that any kind of means test is to be applied. I do not know when the House of Commons will realise the great feeling in the country about the means test—about the inquiries, assessments of income and so on—and I wish the Minister had taken his courage in his hands and wiped out the test for the purpose of the pension. There is already a great deal of muddle because of the many means tests which may be applied in one house. There is a means test if people are unemployed; another if people are old age pensioners, and another if people are entitled to war pensions. We shall get into a terrible muddle unless steps are taken to bring order into these things. The only way to do that, is to do away with the means test altogether. The Minister has not indicated the standard of resources or means which he will apply. I gather it will be left largely to his discretion and that he will decide upon the facts of each case. He gave no indication whether there are to be any scales by which dependence is to be determined. I hope that this provision in the Royal Warrant will be given the most generous interpretation.
        We welcome, too, the Minister's announcement about children. The old provision was clearly indefensible. I should like to know who suggested that the allowance should end with the third child; I should like to see him and have hire psycho-analysed. The suggestion that the allowance should be paid for the first, second and third child and then cease, should never have been embodied in the Royal Warrant. The Minister excused it by saying that the Royal Warrant was drawn up in a busy time and that it slipped through. It was a bad thing to have slipped through and we are
        350
        pleased that it has now been slipped out. I am glad of the modifications mentioned by the Minister in regard to the wife under 40. Where there is a disabled husband at home the physical and mental burden of attending to him has no direct relationship to the age of the wife. Under the old Warrant a wife under 40 might be deprived of any pension although she was engaged in the task of looking after a disabled husband.
        The Minister has announced that he proposes to keep the seven years' rule. He has said that he is taking power, and will use it with discretion and generosity, to reopen any case, notwithstanding the seven years' rule. The fact that he is taking power, and will exercise it generously, to reopen cases in spite of this rule is the best criticism of the rule which I have heard. I would urge upon the Minister a consideration arising out of my experience and that of other hon. Members in connection with workmen's compensation. War follows the technique of industry. This is modern mechanised war and, therefore, the mechine plays its part. The experience of those of us who take an interest in compensation cases is that whereas there may be a reduction in the number of purely physical injuries, the number of industrial diseases of various kinds is increasing enormously. Nervous diseases in particular are increasing because of the strain of modern machine production. Young men, while they are strong and healthy, can carry on in spite of all the monotony and noise and speed of the machine; the effects do not show until middle age or early old age. I think that after this war, which is being waged with so much mechanisation, the young men who survive will in 15, 20 or 25 years begin to reveal the effects of the strain to which they are now subjected. That really does constitute a strong reason why the seven years' rule should be re-considered The Minister has given us a pledge that he will administer it generously, and we shall keep him to that pledge. He has given several other pledges for himself to-day. We will take it that just as the Royal Warrant is approved by the Government the pledge is approved by them too, and though the hon. Gentleman may not be Minister of Pensions throughout the lifetime of this Government that the pledge will stand. We accept it in that way.

        351
        I come now to the problem of appeals. The old procedure left many hundreds, indeed thousands of men with a sense of injustice. After all, a man's desire to appeal, to have his case heard and argued, to fight for justice, shows a spirit to be proud of in the British working class. They want the right of appeal. They regard the present procedure as in a sense placing the Minister in the position of being judge and jury. The Minister was frank about it, and said that he himself was in favour of setting up appeal tribunals, and if I got him correctly I believe he proposes to set up appeal tribunals as soon as it is practicable.
        Sir W. Womersley: That is my view.
        Mr. Griffiths: Let us get this clear. Does that mean that the Minister is announcing the decision of the Government to set up appeal tribunals as soon as practicable or expressing his own personal view?
        Sir W. Womersley: I am expressing my own personal view, but because it is not included in the amending Warrant I did not put the matter forward.
        Mr. Griffiths: This is very important. I understood, and I assume that other hon. Members did, that the Minister was announcing that appeal tribunals would be established, but that for the moment it was not practicable because of the difficulties of travel during the national emergency. Now I take it that that is his personal view and not a Government view.
        Sir W. Womersley: The Government have not expressed any view about it, but I take it that, as it was included in the 1919 War Pension Act, it will be included again. I cannot imagine any Government refusing to do it. I have given my personal view, and I promise the hon. Member that I will put that view before the Government at the earliest possible opportunity.
        Mr. Griffiths: If one thing was brought out more clearly than another in the Debate in October, it was that it was the desire of Members in all parts of this Committee that appeal tribunals should be set up and that a man should have the right to have his case heard. The Minister said he had adopted a method—I thought it was for the interim period,
        352
        but I gather it will be in the Royal Warrant—by which, when there is a dispute between a man's doctor and the Ministry's doctor, the point will be referred to a medical referee, to a specialist drawn from a panel, whose decision will, presumably, be final. I presume that is in the Royal Warrant and that it has been approved by the Government and cannot be changed until another amendment is made in the Royal Warrant. But we have had experience of medical referees in workmen's compensation cases, and I would point out to the Minister, so that he may be aware of the position, that it is the universal desire that in medical matters the single medical referee shall be replaced by a medical board. That view has been put very strongly before the Commission which has been sitting on workmen's compensation, and I think it is certain that when we come to amend the Workmen's Compensation Act one of the changes made will be to substitute a medical board for the medical referee. In the same way I hope the Minister will reconsider establishing a medical board rather than a single medical referee. The fact that his case is decided by one doctor often rankles with a man and does not give satisfaction.
        With regard to the scales of pension, it is difficult for us to discuss them fully without the Royal Warrant before us, but I think it is due to the Minister to say that there have been improvements in the scales, though they are still below the 1919 level and for that reason will not, I think, completely satisfy the Members of this Committee. Members on all sides have urged that the scales should be put at the 1919 figure. In the case of a man and wife and family a good deal of the improvement is due to the fact not only that the scales are raised but that the absurd rule about no allowance for children after the third child is wiped out. A single man or widower is to have his pension for 100 per cent. disability raised from 32s. 8d. to 34s. 2d. For a wife there is an increase, and for the children there are increases. We shall look at these family allowances again, but I want to put in a word at once for what is often the most pathetic figure of all, the old single man or widower. He is to be given 34s. 2d. a week. With the cost of living what it is at the moment, apart from any further

        353
        increases, such a man cannot get suitable board and lodging for under 25s. per week, and that leaves him with less than 10s. to meet all his other needs. Very often such men have no home and no relations, and I urge that this allowance of 34s. 2d. for a single man ought to be reconsidered.
        The Minister has announced that there are to be changes in paragraph (5), and I certainly hope there will be. It is an important paragraph, because it contains the terms of reference upon which the grant or refusal of pension is decided, and in the 1939 warrant the words in paragraph (5) were really but a series of loopholes through which it was possible for the Ministry to escape payment of pensions. There were the words:
        "Directly attributable to his war service."
        I have had some experience of doctors in connection with injuries. What doctor will tie himself down to a decision that an injury or illness is directly attributable to war service—nothing is said about "indirectly"—or that a man's case has been "aggravated to a material extent"? If there has been aggravation, surely that is enough, without adding words about material extent.
        Then the Minister did not make it clear that he intended to make a change in a provision which came very much under the hammer in the last Debate. I refer to the record of evidence of injury which is required. Recently the record was that in the contemporary official records, or, where such records were not available, other defined collateral evidence was required. We gather from the Minister that that provision is to be modified and I hope it is. I hope, too, that the last sentence in Sub-section (2) of paragraph (5) of the 1939 warrant, which was subject to much criticism, will be changed. It stated there that the evidence must be
        "good and sufficient, and evidence that leaves no doubt in the mind of the certifying medical authority that the disability was in fact attributable to war service."
        That is loading the dice against the man. That is giving the benefit of the doubt not to the man but against the man, and I hope it will be modified. The Minister has made some interesting statements about the other schemes which now come under his Department. I think it is a wise procedure to bring all these varying pensions and compensation schemes under one Ministry and I am very glad to hear
        354
        that, in connection with Local Defence Volunteers, the question of compensation or pension if disability or death is caused, is also to be brought under the provision of the Minister's Department. I understand that under the civil injuries scheme, which provides compensation and in certain circumstances pensions for civilians injured in air raids, for example, the injury provided for is physical injury. Interpreted literally, the scheme makes no provision for compensation for injuries other than physical.
        It seems to me certain that we shall get a crop of cases of illness, in which there is no physical injury, arising out of this modern war, and I want the Minister to give serious consideration to that point. Representations have already been made to him, but I gather that, so far, he has refused to reconsider the present plan. Therefore, we have to assume that those who suffer from shock, or whose nervous system is affected, as well as all people who cannot show definite physical injury, are not to be considered as injured by the new form of warfare, and are therefore not entitled to compensation. I hope the Minister will give serious consideration to this point. In the scheme for compensation respecting injuries to civilians because of enemy action, that is one of the major defects which needs to be stressed. Once more I thank the Minister. I hope that it will certainly be much less than 12 years before we again consider the work of his Department. I hope that we shall give more time, attention and care to the problems of these men who, at our command and call, are giving their all to the nation. The nation would expect us to be generous in the treatment of the men, who deserve the best from the nation.
        6.17 p.m.
        Mr. Kingsley Griffith: As a member of the War Service Grants Committee, I would like also to pay my tribute to the Minister. That applies not only to his actual statement to-night, but to his chairmanship of that Committee. I am afraid that we were always asking for more, but we did not feel at any time that we are up against a brick wall; at least, if there was a brick wall it was not the Minister. It was rather—I do not want to be unfair and say the Treasury—the finances of the country, which the Treasury necessarily

        355
        represent. Nevertheless we did feel all the time that the claims we made, even if they could not be substantiated fully by the Royal Warrant, were receiving at least the most warm and friendly consideration from the Minister. Now that he is reinforced by the hon. Lady, once my colleague in the representation of Middlesbrough, now evacuated to an area further North, I think we have much to hope for from the administration of that Department.
        The hon. Member who has just sat down called attention to paragraph 5, relating to disability attributable to war service. After all, that paragraph is where the whole thing starts. Until you have a man accepted as suffering from a disability attributable to war service, you can do nothing. I have been fighting this paragraph ever since October, and I should like to get rid of it altogether. Why should you specify in paragraph 5 (2) particular kinds of evidence that have to take precedence over others? As the paragraph originally stood, if there were any contemporary records, nothing else whatever counted. It was only if the contemporary records had not been taken, had been blown up, or been lost in evacuation, that you could listen to the applicant's friends or, so far as I can make out, even to himself, he being a competent witness on his own behalf. Nothing counted except official records, so long as these were in existence. That was unfair, because such a procedure is not followed, so far as I know, by any other court, in judging a case. The Minister has not definitely said so, but I think the hon. Member will find, when he reads the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow, that his point in this matter has been met.
        The other point, about leaving no doubt in the mind of the certified medical authority, is a frightful handicap to put upon an applicant. He may actually have convinced the person considering his case, or the Minister, of the probability that the disability was the result of war service. The man may say that he hurt his knee when he was thrown up against a parapet during the war, but the Minister has to consider whether there is a reasonable doubt and may wonder whether the man had received a similar hurt previous to the war by falling off a bus but had not said anything about it. This kind of doubt will have to be taken
        356
        into account, because the paragraph says that the evidence must leave no doubt. That means that it will be sufficient for anybody to make a suggestion throwing doubt upon the man's claim to have an attributable disability, and, unless the suggestion is palpably absurd, the Minister, under the original terms of the Warrant, would have to refuse the application. That position was ridiculous, and I do not believe it was intended to apply. I believe it was just bad drafting. I have sufficient faith in the Ministry of Pensions to believe that, even if that wording stood, it would not have been interpreted in that way. There is no excuse for having a bad Warrant or a bad law, and leaving it to chance that you may get a Minister or an administration which would ignore the terms of those instructions and do something else. I was delighted to hear the Minister say, at any rate in part, to-night—and no doubt we shall hear something more of this matter in the future—that this position is to be altered.
        A number of hon. Members, including myself, have devoted a good deal of time to the section of the Warrant relating to the qualifications of parents. The Minister himself has stated that he found the words intolerable as they originally stood. A good many of us felt that the words set up a destitution test for parents before they could qualify. That was intolerable. The position in the other extreme is taken by the hon. Gentleman who spoke last from the Front Bench; he wanted to have no test of need at all. I am not sure that that suggestion would work, because, when you are considering money which is paid in respect of a son to parents, the probability is that, if there had been no need, the son would not have paid any money. That is a matter of common sense. I am mainly considering the soldier sons of working-class parents. In the officer class, the position would much more likely be the other way round, the parents making an allowance to their sons. Broadly speaking, I do not entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman that the test of need is wrong, but I would have it applied automatically by the fact that, if the boy concerned had been paying to his parents, the reasonable probability was that there was an element of need. That would be the only test needed. If there were cases of sons who had paid a large sum—and I suggest these would be few and far

        357
        between—a principle would have to be worked out, but one does not contemplate the State taking on the liabilities of such men. Some kind of limit would perhaps have to be put upon the maximum amount of such payments.
        It is frightfully difficult to discuss this paragraph of the Warrant. Although we have the old Warrant before us and can see how bad that is, we have not the new Warrant before us. It is a very complicated document, which requires to be considered word by word. The Minister has given the general sense of it, which is that need is to be broadly interpreted. Within that broad interpretation, the amount that has actually been paid by the soldier, or might reasonably be expected to have been paid, is to be taken into consideration. That is not quite all that I wanted. It still leaves two successive hurdles for the applicant-parent to get over. The first hurdle is that he has to prove need, and the next is to prove prospective or actual payment.
        I feel that, on the whole, the section will work out well in practice, if it is properly administered. I think it will be found that, guided by this section, need will not be interpreted as a destitution test, and that we shall get a scale in which, whether the soldier really was paying or was likely to be paying, a sum to his parents, the parents will benefit from the circumstances, and the State will take over the liability of the son. That is the essential principle lying behind all these pensions matters, where the son has become incapacitated for performing services to his family and to his dependants, which services he would have performed if he had not been hurt. The State does not take over any more or any less. It is a kind of compromise which I sincerely hope will work out well in practice. In regard to the seven years' limit, the only real danger is whether we can keep the Minister for seven years. Then we shall be reasonably safe; but what occupation or office in these days can be guaranteed for as long a time as seven years?
        I do not profess to be able to follow the exact provisions of the Warrant or the actual rates which the Minister indicated to-night, because they require following carefully on paper, and working out in detail. You cannot guess at this matter, but I observe that there is a sort of key rate, which used to be 32s. 6d. and is
        358
        now 34s. 2d. I should like to be certain about this matter. If I understand it aright, a rate was stabilised in 1928 at as high a figure as 40s. and could not be reduced. If that be so, let it be realised that there is a very big drop when it is compared with the 34s. 2d. I can imagine a situation in which a 100-per-cent. disabled father, injured in the last war, lives in the same house as, or next door to, his son, injured 100 per cent. in this war. He receives 40s. while his son receives 34s. 2d., yet the standard of living pressing upon those two people is exactly the same. Disparities of that kind create a good deal of public opinion and cause a great deal of discontent. It may be, if further adjustments are made in the 34s. 2d. as the standard of living goes up, that the gap will disappear and the difficulty no longer exist, but, at the present time, we are faced with a discrepancy which would be rather startling, if the comparison were made.
        I want now to say a word about the tribunal. I entirely agree with what has been said about people feeling satisfied to be able to go before the tribunal and to feel that their case has been heard, even though it has been turned down. The appointment of a specialist as a sole referee to consider a case is not the same thing to them as an appeal tribunal. For one thing, a specialist is very much more identified in their minds with the Ministry. But I am bound to be impressed by what the Minister has said about the practical difficulties of creating appeal tribunals at the present time. They have to be composed of medical people, and there is so much work for these people. We do not want to put inefficient people on these tribunals. We want good men, and those good men might have to be taken away from more urgent work. Therefore, with the greatest reluctance, I am reconciled to these appeal tribunals being deferred for the present and to hoping for the time when the Minister may be able to restore them once again.
        I do not think there is anything more to-night that, in the absence of the actual Warrant before us, I could discuss in this Committee with any advantage, because the points are so very much points of detail, and unless we have the Warrant in our hands it is practically impossible to follow it. However, I think it is possible to come to a general conclusion

        359
        with regard to the statements which the Minister has made to-night, and that is that an immense advance has been made since the month of September. The spirit in which this Royal Warrant is now drafted appears very much more favourable than that which, coming from I know not where, presided over the birth of this unhappy and unlamented child. I believe that all the changes which the Minister has announced are improvements, and although, obviously, all claims have not been satisfied, the total sum of it represents a great improvement upon which the Committee desire to congratulate the Minister.
        6.32 p.m.
        Captain Sir Ian Fraser: I would like to offer my congratulations to the Minister on his statement. It is unnecessary that he should make any apology for dealing with the important matters which he has to administer in such detail. Indeed, I feel that it is of great importance that Members of all parties in this Committee should realise that the success of pensions administration is as much a matter of personal attention to human details as to the principles which are laid down by Parliament. I would like to observe, since we have not had a Ministry of Pensions Debate for so many years, that this country can well be proud of its record of pensions administration. There are matters of principle—I shall refer to one or two later—with regard to which I have never agreed with any Minister of Pensions, but in the matter of clean, clear, honest administration of human kindness I have always felt that our administration—and I use the words advisedly—is the best in the world.
        I speak for a great section of ex-service men. I am, of course, interested in all sections, but in the nature of things I speak for a special section, and I have at heart most deeply the interest of those most seriously wounded. It is well for the Committee and the country to bear in mind that if you are to do what is right by the man who indubitably was wounded in the war, and was very seriously wounded, then you must have a clean and honest pensions system which does not lead to political jobbery for all who happen to have served in the war. This country is kept clear from that state of affairs, and when we are entering on a
        360
        period when all these problems and difficulties may recur, it is well that we should congratulate ourselves, without being complacent, upon the purity of the administration, and we should ensure that it will continue at that high level. I would like to express my appreciation of the fact that the Government have thought fit to appoint an Assistant Minister of Pensions as a token of the added importance which they attach to the Department, and I would like to say personally how glad I am that the hon. Lady has been asked to take up that post. Her understanding of and sympathy with working-class conditions will be of value, and the fact that the political personnel of that Ministry should be representative of the two larger parties in the House of Commons, now working so happily together, is also important. Of all the subjects of public administration which should be kept outside party argument, surely it is the way in which we treat wounded soldiers and pensioners.
        As regards the question of rates, there is no question but that the pensions given to men wounded in the new war must be assimilated to the pensions given for similar disabilities incurred in the last war. I think it is clear that the Government recognise that fact. The process which they have adopted in raising the standard rate to the arbitrary and rather inexplicable figure of 34s. 2d. and the fact that so peculiar a figure should be chosen indicates that they have, in fact, decided the pensions proposed to be paid to the new men upon a mathematical scale which will assimilate them to those paid to the old veterans. If I understand the Minister rightly, the Government have accepted the principle that the pensions must be assimilated. It only now requires the passage of time and the rise in the cost of living, which I look upon as inevitable, to bring that assimilation about. It seems clear that in the absence of any other way of paying for this war it will be paid for partly by inflation. This is, no doubt, not the time to discuss the merits of that matter, but its consequences upon disabled soldiers may be examined. They are among the most vulnerable in the country. Inflation is profitable to many professional men, to most artisans and workmen, but not to widows and those who live on fixed incomes or to pensioners. If inflation is

        361
        to be one of the primary ways of making all the taxes produce enough to pay for the war—and it seems to me that that is the way we are going—then it is certain that the time will come when the burden of sacrifices which will be called for from the pensioner will be more than is reasonable, having regard to the sacrifice being made by others.
        I hope and believe that pensioners as a whole are willing to make their measure of sacrifice for the nation's need. They have, indeed, already made a very considerable sacrifice, for the cost of living has risen by about 15 per cent.—not 15 points—and it has been aggravated, of course, by the sumptuary taxes. No doubt, the intention is to reduce consumption by these taxes, and we shall have to reduce consumption—disabled soldiers as well—partly because we cannot afford to continue consumption at the old rate, and partly, perhaps, because we realise we may be helping the country by doing so. But if inflation is to be the method of financing the war, and if other classes are to receive their due increases, then the time will come when the Government will have to face not merely the assimilation of the new soldier's pension to the veteran's pension, but also the gradual rise in the pension of the veteran himself. May I remind the Committee of the figures? When this veteran's pension rate was fixed it was fixed at £2 in 1919, and the cost of living stood at 215. It fell in the great slump to 134. By the time this war broke out it had risen to 155, and, in passing, it may be observed that at the time of the great slump, when hundreds of thousands of working men and women were out of work, the pensioner did not lose, but, on the contrary, gained materially. He was both actually better off than millions of his fellow citizens and relatively better off than most, because in the slump cuts took place in almost every sphere of life, but not in his sphere. Then the tables began to turn. By the time this war broke out the cost of living had risen to 155, and now it is 181.
        More than a hint has been given prior to this Debate that when it reaches 215 there will be reconsideration. I notice the Minister's careful qualification that should a substantial rise above 215 take place, the Great War pension will be liable for reconsideration. I hope, from what
        362
        he said to-day—though I would not say that it bound him very particularly—that his obvious goodness of heart in this matter will give us some certainty that when this figure is reached there will not then be a great delay to see whether it is materially exceeded and that there will not be undue and prolonged consideration. By that time the pensioner will have made a very great sacrifice when other people, artisans and skilled and semi-skilled workmen particularly, have been receiving very great increases beyond anything they could have expected in their wages. I hope when that time arrives that the Government will not be ungenerous in raising both pensions by then; it will have to be both pensions, because I assume that by that time the new disabled soldier's pension will have reached the figure of 40s. I realise from what the Minister said that there is no sliding scale now established, but I hope that as the cost of living rises this 34s. 2d. will gradually go up to the full 44s., and that when both pensions are on that level they will both rise together should the cost of living get out of hand.
        I have an observation to make about the fundamental basis on which pensions are paid. It disappointed me very much that the Ministry, either in September or at the present time, in the face of a new war, has not had the imagination to bring forward any alteration in the fundamental basis of paying pensions. There is one particular aspect of the pensions principle which has always disturbed and distressed me. Much can be said for the Government's point of view. I do not mean this Government; all Governments have taken the same point of view. They have said, "We can only pay in respect of the person injured in war service having regard to his liabilities at the time when he was injured. If he was married, we will have some liability towards the wife. If he had children, we will have some liability towards the children, but we will not pay anything for a wife he marries afterwards or for children born afterwards." I have always felt that that was unjust and unwise, and I had hoped that there might have been in that Department imagination which would have brought us some good news as to reconsideration of that question now, when this whole problem has to be reviewed again.

        363
        Think of these disabled men—I know thousands of them—wounded severely when they were 18, 19 or 20 years of age; given a pension, be it 34s. 2d. or 40s. a week; and that is all. It is hardly reasonable to suppose that they will not get married. Indeed, it is desirable, for the community and for them, that they should. They are fine citizens; they have done their service, made their sacrifice. They are the very people to be the fathers of the new race that must take the place of the casualties that follow the war. No consideration is given to the wife or children if they come after the man's disability occurred. That is unfair on the individual and bad national policy; and I regret that the Government has not the sense and the imagination to see that. There is bound to be further talk about pensions as the war proceeds—and another Warrant, I expect. I hope that, before that comes, the best and wisest minds that know about pensioners and their difficulties will be taken into consultation, to see whether the principle shall not be changed. I must register my satisfaction that one fundamental principle of pensions administration has been retained, and that the pensions are paid irrespective of means and irrespective of earnings. It is very important that that principle should remain. You want to encourage a man, even if he appears to be absolutely down and out and totally disabled in the technical sense, to be a useful citizen. No premium must be put on idleness.
        I am not wholly satisfied with what has been said about tribunals. The Government at the time of the last war were clearly convinced that substantial justice could not be done without an impartial tribunal. The demand of the whole country brought it about, and all parties agreed that it was necessary. The Minister himself says that he thinks it is an essential part of a full pensions scheme, and, in his mind, he postpones bringing it forward now only on the ground of expediency, of the expense of travelling and so on. He suggests as an alternative the medical referee. I would like to thank him for taking a step in that direction. It was suggested in a question which I put the other day that he should, as an interim step, make the medical referee system more effective than it has been hitherto. But he has not
        364
        gone far enough. The Minister may think this a petty point, but I ask the Committee to consider it carefully. The essence of the tribunal was that it was not appointed, and was not paid, by the Minister. I am not going to say that professional men of the standing of specialists are influenced by the question of the few guineas that they receive on a pensions case, but it is possible for the Administration to pass the employment to the man on the panel whom they find easiest to deal with.
        The Minister says, "I create an independent panel of specialists. I ask the Royal College of Surgeons and the Royal College of Physicians to nominate a panel. Out of that panel I choose X, Y or Z, to whom I send the case." The Minister chooses X, Y or Z; he pays X, Y or Z, even though X, Y or Z have been nominated by outside bodies. There is a feeling, I will not say of suspicion, but that it is possible to put the work in the way of the specialist whose opinion is, I will not say most favourable, but most agreeable, from the point of view of the Minister, and not in the way of one who, from the Minister's point of view, is a confounded nuisance. As long as there is a possibility of that, there will be a feeling that these men are, perhaps, not getting justice. If there was a case for the tribunals being independent, and being paid by someone other than the Minister, so there is a case for these medical men being independent and paid by someone else. The Minister said the other day, "Someone has to pay them." I agree. Will he let the British Legion pay them? Will he let St. Dunstan's pay them? I will offer, on behalf of St. Dunstan's, to pay them. If the Minister feels himself bound to reject that, will he not ask the Lord Chancellor to pay them, so that they may be independent of him? I will not say that I shall be satisfied with the medical referee system then; but it will be, in fact, independent, and it will give greater satisfaction to the pensioners and to those people who are interested in them.
        I have never regarded the seven years' limit as a matter of much importance. The British Legion has always campaigned about it, and a great many hon. Members have followed the Legion—perhaps they will claim to have led it—up that path. But it is not very important. The present procedure gives an

        365
        opportunity for a case to be reopened after the seven years. I think it would be a pity for the Committee to worry very much about the matter. I just want to place on record that the seven years' limit is not really a very important matter, although it appears to be. What is important is that there should be an independent tribunal, to give satisfaction and an assurance of fairness to all; and that there should be sympathetic and humane administration inside the Ministry
        I complained just now that the Ministry had not thought of introducing an allowance for wives who married pensioners after disability had occurred. I should have observed that children's allowances should be paid too, in such circumstances. They are paid in Canada and in one or two other Empire countries; and in this country one organisation at any rate—St. Dunstan's—has paid children's allowances to all blinded soldiers—and there are 2,000 in this country—in cases where the children were born after disability was incurred. These men have needed that allowance, and I am proud that a voluntary agency should have been able to do what the State ought to have done. Now that we are entering on a new war, that is a liability that the State ought to take up. We have moved forward a great deal since the last war and its aftermath. Recognition of the needs of families, recognition of the idea of family allowances, although repugnant to some trade unionists, has come very much into being. This is a time when that principle might be reconsidered.
        I conclude, as I began, by thanking the Minister for an interesting statement and for the evidence he has given of the very great care that he has shown for individuals. In my own experience, over many years, of the Ministry I have found not only all Ministers, but, more particularly, the civil servants in the Ministry, many of whom have been with it since its early days, keenly anxious to help the disabled man to make his case, keenly anxious to do their duty by the ex-service man and the taxpayer. We are fortunate in this country to have kept this Ministry free of politics all this time. I think this Debate to-day is a good augury for the future, and evidence that during this war we shall continue to deal with pensions in a friendly manner, and not let them become matters of public policy.
        6.58 p.m.
        Mr. Stephen: Since I entered this House, in 1922, I have taken a keen interest in the administration of pensions. I agree with many of the things said by the hon. and gallant Member for Lonsdale (Sir I. Fraser), but I am not convinced that the question of pensions should be kept out of politics; I think that the political outlook has a great bearing on pensions. I cannot say whether the hon. and gallant Member is right in thinking that the pensions system of this country is better than that of any other country, but I do not think that it is better than the pensions system of Canada or of Australia or of New Zealand. I think that in those countries pensions have been more generous, and probably there has not been the same disposition to give the benefit of any doubt to the Ministry rather than to the man by whom a claim is made. However, after a lot of conflict with the Ministry of Pensions over all those years, I have admitted in a previous Debate here that I was wrong in one respect. That was in ascribing so much of the cause of failure to get satisfaction to the Minister, or possibly to his immediately-associated civil servants.
        I believe that the pensions system has been very badly worked in this country. I said once that you could hold a meeting in practically any street in any of our great industrial centres and refer to the question of pensions, and in very little time cases would be provided from that street of injustice in the withholding of pensions. I recognise that it was possibly an extreme statement, but from my experience in going through the country there have been hundreds of thousands of cases of injustice and hardship. An hon. Member shakes his head. That has been my experience. I have taken many cases to the Ministry, and I have only met with failure, and practically every Member with whom I have discussed this matter in this House has told me of cases in his own experience where he was convinced that a pension should have been given, and yet, in spite of all his efforts, he had been unable to obtain a pension. That should not be the case.
        How is it that there have been those injustices? There have been kindly, humane Ministers, and civil servants administering the Ministry who have been very courteous and painstaking in going into cases that have been referred to

        367
        them, and indeed some of the ordinary clerical work of the Ministry in the way that they deal with complaints is a model compared with that in many other Government Departments. But my experience has been that the people who have failed in connection with pensions are the medical authorities at the Ministry. I am convinced that the medical authorities have never had a right conception of their job but have gone on the basis that they have to be very careful in order to save public money, and in consequence I believe they have tried always to rule out a pension when there was any doubt whatever in the case.
        I remember that round about 1922, when many hon. Members on this side of the Committee first came into this House, there was a great deal of criticism of the pensions administration, and a disposition on the opposite side of the House, owing to the influence of the Legion, to try to meet the difficulties that had arisen. The idea was that the benefit of the doubt should always be given to the applicant. I do not think that that has ever been honoured in the spirit. I once raised it in a case, and I was told by the Ministry that they could not find when such a pledge was given, and I had not the exact reference to the statement. I believe that the statement was made by the then Major Tryon, who has now gone to the other end of the corridor. It was a principle that Members on all sides of this House were agreed should be applied, namely, that when there was a doubt the benefit of that doubt should go to the applicant. I believe that medical authorities at the Ministry have failed lamentably in these cases. The very fact that there has been the necessity for setting up appeal tribunals, and that after the appeal tribunals were set up they had to bring in a specialist as another court of appeal, shows that there was a great deal of feeling that there were many cases in which people were not getting pensions when they ought to be receiving them.
        I believe that all the Ministers have been approachable and anxious to try to give an applicant every opportunity of stating his case. As a result of my experience, I have very little criticism to make of Ministers. I recognise that when their local advisers tell them that pension should not be granted in a particular case, it is very difficult for them to say
        368
        to the medical adviser, "I do not agree with you," because the medical adviser is evidently expected to have some special knowledge of disease that the Minister cannot possess. There is also the evidence of the man's own medical adviser, which has been set aside repeatedly by people here in London who have never seen the man. They go over the case and say, "I do not think that the disability really was the result of his service." The man's own medical adviser says on his soul and conscience that he thinks the disability is the direct outcome of the service, and then somebody down here with no greater medical qualifications says practically, "You do not know what you are talking about. The disability could not have occurred in that way." This is all wrong, and the medical people ought to be told and have it strongly impressed upon them that, if there is any doubt at all, they should give the pension. The country would rather that 50 or 60 people who were not really entitled to them should get pensions than that another half-dozen who ought to have them should be refused. I believe that that is the truth.
        The hon. and gallant Member who preceded me made some helpful suggestions to the Minister. It should be part of the specialist's job to get into touch with the man's medical adviser. The case of the Ministry, together with the statement of the man's own medical adviser, is submitted to the specialist, but I want the specialist to get into touch with the applicant's own medical adviser and also with the medical advisers at the Ministry if he so desires. When a case is submitted to the specialist, the applicant does not feel that his own medical adviser has been consulted and that he has been given the consideration that he ought to receive in making a special appeal. I hope that the Minister will do something in that way. I know that to-day is not the one really for dealing with a special case, but I am glad that the Minister is here, because I want to refer to a case which I gave notice that I would raise on the Adjournment. It is the case of a man who died, a Mr. Cole, of Ferryden, Montrose. The Minister is well acquainted with the case. He went very carefully into it, I admit, but his advisers advised him to reject the claim. For five years the man had been a neurasthenia case and then was diagnosed

        369
        as feeble-minded. The Ministry decided that his feeble-mindedness could not be attributable to his war service but was aggravated by his war service. Fancy the state of mind of the doctors who advised on this case. They said he was neurasthenic yet five years afterwards decided that he was feeble-minded when he joined the Navy and that his condition was aggravated by his service in the Navy. In my opinion the doctors who dealt with this case themselves should have been in an institution for mental defectives. This man was for years in a mental institution at Montrose, the physician superintendent of which said:
        "Give him a certificate. In my opinion, as there has been continuous history in this case from the time of his war service, we must consider that his death has been directly due to original disability. There is no question that his chronic depression and the long periods for which it was necessary to have him confined to bed were instrumental in causing cardiac valvular weakness which was the terminal reason in his case."
        The doctor who said this has qualifications as good as those of any doctor in Harley Street. It is not as though he were a general practitioner who had to think of his panel. This man is the physician superintendent of a local authority institution, and his opinion was definite. Then somebody here in London says that this medical superintendent in Scotland is wrong, and says this in spite of the fact that he saw and examined the man during those years. I think a case like that is a disgrace to the Ministry and to the Department's medical advisers, and I believe there are other Members in the House who can tell of similar examples where the Ministry was wrong.
        There is another thing I want to say about the new Warrant, and it also bears on the question of doctors. I notice that in connection with the last war and disabilities there was great disposition on the part of the Ministry's medical advisers to hold the opinion that disability was not really attributable to service but was aggravated by it. In such cases as bronchitis, people who went to the Ministry were told that the aggravation caused by war had passed away. I have had bronchitis and know something about it, and for a doctor to say that aggravation caused by war had passed away shows he was a man without ordinary intelligence. How can he tell the amount of aggravation? It shows
        370
        he is an absolute quack. There have been thousands of cases of bronchitis and other chest troubles in which doctors carried on in this way. I do not want it to be taken that I am criticising the whole of the medical profession. I believe they are as intelligent a profession as there is in this country, and that there are men of great ability in the profession, but I also know, as a lawyer, that in court you can get a specialist to swear one thing and another specialist of equal eminence to suggest the exact opposite for the other side of the case. We must take account of that.
        I believe it is of the utmost importance that there should not be, in every town and village of this country, people fretting out their hearts after they have given service in the national emergency because they have been refused what they consider to be justice arising out of the disability left with them after their service. I know the Minister is as anxious as anybody that there should be no sense of injustice, and I hope that in the new Warrant we shall have none of this nonsense about aggravation. I suggest to the Minister that if a man is passed A1 for the Navy, Army or Air Force, it is not good enough to say, "Our medical board made a mistake in passing you. The weakness must have been there, and we cannot give you a pension because the weakness we could not then find has now made itself apparent." If you pass a man, then you should take responsibility for any weakness that comes to him afterwards.
        I want to support the point made by the hon. and gallant Gentleman who preceded me, namely, that of the treatment of men who marry after receiving their disability. I remember what a shock it was to me when I came into this House with my ordinary Presbyterian outlook on the world to find it was evidently the view of the British Government that a man who had been a soldier, and had received a fairly serious disability, should not marry. I wondered what sort of Members of Parliament had been in the House when the old Warrant, allowing this, had been accepted. I think it is all wrong. Here is a case which came to my notice. A man received a wound and then a second wound but was married between his receiving the first wound and the second. Then the medical advisers of the Ministry got into a great state of

        371
        excitement as to whether he had died from the first or the second wound. The question was whether it was attributable to the first gunshot wound or to the second, because if death was attributable to the first gunshot, they did not need to pay a pension to the widow and children
        That is the kind of lunacy—I can describe it as nothing else—that has disgraced the administration of pensions in the past. I do not know the kind of people who allowed the law to go through in that form, but I hope that the Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary, in view of the new situation in which we find ourselves, will correct these obvious faults. I have never met an hon. Member who individually would agree that what has been done in the case of a soldier who married and afterwards died and left a widow, was just when the widow claimed a pension. I have never met an hon. Member who did not agree that the widow should get the pension. I hope we shall get these things put right and a real improvement in the pensions position. I believe the Minister should lay it down to his medical advisers that if they can see any way at all of giving a pension to these persons, if they can see any way of thinking that these widows are entitled to a pension, they should advise him accordingly, and should not look to see how they can keep them from qualifying for a pension. That is the principle which should be laid down in this matter. I mentioned a case of a Mr. Cole, whose widow has been refused a pension. There is another case in my division, the Drysdale case, which is very similar. The widow submitted to me the evidence of a well-known medical man in the City of Glasgow, a Labour councillor, who also spoke to me personally about it and said he was sure that it was a case of injustice. Nothing that the Minister could do could overcome the theories of the medical advisers.
        I hope that as a result of this Debate we shall get a new spirit in the medical advisers of the Ministry and that they will be as generous as the ordinary doctor in the cities and towns. I have found our medical people very helpful and generous, and I cannot understand how they become such frightful Scrooges when they get into the Ministry of Pensions. I hope the Minister will send the Cole case to one of the specialists, and that the
        372
        specialist will consult the medical superintendent. I shall be willing to take the decision of the specialist if he consults the medical superintendent who gave his verdict in favour of a pension for the widow.
        7.25 p.m.
        Sir Cyril Entwistle: I do not propose to keep the Committee for more than a few minutes, and therefore I shall not discuss the various matters which the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen) has mentioned. He made one statement with which, I think, most hon. Members will disagree. He is entitled to make a wholesale condemnation of the Ministry of Pensions administration, but I do not think he is entitled to say that there was no hon. Member who had not innumerable cases in which he was not convinced that the decision of the Minister had not been unjust. That is not the experience of the average Member of Parliament. It may be that one's sympathies are aroused strongly in individual cases where one would like a pension to be given and where it has been turned down on the ground that the disability was not attributable to, or aggravated by, service. There are many cases in which we feel on the facts that the decision may be just but where our sympathies, nevertheless, are strongly aroused.
        I have had a fair amount of experience of pensions administration. I have been in this House, I do not like to think how long. I came in 1918, and I was one of those ardent individuals who made a maiden Speech on the Address and on an Amendment dealing with pensions. I was a member of the Select Committee on Pensions which was set up after the Great War in 1919, a Select Committee which recommended a 40s. flat-rate pension, which, I think, is generally admitted as being the most generous pension scheme of any country. I have sat on many Departmental Committees which have been set up since 1919, and I want to say that out of all the Ministers of Pensions whom we have had since 1919 there has certainly been none better than the Minister we have to-day. I have served for some weeks on the Central Advisory Committee on Pensions, a body representative of the various organisations and interests, and those who are interested in pensions administration, particularly the British Legion. It was the general view that

        373
        there has never been a Minister more genuinely sympathetic to the case of the disabled pensioner than the present Minister. We have had some experience of it.
        The Central Advisory Committee made a great many recommendations. I do not say that the recommendations were all that they would have liked to make, because they realised that it was no use asking for something which was impracticable or which would have had the complete opposition of the Treasury. It may be that they would have recommended more if they thought it was practicable to get it. But, still, a great many recommendations were made, and I think that, except in a few instances, and those of a minor character, the present Minister has been able to get the consent of the Treasury, which I think is a remarkable achievement, and has also accepted the various recommendations made by the Central Advisory Committee. This Committee should be grateful to the Minister, not only for the great trouble which he has taken, but for the influence which he has exercised over his colleagues in getting these recommendations put into operation. It is not every recommendation of the Advisory Committee that the Minister has been able to carry out.
        A great deal has been said on the question of a parent's pension. There the Advisory Committee did not get quite all that they wanted. The Select Committee in 1919 recommended that the parent's pension should be on the basis of need, and they broadly defined "need" as the amount which could reasonably be expected the son would have contributed to the parent had he lived. That is not what is commonly understood by pecuniary need, and that definition was the one which the Advisory Committee would have liked to have been the guiding principle for the determination of parents' pensions. We have not quite got that, but it has been granted that in the determination of need, regard shall be had to the amount which the son could reasonably have been expected to contribute had he lived. I understand that will be administered in practice in this way. There is a scale of pecuniary need on which pensions, prior to this amendment of the Royal Warrant, have been administered. It is a scale such as we have in the scales of public assistance, unemployment assistance, and so on. I understand
        374
        that scale will be weighted up in cases where a son has made a pre-war contribution to his parents, or in cases where, although owing to various circumstances he has not in fact made a pre-war contribution, there are real grounds for believing he would have made a contribution to the parents if he had lived. The basis which the Committee desired was the likelihood of a contribution which the son would have made to the parents if he had lived, and I hope that in the administration that will be the guiding principle.
        The Committee was not able to deal with the question of the amounts of pensions. The Minister has told us that he has got the Cabinet to agree to an increase in the scales in the Royal Warrant by the amount attributable to the increase in the cost of living since the Warrant was published. In the case of a single person, we are told that involves an increase from 32s. 6d. to 34s. 2d. I understand that if further increases in the cost of living take place, there will be additions to this basic pension until the single 100 per cent. disability pension will reach the figure of 40s. when the cost of living is at the height which it was when the 40s. pension was first recommended by the Select Committee. I think the cost of living figure was then 215 or 220. That is something which, although it is not as much as some of us would like, is a definite improvement, and it is a great satisfaction to know that if there are further increases in the cost of living, this minimum disability penson will be increased accordingly.
        We realise that, as a result of this war, the number of pensioners may be greatly in excess of the number resulting from the Great War. So far casualties have not been excessive, but one must bear in mind that a great many categories now come within the scope of pensions who would not have got pensions in the last war; and if there is serious bombing of our cities, the pensions liability may become enormous before we have attained victory. Notwithstanding that, and however much it may be a strain on the finances of this country when the war is over, I think we all feel this should not be a consideration now in deciding what is a proper, just, adequate and decent pension for people who are disabled now. If after the war our finances are in such a deplorable condition that everyone

        375
        has to make sacrifices, well and good; but in determining our scales now, do let us do what is just now, and leave the financial position of the country after the war to be dealt with when we come to that period. In view of what the Minister has announced I think he has recognised that principle, and I believe it is because the Committee realise that the Minister takes that view and is really sympathetic to the claims of the pensioners, that all hon. Members join in congratulating him on his speech and his administration of his office.
        7.36 p.m.
        Major Milner: We are carrying on this Debate under considerable difficulties. Three subjects arise from the Vote now before the Committee—the ordinary administration of the Ministry of Pensions, the War Service Grants Advisory Committee, and the administration of the Personal Injuries Act. With regard to the general administration of the Ministry of Pensions, although a new Royal Warrant has been approved by the present Government, this day has been fixed for a Debate on the Vote of the Ministry of Pensions notwithstanding the fact that we have not got the new Warrant before us, although we may have it in a few days' time. It seems to me that some other Vote might have been taken to-day, and that before discussing this Vote we might have been in possession of the document, which is apparently ready and approved, but has not yet been printed. It is most unfortunate that this course was not taken.
        As to the War Service Grants Advisory Committee, we have not yet had the advantage of the explanation which the Parliamentary Secretary will give at a later stage in the Debate. The hon. Lady will be the first to appreciate that it is unsatisfactory when statements which, in the ordinary way, would be preliminary statements which the Committee could debate, are not made until the concluding hour of the Debate. In this respect, I hope it may be possible to arrange matters a little better in future, particularly as it may not be possible for all hon. Members to wait to hear the hon. Lady's statement. Certainly it would give hon. Members on these benches great pleasure to hear her first Ministerial statement on her Department. With regard
        376
        to the administration of the Personal Injuries Act, here again the Minister has told us that the rates, which have been the subject of much comment, are being reviewed and that in the course of a few days he hopes to be able to inform us of the new rates and conditions applicable to this Act. I am sure the Minister will agree that in regard to these three matters we are not in a satisfactory position, and I am sure all hon. Members hope that on any future occasion an effort will be made to put the Committee in full possession of the facts before a Debate takes place.
        Having made these remarks, let me join in what has amounted almost to a chorus of approval of the Minister's administration of his Department. I had the privilege of sitting on the hon. Gentleman's Advisory Committee, and I can pay a very sincere tribute to him. I imagine that on some of these committees I am perhaps considered to be a rather awkward individual. There were times when I and others had to speak as plainly as we could to the Minister, but I give him full marks and every credit for accepting all the recommendations made to him in good part, giving them full consideration, and, in my judgment, and I think in the judgment of all Members of the Committee, bringing about very fair results, and at any rate a very great improvement on the Warrant as it was first presented. I am bound to say that I do not understand how the Minister allowed himself to be made responsible for that Warrant in the first instance, but however that may be, if those who served on the Committee assisted not only the Minister but the pensioners, we are glad of the opportunity that was given us. Of course, we have not the new Warrant before us, but I imagine that it contains, substantially, the improvements which the Minister told us had been accepted by the late Government. I hope, indeed I anticipate, that the influence of the new Government will also be marked upon the new Warrant, and that there will be some further improvement. At any rate, what the new Government have clearly done is to deal with the question of rates of pensions and allowances.
        The Minister knows that those of us on the Advisory Committee did not have an opportunity of discussing rates and allowances, and he will also know that

        377
        it was the feeling of most of us that the pensions and allowances in the Warrant as it existed were, in our judgment, quite inadequate and that we were of the opinion they should be increased to the level of those in operation from 1914 to 1918—I hesitate to say during the Great War, because I am not at all sure that we are not engaged at the moment in an even greater war. The Minister and the Government have not, apparently, found it possible to do that, but, as I understand it, the Minister maintains that the result will be that when the cost of living rises we may expect the pensioner to receive the same amount as was the case in the last war. That does not seem to me to be an unreasonable compromise. We are all concerned about the immense costs and difficulties of the present situation, but I do not think we should start to economise here, at this stage of the proceedings, and therefore I welcome the increased rates of pensions and allowances.
        Another point which the Minister accepts in principle, but is not going to bring about at once, is, I gather, the question of the independent tribunals. One would be very foolish to disregard the very proper factors which the Minister has put before the Committee—the difficulties of travelling and the hundred and one other things of that sort. Nevertheless, these difficulties have not really arisen yet, and I feel that a start could be made with independent appeal tribunals, even if they were only of a travelling character, and not set up here, there, and everywhere as the Minister suggested. If a start could be made in that direction, and circumstances then became difficult with bombing so heavy that it was impossible for the tribunals to sit, I should then say that the Minister was perfectly in order and right in suspending their operation. But it is unsatisfactory not to have these tribunals. I do not regard the independent medical specialists, about whom a great deal has been said, as in any way an equivalent of or substitute for an independent appeal tribunal. I therefore still press on the Government the desirability of setting up these tribunals, because it is unsatisfactory if a dissatisfied claimant has no opportunity of appeal.
        I now turn to the question of disability aggravated by service. There it will be found that the new Warrant, like the old Warrant, will only permit a pension to be granted in cases of disablement
        378
        aggravated by service to a material extent. I feel very strongly that some pension should be made to men discharged with a disablement clearly aggravated by service. It seems an impossible proposition to expect medical men to say when there is aggravation, and when there is material aggravation. What is the dividing line? If there is aggravation, then, in my submission, a pension of some kind, not, of course, the full pension, should be granted. Another matter where I think it will be found that the new Warrant is still behind the Warrant of 1919 is on the question of the schedule of injuries. I should like to see a schedule of pensions provided for specific injuries. So far as I can judge from a few cases which come within my experience, and from such information as I can pick up, under the present Warrant not only are the rates of pensions lower than in 1919, but the payments which are made for specific injuries are also lower. That is a double disadvantage which the pensioner of to-day ought not to suffer.
        For example, I have good reason to believe that the assessment for the loss of an eye is only 40 per cent., whereas it was 50 per cent. in the last war. There really cannot be any grounds for that discrimination, and I think I am right in saying that there are similar discriminations in other cases. This is not satisfactory, and the schedule of injuries ought to be published, thereby enabling us to compare it with that of the 1919 Warrant. I know the Minister does not approve of what I am now going to say, but I cannot help feeling that a very great service would be rendered if some provision was made for the payment of a pension to a widow whose husband died while serving in the Armed Forces of the Crown where it is impossible to certify that death was due to or hastened by his service. In these cases I would suggest that a sympathetic pension be provided, for example, a pension of 5s. a week, on a flat-rate basis, as in the last war. At any rate, the Government should ensure that widows are paid a contributory State pension, and that there is no question of their falling between two stools. I am not satisfied that in all cases that is prevented, and I hope the Minister will give it his consideration.
        Something has been said in regard to parents' pensions. The hon. and learned Member for Bolton (Sir C. Entwistle)

        379
        mentioned the factor, broadly interpreted, which the Minister has accepted as the criterion in regard to parents' pensions. I was under the impression, and I believe that the majority of the Committee were also, that if a contribution was made by a son, then the parents would, without question, receive a pension, and that where such a contribution was made that should be the primary factor, instead of which it is the question of need, or in other words the needs test which is the primary factor. I assure the Minister that that was not in the minds of the Committee. Although the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. K. Griffith) is not quite so strong on this particular point, I gather he favours the Minister's present proposal.
        Mr. K. Griffith: I entirely agree that we should proceed on the basis of the contribution, but the test of need should be what the contribution was. I accept the present as an improvement on the last Warrant.
        Major Milner: It is an improvement, but it does not do what ought to be done. It does not ensure, in a case where the son thinks it necessary to make a contribution to the parent's support, that a pension will be granted.
        Sir W. Womersley: It establishes the right of the parent to a pension and then the secondary consideration as to whether there is need comes in.
        Major Milner: I agree that if a father falls out of work and his means are considerably affected, the fact that a contribution had been made by a son would lead, in the majority of cases, to the grant of a pension. The great majority of our workers are not sufficiently well paid, and if a son feels under an obligation to help his parents the State, in the event of the son's death, ought to share the responsibility which he would otherwise have continued to undertake. It is not easy to draw up a formula. I had something to do with the formula which, I think, is more satisfactory than the one the Minister has accepted. He did not find it possible to accept it, and I am not happy about the way in which parents' pensions have been dealt with. I still hope the Minister will find it possible to make an improvement.
        380
        On the question of the War Service Grants Advisory Committee, I urge the Minister to do something in a class of case which I have in mind. A grant can only be made where serious hardship has been caused by the calling up of the man concerned. Incidentally it is difficult to find out where the Minister's functions on that Committee are laid down, and I am not clear that he has any legal standing in the matter. The Committee seems to be purely advisory and the transfer of obligations to it has been done by an administrative act. I am not clear that the Minister has statutory authority for what he is doing. I do not want to raise any difficulties about it, but if there is any point in it perhaps the Minister will look into it. As a grant is only made where serious hardship is caused by the calling-up, provision should be made for the not infrequent case of the poor man, such as the agricultural labourer, who has not been earning a high wage. If it is not made, the Committee is not fulfilling the function which Parliament intended it should do. I press that point urgently upon the Minister.
        Hardly a word was said by the Minister about the administration of the Personal Injuries Act, and I am very dissatisfied with the results of that Measure. It takes away from every individual serving in Civil Defence the rights which he would otherwise have, and substitutes for them the very small pension which the Minister has power to grant. I had a case a short time ago of a qualified nurse who was injured through the negligence of one of the employés of St. Pancras Borough Council. She was a full-time A.R.P. worker and suffered a fractured tibia. It is questionable whether she will be quite right again. In ordinary circumstances she would have had a right of action against the council or its employé for negligence and would probably have recovered a considerable sum. She is now deprived of that right and has to go to the Minister, who pays her a maximum of 22s. a week. How can that woman, who has been accustomed to a fairly decent wage, live for the rest of her life on 22s. per week? The position is intolerable. If nothing can be done to reinstate the right which has been taken away from these people, I hope the Minister will see that the rates in all cases that come under that Act are adequate. Subject to those observations, I

        381
        join with others who have spoken in paying a personal tribute to the Minister and to the Parliamentary Secretary for their administration of this Department.
        7.52 p.m.
        Sir Smedley Crooke: I should like to join my colleagues in offering congratulations to the Parliamentary Secretary on her appointment, which I feel sure is popular. I am certain that she will be of great assistance to the Minister of Pensions, especially in matters concerning women and children. We are all indebted to the Minister for his statement to-day, clear, valuable, and informative as it was. There was in his speech a ring of sincerity, which is not always present in the speeches and statements of Ministers of the Crown. It showed that his heart is in the work and that at long last we have a Minister of Pensions who has the cause of ex-service men, especially disabled ex-service men, at heart. I want to make a short personal statement. Ever since I was relieved from Service at the end of the Great War I have always endeavoured to do what I could to help ex-service men, particularly disabled men. When in 1922 I was asked to contest the seat which I have had the honour of holding for 16 years, I made only one condition. That was that whenever the cause of the ex-service man was under consideration I should be at liberty to vote against the Government if necessary and have a free hand in ex-service men's questions. Since 1923 I have served on the Pensions Committee of the British Legion as a member of the National Executive Council of the Legion. Recently I served on the Ministry of Pensions Central Advisory Committee when it was considering the new Royal Warrant.
        I mention these things to show that I have always been against the policy and worked against the administration of the Ministry of Pensions. I feel that I must now pay a tribute to the Minister, not only for the admirable way in which he presided over the deliberations of the Advisory Committee, but also for the friendly attitude he took up in meeting the various suggestions and expressions of opinion that were made during the discussions on the new Royal Warrant. I am bound to say in all fairness that he has gone out of his way to meet the wishes
        382
        of his advisory committee, and has done his best to secure from the Government such concessions as at one time I felt it would be impossible to obtain. At the moment we are not in a position to criticise the new Royal Warrant, but from what we have gathered from the Minister's statement it is a great improvement upon the Warrant which he put before the House last September, and this change fully justifies the attitude of the British Legion in pressing for a reconsideration of the terms of that Warrant. It may well be that as time goes on it will be seen that the work of the Central Advisory Committee was very creditable to all concerned.
        8.1 p.m.
        Mr. Dobbie: I can associate myself with every Member who has paid tribute to the Minister for his long and exhaustive statement. He dealt with pensions granted, with hospital treatment, with costs, with the possibility of pension appeals, and with the new Royal Warrant, of which, like a good many more in this Committee, I know very little, not having had an opportunity to peruse it. But there, I will part company from my friends who have been paying tribute, and will endeavour, in a quiet but firm way, to try to shock the complacency of this Committee. Speaker after speaker has spoken as though everything was well. I know it was difficult for the Minister to cover everything, but I wish he had dealt a little more extensively with the War Service Grants. He did make a fleeting reference to them, and said that 150,000 cases had been dealt with. That is true, and probably hon. Members think it is very good, but we have not given satisfaction in 150,000 cases. Probably I should be right in saying that 60,000 of the applications have been refused.
        I ask the Minister and hon. Members to believe me when I say there is tremendous dissatisfaction in the country with the way in which the War Service Grants are being administered. I do not know whether it is the Committee who are to blame. They get the blame, but I do not know whether it is their fault or not. I wonder, sometimes, whether Ministers are the prisoners of the permanent officials and whether the permanent officials are the prisoners of the Treasury, but there is something wrong with the way in which the War Service Grants are

        383
        dealt with. I have met scores and scores of men who have come back from France and have expressed to me their intense dissatisfaction. We have a tragic duty and responsibility to these men. We must make all those men who are in the fighting line—and we had a greater responsibility, probably, when they were overseas—believe and understand that every Member of the House of Commons is anxious to see that the women and children whom they have left behind are getting care and attention. Unfortunately we cannot say that that is so at the moment.
        The Minister said, "Those who give quickly, give twice." That can never be said of the Ministry of Pensions in regard to the War Service Grants. The wildest, the most enthusiastic, supporter of the Ministry would never say that of them. I would say in making these criticisms, kindly but firmly, that I do not want any Fifth Columnist or any defeatist to get any satisfaction from them, because those of us who are criticising are determined to do everything humanly possible to see that we win through in the struggle for freedom against aggression, and those soldiers who have grumbled to me, as they have grumbled to others, will keep up the old tradition of the British Army—they will grumble but they will fight, they will do their duty and they will win. Knowing that, I think a greater responsibility devolves upon us.
        I shall deal with two or three matters that are causing some grumbling. One complaint concerns the tremendous time that elapses between the receipt of an application from dependants and the notification that either it has been turned down or that they are to get an allowance. Sometimes they have waited weeks and weeks, and have been compelled, against their will, to go to the public assistance committee. Then they have had a notification to say that the application has been turned down. It is no use telling them that the staff have been evacuated to Blackpool, because they do not understand. They say, "I wish to goodness we could go there." I want the Ministry to speed up the decision on whether a grant is to be made or not. Another thing the people fail to understand: Not one in a zoo of these cases ever goes to the committee. They are dealt with by the
        384
        staff. I do not want to be misunderstood. I do not want to attack the staff, or appear to be attacking them, because it is always very unfair to attack those who cannot defend themselves. The attack, if attack it can be called, is on the Minister. The cases that go to the supervisors and from the supervisors to the committee are only those in which there seems to be some real doubt. In view of that there should be an intimation to every person whose case is rejected that he has a right of appeal against that rejection.
        Then there is the difficulty of obtaining payments after decisions have been made. That is what made me say that I did not know whether the Minister was the prisoner of the permanent officials or whether the permanent officials were the prisoners of the Treasury. There is a classic example; the Minister knows about it. There are cases where the committee had made a decision to give a grant and the permanent officials have looked at it and said, "She will get no more." That is not good enough. It should not be allowed to continue. People come and say, "You are only a member of the Committee; you do not know anything about it." This is another matter which I should like thoroughly examined, in order to make it certain that, when the Committee come to a decision, it should be operated. We are told that the Committee are only advisory and have no power except that of recommendation, but a committee's recommendation or decision should not be vetoed by anybody but the Minister or the Treasury, and an explanation should be made to the Committee in order that they might have an opportunity to look into the matter. The Parliamentary Secretary may say that the case I have mentioned has been put right, but I must endeavour to justify the complaint which I have made, and I can assure her that this is not the case. I have had a telegram to-day to say that payment has not been made. I am sorry to prevent the Minister from getting in a parting shot.
        Another matter which I have often raised in this House is in relation to Form 21. I have put questions, asking that the form should be made obtainable without much trouble, and we have been assured that every officer has been asked to make the forms available to soldiers.

        385
        I now ask the Minister to review the situation again. If a soldier is serving at home, he alone can get the form, and not his wife or mother. The responsibility for making application is on the soldier. It is only if he is overseas that his dependants are supposed to have an opportunity of making application. I beg the Minister to allow the dependants of the serving soldier to have an opportunity to make the application, which should be made at the post office. The forms ought to be at the post offices or the offices of the public assistance committees. Only this week I have had a case of an officer informing a soldier that he had no idea what the form was and that he did not know what the soldier was talking about.
        Another question is that of the foster mother. This matter has been pushed about from the War Office to the Ministry of Pensions, but nobody will take the responsibility. I am anxious about the matter because of a case which I know of myself and because I know the effect that it is having upon other people. My criticism is made only because I want to do everything humanly possible to keep up the morale of the people. In cases of this kind, somebody appears to be acting like an inverted Micawber, and looking for something to turn down. That is what the people imagine who are concerned in these 60,000 cases that are turned down.
        I give this case as a typical instance. It is in an area which I know very well, and it has caused a good deal of dissatisfaction among wives of soldiers, serving soldiers and soldiers' dependants generally. I have been dealing with the case for six months, and the old saying that those who give quickly give twice, is not applicable here. A soldier died from the effects of his wounds in the last war. His wife died, and there was left a family of two boys and a girl. A widow took upon herself the responsibility of acting as foster mother to the two lads and the little girl. The children grew up and the two young men joined the Territorials. In September, came the call of the nation, and off they went with the Territorials. One of these young men desires to keep his home going, so that there can at least be a roof over his head and his sister's head, when the war is over, or when his leave comes. He, therefore, makes an allotment of 14s. a week out of his 21s., and that is a demonstration that he is
        386
        giving of his best, to keep a roof over the heads of his people.
        I ask the Minister to try to put the War Grants Committee on an equality with the unemployment committees. In the realm of unemployment, if this young man had been doing as much to keep the home going, the woman would have received an allowance equal to the allowance of a wife. We ask the Minister to look at the matter and consider whether it is possible to make an allotment to the woman equivalent to that made to the wife of a soldier. The service which is being rendered by that boy, not only to his family but to the nation, makes the woman eligible for such an allotment. I had the wretched experience of taking her to the public assistance committee a fortnight ago. I felt very unhappy about it and so did she, and the lads felt angry. I ask the Minister to have a look at cases like this and to see whether something can be done to meet them. I ask the Minister not to quote the committee's terms of reference to us, about having no power in any case to do more than restore the status quo. I hope something will be done not to restore, but to abolish the status quo. That does away at once with the story of taking into account the prospective earnings of the apprentice once he becomes a journeyman.
        It is difficult to believe anything that anybody says on the other side of the Committee, and I hope something will be done to restore to this side of the Committee confidence in the veracity of Ministers. Last November, when we talked about increases to the Forces, the Minister for War made a statement to the effect that the War Service Grants Committee would be allowed to make allowances up to £2 over and above the ordinary military payments and allowances. A question was asked in regard to what the Minister has referred to as an allowance for rent:
        "Does that also include the obligations of men who were buying their houses and are under financial obligations in consequence?"
        The Minister said:
        "Yes, Sir, most certainly. They will be entitled to make a claim, and their claim can be met in appropriate circumstances to the extent of £2, exclusive and apart from the allowances which I have announced."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th November, 1939; col. 528, Vol. 353.]
        We all know young men who, inspired

        387
        by the idea of owning their own homes, have entered into obligations with building societies to make themselves secure, feeling that they were in steady and regular employment and who hoped to make themselves secure from being turned out by the landlord.
        The men and women in the Services and men and women generally in the country accepted that statement from the Government as meaning that, provided these young men presented a proper case, they would be able to get an allowance which would meet the whole of their obligations in regard to their house-buying. But what did they find? The Committee look at the situation and arrive at a decision. They say, "We will not give you the whole of the money. We will find out how much of this is interest that the building society are charging you, and we will give you that amount." That makes us feel that rents and profits are being looked after to a larger extent than the families of the fighting men. That means that the soldier who has gone either voluntarily or at the demand of the nation is coming back at the end of the war to find that all his obligations are still intact, whereas if he had remained at home and had been in his employment, he would have been able to pay off a good deal of the original debt. He finds that the interests of the people who are drawing the interest, the building society, have been looked after during the time he has been away and that he will have to go on to the end paying this interest to them. We think that is unfair and that the Ministry should be prepared to meet the whole of the obligations. It means further that if that man is killed, his wife is left with the whole of the obligations. It means also that if he comes back an impaired man—impaired in the sense that he cannot meet the responsibilities of industrial life with a pension of the kind which the Minister has been describing to us, but which will not be very much use to him in the circumstances, because the building society will want most of it—his earning capacity becomes smaller, and, judging from the experience of the last war, he becomes a man who is not wanted by the captains of industry.
        In the circumstances we say to the Ministry, Will you be good enough to
        388
        look at those matters from the standpoint which we are placing before you now, remembering all the time that our desire is as great as anybody's to see that the strength and force of the nation is organised in the present struggle and that defeatists and Fifth Columnists shall get no satisfaction from the case of criticism which we put to the Government?
        8.25 p.m.
        Mrs. Adamson: I listened with interest to the speech of the Minister of Pensions. It covered a large variety of human problems which ought to command the sympathy of every Member of this Committee. I was disappointed when he referred to the Personal Injuries (Emergency Provisions) Act. I remember when the Debate on that subject took place some months ago, the women Members of this Committee—
        Dr. Summerskill: And the men.
        Mrs. Adamson: —backed up by the men, protested against the invidious position in which the housewife of this country was placed. As we have not many housewives in the House of Commons, I feel it to be my duty to champion the cause of securing fair play for the women in the homes. How do the women in the homes fare under this scheme? In Part II the wives, unless gainfully employed or Civil Defence volunteers, are not entitled to allowances. But under Part IV allowances in certain cases can be granted to wives who have sustained injuries which lead to serious and prolonged disablement, if the person for whom they work—presumably the husband—can prove that he is in need. The principle of a needs test is introduced into this Act. He can then claim from the Minister an amount in the shape of wages which will be paid for a substitute to come in and run the home during the wife's prolonged illness. But the husband has to prove need. What standard of need we are not told, but, supposing the husband is not considered to be in need, then the wife, who may be ill and unable to carry on her household duties, must rely to a great extent either on the older children in the family or on friendly neighbours.
        Now we have a position by which if the housewives in this country are injured when doing their housework or while out

        389
        shopping, they get no compensation under this Act unless need can be proved by their husbands. We are always being told that the wife and the mother performs one of the highest national services. Evidently, housewives can get plenty of compliments but no justice from the Ministry of Pensions or from the House of Commons in connection with the personal injuries scheme. I used my powers of peaceful persuasion on the Minister of Pensions during the Debate, and he gave an assurance that he would go into this question. This afternoon during his speech I asked whether any further consideration had been given to the principle of compensation for housewives, and I was told that things are as they were. I want to protest against this injustice to flu housewives of this country. We have had a large volume of support from women's organisations in Great Britain and I am sure the Minister has received dozens of resolutions from women's organisations. I am sorry that he has not seen fit to give further consideration to the question and to remove this injustice. I was pleased to learn that there has been a slight increase in the children's allowances under this Act, and that the Minister has swept away the vicious principle of penalising large families. Children ought to have recognition of their right to sustenance.
        The Minister spoke about the Mercantile Marine. He told us of his efforts to remove some of the anomalies in respect of continued payments to wives and dependants after the loss of the husband or father, and that the shipowners have now agreed to continue payments to the wives for four weeks. He told us that he had hoped that they would agree to the normal allowance being paid for 13 weeks, as is done in the other Services, but that he had been able to get them to agree only to four weeks' payments. I have had this question brought to my notice, and have communicated with Ministers of Shipping about it. There is intense indignation among the seafaring community at the fact that as soon as a boat has been announced as missing the owners have stopped payments to wives, and that, almost within a day or two of the loss of a ship and the presumed death of the men, their wives have had to seek relief from the Unemployment Assistance Board. Articles have appeared in the newspapers of practically all the shipping
        390
        towns and cities in the country protesting against the humiliation of these women. We are glad to hear that there has been some modification, and that the shipowners have agreed to continue payments at any rate for four weeks, and that then the question of the payment of compensation or allowances is to be expedited in every way. I am sorry that the owners of the fishing fleet have not come into line with the shipowners on this question, and I hope the Minister will bring pressure upon them to do so.
        I want to say a few words about medical services. Having been for many years a member of the London County Council and of mental hospital boards in Lincolnshire, I am familiar with the problems that occur in connection with the care of those who have been bruised and battered and who have suffered mentally and physically as a result of war service, and who are, to a very large extent, confined in the mental hospitals of this country. I should like to pay my tribute to the work of the doctors and staff in trying to improve the physical and mental condition of these men. But I am not satisfied that in other types of hospitals the wounded men have the advantages of the latest scientific methods. After the last war I took a great interest in osteopathy. I saw the work of a famous osteopath in restoring the hearing of ex-Service men who had been told that there was practically no hope of their benefiting from any treatment. That form of medical service was not available to those ex-Service men through the usual channels. I feel that in these days of progress we should ensure the very latest scientific advantages to the victims of the war. Because of my association with a large industrial constituency I have taken a great interest in what is called physical medicine. I have seen men from industry receive miraculous benefits from electrical treatment, massage and medicinal baths. The Minister ought to make use of these methods.
        I want to say something about the War Service Grants Advisory Committee. Public opinion, as reflected in this House by Members on this side, compelled the Government to increase allowances to the wives and dependants of the Service men and to set up the War Service Grants Advisory Committee. The announcement that grants up to £2 a week would be made gave general satisfaction; but the

        391
        applicant has to prove hardship due to the war. Although the Committee is purely advisory, I find that the members get the blame for all that goes wrong, and for any failure of the awards to come up to expectation. We have to remind the public that the Committee is only advisory. As a member of that Committee, I say candidly that we have to cope with the dead hand of the Treasury. That Committee has done a lot of work, but it is physically impossible for it to deal with every case that comes before it. The staff of the Ministry of Pensions have been trained in the work. They know the broad principles of policy upon which decisions are made, and I believe that they conscientiously carry out their duties in the spirit of the broad principles that have been laid down. I can say that quite sincerely as a member of the Committee. We have asked for cases to be taken out at random, and we have gone through them to see whether the staff were carrying out these principles. I am bound to confess that I have no cause to complain at all of the decisions that have been made. The decisions of the staff have been worked out in accordance with the generally accepted policy and principles, but I feel that we must have greater powers. I want to say to the hon. Lady who is now the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions that I hope she will stand up to the Treasury, as I feel certain that Members in all parts of this House will stand by her in her resistance to the dead hand of the Treasury in respect of this humane work of the War Service Grants Advisory Committee.
        We desire some changes to be made in respect to the administration. I attended a meeting to-day of the Committee, and once again I expressed dissatisfaction about what we would call low-standard units. It is the case where the applicant, perhaps because of circumstances over which he had no control before he entered the Service, either through low wages or unemployment, had a poor standard of life or was suffering acute poverty. Because this Committee has not the power to make the applicant better off while he is in the Service than he was in pre-service days, because he had been exploited in various ways, the assumption is that the State must continue to exploit him. We had hoped
        392
        that at long last we were to get a decision from the Treasury on raising the unit standard in cases of this kind. We have waited for months for a decision in respect of the almost unanimous opinion of the War Service Grants Advisory Committee that something ought to be done to raise the standard of life in the homes of that section of poorly paid and lowly placed people who are now in the Services.
        I would urge that every facility ought to be given to the men who are now joining up or are in the Services to secure the necessary form of application. A meeting was recently held upstairs in this House attended by a large number of "Brass Hats," and we put the question to them as to whether they could help us to ensure that all the men in all the Services had a chance of getting this form in order to make an application for a grant to enable them to maintain their homes at the standard of life at which they were maintained before they joined the Service. I believe that it is easier to-day to get these forms, but there is still a great deal of dissatisfaction, because, if a man asks his commanding officer or paymaster for the form, he is often held up for weeks before he can get it. I was pleased when I heard a statement made some weeks ago that all men when they were medically examined were to have an opportunity of getting this form, but there is still too much difficulty in the matter.
        I would like to back up the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. Dobbie) when he said there was too much delay in dealing with cases. Very frequently it means the creation of acute hardship in the home of the dependants of the Service man. I remember that it was decided that if there had been delay in dealing with a case, when the case came up for review or for consideration either by the staff or by the Committee, arrears would be paid and a grant made, but I do not know whether that is now being carried out. Applicants ought not to be penalised because of the delay in dealing with their case.
        These are very largely the points I desire to make in respect of this Debate, but there is one further point that has been brought to my notice in regard to adopted children. I have had put to me by a Member in this House the case of a lady who adopted a child. She died, and her son took the responsibility for

        393
        the maintenance and support of that child. The man joined the Army, and although his wife can get an allowance for her own children, she cannot get an allowance for the adopted child. She has been referred to the War Service Grants Advisory Committee. The same principle that applies in respect of unemployment benefit in the case of an adopted child ought to be embodied in the laws of this country in relation to adopted children of men who are in the Services. I lope that the hon. Lady will take up that question, and I am sure that the Members of this Committee would be eternally grateful to her if she could do something on behalf of these children.
        I will conclude by paying, as so many other hon. Members have done, my tribute to the Minister of Pensions. I can say truthfully that I have done very well out of the Minister of Pensions with cases that I have brought to his notice. Hon. Members want injustice to be removed, and we have to show courage and determination in trying to tackle this problem. While I have not been successful in all the cases that I have brought, I must pay my tribute to the Minister of Pensions for the consideration which he has given. Although I have been disappointed in many cases, at the same time I have received always courtesy and consideration in respect of the cases that I have brought to his notice.
        8.50 p.m.
        Mr. Tinker: We have had a fairly long and interesting Debate, and I am wondering whether the hon. Lady who is to reply is tired. She has sat here the whole of the evening and no doubt expected that the Debate would not last so Long. The Minister, however, dealt with his work and with the Advisory Committee and their recommendations, and the length of his speech goes to show how long it has taken to explain the whole position to the Committee. We on this side thought the Debate might have been divided into two parts—that we should deal with the Minister's report today and discuss the Advisory Committee on another occasion. However, I can understand the Minister's position. These recommendations come into operation next month, and he wants the people of the country to know what they will get and consequently has taken the opportunity of putting forward the proposals to-day.
        394
        There are not many points with which I want to deal, but there are one or two that I wish to emphasise because I served on this Advisory Committee. The points I advocated did not meet with the approval of the Minister, and naturally one feels a bit aggrieved that the points put forward did not get as favourable consideration as did many other points. I am not complaining about what was done in other directions. Indeed, I want to pay tribute to what the Minister has done, but one of the matters which requires the attention of the Committee, and which was particularly mentioned by the hon. and gallant Member for Lonsdale (Sir I. Fraser), is with reference to the soldier who joins up and does not marry before going to war. He may be wounded and entitled to a pension, perhaps a full disability pension, but when he returns to this country, and in due course desires to marry, he is placed in a different position from another soldier who married before going overseas or gets married before he is wounded. The soldier in the latter category is entitled to an allowance for his wife and children, but the soldier who is not married before he is wounded is debarred from getting an allowance. We do not want young men to get married early in life simply for the purpose of getting their pension rights, yet that is what it means. Often a young man says, "I am not prepared to marry yet. I will wait until I return home and see what the future holds for me before I do so." Unfortunately, he is wounded while on active service, and, therefore, when he comes home to get married is debarred from the same rights as a married man receives. Can anybody justify that? The Minister did not state that such a case as that did not deserve recognition. His plea was that the Treasury would not like to be burdened with such a matter. At a time when the whole country has to face up to what may happen, is it fair to take advantage of a man who gives all he has for the service of his country?
        Another argument was that children will come. This war will reduce the manpower of the nation. One of the big things we have to look forward to in future is the question of having children to carry on the work of the nation, yet we say to the wounded soldier, "You are not to have the opportunity of help-

        395
        ing forward the race by having children, because if you bring children into the world, there is nothing for you." Equal rights should be given all round. If two men come back unwounded, they start on an equal footing. I do not think it is any defence at all to talk about cost; the question of cost does not trouble me much if I see that justice is done to those who are fighting. When the war is over there will be such a tremendous sum of money to be found for all purposes that I have stopped trying to calculate where it will come from. However, that is a secondary consideration, and I do not want the Minister or Treasury to hide behind anything of that kind when we are fighting for justice for the people.
        The second point that I want to bring forward is one which concerned me in the last war and which I want to try to prevent happening in this war. It is with regard to children entitled to benefit up to the age of 16 where the father is suffering from war wounds. Under the Warrant of the present time it says that children receiving allowances up to 16 years of age shall continue to receive allowances, if the father is still unable to work, up to the age of 21. The Minister has no right to give anything further for that child after that, with one exception, which, I believe, was secured by the late Mr. Roberts, namely, that if the child is an orphan the Minister can continue the allowance after the age of 21. I have a typical case, which I think ought to be quoted to the Committee, where, during the last war a child was born after its father had been killed. Its mother was six months pregnant at the time the child's father was killed in France. When the child was born it was a cripple. That child received an allowance up to 16 years of age, and the Minister continued the allowance up to the age of 21. But he cannot do anything more except by voluntary grant. He has no right to do anything more. I have tried to get the Pensions Advisory Committee to recognise the duty of the State to that child. I have failed. The Minister admitted that it was a good case, but he said, "Where is the money to come from?" and at the moment there has been no redress in cases of that kind. I put it to the Committee that where we can satisfy the Minister that the child's in-
        396
        capacity and physical disabilities, or its mental disabilities, can be traced to what happened to the mother during the war, there is no reason why we should not meet our responsibilities and see that that child is looked after by the State. I claim that once it is allowed that such a child is entitled to an allowance up to 16 years of age and is continued until 21, there is no justifiable reason why it should not be continued so long as it is incapacitated.
        I want to pay my tribute to a kindhearted Minister of Pensions. I have met the hon. Gentleman on many occasions, and I believe that he has as kind a heart as anybody in the Committee. I wish his kind-heartedness had enabled him to go a little further when I brought forward my two points. I told him on the Advisory Committee that I should claim the right to deal with this matter when it came before the Committee, and that it would not be a breach of confidence. I am not committing any breach of confidence. If you have committees examining these questions, it is the House of Commons which has the final judgment. I am satisfied that, after the repeated pressure which has been brought to bear on the subject of the unmarried soldier who gets married and who has at present no allowance after he marries, it is a matter which will receive attention. I trust that the Minister will pay close attention to what has been said and that some redress will be made at the first opportunity available to the hon. Gentleman.
        9.3 P.m.
        The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions (Miss Wilkinson): I want to make it clear that I am not closing the Debate. There is no reason at all why the Debate should not go on, but it has been made clear that there are some hon. Members who would like to have some guidance with regard to the work of the War Service Grants Advisory Committee. As that is my special Department, it may be convenient if I deal with the points that have been raised and also give some description of the work of the committee. With regard to the points raised in connection with pensions, which do not come under my Department, the Minister of Pensions has promised to deal with them at the close of the Debate. I think it is important that hon. Members should understand

        397
        what the War Service Grants Advisory Committee has been set up to do and the work which is actually carried on. There are one or two hon. Members who are specialists in this work, but there are others who, like myself before I went to the Ministry, may have a vague idea—that there was some sort of committee that did dole out money sometimes if you wrote a sufficiently nice letter to the Minister. It is only when one is in the Department and sees the work that one realises what a very big social experiment is being made in war service grants, and how a whole body of experience is being built up.
        After all, it is a very new department and a very new departure. It grew up in a rather casual way. Conscription was to be imposed, and, of course, the difficulty of imposing conscription in a country that had never had it was that the citizens were not used to making provision for it. In a country where conscription is an old-established practice and where the men go through their service at recognised early ages, provision is made in the normal course in the family budget. We were suddenly having to impose conscription without any previous preparation. The first idea, as hon. Members will remember, was that the conscription would be for six months' military or civil training. Therefore, when the idea of a Committee was mooted and when the Committee was set up in June, 1939, the idea was only that it should be advisory, not to the Ministry of Pensions, but to the three Services and to the Ministry of Labour. It had a very restricted function. It was only to consider the liability, say, of youngsters who were being called up for six months' training and a certain number of Territorials. That is why there was a limit of £2 a week which included the allowances that were being paid to the men in training. When the war came the whole situation was altered. We had to face not the calling-up of young men for six months' training, but possibly the progessive calling-up of all citizens of military age as their age groups came due, and this included family men with serious commitments. Clearly, something on a much bigger scale than the original Committee was needed.
        I do not want to go into a mass of detail. It suffices to say that from 1st
        398
        December, 1939—we have been going only for about seven months—the whole matter was taken over by the Ministry of Pensions. The limit of £2 was retained, but it was to be excluding the allowances paid to the soldiers. As hon. Members have said, this Committee is an Advisory Committee, and it has been said that its terms of reference are very narrow. The Committee has to work within its terms of reference; therefore, let us consider, first of all, what are those terms of reference. They are, first, that serious hardship directly due to calling-up is to be the only thing to be considered by the Committee. The evidence of this hardship is to be the inability of the soldier to meet commitments as a result of his being called up; that is to say, they are not to be general debts that were contracted in any way, but commitments which he is unable to meet because of his being called up. It follows that the Committee is solely concerned with the difference in the financial position caused by the calling-up, and, therefore, it follows again that the Committee has no power strictly to do more than restore the status quo.
        It is on these terms of reference that the Committee has had to work, and however one may quarrel with that Committee, one has to remember that these were the limitations imposed upon it. As I have said, the Committee was rather casual in the beginning. It is the British system, and the system of this House, to leave a lot to the discretion of a Minister or to a committee; but, of course, there is the Treasury watch-dog. There are certain advantages in this system. Ministers and committees learn a lot from the actual working of cases, and clearly they learn it in a way which could not possibly be understood by any official, however expert, who has to draw up rules and regulations before a committee starts working. Therefore, what is actually happening, and what has been happening in these seven months, has been that this Committee has been evolving from experience a whole body of working rules and regulations. It has been making its terms of reference work and has been making its own case laws a living thing. Inevitably when doing this, because it has to deal with the known facts of our social system, to put it tactfully, it reaches a position where it has to persuade the Treasury that these terms of reference, I will not say must be

        399
        altered, but interpreted, if we are to have a real working system of rules. Although it may seem that this is a clumsy method, and, of course, it would have been much nicer to have had a rigid set of rules—
        Mr. E. Smith: Hear, hear.
        Miss Wilkinson: The hon. Member says, "Hear, hear," but with his great knowledge of these subjects I think he would be the first to protest if he had given to him a set of rules by an official and had to sit down to make the system fit these rules. He knows that no one could do it, and he knows, therefore, the position we are in. I would say here to the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. Dobbie) that for his work in connection with this Committee we are profoundly grateful. He has brought us great experience and a warm heart. I assure him that the decisions of the Committee are not vetoed by officials just for the fun of it, or because they do not like them. These decisions can only be vetoed by officials if, in fact, they go outside the terms of reference or any agreement we have come to with the Treasury.
        I can give some examples of what I mean when I say that we are building up a set of working rules out of our actual experience. Take the case of the temporarily unemployed man. He may be an engineer, but, because of a long period of slump, he has been out of work. He joins up, or is called up, and his fellow unemployed at home are now working overtime. Is it fair only to restore the status quo of that man and make his family remain on unemployed standards for the rest of the war? Obviously that is what the terms of reference would mean. The Minister approached the Treasury and got them to agree—and this is a very substantial concession—to ignore the pre-service income and substitute instead what the man would normally have earned in his ordinary occupation. That is now the working rule of the committee. Then we came to deal with the case of the man who came from a distressed area, that is, the man who had been unemployed over a long period. It could not be said that such a man would have got such and such a wage because he might 10 years ago have been employed, say, in Jarrow shipyard. The Minister again approached the Treasury, and there was a large number of consultations. As a
        400
        result we have secured a formula allowing that man to be classified as a labourer in his previous industry if his wage was higher than his Unemployment Assistance Board allowance. In some cases where there was a large family it would pay the man to keep on the unemployment assistance allowance.
        Then we came to the question, which has been raised by several hon. Members, of the dependants of apprentices, that is, the potential dependence on apprentices who were just out of their time. We had many pathetic cases of parents who had made sacrifices to give their boys a good education so that they could be trained as teachers, chemists and so on, and also of boys who had been working on low wages in order to acquire journeyman's status. If we were to keep to the pre-service status we could not give any dependant's allowance. The Treasury has now agreed to the potential earnings being taken into consideration. The Minister pointed that out in regard to pensions, and it is now being carried out in regard to war service grants.
        We then came to the very difficult problem of the man whose wage on full employment was below the standard rate and in some cases even below what he would have got as unemployment assistance. I do not think all hon. Members realise to what a low standard many wage rates had fallen before the war. I am talking about industrial wages; agricultural wages were a special problem. Some industrial rates, even in the conditions of urban life, were found to be very low indeed. The Minister took a sample haphazard of just over 2,000 applicants. It showed that 25 per cent. of the applicants earned under 55s. a week and 41 per cent. under 60s. We were faced with the point which the hon. Member for Dartford (Mrs. Adamson) mentioned. She has put a great deal of work and energy into this matter and has been one of the most valuable members of our Committee. She brought up a number of such cases which we are dealing with. Here was the difficulty, that where a man was in full employment we literally had no power to give an allowance for the dependants in excess of the amount he was earning previously.
        Many tributes have been paid to the Minister of Pensions, and I want to pay mine after what I have seen of his work

        401
        in the Ministry, in that he has, so to speak, got his teeth into this question of what we may call the low-unit family income. It is not an easy matter to deal with. It is easy, of course, when one is just saying what is desirable and what ought to be done; but when it is looked at as a matter of administration which not only concerns this one section but affects every kind of grant in the way of family allowance given by the Government, you really are up against a tough proposition. We are now negotiating with the Treasury for a formula that will fit these cases, and Members of this Committee know how long that fight has gone on. I can assure the hon. Member for Rotherharn and the hon. Member for Dartford that it is not a question of delay in the sense of putting the matter in a pigeon-hole and then forgetting all about it. On the contrary, it is a matter of the most urgent and the most active consideration in the sense of our having consultations, conferences, letters and dealings with the Service Departments. We could have settled it at once if we had accepted the Treasury view, but it is the fact that we have not accepted it, and have kept on worrying them on these low income units, that has meant delay. On the whole I do not think that can be blamed on to the Ministry, and now we are coming to a stage in the struggle where we hope to get something, and in the meantime we have secured an agreement from the Treasury that we can give special consideration to families with several children where the Service allowance and any other income of the household is insufficient to prevent hardship even though the effect may be to improve the position of the household in service as compared with the position pre-service. That is getting somewhere along the road we all desire to go.
        As to the complaints of delay in dealing with cases, I can honestly say that that is not the fault of the staff. Let hon. Members consider the situation. We have a rapidly expanded staff working under war conditions, and we have had to evacuate half of them to the North. We have half our staff in the North and half in London; and quite recently we have had to evacuate another big section of them. How on earth they have managed to keep this whole machine going and deal with the work as quickly
        402
        as they have done is a miracle, and all that I feel guilty about, as a trade unionist, is that we have had to ask them to work such long hours, work Saturdays and Sundays and they have done it uncomplainingly, in order to get through the work. It is not the fact that we are asking people to work overtime when we ought to have had extra staff, because we have taken on all the staff we could get for this job.
        As regards what we call our straightforward cases, those dealt with by the machine, they can be settled by the staff, and most of them are settled within 48 hours after the receipt of the application at the Ministry. Of course, that is not to say that the forms reach the Ministry as soon as they are signed by the applicants, because there are delays for which we are not responsible; but most of the straightforward cases are settled within 48 hours, and all such cases could be settled if we just rejected them according to rule, because they did not fit. But any cases about which there are doubts are dealt with by experts, and are carefully considered, and if there is any chance of the applicant being given the benefit of the doubt, or even of getting rules modified if necessary, then the inspectors arrange that the case should be sent to headquarters for consideration. The delay could be avoided by automatic rejection, but we do not want to do that sort of thing, because we desire to build up a working set of rules, which may seem vague but yet fit in more or less with our terms of reference.
        Of course, we have to deal with some extremely complicated cases. I thought I knew a good deal about this matter, but I never realised what a mess some people can make of their businesses and family affairs until we started to unravel some of the cases. I feel that men must sometimes go into the Army with a sense of relief, feeling that they have left other people to deal with their problems. We have the problem of the one-man business, in which the accounts are all mixed up with the family budget, and we have to sort it out. We find the most extraordinary collection of commitments, personal and otherwise, to put it tactfully, and all sorts of problems have to be resolved. A good deal has been said about having a committee to deal with these matters, but I would remind hon.

        403
        Members that, in the last war, we had the Civil Liabilities Committee, experts who often took weeks to decide complicated cases. Now we are following the practice, when a prima facie case is reasonably established, of making a provisional award which is subject to the final determination in the case. We sort it all out—and in some cases it does take some sorting out.
        Very briefly I want to give hon. Members some points that may help them in dealing with these matters among their constituents. I would appeal to them to help us. This Parliament is becoming something different from what we have known; it is becoming very much a working committee, and I would appeal to hon. Members to give attention to these cases and, in that way, to help us very much. These are points which I believe hon. Members would like to know. We fix our allowances after certain commitments are disregarded, that is to say that, in a case where we award 15s., it is after certain commitments have been met. We disregard the first 5s. of sick pay from a friendly society, the first 7s. 6d. of any benefit under the National Health Insurance Acts, the first £1 of any superannuation or pension and half of any payment to an injured person in regard to workmen's compensation.
        Mr. G. Griffiths: The Minister has just made the statement that only half the workmen's compensation is taken into account, but I would point out that, in the case of a woman whose husband has been killed in the pit, the full compensation is taken into account.
        Miss Wilkinson: My hon. Friend is not making a distinction between the War Office grant, the War Office pension, and our War Service Grants Advisory Committee. I am not talking about the pension grants which are only given when the person is alive. These are in addition to the Service allowance. When he is dead or discharged or pensionable, the man is no longer under the War Service Grants Committee, and none of those things apply.
        Mr. Griffiths: This is the case of a widow whose son is fighting at the present time and allowing his mother 14s. The Ministry say that because he is allowing her 14s. they will not allow anything.
        404
        They are not taking half compensation; they are taking full compensation.
        Miss Wilkinson: May I get this perfectly clear? I think we are talking about two separate matters. I think the hon. Member is referring to a War Office case, but I will certainly look into the matter. Half of any weekly payment in respect of workmen's compensation is the rule—
        Mr. Griffiths: It is the rule of the War Office too.
        Miss Wilkinson: I am not concerned with the War Office; I am concerned only with my own job. With regard to the question of rents and rates, increases in the commitments in regard to rents and rates are not ordinarily taken into account. Where we have had cases of house purchasing, there has been a complaint that we do not make any allowance for repayment of capital. The Minister and I have been in consultation with representatives of the building societies on this matter, and they were as anxious as the hon. Member for Rotherham, but from an entirely different point of view, that we should repay their capital as well as their interest. After all, we have to consider the question of the State and the State's commitments in the circumstances. Building societies are not dealing, as in the case of hire-purchase firms, with a wasting asset, because house building has practically stopped. If these houses have to be foreclosed upon, the assets will be worth more because of the war situation. Therefore, we decided that we would pay only on the basis of the interest which kept the man's interest in the house alive, and that we would not repay capital to the society. We have admitted repairs to the extent of one quarter of the gross annual value or one third of the rates. We have met insurance policies taken out before the war, and we have met liabilities in respect of hire purchase, except that we have to make provisions with regard to certain hire-purchase claims which are regarded as extravagant.
        Mr. Glenvil Hall: Would the Committee also consider making some sort of allowance for mothers whose children have taken scholarships and who have to pay a certain amount?
        Miss Wilkinson: All those matters are taken into account by the Committee, and

        405
        that is the value of a discretionary power. I was not dealing with special cases. I can mentioned 100 matters that are, in fact, taken into consideration by the Committee, but what I am concerned with here are those matters which might be regarded as average things that practically everybody has to take into consideration. In regard to those commitments, it is after death that we have to deal with the final amount, and, as I have said, we take what is left and divide it among the number of units in the family. It is after that that we compute the difference between in-Service and pre-Service disabilities. I have gone through a large number of these cases; I do not say that I am satisfied with the awards in every case, but I do say, since the Minister has been criticised, that I feel that at times the Advisory Committee might have taken a more generous view, within their terms of reference. I do not consider that the Committee have given grants to the extent to which they might have given, and on occasions I have sent back cases—as it is within my power to do, because the Minister of Pensions has handed me this section—for review, because I did not think that sufficient had been given to meet the necessities of the cases. But the Committee have given a great deal of time to this job, and it is from the Committee themselves that there has come this pressure on the Minister—and, therefore, at second remove, on the Treasury—to allow them to take a more generous view, particularly in the low-category cases.
        Mrs. Adamson: I hope hon. Members will understand that the Advisory Committee do not meet as a whole to deal with these cases, but that we work in panels. In my judgment, some panels are not as generous in their treatment, and do not put the same interpretation on the necessity for an award, as others do.
        Miss Wilkinson: My hon. Friend is right in saying that the Committee meet in panels. That was intended when a committee of 20 was appointed. The Committee is divided into three panels, and those panels make separate judgments. But the chairmen of the panels are themselves alive to the fact that it is necessary to get a working body of rules, on which all are agreed, before one can hope to get a generous standard of awards. That is what we are trying to get, and no one
        406
        is more anxious for that than the three gentlemen who are chairmen of the panels. In fact, they are pressing for it, and the Minister and I have had that matter under consideration. But we have had only seven months, and that is not a long period in which to build up this working body of rules. The problem is a vast one; yet we have gone a certain way along the road towards getting this working body of rules. I hope that we shall get some more settled in the near future. We are now in discussion with the Treasury on certain lines, which if we finally come to agreement will mean that a large block of cases will be settled automatically. That will sweep away delay, and will leave the Committee to deal with a small percentage of complicated cases where human feeling and specialised judgment are really needed. This is a thing which has grown under our hands. It is an intensely human thing, dealing all the time with human problems. Hon. Members will help us enormously if, instead of accepting without question these stories of delay, they will send cases to us, because every case that is dealt with by us helps to make a precedent. I am sure from the interest that has been displayed in Committee we shall have that hearty cooperation in the near future.
        Mr. Dobbie: Will my hon. Friend be good enough to reply to the question whether or not the Department has considered the question of greater accessibility for applicants to get hold of Form 21, as there is still tremendous difficulty in the matter?
        Miss Wilkinson: I am sorry that I missed that point. We have given a good deal of consideration to that matter. We have been in communication with the War Office, and they have sent out a circular to the paymasters. The difficulty is, I am afraid, that the paymasters sometimes feel that we are rather like the famous Bairnsfather cartoon, in that we send in the middle of a bombardment to ask how many pounds of raspberry jam have been issued. They get a little impatient, but we have adopted the system under which every man is given the pink form when he goes up for medical examination. That must be given to him, and if there is any doubt whatever as to how to fill in that form, he can go to his welfare officer. This has been in operation only for a very

        407
        short time, but we have already seen an improvement in the character of the forms which are sent in, and the speed with which they are coming in under that system. I am glad that my hon. Friend asked that question.
        9.42 p.m.
        Dr. Summerskill: I wish to occupy the Committee only for a few minutes at this late hour, but I am very pleased to see both the Minister and the hon. Lady on the Front Bench—the Minister, because I hope that he will give further consideration to the point that I am about to raise, and the hon. Lady, because I know that she will understand fully this point, and will perhaps use her new influence at the Ministry of Pensions. The matter is one which has already been raised by deputation, and I hope that the Minister will bend his mind once more to the whole problem and not perhaps to-night treat it so lightly as he treated it when I first spoke about it many months ago. I refer to the question of compensation for the housewife. The Minister, if he casts his mind back, will remember that, when I pointed out to him that there was no rational reason why the only worker in the home, the housewife, should be excluded from compensation in the event of an air-raid, he treated it rather lightly and made a joke about it. Many male Members rose and supported my contention, and then the Minister said that he would reconsider the matter. Since then I have heard that a deputation of representatives of many influential women's organisations have visited the Ministry of Pensions. In spite of that, no action has been taken.
        Who is it who advises the Ministry? I take it that in regard to all the points that the hon. Lady has just mentioned there are experts, and that there are doctors and others who deal with other questions, but who advises the Minister on what might be regarded as the new or twentieth-century conception of the status of the housewife. I suggest that in the Ministry there is nobody who has ever really given proper thought to the whole question. This is extremely important. The housewife to-day is doing a job of work which should not be regarded as having no economic value at all. She should be regarded as being engaged in gainful occupation. I would remind the Minister that throughout the country the
        408
        whole problem of evacuation depends upon the work of the housewife. She is in fact subsidising the Ministry of Health because she is giving her work without pay. I have put this point on a previous occasion. I said that if this woman had to go outside her home to get a job, she would be asked to do housework or cooking, and she would be paid as a housekeeper. I then said that if she was a paid housekeeper and was injured during an air raid, she would be compensated, but because she is a housekeeper in the home she is not. She has no compensation. I want the Minister to say why he has not given that favourable consideration. Is there anybody in the Ministry of Pensions who thinks in terms of his wife having a real economic value in the home, because that, after all, is a proper approach?
        The other point about which I wish to remind him is that the other provision, in my opinion, added insult to injury. When we discussed this many months ago the war was static; we looked down the months and said, "I suppose we shall have air raids." There may be an air raid to-night, perhaps in a few hours. We shall hear that there have been so many killed and so many injured. Among the injured there will almost certainly be a number of housewives. What is their position? The amazing thing is that the Minister has supported this injustice. I cannot find words strong enough. To-night, if a housewife is totally incapacitated, the only form of compensation is this: her husband is allowed to choose any woman he likes to go into the house and do the work, and he is given the money with which to pay her. The Minister laughs. I cannot understand this fifteenth century attitude. His advisers must be of the fifteenth century. A housewife to-day has an entirely new conception of her status in society. Why cannot the Minister make this small concession and allow a housewife to be able to pay a woman who goes into her home to do the work? It is not inconceivable that a housewife may lose both her legs. I have seen many women in that condition. They sit in the corner, and other women do their jobs. It would not cost the Minister of Pensions one penny if they allowed these women the dignity of being given the money with which to pay the women who help them. This is not some fantastic notion of mine. The Minister

        409
        has had representatives of influential women's organisations asking and imploring him to grant this small concession. Yet he has dismissed the whole thing very lightly. I do ask him once more to try if possible to think in modern terms and realise that the modem housewife is not content simply to cook, scrub and slave and feel she has no economic power at all. If he will grant this little concession and put this money into her hands, I feel certain that many women throughout the country will be very grateful.
        9.49 p.m.
        Sir Francis Fremantle: I do not want to say much, but I feel that something must be said further in order to remind the Committee of the very great debt that is payable to the medical service of the Ministry of Pensions. We have heard little reference to their particular virtues to-day, but I was very glad of the particular reference paid to it by the hon. Member for Dartford (Mrs. Adamson), who has rich experience of the work of the Ministry from her position on the London County Council. It is most difficult work. It is specialist's work which has been developed entirely by the Ministry of Pensions. The apportionment of attributable disability is one of the most difficult things to decide. Until it was taken up by the Ministry of Pensions it was almost impossible to get any clear line upon which to undertake a decision.
        I remember a case in the last war of a young clerk who went from a provincial town and rose to commissioned rank. As a result of four years' service he came home with very bad bronchitis, which was found to be tubercular. He had severe hemorrhage. He lost his job, but as a result of very careful treatment in one of the hospitals of the Ministry he was able to live a happy life, and was restored to much better health than he had enjoyed before. He was unable to get any remunerative job and at the moment is digging his garden with a boy to help him. He was given a pension some years after the war. I heard his former history, which, as a matter of fact, showed that he had symptoms of this disease before the last war. They were concealed and not discovered on recruitment, but he had been awarded a full pension. It is most difficult to decide many of these cases. As Members of Parliament we know that our constituents have a genuine feeling and are convinced that their illness is due
        410
        to the war when as a matter of fact a careful examination will find that the weakness was there before the war, although it was increased by the war. It is a difficult job to decide to what extent you can blame the war for the illness. No one has had any experience of these cases equal to that of the medical men in the Ministry of Pensions. They may make mistakes, but I think they make few mistakes.
        When I have looked into the details of these cases I have nearly always been convinced that the Ministry of Pensions have been right in their decision when it has differed from that of the private doctor. I am glad that the Minister has recognised the necessity for further confirmation, although it may be only in 1 per cent. of the cases that the opinion of these medical officers has been wrong. But even if it is only in 1 per cent. of the cases, it is a splendid arrangement to have an appeal tribunal, which has the advantage, as the Minister has said, of being the best kind of committee—namely, a committee of one, a man nominated by the President of the Royal College of Physicians or the Royal College of Surgeons. I should like to ask the Minister whether he can give us any idea of the number of appeals that have been heard in this way and what has been the result. It would be very useful to watch the results of this Appeal Tribunal, and to see whether the conception which I have of the good work of the Minister's staff is confirmed by these tribunals. There are 23 medical officers at headquarters and 32 regional officers. They have a tremendous amount of work to do, and we owe them a debt of gratitude. They are the only body of experts of that proficiency in the world. I do not know whether they have anything comparable in Germany, with their wonderful systematisation, but I should think that probably this body of experts would be able to beat them, as our country will be able to beat them in other spheres as well.
        I want to raise the question of what is done on the prevention side for the purpose of preventing the need for pensions. Hon. Members know cases which, owing to, let us say, dilatory treatment or even wrong or defective treatment, become cases for pensions, or need pensions at a higher rate than might otherwise have been necessary. I should like to know what liaison has been established between the Ministry of Pensions on the one side,

        411
        and, on the other side, the Ministries for whom the Ministry of Pensions has to provide the pensions—the three Fighting Services and the civil medical services of the Ministry of Health. It is on the last of these that may be laid the greater burden of casualties if we are to have a large number of severe air raids in this country. The Ministry of Health, in their emergency medical service hospitals, will treat these cases which will eventually come to the Ministry of Pensions for payment. Reference has been made in previous Debates to the tremendous burden that is unnecessarily placed on the Treasury, through the Ministry of Pensions, by pensions cases that might have been cured or at least made partly able to work if there had been better treatment. Some of us have recently been in a deputation to the Ministry of Health on the subject of the need of physio-therapy, a subject in which the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Glenvil Hall) has taken an active interest. That is one of the specialist services which one wants to see properly used. There has been considerable agitation by those who are keen on this modern line of treatment on the grounds that sufficient use is not being made of it in the civil medical services and civil medical hospitals. On the other hand, the British Hospitals Association have put forward a scheme for the general adoption of fracture clinics in civil hospitals—
        The Deputy-Chairman (Colonel Clifton Brown): I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member, but I do not see what relevance this has to the Vote before the Committee.
        Sir F. Fremantle: I want to avoid part of the burden that falls upon the Ministry of Pensions, and for that reason, I am asking what liaison the Minister has established with these other Services in order to find out in what way this Vote can be reduced in another year. I think that is germane to the Debate. All these specialist treatments have their advocates, and I know that these methods of treatment are being used by the Ministry of Pensions in their own hospitals when they receive the cases; but the right thing to do is so to treat the cases from the beginning, and therefore, it is necessary to have the liaison to which I have referred. In the hospitals of the Ministry of Pensions a great deal is rightly being done
        412
        in the matter of massage, electricity, and so on. The hon. Member for Dartford put forward the claims not only of physio-therapy, but of osteopathy. These are specialities which ought to be included in the unified form of treatment under the general direction of the physician or surgeon. I do not know whether that is the case in the Ministry's hospitals. These specialists have separate, independent departments which is a very dangerous thing. I hope that in these hospitals it will be seen that these specialists have their proper place and their proper equipments, but only under the direction of the man who takes the larger view. More especially is that so in the case of those requiring physiotherapy. These are a considerable proportion of the cases which come under the Ministry of Pensions. A great deal can be done by proper treatment, and a great deal of harm by improper treatment, and therefore again I stress that we must work in with the other forces. It is the Minister's job to see that proper treatment is given at an early stage.
        On various subjects in this House, the claim is made for liaison between Departments concerned. The natural tendency is for a Department to be independent and watertight, but we want them to work in together as much as they possibly can. Let us remember the experience of the last war. Roehampton and other hospitals did splendid work and were independent of the whole hospital system of the country, but can we not get over the very great difficulty of adjusting them to the general hospital services of the country while the expansion is going on? It seems to be a great pity to start to enlarge a system of hospitals, particularly for those cases which come under the Ministry of Pensions, and only have that part for the cases which come under them. I hope that the liaison with the Minister of Health in this matter may be useful and fruitful. I would end by paying a tribute both from the medical profession generally, and from this Committee, to the medical services of the Ministry of Pensions and to the Minister himself.
        10.4. p.m.
        Mr. Tomlinson: I do not apologise at this late hour for keeping the Committee for some time, because I believe this is one of the subjects in which all our people are interested. They are

        413
        particularly interested to see that justice is done, and from the paean of praise during the Debate from all quarters one would imagine that everything in the garden of the Ministry of Pensions was lovely. I wish to say that it is not. My view, after hearing the hon. Member for St. Albans (Sir F. Fremantle) patting the medical profession on the back, is that they are not entitled to all the kudos given to them. I was amazed to hear the Minister say in justification of his Department that they have granted 649 cases since the last war. He put that forward as a testimony to the fact that the Ministry have been doing their work, but he did not say how many applications they had received. I happen to know something about one of those 649 cases, and I am wondering how many applications there have been. That is a case in which I have been interested for 17 years. During that time these wonderful doctors at the Ministry have been taking shrapnel out of this man at different stages. Whether they thought he had eaten it, I do not know, but it was never attributable to his war service until this year. These wonderful doctors and specialists, of whom we have heard so many eulogies to-day, have been responsible for this young man being denied anything in the nature of justice for 17 years. I am glad that justice has overtaken him before he is dead.
        I wonder how many men have died since the last war when seeking to obtain a pension for war injury and have never obtained it because the doctors were never able to decide what they were suffering from until after they were dead. The Ministry of Pensions do not have postmortem examinations to see whether they have been wrong in their decisions. It was because of that that I was sorry to hear the Minister say that they had taken on a new batch of doctors and that when they had had training in the Ministry's work they would be splendid. The note I made of that statement was, "If only they could be left human." I am sure that the medical profession, if they were left to their own devices and could act as human beings, would be vastly different. I wonder how long it takes to get them into the frame of mind in which they can draw up the circulars which the Minister is so fond of sending, in which he expresses his sorrow that nothing can be done. One of these circulars says:
        414
        "The case has been carefully reviewed from this standpoint in consultation with the Ministry's medical advisers, and in the light of the available evidence, including reports of recent clinical and radiological examinations, but the condition as now found cannot be ascribed to the persisting effect of this man's war service, which terminated over 23 years ago."
        There are cases of men who have never been able to work in all the 23 years. The Ministry admit responsibility to the extent of allowing the 20 per cent. decided upon in 1923, but they have never been able to work as a consequence of their war injuries. Then hon. Members speak about the medical profession doing their job of work. I am sorry that the Parliamentary Secretary intervened in the Debate and then had to leave, because I wanted to say something about her department. It seems to me that she attempted to do the impossible. She sought to justify something which was unjustifiable. She pointed out that the terms of reference under which these committees were working were far too narrowly drawn. A committee cannot do justice if its terms of reference do not enable it to do it, and in this case they do not. I could prove it from a dozen cases. I could not understand the Minister's reference to the King's Fund and the keeping in insurance of disabled ex-service men who were unfit for work. If these men are unfit for work, there is no necessity for them to be kept in insurance.
        Sir W. Womersley: I did not say anything of the kind; I referred to men who, were out of work.
        Mr. Tomlinson: The reference was to disabled men who were out of work.
        Sir W. Womersley: There are degrees of disablement.
        Mr. Tomlinson: I grant that, but if it was suggested that these individuals should be subject to the charity of the King's Fund in order to keep them in insurance, I want to point out that it is unnecessary. The position of the disabled ex-Service man is that if he is out of work and capable of working, he can get a stamp at the Employment Exchange which will retain him in insurance. If he is not disabled to the extent of being unable to work and wishes to retain National Health Insurance, then that frank which he receives on account of his disablement, even though he is able to work, will keep him in health insurance, and I do not

        415
        see the point of the King's Fund being used to keep those men in insurance. If it is suggested that they are turned into voluntary contributors who pay 50 stamps out of the 52, whether they are working or not, in order that they may get 10s. benefit when they are sick, then I can understand it; but I want the Minister to inquire whether they are getting full value for the money by putting stamps on in that way. It seems to me that charity is not enough. We had the story of the widow's mite. The widow who sacrificed the pension granted to her on the last occasion in order to help her country at this time should not only be an example to other individuals to do likewise but some encouragement to the Ministry to meet their obligations in this time of need.
        It was cases which have come to my notice which caused me to ask the Minister, when he was referring to the Mercantile Marine, whether when a ship went down it was assumed by the Ministry that it was always the result of enemy action. Ships sink by reason of accident as well as of enemy action. There was the case of a young man who was wireless operator on board a ship and who, in the black-out, walked off the deck and was never seen again. The captain came to the conclusion that he had taken a wrong turn and walked into the sea on a particularly stormy night. An effort was made to bring that lad's case under the scheme, and, in spite of the fact that the Ministry turned it down, and all the experts have said that the application could not be justified, I submit that had it not been for enemy action there would have been no black-out and the lad would never have walked into the sea. In my view, wherever there is a doubt the benefit of it ought to be given to the widowed mother. I have not had such a case yet, and have not heard of a case, in which there has been a doubt where the benefit of the doubt has been given to the applicant. These great medical professors who advise the Minister have never given the benefit of the doubt to the applicant in any case that I have heard of.
        There is the case of a man who was an old soldier and, when the call came, joined up. Patriotism, at any rate, was not lacking. He joined up in December
        416
        of last year and died in January of this year. He was in the Army about three weeks or a month at the outside. During that time, in the bitterest winter we have experienced for many years, that man slept in a stable for two or three nights. He died from bronchial pneumonia. His name appears in the British Army's first Roll of Honour, the only place where it does appear. When I begged for a pension for this man's widow, what did these medical men say? His own medical man who had been attending him on and off for 20 years, wrote me that he had had bronchial trouble and that he had visited him for it, but he made it perfectly clear that for long enough before this man enlisted he had not been under his care. This man went before the Army doctor, and he was passed into the Army. He lived under adverse conditions, to put it mildly. If he had a tendency to bronchial trouble, sleeping in a stable during that mid-winter would not help him to overcome them. When he died as a consequence of all that, I think his widow was entitled to a pension from the State. She has not received it. The Minister wrote:
        "I find that Private Reynolds joined a National Defence Company on the 11th December, 1939, and was posted for duty with the battalion, then forming at the Drill Hall, Warwick Street, Liverpool, where he was housed. He went home on leave at Christmas but died on Christmas day of myocardial failure and acute bronchitis. I sympathise with Mrs. Reynolds in her loss, and I have caused all the facts of the case to be exhaustively reviewed by my medical officers."
        Then comes the usual statement that regard was had to his physical condition before and on enlistment, and
        "to the very short period of war service, to the nature of the duties performed, to the conditions under which he was housed and to the report by his own doctor who treated him during the fatal illness. It is true that Reynolds was examined and found fit for Army duties in Grade II, but my medical advisers assure me that the nature of the war service performed by Private Reynolds was not such as to have aggravated his chest condition and materially hastened his death."
        That is not giving the benefit of the doubt to the applicant, but is penalising the widow for what I may call the patriotic folly of the dead husband.
        I have another case, and I have asked a Question about this. It is the case of another man who died, a Mr. Collins, and the circumstances are somewhat similar. Mr. Collins wrote to me pointing out that this man had also been in the last war.

        417
        The case struck me as being worse than the one I had taken up before. The man did four years in the Royal Army Service Corps in the last war. He joined up again for the duration of this war, on 4th December, 1939. On 14th January, 1940, he died. On 30th January the lady had a telegram to say that her husband was seriously ill and, later, the police came and told her she would have to go to Shorncliffe Military Hospital. They gave her two railway warrants, but she says:
        "when I arrived at the hospital, he had passed away, with bronchial pneumonia, which, I think, was caused by the severe weather under Army conditions. He passed seven doctors"—
        that was when he was taken into the Army—
        "and passed A.1. I applied for a pension, but received a letter to say they could not attribute his death to war service."
        Neither could I get a medical officer of the Government to agree that it was due to war service. In the streets of our towns and villages, cases of this kind coming home to the people create anything but the morale which is good for this country, and what we are saving in money we are losing in the spirit of our people. The poorest people in the street of this woman would gladly pay an additional tax in order that she might have a pension, because of her husband's death.
        I would like to say a word about the War Service Grants Committee, the determinations that have to be made by the Committee and the terms of reference. It seems strange that we should always attempt, and sometimes succeed, in penalising the most deserving people in these cases. We seem not only to have made a practice of it, but to have made a study of penalising the people who are most deserving. I have a case before me now. I have sent it to the Ministry, but there is no hope, because it is outside the terms of reference. This is the position, and the folly of the position. In 1938 a man was earning £3 and paying his mother £2 12s., keeping 8s. a week for himself. This man decided in 1938 to go into the Army as a career. He underwent an operation while in the Army and, through somebody's mistake, he remained longer than he should have done in hospital. He lay there for six or seven months, and at the end of that time he carried on
        418
        with his training. He is not yet fully recovered, but he is still in the Army. As a consequence of this treatment in hospital and the training expenses in connection with his work in the Army, he did not begin to make his mother an allotment until January of this year. He then allowed her 14s. a week. He applied for some allowance for the mother, who is a widow, and the answer to the application was that six months before the war broke out he was not paying 9s. a week to his mother, the position being that during the greater portion of that period he was on his back in hospital. Prior to that he had been paying her the best part of £3 a week. But he does not come within this particular category, and, therefore, the widowed mother receives nothing on top of the 14s. which the young fellow is paying to her. The consequence is that he is penalised, and we are penalising the best type of individual. Had the definition which was given by one hon. Member been accepted, there you would have a case which stands high and dry, where the person is entitled to an allowance, but under the terms of reference the War Service Grants Committee grants nothing.
        Here is another case from my own constituency, where the War Service Grants Committee is empowered to recommend grants but only in cases where the war service prevents him from meeting financial obligations which he had previously undertaken. What is the position in this case? The young fellow was an out-porter. He had been unemployed for 10 months, and some months before the war broke out, like many others who had been unemployed, he joined the Army, not to see the world but because he had been unemployed so long. Then the war broke out, and again the widowed mother was not entitled to receive an allowance because this lad has been too patriotic. Under the new regulation and the new interpretation, as an unemployed individual the possibility of what he would have been earning can be taken into consideration, but the fact that he had joined the Army before he needed to rules out the question of an allowance for his mother, and as a consequence the mother is dependent solely upon her widow's pension. It seems to me that in spite of all that has been said about the new order which is to be made to rule these conditions of pension, so

        419
        long as cases of that kind come to the notice of our people, so long as they are known and talked about by the mothers, and so long as boys are allowed to go and die, and the parents of those boys receive no recompense, so long will there be discontent among the people of this country.
        I have another case, of a fine lad of 22, one of the most promising lads in my constituency. He came to London, and joined the Royal Air Force; and was glad of the opportunity. Six months later the poor lad was dead. He had been making his allotment of 14s. a week. The father happens to be working; therefore, there was no allowance; and there is no pension, because there was no allowance. It is true that the mother has received a letter now, as a result of two letters which I wrote to the Minister. The Minister's letter indicates that in the event of the parents falling on evil days they will be entitled, because the lad gave his life, to apply for a pension at some later date. But the Minister cannot guarantee that there will be a pension; he can only say that if he is still Minister something will be done. That is not good enough. The State took that lad for its service: in the service of the State, that lad lost his life; and the parents are entitled to some recompense: not a promise for the future, but something here and now.
        10.27 p.m.
        Mr. Dunn: I do not want to keep the Committee any minutes, nor do I want to proceed along the lines followed by the hon. Member for Farnworth (Mr. Tomlinson), because every one of us could bring a number of such cases if he wished. The Minister will remember that a deputation from my constituency came to see him on 21st December, 1939, and that we thoroughly discussed with him the terms and conditions upon which the War Grants Advisory Committee were about to work. I was very surprised to hear the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary deal with identically the same points as we dealt with as long ago as 21st December. It is now 25th June, and it is too bad to try to work that across this Committee after all these months. After the seven months that have elapsed, we are here to-night with, not one but numerous cases of delay. I have written to the Department about cases, and some of them have
        420
        been thoroughly examined by the Advisory Committee; yet, although the cases were sent in last December, we have had no determinations yet. The Minister, if I may say so, made a good opening statement, and a very long one, in which he took great pains to go laboriously into the activities of every department of his Ministry. But I do not know whether I interpreted him correctly when I understood him to say that the amount actually paid out under the Advisory Committee was £438,900.
        Sir W. Womersley indicated assent.
        Mr. Dunn: That was what I thought. He also said that the number of cases was approximately 150,000. I would like to ask, What period did the 150,000 cases actually cover? Did it cover the period from 1st December up to date, or the period from the commencement of the war up to date? That is rather important. I gathered from my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr. Dobbie) that out of approximately 150,000 cases dealt with by the Department 60,000 had been rejected. That was the impression I received. The point I want to put to the Minister is that we discussed this matter with the Minister on 21st December. We discussed the question of rents, ground rents, insurance, hire-purchase, educational grants, clothing allowances, dentures and a host of other things that the particular Committee were entitled to take into consideration in fixing additional allowances under the heading of "Hardships." If a true picture has been given by the Parliamentary Secretary to-night, it is amazing, if one takes out administrative expenses, that the average grant made is less than 3s. per case per week.
        Sir W. Womersley: The hon. Member is quite wrong.
        Mr. Dunn: It is a matter of simple arithmetic, and anyone can work out the figures for himself. I understand the figure to be £438,900, that there were 150,000 cases dealt with, and that 60,000 of these were rejected. It is not enough, and it is not calculated to maintain the morale of the people of this country.
        The Minister spoke a good deal about the British Legion, and some of us have communications with the British Legion. I was talking to the President of the British Legion in my Division only yester-

        421
        day. He is a leading Conservative in that Division, and he told me that the British Legion are seething with discontent at the way they have been treated in our particular area. The Minister may remember that at the last Scarborough Conference he was the man who kicked up a row about his predecessor, and nearly broke up the conference because of the treatment that was being meted out to ex-Service men. I beg the Minister not to forget that the soldiers are now in this country; they are not on foreign soil. They will be going to their homes, and if the hon. Lady's picture is a correct one—and this is identical with what he said on 21st December, 1939—we are breaking faith with the homes of the people. There is discontent throughout my Division in consequence of the number of appeals and the treatment of cases.
        We have taken the trouble to fix up an organisation which examines every individual case, and the Minister will know that when I sent cases to him, every one of them was worked out on a unit basis and on exactly the same basis as that put forward by the hon. Lady the Parliamentary Secretary to-night. I stand here to say that out of the numerous cases we have sent, not 10 per cent. in which awards have been made have fallen within the formula. I beg the Minister, because of the numerous cases outstanding, to speed up the making of these awards—and it is a matter which concerns women as well as men now—in order that the morale of our people may be maintained.
        10.36 p.m.
        Sir W. Womersley: It is not usual for a Minister to make two speeches in one Debate when his Parliamentary Secretary is available, but it seems to be the general wish that I should deal with one or two points raised on purely pension matters. Many hon. Members have said that they do not feel competent to debate the terms of the amended Warrant until they have a copy of it in their possession. It was made clear that there is to be a further discussion when the Warrant is in the hands of hon. Members and they have had time to consider its terms and conditions and to formulate their own opinions. That being the case, and the hour being late, hon. Members will not expect me to reply to all the points raised on the amended Warrant.
        422
        I merely gave a sketch of the various amendments introduced by me which I thought were for the benefit of those claiming pensions. I am prepared to have a full discussion on the amended Warrant at a later date. I believe it is better now to leave all the questions which have arisen until the Warrant comes out—
        Mr. Tinker: When will it be out?
        Sir W. Womersley: I hope to have it out by Friday or at the latest next Monday. It is not a question of any delay by my Department. The Stationery Office is overwhelmed with work and the proof of this important document must be carefully scrutinised—
        Mr. Tinker: I am not criticising. I only wanted information.
        Sir W. Womersley: We cannot afford to have printers' errors in a document like this. The hon. Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Dunn) spoke of the deputation which was introduced to me this evening. They were members of local authorities and others, all imbued with the idea of trying to be of some assistance to the serving men in their own areas. I welcome such deputations because we thereby get at the cases which require attention. The hon. Member must admit that a good deal of attention has been paid to his cases. There has been no neglect, as far as I know. He wanted to know about the amount and awards. The figures I have are only up to mid-June.
        Mr. Dunn: When did they commence?
        Sir W. Womersley: From the beginning of the war. Up to mid-June, in round figures 75,000 awards have been made and 54,000 have been rejected, and I can assure the hon. Member and other Members that these rejections were made because no case was made out. When all is said and done, you are bound to have some test as to where there is a case for allowances. The average grant is 7s. 8d. The only question that remains is that raised by the hon. Member for West Fulham (Dr. Summerskill), which concerns the case of the injured wife and the civil disabilities scheme. I have given the most careful consideration to that matter. I had a deputation from the women's organisations, who put their case very well indeed. I do not know whether the hon. Lady has seen the reply which I gave.
        Dr. Summerskill: I have, and it is not satisfactory.
        Sir W. Womersley: If not, I will send her a full copy, as it explains the reasons why we have had to make the recommendation whereby a wife, when injured in an air raid or by any form of enemy action, cannot be paid compensation, unless someone is employed to do her work. The simple common-sense way in which I look at the matter is this. I know working-class conditions, and I know that a woman, if she is sick or partially injured, will carry on with the work in the household rather than pay someone else to do the work. There is a sense of duty to her husband and children. We make that impossible by saying that if she is sick or disabled on account of enemy action, by air raid or anything else, someone must be provided to do the work so that she can have proper treatment and rest. Therefore, we will provide the money to pay for that help. When it comes to a question of whether or not a woman is an employé of her husband, we are getting into a field into which I would rather not enter.
        Dr. Summerskill: Why not pay the money to her?
        Sir W. Womersley: That is a matter of administration. If the woman is in hospital it is no good paying the money to her. In all our disability pension schemes the money for the wife is paid to the husband, but if we find that he is not using the money for providing help for the woman so that she can have proper rest and attention, we will deal with him very promptly. As to the question whether it is dignified on the part of the woman to allow her husband to draw money on her behalf, that is rather an old question and I do not profess to be able to give an answer to it to-night. The provisions we have made in my opinion are all to the benefit of the housewife and that being so I feel I am justified in carrying on.
        Mr. J. Griffiths: I understand the interpretation being given to the scheme is that the only injuries for which compensation can be paid are definite physical injuries
        424
        and that other injuries, like nervous effects, are not covered. Has the Minister decided that other injuries are excluded from the scheme?
        Sir W. Womersley: It is stated in the Scheme that the injuries must be physical. As to neurasthenia and all the rest of it, there is a great deal of medical opinion which would be worth while discussing.
        When we were discussing this matter earlier in the year, I announced that I had set up a committee of experts, with Lord Horder as chairman. This committee, which was composed of medical experts who had dealt with these cases for many years, said that neurasthenia, if taken in the early stages, could be cured by treatment. Therefore, we provide treatment, but we do not provide pensions. The brochure which has been produced by this committee has been circulated among all the general practitioners throughout the country, and accepted pretty well generally by the medical profession. If the instructions there are carried out, I am satisfied we shall not have anything like the number of neurotic cases that we had to deal with after the Great War. As I announced earlier, the civil liability scheme is coming under review, and I will certainly bear in mind the suggestions that have been made by hon. Members during the Debate. Now I think we ought to go home.
        Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to.—[Mr. Munro.]
        Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.
        The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

  ADJOURNMENT.
  Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Munro.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Thirteen minutes before Eleven o'Clock.

BRITISH ARMY.
  MOTOR CARS (REQUISITIONING).
  MOTOR CARS (REQUISITIONING).
  LOCAL DEFENCE VOLUNTEERS (UNIFORM).
  LOCAL DEFENCE VOLUNTEERS (UNIFORM).
  VACCINATION AND INOCULATION.
  VACCINATION AND INOCULATION.
  TERRITORIAL QUARTERMASTERS (PROMOTION),
  TERRITORIAL QUARTERMASTERS (PROMOTION),
  MEDICAL OFFICERS (PHYSICAL FITNESS STANDARD).
  MEDICAL OFFICERS (PHYSICAL FITNESS STANDARD).
  CAMP CONSTRUCTION (COST).
  CAMP CONSTRUCTION (COST).
  DOMINION FORCES (OFFICERS, INTERCHANGE).
  DOMINION FORCES (OFFICERS, INTERCHANGE).
CIVIL DEFENCE.
  SHELTERS AND HELMETS (DISTRIBUTION).
  SHELTERS AND HELMETS (DISTRIBUTION).
  EVACUATION.
  EVACUATION.
  CONTROL SCHEMES (SCOTLAND).
  CONTROL SCHEMES (SCOTLAND).
  EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICE.
  EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICE.
  COURTS (EMERGENCY POWERS) ACT.
  COURTS (EMERGENCY POWERS) ACT.
  ROYAL NAVAL VOLUNTEER RESERVE (LEAVE).
  ROYAL NAVAL VOLUNTEER RESERVE (LEAVE).
  MILITARY SERVICE (TRADESMEN).
  MILITARY SERVICE (TRADESMEN).
  EMPIRE AIR-MAIL SERVICE.
  EMPIRE AIR-MAIL SERVICE.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE.
  NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE.
  ENEMY-OWNED PATENTS (ROYALTIES).
  ENEMY-OWNED PATENTS (ROYALTIES).
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS.
  CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
  CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.
  MINISTRY OF FOOD.
  MINISTRY OF FOOD.
Preamble
The House met at four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932.
Orders made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section 1 of the Act to:

The Urban District of Baldock;

The Borough of Taunton;

The Borough of Colchester;

The County Borough of Walsall;

The Borough of Wokingham;

The City of Leicester;

The City and County of Chester;

The City and County of Lichfield;

The City and County of Bristol;

The Urban District of East Barnet:

Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), for affirmative Resolution and ordered to lie on the Table.

WEY VALLEY WATER BILL.
Read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.
MID-WESSEX WATER BILL, [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

THE WAR: FRENCH ARMISTICE TERMS.
4.2 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Addison, may I ask His Majesty's Government if they have any statement to make on the war situation?
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DOMINION AFFAIRS (VISCOUNT CALDECOTE): My Lords, a week ago, in the statement I made to your Lordships, I gave a brief account of some of the events leading up to Marshal Pétain's request for armistice terms. To-day I am able to give a little further information which is necessary to complete the story. I told your Lordships of the statement

657
which was broadcast by the French Foreign Minister in which he said that the French Government would never accept shameful conditions or conditions which would mean the end of their spiritual freedom. Herr Hitler's terms had not then been revealed. Now they are known, and they have been accepted substantially as proposed by the German Government. Their severity can have caused your Lordships no surprise. Those who surrender to the forces of darkness and lay down their arms in a struggle have to face a hard lot. Your Lordships will observe that in the terms of the Armistice a distinction is drawn between the area openly occupied by Germany and what is euphemistically called "unoccupied territory." The fact is that in both districts Marshal Pétain and his colleagues are held tight in the grip of their enemies. Even if, in accordance with the French counter proposal, Paris is to be included in the unoccupied territory, the real governors of France will be found in Berlin and not in Paris.
The first consequence of this indubitable fact is that our formal relations with the Government of France are bound to be very difficult. It would be not merely distasteful, but actually mischievous and full of danger to our interests, to have British representatives in unoccupied France accredited to a Government actually under the thumb and daily observation of our enemies. It may even prove actually impossible, save with the consent of Germany, that any such relations should exist at all, and I am sure there would be general agreement in your Lordships' House that that would be wholly inadmissible and inacceptable to His Majesty's Government. With sorrow I am afraid it must be recognised that the French submission has made the severance of formal relations between France and Great Britain, for the time being, almost inevitable; but I am empowered to give the assurance that, if there are any contacts which can be maintained, His Majesty's Government will lose no opportunity.
We are now thrown back upon our own resources. I gave your Lordships—and my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, in another place, gave in much fuller outline than I could give—good reasons for thinking that we can stand the strain better than can our enemies. I may be allowed to say in
658
passing that if our material resources are likely to prove greater than those of our enemies, how infinitely greater is the spirit of our men in the field and of our people in proportion to the greatness of our cause. Meanwhile I am sure that there would be universal agreement that we are right in paying attention to the means by which we may both husband and augment our material resources and prevent the enemy from profiting by the terms of the Armistice forced upon France. Your Lordships will have shared the concern of the Government that the French Fleet should not fall into German hands. No one will be unaware of the powerful aid which the French Fleet could bring either to Germany or to Great Britain. Our defence will, indeed, depend in part on the ships which have, until quite lately, been operating in the Mediterranean with the Royal Navy. It would be more than a misfortune, more than a tragedy even—it would be cause for shame, if forces so lately used in the service of the Allies were to be transferred to the enemies of all that France and ourselves have stood for in the last nine months.
Here I come to facts which were not included in last week's statement. On June 13 the Prime Minister, at the request of M. Reynaud, went to Tours. He was accompanied by the Foreign Secretary, my noble friend Lord Halifax, and my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook. At that meeting M. Reynaud asked that France might be released from her solemn obligations not to negotiate or enter into an Armistice or Peace except with the consent of her Allies. The Prime Minister, in response to that request, rightly anxious to keep France fighting beside us, withheld the desired consent, and it was agreed between M. Reynaud and the Prime Minister that a last appeal should be made by M. Reynaud to the United States of America. It will be no surprise to know that the Prime Minister on that occasion offered no reproaches, for who could at such a moment reproach a suffering, bleeding France? The efforts of the two Prime Ministers were directed to securing the continuance of the struggle under the happiest and most hopeful auspices. The response to the appeal to the united States of America was not such as gave M. Reynaud any reason for thinking that it was possible for him and his country to continue to

659
fight, and he renewed his request for a formal release from the undertaking which I have mentioned. The reply which M. Reynaud received was that his request would be conceded by His Majesty's Government subject to this all-important condition—namely, that the French Fleet was sailed forthwith for British harbours. From that time forward, every possible step has been taken to secure these ships for the cause of the Allies. The French Government were again and again reminded of the pledged word not of a Minister or even of a Prime Minister, but of France. The First Lord and the First Sea Lord went to Bordeaux and received from Marshal Pétain and his Ministers assurances that the French Fleet would in no circumstances fall into the hands of Germany. In these circumstances I may again recall the declaration of a French Minister that he and his colleagues would never accept shameful terms. His Majesty's Government, not unnaturally, found comfort and confidence in such assurances.
Now the Armistice terms have been published. Your Lordships will have noted Article 8, which has been accepted subject to some modification which the French Government made by way of a counter proposal—a counter proposal which has not been agreed to. Article 8 proposes that the French Fleet, excepting that part left free for the safeguard of French interests in the Colonial Empire—and nobody, of course, in ignorance of the terms of the Italian Armistice, knows how great or small that Colonial Empire may be—shall be collected in ports to be specified, demobilised and disarmed under German or Italian control. The German Government, it is true, went on to declare that it has no intention of using for its own purposes, during the war, the French Fleet stationed in ports under German control. That, however, is subject to this exception—namely, the exception of those units necessary for coast surveillance and mine-sweeping. The concluding Article, Article 24, provides that the Armistice is valid until the conclusion of the Peace Treaty and can be denounced at any moment if the French Government do not fulfil the obligations of it. Moreover, new claims may be made by Germany when the Peace Treaty comes to be considered. There, my Lords, the matter rests at the
660
moment. Your Lordships will not expect any statement from me as to the future course which this question of the French ships may pursue, though you may be assured that His Majesty's Government and the Prime Minister will relax no efforts to secure that these ships shall continue to serve the cause in which they have been employed for so many months.
This is not the first time that I have had to give your Lordships a sombre narrative. The facts are melancholy enough without the addition of the bitterness of reproach for our recent Allies. That some day France will be again beside us in action, as I am persuaded their people are in spirit, may be taken for granted. Her hopes, as our own hopes, depend now under God on our own efforts, subject to one important addition which we hope may be made to the forces of light and of liberation. We may hope that the French Empire in many parts of the world will wish a continuation of the struggle and that it may be the seat of a Government that fights and labours as well as hopes for final victory. There is only one other observation I would add for your Lordships' information. The superior initiative and skill of our troops in the Middle East is establishing in that part of the world a definite supremacy over the forces of the ally of Germany. The feat of the trawler with a 4-inch gun in subduing an Italian submarine may be regarded as typical of the supremacy to which I have referred. On that note I am sure I may once more invite your Lordships to view the prospect with confidence and determination.
4.16 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF CREWE: My Lords, we are all, I am sure, grateful to the noble Viscount opposite for the statement he has made, though, as he himself has stated, there is not very much in it to lighten the heavy atmosphere that surrounds public affairs. So far as the French Army is concerned, we none of us, I am sure, would speak hardly or harshly of the surrender which that Army has been compelled to make. As we all know has often happened, a brave Army has been obliged to capitulate, but it is difficult to reconcile with what any of us know of the Constitution of France the actual manner in which not merely the Army or a section of the Army has been obliged to surrender, but in which

661
the whole nation of France, without the people knowing what has happened, has been compelled to capitulate. My memory goes back to the month of October, 1870, when the fortress of Metz was surrounded, and Marshal Bazaine with something like 200,000 unwounded troops, including three Marshals of France and a number of superior officers, surrendered without any attempt being made to break out and assist the effort; which were being made in other parts of France under the enterprise of Gambetta, to save the situation as far as it could be saved after what had occurred. Some two years later, at his own request, Marshal Bazaine was tried before a Military Court, and in the course of his personal defence he said: "What was I to do? The Emperor and his Army had fallen at Sedan. I was surrounded; there was nothing left." But the Ducd'Aumale, an old soldier of Algeria who as a Prince of the Royal House was naturally not permitted to fight for his country under the Imperial régime, simply replied, "France is left." I hope and believe we can say (he same still, in spite of the unexplainable conduct of those who, as the noble Viscount said, have arrogated to themselves to speak for France, a democratic country, with no assent from their Parliament. In spite of all that, we believe France does remain, and that the time will come when France will live again.
We all, I am sure, listened with deep interest to what the noble Viscount told us about the history of the French Fleet. It is a melancholy story that it should have been thought possible, after the pledges that had been made to this country, to carry out the miserably humiliating terms imposed by the Armistice with Germany. I cannot believe that the officers and men of the French Navy could be brought to agree to those terms. I do not attempt to discuss—of course the noble Viscount naturally did not touch on the matter—how the loss of the French Fleet may be avoided, but I cannot believe that these wretched conditions, not agreed but imposed on the French by the Armistice, will be carried out so far as the Fleet is concerned. Lastly it is good hearing that brave men in different parts of the French Empire are determined to stand out. So far as I know, there has been no exception in all the scattered French Colonies
662
to the brave expression of that determination. I am sure His Majesty's Government, as we have reason to believe is the case, will do everything they can to encourage and support that spirit of those Frenchmen who must be broken-hearted at thinking of what has happened to the soil of France which I am sure they are determined to help us to recover.
4.25 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, I hope you will think it right that a word should come from these Benches, lest there should be any misunderstanding. Otherwise I should be content simply to leave it to the noble and eloquent language of my noble friend the Marquess of Crewe. First of all I wish to mention a matter affecting your Lordships' House and I apologise for having to make, not this protest, but this suggestion myself. What I am going to say contains no kind of reflection on my noble friend Viscount Caldecote. His unfailing courtesy and, if he will allow me to say so, his address, are a credit to your Lordships' House. But we feel that a statement of this gravity—I have had this conveyed to me from several members of your Lordships' House—should have been made by the noble Viscount the Foreign Secretary, who is a member of the War Cabinet. I am aware that my noble friend Viscount Caldecote attends meetings of the War Cabinet in an ex-officio capacity, but that is not the same thing. We feel that the Foreign Secretary should have followed the example of the Prime Minister and should have made this statement to-day, especially as he was present at the fateful meeting at Tours. I repeat that in saying this I make no kind of reflection on my noble friend.
Now there is something much more important which I feel it right to say. We have had a series of very heavy blows in the last nine months—the unexpectedly rapid over-running of Poland, the unfortunate campaign in Norway, the defeat but the heroic evacuation of our splendid Expeditionary Force in the Low Countries, and now this last blow. In spite of all that, everywhere I meet—and I am sure my experience is common to all your Lordships—no kind of dismay from the British people, none whatever. On the contrary, there is the most remarkable manifestation of calm, determined courage. And, my Lords, this is not the

663
valour of ignorance. This is the valour of a people who face peril and are inspired by the greatness of their cause.
My final remark is this. I hope His Majesty's Government realise that this war is taking on a different complexion. What has happened in Norway and with King Leopold in Belgium, and now in France, shows that this war is taking on some of the characteristics of a civil war. It is a war now not so much between nations as between Nazism and Democracy. It is a war between the powers of reaction and tyranny on the one side against the forces of progress and justice on the other. If the Government do realise it, as I hope they do, I would suggest that that should now inspire our propaganda to our own people and to people everywhere. We are up against the Quislings, the traitors, the Fifth Columnists who are speaking for a small minority of selfish men who wish to put back the clock of progress against the great advancing masses of the people and all they stand for. This is the new character the war is taking on, and it is the great answer to those who have been trying to weaken the effort—without success in this country but with some success in France—those who say that this is an Imperialist war, a war for Colonies. It is nothing of the sort. It It is a war of the deepest emotions that can inspire mankind for good or evil.
4.28 p.m.
VISCOUNT CALDECOTE: My Lords, perhaps I may be permitted to say one word in reply to the suggestion that my noble friend Viscount Halifax should make the weekly statement on the progress of the war.
LORD STRABOLGI: Only on this occasion.
VISCOUNT CALDECOTE: I can assure your Lordships that no member of this House more heartily welcomes that suggestion than the present speaker. My noble friend will be made aware of support for the proposal of the noble Lord opposite from another quarter which I will leave it to your Lordships to imagine.

FINANCE BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
4.29 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT SIMON): My Lords, I ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading to the Finance Bill, which has now come from another place for your approval. Those of your Lordships who have had occasion to examine the text of the Bill will have remarked that it is of quite exceptional scope and dimensions. It is divided into five Parts, to be followed by eight substantial Schedules; it includes more than sixty clauses and covers more than a hundred pages of print. Indeed, the effect of the Bill is not incommensurate with its external appearance, for under this Bill there will be raised by way of taxation in a single year the largest figure ever drawn from the taxpayer in the history of this country. Even so, it has always been contemplated that we might have a further Budget before the financial year was out, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer in another place has announced that that is his intention.
This Bill, apart altogether from the proposed Purchase Tax, which would require separate legislation and is not included, is estimated to produce in this present year by way of taxation £1,234,000,000. That is an enormous sum. If I may be permitted the quotation of a single sentence of my own—because this is the first time, I think, that the occupant of the Woolsack has ever had to commend to your Lordships' House that which is partly his own production—I said, and I say again, that there is no limit to what we are prepared to spend for victory, and for that purpose we must raise the maximum possible sum by taxation. Of course the rest must be borrowed. What my noble friend Lord Strabolgi said just now about the manifest determination and undiminished courage in the outlook of the British people was well and truly said, and in nothing are those qualities more obvious than in their willingness to face these financial burdens. The British people, my Lords, are prepared to shoulder all financial sacrifices, on two conditions. The first is that the sacrifices should be fairly shared, and the second is that, side by side with the raising of these immense sums of money, the most strenuous efforts should be made to avoid and to restrict waste.
I do not think your Lordships would wish me to take you through this immense

665
document clause by clause and feature by feature, and perhaps I shall serve your Lordships' House best if, as briefly and as clearly as I can, I state the broad effect of the clauses in each Part of the Bill. Part I provides for greatly increased duties on beer, spirits, tobacco, matches and so forth. Your Lordships will be well aware that if it is desired to raise great sums of additional revenue by means of indirect taxation, you must put your tax on articles of widespread use and consumption. Fancy taxes appeal to many ingenious minds and I do not rule them out, but they will produce, comparatively speaking, very little money I think your Lordships will be glad to observe that in this first Part of the Bill, which imposes increased indirect taxation, there is no additional tax on any necessity of life. There is no tax which will raise in the smallest degree the calculation of the cost of living, and the total revenue which will be produced in a full year from the taxes imposed by Part I of this Bill amounts to no less than £472,000,000.
Part II deals with the direct taxes: Income Tax, Surtax and the like. It brings into force the full rate of Income Tax of 7s. 6d. in the pound as a standard rate, which was planned in the Emergency Budget. I may perhaps remind your Lordships that the Emergency Budget, which had to be very quickly produced in the month of September last, was deliberately so framed as not to be limited to the remaining months of the financial year. It appeared much better—and it was generally agreed that it would be much better—to announce then and there in advance what would be the greater height of the standard of Income Tax, and 7s. 6d. was then declared to be that figure. Let no one suppose—and I do not imagine there are many in your Lordships' House who do suppose—that that figure represents any light impost. When you add to it the present and increased scales of Surtax, the effect is that the standard rate of Income Tax together with the Surtax raises contributions on the higher slice of the largest income to the figure of 17s. in the pound. There is another provision in Part II: Surtax next year will begin at £1,500 a year instead of at the present figure of £2,000. As your Lordships know, Surtax, as it were, always operates a year late, and it is necessary to make that
666
enactment now in order that when the finance of the next year is framed it will be possible to impose Surtax as upon the lower figure. Part II of this stupendous Bill provides, then, for direct taxation which in a full year will produce £760,000,000.
Now I come to Part III, which deals principally with the Excess Profits Tax. This is a very complicated subject, and those of your Lordships' House who are specially interested in it have no doubt already examined the clauses with attention. I call attention to only two matters about the Excess Profits Tax. First of all, it has been decided that that tax shall be charged on the excess, not at the rate of 60 per cent., but at the rate of 100 per cent. of the excess duly ascertained. That change has been made since the Budget was introduced, and, as your Lordships will appreciate, is closely connected with the new powers which Parliament has granted over both persons and property, which make it for many purposes reasonable and right to make that change. There is, however, a second feature of Part III dealing with Excess Profits Tax to which I must draw attention in a word or two. If you are going to have an Excess Profits Tax, and especially if it is going to be at so high a figure of charge as 100 per cent., it is above all important that the standard from which you measure should be carefully and justly arrived at. In the hasty proposals at the end of last year it was recognised, and indeed admitted, that the standard had not been sufficiently worked out. If, for example, your Lordships look at Clause 27 you will now see the provisions—manifestly just, which I am sure will commend themselves to every sensible man—by which, when the figure of past profits of a company or undertaking would not set out a reasonable standard, another figure, carefully arrived at, may be substituted for it as the standard from which to measure.
Part IV deals with the extremely complicated subject of Estate Duty. It is very complicated at all times, and is, I am afraid, getting more complicated every year. To a large extent the provisions in Part IV are aimed at preventing the evasion of duty in various ways. I might perhaps remind your Lordships that when Mr. Snowden was Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1930 he introduced

667
into the Finance Bill of that year provisions for preventing evasion of Estate Duty through the medium of the creation of private companies. The resources of ingenious people in this matter seem to be almost endless, and I may say that I have spent a good deal of time and of hard work in endeavouring both to understand them and to counteract them. This year, however, it has seemed to us right to make a new and most strenuous effort for the purpose of tightening up those provisions, which did not in the end prove to be completely watertight, and the opportunity has been taken in Part IV of this Bill to deal with some other methods of evasion which have come to light. I am sure that your Lordships will agree that the present time is the very last time when evasion—artificial evasion or deliberate evasion—of what the taxation is meant to produce should be tolerated by any honest and patriotic citizen.
I will not delay the House by dealing with Part V, but I should like to make a single observation on the relation of taxation to borrowing in times like these. It is not always appreciated that, try as hard as you may, you cannot make by the method of increased taxation alone so rapid an increase of revenue as is needed when revenue is being spent at the perfectly unprecedented rate at which it has to be spent in time of war. Undoubte lly the best course is that we should pay as we go and pay by taxation, that we should raise by taxes on the people, justly spread, what is needed to be expended within the year. It is quite impossible, however, to rely simply upon that abstract proposition when expenditure rises rapidly to these unprecedented heights; because, in spite of the most tremendous efforts to increase the rate of tax and to find new taxes, the extent to which you will increase your resources within a twelvemonth by that means falls far short, and always must fall far short, of the sum total that you may have suddenly to spend.
I therefore commend these propositions to your Lordships' House. It is essential at such times to increase the tax yield by every means in our power, both by increasing rates of tax and by finding new sources of revenue; but that is in order that we may reduce the needs of borrowing to a smaller figure than would otherwise be possible, and I do claim that the
668
course of finance which is being followed by the Government, with, I think, the general approval of the country, is having the result of making borrowing distinctly easier. It must be a great satisfaction to your Lordships' House, as it is to everybody outside it, that we have reduced the governing rate for loans of medium length to 3 per cent. We are maintaining it at that figure, for the new loan which was announced in the papers yesterday—the 2½ per cent. National War Bonds—which is being issued and offered without any limit of time, is a short-dated security—five years or seven years—and to get loans for that short period at the rate of 2½per cent. is on exactly the same general interest level as was established by very strenuous efforts before the 3 per cent. long-term loan was issued.
Lastly, I think that we must take satisfaction in the most remarkable success of the small savings movement. We are deeply indebted to Sir Robert Kindersley and to my noble friend Lord Mottistone, who are the chief leaders in that effort throughout the country. It is an astonishing thing that by means of offering these Savings Certificates, in which it is possible to invest only £375, and by offering these Defence Bonds, which it is not possible to hold for more than £1,000, since the month of November last £235,000,000 has been raised by those means alone. When we recall that Mr. Gladstone never in his life saw a year in which we were spending, all told, £100,000,000; when we recall that the Budget of Mr. Lloyd George, which caused so much perturbation in your Lordships' House, was a Budget to raise rather less than £200,000,000; and when we recall that before the war of 1914 we had not overtopped that figure, is it not an amazing fact that from this single source alone, owing to the zeal and courage of small people all over the country and with the aid of splendid organisation, we have already got £235,000,000, and that the week before last, which was known as Savings Week, no less than £20,000,000 was subscribed?
I therefore recall the observation of the Leader of the House just now, when he said that this country was thrown back upon its own resources. I would not say that this country is thrown back upon its own resources, but this country and

669
the British Commonwealth overseas between us have to fight this matter out; and at this sombre time in this grim hour, with these heavy burdens to be shared and borne, I proclaim that the financial weapon, fearlessly used in this country, will prove one of the resources by means of which liberty may be defended and a reasonable life restored. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
4.49 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My noble friends have asked me to follow the usual practice of making a few remarks on the Budget. The Lord Chancellor is aware that although we cannot amend this monumental measure, we at least think it necessary to examine it. First of all, I should like to ask my noble and learned friend a question, and I apologise to him for not having given him previous notice of it. Perhaps he would prefer to make the answer at a subsequent stage. My noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor skirted over Part V, but it contains a small clause which affects merchant seamen and others engaged at sea in warlike operations. That is Clause 64 which extends to the estates of merchant seamen the exemption from Death Duties in certain circumstances granted to the estates of officers of the Army and Navy killed on active service. The particular point about which I wish to ask—and I do not ask for an answer from the Lord Chancellor now—is whether within the ambit of this clause will come those yachtsmen and other amateur seafarers who came forward—and many of them were killed—to evacuate the Army from Dunkirk. They were enrolled for one week; some were not enrolled at all. They came up in answer to the call, with their small pleasure cruisers and yachts and so forth, and they did splendid work. Do they come within the ambit of Clause 64? Ordinarily everyone of your Lordships would say, "Of course," but then the Lord Chancellor knows his Treasury, and unless it is made absolutely clear, some bureaucrat will raise a question, and these man, whom I am sure your Lordships would wish to see treated on all fours with other seafarers, will not have the benefit of this exemption.
The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack said that it was a unique
670
occasion for the same person to introduce a Budget in another place and also in your Lordships' House. That is not the only curious feature about this Budget introduced by my noble and learned friend. My noble and learned friend has introduced a Budget in your Lordships' House which on his own showing is already completely obsolete. In fact, the criticism made of this Budget in another place, and the criticism I would make here, is that it showed an utter failure by the late Government to appreciate the magnitude of our task in this war. That is the second curious feature of my noble and learned friend's speech to-day. But there is a third. My noble and learned friend is calling upon us to find this enormous sum in taxation—and the burden on the great estates of the country, which particularly affects members of your Lordships' House, will be crushing—to pay for a war which results (I am sorry to say what sounds a hard thing) from the honest and well-meaning mistakes of the same noble and learned Viscount, who was then Foreign Secretary, in 1932. In that year in which the savings bank lie of another of the noble and learned Viscount's colleagues, Lord Runciman, had destroyed Mr. Henderson, the Foreign Secretary, as a political force in the Labour Government, we saw the beginning of the destruction of the new system, the one great thing that came out of the last war—the new system of the League of Nations and collective security and a better means of settling disputes than by force of arms. The destruction of this great new system was begun by the Foreign Secretary of Great Britain, who now adorns the Woolsack in your Lordships' House.
LORD MANCROFT: I do not admit it.
LORD STRABOLGI: Of course, my noble friend does not admit it for a moment, but all over the world the failure to check the Japanese aggression in Manchuria is linked with the name of Simon.
LORD MANCROFT: Will the noble Lord allow me? On every possible occasion the Party with which the noble Lord is associated opposed the power of the Government in office to arm itself. They voted against Singapore, they talked about Imperialism, they put every spoke they could into the wheel of our effort to

671
provide the necessary force to give effect to our policy.
LORD STRABOLGI: I have a complete alibi, because I was not in Parliament. I had gone down in the general débâcle, I had lost my safe seat owing to the savings bank lie. I am sure that the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack shares my pleasure—and the pleasure I am sure of all your Lordships—of seeing his colleague, with whom he could not see eye to eye, Mr. Stimson, once more as a Republican in high office in the United States of America. What a remarkable turn of the wheel of history—unfortunate history. It will never be forgotten that the Japanese delegate to Geneva congratulated the present Lord Chancellor of Great Britain on being a better advocate for the Japanese case than he could have been himself.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Will the noble Lord allow me? He never did anything of the kind.
LORD STRABOLGI: I accept that at once. He could have said it—put it that way. I am glad to know that the Japanese representative at Geneva did not say that, but it has been current and has been accepted as true all over the world. This is the first time that it has been denied.
Now for the future. We are all aware that all our resources are now going to be required, and that not only is this Budget completely out of date but a new system altogether of financing the national effort will be called for. We shall be lucky if we end up with an iron ration all round, soldiers and sailors and civilians alike, but with our country victorious as a champion of justice and freedom. My noble and learned friend on the Woolsack made some remark about financing the war effort by loan. May I make this observation? Since this Budget was drawn up by the Treasury and my noble and learned friend, it has been announced that the banks of this country are now controlled—and the Bank of England of course has been controlled in effect for a long time. Are we to continue to pay interest on the money, which we create ourselves, or rather allow the banks to create, on the national credit? In other words, are we to create a new national debt? I am not talking about the savings of the small people, which, I agree, have been
672
magnificent. That is something quite different. But are we to continue to create a new national debt, on which we shall have to pay interest in the future, out of the use of our own credit, using the banks which are our servants as the channel, and paying interest to them for the privilege of doing it?
Some noble Lord may speak of the dangers of inflation. There is no real substance in this danger of inflation. My noble and learned friend knows better than anyone that the Treasury have a scientific method of preventing inflation. You do not need to inflate at all. What, after all, is the wealth of the country? It is the natural resources of our country, and, as the Lord Chancellor said just now, there is a great Empire behind us, exploited and developed by the labour, power and skill of our people. That is the real wealth of the country, and the only way we can carry on the war effort is by exploiting those great natural resources and that immense labour reserve and skill of our people. And actually victory at the end of this war, as at the end of the last war, will see us richer in the things that matter. We shall have a better cultivated land, we shall have a greater power of production, finer factories and machines, more skilled workers and, I hope, a more frugal and industrious spirit and less of the spirit of pleasure for pleasure's sake. We can come out of this war not only victorious, but also wealthier in the things that matter to a nation than when we began. I must explain to my noble friend on the Woolsack that when we speak from these Benches on the Budget year after year—my noble friend Lord Snell in his turn has done this—we always take the opportunity of expounding a little of the pure milk of Socialism, because that is what we are here for.
May I ask one further question? It is a war question, and it is a very serious one indeed. May I ask the Lord Chancellor particularly this? If he cares to reply now or later, it does not matter. Is the Treasury system of checks and counter-checks on expenditure now loosened? We all agree with what the noble and learned Viscount said about the necessity of preventing waste. None of us wants to see avoidable waste, but the habit for a generation of Treasury civil servants in always finding reasons, from

673
the Treasury point of view, for not spending money at all in any direction if it could possibly be avoided, which was their duty in peace-time, can be very hampering to our war effort to-day. It leads to delay if nothing else. We are told that this Treasury control has been much loosened. I hope that is really so. In other words, can the problem be solved of preventing avoidable waste and extravagance without at the same time checking, hindering, and slowing up our war effort? It is a very difficult problem, and I am not putting this question at all, as in some of my earlier remarks, in any critical sense. I am putting this in a sympathetic way. Is this problem being solved? Because I suggest that on our success in solving it a very great deal of the war effort we are now making, and will have to make in ever-increasing volume, will depend.
5.2 p.m.
LORD GAINFORD: My Lords, we are fortunate in having on the Woolsack not only an eminent Lord Chancellor, but also one who is so conversant with finance as our late Chancellor of the Exchequer. We have listened to a speech on the Budget which is of very great interest, but it has been short. The reason it has been short no doubt is that your Lordships in 1910 thought it prudent to throw out the Budget of chat year and thereby lost the power by which this House could criticise freely and amend the Budget and Finance Bill of the country. We are in a position, however, of being able to ask questions, and there is one question I have risen to ask.
As I followed the Lord Chancellor's figures, he said this Finance Bill was raising £472,000,000 by indirect taxation in a full year and £760,000,000 by direct taxation—the two sums amounting to £1,232,000,000. But he informed us at the commencement of his speech that the total amount to be raised by this Finance Bill was £1,234,000,000. There is therefore only a difference of £2,000,000 between Part I and Part II and the sums to be raised. I wish to ask my noble and learned friend if he would tell us whether that £2,000,000 is going to be secured by the taxation in Part III, which raises to 100 per cent. the tax on excess profits, and the National Defence Contribution, and includes also the evasions which are to be met by Part IV. There are, of
674
course, other miscellaneous provisions, but if he could inform us whether this £2,000,000 covers the whole of Part III and Part IV it would be useful to the country to know, because these figures as explained from the Woolsack do not seem to me quite to cover the position.
I could say a good deal in regard to Treasury control, having desired at one time to get a good deal of money for education, which was refused owing to Treasury control. I was also aware of great extravagance during the war of 1914–18 through Treasury control not being sufficiently exercised. To-day I realise that Treasury control is still of great importance, but I agree entirely with the noble Lord who has just resumed his seat that it must not cause delay of expenditure essential for the carrying on of the war on land, on sea, as well as in the air. In sitting down I desire to say that I realise the greatness of the contribution now being generously made by the taxpayer. He is finding enormous sums. He recognises how important it is that we should not borrow more than is necessary. At the same time he has paid willingly, and is doing his utmost to pay the money that is asked from him in taxation. I am quite sure every citizen is determined to-day to do his utmost to find the money to carry the war to a successful conclusion.
5.8 p.m.
LORD ARNOLD: My Lords, the limits of order in your Lordships' House permit a wide latitude in discussion. I could not help thinking, however, that some of the observations of my noble friend Lord Strabolgi were very remote from the Finance Bill. I should like to thank the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack for his extremely lucid exposition of the provisions of this Bill. It is true that the discussion of the Finance Bill in this House is generally more concerned with broad problems and considerations than with detail of individual taxes, and in the brief remarks I have to make I shall follow that usual custom. There is all the more reason that that should be done to-day because, as the noble and learned Viscount indicated—and other Peers have referred to this—we all know that this is an interim Budget and that another Budget will be introduced before long.
There are two or three matters upon which I should like to touch purely from the financial aspect, leaving aside other

675
views and considerations. Looking at the financial situation as a whole, whereas there is much that gives cause for grave concern, there are, in fact, some features which legitimately permit of a more optimistic outlook. The Lord Chancellor touched upon the question of borrowing and the low rate of interest which has been achieved in that regard. That is very important. The National Debt is now about £9,000,000,000, and, as the noble and learned Viscount said, long-term loans have been borrowed at 3 per cent. and the short-term five-to-seven-year National War Bonds now being issued bear interest at only 2½ per cent. Actually the Government are borrowing at a much lower rate than that. This is, of course, because the Exchequer rates income at 7s. 6d. in the pound on all the newly created loans. That is often overlooked.
Indeed the position is slightly better than that, because account has also to be taken of Surtax on the individual holdings of war loans by people in the Surtax class. In fact, looking at the matter as a whole, it is probably no exaggeration to say that the Exchequer gets back Income Tax of 7s. 6d. and perhaps an average of a further 6d. in regard to Surtax, as I have explained, making a total of about 8s. in the pound. If that is so, and I think it is about right—it cannot be far wrong—that means that they are getting back two-fifths of the interest costs, and that means that these National War Bonds will not cost the country 2½ per cent. but will cost the country only 1½ per cent. That is a very low rate indeed—very much lower than anything which was achieved in the last war. On that basis you can borrow £1,000,000,000 for a net annual charge of £15,000,000 a year and you can borrow £5,000,000,000 for a net annual charge of £75,000,000 a year. When you are dealing with a Budget of £1,234,000,000 apart from war expenditure, there is nothing very affrighting about an additional charge of £75,000,000.
The next point on which I wish to touch, endeavouring to take, as far as it is permissible to do so, a more optimistic outlook than some people take in these days, is this. We are constantly told that the cost of the war is about £7,000,000 a day, and that that figure will soon be largely exceeded. It may be exceeded now—I dare say it is considerably
676
—but it must be remembered that the figure of £7,000,000 a day or a higher figure is a total figure which includes the pre-war expenditure interest on Debt, Civil Services, Social Services and so on. These come to about £2,000,000 a day and are included in the figure which is so frequently quoted. Therefore the actual cost of the war itself is always about £2,000,000 less than the figure which is given. That is a point which it is worth bearing in mind.
Now I want to speak finally, and at rather greater length, about a vital problem which I do not think the Government have yet sufficiently faced, nor have the people of the country sufficiently faced it. It is that if the war is to be financed, it is absolutely necessary that the standard of life of all in the country, except the very poorest, should be reduced a good deal more than has yet been done. That is a hard doctrine, but I think I can prove it. The national income of the country last year was probably about £4,800,000,000. Now in this year, the current year of 1940, the income will be higher, though how much higher it is impossible to say. Prices are higher. On the other hand, overseas trade is reduced, and there are losses in various other directions. It is very difficult to say. A figure was given in another place suggesting that in this current year the total national income, including war debt interest, would be about £5,500,000,000. Let me take that figure. It may be too high or it may not be high enough, but I will take it. It seems not unreasonable taking into account all the circumstances. To this should be added a sum of let me say £300,000,000, which may be available to the Government during the current year from gold and from the sale of foreign securities. That is from, what I may call for short, capital assets. On this computation the total amount available for the country during the current year would be £5,800,000,000.
The next point to be considered is how much is spent by the people of the country in private consumption—that is, for their own living. It is very difficult to say. The figure must be, to a certain extent, a matter of guesswork, but it seems probable that in the last year the amount so spent was about £3,200,000,000. That is apart from indirect taxation, the balance being accounted for by the Government's national expenditure and

677
by savings. In this year of 1940, with the restriction on consumption that has taken place, the amount to be spent by the people on private consumption might appear to be appreciably less than £3,200,000,000. On the other hand it has to be remembered that prices are generally higher than last year, also that many of the workers are receiving better wages. Taking everything into consideration, I think it is better to keep the figure of £3,200,000,000. If it is too high it will leave something in hand to set off against items on the other side which may not be perhaps sufficiently allowed for.
Now taking the figure for private consumption as £3,200,000,000—and that must come out of a total sum of £5,800,000,000 for national income and realised capital assets—in the current year there is left a balance of £2,600,000,000 for war expenditure, and no more. This Budget, which for this purpose we may take as war expenditure, though it really includes other items, contemplates an expenditure totalling £2,667,000,000, but everybody knows that that amount will be exceeded in the current year, perhaps largely exceeded. In the debates in another place the figure was put at £3,000,000,000 and £3,200,000,000 and one of the financial papers went so far as to say we ought to be spending £10,000,000 a day. If that were done the total expenditure would be £3,650,000,000. That is indeed going to a very high figure. How far the cost of the war may be lessened owing to the withdrawal of troops from the Continent, or, on the other hand, how far it may be added to in view of the prodigious efforts which Great Britain will now make, are matters for speculation, but I will assume—and I do not think it is unreasonable in all the circumstances having regard to the various factors at work—that the expenditure during this current year will amount to £3,000,000,000. It may well be more, but I will leave it at that.
I have already suggested that the total amount available of national income and assets is £5,800,000,000, and if the national expenditure on the war and so forth is £3,000,000,000, then there will only be available for private consumption £2,800,000,000. That is £400,000,000 less than the figure which I have suggested. If I am right, or anything like right, there is, so to speak, a deficiency of £400,000,000.
LORD STRABOLGI: May I ask a question? I am very interested in this. Will my noble friend deal with the point that I ventured to make? If we increase our production as we are doing, that automatically increases our income. We produce goods which we buy from ourselves, so to speak.
LORD ARNOLD: My reply to the noble Lord would be that I think I have allowed for that, because I have increased the national income from £4,800,000,000 to £5,500,000,000 this year. I think that is probably enough. That is the position as I see it. These are matters for argument I know, but I think my figures are not unreasonable. If I am right and there is a deficiency of £400,000,000, national consumption will have to be reduced in the current year or else you cannot make the accounts balance. You cannot take more out of a pint pot than is in it. If nothing more is going to be done than has been done to reduce private consumption it seems to me there are going to be very great difficulties in financing the war before we get to the end of the current financial year. That is the point I am putting. Without the reduction I have indicated, if the various figures I have given are anything like right, there will be a very difficult problem for the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Government to face. There is one qualification which I think is rather important. There may be more, but I only mention this one. It may be, of course, that more than £300,000,000 could be realised on gold and sale of foreign securities. I have no doubt that in the last resort to some extent those resources could be drawn upon, but that would be at the expense of the future. If the war is going to be a long war, to assume that you will draw about £300,000,000 a year from those two sources I think not unreasonable and probably prudent.
These figures which I have been giving, or something like them, it seems to me go to the very heart of the financial problem. Yet when not very long ago someone suggested that the Income Tax payers getting from £5 to £12 a week would have to pay more—or words to that effect—I do not think I am exaggerating when I say that that statement was received with howls of protest. But of course it really represented the

679
simple truth if you are going to reduce national consumption. I believe I am correct in saying that in Germany the tax on wages, which is really Income Tax, begins at a little over £1 a week. That is a very different state of things from Income Tax paying in this country. The need for those with less than £5 a week to reduce consumption, except the very poorest classes, becomes I think all the more evident in view of the figure which the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack gave in another place when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. He said that two-thirds of the consumption of the country-is on account of those with less than £5 a week. I repeat that because it is so striking: two-thirds of the consumption of the country is on account of those with less than £5 a week.
It is quite true that the noble and learned Viscount, although he said that, could not substantiate it by any official figure because there is no official figure. I have several times commented in your Lordships' House on the lack of official figures in this country in regard to certain vital matters. I should be surprised if the noble and learned Viscount did not take them from an article by Mr. Keynes in the December number of the Economic Journal. I have the greatest respect for Mr. Keynes, but it does not necessarily follow that his figures are right. He is rather more an economist than a statistician. Probably, however, this figure is not very far wrong and it is a very arresting figure. Conversely it means this, that if it is right, or about right, those with incomes of more than £5 a week are only responsible for one-third of the consumption of the country. It must mean that.
Now let me go right to the other end of the scale, to the rich classes, or to those who are regarded as rich, the people in the Surtax class. I do not hold any brief for them, but it is a fact that if the whole of the income remaining to them after deduction of taxation was taken away from them—the whole lot of it, if I may use the common but expressive phrase of the day—the resultant sum would only finance the war for about ten days. That is all that would happen. It is no use looking to a source which in fact cannot do a great deal because it has been already reduced to such a small volume.
680
As regards Income Tax payers in general, let me make this point. I hope that the noble and learned Viscount will make a note of it. There is nothing very new about it, but nothing has been done so far. It was to this source, very largely, that in the economic crisis Mr. Philip Snowden, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, went for a year or two in order to get through the very difficult times of those days. The point I want to put is that quite apart from any alteration in the standard rate of Income Tax—which probably will be raised and I think is almost certain to be raised—a very considerable sum of money can be got by an alteration in the abatements. I do not say in all of them, but there are a good many abatements—the personal allowance, the exemption limit, the married person's allowance, the children's allowance, the earned income allowance and so on. So many people are affected by those abatements that a great deal of money can be got in that way.
The necessity to reduce private consumption must, I submit, be more boldly faced, but I am not saying that all that is needed can be done by taxation. Taxation is one weapon and a very powerful weapon, but it is not the only weapon. In any case the question arises what are the limits to which the country can go in reducing consumption; that is, in reducing the standard of living. I will speak only of two limits. The standard of living should not be reduced below the point which would adversely affect the productivity of labour. I think we must all agree about that. If it is reduced below that, then what is necessary for the maintenance of the civilian population and for the conduct of the war might not be forthcoming. The other limit, to which personally I attach great importance, is that as regards one class of the community, numerically very large, the poorest class, there should be no reduction in the standard of living, because their circumstances are such that if you go below the level of subsistence on which they have to live you are doing an unwise thing, something which would have harmful effects on the workers and their efficiency and productivity and particularly on the next generation coming from them.
I think it is very regrettable, in view of the consideration I have just been

681
advancing, that this Finance Bill makes sugar and tea—and for the poorest class tea is virtually a necessity—dearer to the; extent of nearly £20,000,000 than they were two years ago That is a very large sum, and of it no small proportion will be paid, and has to be paid, by the poorest section of the community. We all know that sugar is a vital food, especially for children; and to raise its price to the very poor may be expected, without exaggeration, to have harmful effects from the health point of view. We have been told again and again, and it has never been seriously disputed, that 40 per cent. of the population are not properly nourished. If that is so, to make sugar dear must adversely affect the efficiency and fitness of those people.
Moreover, I should like to put this point to the noble and learned Viscount; I am not putting these matters forward in any controversial spirit, but I should be very interested if he could say something about this. Sugar enters into the cost of living, and a high sugar tax therefore enters into the cost of living. Consequently it tends to increase some wages because of the rise in the index figure, and to affect the vicious spiral of higher prices. As I understand it, it was in the endeavour to stop that sort of thing from happening—prices following wages, and particularly the figure for the increase in the cost of living—that the noble Viscount introduced the policy of subsidising some foodstuffs. That may be a good thing in war-time, but it is a little difficult to reconcile the subsidising of some foodstuffs with the putting of high taxation on other foodstuffs. If we could have a little light on the seeming irreconcilability of those two policies, it would be of value. Taxation is not the only weapon for reducing consumption. It is a powerful weapon, but it ought not to be used to raise the cost of vital foodstuffs. All taxation should be equitable, economically sound and productive, and to make vital foodstuffs dear, especially for the very poor, is not economically sound.
5.34 p.m.
LORD MANCROFT: My Lords, I hope I may be forgiven if I detain you for a few minutes in dealing with two or three points—not more than three points—which have come to my mind One of the more important was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, and another by the
682
noble Lord, Lord Arnold. I have followed the whole of this debate in the other House, and have read every word of the OFFICIAL REPORT, and the noble Viscount's speeches and those of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I do not propose to deal with the Rill as a whole, as I am in support of it; but first with the point made by Lord Arnold that the cost of living of the poor should not be allowed to rise, I agree. One thing should be done to prevent that: it is a very moderate proposal. I am of the opinion that the general cost of distribution of the things required for the living of the poor is much too high and that it has never been properly investigated. I have made during the last few weeks, with the help of members of my family, investigations into the variations of prices of the things required for my table as sold in the West End of London. I have been amazed at the differences in prices of similar things. Your Lordships are aware that there are in Britain large stores like Whiteleys', and, going down from them, shops of every size to the small shop in the small street. There are altogether something in the neighbourhood of 600,000 shops, large and small. When you divide those shops up amongst 40,000,000 of population you get one shop, large or small, for every eighty persons. That is to say, if every family consists of five persons, you have a shop, large or small, for every sixteen families. Such numbers of shops are superfluous, and the cost of distribution must be, I think, made excessive by that superfluity of distributors. Therefore the first point I suggest to the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack is that some of our young men, perhaps from the Cambridge Economics School or the London School of Economics, should be set to work to find out whether there is not some flaw in the shop system by which we arrange our distribution.
My noble friend opposite, Lord Strabolgi, made use of the words "Treasury control." Treasury control has become a cliché; it has become rigid in meaning; it is taken to mean something, but we do not pause to think what it means in operation. Someone comes along and suddenly says "Treasury control," and we may remind ourselves of the children's story of the Emperor's clothes which everyone said were very fine, until the small boy came along and said that he had no clothes on at all.

683
What is this Treasury control; who are the skilled controllers operating it? I do not find fault with the Treasury control; I do not blame it or deal with it in a hostile manner, but I think it has become rigid and formal, and that its machinery is out of date. We do not reflect enough on how it works. It is sometimes inadequate, that is certain, to stop waste; because we have seen two instances reported by the National Committee on Expenditure of the other House recently. It evidently failed entirely in the two quoted cases. Why it failed I do not know. It may have been hoodwinked; it probably was hoodwinked. I put no blame upon it. But what is this control system that did not stop the waste on the two quoted sets of operations? We should be more certain of the technical knowledge of the controllers which failed to detect the waste which actually occurred.
There is a well-known nursery story of a mother of children saying "James, go upstairs into the nursery, see what Mary is doing and tell her she musn't." That is not the way Treasury control should be run. It should be run by very competent men who know exactly upon what the money is to be spent and how and why it is to be spent. It should not only ask for regularisation of accounts so that when they come before the Public Accounts Committee it can see at once what they mean. The inner meaning of the whole expenditure must be looked into, because it is quite possible that, while you may prevent waste or excessive expenditure, or expenditure which is not within the intention of Parliament, in respect of something which should be spent control may have the effect of discouraging initiative and valuable experiment. The Treasury may even deflect policy by exercise of control. I am not criticising the Treasury control in an unfriendly spirit, because I have seen myself how it is worked; it is worked by devoted men doing their best. But I think the system perhaps of impersonal action ought to be reconsidered and reorganised to meet difficulties in war preparations which have been disclosed by the House of Commons Committee.
There is another thing I should like to say, and I hope that its reasoning will appeal to my noble and learned friend on the Woolsack. I have spent part of my life in a great provincial industrial
684
city, so I have seen how much better off the poor and the lower middle classes have become—and thank God for it. I have taken part in the Kindersley lending scheme and seen how easy it has been to get people to subscribe. The noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack congratulated himself and us—and we accept that congratulation because it is well founded—on the ease with which we have recently raised large sums of money. What is the reason? The reason, in my opinion, is this, and I hope the Lord Chancellor will bear me out. Let me give as an instance an argumentum adhominem, so that I can make myself clear. A manufacturer goes and borrows from his bank £5,000 and pays interest on it. In the course of a year or two that £5,000 enables him to put up more working sheds, he sells more goods, and in the long run, at the end of a few years, he has found that that £5,000 has created more earning assets for his business which earn for themselves enough to pay the whole interest on the sums borrowed. He has made profits and saved them, as represented in increased assets. In other words, he has "squeezed out the water," as they say in America.
I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Arnold, talks about the National Debt being £8,000,000,000 or £9,000,000,000; be it so. When we left our accounts in 1918 we had a debt of £7,000,000,000 or £8,000,000,000. But I firmly believe—and I hope the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack will be able to find it is correct, for it will give us reassurance, because in the strength of our finance lies one of the safeguards for our victory, and it is important that the increased soundness of our finances should be more widely known—that since 1918 we have made and saved out of our foreign trade and general trade at least £200,000,000 a year. That is to say, we have squeezed out water from the National Debt to the amount of £4,500,000,000, since the last war ended. We have by our savings in trade added to our earning assets, as did the manufacturer in the illustration which I gave. We have reduced the burden of debt of nearly £8,000,000,000 by adding saved assets amounting to £4,500,000,000. We are to-day better off by £4,500,000,000 than we were when the last war ended. The earnings on these savings are now coming into beneficial play. If that point is well

685
founded, and I do not think that it has been made sufficiently often, I offer it to your Lordships in the hope that if brought to the attention of the taxpayer it will go far in reassuring public opinion and in preventing people from worrying too much about the fresh increase in the National Debt. Give us peace, and we can soon earn, save and pay off much of what we have borrowed for this war.
5.41 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I may perhaps be permitted a few words of reply after this short but interesting debate. My noble friend Lord Gainford took down two figures which I mentioned when I moved the Second Reading, and noted an arithmetical coincidence which I had not noticed myself, but which, if you will excuse me for saying so, led him to a false conclusion. I happened to give two figures of what would be the yield in a full year of the direct taxation imposed by this Finance Bill and of the indirect taxation. As your Lordships know well, the amount which is raised in the first or current year from additional taxes is by no means the same as that which will be raised in a full year. Indirect taxes have to be imposed from the day when they are made, and that is not the beginning of the financial year. As regards direct taxes, it frequently happens that you do not get the full flow of the tax for, it may be, a twelvemonth. I therefore gave two figures, £760,000,000 and £472,000,000, as being two figures which would be found, according to my estimates, to be true when we had a full year of the existing taxation; and it does happen, as my noble friend acutely observed, that, added together, they come to £1,232,000,000. That is a coincidence, and has nothing in the world to do with the other proposition, that the total amount of revenue expected to be raised from this Finance Bill this year is £1,234,000,000.
There are other sources of taxation mentioned in the Finance Bill besides the two to which I referred; for instance, there is the Excess Profits Tax, which I did not include in my estimate at all, and there are other taxes. If you take the whole list together, and limit yourself to what these different taxes will produce this year, the estimated grand total will be £1,234,000,000; but it is nothing more than an arithmetical coincidence—an in-
686
genious one, perhaps—that if you take two of the principal items and, instead of seeing what they will produce this year, ask what they will produce in a full year, you find that they will in a full year produce almost the same amount' as all the taxes put together will produce in this year. I am sure that my noble friend suspected that there was some such explanation, but it is very right that we should get our arithmetic correct on these occasions.
Then I must express my indebtedness to my noble friend Lord Arnold, who made, as he usually does, a very closely-reasoned speech. Some of his figures I hardly dare to say that I should like to look at myself, but I should like to invite the Chancellor of the Exchequer to look at them with attention. There are two points that he made on which I will just touch. He observed—and it is a very forceful observation—that since unquestionably it is necessary to get so large a part of the total that is raised by taxation from the prosperous working class and the lower middle class, because of their enormous numbers, therefore one method by which a considerable change could be made in the yield of Income Tax is an alteration in abatements—the abatements for marriage, for children, for earned income and so forth. I have no doubt that my noble friend has observed that very important changes of that kind were made in the Emergency Budget last September. If he will examine that Budget, he will find that they were made so as to begin to operate only in the present financial year; and in fact he was quite right when he said that this is a very fruitful source of additional revenue, for, if those changes had not been made, the yield of Income Tax this year, would not be by any means what it is hoped that it will be.
The other observation of his to which I would make a brief reference is his comment that it seemed to him inconsistent that at a time when we were raising revenue by indirect taxation on a number of articles, including sugar and tea, we should at the same time be finding very large sums by way of a subsidy for the purpose of cheapening other articles of primary consumption. I recognise that there is a certain logical force in that argument, but the noble Lord will of course appreciate that what is moving the authorities in reaching their decision is this. There are certain

687
articles of food, such for example as bread, regarding which it is so enormously important that nothing should happen to alter the price that one would willingly forego a reputation for consistency if something could be done in that direction. One of the curious facts about bread, as your Lordships know, is that the actual amount of bread which is consumed is very little affected by the price of bread. In the case of most articles of food, if the price goes up the consumption goes down. That, however, is not so in the case of bread, and the explanation is, of course, that even the poorest household, when they find that things are getting, more expensive, tend more and more to use their slender resources at least to make sure that they obtain their provision of bread. On the other hand, if bread becomes exceptionally cheap, we never hear anyone say "Bread has gone down in price; let us go and have a burst on bread" The amount of bread which is consumed in the country is extraordinarily stable, and it is therefore most important to keep its price down even at the cost of a subsidy. Another example is that of milk. While I feel the force of the argument about tea and sugar, I can hardly think that there is any commodity in regard to which a Government would be better justified in using their resources for the purpose of keeping down the price than milk, which is so enormously important for infant and child welfare. I shall not this afternoon deal with the other matters mentioned by the noble Lord. I was deeply interested in some of them, and I shall have the opportunity of reflecting upon them. I have noted the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Mancroft.
Lastly, I want to say a word or two about the points raised by my noble friend Lord Strabolgi. He asked me first, as a matter of interpretation, whether in Clause 64 of the Finance Bill the reference to relieving from Death Duties the masters and members of crews of ships could be safely understood to include, for example, yachts which helped in the Dunkirk evacuation and small craft of that kind. I will give a perfectly confident answer if he will take it, and I feel pretty sure it will be accepted elsewhere. The word "ships" does not necessarily refer to vessels of any great size. The noble
688
Lord should bear in mind that the yachts were only lending assistance in the crisis at Dunkirk for a few days. But the answer to him is that Clause 64 relieves people of Death Duties if they lose their lives in the service of the Crown. I know that there were cases where lives were sacrificed at Dunkirk, and I do not imagine that there will be any difficulty in applying the clause to the limited number of cases of yachtsmen, yacht masters and yacht crews who died in the evacuation operations.
There were two other observations made by the noble Lord to which I must refer. First of all, in his pleasant way he informed us that this Finance Bill was obsolete. I assume that the noble Lord like other people, is going to pay his taxes, and if he has that intention he will soon find out if it is obsolete. This is the instrument—and it is the only instrument—which is going to raise this enormous sum by taxation. What I think the noble Lord has in mind is a criticism of quite a different point—not, I venture to think, a well founded one, but quite a different criticism. The criticism is not that the Finance Bill is obsolete but that the calculations which were available as to what we might want to spend in the course of the year will need substantial revision. As a matter of fact I said they would myself, and I said that the thing that principally governed it was the man-power available, and the extent to which we should organise production. I must observe that the Finance Bill and the Budget are not instruments for the purpose of spending money—that is easy. They are instruments for the purpose of raising money, and though I am sure, as I have said, that we may expect another Finance Bill before the year is out, I do not think it will be found so singularly easy to multiply the amount that this Finance Bill produces by any very enormous figure. The real truth is that the greater expenditure becomes, the more it is necessary to raise all you can by taxation and, for the rest, to accept the burden of borrowing on which, it seems to me, noble Lords, Lord Arnold and Lord Mancroft, made some very admirable observations just now.
Lastly the noble Lord—and I take it with complete good humour—made a reference to the policy of His Majesty's Government in the Far East in the years 1931 and 1932. It was hardly necessary

689
for him, after that, to explain to me that he makes a habit on these occasions of doing all he can for Socialist propaganda—that was entirely obvious.
LORD STRABOLGI: No, that referred to my economic argument.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I cannot deal with the matter now in a debate on the Finance Bill, but if the noble Lord will do me the kindness of reading a document which I shall have the pleasure of sending him, I am sure he will see that as a matter of fact I have not been treated very generously by my critics. This, however, is a very long way from the subject we are dealing with to-day, and I am certainly not going to pursue the matter. But when one considers how the British Navy was reduced in power, how the building of Singapore was not proceeded with, how year after year the Estimates for the Forces were voted against, how, when a proposal was made to increase our Air Force, a Vote of Censure was moved by the noble Lord's Party in another place, well, I say it with all humility and all respect, but I think it requires either a very short memory or a very thick skin to make such a criticism.
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived.

REMISSION OF RATES (LONDON) BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
5.56 p.m.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA AND BURMA (THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE): My Lords, I shall not keep your Lordships for more than a very few minutes on this Bill. It arises out of a promise made in another place by the late Solicitor-General. The Bill is designed to effect a modification in the law relating to the remission of rates in London and to bring it into accord with the law as it obtains in the provinces. In London, the local authorities have not got the power to remit rates—powers which have been possessed for the last fifteen years by local authorities in the provinces and which have worked, so far as I am aware, quite satisfactorily and without giving rise
690
to any adverse criticism. This Bill will give similar powers to the metropolitan authorities. It is a purely emergency measure and is intended to deal with the undoubted hardship caused to certain classes of ratepayers who have been hit by war conditions, and are really unable to pay their rates—a class of ratepayer quite different from those who are normally in arrears with their rates.
As the law stands now, these people have to go before the justices in order to obtain any relief, and this Bill will give them power to go to the local authority to make their statement, and if the local authority is satisfied, it will be able to remit the rates. I ought to make it clear to your Lordships that the whole question of assimilating rating practice in London and the provinces is overdue and that is being considered now. This is not part of that general process which is wanted, but there are various matters which are outstanding; this is only a small measure, designed as a temporary measure only during wartime to deal with a real grievance which needs redressing.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Duke of Devonshire.)
5.58 p.m.
LORD ARNOLD: My Lords, I should like to say a few words in welcoming this merciful measure, if I may so call it. I do not think it is possible for us to visualise the misery which has been occasioned by the war in certain parts of London, particularly to widows and spinsters who let rooms, by the conditions with which they are faced, and rates are obviously a factor in that gloomy picture. The measure which is now before your Lordships will, if generously administered, as I hope it will be, do something to relieve the burdens and anxieties of those people. There was a Bill passed by your Lordships' House in 1935, when the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack was at the Home Office. That was a very merciful measure, and it dealt with the question of imprisonment for non-payment of rates. It laid down that in future nobody was to be sent to prison for non-payment of rates, except on account of wilful refusal or culpable neglect. I would not like to say it has been carried out in its entirety, but it has reduced very substan-

691
tially the number of people going to prison for non-payment of rates. But whether it is a question of prison or not, it is extremely hard that many of these people should have to go before the justices, which does involve a certain amount of anxiety. Therefore I feel quite certain that this is a measure which will meet with full approval in your Lordships' House.
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
6 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, may I ask the Deputy Leader of the House whether he has any statement to make regarding business?
LORD SNELL: My Lords, it would probably be for the convenience of your Lordships if I stated that it has been found necessary to rearrange some of the business already announced for this week, and also to make provision for some additional business. Probably it will be best if I deal with the additional business first. A Bill of some urgency conferring additional powers upon the Governor-General of India and the Governor-General of
692
Burma is being passed through all its stages in another place to-morrow, and I shall ask your Lordships to deal with it similarly on Thursday. Arrangements have been made that the Bill should be circulated to your Lordships in its Commons' form in order that you may be acquainted with its provisions before being asked to consider them. Now as to the rearrangement of business. It had been intended to take the Second Reading of the Colonial Development Bill, a measure of considerable importance, on Thursday next, but, as your Lordships are aware, a Secret Sitting will follow the statement of the Minister of Supply in another place that afternoon, and I have little doubt that your Lordships would prefer to postpone the debate on the Colonial Development Bill in order that you may have an opportunity of listening to the debate in another place. An additional reason for the postponement is that in order not to interfere with the Secret Sitting, we shall endeavour to arrange to have our business in this House completed in time to hold the Royal Commission at 4.45 p.m. The Second Reading of the Colonial Development Bill has now been arranged for Tuesday next, July 2.
House adjourned at two minutes past six o'clock.