Sitting of 18 March 1943

Preamble
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  NATIONAL WAR EFFORT

    Nurses and Midwives (Welsh Representation on Council)
    Mr. Daggarasked the Minister of Labour whether he has considered the communication from the Monmouthshire County Council asking for the appointment of a representative from Wales upon the National Advisory Council for the Distribution of Nurses and Midwives; and the nature of the reply sent to the Council?
    The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Bevin): I have this matter under consideration and have not yet replied to the Council.
    Mr. Daggar: Am I entitled to anticipate that there will be a representative from Wales on this Advisory Council and that the claims of Monmouthshire will not be neglected?
    Mr. Bevin: I should not anticipate anything until I have made a decision.

    Worker's Appeal, Stoke (Reinstatement)
    Mr. Ellis Smithasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that W. Berks, 11, Parkhead Drive, Weston Coyney, Stoke-on-Trent, in May, 1942, won an appeal, and the firm was ordered to reinstate the man and pay his wages and expenses; why that has not been carried out; and what action is it intended to take to carry out the Appeal Court's decision and pay the £25 owing to Mr. Berks?
    Mr. Bevin: I am aware that Mr. Berks was not reinstated by his employers, but I was advised that any proceedings which I might institute for contravention of the Essential Work Order would be unlikely to succeed. I have no authority to institute such civil proceedings for recovery
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    of any wages that may be due. It is open to Mr. Berks to institute such proceedings himself in the civil courts.
    Mr. Tinker: Can my right hon. Friend say what action is taken against employers who refuse to carry out a decision? Are they prosecuted like other people?
    Mr. Bevin: They are prosecuted and fined. In some cases I have de-scheduled their works, and other cases I have dealt with through my right hon. Friends who are responsible for production.
    Mr. Kirkwood: In a case where a workman has to take his employer before a court how can he afford to do that? This is something new from the Minister of Labour.
    Mr. Bevin: That is the law at present, and I cannot alter it, but most workmen have a union which would help them if they had to go to court.
    Mr. Rhys Davies: Will my right hon. Friend look into this matter again, because several cases have been reported already, and it does appear unfair to a workman that when a decision has been given in his favour he has to go to court to have it implemented?
    Mr. George Griffiths: Have any employers been sent to gaol for this kind of thing?
    Mr. Bevin: The case of the recovery of wages has always been a civil matter, and unions have always maintained that. The question of fining an employer is a matter for the court. This is a case of the recovery of wages.

    Protected Establishments (Managerial Staffs, Calling-up)
    Mr. Higgsasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware of the dislocation that is caused by the calling-up of staff men under 30 years of age from protected establishments and of the pressure that is being applied to accelerate output; and will he, in future, give greater consideration to men who have been continuously engaged on the same work for more than seven years?
    Mr. Bevin: I assume that, in the first part of the Question, my hon. Friend is referring to men who are on the managerial staffs of the establishments which

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    he has in mind. I am, of course, aware of the call for increased output but not of any dislocation caused by the calling up of the men in question who are under 30 years of age. With regard to the last part of the Question, while duration and continuity of a man's employment on the same work are taken into account in deciding whether his calling up should be deferred, the decision must rest mainly upon the importance of that work and the need for the man's retention for its continued performance.

    Clydeside Rivetters
    Mr. McNeilasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware of the discontent, particularly among Clydeside rivetters, caused during recent wet weather, by the varying interpretations by employers of section 4, paragraph (d), subsection (11), of the Essential Work (Shipbuilding and Shiprepairing) Order; and whether, to assist union officials in their efforts to avoid friction and stoppages and to meet the discontent of the men, he will restate the obligations of the employers under this section and so place the subject beyond ambiguity?
    Mr. Bevin: There is an agreement between the Shipbuilding Employers' Federation and the trade unions concerned according to which questions arising in this connection should be settled by means of the ordinary industrial machinery. I am not aware that difficulties are occasioned owing to any ambiguous wording in the Order, but if my hon. Friend will let me know more precisely what he has in mind, I will consider the matter.

    Transferred Workers (Post-War Employment)
    Mr. Banfieldasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that a worker compulsorily transferred from a civilian job to war work has no statutory right to reinstatement in his old job when the war ends; and whether he will take the necessary legislative steps to give those workers such a right?
    Mr. Bevin: This matter has been considered on a number of occasions, and the conclusion has been reached that it would not be practicable to make legislative provision on the lines suggested. I have no doubt that most employers will in any case wish to reinstate their former
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    employees wherever this is practicable. In addition, it will be the aim of the Government to assist in ensuring that opportunities of suitable employment will be available for workers generally.

    Old Age Pensioners
    Mr. Tinkerasked the Minister of Labour whether he will give the figures of the number of old age pensioners who are working and of those who have taken up work since the war started?
    Mr. Bevin: I regret that the information asked for is not available. Certain information is contained in a reply I gave to the hon. Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. Graham White) on 21st January, of which I am sending my hon. Friend a copy.
    Mr. Tinker: Could my right hon. Friend give some approximate figures?
    Mr. Bevin: It is a little difficult.

    Marine Engineers (Wages)
    Mr. Kirkwoodasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that the basic rate of pay of marine engineers is 11¾d. per hour, raised by various bonuses to 1s. 8 13/16d. per hour for a 47-hour week; that wages have been reduced by the loss of Sunday work and overtime; that negotiations on the men's demands for an increased wage have been going on since September; and whether he will use his powers to consolidate wages, doing away with the bonus system and to grant the men a larger increase than has so far been agreed to by their employers?
    Mr. Bevin: No, Sir. I cannot accept my hon. Friend's suggestion. The question whether there should be any modification of agreed rates of wages is a matter for negotiation between the two sides, through the recognised machinery of the industry.
    Mr. Kirkwood: Is the Minister not aware that these negotiations have been going on officially since 5th November? My union have asked the Minister of Labour to intervene. Will he use his influence to have this matter settled as early as possible?
    Mr. Bevin: It is not correct to say that my hon. Friend's union have asked me to intervene. What they have done is to ask my hon. Friend not to intervene.
    Mr. Kirkwood: Probably the Minister is right as regards the executive of my union, but members of my union all over the country are asking me to intervene.
    Mr. Gallacher: Is it not the case that the Minister has continually encouraged trade unionists to pay a political levy so that they could get their trade union activity supplemented by Parliamentary activity? Will he not encourage such supplementary Parliamentary activity?
    Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir, but I have also encouraged trade unionists to do politically things which it is wise to do politically and industrially things which are more properly done through industry.
    Mr. Kirkwood: I will raise this matter again on the Adjournment. I have been here for 20 years and a member of my union for many years.

    Widowers (Domestic Help)
    Mr. McLean Watsonasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that widowers with families are being deprived of the services of their daughters for housekeeping even where the girls are only experienced in domestic work; that these girls have been told they must take work of national importance and that other girls, already engaged on munition work, will have to undertake household duties; and will he say what purpose is served by this action?
    Mr. Bevin: I assume that my hon. Friend is referring to cases where a widower father has two daughters, one of whom acts as housekeeper, and the other is employed on munitions. In an area where immobile women are available as substitutes it is in the national interest for one or other of the daughters of the widower father to leave home and go to work which has to be done by a mobile woman and for any consequent vacancy in munitions to be filled by a woman who in no circumstances could be expected to leave the district. I am prepared to leave it to the family to decide which daughter shall leave home. The other who remains at home will probably be available for some employment locally. In other areas where the daughter on munitions could not be replaced by the services of an immobile woman, the housekeeping daughter is not sent away from home, even though, when considered solely from the point of view of
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    exceptional hardship, postponement would not be justified.
    Mr. Watson: Is not my right hon. Friend aware that a considerable amount of hardship is being caused through daughters who have been working as housekeepers being called up for National Service, so that no-one has been left to look after the house?
    Mr. Bevin: I have dealt with a number of cases, but if my hon. Friend has others and will let me have them, I will look into them immediately.
    Mr. Watson: Is not my right hon. Friend aware that in the last few weeks I have sent him a number of cases on the same point? Last week I had a reply from him which had the effect of depriving a widower of any female help whatsoever.

    Childless Married Women
    Mr. G. Straussasked the Minister of Labour whether, in view of the variations in practice among employment exchanges in different parts of the country, it is the policy of his Ministry to direct childless married women under 40 years of age, whose husbands live at home and who have no other domestic help, into full-time or part-time occupations?
    Mr. Bevin: The hours of full-time and part-time work vary very much with different occupations as do the arrangements made by employers for the convenience of their married women workers. Accordingly, each case has to be considered on its merits on the advice of independent women's panels who have knowledge of local conditions, of the work available, and the individual circumstances of the woman concerned. I have arranged for meetings of members of women's panels to be held in different areas at which common problems can be discussed, and have recently drawn their attention to the responsibilities of a married woman for running her home which must be taken into account in considering the work she should be asked to undertake.
    Mr. Strauss: Does that mean that where a woman has domestic responsibility, looking after her husband, and has no other domestic help she would be asked to do only part-time work and not engage in a full-time job?
    Mr. Bevin: That is the general direction.

  INTERNATIONAL LABOUR OFFICE (CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE)
  Commander King-Hallasked the Minister of Labour whether he has any information as to why the consultative committee of economists and statesmen to deal with reconstruction, which it was decided to set up as a result of the International Labour Conference in New York, in October, 1941, has not yet been formed?
  Mr. Bevin: I assume that my hon. and gallant Friend refers to the decision of the Emergency Committee of the Governing Body in April last, to set up an Advisory Committee on the Economic Conditions of Post-War Reconstruction. It was agreed that the International Labour Office, in consultation with the Chairman of the Governing Body, should enter into the necessary consultations for the nomination of members of this Committee and should submit names to the Governing Body in due course. I have no detailed information with regard to the progress of these consultations, which, as I have stated, are in the hands of the International Labour Office and the Chairman of the Governing Body, but I hope shortly to have an opportunity of discussing the matter with the Acting-Director of the Office, who proposes, I understand, to visit this country in the near future.

  HOUSING

    Rent Charges
    Mr. Daggarasked the Minister of Health whether he has considered a communication from the Urban District Councils Association regarding allegations of extortionate rent charges; and will he state the nature of his reply?
    The Minister of Health (Mr. Ernest Brown): I am sending my hon. Friend a copy of my reply of 11th February to the Urban District Councils Association.

    Small Gardens
    Lady Apsleyasked the Minister of Health whether he will give an assurance that the 4,000,000 houses, which it is proposed to erect immediately after the war, will in all possible cases have a small garden attached?
    Mr. E. Brown: Yes, Sir.

  PUBLIC HEALTH

    Tuberculosis (Treatment)
    Mr. Ammonasked the Minister of Health when he expects to issue a report on the improved arrangements for the treatment of tuberculosis mentioned in Ministry of Health Circular No. 2741?
    Mr. E. Brown: I hope to issue a further memorandum on this subject early next month.

    Hospital Nurses (Rushcliffe Committee's Recommendations)
    Mr. Messerasked the Minister of Health (1) whether he has considered the letter sent to him by the Middlesex Medical Society in reference to the position of ward sisters as recommended by the Rushcliffe Committee; and whether he proposes to take any action to effect some improvement;
    (2) whether he is aware that the recommendations of the Rushcliffe Committee relating to assistant nurses will not encourage suitable women to take up this work; and whether, in view of the special position they occupy through absence of the possibility of promotion, their position can be reconsidered?
    Dr. Edith Summerskillasked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been drawn to the dissatisfaction expressed by the 200 doctors of the Middlesex County Medical Society with the Rushcliffe recommendation that a ward sister should be paid only £130 per annum plus £70 living-out allowance; and whether he proposes to reconsider this recommendation?
    Mr. E. Brown: The recommendations of the Rushcliffe Committee are the result of a full examination of the question by a Committee consisting of two panels representing employers and employed respectively. I have commended to hospital authorities these recommendations, the adoption of which will secure for the first time uniform national scales for all grades of hospital nurses. I do not propose to take any action likely to prejudice the agreement which has been reached.
    Mr. Messer: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the fact that as the most progressive public health authority is not represented on the employers' side, the Report in effect makes some of the

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    workers worse off than they were before, and will he give an opportunity for the reconsideration of the matter?
    Mr. Brown: I could not agree with that. The individual representatives of the employers' panels and the Royal College, the trade union concerned, all agree that this is the greatest advance ever made in the history of the nursing profession.
    Mr. Jewson: What will be the estimated financial advantage to the nursing profession as a whole if the Report is implemented?
    Mr. Brown: The total additional cost of the proposals in a full year is estimated at £2,000,000.
    Dr. Summerskill: Is the Minister aware that before a ward sister obtains that position, she has to work for many years, and is also responsible for the training of the students, and can the Minister honestly say that £130 a year, plus £70 living-out allowance, is a fair and just remuneration?
    Mr. Brown: The hon. Lady had better look at the Report. She will see that there are figures for recommended increases in the salary of £130, rising by increments of £10 to £180, with one additional service increment of £20 after 10 years service, so that with emoluments the salary goes to from £230 to £300.
    Dr. Summerskill: Was there a ward sister on the Rushcliffe Committee?
    Mr. Brown: That is not my responsibility. The Royal College, the trade union concerned, formed the panel, and it is to them that the hon. Lady should address her question.
    Mr. William Brown: Is it not the case that the Royal College of Nurses is in no sense whatever a trade union and that the trade unions that represent the staffs are appalled at the character of this Report?
    Mr. E. Brown: There were trade union representatives on the Rushcliffe Committee.
    Mr. Storey: Is it not a fact that not only were the nursing bodies represented on the Committee, but that the Trades Union Congress and all the local authorities were represented?
    Mr. Brown: That is so.
    Mr. Messer: Is it not a fact that the Middlesex County Council has sent a letter to the right hon. Gentleman pointing out the anomalies?
    Mr. Brown: That may be so, but over a large scale of various grades of nurses it is perfectly simple, when long negotiations have taken place and there have been general decisions about a national standard, for any body to say that it does not agree with this, that or the other thing. I am defending what is a great advance on a national basis for the first time.
    Mr. Messer: I beg to give notice that, owing to the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment.
    Mr. Brown: That will suit me.

    Beveridge Report (Dentists, Opticians and Pharmacists)
    Mr. Wootton-Daviesasked the Minister of Health whether his conversations with the medical profession with regard to the implementation of the Beveridge Report will include discussions with allied professions, such as dentists, opticians and pharmacists?
    Mr. E. Brown: Yes, Sir, and I shall make appropriate arrangements to this end.

    Milk (Pasteurisation)
    Mr. Purbrickasked the Minister of Health how many eases of epidemic summer diarrhoea have arisen in the last year in infants under two years of age; how many of such were fed on pasteurised milk and how many on raw milk?
    Mr. E. Brown: The information received in the Ministry from local authorities shows, for the last full year, 878 cases of epidemic diarrhoea in children under five years of age, but I regret that I have no separate figures for children under two. Nor can I say how many of these children were fed on pasteurised milk.
    Viscountess Astor: Is it not true that pasteurised milk is good for children and far better than dirty fresh milk?
    Mr. Purbrickasked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the fact that pasteurisation of milk kills the harmless

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    lactic bacteria and thereby leaves a much better field for the growth of other dangerous diseases and putrefactive germs, he will prohibit pasteurised milk being fed to babies without notification?
    Mr. Brown: No, Sir. I am advised that the keeping quality of milk is much improved by pasteurisation and that there is no scientific evidence for the statement that pathogenic organisms grow better in pasteurised milk than in clean raw milk.
    Mr. Stokes: Is it not a fact that in an experiment at Newcastle not many years ago, rats were fed on pasteurised milk and died of it?
    Viscountess Astor: But children are not rats.
    Mr. Purbrick: Is the Minister aware that the suggestion contained in my Question is a fact which has been established both commercially and scientifically for many years and that it still holds good, and that pasteurisation does nothing towards destroying those bacteria which gain access to milk after it has been pasteurised?
    Mr. Brown: I think my hon. Friend has overlooked the fact that when lactic bacilli have so soured milk that it is unfit for human consumption, the growth of other organisms may be inhibited by the acid produced.
    Commander Locker-Lampson: If pasteurised milk is so bad for people, will the right hon. Gentleman feed Hitler on it?
    Dr. Russell Thomasasked the Minister of Health in view of the fact that pasteurisation is claimed to destroy the so-called bovine tubercle bacillus, what is the cause of the large number of cases of so-called bovine non-pulmonary tuberculosis in the London area where practically all the milk for domestic consumption is pasteurised?
    Mr. Brown: I know of no evidence to support my hon. Friend's suggestion that there is a large number of cases of bovine non-pulmonary tuberculosis in the London area, nor of any evidence incompatible with the supposition that the great majority of cases of non-pulmonary tuberculosis in the London area are due to human infection.
    Dr. Russell Thomas: Are not the replies of the Minister on this matter getting somewhat muddled and ought he not to seek guidance from the House instead of from the employés and lackeys of the big milk producers, the bacteriologists?
    Mr. Brown: I disagree with every single sentence of the hon. Gentleman's Question.

    Evacuated Mothers (Return Fares from Maternity Homes)
    Mr. Astorasked the Minister of Health whether he can now make any statement regarding the payment of return fares to mothers who have been sent to hospitals outside London for their confinement?
    Mr. E. BrownYes, Sir. While it is still the policy not to encourage the return to London of persons evacuated to emergency maternity homes outside London, I am making arrangements that will enable help to be given to mothers who are anxious to return but cannot pay their return fares without hardship.
    Mr. Astor: Thank you very much.

    Water Supply (Sedgefield Area)
    Mr. Leslieasked the Minister of Health whether he has considered the protests from public bodies, individuals and the hon. Member for Sedgefield, complaining of the condition of the water supply which householders in Fishburn, Ferryhill and Sedgefield have to use, which is drawn from the local mines and which creates difficulty in washing and results in the bursting of hot-water pipes; and whether he has yet decided to deal adequately with the situation?
    Mr. E. Brown: I have received representations on this matter, and I have had occasion to arrange for an inquiry to be held into certain applications which have a bearing on the point raised by my hon. Friend. He will appreciate, no doubt, that the responsibility for dealing adequately with the needs of consumers rests with the Water Board, but I will communicate further with him when I have had an opportunity of considering my Inspector's report.
    Mr. Leslie: Is the Minister aware that this has gone on for several months now and that he has actually refused the Water Board an opportunity of erecting a water

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    softener, and that there is a real danger now in people lighting fires because it may cause burst pipes?
    Mr. Brown: The hon. Member will understand that there are many more complications than that in this story, otherwise I would not have instituted an inquiry. I have received a comprehensive report and I shall be glad to talk to the hon. Member about it when I have had an opportunity fully to consider the report.

  ARMED FORCES AND CIVILIANS (PENSIONS AND GRANTS)
  Mr. Ammonasked the Minister of Pensions whether he will give the number of cases to which the Comptroller and Auditor-General has drawn attention in which persons have obtained pensions through the carelessness of officials and/or fraudulence by dishonest persons; and whether prosecutions have been instituted?
  The Minister of Pensions (Sir Walter Womersley): Full information as to our issues in the year is set out in the Notes to Subhead LL of the Appropriation Account for my Department for 1941, which has been presented to the House. It is not possible to specify the number of cases to which attention was drawn by the Comptroller and Auditor-General and not by my own Department, but these would represent a very small fraction of the total. Legal proceedings are taken in all appropriate cases.
  Mr. Tinkerasked the Minister of Pensions how many cases have been refused pensions who have passed into the Army as being medically fit and then had to be discharged on medical grounds?
  Mr. A. Edwardsasked the Minister of Pensions how many men accepted into the Services and since discharged as unfit have had pension claims disallowed as disability is not due to, or exaggerated by, war service.
  Sir W. Womersley: The figures asked for by the hon. Members would enable an estimate to be made of the numbers invalided from the Forces, and it would not be in the public interest to give them.
  Mr. John Dugdale: Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that the figures are
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  very large and show considerable hardship?
  Sir W. Womersley: No, I do not agree with either suggestion.

  INDIA

    "Calcutta Diocesan Record" (Articles)
    Mr. Dribergasked the Secretary of State for India whether he has considered the reprint sent to him of the two recent articles in the "Calcutta Diocesan Record," regarding requests by the civil police that inhabitants of a residential district in Calcutta should move elsewhere, their houses being required for brothels for the military; and whether he will inquire into the circumstances in which such action was taken?
    The Secretary of State for India (Mr. Amery): I have made inquiries and am informed that no brothels for troops have been provided by the authorities in Bengal and that there has been no question of turning residents out of their houses to make room for such establishments. The Government of India have recently stated in the Legislative Assembly that it is no part of the policy of the civil or military authorities to provide brothels for troops or to assist in such provision. Brothels in Calcutta are out of bounds to troops, and an old order to that effect was reaffirmed last June.
    Mr. Driberg: Does not the right hon. Gentleman consider that, if a responsible church publication like this and the Bishop of Calcutta make detailed and grave charges of this kind, it is evident that some official who has made a blunder is being protected and the matter is being hushed up? Will he reinvestigate and make sure that, if people have been turned out of their houses, they shall be restored to them?
    Mr. Amery: I have answered the Question in regard to the policy of the Government of India, otherwise administratively the matter is entirely within the province of the Government and Parliament of Bengal.
    Miss Rathbone: Can it really be left at that? Can this country disclaim responsibility for the disgraceful state of affairs indicated in this very serious report?
    Mr. Amery: The matter is one entirely within the powers which Parliament a good many years ago gave to the Indian Provinces.

    Convicted Prisoners, Kayyur
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for India whether he has any further information respecting the convicted prisoners in the Kayyur case?
    Mr. Amery: The facts of the case to which the hon. Member refers are that an Indian police constable who was visiting the village of Kayyur in Madras for the execution of a warrant was attacked by a mob. He was beaten and thrown into a river and then stoned until he sank and died. A number of persons were arrested and tried and four of them were sentenced to death by the Sessions Judge. The sentences were confirmed by the High Court of Madras, and the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council has recently considered and dismissed an application for special leave to appeal. A remark by the Sessions Judge that "it may be that the person who dealt the mortal blow could not with certainty be picked out of the group, or perhaps is not even before the Court" has given rise to a wholly mistaken impression that there has been a miscarriage of justice in this case. Once it is established, as it was in this case, that the act which extinguished the life of the victim was done by one or more persons in furtherance of the common intention of them all, each of them is guilty of murder even though it can never be known by whose hand life was actually extinguished.
    Mr. Sorensen: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is a certain parallel between this case and a somewhat similar case in Northern Ireland, Where some of the convicted prisoners Were reprieved? Could he say therefore whether the attention of the Viceroy has been drawn to this, and will he inquire of the Viceroy whether clemency is likely to be exercised?
    Mr. Amery: No, Sir. A petition for mercy can always be sent in on behalf of the person concerned.
    Mr. Ridley: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the legal position in which a man can be condemned to death for murder even though it has not been proved that he committed the murder?
    Mr. Amery: Any question of an appeal for clemency goes to the Viceroy. I am not aware that such an appeal has been made.
    Mr. Gallacher: Are we to understand that all who participated in the affair were equally guilty of murder but that only four are being executed? If four are being executed, why not execute the whole lot?
    Mr. Amery: That is a matter for the Judge who tried the case.

    Non-Congress Leaders (Conference, Bombay)
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for India whether he has now considered the Report of the Bombay Conference of Non-Congress leaders; and what response has been made to their plea?
    Mr. Amery: The resolution passed at the Bombay Conference contemplated an approach to the Viceroy. I am not aware that any such approach has yet been made, and in the meantime I am not prepared to make any further statement on the matter of the resolution.
    Mr. Sorensen: If these non-Congress leaders desire contact with the Congress leaders, does the right hon. Gentleman know whether the Viceroy will allow contact to be made?
    Mr. Amery: We had better wait until the resolution has been presented and then have the Viceroy's opinion on the matter.
    Mr. Edmund Harvey: Whatever the outcome of this resolution, will the right hon. Gentleman say that he continues to welcome the efforts being made by Indian leaders to get an understanding in India?
    Mr. Amery: The hon. Member raises a broad question of policy which, I understand, must be debated shortly.

  FUN FAIRS (JUVENILES)
  Sir Reginald Clarryasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been drawn to the large number of juveniles who frequent the fun fair in Newport; and whether, in view of the many cases of juvenile delinquency which come before the courts, and the unfortunate influence

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  which places of this kind have on the youth of the town, he is prepared to take steps to prevent the admission of young people to fun fairs of this kind?
  The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): I fully recognise that if young people have nothing better to do with their spare time than to idle about the streets or to go to a fun fair, there is a risk of their getting into trouble, but I am not satisfied that the remedy lies in prohibiting their admission to fun fairs. Last year I made some general inquiries about fun fairs, and after considering the representations which had been made to me, in conjunction with the reports from the police, I came to the conclusion—and so informed the House—that there were not sufficient grounds to justify me in proposing at the present time new statutory provisions with regard to these places.
  Sir R. Clarry: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that protracted correspondence with the local authorities has taken place and so far there has been no co-operation by the Home Office in the matter?
  Viscountess Astor: Will the right hon. Gentleman himself visit one of these juvenile courts and see what has happened? The Chief Constable of Plymouth, the head of the Watch Committee and everyone interested in the social welfare of children is against these fun fairs. I beg of him to remember his past.
  Mr. Morrison: We have been careful to get all the information we can about this, and really the wild and extreme allegations as to the effect of these fun fairs do not stand up. Unless there is a good case for interfering with people's enjoyments, I am not going to interfere with them.
  Mr. Thorne: Will the right hon. Gentleman continue to advise young boys and girls to join clubs to keep them out of trouble?
  Mr. Morrison: Yes, and that has been actively done by the President of the Board of Education.

  CIVIL DEFENCE

    Fire Guard Duties
    Mr. William Brownasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that the married, non-resident, full-time nursing
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    staff at the emergency hospital, Rugby, have been informed that they are to do fire-watching duties at the hospital during their off-duty time; that many of these married nurses, in addition to their hospital duties, are on emergency call throughout the 24 hours and have home duties and shopping to perform; and whether he will inquire into this matter?
    Mr. H. Morrison: Under the forthcoming Orders women will only be liable for fire guard duty at the premises at which they work where, as in the present case, there are not enough men available to carry out the arrangements. I propose at the same time to make suitable provision to ensure that women working at business premises who have heavy domestic responsibilities may be exempted from fire prevention duties at those premises.
    Mr. Sorensen: Are we not indebted to the trade unions in some measure for this modification?
    Mr. Morrison: Yes, there has been a good deal of co-operation from the trade unions.
    Mr. Messerasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that, when incendiary bombs fell recently on a building of which he has been informed, there was only one porter on duty who was available for service; that there is no allocation of staffs for fire prevention duty until 11 o'clock each night; and whether he will take steps to ensure adequate cover from 5 to 11 p.m.?
    Mr. Morrison: From preliminary inquiries it appears that three members of the staff were on fire guard duty on the occasion in question and that normally up to 11 p.m. there are two porters on fire guard duty in addition to a large number of hospital staff, all of whom have been trained in fire guard duties. These latter are available for fire guard duties in an emergency.
    Mr. Messer: If I submit a letter from the staff, will my right hon. Friend go into this matter again as his reply does not accord with my information?
    Mr. Morrison: Certainly, Sir.

    Motor Vehicles (Immobilisation)
    Mr. Ross Taylorasked the Home Secretary whether, in order that loss of time may be avoided, he will cause the

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    Regulations in regard to the locking or otherwise immobilising of motor vehicles to be relaxed at least during daylight?
    Mr. H. Morrison: I regret that I do not feel justified in adopting my hon. Friend's suggestion at the present time, but, as I stated in reply to the hon. and gallant Member for Eastbourne (Captain C. S. Taylor) on 21st January last, this matter will be reviewed from time to time in the light of current circumstances.

    Personnel (Co-operation with Home Guard)
    Lieut-Colonel Heneageasked the Home Secretary how far the Civil Defence units, especially National Fire Service, are co-operating with Home Guard duties in sparsely inhabited localities; and to what extent reciprocity has been secured?
    Mr. H. Morrison: Co-operation naturally varies according to local circumstances, but I am glad to say it is improving and in some areas is already close and effective. The Civil Defence Services can help the Home Guard by enrolling in list (ii), and several thousands of such enrolments come from the rural areas. Conversely, in many country districts Home Guards undertake training and duty in the wardens' and other services, and instructions have been issued whereby in many places the Home Guard give their assistance after air raids. In addition the Home Guard depend on the Civil Defence casualty services in case of invasion, and co-operation in this and other activities is secured by joint exercises. In the case of the National Fire Service, while the same general principles apply, the nature of the duties which firemen will have to perform in time of invasion limits the numbers who can be permitted to enrol in list (ii). A certain number have, however, been permitted to enrol, and in some areas Home Guards are being earmarked and trained as members of fire pump crews. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War and I wish to promote full co-operation between the Home Guard and the Civil Defence Services, and within the bounds of what is practicable no opportunity is lost of extending the system of mutual aid and dual training and duty.
    Lieut.-Colonel Heneage: While thanking my right hon. Friend for that reply,
    1316
    may I ask him to ensure that this information gets down to the lower ranks and is not confined to the higher ranks?
    Mr. Morrison: I will do all I can in that respect.

    Depot Superintendents, London
    Sir George Mitchesonasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been drawn to the grievances of superintendents of Civil Defence depots in the London area, who, though they are in charge of the combined service depots which comprise the heavy rescue services, have never had their status properly defined, and so have been granted neither the increases of basic pay allowed to Civil Defence personnel nor the cost-of-living bonus paid to local government officers; and will he take steps so that they may have treatment as favourable as that accorded either to Civil Defence personnel or to local government officers?
    Mr. H. Morrison: The great majority of depôt superintendents are enrolled as members of an appropriate Civil Defence service, and are employed under Civil Defence conditions. Local authorities are aware that it is open to them so to enrol the superintendents where that has not already been done. The maximum rates of pay of depôt superintendents were fixed in four grades in accordance with the responsibilities of the posts. The increases in Civil Defence pay have been authorised in full for the lower grades of superintendent. Holders of posts in the higher grades have not received the full increases because, except on the occasion of the last increase, their pay was above the rate up to which the increases in Civil Defence pay were applied.

    Fascist Signs and Slogans, North London
    Mr. Leslieasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that Fascist signs and slogans are being chalked all over North London arousing indignation on the part of local residents; and have orders been issued to the police to keep a careful watch with a view to the arrest of these Fascists?
    Mr. H. Morrison: I have no evidence to the effect that the practice is as extensive as my hon. Friend's Question suggests, but if my hon. Friend will let me have particulars, I will cause inquiries to be made.
    Mr. Leslie: Is the Minister aware that these pro-Germans actually tarred a picture of the Prime Minister the other night outside the Russian exhibition and that this is happening all over North London, according to Press reports? Surely if a few arrests were made and the people given a term of imprisonment and then internment for the rest of the war, it might have a salutary effect?
    Mr. Morrison: I can assure my hon. Friend that both I and the police are anxious to get hold of these people, and that if we do suitable legal proceedings will be taken. There is no lack of wish on the part of the authorities to make prosecutions.
    Mr. McGovern: Is it not amazing that the Labour Party are getting so anxious to put everybody in prison?
    Mr. Leslie——
    Mr. Speaker: I have already called the next Question.
    Mr. Leslie: We are really concerned about these pro-Germans.

  YOUNG PERSONS (INTOXICATING LIQUOR)
  Mr. Ammonasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been called to the increase in alcoholic drinking among young people and the consequent difficulty of licensees being able to determine whether they are of the age fixed by Statute; and what remedy does he propose to solve the problem?
  Mr. H. Morrison: I am keeping a careful watch on this matter, but the information I have been able to obtain does not support the suggestion that an amendment of the law is called for to check alcoholic drinking by young people. In connection with any statutory prohibition relating to young persons, difficulties of enforcement are liable to arise because some of them may appear to be older than their actual years; but I can find no ground for the suggestion that there is any widespread failure to comply with the prohibition against selling intoxicating liquor to persons under the age of 18 for consumption on licensed premises. The police and the licensing justices are fully conscious of the importance of seeing that this provision of the law is strictly observed.
  Mr. Ammon: Has my right hon. Friend seen a recent letter in "The Times," signed by a number of distinguished social workers, and the comments of the Chief Constable of Warrington and a large number of stipendiaries?
  Mr. Morrison: Yes, I have seen these important statements, and we have investigated them in so far as details are given, but despite our efforts I have not a great deal of evidence which would warrant me in proposing to amend the law.
  Sir Herbert Williams: Does not the right hon. Gentleman consider fun fairs a useful counter-attraction to the pubs?
  Sir Percy Harris: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider issuing a special poster calling attention to the law and to the necessity of taking care not to serve young children?
  Mr. Morrison: I will consider that.
  Mr. Gallacher: Is it not the case that the young people are following the example of their elders, and if the old people will keep out of the pubs the young people will?

  ALLIED FORCES, LONDON (CONDUCT)
  Commander Locker-Lampsonasked the Home Secretary how many arrests for drunkenness and misbehaviour in London there were on the average on Saturdays in 1942 of men serving in the Forces of the Allies; and how this compares with similar arrests on Sundays?
  Mr. H. Morrison: I regret that statistics are not available in the form asked for by my hon. and gallant Friend and could not be furnished without considerable research. In any case they would not include those cases of misbehaviour that are dealt with by the military police. I understand that, as in the case of the civilian population, drunkenness occurs less frequently among members of all Armed Forces on Sunday than on Saturday, but the number of cases on any day is relatively small. I would like to take this opportunity of paying a tribute to the public behaviour of the large majority of Allied troops in this country, which, I am informed, is most satisfactory in every respect.
  Commander Locker-Lampson: Are not these statistics evidence against the Sunday opening of theatres?
  Mr. Morrison: I do not think I had better walk into that trap.

  ALIEN REFUGEES
  Mr. Lipsonasked the Home Secretary whether visas for entry into this country are granted to victims of Nazi persecution who have been able to escape to neutral countries and who have sons serving in the British or Allied Forces?
  Mr. H. Morrison: Under war-time conditions it would not be practicable to treat the presence of an alien in this country as constituting in itself a claim for the admission of his adult relatives; and the general rule has necessarily been that the desire of an alien to bring his relatives here cannot be treated as a ground for granting the application. An exception has been made in favour of the wives and children of men serving in the British and Allied Forces, but it has not been possible to extend this to other relatives.
  Mr. Lipson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the harsh and ungenerous attitude in this matter is causing great concern to those who care for the tradition of this country as an asylum for refugees?
  Mr. Morrison: I think that that is a very ungenerous observation. This country has been exceedingly generous to refugees.
  Miss Rathbone: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there are men in this country whose parents are in Spain and are in danger of being imported to Poland and massacred if Germany invades Spain, and as some have as many as four sons serving in our Forces will they serve any better for knowing that their parents are exposed to that great and deadly risk?
  Mr. Morrison: I am sure that the sons are very glad to be here as refugees, notwithstanding the fact, or because of the fact, perhaps, that they subsequently joined His Majesty's Forces, and I cannot undertake that all their relatives can come here.
  Mr. McGovern: How does that declaration square with the declaration of the Foreign Secretary recently that all people
  1320
  who could be rescued would be rescued and given asylum here?
  Mr. Morrison: I should like to see that statement before I comment on it.
  Mr. Hannahasked the Home Secretary whether he will consider the possibility of interning in the Isle of Man refugees who can escape from the Continent and whose loyalty may be in doubt?
  Mr. Morrison: The possibility of using such limited accommodation as is still available in the Isle of Man for any fresh classes of persons whose detention may be necessary has been, and will be, kept in mind.
  Mr. Hannah: Are the Government aware that there is widespread feeling in the country that we are not doing enough for refugees from German tyranny? Only this morning I had two petitions on the subject.
  Mr. Morrison: I can only say that this country has a very fine record in the matter and has done more than any other country. This is a small country and is the base for future offensive operations.
  Mr. Harveyasked the Home Secre-Secretary whether he will supply figures showing how many visas for the United Kingdom were issued to natives or nationals of countries now dominated by the Axis Powers from the beginning of Hitler's regime in 1933 till 30th January, 1942; how many of these were issued since the outbreak of war; and how many or what proportion of those to whom visas were authorised succeeded in reaching this country?
  Mr. Morrison: Before the war nationals of most of the countries now dominated by the Axis Powers did not require visas to come to this country. Since the outbreak of war there has been a general requirement that every foreigner seeking to enter the United Kingdom shall obtain a British visa, but in numerous instances the British representatives abroad are authorised under general instructions to grant visas without referring the individual case to the Home Office. Consequently it is impracticable to give such figures as are asked for. I can, however, say that during the three years 1940, 1941 and 1942 over 50,500 nationals of countries dominated by the Axis Powers

  1321
  have been admitted to the United Kingdom as refugees. In a large proportion of these cases the circumstances in which they succeeded in reaching our shores precluded them from obtaining a British visa.

  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS (WAR-TIME RECORDS)
  Mr. De la Bèreasked the Prime Minister whether he can make a statement regarding the practice, instituted by certain Government Departments, of installing an historian to write up the history of the Department since the outbreak of hostilities; which are the Departments who have already put into force this practice; and whether it is the Government's intention to extend it to all Government Departments?
  The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill): Experience has shown the need for having available a record of the development of war-time administration of Government Departments, and that such a record cannot be adequately compiled if it is left entirely until the end of hostilities. With this object in view, a number of appointments have been made, under arrangements concerted generally by the Historical Section of the War Cabinet Office, formerly of the Committee of Imperial Defence. I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT a list of the Departments covered by these arrangements, which may be extended as thought necessary to other Departments whose war-time activities could with advantage be recorded in this way.
  Mr. De la Bère: Is there any need for the employment of historians in so many Departments, and will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that the public relations officers will not be utilised to whitewash the deeds of these various Departments during the war?
  Mr. Molson: Is it not the case that when war-time Departments were set up valuable information was found in the records of similar Departments set up in the last war?
  The Prime Minister: That is the point I was conveying in the somewhat different language of my reply.
  Mr. Shinwell: In the compilation of this history of Departments, will my right hon. Friend allow a few interpolations from outside sources?
  The Prime Minister: There is no reason why persons in unofficial positions should not compile histories of their own activities during the war, and I trust I may be given the opportunity of making some interpolations of my own.
  Mr. Thorne: Does the Prime Minister know of any historian who is compiling a history of the war day by day?
  Colonel Cazalet: Is my right hon. Friend himself compiling notes in his spare time for the great benefit of us all in future?
  The Prime Minister: My time is wholly given to the State.
  Following is the list of Departments:

  Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries.

  Ministry of Aircraft Production.

  Colonial Office.

  Ministry of Economic Warfare.

  Board of Education.

  Ministry of Food.

  Foreign Office.

  Ministry of Health.

  Home Office.

  Ministry of Home Security.

  Ministry of Labour.

  Scottish Office.

  Ministry of Supply.

  Board of Trade.

  Treasury.

  Ministry of War Transport.

  BEVERIDGE REPORT (IMPLEMENTATION)
  Mrs. Cazalet Keirasked the Prime Minister whether the Government have consulted Sir William Beveridge on the setting-up of the new machinery for implementing the recommendations of his Report.
  The Prime Minister: No, Sir.
  Mrs. Keir: In view of the fact that the Government have accepted the large majority of the Beveridge proposals, would it not be wise and useful to consult the author on the best methods of implementing his proposals?
  The Prime Minister: No, Sir.
  Sir H. Williams: Is the visit of Sir William Beveridge to the United States an act of optimism or an act of pessimism?
  Mr. Mathers: Has the Prime Minister found anyone who wishes the recom-

  1323
  mendations of the Beveridge Report to be brought into operation without qualification?
  The Prime Minister: I have not been about so much as usual.
  Mr. Clement Daviesasked the Prime Minister whether he has now any further statement to make as to the Beveridge Report and the Government's policy with regard thereto?
  The Prime Minister: I would refer the hon. and learned Member to the answer given to the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg) on 2nd March last, to which I have nothing to add.
  Mr. Granville: In view of the fact that the newspapers report that the Prime Minister is to make a broadcast, will the right hon. Gentleman take the opportunity of making his own views on the Beveridge Report known to the nation?
  The Prime Minister: I hope that I may be allowed to make my own broadcast.
  Mr. Shinwell: Is it the Government's intention to introduce during the war the proposals in the Beveridge Report which they have accepted?
  The Prime Minister: I am not prepared to add at all to the statements which were made during the three days' Debate followed by a Division which took place so recently.
  Mr. Shinwell: But as there was considerable doubt in the minds of hon. Members as to the Government's intentions in point of time, is it not possible for my right hon. Friend, who so far has not made any pronouncement on this important subject and whose opinion we should value very highly, to say whether it is intended to introduce these proposals during the war?
  The Prime Minister: I was asked a Question whether I had any further statement to make upon this subject, and I replied that I had nothing to add to the statement of my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister on 2nd March, which was to the effect that it is too soon for the Government to say when they will be able to make a further statement. Therefore, I considered that I have answered the Question on the Paper.
  Mrs. Cazalet Keirasked the Minister without Portfolio whether the small body of experienced persons who will be concerned with bringing the Beveridge proposals into legislative form has yet been appointed; and whether he can give their names?
  The Minister without Portfolio (Sir William Jowitt): As was stated in the House by my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council, the greater part of the work involved in the preparation of the necessary legislation will have to be carried out by the Departments concerned. The small central staff which, under my direction, will deal with those matters which are not the concern of any existing Department, and will co-ordinate the development of the work as a whole, has been selected. It consists of seven civil servants of standing, seconded for the most part from the Departments concerned, but as my hon. Friend will appreciate, it is not our practice to refer to civil servants by name.

  Mr. SPEAKER'S SEAT
  Wing-Commander Jamesasked the Prime Minister whether the opportunity will now be taken to review the position of the Speaker's seat?
  The Prime Minister: His Majesty's Government have no intention to review this matter at the present time. A Select Committee of this House reported on the question of Mr. Speaker's seat as recently as April, 1939. I refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the Report of that Committee. (House of Commons Paper 98 of 4th April, 1939.)
  Wing-Commander James: Will the right hon. Gentleman give further consideration to this matter, in view of the fact that experience in the Daventry Division, in which I live, has shown that while there is a general desire on the part of all parties to respect the high office and person of the Speaker, it is felt that the present system is obsolete and results in a negation of the needs of present-day representation?
  The Prime Minister: I do not agree at all. The matter was very carefully considered at the time of the last difficulty on this subject before the Report of the Committee which examined the problem,

  1325
  and it touches very deep-seated principles in the constitution of the House of Commons.
  Mr. Mander: Will the Prime Minister bear in mind that there will be very strong objection to any change in the present system from conservative-minded persons like myself?
  Mr. Ivor Thomas: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Mr. Speaker's seat requires no patching?

  AGRICULTURE

    Workers' Cottages
    Mr. De la Bèreasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the fact that at the present time four or more Ministries are interested in, and dealing with, the proposals for the erection of farm cottages for agricultural workers, he will give an assurance that effective co-ordination is being maintained, in view of the urgent national necessity for the speedy erection of these cottages?
    The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir. I am assured that proper arrangements have been made for effective co-ordination at the departmental, the regional, and the local goverment level and that preparations for the erection of these cottages are in fact proceeding as fast as possible.
    Mr. De la Bère: Is not my right hon. Friend aware that food is a most important munition of war, and does he not realise that without sufficient cottages for agricultural workers we cannot get the maximum output of food? Is not the Government's target of 3,000 cottages too small, and should it not have been 30,000 to make it adequate to the needs of the case from the point of view of the country's food supply?
    The Prime Minister: I have heard something about all those points, and I am well aware of the need for building cottages, but that need has to be fitted in with a great many other claims.
    Mr. De la Bère: Would my right hon. Friend consider having a talk with Lord Beaverbrook on this subject.
    The Prime Minister: I should be very glad to do so.

    Dairy Equipment
    Mr. De la Bèreasked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will confer with the President of the Board of Trade with a view to ensuring that the Government should allow the purchase of udder cloths and towels to be made coupon free and, in general, expedite the supply of dairy equipment, in view of the national necessity of maintaining the maximum output of milk from the farms?
    The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. R. S. Hudson): A scheme is nearing completion which will enable dairy farmers to obtain towels and udder cloths without surrendering personal clothing coupons. Production of farm dairying machinery in 1943 is expected to be considerably greater than in 1942 and should be sufficient to meet farmers' needs.
    Mr. De la Bère: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is still very great difficulty in getting dairy equipment, and will he do everything possible to expedite it, and is he not aware that the National Farmers' Union have called his attention to its many times, with no great result yet seen?

    Farms and Holdings (Tenancies)
    Mr. Ralph Ethertonasked the Minister of Agriculture how many farms he has found it necessary to take over and how many individual tenancies have been terminated by his Department under the Defence Regulations?
    Mr. Hudson: Up to 1st March, 1943, possession had been taken under Defence Regulation 51 in 5,631 cases in England and Wales, including portions of holdings, undeveloped building sites, parts of golf courses, private parks, etc. The number of farms included in the figure cannot be separately stated. In addition, the tenancies of 2,502 farmers had been terminated by notice under Defence Regulation 62, without the necessity for possession being taken.
    Mr. Etherton: Can the Minister give an assurance that he will not terminate the tenancies of any farmers without a review in his Department in London and not merely upon the advice of his regional or area officers?

    Animal Food (Yeast)
    Mr. Wootton-Daviesasked the Minister of Agriculture whether he has con-

    1327
    sidered the possibility of using yeast as an animal food for the production of milk and eggs and for the improvement of livestock generally?
    Mr. Hudson: Yes, Sir. I am sending my hon. Friend a copy of a notice recently issued by my Department.

    Workers' Motor Coaches (Drivers' Idle Time)
    Mr. Toucheasked the Minister of Agriculture whether he is aware that the drivers of motor-coaches who take agricultural workers to farms in Surrey, arriving about 8 a.m., stay with the coaches all day doing no work until the return drive in the evening; and whether he will take steps to prevent this waste of manpower?
    Mr. Hudson: I understand that the motor vehicles to which my hon. Friend refers are hired with their drivers by the Surrey War Agricultural Executive Committee for the transport of labour. The drivers are the employees of the owners of the vehicles, and neither my Department nor the Committee has any jurisdiction over them. Where possible, however, voluntary arrangements are made to employ the drivers in agriculture during the waiting period.

  DETAINEE (MARRIAGE REQUEST)
  Colonel Cazaletasked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been called to the case of a certain political detainee in Brixton Prison, whose name has been given to him, and whose request to marry his fiancée, a British subject by birth, has been refused; and whether he will reconsider this refusal, in view of the fact that it will entail the illegitimacy of their unborn child?
  Mr. H. Morrison: The man whom my hon. Friend describes as a political detainee was a German national, lived in Germany most of his life, and came here in 1938 on a German passport. He was admitted for temporary residence not as a refugee but on a claim that he had business reasons. Immediately after the outbreak of war the information available as to his associations and activities showed that his detention was necessary, but as he had just previously got himself naturalised as a citizen of the Republic of Haiti he was detained—not as
  1328
  an enemy alien—but under Regulation 18B. A few months ago he was allowed to go into hospital for an operation, and when he was convalescent the hospital authorities, I understand, allowed him to go out for short periods with a visitor, who is now said to be pregnant.
  A number of applications have from time to time been made by aliens and other persons who are detained to be allowed facilities for marriage, and I should not be justified in granting in this case a concession which has been refused in other cases. The question, therefore, is whether the general rule should be to allow facilities for marriage, whatever may be the grounds of the application, and further whether requests should be allowed for the parties to spend at least a few days together after the ceremony, or whether all such applications must be refused. After reviewing the many and varied purposes for which detained persons ask for permission to go out, either under escort or on parole, I have been forced to the conclusion that the general rule ought to be against allowing facilities for marriage.
  Although our law provides for the legitimation of children by the subsequent marriage of their parents, I am not unsympathetic to my hon. and gallant Friend's plea, but for the reasons I have stated I am sorry I do not feel able to regard the circumstances of this case as justifying an exceptional concession.
  Colonel Cazalet: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, whatever may be the faults of the parents, by his decision he is condemning an unborn child to illegitimacy; and may I plead with him that when it can be so easily avoided he ought not to visit the sins of the father and the mother upon the child?
  Mr. Morrison: I have already considered that angle of the matter, but I really do not feel sympathetic about this case, and it must be understood that when the man comes out he can marry the woman, and the child will be legitimated. He is in no worse position than a certain number of members of the British Army serving abroad.
  Colonel Cazalet: Is my right hon. Friend not aware that this child will in fact if not in law be born illegitimate?
  Commander Locker-Lampson: Has the right hon. Gentleman taken into con-

  1329
  sideration the feelings of the woman in this case and whether they do not come before any consideration respecting the man? And is it or is it not true that she is pregnant?
  Mr. Morrison: I can only say that it is claimed that she is pregnant, but I do not think there is much point in my going into the position of the woman.
  Mr. Stokes: Arising out of the right hon. Gentleman's first reply, is it not the case that detention under Regulation 18B is regarded only as preventive and not punitive, but that in the circumstances of this case his ruling makes it punitive?
  Mr. Morrison: In this case it evidently was not preventive.

  BRITISH NATIONAL PARTY
  Mr. Ivor Thomasasked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that the British National Party is seeking to stir up racial prejudice and to bring about a negotiated peace; and whether he proposes to take any action with regard to it?
  Mr. H. Morrison: I am well-informed about this organisation, and if there were any danger of a revival, through its agency, of activities similar to those of the British Union, I should have no hesitation in taking appropriate action. But there has been gross exaggeration with regard to this group of people. It is a small body with about 100 members which in no way merits the importance which has recently been attributed to it, and which tends to give it a needless advertisement. The House can rest assured that a close watch is kept over all activities which may become injurious to the war effort, and that there will be no failure to take whatever action is necessary for purposes of public security.
  Mr. Driberg: Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that this organisation was able recently to secure a large London theatre for a meeting, and that the meeting was cancelled only as a result of the publicity given to it in this House, although we had not advertised the body by name?
  Mr. Morrison: It is not an offence for anybody to book a public hall. If this body ought to be suppressed, it is my
  1330
  responsibility to do it. I do not think that arrests are called for in this case, at any rate yet. Life is getting difficult for the Home Secretary, who is denounced as a tyrant sometimes and the next second is being pushed into more tyranny.
  Mr. Driberg: Has the right hon. Gentleman considered the documents about this party which I sent him, at his request, and do they not indicate clearly the treasonable nature of its activities or intentions?
  Mr. Morrison: Yes, Sir. I have seen those documents, and, believe me, I have seen a lot of other documents too which my hon. Friend has not seen. I agree as to the potentialities in this matter. If there is public cause, I will crush this body, but I do not want to crush anybody unless there is good public reason.

  DETAINEES AND INTERNEES, ISLE OF MAN
  Mr. Harveyasked the Home Secretary how many aliens were in internment or detention camps in the Isle of Man at the beginning of March, or other near date, in 1941, 1942 and 1943?
  Mr. H. Morrison: The numbers for the beginning of March in each of the three years are as follow: 1941, 8253; 1942, 4036; 1943, 3369. These figures do not inclure children living with their parents in the camps, some of whom are British-born.

FLOWERS BY RAIL (CONCESSION)
The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport (Mr. Noel-Baker): My hon. and gallant Friends the Members for Ormskirk (Commander King-Hall) and Holland with Boston (Mr. Butcher), together with other hon. Members, have asked me a number of Questions in recent weeks concerning the transport of flowers by rail, and I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for giving me this opportunity of making this statement on a matter which has been of interest to them, and to the whole House.
The Government have reviewed the present arrangements, and have decided that the lengthening hours of daylight will make it possible, subject to the conditions which I will indicate, for some flowers to be carried by rail. The Transport of

1331
Flowers Order is, therefore, being suspended as from 25th March, and during the summer months. This suspension of the Order does not, however, mean a return to the conditions which existed before it was introduced. On the contrary, it must be clearly understood that the carriage of flowers will be subject not only to the state of railway traffic, but also to the following special conditions.

First: no special or additional trains will be run for the carriage of flowers.

Second: flowers or plants will only be carried subject to the prior claims of perishable foodstuffs and other essential traffic.

Third: flowers or plants will not be carried in any case where a reduction in the accommodation for passengers would be involved.

Unless these conditions can be fulfilled, flowers will not be accepted for conveyance. Thus they will not be carried on heavily occupied lines. No guarantee can be given of conveyance by any particular service, and conveyance will be only at owner's risk. Growers must, therefore, ascertain from local railway officials what services are likely to be available before they arrange to present their consignments. These new conditions do not, of course, apply to plants for producing food crops, or to those forms of hardy nursery stock which are excluded from the operation of the present Order. These plants, bushes, shrubs and trees, will continue to be carried as they have been hitherto. The Directions required to give effect to these arrangements are being issued to the railways without delay.
I must add this warning to the House and to the public. While my Noble Friend has been glad to make these small concessions for the transport of flowers, it must not be assumed that the need for the strictest economy in the use of all forms of transport has become less urgent than it has been in the recent past.
Commander King-Hall: Is my hon. Friend aware that his statement will give great satisfaction to thousands of flower lovers, while the restoration of this amenity will not detract from the war effort?
Sir H. Williams: Will the Postmaster-General also modify his prohibition of the
1332
conveyance of flowers by parcel post? Will the Minister ask the Home Secretary also to review the very heavy penalties imposed for offences which happened only a day after the Order was issued, and in which a number of people were arrested and very heavy fines were imposed upon them?
Mr. Noel-Baker: I understand that it will not be possible for the Postmaster-General to relax his present Order. In regard to the second Question, the hon. Member will no doubt remember that the penalties were imposed under the Defence Regulations and were for offences which were certainly most unpublic-spirited.
Mr. Shinwell: Was it necessary to modify the original Order? Is it not a terrible commentary on our proceedings that we should be modifying the decision of the Government in this matter at a time when we are asking men to sacrifice their lives?
Mr. Noel-Baker: No, Sir, I do not admit that at all. We have made a very considerable economy of transport during the winter by this Order. Conditions in the summer are quite different. I am sure that my hon. Friend would not ask us to impose austerity for austerity's sake. I hope he will recognise that this arrangement now proposed will, broadly speaking, permit the use of carrying capacity which otherwise would be unused.
Sir H. Williams: May I press the Minister further on this point? Is he aware that when the Order was published the only public reference to it was five lines in "The Times" newspaper, and that next day four people, who were totally unaware of the existence of the Order, were arrested at Paddington Station and that fines up to £75 were imposed?
Mr. Noel-Baker: That is obviously a matter with which I cannot deal now. I hope my hon. Friend will realise that travelling for the carriage of flowers in order to obtain high profiteering prices is an anti-social abuse that we ought to stop.
Mr. Butcher: Is not the Minister aware that many ex-service men from the late war are engaged in flower growing and that they will thank him for his reconsideration of policy? Will he also ask his Noble Friend not to be too impressed with the criticisms of the hon. Member for Seaham (Mr. Shinwell)?
Mr. Shinwell: I shall continue to indulge in that criticism.
Sir Joseph Lamb: Further, with regard to the Post Office, may we know whether the hon. Gentleman will be in communication with the Postmaster-General, and whether it is absolutely certain that no relaxation of the Order with regard to the carriage of flowers by post will be made?
Mr. Noel-Baker: Certainly, I will consult with the Postmaster-General, and I believe I am right in saying that it is not absolutely finally settled.
Mr. Thorne: Have we any control over the price of flowers? Is my hon. Friend aware that at Upton Park railway station, daffodils were being sold at 6s. 6d. per bunch of four?
Mr. Noel-Baker: I am aware that there is a very undesirable profiteering in flowers, but my hon. Friend will recognise that it is an extremely difficult matter to deal with. Obviously it cannot be stopped through the transport system, and it would therefore fall within the competence of another Department; but it is in fact being considered whether it will be possible to overcome the difficulty.
Mr. De la Bère: Is my hon. Friend aware that the prime cause of all this trouble was the hasty and unfortunate drafting of the Order in connection with flowers?
Mr. Noel-Baker: I do not at all accept the criticism of my hon. Friend.
Mrs. Rathbone: Why all this fuss about a luxury for the well-to-do? The hon. Gentleman ought to take strong steps to see that prices are reduced.
Mr. Gallacher: This is all a waste of time.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. Arthur Greenwood: Will the Prime Minister state the Business for the next series of Sittings? I understand that the White Paper on India is in course of being printed, and I think it would be convenient to the House to know at the same time when it will be in the hands of Members.
The Prime Minister: The Paper on India is with the printers now, and it will be printed and circulated early next week.
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The Business for the next series of Sittings will be as follows:
First Sitting Day—Committee and Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill. A Debate on War Pensions will take place. I understand that is a subject which interests hon. Members in all quarters of the House.
Second Sitting Day—Second Reading of the Nurses Bill. This Bill was presented yesterday, and copies are now available in the Vote Office; Second Reading of the Housing (Agricultural Population) (Scotland) Bill, and of the Army and Air Force (Annual) Bill; and, if there is time, Committee stage of the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Bill, which has come to us from the Lords.
Third Sitting Day—Committee stage of the Catering Wages Bill.
Mr. W. Brown: I understand it will not be possible for us, in the next series of Sittings, to have, on the Nurses Bill, a discussion on the terms of the Rushcliffe Committee Report, because the Nurses Bill is couched in very narrow terms. In these circumstances may I ask when the right hon. Gentleman thinks it will be possible for the House to have a discussion on the Rushcliffe Report?
The Prime Minister: I understand that notice has been given by an hon. Member of his intention to raise this point on the Adjournment.
Mr. Granville: In view of the fact that the Secretary of State for Air gave an undertaking last week that we would have a full day for the discussion of civil aviation, would the right hon. Gentleman consider placing that high on the priority list for debate in the future?
Mr. W. Brown: Is the Prime Minister aware that the Leader of the House a fortnight or so ago did promise us facilities for a Debate on the Rushcliffe Committee Report? Are we to understand that that opportunity is to be taken from the House as a whole because one hon. Member proposes to raise it on the Adjournment?
The Prime Minister: I understand that there was no definite promise but only a conditional undertaking to be guided by the feeling of the House in the matter.
Mr. Maxton: Does the Prime Minister really think he can continue to get distinguished Members of the other place to become chairmen of committees, and labour on these committees and produce reports, to have them dealt with in this House by a private Member raising them on the Adjournment? Surely, that is not a proper way for the Prime Minister to treat a Committee which his own Government have set up.
The Prime Minister: The Upper House receives continued refreshment and fortification and is able, I think, to bear the strain implied in the situation which has now arisen, more especially as I understand that the recommendations of the Report are to be put into effect on 1st April.
Mr. Sorensen: Has the Prime Minister conferred with the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Colonies with a view to a continuation of the Debate on the West Indies and the Jamaica Constitution which we had this week?
The Prime Minister: I am dealing to-day only with the Business for the next series of Sittings.
Mr. Messer: On a point of Order. In view of the fact that I gave notice that I would raise on the Adjournment the question of the ward sisters that was contained in the recommendations of the Rushcliffe Committee, do I understand that it is going to prevent a Debate on the whole Report? If so, I want to withdraw my notice to raise it. I was only dealing with the sisters in the Report and not with the whole Report.
Mr. Speaker: I have some direction on such matters. The fact that the hon. Member had given Notice for an Adjournment would not prevent a Debate on the Report on the ground of anticipation.
Mr. Greenwood: Would it not be better if this problem was discussed through the usual channels?
Mr. Glenvil Halt: Is the Rule to be suspended on the day we discuss war pensions? Very many people will want to take part.
The Prime Minister: We will consider that.
Mr. Stokes: I understand we are to have a White Paper on post-war currency and other financial questions now being considered in the Treasury and by the United Nations. Can the Prime Minister give us any indication when that will be published, and in view of the Chancellor's assurance that no decision will be come to without consulting this House, when there will be an opportunity for debating it here?
The Prime Minister: It will be published as quickly as possible.
Captain C. S. Taylor: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider postponing the Committee stage of the Catering Wages Bill to the following series of Sittings? My right hon. Friend who has taken such a large part in the discussions on this Bill is indisposed at the present time, and I cannot believe that there can be any real desire to rush this Bill, and we were promised that there would be a reasonable time.
The Prime Minister: Over five weeks have passed since this Bill was read a Second time. In my experience, that is quite an exceptionally long time to intervene, and this long delay has been arranged in order that the differences might be reduced as far as possible. I certainly feel that we have now reached the point at which we have to come to grips with this question.
Mr. Gallacher: I wish to ask the Prime Minister whether he will not seriously consider giving an extra day in the next series of Sittings so that we can have a discussion on the war situation. Are these discussions to be left entirely to the other place?
The Prime Minister: I do not think it would be desirable to have a discussion on the war situation in this coming series of Sittings. As to the future, naturally if there is any need and occasion for a further statement from me, I should be ready to give one, even though it was rather a short one, and to give opportunity for discussion, but I am not contemplating it in the next series of Sittings.
Mr. Gallacher: There is a lot of need just now.
Captain Cunningham-Reid: As there seems to be a certain amount of confusion about the differentiation (between Nazis and Germans generally, would the Prime

1337
Minister consider giving the House an opportunity of debating this subject and also other matters concerning post-war Germany?
The Prime Minister: I fear that the contributions of some hon. Members might well add to the prevailing confusion.

CONSOLIDATION BILLS
Report from the Joint Committee with Minutes of Evidence in respect of the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill [Lords] (pending in the Lords), brought up and read; to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 66.]
CHAIRMEN'S PANEL
In pursuance of Standing Order No. 80 (4), Mr. SPEAKER has nominated Charles George Ammon, Esquire, a member of the Chairmen's Panel, in the room of Major James Milner, M.C., now Chairman of Ways and Means.
ORDERS OF THE DAY
  CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 2) BILL
  Read a Second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House for the next Sitting Day.

  FOREIGN SERVICE (REFORM)
  The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Richard Law): I beg to move:
  "That this House approves the proposals of His Majesty's Government for the Reform of the Foreign Service contained in Command Paper No. 6420."
  It is a matter of very great regret to me, and I am sure it will be to the House, that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is not in his place to-day. My right hon. Friend has for a large number of years taken a very great interest in the important problem which we are to discuss to-day. I suppose that no man now living has a wider experience of foreign affairs than he from both the technical and the political angles. As the House knows, his connection with the Foreign Office began as long ago as 1926, when he was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the late Sir Austen Chamberlain, and since that time, with a few comparatively brief intermissions, he has been connected with the Foreign Office. It was a matter of deep regret, indeed of deep disappointment, to my right hon. Friend that he was not able to be here to launch these reforms, which owe their being entirely to his inspiration, his imagination and his enthusiasm, and I am sure the House will share his disappointment. I hope too that the House will give me its understanding and its patience in the difficult task which is facing me to-day.
  Before I deal with the proposals in the White Paper, there are one or two general observations which I would like to make and which will, I hope, give something of
  1358
  the background of this problem and something of what was in my right hon. Friend's mind—as far as I am able to interpret it—when he conceived this scheme of reform. First, I would ask myself one or two questions and suggest that hon. Members should put the same questions to themselves. What is the necessity for a reform of the Foreign Service to-day; what are the weaknesses of the Foreign Service, and in what ways can that Service be strengthened? I believe there is a great deal of muddled thinking about the Foreign Service and the part which it plays in our affairs—muddled thinking of a kind which is exemplified by a story that had a certain currency during the early days of the war. It is said that two young officers were travelling in a train and were beguiling the tedium of the journey with a discussion on the higher strategy of the war. One maintained that the war would be won by air power. The other maintained as stoutly that it was going to be just like the last war, with vast land forces immobilised in trench warfare. Thus the discussion went on, and as the train was drawing into the terminus and the passengers were getting their luggage out of the racks, a distinguished-looking gentleman, neatly clad in black coat and striped trousers, who had been sitting in the corner, turned to the two young officers and said to them that he had been much interested in their discussion, adding, "I hope you realise that if it had not been for us, you would not have had your silly old war at all. I come from the Foreign Office."
  That is not a true story. On the other hand, a number of people believe it to be true—at any rate in the sense that a parable is true. A great many people believe that the Foreign Office is responsible for the formulation of foreign policy and is, in large degree, the final arbiter of peace or war. That is not the case. It may be said that our foreign policy between the two wars was mistaken. Speaking from this vantage-point of time, I would say myself that it was tragically mistaken, and I think probably all hon. Members of this House would agree with me, though the basis of their agreement might be different from mine. But the responsibility for that foreign policy was not the responsibility of the Foreign Service. It was the responsibility of the Cabinet, of the Government, of this House of Commons and of the

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  people of this country. It is easy enough to find scapegoats, but one has to remember that the scapegoat itself is an innocent creature which symbolises and represents the guilt of other people. The Foreign Service has been held up as the scapegoat for the disasters that have fallen upon us, but, as I have said, the Foreign Service is not responsible for policy. Policy is the responsibility of the Cabinet, and the Cabinet is responsible to this House, and, what is more, the Cabinet is responsive to this House, and when we think of the things that happened between the two wars, it would be well for us in this House to remember that.
  If the formulation of policy is not the function of the Foreign Service, what then is its function? I would say that 80 per cent. of the work of the Foreign Service, both here in London at the Foreign Office and in missions abroad, is taken up with the settlement of quite unimportant arguments and disputes between His Majesty's Government and foreign Governments, between British interests and the interests of other countries—disputes of the kind for which in ordinary life we employ on either side solicitors, in order to clear up any matters in dispute without any necessity of litigation. Eighty per cent. of the work of the Foreign Service is that rather humdrum, dreary, routine, but highly important work.
  So far as foreign policy itself is concerned, the Foreign Service has a double function. In the first place, it is the duty of the Foreign Service to advise His Majesty's Government and to give the Cabinet a background of information about foreign countries. In the second place, it is the function of the Foreign Service to represent His Majesty's Government and this country in foreign countries, to try to put across the policy, whatever it may be, upon which the Cabinet is determined in those countries, to try to promote British interests, of which international peace and international understanding are the most important, and to do that within the limits set out, not by Foreign Office officials, but by the Cabinet. I say within those limits advisedly, because, obviously, if it is the policy of the Cabinet to appease a foreign country, nothing that the Foreign Service official
  1360
  can do can alter that policy, and, equally, if it is the policy of His Majesty's Government to be firm, there is nothing that the Foreign Office official can do to placate. The function of the Foreign Service, therefore, is in the main interpretative rather than positive. The Foreign Service man is not a principal; he is only the agency of His Majesty's Government. I do not think it is possible to over-emphasise that point, for it is a point of which the House is aware but of which the public is not fully aware.
  If that is the position, if the Foreign Service is not responsible for the formulation of foreign policy, one might ask: "Why all this fuss and bother; why bother to reform the Foreign Service at all?" I will try to give some of the reasons of my right hon. Friend. My right hon. Friend is not proposing Foreign Service reform because in his view the Foreign Service is inefficient. In the view of my right hon. Friend, in my view, and, I think, in the view of everybody who has seriously considered the problem, the Foreign Service has been and is extremely efficient. The reason is simply that time marches on, that conditions change, that even the best machine has to be brought up to date and remodelled from time to time. The Foreign Service is a very good example of that. From the day in 1782 when the Foreign Office first began, when the Secretary of State for the Southern Department and the Secretary of State for the Northern Department were abolished and their places taken by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, there has been a considerable series of reforms, the last of which was made at the time of the last war. If there has been a necessity in the past to reform the Foreign Service, in the sense of bringing it up to date, there is more necessity to-day, because in the lifetime of the youngest Member of this Parliament world conditions generally have completely changed, and in particular the conditions with which the Foreign Office is called upon to deal. It is said that the human body renews itself in every tissue every seven years. Something like that has happened in the last generation to the whole structure of human society. It is vital that every one of our Services, and especally the Foreign Service, should be remodelled to take account of those new conditions.

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  I conceive that there are two main changes which have taken place and which vitally affect the conduct of our international affairs. The first is the disappearance of what, for lack of a better term, one might call the governing class. That class has disappeared everywhere. Until relatively recently, in every Western country there was a small and restricted class which was responsible for the government and for the policy of that country. In every country that class was the same. It had the same traditions, the same outlook, the same standards of education and of values. In those days it was necessary only that our diplomats should be members of the governing class. Indeed, in those days it was essential that they should be members of that restricted class, because if they were not, they would have had very little influence in the countries to which they were accredited. Then the hunting ground of the diplomats and the Foreign Office officials consisted of a few drawing rooms and a few odd chancelleries. The general field of human affairs in the country in which he worked was something beyond his ken and beyond his responsibility. I would mislead the House if I tried to suggest that members of the Foreign Service to-day were drawn from so restricted a class, or were so restricted in their ideas. For a long time the net has been cast very widely. But tendencies which were well-marked before the war will certainly become even more definite in the post-war period, and it Would be desirable that every member of our Foreign Service should be in the fullest possible sense representative of our whole nation, of every class and section of the community, and that he should be able to deal in the country to which he is accredited with the whole nation, irrespective of class and outlook. That is one great change.
  There is another, perhaps an even greater, change that has come about. I mean, the fusion of politics and economics in foreign affairs. That is very much in the public mind and is very widely discussed in the Press. In one sense there has never been any distinction. The influence of economics has always been imposed upon politics. Indeed, it is just a little more than 100 years since Mr. Disraeli introduced into this House a Motion advocating the amalgamation of the Consular and Diplomatic bodies, and Mr. Disraeli urged that the distinction be-
  1362
  tween politics and commerce had become altogether blurred. Mr. Disraeli's Motion was rejected, but it is curious to reflect that a century later the Foreign Office spokesman is advocating the same thing for the same reasons. Perhaps it is not so curious as it sounds, because I suppose the House generally would agree that the Tory Party is always about 100 years ahead of contemporary thought. The day has quite clearly gone for ever when the diplomat can concern himself solely with those fascinating questions of high policy and leave the bread and butter questions of economics to more vulgar minus. The stuff of which our international relationships is made is becoming increasingly economic as well as political, and economics are all the time playing a more important part.
  But there is something more than that. Just as the distinction has been blurred between politics and economics, so, in a sense, is the distinction blurred between home affairs and foreign affairs. The well-being of the people of this country here at home, leaving aside any question of peace and war, depends very largely upon the degree to which we can nourish and revive our export trade. The Foreign Service in the future will have to give all the help it can to our exporters; it will have to do everything it can to revive, develop and increase our export trade. And so the duties of the Foreign Service now, quite apart from international relations, though they are important enough, are extremely important because of our whole standard of life here, of our standard of education, housing and social security. Our whole lives here depend fundamentally upon the chances of our reviving our export trade. That is one of the reasons, I have no doubt, why many people have taken the view, in the Press and elsewhere, that the Foreign Service is now due for an eclipse and that it will be eclipsed by other great Departments of State which bear more intimately upon our lives here in this country. That is not my view, and it is not the view of my right hon. Friend. These modern tendencies which I have been attempting to describe—the mixture of politics and economics, the mixture of home affairs and foreign affairs—only mean that the work which the Foreign Service has to do is more important and that the Foreign Service must be made even more efficient

  1363
  than it is to-day, and that is one of the main purposes of my right hon. Friend's proposal.
  But there is one other difference in conditions to-day from conditions a generation or two generations ago, and that is this. There was a time when it could be said with truth that the objectives of our foreign policy were simply the prevention of war. That is no longer the case. When this war is over we have to do something more than merely prevent war. We have to create peace. We have to create those conditions of confidence, development and expansion in which men and women in this country and in every other country can take advantage, as they did not take advantage in the period between the two wars, of the marvellous inheritance which is awaiting mankind if only it can have the sense to seize it.
  It is against this background that I would ask the House to consider the proposals of my right hon. Friend. In every one of these proposals my right hon. Friend has had these considerations in mind. Each one of these proposals is designed to ensure that the Foreign Service can take advantage of the new conditions which have arisen in the world; each one of these proposals is designed to show that the Foreign Service is aware that even greater responsibilities will fall upon it in the future than in the past; each one of these proposals is designed to tighten up the efficiency of the Service and to make it as effective a service to the country as it possibly can be. The first of my right hon. Friend's proposals for the reorganisation of the Foreign Service—I would refer to the White Paper—is for the creation of a new Combined Foreign Service separated from the Home Civil Service and treated as a self-contained and distinct service of the Crown.
  The first proposal of this new Service relates to the amalgamation of the Consular, the Commercial Diplomatic, and the Diplomatic Services. I would say, in passing, that my right hon. Friend attaches very great importance to the separation of the Foreign Service from the Home Civil Service for this reason. At the present time members of the Foreign Service spend part of their lives abroad and part of their lives in London at the Foreign Office. When they are abroad
  1364
  they are members of a separate and self-contained Service—the Foreign Service—but when they are in London they are assimilated very largely to the conditions of the Home Civil Service, and that means in effect that the Foreign Secretary is prevented, because of the differences in conditions at home and abroad, among other reasons, from moving a man freely from one post to another according to the needs of the moment and the efficiency of the individual. Very often we have to keep a man abroad because he cannot fit in at home. As things are now, very often the Foreign Secretary's whole freedom of action is very largely confined.
  The White Paper deals with the reasons for the amalgamation of the three Services, and I hope that the House will consider that these reasons are sound. There will always be a distinction of function between the Consular work, the Commercial Diplomatic work and the Diplomatic work pure and simple. They are different kinds of jobs, and they will require different kinds of people to do them, but even though there is this difference, it will not be obliterated by anything that my right hon. Friend proposes. It is, in his view, of the greatest importance that there should be the fullest possible interchange and the fullest possible fusion between the three branches of the Service, and for this he has three main reasons. In the first place, present conditions are extremely unfair in this respect, that some men spend the whole of their careers in the most interesting and fascinating political posts in the great capitals of the world, whereas other men are condemned to spend the whole of their careers in some dark and gloomy outpost where there is very little political interest and very little excitement of any kind, and, from the point of view of fairness and of the spirit of the Service as a whole, that is not at all a satisfactory arrangement. That is the first reason.
  The second reason is, that it is vitally important, if you are to have this new Service and if you are to have the right spirit in that Service, that the highest posts should be open to every member of the Service, from whatever branch of it he comes. The third reason is, that it is vitally important that every member of the Service, in whatever branch he may be working, should have, as far as possible, an all-round knowledge of

  1365
  foreign affairs as a whole; that is to say, that the political diplomat should have knowledge and understanding of economic questions and that the consular and commercial diplomat should have equal knowledge and understanding of the political background of the perhaps more technical questions with which he is dealing. Of course, it will not be possible to have an amalgamation of the Services in the sense that every man who enters the new Service will spend a third of his life in the Consular Service, a third of his life in the Diplomatic and a third of his life in the Commercial Diplomatic. That will not be possible, nor would it be desirable. In fact, it will be found that some men have a special aptitude for commercial and consular work and others a special aptitude for political work, and eventually each one will settle down to his own speciality. But it is intended that in the early part of his career every man shall have some period of service in each of the three branches of the Service, and that, in my right hon. Friend's view—and I hope that the House will agree with him—should be definitely to the advantage of the Service as a whole.
  Now there are three great advantages which should accrue from the amalgamation of the three Services. You cannot have great advantages without having some compensating disadvantages, and I would like to say a word or two about those disadvantages. In the first place, if you have a Foreign Service of 700 men and it is your intention that each one of those men shall serve at one time or another in each of the three branches and that each one shall serve a period in London so that he will know this country as well as foreign countries, it is possible that the spells of duty of any given Foreign Service man in London will be very short and that, in consequence, he will not have that knowledge of conditions in this country that he must have if he is effectively to represent this country abroad. My right hon. Friend is aware of that danger and hopes that it will be possible to bring men home from time to time for short refresher courses both in the Foreign Office and, if possible, in other Government Departments, where they will get a background of knowledge which will be useful to them when they go abroad again. Another obvious difficulty about amalgamation is that if it takes place on the pre-war basis, the Consular
  1366
  officials would together outswamp the Diplomatic, and if we are to get a combined and effective Service, that is not at all desirable.
  My right hon. Friend is, therefore, proposing to mitigate that disadvantage in the following ways: He proposes, first of all, to make an increase in the diplomatic posts. As I shall say in a few minutes, our diplomacy has suffered very much in the past from understaffing. My right hon. Friend proposes to make some reduction in the Consular posts. I would not like it to be thought that because he proposes to make this reduction he sets no value, or very little value, upon the work which our Consuls are doing all over the world. That is not the case at all; he sets great store by that work. He proposes to make up for the reduction in the Consuls partly by regrouping the existing Consular posts so that the Consular posts in any given country will be rationalised, as it were, and brought into more intimate and reasonable contact with the head of the Mission in that country and partly by promoting to some of the existing, or pre-war, posts men in subordinate grades of the Foreign Service for whom adequate avenues of promotion are not at present open.
  My right hon. Friend, therefore, feels that, in spite of the disadvantages, the advantages of amalgamation are very considerable and that it should not be rejected. The amalgamation, we hope, will mean that the Service as a whole will be inspired with a new spirit and that the members of it will have more ambition and will face their work and problems with much wider experience than they have possessed in the past. There is one other disadvantage that may result from the amalgamation and which has to be guarded against. It is the possibility of our losing the expert knowledge of the Far East and Oriental countries generally upon which the Foreign Service has always prided itself, and with justice. My right hon. Friend intends that where men are selected for Oriental and Eastern posts and have served there for three, four or five years, or whatever term it might be, they will return to a Western country, so that you will not get, as has sometimes happened in the past, people who are complete and absolute specialists on the Far East, but who have little or no knowledge of conditions in the Western

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  world. My right hon. Friend is determined that our Far Eastern experts, when they have done their preliminary years of training in the Far East, shall be brought back into contact with the Western world again, so that when they go back to the Far East they will have knowledge, not only of Far Eastern politics and ways of life, but of world politics as a whole. I would like to say, too, that my right hon. Friend is deeply conscious of the importance in the future of' Latin America and will take steps to develop and improve the Foreign Service throughout the American Continent.
  The second section of the White Paper, that which deals with recruitment and training, is, possibly, the most important part of the White Paper, but it is so clearly explained that I do not think I need detain the House for very long with it. It is clear from the White Paper what the purpose of this proposal is. The purpose of Section II is simply this: First, no young man of ability, personality and character will be prevented from going into the Foreign Service through any lack of means. Second, every young man who does go into the Foreign Service shall receive the fullest possible training and grounding, not only in foreign languages, but in commercial and economic practice, trade union law and so forth. If we are to throw open the Foreign Service to men without means—and I do not know, if we do not, where we should find men with means to make a start—it will not be much good unless we see to it that when they get into the Foreign Service they are enabled to live decently and do a decent job on their pay. That is the reason for the proposals of Section III of the White Paper.
  I would like to elaborate slightly the arguments in Section III, I do not know whether any hon. Members have been aware of how woefully understaffed the Foreign Service has been in the past. There have been few Diplomatic posts where there have been more than two Diplomatic Secretaries and a great many where there have been no Diplomatic Secretaries. In the 50 Missions abroad, which existed before the war, there was a total trained staff of about 130, or some-thing like two and a half trained diplomats to run every Mission. In these conditions it is not possible to run an effective Foreign Service, and my right hon.
  1368
  Friend is determined that when these reforms become effective after the war our diplomats abroad shall be sufficiently numerous that each one will not have to spend the whole of his time wrestling with mountains of paper on his desk, but, in addition to the head of the Mission himself, will have time to go about among the people of the country, get a full grasp of their interests and outlook and also be able to keep in touch with British residents in that country.
  At the present time, as I said earlier, it is very difficult for the Foreign Secretary to move people freely between posts abroad and posts at home, and for that reason my right hon. Friend makes the proposals which are outlined in Section III. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has very kindly agreed to my right hon. Friend's proposals, but I would like to say to the House that his generosity is not unique among Chancellors of the Exchequer, because this principle of allowances for men serving in the Foreign Office is an old one. In the 18th century the Permanent Under-Secretary had an allowance which was vastly in excess of his official emoluments; he was also open to the reception of various interesting gifts, for example, a cargo of fresh herrings, which would be very agreeable to see in the Foreign Office to-day, or a parcel of rhubarb. It may be interesting to some of my hon. Friends to know that the funds from which this allowance was derived in the 18th century were devoted, among other things, to the killing and apprehension of Tories.
  Viscountess Astor: To what?
  Mr. Law: To Tories, like my noble Friend. But I understand that that is not my right hon. Friend's intention at this time. Before I come to the last of the major proposals in this Bill, I would ask hon. Members to pay particular attention to the proposals, in Section VI of the White Paper, for the subordinate staff. The position in the Foreign Service in this respect has not been satisfactory in the past. The Foreign Service has consisted of an army of officers, and an army of officers is not, probably, very good. It is my right hon. Friend's intention to see that the subordinate staffs are brought into the Foreign Service in a way that they are not now and that we have an army in which every soldier, whether

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  officer or private, will owe full loyalty to the army and will have open to him honourable avenues of ambition and promotion.
  Now I come to the superannuation provisions of Section V. This is a point which has evoked the greatest interest in the House and outside it. I think the House is familiar with the existing position, which is that the Foreign Secretary has power to retire a man on pension before the age of 60 if he falls ill but has no power to retire a man on pension if he is just not up to his job. In every walk of life people go into a service, and perhaps after 10, 15 or 20 years their energy seems to go; they do not seem to fulfil the promise of their early youth, and either they have to be dismissed, or put into posts for which they are unsuited or stay in their present posts and clutter up the avenues of promotion. In the past, owing to the inability of the Foreign Secretary to pension off a man of this character, there has grown up the custom of sending men like that to unimportant posts or, at any rate, posts considered to be unimportant. That was a bad policy before the war and would be a fatal policy after the war. Who can say that any post in the world is going to be unimportant? The Foreign Service after the war will want in every post the very best possible man.
  Viscountess Astor: Or woman.
  Mr. Law: The very best possible man. I will go into that matter later. It will want in every post the best possible candidate.
  Viscountess Astor: That is better.
  Mr. Law: The purpose of the Bill, which I will not anticipate, will be to give the Foreign Secretary powers to pension off members of the Foreign Service who have been faithful and devoted servants, who have committed no crime, who have been excellent subordinates, but who are not quite fitted to take the posts of the highest responsibility. This, of course, makes an alteration in the condition of service, because at the present time, when a man enters the Foreign Service, he has the expectation that if he commits no crime and his health holds out, he will go on in the Foreign Service until he reaches the age of 60; and in these circumstances it is proposed that there should be a very slight increase both in the pension
  1370
  and in the lump sum awarded to the official who retires.
  Mr. William Brown: According to the terms of the White Paper, the provision for retirement with accrued pension rights is only to operate in the case of officers with the rank of First Secretary or above. I approve of this proposal, but why is its scope so much restricted? Why not cover all the officers?
  Mr. Law: I think the reason probably is that these proposals are hardly likely to apply to a man unless he gets above the post of First Secretary. I think that the critical time, as it were, in the life of a Foreign Office official, or indeed in the life of any of us, is when the first enthusiasm of life has gone, when we reach 40 or 45—[Interruption.] It affects me, too. I do not say that people come to an end when they reach the age of 40 or 45; I say that the first flush of youthful enthusiasm goes. When we get beyond that age, the more robust and the wiser of us substitute for that youthful enthusiasm mature and experienced enthusiasm. It is for those people who do not make that substitution that these proposals are desired. These proposals do not give the Foreign Secretary any powers he has not got at the present time. Theoretically he can get rid of any man he pleases, but the Foreign Secretary would have to be a very hard-hearted man and a very disagreeable man if, in present circumstances, he were willing or anxious to get rid of men who have given many years of faithful service and who suffer from no faults of character, or indeed of intellect, but are just no longer suitable for the highest posts. It is a matter of some importance as to how this power will be exercised, and it is very important that the Service should understand that there will be no chance of the Foreign Secretary exercising his powers tyrannically. I think I can give the House that assurance. The White Paper refers to a special board under the chairmanship of a former senior member of the Service. The proposals for this Board have not yet been fully worked out but the House may rest assured that we shall take care to see that, however that proposal is finally worked out, a balance is maintained between possible tyranny on the part of the Foreign Secretary on the one hand and, on the other hand, the Foreign

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  Secretary's ability, which is obviously absolutely necessary, to be master in his own house.
  I have left to the last the most formidable of the hurdles in the course which I have set myself. I can only hope I shall be able somehow to scramble over it without anything worse than a few surface scratches and a bruise or two. Section VII of the White Paper deals with that subject which is so close to the heart of my Noble Friend, the admission of women. Section VII makes quite clear what the proposals of my right hon. Friend are. He proposes that this question should be re-examined afresh at the end of the war by an impartial committee. My right hon. Friend is fully aware of the very great work which women have done and are doing in the subordinate grades of the Service, and he is also aware that there is a certain lack of logic in proposals which, intending to make the Foreign Service more representative of the people of the country as a whole, yet debar rather more than half of the people of the country from entering the Service. He is fully aware of that. Nevertheless, it is a very difficult and a very important problem, which was gone into fully not so very long ago. In 1934, a Committee, quite an influential and powerful Committee, was set up to go into this problem, and in 1936 the Report of the Committee was issued with the comments of the Government of the day. In that covering Report, His Majesty's Government stated that they were not convinced by the arguments for the inclusion of women in the Diplomatic Service. It is important to remember, when considering that Report, that the question of the inclusion of women in the Diplomatic Service was more or less of a tie; the Committee were very evenly divided; but there was a very considerable majority of the Committee against the inclusion of women in the Consular Service where their function would be so very different. If that doubt was reasonable in 1934 and 1936, it becomes even more reasonable now when we are proposing to make one combined Service and when anyone who goes into the Diplomatic Service automatically goes into the Consular Service as well, and if my right hon. Friend had done what my Noble Friend would have liked, he would have been going absolutely counter not only to the Government of the
  1372
  day but to the majority Report of that Committee. I do not think the House ought to expect him to do that on so important a point without further consideration.
  There is another point I would make to the House while I am on this topic, and that is that the value of women in the Diplomatic Service does not depend on the value which we set upon them here in this country. It depends upon the reception which they would receive in foreign countries. That was admitted by, I think, every member of the Committee of which I am speaking, and it is interesting to remember that one very important witness before that Committee, who was arguing in favour of the admission of women into the Diplomatic Service, admitted that there were 28 countries to which it would be impossible to send women. If that is still the case to-day, if there are 28 countries or anything like that number where it would be undesirable to send women diplomats, and if we were to admit women into the Foreign Service, that would mean that one of the fundamental bases of my right hon. Friend's proposal would be completely undermined, for one of the most important parts of his scheme is to ensure that there is the freest possible interchange between the various posts, and if there is a very large number of posts to which women cannot go, that interchange must be completely wrecked. I think it will be necessary when the war is over to examine this question afresh, and I think the House would be wise to accept my right hon. Friend's view on that. These are questions of very great importance, and before they can be properly answered we must know a great deal more about conditions in the post-war world than we know now. I think the House will agree that my right hon. Friend's proposal to have a Committee of Inquiry after the war—and it is important to remember that he has said that the activities of that Committee would be in no way prejudiced by the evidence of the Committee which went before—is the best solution possible in the circumstances.
  I must thank the House very much for the patience with which it has listened to my exposition of these perhaps rather complicated proposals. The White Paper indicates that these proposals are necessarily incomplete and liable to modification in detail. I know that my right hon.

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  Friend will pay particular attention to any criticims or suggestions which are made by hon. Members in this Debate, and I know, too, that he will pay great attention to any suggestions which may be made to him in another place, where there is, of course, a particular wealth of experience in diplomatic matters and foreign affairs. My right hon. Friend is very anxious to get the approval of Parliament for these proposals and to submit an Order in Council for the setting-up of the new Foreign Service. Therefore, I hope the House will give its approval to the White Paper. In doing so, it will certainly in my judgment be creating a very much better Foreign Service, and in doing so it will be holding out to so many young men who are now serving the country, and who would, if it had not been for the war, have been trying to enter the Foreign Service, the promise of a fruitful and honourable career in the service of their country.
  Mr. Pethick-Lawrence: It is no disparagement of the right hon. Gentleman, to whom the House has listened with so much pleasure, to say that we share his regret at the unavoidable absence of the Foreign Secretary owing to still more important engagements overseas. I had not the privilege of being in the House when the right hon. Gentleman's distinguished father was leading it, but I have been told by those who were here at that time that one of the characteristics which endeared him to the House was his ability to make a speech without having a single note. I am sure I am voicing the opinion of those who have listened to the right hon. Gentleman's speech in saying that we should like to tell him how much we have appreciated his ability to live up to the tradition of his distinguished father, because there is no doubt whatever that a speech delivered as he has done it is much more effective than one that requires continual application to notes prepared in advance.
  If I have a criticism of the matter of the speech, particularly of his introductory remarks, it would be that he overstated the position that he was defending in two particulars. In the first place, I think he over-stated the subordination of the Foreign Office to the Government of the day and almost suggested that it only played a kind of office-boy part. While, of course, I agree with him that all the major
  1374
  decisions taken, for instance, preceding the present war, when he and I saw more eye to eye than other Members in different parts of the House, those decisions were the decisions of the Prime Minister essentially. Nevertheless, I cannot acquit the Foreign Office in a large sense from all blame with regard to what was done, because I take the view, and I believe the view could be substantiated by those who have better knowledge than I have of the matter, that this country was not fully informed by its representatives abroad of what was going on in foreign countries, nor, I think, was this country always well represented by the Foreign Service in the capitals to which it was accredited.
  I think the right hon. Gentleman somewhat over-stated the position also when he said that these changes proposed in the White Paper were not being made because the Foreign Office was inefficient. He qualified that by saying the real reason was that conditions had grown up which rendered the Foreign Office, which was efficient, unable to cope with the present circumstances. He can have it that way if he likes, but I am bound to say that an organisation which fails to keep abreast of the times is certainly, in my opinion, inefficient, and I should have thought it was of the very essence of inefficiency that the Foreign Office had failed to keep abreast of the times. However, that is largely a matter of words, and I do not very much mind precisely the terms that are used to describe the position. What, I think, will be agreed, both by the right hon. Gentleman and by the House as a whole, is that it is high time there was reform in the Foreign and Diplomatic Service, because at the present day it fails to be abreast of the current life and activities of the country to represent them abroad. I imagine that the only difference there may be among Members of the House is as to how radical that reform should be.
  Though there are points in the White Paper to which I shall take some exception, I am of opinion that the spirit underlying the White Paper is thoroughly good, and the main question to which I will address myself is how far this spirit is likely to be implemented, what are the forms of implementation that ought to be carried out, and how far inertia or, if you like, snobbery or blimpery will stand in the way of what ought to be done. The fact is that up to now the Foreign Office has not had a 20th century mind

  1375
  or 20th century apparatus. I would go further and question whether in some respects it has even got as far as a 19th century mind. I would suggest that in many respects it still has an 18th century outlook and has had an 18th century method in the choice of its personnel, with the result that it has been largely ignorant not merely of 20th century development, of the life and activity of our country as it is to-day, but even of some of the 19th century requirements, and that its representatives are often ill-equipped to deal with questions which have become of first-rate importance at any time during the last 150 years. I suggest that this arises partly from the fact that the Foreign Office is an enclave, shut off from other parts of the Civil Service, shut off by its method of selection from representing the nation as a whole, but also very largely because it has been protected from the healthy wind of criticism of this House of Commons, which has not been allowed to blow through it.
  For that, of course, there have been obvious reasons. By its nature the decisions, the actions and the information of the Foreign Office cannot all be made public property, as similar matters in some of our domestic Ministries can be. I remember Debates in the House, particularly when Sir Austen Chamberlain was Foreign Secretary, when we had the hush-hush policy carried to extravagant degrees, so that anyone who ventured to criticise or doubt any of the things that were being said was regarded as almost guilty of leése majesté, or of endangering the very safety of the State. I, of course, recognise up to a point the validity of that attitude, but I think at the same time it is that lack of the wind of criticism which has been responsible to some extent for the stagnation of the Foreign Service. I would suggest that the Service has been planned in a way that did not meet the needs of the present day, and it has been staffed largely by gentlemanly amateurs who knew little of the life either of their own country or of those in which they served, and, having been selected from a small well-to-do class, could not know very much. The result of that was definitely bad. On the one hand, diplomacy is breaking up into a whole series of specialisms, and the regular personnel of the Foreign Office and
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  Diplomatic Service appears to have had little experience or training which would qualify it to deal with them. On the other hand, the ability to distinguish sympathetically and to interpret at home and abroad popular movements and affairs is becoming every day more important. Many of the public school and Oxford and Cambridge young men on the staffs of Embassies know little about such matters and appear not to wish to know them. That, of course, is a strong criticism and certainly does not apply to every one, but it applies to an important proportion of the Corps.
  There are two main necessities. The first is that an Embassy should be in possession of up-to-date information, not merely of large business and trade matters, but of industrial issues. It ought to know a great deal about British labour and be able to interpret British labour conditions to the country where it is accredited, and it ought to be studying the labour conditions in that country and be able to report back to us the information which is obtained. I understand that at Washington a very good beginning has been made. I do not know whether I am using the correct term, but I understand that there is a labour Attaché connected with the Embassy there and that a great deal of the work done is of an admirable character. This has to be followed up elsewhere, and, in order to enable that to be done, there must be suitable status and staff. The official appointed to represent British industry and labour should be able to answer all questions on the subject addressed to him by the nationals of the country where he is, and to supply full and regular information about corresponding subjects in that country to the British Government, to advise the Ambassador on matters relating to them, and to travel about sometimes and attend conferences and establish personal contacts, and for that he requires knowledge and expert assistance. But, of course, it is not only in trade and labour matters that an Embassy needs to be well informed. It needs to have accurate in-formation with regard to a great many other services rendered by the Government at home. It would hardly be too much to say in the very largest Embassies that it has to reproduce in petto the whole of the functions of the home Government, and one particular example of that is the Colonial Service.

  1377
  I was rather sorry to hear the strong view expressed by the Under-Secretary on behalf of his chief that, as I understood him, he thought that any inter-penetration between officials of, say, the Colonial Service and the Foreign Service was not acceptable. I had hoped it would be possible, say, for recruits to the Foreign Office sometimes to enter it from one of the other Services, such as the Colonial Office. I gathered from what he said that that was not acceptable and that it was proposed to build a wall round the Foreign Service which would prohibit members entering it from other Ministries.
  Mr. Law: The point I was trying to make was that the Foreign Service was going to be separated from the Home Civil Service from the point of view of strict assimilation of conditions of service and so on, because unless it is separated in that way, it has been and will continue to be extremely difficult to exchange men between London and posts abroad. So far as other Government Departments are concerned, I think I said it was my right hon. Friend's intention to bring men home and post them temporarily in other Government Departments. I do not think it can go very far in letting in people from other parts of the Civil Service without destroying the spirit of initiative and esprit de corps of the Foreign Service.
  Mr. Pethick-Lawrence: I do not know how far that goes, but I gather that it rules out what I had in mind. Perhaps it would be possible to second a person for a time from the Colonial Office to assist in Foreign Office duties. The Foreign Office has further, in my opinion, to be imbued, I do not say with a journalistic spirit, for that would be putting it much too high, but with some knowledge that may be acquired in, say, the Ministry of Information. I believe that the Marquess of Salisbury, the Prime Minister, was in his youth a journalist, or at any rate for a time took a considerable part in journalism, and I always thought that that added to his capacity and knowledge when he had to represent views in a way that the public could understand. There-fore, although I certainly do not suggest that the Foreign Office should be recruited largely by journalists, I think that a certain amount of journalistic knowledge which could be acquired in the Ministry of Information in future may not be altogether irrelevant to the Foreign Office official as I see that he may be.
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  In the larger emphasis I contemplate, as I think the White Paper does, a considerable number of well-informed persons, all contributing to give advice to the Ambassador himself and to equip him and his officers generally with knowledge, experience and understanding which will help them to carry out their duties. That cannot exist in the smaller Ministries or Embassies or whatever they are called, where the number of officials is only two or three. I want to stress the importance in those cases of having all-round men, because, if we have men at the head of those offices whose knowledge is limited to certain social contacts to which they have been accustomed, as has been the case in the past, it will render the Ministries to the smaller countries hopelessly inefficient. For that reason I thoroughly welcome the proposals for dealing with some of the officials who are or who have been occupying positions in what are considered the less important countries. I endorse what the right hon. Gentleman said about the undesirability of thinking that because a country is small it thereby does not very much matter what sort of a man, however much a failure he may be, is appointed as our representative. I have had experience of some of the men who have been appointed in the smaller places. I do not want to be thought to be disparaging our Ministers as a whole, many of whom carry out their work in a most admirable way, but I do not think any of us will deny that there are men who would be much better not there and who produce on the countries to which they are accredited a very unfavourable view of the British attitude.
  There are one or two points in the White Paper to which I would like to call special attention. Paragraph 4 in its beginnings, I think, admirably sets out the criticisms of this House. It says:
  "The conditions which the Diplomatic Service originally grew up to meet no longer exist unchanged in modern international affairs. Economics and finance have become inextricably interwoven with politics; an understanding of social problems and labour movements is indispensable in forming a properly balanced judgment of world events. The modern diplomat should have a more intimate understanding of these special problems and greater opportunities to study them than he has usually possessed in the past."
  I do not think that it can be much better said than that, and provided that the change is carried out in the spirit of that criticism, there is very little more

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  that we could wish. Paragraph 6 deals with the amalgamation of the Foreign Office and Diplomatic Service with the Commercial Diplomatic Service and the Consular Service. This is what I described at the beginning as carrying the Foreign Office from the 18th century up to the 19th century. In so far as it does that, it certainly has the support of myself and, I imagine, most of those for whom I speak. We do not want to make the ambassador a glorified commercial traveller, nor, on the other hand, shall we be content with adding commercial trade qualifications to diplomatic qualifications. We have to go a great deal beyond that to bring the Embassy into full touch with all the life and activity of the nation.
  I come to Paragraph 16, which deals with the examination to which the candidate who is trying to get into the Service by what is called Method 1 is subjected. I am told that, although a candidate for the Foreign Office submits himself to a written examination in the ordinary way, he has also to submit himself to an oral examination. That is, of course, very desirable, but I am told that the opinions formed of him generally in the oral discussion play a large part in deciding his opportunity of entering into the Service and that a highly intelligent and able man who secures good marks in the written examination may be failed owing to opinions formed from his behaviour in the oral interview. It would be foolish to deny that there are other qualities desired for a Foreign Office official, and more particularly for one who will be called upon to go abroad, than mere mental agility. It is clear that the ability to deal with men and to mix on reasonable terms with men is an essential part of those characteristics which a candidate for a Foreign Office position must have.
  On the other hand we have to be careful that men are not selected because they have got a pleasant and ingratiating manner or because their antecedents are such as to commend themselves to the persons who are acting as examiners. I do not suggest for a moment that all the men coming from one class are to be viewed with suspicion because they come from what has been called in previous years the governing class. I do not suggest that every boy in a secondary school who attains to high distinction is necessarily a
  1380
  suitable candidate who ought to be selected for the Foreign Office. I do feel, however, that what we want are men who can transcend their class origins, whether they come from what has hitherto been called the governing class or from what has hitherto been called the lower class. Unless they can transcend their class prejudice or bias, they will not make good Foreign Office displomats, because it is essential in the future, if it has not been so in the past, that men accredited to foreign countries shall be able to mix on terms of neither superiority nor inferiority with all the classes with whom it will be their business to come into contact. That is essential. Therefore though I do not take exception to the fact that oral discussion must necessarily play a large part in the selection of candidates, I hope we may have an assurance that that will not result in bias in favour of certain persons because of the accident of their birth and upbringing
  I come to the next paragraph, which deals with Method 2. I can see some force in the arguments that are put before us, but I confess that I regard this method with some apprehension. It may be that, handled by people of wide sympathy and exceptional ability of choice, it would be a good plan. Human beings are frail and subject to human limitations, however, and it is equally possible that this method might become a serious danger by resulting in the selection of men who had influence and some pull or drive upon the machine and that it would become a backdoor for getting into the Service men who were not by any means the kind of persons the British people would wish to represent them abroad. I view this particular proposal with a good deal of apprehension. I do not, of course, suspect the motives of the Foreign Secretary in the least, but I feel that the proposal has elements of great danger attaching to it. The proposal in paragraph 20 is wholly admirable. It deals with the study of economic, social and industrial questions, and it is a proposal which we can thoroughly approve. Paragraph 22 at the end deals with the heads of Missions having expert assistance. I have already referred to this, and it strikes me as an admirable point. The same applies to paragraph 24, which deals with closer contact between the Foreign Service and the Colonial Service. I think that that is all to the good.

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  Paragraph 29 deals with the question of retirement and superannuation. As I have already said, I am sure the Minister will agree that this ought to be drastically applied. We must not allow personal considerations, however friendly we may feel towards a particular individual, to allow him to spoil the relationship between our country and the country, even though a comparatively small one, to which he is accredited. I hope the Foreign Secretary will use this power drastically though wisely if it is given to him by this House.
  Finally, I come to paragraph 33. I look at the question of the inclusion of women from a point of view which does not seem to have occurred to the right hon. Gentleman. It is not easy to have in totality the qualities we require from these officials. A man may have a very clever brain but be very stupid in personal contacts; he may be affable, kindly and have a pleasing personality and yet may be unable to appreciate large issues. The various qualities required to make a successful diplomat are such that it is not easy to find them accumulated in a single person, and if we limit our choice to one half of the human race, and that half the male half, it seems to me we shall to that extent prevent ourselves from choosing the persons who may be best for this particular purpose. It may well be that a good many other countries have to be educated up in this matter, and it may be true, as the right hon. Gentleman said, that there are some to which it might be difficult to appoint other than a man, but I would remind him that very great countries, including the United States, which has shown us recently that it is fully alive to the importance of good diplomacy, have not confined their Diplomatic Service to one sex. Therefore, we should not be pioneers blazing an unknown trail if we should open the door of our Diplomatic Service to give us a wide choice from both sexes.
  Then we come to the question of increasing salaries. It is true that we tend to get what we pay for, and if we are to get an improved Foreign Service, it may be that in order to meet the exceptional expenses of persons engaged in it we may have to pay a higher rate of salaries than prevails in other branches of the Civil Service. I should not object to that, provided we really get value for those higher salaries, but I do not want to
  1382
  see higher salaries paid than are paid in branches of the purely Civil Service unless we do get what we want.
  I should like to conclude by saying that I have been rather scathing at times in the course of my remarks upon some of the officials in the Foreign Service. I should be very sorry if that were taken as a general criticism of our British servants who have been serving us in foreign lands. I am aware, and I am sure that it will be universally recognised, that we have had in the past and have to-day a number of very able men, men with great brains and with wide human sympathies, who have rendered invaluable services to their country. But that is not to say that the system may not call for great improvement, and I believe that those who have rendered the best services will be the first to admit that fact.
  The British attitude towards foreign questions differs considerably from the attitude of most foreign countries. We are not anxious to bring about complications in foreign affairs which on a narrow point of view might appear to be to our own advantage. The British attitude is a wise and tolerant attitude in the main, and those who have had contact with our British representatives abroad will know that by and large the British Government does desire really friendly relations with foreign countries, and that what our representatives say and do is directed in the main not to some narrow imperial gain but is in the interests of the world as a whole. Unfortunately, that good intention has been smeared over in many cases by failure of knowledge, failure of acumen, failure to grasp the different points of view which may prevail in foreign parts. The reform which I believe all of us want to see carried out in the Foreign Office is that the good intentions at the back of British diplomacy shall be borne out in the personnel and in the application of the principles, and that therefore our British standard shall be upheld in accordance with the highest traditions of our country.
  Viscountess Astor: I hope the House will bear with me and not think that I am being purposely offensive—I do not want to be offensive—but I must say that I have never been more disappointed in anything than I have in the bright young men who went to the Foreign Office to build a new world.

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  Those are the men who have brought up these reforms, but really they are so mild that even the most Conservative papers, "The Times," for instance—well, it was Conservative, though, thank goodness, it is not so Conservative as it was—have urged upon the Foreign Office to go a little further. The right hon. Gentleman, to whose speech we listened with great respect, really told us that they were bringing forward these proposed changes, not because there is anything wrong with the Foreign Office, but because times have changed. Times may have changed, but there is a certain point of view in the Foreign Office that has not changed a yard, and what I cannot understand is why the Labour people—I see the Deputy Leader of the House sitting there—let this old-fashioned, pre-1914 view as far as women are concerned prevail without saying a word. It passes my comprehension.
  It is a pity that every Member of the House did not read the Report about which the right hon. Gentleman has been talking. It is interesting reading, and I think hon. Members should know what led up to it. Before the last war women were not regarded as citizens. They were in the same class as peers, paupers, lunatics and criminals. It was only after the war that we had the sex disqualification removed. That was in 1919, and that had its drawbacks. Then women had a fight in 1921 to get into the Civil Service on equal terms. They got it with difficulty, but it is only lately that women have been allowed to marry and still remain in the Service. The Tomlin Commission was appointed in 1929 to consider the whole question of women in the Civil Service. In 1934 a Committee was appointed to consider the admission of women into the Diplomatic and Consular Services, Who was at the Foreign Office at that time? That Committee consisted of eight distinguished members. There were three high officials from the Foreign Office, three from other Government Departments and two senior civil servants, with Sir Claud Schuster as Chairman.
  After hearing both sides the Committee were unable to agree, and presented three separate reports. The two women reported in favour of opening both Services to women. There were six men who opposed opening the Consular Service to women.
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  The three Foreign Office members and one other opposed the entry of women to the Diplomatic Service. The Chairman and the Treasury representatives were in favour of admitting women for a limited period as an experiment. Thus, four out of the eight reported in favour of progress. I had the pleasure of giving evidence before that Committee. It was really very embarrassing. One of the Foreign Office high officials, an ex-Ambassador, was bitterly against women, and I had to remark to him, "But you wouldn't have kept your job without your wife." It was true; everybody knew it. No man had ever been a greater failure than he was. At the end the six who did not agree said that if women should continue to gain ground classes of the population as yet unaffected would be employed in other spheres and in that event the matter could be reconsidered in the light of the circumstances then existing.
  Surely everybody has by now become accustomed to the employment of women in spheres previously closed to them. Think of what women have done in this war, what they are doing in the Services and out of the Services, of the pride which the whole country has in its women folk—and then they come here with this old Report, and tell us that the Foreign Secretary feels that he must wait until after the war to give women a chance. I wonder what he will say to Madame Chiang Kai-shek in Washington. That would be interesting.
  Mr. Stokes: Probably kiss her.
  Viscountess Astor: Do not be offensive. I do not want to be offensive. I looked up the word "foreign," and it interested me very much. Foreign means, "Outside the country; not in one's own land." Well, the Foreign Office is well named, because it certainly is outside the consciousness of the vast majority of the people of this country. The Government say they want to bring in a Bill to represent everybody, and yet they deliberately cut out half of the population from having any say at all in these Services which are of such vital importance.
  I have had a little experience in these matters. About 23 years ago, when I went to Washington, I was amazed at the Embassy there, because it was completely out of touch with everything in the United States. It was pathetic. When I came

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  back I proposed to the Foreign Office that it would be advisable to appoint somebody who could keep in touch with the women's movement in that country, which was pretty considerable. The Foreign Office did not do it, and they never would have done it, until Lord Lothian, I think against the wish of the Foreign Office, appointed the lady who is now one of the outstanding successes at the Embassy there. In the Report of the Committee, these words occur:
  "It must be remembered that an essential element for success in diplomatic life consists in the members of the Service being favourably received in the countries to which they are posted. If they are not so received, their usefulness is greatly diminished, and the Mission is likely to fail."
  How many men have failed in this way in the last 25 years? I do not want to go into the details of those failures, but their number is enormous. The Committee said many other things, including that women might not be able to stand up against the climate and that a very intimate life was lived in the Chancelleries, where there was usually such a happy family. The people in most of the Chancellories have been such happy families that they did not know what was going on in the countries where they were posted.
  I am not blaming the Foreign Office officials for all these things so much as I am blaming the Permanent Secretaries. The underlings have to obey their masters, but we have had Foreign Office Permanent Secretaries who have been dominated by what we call the Latin point of view. Two of them have boasted of understanding France. France was their spiritual home, and they understood everything about it. That is one of the reasons why our foreign policy has been so dominated since the last war by France. If we had had a foreign policy not dominated by France—well, I do not want to say anything about a country when she is down. France is a shell-shocked country and has been so since the last war, and I suppose everybody knows it except the Foreign Office. We had a Foreign Secretary, Sir Austen Chamberlain, who said he loved France as a man loved his mistress. Men have no business to have mistresses. It shocked me at the time. It was upsetting that our foreign policy should be so dominated by France. We have had people who have written poems and spoken the language, so thoroughly were they absorbed in the
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  Latin point of view. I do not want to be offensive to France, but this Latin point of view is not the British point of view. It is a very dangerous point of view. That is the point of view against letting women into the Foreign Services.
  The real objection seems to be that if women got into the Diplomatic Service they might marry foreigners. Very few women for a long time would get into the Diplomatic Service highest grades, because they have to have great qualifications. If a woman has great qualifications and gets into a very responsible position, I do not believe she will jeopardise her country for the sake of marriage. I ask the House of Commons: Who has the greater influence, men or women? Have more women ruined men than men have ruined women? Everyone knows the answer. It has been proved time and time again that a man in the Diplomatic Service who has made a bad marriage is passed over, and no doubt that would be the case with women. Look at the position of women in other countries, such as China, Russia, the United States of America and the Scandinavian countries. Our Foreign Office is taking the view of Germany, Italy, Spain, France and Japan, mostly Latin countries and all with the Latin point of view. We have been waiting for years for this reform of the Foreign Office. Is it fair that the women of England should be put in the same category as we are in in enemy countries? Look at Moslem women. Nothing is more remarkable than the way in which Indian women are coming along—faster than the Foreign Office, if you ask me. The Foreign Office, of all offices, really needed a complete overhaul. I am not going to say that they have not had successes, because they have, but they have also had some crashing failures. I hope that this new broom will sweep it clean, but I am afraid that although you may have a new broom, it will have an old stick, and that stick will be the Latin point of view. I should like to remind the House of Commons of the number of Ambassadors who many people from other countries.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Charles Williams): It may be very hard upon us if the Noble Lady should read through the list of names of all the representatives of the Foreign Office. I hope the Noble Lady will not take too long about that.
  Viscountess Astor: I assure you, Sir, that I shall not be long, but it is very important for us to know these things. Some of these foreign representatives have married French, American, Italian, Chilean, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Belgian, Danish and Swedish women. One of the arguments was that the Foreign Office did not need women in their Embassies, because the wives of Ambassadors could get into touch and represent the British point of view, but I would point out that an American woman who is born in Paris is neither American nor French. Those women are mostly the kind of Americans that foreign diplomats marry.
  Let me ask the Foreign Office whether it is really fair and just, and in keeping with the spirit of the times, that they should at this moment deny to women their chance of rebuilding the new world after the war. Women will have the most tremendous work to do, not only in Europe, but all over the world. The democracies have to give a lead to the rest of the women of the world. How can they do it? The Foreign Office says that they will consider this matter when the war is over, and that is really most unfair. I would like to remind the Foreign Office of women's great successes at the moment in the diplomatic field. There is Miss Freya Stark, who has had a wonderful success. The Foreign Office do not talk about their successes. The Report asks what would be the position if we were given a trial and then could not be got rid of, but the Government are now bringing in a Bill just because they cannot get rid of their failures. I do not believe that we are out of touch with the country in asking for these changes. I believe the Government are completely out of touch with the country in refusing admission to women in the Foreign and Consular Services. Remember that there are more women than men and that women are showing a spirit of courage, gaiety, endurance and patriotism, and they are also showing an unexpected competence. They are doing things which nobody thought they could do. I am certain that if you give women this chance, it will be better for the country, for the Foreign Office and for the world in general. Women have some sort of strength that men have not. I think you can call it moral and spiritual quality, and it has stood them in great stead in this war. Do not use that old-fashioned
  1388
  and out-of-date argument that some countries would not welcome the change. I do not believe there are countries which would not welcome the arrival of a sound, keen and intelligent Englishwoman.
  I have been asked how I came to the House of Commons. I would point out that I got my traditions from being born in the English way of thinking in the country that is permeated with it, that is Virginia. When I talk about that English way of thinking I am talking of one of the most important things in the world, and the Foreign Office has not got it. I implore the Foreign Office to reconsider this matter. I ask the House of Commons to insist upon helping the Foreign Office to bring itself up to date. I do not want to appear offensive, but I feel deeply on this question of women having equality with men. If women had run this country for as long as the men, we no doubt should not be in the mess we are in to-day. If God's gifts and talents belong to one sex and not to the other, then it is to the mothers of the race and not to the fathers.
  Mr. Harold Nicolson: I am sure that the House has listened with interest and considerable sympathy to the very general review of the problem of the entry of women into the Diplomatic Service which the noble Lady has just made. I agree that there are many occasions when it would be very much in the public interest to appoint some well-known woman—known for her probity, intelligence, ability and balance—to some diplomatic post. I will go further. I agree that in certain special branches of diplomatic work women will always be, as they always have been, extremely useful. I refer to women like Freya Stark and Gertrude Bell. They are enormously valuable. I would go even further. I would regard it as possible that it should become a permanent institution that one of the attachés, at Washington and Copenhagen for instance, should be a woman Attaché who would devote her very special gifts to the study of women's interests in those countries.
  I gather, however, that this is not what the Noble Lady and her friends really want. They do not want women to be picked here and there for special Qualifications and given special posts in diplomacy. They want them to enter the Foreign Service on exactly the same footing as men. I must assure them that that

  1389
  is quite impossible. The Noble Lady dismissed marriage as though it were a mere incident; it is not a mere incident, but a very profound biological fact. She went out of her way to show how frequently marriages happened in the Foreign Service; that so great was the philoprogenitive or connubial instinct of its members that they married all the time and always married foreigners. If women are admitted, we have either to condemn them to perpetual spinsterhood or realise the fact that they may marry foreigners and lose their British nationality. If a man marries a Chilean nothing happens; she becomes a British subject. If a woman marries a Chilean, she becomes a Chilean. We are not going to alter that.
  Viscountess Astor: We are one day.
  Mr. Cluse: Why is the hon. Member so insistent that it cannot be altered? It can be altered, possibly in a very short space of time.
  Mr Nicolson: It will take many generations before that is altered.
  Mrs. Tate: You move like tortoises.
  Mr. Nicolson: There are posts and there always will be posts, at least for three generations, at least for go years, to which women could not be appointed and for which they would not be qualified. To put them on a footing of absolute equality would be to put them in a position not only of equality but actually of privilege. The places where they would function most usefully would be the more agreeable, the more advanced places, the places closer to England where their children could be educated in good schools—the advanced places—and the wretched men would be relegated to the less convenient places.
  Mrs. Tate: Has the hon. Member ever noticed that women missionaries are always kept near home where they can live in healthy climates and where their children can go to the very best schools?
  Mr. Nicolson: Women missionaries are sent out with the intention of living abroad in certain countries, whereas women in the Foreign Service would be sent with the intention of being moved from one place to another. The Noble Lady said, and it is a contention of many people, that women have never been given a chance hitherto.
  1390
  I think it may be correct that they have never been given a chance; but from the days of Helen of Argos to the days of the hon. Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) they have taken a great many chances and they have always been disastrous.
  Viscountess Astor: As mistresses?
  Mr. Nicolson: I think not for the reasons which the Noble Lady adduces, but for a much more serious and important reason, namely, that the special virtues of women—and the Noble Lady did indicate that women possessed certain virtues and talents to a degree greater than men—are singularly ill-adapted to diplomatic life. These virtues, I should say, were, first, intuition and, secondly, sympathy. Intuition is absolutely fatal in diplomacy. It tempts people to jump to conclusions. Sympathy is equally fatal because it leads people to identify themselves with causes or personalities with which or whom they feel sympathy. That is fatal to that very balanced attitude which it is the business of the Diplomatic Service to preserve. I do not wish to pursue any further this question of women in the Foreign Service.
  Viscountess Astor: I want to put one point to the hon. Gentleman. I am somewhat alarmed in that in many ways women are harder than men. If you give a woman a job, I do not think you will find she will be over sympathetic. I am rather worried about that.
  Mr. Nicolson: I did not mean my observation to imply softness or hardness; but to indicate the tendency of women to identify themselves with parties, personalities and controversies in the countries to which they would be accredited. I pass from that question. After all, in the White Paper the question of women is reserved for future consideration in terms which repudiate all ancient prejudice.
  There is one point, one suggestion which the hon. Lady made, which I am glad to say the right hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Pethick-Lawrence) did not make, an imputation that hitherto the Diplomatic Service and the Foreign Service had acted with great incompetence and were staffed by people of very secondary ability.
  Viscountess Astor: I did not say that.
  Mr. Nicolson: That was the impression I got.
  Mr. Kirkwood: Is it not true?
  Mr. Nicolson: I should very much regret it if it went out abroad that the general opinion of this House was one of anything but appreciation of the extraordinary ability shown by the officials of our Diplomatic Service during the present war. I do not wish to particularise—that might be invidious—but the work, for instance, done by Sir Archibald Clark Kerr in Chungking and the relations he managed to establish at moments of very great delicacy with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek; the work done by Sir Percy Lorraine in his relations with Kemal Attaturk, which has been carried on by Sir Hugh Knatchbull-Hugessen with great diplomatic ability; these are great diplomatic achievements. Surely the House realises also that the work done by Sir Miles Lampson—and no public servant has better deserved a peerage—in Egypt during the last few years has been worth to us five divisions—a pure triumph of personality. If the Noble Lady says that members of the Service under the old system of recruitment and training have been as incompetent as she thinks, I ask her to remember that there are, I think, eight ex-members of the Service who are Members of this House. Seven of them have for long or short times reached the Front Bench, and the eighth, who is the right hon. Member for Mitcham (Sir M. Robertson) is Chairman of the British Council and really the only begetter of this Report. If this House is, in fact as it is so often reputed to be, the filter of ability, the great strainer of character, I do not think a percentage, whereby out of eight ex-members of the Foreign Service, seven hold or have held Front Bench rank, is so very bad.
  Mr. Kirkwood: Was it not influence that got them in—a matter of the old school tie?
  Mr. Nicolson: Does my hon. Friend really think the Minister of Agriculture owes his position and influence to the old school tie?
  Mr. Kirkwood: I would say not, but what of the rest of them?
  Mr. Nicolson: I would refer to the admirable work done by the Service as it now stands. I trust that the reforms indicated in this Report will not destroy
  1392
  the traditions and continuity of the Service as it existed before. I would be the very first to admit that in this modern age it would be quite impossible to work our foreign policy with the more specialised machine such as we had up to the outbreak of the present war, but I would ask the House to remember that those who have pressed for these reforms for 20 or 30 years are people who have been and are now members of the Service. I would specially mention Sir Victor Wellesley and the Minister of Agriculture, who have for years been urging reforms of this exact nature. I do not want it to be thought that this new scheme has been imposed on the Foreign Service from outside; it has come from the inside, from people having inside experience and knowing that the old system could not continue under modern conditions. I regret that the Foreign Secretary is not here. All previous demands to make these reforms, all agreements reached on committees and deputations, have always broken down on one rock—the rock of the Treasury. I think this House ought to feel deeply grateful to the present Foreign Secretary, who has had the imaginative vision to know exactly where the real blocks and barriers were; who possesses such amazing popularity in the Service that things are acceptable from him which might have caused difficulty if proposed by somebody else; and who has had the authority in Cabinet and in the House to break through the barricades which have hitherto proved an insurmountable obstruction.
  I do not wish to waste the time of the House in saying how deeply I welcome this Report, how efficiently I think it has been Written and conceived, or how valuable I am certain it will prove. I wish to make certain suggestions, not criticisms, which are in fact amplifications of what my right hon. Friend said in moving the Motion for the acceptance of this White Paper. I have certain suggestions to make which, although they do not bear on the actual scheme as drafted, do bear, I think, on exactly how the scheme will work out in practice when the Service, so reconstituted, begins to find itself. The advantage of the old Service, a very great advantage, was that it was very small. The Secretary of State knew every member of the Service personally. Every member of the Service realised that his merits or demerits were known to the Secretary of State. That will not be

  1393
  possible if the whole Service is to be enlarged so enormously; people will become anonymous; they will become lost. In the new Foreign Service this will lead to frustration, discontent, sometimes to actual unfairness. A young man gets sent out to some remote place. He may be under a chief who is unsympathetic to progress, who wishes to snub and repress all original points of view. That young man will not get known. He has no chance of getting known. He passes from Pernambuco to Bahia Blanca and does not come back to the Foreign Office. He does not get known; he gets lost. In such circumstances, the temptation may arise, and it is a terrible temptation, for the ambitious young man to seek to draw attention to himself either by too much zeal, which, as Talleyrand remarked, has its diplomatic dangers, or actually by seeking publicity, a thing which has happened in the American Diplomatic Service before now and which is most undesirable.
  The second difficulty to which my right hon. Friend alluded is that of specialisation. We have to have specialists. You have to have people who have lived their lives in particular countries and who are able to assist the Minister or Ambassador in the exercise of the functions of his Mission. If everybody is to be fused together you are not going to maintain these specialists; you are going to lose them. Thirdly, you may, as my right hon. Friend remarked, in principle fuse the Diplomatic Service with the Commercial, or the Consular, Service; but in practice it will not be one Service. There will be a differentiation of function, of categories, in the Service. That again may lead to a man feeling that he is classed as a Consular type, or as a commercial type—and that the plums of the Service are going to the Diplomatic type. Those who fall into the other categories will feel discontented.
  I make these criticisms because I think I can suggest a solution for all three. The solution would be something like a staff college. I hate to use military terms, because it suggests a general staff and as such approximates to a theory advocated by "The Times," which to my mind was one of the most nonsensical things ever written in that great journal. But a staff college would be a filter, through which a man would pass between the ages of 30 and 35, by which his qualities could
  1394
  be strained and sifted, by which his name and value may be known, and by which he himself may see where his greatest prospects lie. That is absolutely essential, I think. Otherwise, you will have a great fishpond out of which you will never pull the right fish. There must be a filter through which, after 10 years of service, the fishes pass.
  Finally, there is the superannuation rule. Of all the rules that this new reform brings in, that, to my mind, is in fact the fairest, and will produce the most beneficial results. It was this bottleneck which flung so many of us promising young men, who at that time were energetic, whose faults had not then become apparent, from the Olympian heights of diplomacy to the benches we see around us now. But there is a danger, and I hope that my right hon. Friend will bear it in mind, and that the House will give it their attention. The most extreme temptation in the Service is the temptation for an envoy abroad to report to his Government at home those things, those facts, those tendencies, which he thinks will be agreeable to that Government and will be in accord with the policy they have proclaimed. That has always been the danger, but the danger is going to be increased by the superannuation rule. A man may think that this future is dependent upon the good will of the Secretary of State. I do not think that there is a single man in the Service who would not willingly place his future in the hands of my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary or of my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary, but we may have other Governments: we may have Governments of a Fascist tendency which will think that a man abroad with Socialist sympathies is not suitable, and we may have the opposite state of affairs. You may have a man who thinks his career is dependent on the favour of the Foreign Secretary reporting facts in a pleasant way instead of giving the horrible naked truth. The only remedy is for the Secretary of State and his advisers to be very careful that no man is retired compulsorily owing to any political bias or any unwelcome views that he may express, but that he is retired only because in the opinion of his contemporaries he is not fitted in terms of ability and energy for the job he holds. I beg my right hon. Friend and the Foreign Secretary, now that they have

  1395
  their superannuation rule, now that they can retire men of 40 or 45 with superannuation if they need it——
  Mr. Kirk wood: There is no means test, is there?
  Mr. Nicolson: No. I beg them not to carry out the rule regarding retirement at 60. One of the most incredible things which have happened has been the way in which we have got rid of some of our ambassadors at the very moment when the whole weight of their experience was most essential for the public good. Diplomatists are like wine, they improve with age. To get rid of a man like Sir Horace Rumboldt at the age of 60 was perfectly grotesque. It was done in order to get the water passing through the filter more swiftly. I hope that the Secretary of State will use the discretion which he has and not retire gifted ambassadors because they have reached a certain age. I hope the House realises that this plan is much more than just a White Paper. It shows an imaginative insight into the very fibres of the problem. It has its difficulties, it has its dangers; but I believe that it will provide the country, in the extremely difficult times to come, with a Foreign Service fitted to the new order of things.
  Mr. William Brown: I rise to attack the proposals of the White Paper, and I intend to assail them with all the ferocity of which my gentle nature is capable. Before doing so, I would like to pay a tribute of admiration to the hon. Member for West Leicester (Mr. H. Nicolson) for the speech to which we have just listened. It was couched in the most felicitous terms, and had the charm and the dignity which one always associates with the hon. Member. I think that for the House as a whole, and for me at any rate, it was a pleasure to listen to the speech. Let me say one other kind word before I let loose the ferocity with which I propose to attack the White Paper. I want to make it perfectly plain to the Under-Secretary that there will be nothing personal in the attack which I intend to make on the Government's proposals. One of the charming things about this House is the divorce between personal and political animosity. My political animosity to these proposals is extreme, but I have no personal animosity to the Undersecretary. I know him only through what he writes, and what I have read of his
  1396
  writing I admire. I have now finished with the gentle side of my disposition and I turn to attack the proposals.
  The most essential element in the treatment of any ill, whether a disorder of the human frame, or a disease of an institution, is correct diagnosis. The first thing we have to ask is, What was wrong with British diplomacy before the war that it now stands in need of radical remedy at the hands of this House? I believe there were two fundamental defects in our Diplomatic Service. The first was a defect of disposition, and the second a defect of selection. As regards the defect of disposition, I had a conversation a week or two ago with a Yugoslav diplomat, who, knowing my interest in British Civil Service problems and in diplomatic problems, exchanged views with me about the psychological defects in our Diplomatic Service. He put it in this way: "My country is a very small country. It had no navy at all, it had no army worth speaking of, and it was never in a position to practise the diplomacy of power politics. Your country was a great Power. Your diplomats impressed upon me from time to time that in the last resort it was not they who were speaking, but the ultimate power of the British Empire which lay behind what they said." He said that there was a tremendous pyschological difference between the attitude of small Powers in diplomacy and the attitude of the so-called great Powers. I know no remedy for that except a permanent insistence from the centre of the Foreign Office throughout the Diplomatic Service that power does not necessarily connote right.
  The second defect was a defect of selection. Do not let us make any bones about it: our diplomacy has been selected from the younger sons of the governing class of this country, people who were disqualified by the circumstances of their birth and their upbringing from understanding the nature of social changes taking place in the world. If anybody doubts this I commend to him two examples. I commend to him Sir Nevile Henderson's book "Failure of a Mission." Nobody who has read that book can help feeling how completely out of touch with modern realities, how utterly uncomprehending of what was happening on the Continent of Europe, was the British Ambassador in Berlin up to the outbreak of war. I assert that that emerges

  1397
  from every page of Sir Nevile Henderson's book. If you want an independent American view, you can find it in Mr. Joseph Davies' book. You may read in that book his comments on the equivalent failure of our Embassy in Russia to understand the significance of what was happening in that country. So long as we draw our diplomats from the narrow circle of the younger sons of the governing class, our British diplomacy will continue to be a reproach to us throughout the world.
  The Foreign Office itself appears to have an uneasy feeling that my diagnosis is not far wrong, for paragraph 2 of the White Paper says:
  "Among the criticisms which have been brought against the Diplomatic Service, the view has been expressed that it is recruited from too small a circle, that it tends to represent the interests of a certain section of the nation rather than those of the country as a whole, that its members lead too sheltered a life, that they have insufficient understanding of economic and social questions, that the extent of their experience is too small to enable them properly to understand many of the problems with which they ought to deal, and that the range of their contacts is too limited, to allow them to acquire more than a relatively narrow acquaintance with the foreign peoples amongst whom they live."
  I believe the criticism in paragraph 2 to be utterly well-founded. I am the Secretary of an Association which represents the clerical staff of these Embassies, and I believe that for the last 10 years my information from the Embassies of Europe has been very much better than the information that the Foreign Secretary has received. [An hon. Member: "Why?"] Because my information has come from the clerks, who move freely among the peoples among whom they live, and not from the diplomatist, whose attention was largely confined to the drawing rooms of the capitals of Europe.
  Sir Alfred Beit: I hope that the hon. Member passed on the information to the Foreign Office.
  Mr. Brown: I do not mind the hon. Member interrupting, but I do ask him to be articulate.
  Sir A. Beit: I said that I hoped that the hon. Member passed on the information to the Foreign Office.
  Mr. Brown: Certainly, but can you imagine the Foreign Office between the
  1398
  period of the last war and 1940 being influenced by anything like common sense? I hope the hon. Member will not interrupt me any more. The White Paper, in a burst of generosity, in paragraph 3 states that there has been extensive change and goes on to say that
  "by introducing the reforms hereinafter described it is intended to re-equip the Foreign Service to meet modern conditions and to create a Service which, by its composition, by the recruitment and training of its members and by its organisation, shall be better able not merely to represent the interests of the nation as a whole, but also to deal with the whole range of international affairs, political, social and economic, and so constitute an adequate instrument for the maintenance of good relations."
  I assert that between the great phrases of the introduction of this document and the concrete proposals contained in the document there is not the slightest relation whatever.
  I would now like to look at what they propose. They propose, first, to combine the Diplomatic and Consular Services. So far so good. That ought to have been done many years ago. They propose, secondly, that the Foreign Secretary should have power to retire on pension, before the age of 60, officers of the rank of First Secretary and upwards. Good, but why limit that to officers of the rank of First Secretary and upwards? If men become stale at 40 in the higher ranks of the Diplomatic Service, they can become stale at 40 in the clerical ranks or indeed in any other rank of the Diplomatic Service. I argued about three weeks ago when discussing the British Civil Service that one of the most urgent reforms necessary was that we should amend the present Superannuation Act to enable men to retire with their accrued proportion of pension rights or to enable the Department to dismiss men with their accrued proportion of pension rights. I hold that to be true of the Civil Service at home, and I hold it to be true of the Diplomatic Service, and I do not for the life of me understand why this particular proposal is limited to officers of the rank of First Secretary and upwards.
  Having provided for one Service instead of two, and having equipped itself with certain powers to get rid of senior officers who have gone to seed, the Report then goes on to give proposals as regards the future recruitment to the Diplomatic and Consular Services. I insist that there

  1399
  is the crux of this Report. Whether we are going to get a continuation of the old Diplomatic Service, or a Service which is capable of doing the things which I quoted a moment or two ago, depends on the type of new recruits we get into the Diplomatic Service. By these proposals this White Paper must stand or fall. On these proposals rests the future quality of the Diplomatic Service of this country. What do they propose under this most important head? They propose two methods of recruitment in future—Method No. 1 and Method No. 2—and it is significant that in all the hour's speech we had from the Under-Secretary there was not one sentence devoted to this, which is the crucial thing about the whole Report. Method No. 2 is only intended to bring in two new appointees each year. We heard from the Under-Secretary earlier that there were 700 people in the Diplomatic and Consular Service, so that whatever the merits of Method No. 2, that method will only affect an infinitesimal fraction of the number of people covered by that Report. It is Method No. 1 which will determine broadly the character of the Diplomatic and Consular Service of the future.
  Mr. Law: I think that the hon. Member is under some slight misapprehension. Did I understand him to say that Method No. 2 would only affect two new appointees a year?
  Mr. Brown: As I read the Report.
  Mr. Law: I think that the hon. Member reads it wrongly. It says:
  "For an experimental period of 10 years candidates for not more than 25 per cent. of the annual vacancies will be chosen"—
  It is on page 7.
  Mr. Brown: Surely, under Method No. 3. But let me add two and three together—75 per cent. of the appointees would be affected by Method No. 1. Is that common ground? Two every year out of 700 is a negligible percentage, but call it if you like 70 per cent. of the appointments to be governed by Method No. 1. What is Method No. 1? It provides
  "an open competitive examination conducted by the Civil Service Commission and so designed that candidates will be able to take it shortly after their University degree examination and without special study."
  1400
  What does that mean? It means that nobody who has not had a university education could enter for this examination with any hope of success whatever.
  Mr. Pickthorn: Lord Vansittart, for instance, entered for examination in the same way and was successful.
  Mr. Brown: My hon. Friend, like the rest of the Tory Party, is miles out of date. The method at the time of Lord Vansittart's entry into the Foreign Office was not upon competitive examination but selection, as the hon. Member ought to, know.
  Mr. Pickthorn: No.
  Mr. Brown: I will give the hon. Member the point if he wants it for the convenience of debate. I am not talking about exceptional characters like Lord Vansittart, whose advice you constantly ignored throughout the whole period of the last few years. I am talking about ordinary folk. Under these proposals you eliminate every intermediate schoolboy, every secondary schoolboy and every elementary schoolboy from entry.
  Sir A. Beit: May I interrupt?
  Mr. Brown: The hon. Member interrupted before. I am not giving way. I know that I shall be told that a certain number of secondary and elementary schoolboys get to the universities.
  Sir A. Beit: Forty-two per cent.
  Mr. Brown: We will get the figures right. Out of every 10 boys going to the elementry schools, only one gets to the secondary school, and out of every 10 who go to the secondary school only one gets to the university.
  Sir A. Beit: That is not the point.
  Mr. Brown: I do not want the hon. Member to make the point. I am making my own point at the moment. Out of every 100 elementary schoolboys only one will get the opportunity of going through to the university.
  Sir Granville Gibson: Will the hon. Member read on from line 4 to line 7 on page 7?
  Mr. Brown: Does the hon. Member imagine that I have not read it? I will read it for his benefit:

  1401
  "Although designed for those who have studied at a university in this country, the examination will be open, as at present, to candidates who have not attended a university."
  That is rather like saying that the Ritz or the Carlton is open to everybody—if you have the money! I am telling the House that no elementary schoolboy and no secondary schoolboy can hope to pass this examination unless he has had a university training. So far from democratising the Diplomatic Service in this country, this Report tightens the stranglehold that the university man possesses already in relation to the Diplomatic Service, and tends to make it permanent and unshakeable.
  Now I come to those who are to be recruited by selection by the Foreign Secretary, with the advice of the Civil Service Commission. Who are they going to choose? We can only answer that question by looking at the Foreign Secretary and the Civil Service Commission. What is the truth about the Foreign Secretary. He is a charming fellow, well in line for the succession. But let us look at the Foreign Secretary, not as an individual but as an institution. What is the truth about it? When there is a Conservative Government in power in Britain the Foreign Secretary will be a university man. When there is a Coalition Government in Britain the Foreign Secretary will also be a university man. He will be a university man because, while it is proper that we should have a Labour Minister to round up workmen and shove them into the Army, and that we should have a Labour Home Secretary to clap them into gaol if they make too much trouble about it, there can be no question of having a Labour man either at the Exchequer or at the Foreign Office, Those two Departments are permanently reserved to the Tories for ever.
  What is the prospect of getting a Labour Foreign Secretary? That rests on the possibility of getting a Labour Government. The answer is, "None at all." Why? Because all history shows that when parties of the Right go into Coalition they may emerge unscathed, but parties of the Left can never do it without committing suicide. We are driven back on the Independents. While our numbers have increased by 25 per cent. this last week owing to the resignation of the hon. Member for Burslem (Mr. MacLaren) from the Labour Party, and although we are
  1402
  not without hope of further accretions from this source and similar sources, the realist in me is compelled to admit that there is still a substantial distance between us Independents and the conquest of complete power. We are faced therefore by a situation in which there will be permanently a Conservative or university Foreign Secretary for Great Britain.
  Now look at the Civil Service Commissioners, all of them university men. It will be as difficult for a non-university man to be a Civil Service Commissioner as it would be for a Labour man to become Foreign Secretary or Chancellor of the Exchequer under a Coalition Government. From their point of view it is obvious that those that they select are also going to be university men so making the Foreign Service safe for our sons for ever. The idea that there is any reform in this document is just nonsense. This document represents, to my way of thinking, a classic example of the Conservative political methods in action. May I define it for the benefit of this House and posterity? This is the Conservative Method. No. 1: "Do not move unless you are obliged to." No. 2: "When you are obliged to move, move as little as you can." No. 3: "When you do move, make it appear you are doing a favour." No. 4: "Never move forward but only sideways." That is exactly what this document does. It does not move unless it is obliged to move. When it moves, it moves as little as it can. It makes it appear we are having an immense favour done to us when there is a move—and we have had some extravagant language applied to this document—and finally, when one examines the proposals, one finds they are not a move forward, but a move sideways. It is the same thing with knobs on. This is not a document to make the Diplomatic Service safe for democracy; it is a document to make the Diplomatic Service safe for the old gang.
  Mr. Kirkwood: The old school tie.
  Mr. Brown: That is a wider phrase than I would care to use, because it covers everything from Oxford to Borstal. I hope I have demonstrated that this is not a document to make the Diplomatic Service safe for democracy, but a document to make it safe for the safe boys of the governing class of this country. I apply an acid test. How does this White Paper treat the subordinate staff of the Diplomatic Service itself? The Under-Secretary

  1403
  of State directed the attention of the House especially to paragraph 6, which deals with subordinate staff, and he used language which implied that the document would be incomplete if it did not provide for a free avenue of promotion from the subordinate to the major grades of the Diplomatic Service. Listen to what the White Paper actually does provide:
  "In addition to the higher posts which will be available in the subordinate branches themselves, it is also proposed that junior subordinate employés of exceptional merit shall be considered with other candidates competing for posts in the senior branch by Method 2."
  The House may not know, but it is the fact that the phrase "exceptional merit" has a definite and well-understood connotation in Civil Service affairs. When it is stated in a document, as it used to be stated about the promotion, say, of assistant clerks to the second division, or members of the second division to the first division of the Civil Service, that they should be promoted by exceptional medit, what it meant was that they were not promoted at all. In all the years in which that phrase "special merit" existed, as between assistant clerks and second division clerks, there was not more than the merest, most contemptible trickle of promotions. That phrase is not intended to enable subordinate staff to be promoted. It is there to make their promotion the most difficult thing under Heaven, because of the importation of this phrase "exceptional merit." This Report reminds me of nothing so much as the conversation that took place when a man went to dinner with a friend. At the end of dinner he was asked, "How did you like it?" He said, "Well, it was very good, what there was of it." Then, realising that he had committed a gaffe he tried to recover himself by saying, "What I meant to say was that there was plenty of it, such as it was." That is exactly what I feel about this document.
  As an instrument of organic reform it just is not in the picture. It is a bit of spoofing, a bit of lip-service to democracy. This country is sick to death of lip-service to democracy. As a document of administrative reform, it just is not there at all. It starts with an assumption which is all wrong. It starts with the assumption that there is a necessary connection between education and diplomatic ability.
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  Our experience largely denies that. The best diplomatist in Britain is the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister is utterly incapable of passing any examination whatever. Indeed, in his memoirs he takes a certain amount of credit to himself that this is so. The second best diplomatist in this country is the Home Secretary, who can make black reaction look like social reform. The Prime Minister had no education worth speaking of. The Home Secretary had no education. I notice that both the Americans and ourselves, when we want to get a job in diplomacy done, have frequently resorted to people right outside the ordinary diplomatic range in order to get it done. The President of the United States will frequently select a journalist. Why? Because journalists are very good public relations officers. We ourselves have sent to Moscow and elsewhere people outside the ordinary diplomatic service. I challenge the whole assumption upon which this document rests. Education has been chosen not because education is a mark of diplomatic ability; the educational standing has been chosen because in Britain it is still overwhelmingly a class classification.
  I shall divide the House against these proposals, because I could not sleep happily in my bed to-night without having spoken and voted against what I regard as the most spoofing, spurious, dishonest, inadequate proposals that have ever been brought before this House to meet a really serious situation in the Civil Service at home or abroad.
  Captain Mott-Radclyffe: It is with very great diffidence that I rise to speak in this Debate, first because it is alarming when, for the first time, one's halting words are recorded in the OFFICIAL REPORT, and secondly, because I can make no claim whatever to be an expert on foreign affairs. All I can claim is to have made something of a Cook's tour round some diplomatic posts in Europe for a few years immediately before the war, when I served in the humblest possible capacity as attaché on the staff of four posts in the short space of three years, but I hope that my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will not imagine from that that I was like the proverbial baby whom nobody wanted to hold and who was so tiresome that he was quickly passed round from one post to

  1405
  another, only finally escaping disaster by the advent of the war.
  The two most welcome features, to my mind, of these new proposals are, first, that the members of the new Foreign Service will be versed in the wider matters of commerce and economics. It has become increasingly clear of late years that these two subjects have so encroached upon what was hitherto regarded as the technical field of diplomacy that it was impossible to draw a line between where one began and the other ended, and when, in fact, the distinction between work of the chancery and the commercial secretariat was often very ill-defined. Secondly, the statement in the White Paper that it is proposed to increase the staffs of Britain abroad is particularly welcome. I do not know whether hon. Members realise how many were the difficulties to be overcome with an inadequate staff or how much of the criticism which has often been levelled at diplomats was due to a shortage of staff. I doubt very much whether in many posts staffs were adequate even for what were called normal times. But times are rarely normal, and what happened was that when a member of the staff was ill at the same time as another was on leave, the rest were tied to their desks from morning until far into the night, and it was quite impossible for them either to travel about the country as they would have liked or to make wider contacts outside the capital.
  I have often felt that in some cases there was a gap untouched between the ground covered by our diplomats in the capitals and that covered by our Consuls in the provinces. The one tended in many respects to be too restricted to the capital for the reasons I have endeavoured to explain, and the other tended to be too parochial. I hope that under the new system whereby there is an adequate increase in the staff there will be sufficient personnel to cover this gap, hitherto not covered, so that not only will members be able to travel about the country but will be able to make contacts in the provinces. I also hope that members will be encouraged to specialise in some particular field of activity, such as education or agriculture, in the countries to which they are accredited. I urge my right hon. Friend to ensure that with the increase in administrative posts there will be similar increases in clerical posts. One can hardly expect a Second, or a First, Secretary to sit up
  1406
  all night at a time of crisis deciphering complicated and important instructions, and be at his best the following morning either to act on those instructions or help the head of the Mission to do so.
  May I say a word about finance? I think the quickest way of bringing into operation what economists call the law of diminishing returns, is by what I might call diplomatic representation on the cheap. I hope a really generous redistribution of representation allowances will be made. Too often in the past our representatives have been put in a very embarrassing position. They have either had to continue to accept hospitality which they were unable to afford to return, or if they tried to return adequately the hospitality they have received they were put into serious financial difficulties. If the prime function of our representatives abroad is to represent His Majesty's Government with the Government of the country to which they are accredited, it follows that they must have essential contacts with members of that Government and that those contacts must be assisted and strengthened by social contacts.
  I also hope that my right hon. Friend will review very carefully the question of buildings. I am very glad to see that mention is made in the White Paper of this point. I think the House in general will agree that a building in which our representatives live and work should be commensurate with this country's position as a world Power. We do not want anything flashy or gaudy; we want something dignified and solid. It does not always help efficient administration if the military or naval attaché's office is sometimes a mile or half a mile away from the Chancellery, or our prestige, particularly in Oriental countries, if, when a colleague from a neighbouring Legation or Ministry of Foreign Affairs calls on you and you forget to warn him not to shut the door with a bang, a mass of plaster falls on his head. You can laugh this off once, but if six months later the same thing occurs because the Office of Works refuses to authorise the necessary expenditure for repairs it is more difficult to laugh it off a second time.
  There is one point on which I am a little puzzled, and I should be obliged if my right hon. Friend would give us some indication of how he proposes to solve it when he comes to reply to the Debate. Under the existing system there are about

  1407
  double the number of posts abroad to posts at home. Once the Diplomatic and Consular Services have been amalgamated—and I well understand and welcome the reasons for that amalgamation—it follows that there will be many more posts abroad proportionately to the number of posts at home. If in future a member of the Foreign Service has spent six or seven periods abroad for every one period he has spent at home, it seems to me that it will be very difficult for him to fulfil the essential function of representing his country in the widest and best sense if he comes back at such rare intervals that he does not know much about his own country. I do not know whether that difficulty can be overcome either by bringing men back from the remoter posts for courses or by extending leave for which a man would be paid his full allowance.
  But when these new proposals are in force and the Foreign Service has been reformed, I hope we shall not sit back in a complacent frame of mind and say, "We have reformed the Foreign Service; now we can expect all sorts of new successes to be achieved abroad." It is the responsibility of the House to see that it is the policy of the Government to create conditions under which our Foreign Service is likely to be successful. There has been a great deal of criticism of our Diplomatic Service in the years preceding the war, and much adverse comparison has been made between our own successes, or lack of them, with successes in the diplomatic field achieved by the Germans. One must remember, however, that in the 1930's the Germans had one estimable weapon with which to support their diplomatic activity and which was singularly lacking so far as we were concerned. They usually had 100 divisions on the frontier of the neighbouring Power, whereas our own diplomatic representatives were often asked to make bricks without straw.
  But the real criterion by which the Diplomatic Service must be judged—I am sure it is the criterion by which they themselves would wish to be judged—is whether the advice they offered and the information they gave was good or bad, and, as only very few of the documents have ever been published, I feel that a great deal of the criticism that has been offered of our representatives abroad is largely ill informed. Let this be said,
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  that where instructions were received which were contrary to the advice given, they were loyally carried out in a manner which those who enter the new Service under new conditions might do well to follow. I feel that after the war this country will have a chance rarely presented to any country before, to lead a suffering and starved world, particularly those nations at present overrun by the Nazis, into a world of stability and prosperity, in conjunction with the Dominions and the United Nations, and that a very large part of the burden of carrying out that task will fall on members of the Foreign Service.
  To succeed, I think there are three essential conditions which must be fulfilled. The first is that foreign policy and defence must go hand in hand; secondly, there must be the closest possible collaboration between ourselves and the Dominions in our conception of foreign policy and as nearly as possible there should be one foreign policy for the whole of the British Commonwealth; thirdly, the diplomats themselves should be above all men of personality. They should possess the qualities which will make them acceptable to the foreigner. They should have a thorough knowledge and love of their own country and of the ideals for which we have fought and suffered in this war. Lastly, they should maintain that high standard of personal integrity and loyalty which has been the tradition of our representatives abroad in the past.
  Mr. Martin: I am very pleased to express, on behalf of Members on all sides, the appreciation that we all feel of the hon. and gallant Gentleman's speech. He showed at least a great intimacy with and mastery of the subject, a quality which recommends a speaker to this House, wherever his listeners may sit, and I hope we shall often hear him again in the future.
  I think some of the criticisms that have been made about the Foreign Service have not been justified. There are two serious points on which beyond it this Service falls short, and has done for some time, of the ideal which we should set for it. The first is that, as a democratic instrument, it is obviously not efficient at present. The second is, as has been shown by the way it has been treated by Governments for a considerable time past, that there is something about the Foreign

  1409
  Service which does not enable it perfectly to fulfil the functions it is called upon to perform. I do not think we can possibly be entirely satisfied with a Service which appoints to major posts abroad at every moment of crisis envoys from outside that Service. During and after the last war we sent to Paris, in succession, Lord Derby and Lord Crewe. We sent to Washington Lord Reading, Lord Grey of Fallodon and Sir Auckland Geddes. We sent to Berlin at a critical moment, when we resumed relations with Germany after the last war, Lord D'Abernon. As soon as this war began we sent to Moscow the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for East Bristol (Sir S. Cripps), to Madrid the right hon. Member for Chelsea (Sir S. Hoare) and Lord Lothian and Lord Halifax in succession to Washington. Those facts constitute a serious indictment of the Service in themselves.
  I do not think I have the competence to trace the reason why those conditions came about, but we have to face the fact that in some way the Foreign Service fell short, apparently not on the commercial and economic and industrial side, on which we are always told its shortcomings exist, but on the political side. The people who have been chosen to go to these places were not people whom the commercial interests would choose as Ambassadors for themselves. With all respect to Lord Halifax and Lord Crewe, and even to the right hon. Member for Chelsea and the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for East Bristol, I do not think in the ordinary way any of them would have been chosen primarily for their commercial qualifications, but evidently there was some reason which caused this state of affairs to come about. I believe, when the Foreign Service was started, the idea in the minds of people was primarily to supply Ambassadors and Ministers with competent staffs and not to build up a great school of envoys who would be ready, when an emergency arose, to take their place in the great capitals of the world. In the 18th and 19th centuries it was customary to send ex-Cabinet Ministers, large landed proprietors, great nobles, ex-soldiers of distinction, people like Lord Stewart, Sir William Hamilton and Sir Horace Mann, not professional diplomatists but people of great competence, to represent their countries in foreign places. What was
  1410
  found to be necessary was a competent staff to assist them, and a competent staff was built up by the first Diplomatic Service. One thing, however, that was omitted from the qualities required for a staff seems to have been political competence. The people chosen had to be of agreeable manners, people who could get on with foreigners and who were competent as staff officers. They were not primarily concerned to be people of political competence who might well represent their country in an emergency. That was a shortcoming which gradually permeated the Diplomatic Service and brought it down to a level of service which somehow did not compete on all fours with the other services of the country in the difficult times of the last 40 or 50 years.
  What ought we to do to remedy that state of affairs? What are the qualities which are most required in a diplomatist to-day? I cannot believe that we want simply to add to the qualities which they already possess just a veneer of commercial and economic knowledge. I believe that that would be fatal to the Service. We want to build up either a Service of great political talent which may in course of time provide us with competent envoys in the countries abroad, or else the best possible staff and recognise the fact that we do not in every case intend to draw the chiefs of Missions from that staff if need arises. I suggest to my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary that he should take counsel very seriously with the Foreign Secretary and his advisers on these matters and that they should make up their minds whether they wish to continue in the present way and have a system of that sort, or whether they propose to aim at building up a great school of Ambassadors. It seems to me that the modern Foreign Secretary will never in very critical questions allow an Ambassador altogether to speak for him. I know that it is the theory and the practice of the right hon. Gentleman who now holds that position to keep the personal touch as far as possible with the Foreign Ministers of countries abroad, and I believe that that is the right policy. Prime Ministers and Foreign Secretaries must in the future, with the narrowing factors that are going on in the world, which make the world a more closely knit community than in the past, keep close con-

  1411
  tact with their opposite numbers in foreign countries. That state of affairs will continue to develop rather than to decrease. It that be so, I suggest that what is required is a very competent staff and that the production and development of that staff must be the prime aim of whatever reforms are introduced.
  With that aim in view and without developing that side of the matter further, I would like to ask one or two questions about the White Paper. In paragraph 12 it is suggested that the number of Consular posts must be reduced and the number of Diplomatic posts increased. That is a state of affairs we shall all welcome. It will fit in well with the greater democratisation of the Diplomatic Service. The difficulty we feel on this side of the House has already been expressed by my right hon. Friend who spoke first from this side. It is all very well to talk about the democratisation of the Service, but if the examination system is to be open to everybody, the question is how we are to get the people inside it. The ordinary elementary and secondary school boy has very little chance under this system of reform, because he has to get to work and start his career long before he reaches the ages of 21 or 23, as is suggested in the White Paper. Under these proposals a boy passes from the university, and at the age of, say, 22 he comes to the first stage and goes up to the Foreign Service. He passes an examination and is accepted. He then goes for 18 months abroad and has an opportunity of learning foreign languages and of getting some experience of what the Foreign Service is like. He then comes back to this country and goes through a second examination. Perhaps the Under-Secretary will clear up the disparity between paragraphs 14 and 20. Paragraph 14 says that the young man will become a member of the Foreign Service on his return to this country after his 18 months abroad. Paragraph 20 says that he will go through a year's further service. The question whether that second year is a probation period should be cleared up. He returns at the age of 24 and has to go through a year's probation in this country, in which time he studies economics and subjects of that sort. By that time the young man is 25 years of age, and it is not really practicable, it is not within the reach of the working-classes of this country, that
  1412
  their sons should be so uncertain of what their careers are to be until they reach 25.
  I have the greatest sympathy with those who drew up the proposals in this White Paper, but to keep a young man hanging about, continuing as it were his technical education until he is 25 and then to say to him, "We are sorry, we do not want you; we do not think you are the right sort," is extremely unsatisfactory. It will mean that we shall not get the best type of boys going from the elementary and secondary schools into this kind of service. I freely confess that it is a difficult problem. Diplomacy is a thing to which a man must come rather late in life, and we cannot get trained diplomatists at the ages of 20 or 21. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman might think again with his advisers and see whether he can do something about what the Under-Secretary in opening the Debate referred to as an army that consisted only of officers. Why not try and create an army and see that promotion is accessible to all its ranks? At the present moment the budding diplomatist does in fact have a real promise of certain success. He must be a complete dud not to get a certain distance. However much he might have been subject in his early days to sarcastic heads, he has a good chance of spending golden afternoons in Panama or somewhere of that sort, because at the present the numbers of heads of Missions are practically equal to the numbers of entrants into the Service.
  This state of affairs has to disappear, and I would ask the Under-Secretary to consider whether the second division cannot be recruited more actively and whether it would not be possible to post men of promise to Consulates soon after 18 or 19 where they might learn the elements of their service until 22 or 23. If they showed promise, they might be sent to do the job themselves in a not too important Consular job where they would have the possibility, if they had the competence for it, of sending in reports on conditions in that post and getting into contact with business; then gradually by that means they would advance in the Service, and be able to share in the opportunities of promotion later. I believe it is only in that way that we shall really throw the Service open to the ordinary citizens of this country. Whatever else is true in the observations of the Noble

  1413
  Lady the Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor), it is true that it is becoming exceedingly important that this Service should be thrown open to the people as a whole.
  There are two further points I wish to put forward. One concerns the selective method. I do not altogether agree with my right hon. Friend who spoke from this side of the House that the selective method is to be discouraged. I think there is a good deal to be said for trying as an experiment whether it is not possible to find men of all classes outside the circle of examinees who might be brought in at a rather later date and become useful members of the Diplomatic Service, and I welcome this method, but it is extremely important that it should be really divorced, as I am sure it is the intention of the Foreign Secretary that it should be, from any sort of class connection. If it is to be a successful experiment, it should be open to young men of all classes who may show some aptitude for the Service.
  Lastly, there is the difficult question of choosing the right kind of man to represent this country abroad. The hon. Member for West Leicester (Mr. H. Nicolson) spoke somewhat disparagingly of the qualities of sympathy and intuition. I cannot help thinking that perhaps he spoke rather hastily. Intuition is an important quality; it is not only a facility for acting on guess work, but is the capacity for entering into the mind of the person to whom you are talking or with whom you have relations. Lord Malmesbury and M. Callieres, two great experts in this matter, speaking at different times 100 or 200 years ago, laid it down that the qualities of the heart were just as important as the qualities of the mind in diplomacy, and that in fact sympathy and the imaginative power to get inside the mind of the interlocutor were among the most important of diplomatic gifts.
  I cannot help thinking that those qualities still hold good to-day, and that one of the reasons why we have not been successful in producing the best men in our Diplomatic Service is that those qualities and an aptitude for politics have not been sufficiently considered in choosing our candidates. I am glad, therefore, that the right lion. Gentleman has left his method rather vague and is prepared to advance by trial and error in this matter, and I would ask that he pays special attention to the neces-
  1414
  sity for seeing that people who do enter the Service have these qualities and are given ample opportunity of developing them as their period in the service advances. To-day we are helping to make a delicate precision instrument for the formation of the new world. We do not all agree in this House as to what shape that new world will take, but we must all agree that the Diplomatic Service will play an important and valuable part, and that it must be the best possible for its task; and if the right hon. Gentleman before he introduces a Bill will think again on this important matter of democratising this important Service and how to select the best possible candidates, I think it will be of advantage.
  Dr. Burgin: These reforms, in my judgment, are obvious reforms, and they are generations overdue, and I therefore commend their arrival in the White Paper. Perhaps I may speak for a moment about the impact which the Foreign Service makes upon business in this country. There are hon. and right hon. Members who have held very high posts in Embassies abroad, and a great many hon. Members have no doubt travelled very widely, but in a more modest way, over the last 40 years, I too have come into contact with Embassies and consular offices in a large part of the world, and perhaps I may speak of some of the things which have struck me. I was brought up to make my way at once to the Embassy on setting foot on the soil of a foreign country and to leave my card, not as a punctilio of politeness but because it was the sensible thing to do. I should like to feel not merely that it is still the sensible thing to do so but that failure to do it would be recognised as a self-imposed handicap upon any British subject visiting a foreign country. This House must take a very large responsibility for the fact that our Foreign Service has not been adequately supported in the last 20 or 30 years. On page 8 the White Paper mentions that the reforms will cost money, and also says on the same page that false economies on buildings and staffs, if they result in impaired deficiency, will be very serious. On the last page it says:
  "The results of inadequacy may involve a costly disaster."
  Certainly they may. We have not supported our Foreign Service adequately. Reference has been made to buildings and to lack of staffs. Numberless stories could

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  be given of visits to Embassies where coats of paint were obviously wanted, where books of reference were years out of date, where the Ambassador's allowance for a car or other means of conveyance was so inadequate that there were whole lists of duties which he could not perform, but I am more concerned with the aloofness of the Foreign Service. I am aware that the Ambassador and his staff live in an atmosphere of patronage, of detachment, of diplomatic immunity, of absence from the law of supply and demand, of permitted entry and of privilege. I recognise all that. It is very hard if, even nationals of the country of the Ambassador himself experience aloofness when they reach an Embassy, Consulate, or Legation, but that happens time and time again.
  I say at once that, in the conduct of the international business, it is not to the Embassy or the Consulate that one goes for information about a country but to a cable office, a newspaper company, or one of the big international institutions such as a big chemical company or the Association of Chambers of Commerce or the Federation of British Industries or to any other office of that kind. It is a great pity that in the conduct of international business in foreign countries, nationals of our own country should feel that they are handicapped in negotiation with the opposite Government or with nationals of another Government; for in these cases there appears to be diplomatic support for those with whom one is negotiating, whereas in our own case there is a lack of up-to-date knowledge. These are very serious matters.
  Mr. Gallacher: If the right hon. Member went to another country and wanted to know something about the working-class of that country, is it not the case that he would have to go to the trade union movement, or may be to the Communist party in that country, and not to the Embassy?
  Dr. Burgin: I do not want to be led away from the argument which I was trying to adduce.
  Mr. Gallacher: It is important.
  Dr. Burgin: I am not saying that it is not important. It happens to be irrelevant. What I want to say is that I hope that there will be inherent in these reports
  1416
  the idea that the Embassy is a place where up-to-date information about a country can be procured. I am very struck with the fact that very often the London equivalent of the other country has more information than our own Embassy in that country, and I am wondering whether, as part of the training for the new entrants to this Foreign Service, the idea perhaps of a period of apprenticeship in the London Embassy of the foreign country to the Embassy of which he is to be posted, might not be a good idea as part of that training. This is not a fanciful suggestion but one to which a good deal of thought has been given and which would confer a good deal of advantage. When I use the word "Ambassador" I intend to cover the whole membership of that kind of Foreign Service.
  We have heard a good deal of that part of an Ambassador's life which represents the portrayal to a foreign country of British institutions and the British mode of thought, but we have not heard so much about that part, very often under-done, of the representation back to this country of the feeling, thought, culture and currents of opinion in the foreign country. You cannot be aloof in an Embassy and understand currents of opinion in the foreign country. I agree with the hon. Member who asked me to give way just now that you cannot be aloof in your study engaged in deciphering documents, and at the same time be wooing the intelligence of another country and learning the currents of opinion that exist there. It is not merely a matter of knowing the language, although that no doubt is an indispensable preliminary. It is much more a matter of knowing the people, of having a very wide, tolerant, ubiquitous presence. It is moving in, around and among, and it is not merely always going to the capital of the country to which you are accredited as Minister by the P. and O. special or by train. It means taking the unorthodox method of going by air or by sea to the nearest port. The approach to a country always by the main railway station is a very limited approach, exactly as if a horse has blinkers. The approach by air gives one an entirely different access to different sections of people and to a different class of thought in the foreign country. Approach by sea is another entirely different approach. These are only a suggestion that among the

  1417
  training of an Ambassador should be included a departure from the idea that you merely go to the country in a coach running on rails. There is a germ of thought in that suggestion.
  As to the learning of languages, it is also stated that an Ambassador must learn the languages of the Latin, Oriental and Slavonic groups. I do not know who was responsible for that selection, but I would remind the House that there is a large group of languages known as the Teutonic, a knowledge of which is not without importance. There is another group known as the Scandinavian, a knowledge of which is equally desirable. I am assuming that those are merely examples and that the White Paper is intended only to be an index and is not exhaustive in this respect. If we are to mention families of languages, let us not limit ourselves to Latin and Oriental languages. We must realise that German is the language of a number of other countries and is the second language on the Continent of Europe. A thorough knowledge of German will be necessary and essential for a great many years to come. The Scandinavian group, of which seven are very similar, is also very important.
  Here is the Foreign Office saying that this system of the Foreign Service must be overhauled, and putting forward a White Paper with a number of minimum suggestions. It is very desirable that reference should be made to the different methods of recruitment. A number of men will be coming back from the war with excellent Service records, but with no capacity to take examinations in the ordinary way. The idea of a viva voce examination in order to find out what is in a man and paying tribute to the service that he is performing for his country is an essential one.
  These reforms are overdue, and not only in our own country; there is not a foreign service in the world that would not be prepared to treat the proposals of this White Paper as being applicable to themselves. I have discussed this White Paper which, of course, has already been translated into most of the languages of the world, with the diplomats of many countries and they pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary for having brought in this White Paper at this stage. They say how much they would like to have an equivalent in their own countries.
  1418
  The Foreign Service has an immense capacity for good or ill. I dissociate myself from those who try to run down the value of our Foreign Service. It is quite wrong to say that the world looks down on our Foreign Service; exactly the reverse. We who knock about the world, going to Embassies, Legations and Consulates in different countries are aware that there are shortcomings in the way of insufficient staff and not enough experts and that our Ambassadors have to spend too much of their time on tasks which they ought to be able to delegate, so that they would have more time to ascertain the culture, language and life of the countries to which they are posted; but when the most perfect organisation has been worked out, with the most wonderful signal box and a perfect system of railway lines, it is still necessary to pull the right levers or you will get the right train in the wrong place. However perfect this organisation, there will still be the human factor of selection.
  I hope this House will request of the Foreign Secretary that, in future, a great deal of thought will be devoted to the selection of the head of a mission. The tasks that he has to perform must be put before any consideration of his own seniority and the attractions of the post to him. It is essential that the idea of the duty to the particular man takes second place to the idea of the duty of fulfilling the mission with the best possible aptitude. That is a very important matter. We have appointed a Francophile to Berlin in the past. It is very necessary that we should avoid gross mistakes of that kind by making the selection, not only because of the rights of a particular applicant or the attractions of the post, but because the person selected had the highest qualifications to represent his country, in the best meaning of that expression. I commend these reforms and I hope they will receive the overwhelming support of this House. They are years overdue.
  Mr. Ivor Thomas: The character of an Ambassador has changed a great deal from the days when Sir Henry Wootton defined him as an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country. In those days he was an envoy from a court to a court. More recently he has become an envoy from a Government to a Government. To-day he ought

  1419
  to be an envoy from a people to a people. It is because in general these reforms point in that direction that I feel able to support them, with one rather important exception; and I feel able to support them also because they do attempt to tap the great reservoir of talent we have in the secondary and grammar schools of this country, which has not as yet been tapped to any extent for the Foreign Service. May I say on that point that it is not enough merely for this House to approve these reforms? Great expectations were held of the Macdonnell reforms of 1918; they have been frustrated. What is the Teason? Very careful examination of these reforms was made in the journal known as "Adult Education" by a tutor disguising himself under the name of Richard Krammer. He comes to this conclusion:
  "We have thus arrived at what is, I believe, the main if not the only, explanation of the ineffectiveness of the 1918 attempt to broaden the social texture of the Foreign Office and the Diplomatic Service by removing all economic and social barriers to candidature. The explanation is that the sons of that section of the community in whose interests the reforms were primarily intended, did not avail themselves of the possibility of competing for admission to the Diplomatic Corps, which these reforms gave them, to anything like the extent to which the reformers expected that they would."
  There were many reasons for that result—the feeling that they would have to mix with people with whom they could not mix on equal terms, and so on. I want to suggest to the Under-Secretary that, in consultation with the President of the Board of Education, he should circularise all headmasters throughout the country so that they will direct the minds of their pupils, especially pupils in the secondary schools, to the possibility of a career in the Foreign Service. Very few headmasters to-day regard the Foreign Service as a possible career for their pupils.
  As I say, I feel in general agreement with these reforms. In fact, I feel an enthusiastic agreement with most of them, but it is no use, for the purpose of debate, to hand bouquets over the Table. So I pass right away to the great point of disagreement. I object to Method 2 for the selection of candidates for the Foreign Service. We are informed that 25 per cent. of vacancies may be filled mainly by selection, by an interview board, on the basis of past records. I regard that
  1420
  proposal with the greatest apprehension. If I may briefly recall to hon. Members the history of recruitment to the Foreign Service, they will remember that the Diplomatic Service was rescued from an age of favouritism and nepotism and corruption, firstly, by the introduction, in 1855, of a qualifying examination and then, in 1870, of the principle of the open competitive examination. Whatever the faults of the Foreign Service have been in recent years—they have not been so great as some Members have supposed, though much greater than some other Members have allowed—they are in no way comparable with the faults before 1855. These defects have been removed by the principle of the open competitive examination. As I see it, Method 2 means the undermining of that great and salutary principle. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Pethick-Lawrence) has expressed some anxieties on this point. I wonder whether he is aware that one of his predecessors in this House expressed himself eloquently on it. This is what Thomas Babington Macaulay, as he was then, said on 24th June, 1853, in a speech which had a great deal to do with the introduction of the qualifying examination:
  "I must say it seems to me that there never was a fact better proved by an immense mass of evidence, by an experience almost unvaried, than this—that men who distinguish themselves in their youth above their contemporaries almost always keep to the end of their lives the start they have gained in the earlier part of their career."
  I feel that is equally true to-day, and even more true because the technique of examination has been greatly improved.
  May I take up what was said by the hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. W. Brown)? At one point I feared I was going to agree with him, for the first time in my life in this House. I was relieved to find that I was in disagreement with him at the end. What we ought to be aiming for is to ensure that every elementary schoolboy in this country with the requisite ability is able to make his way to the secondary school and to the university. To a large extent it is certainly the case at Oxford and Cambridge to-day that a very high proportion of the young men there are old elementary schoolboys. It is quite impracticable to take someone from a workshop and put him into the Foreign Service, for the simple reason that the daily work of a man in the

  1421
  Foreign Service calls for special qualifications of a university standard. He must know languages, economics, and the history and social institutions of the country to which he is accredited. It ought to be our aim, to see that every boy of ability does go to the university and there does have a chance to enter the Foreign Service.
  Open competitive examination is the best method of recruitment because, in the first place, it is objective; it is a test to which no exception can be taken. Secondly, I think it is the most suitable method because what a clerk in the Foreign Office or a Secretary at a Mission abroad is required to do is, as often as not, precisely what he is required to do in the examination room. His superior will suddenly call on him to write a précis, on, shall we say, the history of the Russo-Polish boundaries or something of that sort, which is the type of thing he is called upon to do in the examination room. Examinations are, therefore, a good test of the work he will be called upon to do in the future. Are there some persons who ought to be in the Foreign Service who yet cannot pass examinations? There may be a few such persons, but I do not think that with the improvement in examination technique there are very many to-day. I think that they are amply provided for by the provision that the Foreign Secretary may take two such persons annually. But with the improvement in the technique of examinations the days have gone by when such persons as John Henry Newman or Mark Pattison could be "ploughed." The re-introduction of the method of selection is not an advance but a retrogression to pre-1870 or even pre-1855 days. It is really the last refuge of the old school tie. It may not be intended for this end, but it can have the result of preserving the Foreign Service, in the words of Bright, as a "system of outdoor relief for the younger sons of the aristocracy."
  I, therefore, like my right hon. Friend the Member for East Edinburgh, view with the greatest apprehension the introduction of Method 2. Apart from the two members whom the Foreign Secretary may choose annually, I would like to see all the posts thrown open to competitive examination. I am afraid the current prejudice against examinations may be very dangerous for this country. We shall, of course, have opportunities of
  1422
  discussing the general question when the Education Bill comes up. But we all know how on every speech day someone gets up and says, "Of course, when I was at school I never took any prizes," and as the afternoon wears on the poor prize-winners are made to feel the most wretched worms that ever flattened their bellies on the earth.
  If I have spoken with some heat, it is out of zeal for the Foreign Service. The business of foreign affairs is half the business of government. On its successful prosecution may hang the question of peace or war, and of life and death for millions. We cannot be at too much pains to see that the people recruited into the Foreign Service are the very best. It is because I agree that in general the Foreign Secretary's proposals are directed towards that end, and calculated to secure it, that I feel enthusiastic in their support; but, because Method 2 seems calculated to introduce into the Foreign Service annually a number of persons who would not otherwise be there, I feel bound to register the most emphatic protest against that method.
  Mr. Hamilton Kerr (Oldham): My hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mr. I. Thomas) prefaced his remarks with the famous saying of Sir Henry Wootton, that "an Ambassador is an honest man sent abroad to lie for his country." I would add to that in these days "and to know all." It is a commonplace that science in the form of the aeroplane has so contracted the world that the impact of the nations upon each other has been greatly intensified, and it is essential for an Ambassador to know not only the leading political personalities of the country to which he is accredited, but also its economic resources and the hours of labour in its factories. I cannot help feeling how true this point about the contraction of the world is when I cast my mind back to an occasion before the war when I had tea in Berlin, to the sound of S.S. troops marching up the Unter den Linden, dinner among the tulip fields in Holland, and then returned to this House in time to vote on the Navy Estimates.
  Mr. MacLaren: For or against?
  Mr. Kerr: For. In these days, when the world is contracting, it is more and more obvious that political, economic and

  1423
  social problems are no longer separate, but have become one major problem. The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. W. Brown), who is not in his place, made a very lively criticism of our Diplomatic Service. He rather recalled to me the more romantic and highly-coloured pages of some of our modern magazine fiction, whose writers try to persuade us that the only qualifications necessary to an Ambassador are to be able to manipulate an eyeglass with grace and dexterity, to obtain the services of the best chef in the capital, and to write witty and barbed comments in his despatches on his diplomatic colleagues, and that the one accomplishment necessary to a junior Secretary is to be able to pay charming compliments to a long-lashed Brazilian beauty while toying with quail at a diplomatic dinner party. But that is pure fiction, recalling the saying of an American diplomat that diplomacy was "light on the head but hell on the feet." What is the asset that a diplomat most desires when he comes to a foreign capital to take up his post? It is the knowledge that the Government he has the honour to represent has a fixed and firm foreign policy, which is supported by a large majority in the country and is guaranteed, above all, by adequate armed force. To be quite frank, we all bear our share of the responsibility in this House for the fact that our diplomats did not have these trump cards before the war. You cannot, as one hon. Member said, have a good thing unless you pay for it. It is no good putting a Baby Austin engine into a Rolls-Royce chassis. If you want a good Diplomatic Service, you must spend money on it.
  Let me mention the three important changes that are now being made. It is no longer essential for an able young man to possess private means before being able to take the examinations to go into the Service. Secondly—and this is the most important reform of all—there is the system of pensioning off men who have honourable records but who are not fitted for the higher posts. This will prevent the bottleneck which so often in the past blocked promotion. I also welcome the fact that, theoretically at any rate, each man will have to spend some of his time in the Consular Service. We have, as one hon. Member said, a unique opportunity after the war. We in this little Island off the
  1424
  North-West Coast of Europe are part of Europe, yet we speak English, the mother tongue of the United States. We can play the part of honest broker between the new world and the old. We possess in the British Empire a far greater political experience than any other part of the world. We find not only the great self-governing Dominions, in whose Parliaments the age-old ritual and procedure of Westminster is followed; we find Colonial dependencies half way to self-government with half-elected, half-nominated Councils, and we find the primitive chieftain, on the Gold Coast or in Nigeria, who dispenses justice under an umbrella, with a British adviser at his elbow. We have a tremendous part to play, and in interpreting this part the new, modernised Foreign Service will have an important influence.
  Take two imagined examples. First, our relations with our enemies. Suppose that some of us are standing a few days after the Armistice among the twisted girders and still smoking ruins of Krupps' shattered works. The question comes to our minds, "Shall we allow these works to be rebuilt?" If we do, what will they make; will it be munitions, or locomotives and tractors? If any of these, where will there be a market? Suppose we walk through the streets and enter a school. On the wall there may still be hanging a picture of Hitler. We run our eyes over the textbooks and see some of the poison of Dr. Rosenberg on the Aryan myth. Are we to allow this type of teaching to continue? On all this range of problems, we shall require expert advice. What about our relations with our friends? That is perhaps even more important. Look at China. Imagine we are at Chungking, perhaps in the office of the Ministry of Communications. On the wall we see a map, showing in coloured chalks new railways, road and air fields. We can see in imagination thousands of coolies building these new roads, bulldozers on the airfields removing obstructions, rivetters at work on new commercial buildings in the cities. What part is the new commercial China to play in the world? How will her commercialisation affect us?
  Very briefly, because time is short, I want to make one or two practical suggestions. The first is about the actual housing of the Foreign Service. Enter the Foreign Office, walk up the marble steps, enter the Foreign Secretary's room, with

  1425
  its ponderous and magnificent furniture, from the days of Palmerston. You are impressed. But go into the rooms used by some of the lower-paid workers, and you will find them more like the Bastille. If we are to have a better Foreign Service, we should accommodate its members in better offices.
  My Noble Friend the Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) spoke about women in the Foreign Service. I should like the question to be reopened after the war and examined in the light of the experience both of the United States of America and of Russia, who are making considerable use of women in their Foreign Service. I also believe it to be true that certainly there are many women workers in the Foreign Office at the present moment who are scandalously underpaid. It is true that many women possessing the gift of two languages, extremely competent typists and shorthand writers, are receiving less than £3 per week. It is shameful and does not conduce to high service and efficiency. It might be advisable as a practical step that the whole administration of the Foreign Office should be gone into by some expert in business methods to see whether salaries should not be raised, accommodation improved and the general efficiency of the whole organisation overhauled.
  My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Windsor (Captain Mott-Radclyffe) made some very practical observations upon the necessity of increasing staffs overseas and likewise of increasing their entertainment allowances. He made the very wise observation that it is foolish for a diplomat to spend his days entirely in the great glittering world of the metropolis, where he meets only a few members of the Government to which he is accredited or perhaps the leaders of society. He must get out into the country and contact the leaders of public opinion, the editors of local newspapers, Church dignitaries and trades union leaders. Certainly the success of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chelsea (Sir S. Hoare) in Spain has been due to the fact that he has taken the trouble to go round the provinces. I believe it will always be found that opinion is far more representative and more stable in the provinces of a country than in the capital, which is largely cosmopolitan. I hope that more generous allowances will be given to our diplomats in the future to
  1426
  enable them when abroad to travel round the country and get a real cross-section of the opinion of the country. I must recall one statement which has always stuck in my mind. The Noble Lady the Member for the Sutton Division referred to Lord Lothian. Before he left for America some of us dined with him, and in his charming way he asked many of us to write him and said, "My influence with the President will depend principally upon my sources of information." Sources of information are all important to the diplomat, and is because I believe that this new reform will help our diplomats overseas to extend their sources of information that I welcome it unreservedly. I want to congratulate the Under-Secretary of State upon his speech to-day and upon the definition he gave to our diplomacy as interpretative and not positive. It is we in this House, in the last analysis, who must bear responsibility for our diplomacy overseas, and we can be certain that if we state it well the Foreign Service will well and truly represent us.
  Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: I would like to echo the last words of my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hamilton Kerr) in the remarks which he made about Lord Lothian. I intended to do that because my hon. Friend the Member for West Leicester (Mr. H. Nicolson) pointed out that no less than eight ex-members of the Diplomatic Service found their way to this House and that I think seven of them are Cabinet Ministers. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the Postmaster-General, the Minister of Agriculture, one of the Whips and a very distinguished ex-President of the Board of Education, Lord Eustace Percy, all came from the Diplomatic Service. But my hon. Friend did not go on to ask why. I have heard—it may be wrong—that there was a certain amount of congestion, and these gentlemen found that the rougher ways of democracy in this House were more suited to their chances of promotion and their obvious ability. At the same time, as the hon. Member for Central Southwark (Mr. Martin) pointed out, Lord D'Abernon, Lord Derby and Lord Lothian and other distinguished gentlemen have entered at a higher level and it may be there is some discouragement in the Service because so many appointments have gone to outsiders. I do not think anyone has attempted to draw a lesson from this.

  1427
  What is the deduction? This Service like every other must be extremely flexible and it is not easy to let young men go in at the age of 21, 22 or 25 and let them go right through, without any fresh wind blowing from outside. This situation has come to a head at two periods, the last War and the present war.
  I would like to congratulate my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary on his speech. He has great command of language and perhaps unconsciously covered up one or two points about which I wish to ask him questions. There is the point he made that the Foreign Service is going to be drawn from a very much wider class. The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. W. Brown) is right on this point; I am in complete agreement with him and I do not share the view of the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. I. Thomas). I am afraid the facts do not bear him out. If any hon. Member wants to look at the facts he can get them. It is not true that in the last 20 years, since the Foreign and Diplomatic Services have been amalgamated, there has been any democraticisation worth noticing. No less than 70 per cent. of those who have entered the Service have come through from Eton or eight other schools. I have been at some pains to get these figures and I could if necessary repeat the precise names of the schools. I do not refer to the years previous to the last war for this, because these were then the gradations in society at home. If you say now 75 per cent. are coming from universities, it depends who goes to the university. The hon. Member for Rugby is not quite accurate. It is not one boy out of every 100 but of every 900 who gets to the university in this country.
  There is not a single man in the Foreign Service in this country, except three or four who came in almost by accident, who have ever been to an elementary school or a school outside the headmaster's conference list. It is a very limited range. While I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that 80 per cent. of the work of the Foreign Office is rather humdrum work, there is a percentage of his department which is highly political. A careful analysis has been made by Mr. Dale in his book "The Higher Civil Service" of what this political work means. It implies very close contact with the Minister. I admit that every Foreign Service official
  1428
  must work against a background at home, and that sometimes it may be a rather defeatist milieu. The only reason I dare to speak is that I feel that anybody who came out of the last war has a terrible sense of responsibility resting on him, because these last 20 years have brought about so few of the things for which he hoped. It is true that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs is one of the few people who emerged from that war and has on the whole tried to see Foreign Affairs with a progressive mind, but even he must bear his share of responsibility. He was there during the period when these reforms ought to have taken place. I must be very specific and I promise that I will not occupy too much time. I must ask the right hon. Gentleman this question, because it is absolutely crucial: When are these reforms going to take place? I read in the White Paper the word, "immediately," but it is covered up by a series of qualifications. As I see it there will be no change for many years. The Noble Lady the Member for the Sutton division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor), with much of whose speech I agree, would also share this view. She is anxious to get some changes made soon. I think that the hon. Member for West Leicester was wrong about the qualities of intuition and sympathy not being needed in the Diplomatic and Foreign Service. He overstated his case. This is the point: If you wish to have genuine reform it must be done within the next 10 years. But these changes will not begin to operate until the new entrants come in. I am advised—and I wish my right hon. Friend would answer this question—that a Joint Seniority list could be devised quite quickly as it was devised for the China-Japan-Levant portions of the Consular Service. Otherwise, no results will appear for from 15 to 20 years. We must be realists about it.
  What are the main jobs which have to be done? What is the modern job of the Foreign Office? What sort of men and women do they want and where are they to find them? Does this White Paper help to get them more quickly? The job of the Foreign Office is, as my right hon. Friend said so well, not only political but economic; I might add social and cultural. My right hon. Friend the Member for Luton (Dr. Burgin) wished to meet certain trade interests when he went abroad, but when I used to visit France

  1429
  I went to the British Institute in Paris because my contacts with the educational world were more often found within that Institute. I hope that such institute will be found throughout the whole of Europe. If so you must broaden your conception of Foreign Service. You have to train men such as those who have come into this House on the benches behind me. What is the only radical change that has affected this House during the last 30 or 40 years? People who have come here have actually been unemployed. It has made a difference to this House. The presence of an hon. Member who comes from a mining region or from the cotton industry, as my hon. Friend the Member for Farnworth (Mr. Tomlinson) does, makes the whole thing live. You have men like the late Lord Lothian in the Embassy at Washington, or like Professor Tawney or Professor Scott Watson. Would they have had to go through this sieve? The White Paper talks about specialists. What about the men who represent us abroad from the Department of Overseas Trade? What about the Foreign Department at the Ministry of Information? Is that to continue? If so, in what shape? Diplomacy may well be the least important of half a dozen jobs which will have to be done in our Embassies and British Institutes overseas.
  Let us talk about the next 10 years, not about something 20 years hence. The jobs during the next 10 years will be for technicians, administrators, doctors, social workers, engineers and the like. They will be wanted from Cairo to Washington. If you go to Washington, Ottawa, South Africa or Cairo to-day you will find such men there, including five hon. Members from this House and two from the House of Lords. There are distinguished men there like Mr. Harold Butler, Mr. Brand, Mr. Noel Hall, who is an economist, and Sir Arthur Salter. How are you to get more of these men? Hence the importance of the "special entry." I suggest to my right hon. Friend that he will have to pay very great attention to the special entry. The people who go in by special entry ought to represent the spirit of men like Derek Rawnsley and others who have died in the last two years. It will be no use waiting for the time when the new entrants come in; a new race of administrators internationally will be required in the next five or 10 years.
  1430
  I agree with the hon. Member for Keighley about the selection. Why is it that to-day there are committees, official and unofficial, sitting on the selection and training of teachers, ministers, doctors, and architects? Why is it that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has set up a committee for the Civil Service at home only this week and this aspect of the Colonial Service has been debated three times recently in another place? The reason, in my submission, is that the education system in the higher ranges is out of date, and no longer corresponds either to the march of science or even to what I may term the science of human relations, and international affairs is two-thirds human relations. That is another reason why it is important that there should be women in these posts. How is the selection to be done? You are going to eliminate to some extent the examination system, which Mr. Gladstone and Sir James Graham started 80 years ago, saying that it was the most important reform since the taxation was taken off bread. Why is it necessary to have two interviews and for a young man to go before the selection boards? What is the experience of selection boards? Do they not depend very largely on the personal equation of the members? I think you will have to be extremely careful unless you combine examination results with a selection board.
  But if there is a selection board only—I know this is intended to bring in the widest group—what will the young men do with themselves between the ages of 17 and 18 when they leave the secondary and grammar schools and the age of 21 and 22 when they go before the selection board? If they are to start off their life in different kinds of jobs, they will very likely have got a foothold in some reasonable job. Perhaps my right hon. Friend, when he replies, will say what is to happen to the 25 per cent. between the ages of leaving school and the ages of 21 and 22 when they are to meet the university men who have had three years at a university? From what sources does he expect to get these young men? Are they to come from the trade union world? Are they to compete on practically level terms with the university men?
  With regard to refresher courses, I would remind my right hon. Friend that the idea of a refresher course has com-

  1431
  mended itself to the Colonial Service and to many industries and professions. Perhaps he will develop the idea that he had in mind when he said that after about seven or 10 years in the Foreign Service it might be possible for these officials to get some fresh experience at home. I have tried to look impartially at the home Civil Service and the Foreign Office Service. The Lord President of the Council is present on the Front Bench, and nobody has greater experience of the Civil Service than he has. Does he agree with me that it looks as if 45 years, or whatever it may be, in one profession tends to dull quite a few people, whatever their profession may be? The Civil Service in addition happens to give security. My experience of undergraduates who have neither money nor influence is that there are only three things into which that type of young man can go—academic life at the universities, teaching in schools, and the Civil Service. In an attempt to get something different from the examination product, my right hon. Friend has suggested the selection board and also two men annually coming in up to the age of 30.
  To sum up my very scattered remarks, which I have had to telescope into very few minutes, will my right hon. Friend give us some greater hope that these things will be done speedily, and that we shall not have to wait until the new entrants have to come in several years hence, and can he give us any guarantee that the boys will come from the widest possible social sections of the country? If he can do those three things I, certainly, am not going to oppose him. I am only too glad to think that they have been introduced.
  Mr. Law: The hon. Member has asked me one or two specific questions to which I will reply at once. He asked first what guarantee there will be that the field of selection will be wider in the future than it has been in the past. I think he did something less than justice to the width of the field of selection in the past. The net has been cast pretty widely. But, leaving that aside, the arrangements for training abroad at the expense of the State should ensure, as far as possible, that the net is cast as widely as it may be. He also asked me what the 25 per cent. of people who entered the Service under Method 2, were going to do between the
  1432
  time they left school and the time they came up for interview to get into the Service. Of course, they might be doing a variety of things. They might be at a university, or they might just have taken their Schools, or taken their degree and feel disinclined to sit for another examination, or they may have been in business and studying at a night school, or they may have spent a year or two abroad learning languages. They might be filling their time usefully in a number of profitable ways.
  I should like to say how much I welcomed the very interesting speech of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Windsor (Captain Mott-Radclyffe). I think he did something less than justice to his own career in the Diplomatic Service. Indeed, it was obvious from his speech that, in spite of the comparatively short period during which he was connected with the Diplomatic Service, he made the most of it. For one who has been connected with the Foreign Service for so short a time he made a very remarkable name for himself, and I am still hearing of some of his more famous exploits. If he makes the same name for himself in the House—and I think from his speech to-day he will—there is a very great future for him.
  I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Pethick-Lawrence) for the welcome that he gave to our proposals, but there were one or two points upon which he was doubtful and upon which he asked enlightenment. One was the separation of the Foreign Service from the home Civil Service. I tried to explain that the separation is not absolute and that there will be opportunities for seconding, or the appointment of Foreign Service officials to posts in other Departments and vice versa. The appointment of people from other Departments to the Foreign Service will not be in any way excluded by these reforms. The right hon. Gentleman was also rather doubtful, like my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Lindsay) about the selection by interview. I would like to remind him that under these proposals the preliminary Foreign Office interview is discarded. That will no longer take place, and the examination which the new entrants will have to face will have to be the examination conducted by the Civil Service Commissioners for

  1433
  the Civil Service as a whole. The interview—which is really the wrong name to give it—which candidates will have to face will be the viva voce part of the examination which I understand all candidates for the Civil Service will have to face. The Civil Service Commissioners can be trusted to see that the oral part of the examination will not be loaded against the candidate and in favour of the old school tie.
  The Noble Lady the Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) made a very interesting, sincere, sympathetic and almost passionate speech about the proposals, which she regarded, I understand, with a certain amount of disfavour. I gather that she would be opposed to any measures for the reform of the Foreign Service which did not allow of the entrance of women into the Diplomatic Service and which did not recognise the great work, which no one for a moment denies, which women are doing in every sphere of national activity today. It is, I think, fair to say that my Noble Friend's principal interest in these reforms is in the question of recognising the position of women. It is necessary to remember, however, that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has to regard the problem from a slightly different point of view. One would have gathered from the speech of my Noble Friend that the Foreign Secretary and the whole of the Foreign Office were violently and unalterably opposed to the admission of women into the Foreign Service. That is not the case. The point I tried to make earlier, and the point, I think, that is made in the White Paper, is that this is such an important problem and a problem of such difficulty, that it would be a mistake to rush into it without the fullest consideration, and a mistake to hold up the whole of the reforms until this very difficult point has been decided. My right hon. Friend has to regard this problem from a point of view slightly different from that of my Noble Friend. He has to think not so much of the position of women but of the efficiency of the Foreign Service. That is the sole criterion he has in his mind, My hon. Friend the Member for West Leicester (Mr. H. Nicolson), who made such a lucid, useful and, indeed, brilliant speech from the depth of his wide experience of this subject, gave us some idea of what the difficulties of the question of the
  1434
  admission of women are. I think the House would agree after listening to that speech that it was at best a finely balanced argument and that it would be a mistake to come to a decision, not on a consideration of what is best for the Foreign Service, but on a consideration of how best the services of women in the war effort, or wherever it may be, might be recognised.
  My hon. Friend the Member for West Leicester raised two or three points to which I would like to allude. I am very glad to think, and my right hon. Friend will be very glad to think, that he does generally welcome these reforms, but he has pointed out, as indeed I pointed out earlier, that the amalgamation of the services will bring with it certain compensating disadvantages. He pointed out that the Service as constituted at present is a small Service. When the Consular and the Commercial Diplomatic branches are brought into it it will be a very much larger Service, and it will be impossible for the Secretary of State to take in each individual man the same interest as he can when it is a small Service. That is true; but that point we try to meet in Part 4 of the White Paper, where we explain that a personnel department is being established which will keep careful record of all members of the Service, and that a system of inspection of diplomatic posts is to be established which will enable the personnel department to keep track of individual records. I do not think the disadvantages which my hon. Friend fears will be anything like as great as he suggested.
  Then the hon. Member dwelt upon the essential need for having specialists, men who have spent their whole lives in one part of the world. My right hon. Friend is fully aware of the need of having experts in various spheres but he does not want to train a corps of specialists. He wants even the people who specialise on any particular subject to have, as well, all round knowledge and experience. I think that will be achieved by the proposals of my right hon. Friend. My hon. Friend also said that with the amalgamation of the Services there will be a sense of frustration, because members of the Services will fall into categories of sheep and goats, and the goats will get very despondent. I do not believe that is so of the future though I believe it to be very largely the case at the moment. I

  1435
  think the Consular Service at present suffers to a very great extent from that sense of frustration, because it feels there is no outlet or avenue of promotion. That will be corrected by my right hon. Friend's proposal.
  My hon. Friend also mentioned the desirability of having a staff college. I doubt very much whether a staff college would produce the results which he has in view. After all, the purpose of a staff college is, as I understand it, that soldiers who in peace time have no training in or experience of war and need training in the theoretical side of warfare go to the staff college to make up the deficiencies which peace imposes upon their training. The Foreign Service is quite different. In the Foreign Service the battle is going on all the time. All the time members of that Service are getting, so to speak, their staff training, their war training, in the natural course of their career.
  Sir Percy Harris: There is a proposal to set up a staff college for the Civil Service as a whole. It has been recommended by a committee and has been discussed in this House. Does the right hon. Gentleman suggest that if such a staff college were set up, the Foreign Office would refuse to let their staff have the advantage of it?
  Mr. Law: No, I would not suggest anything of the kind, but I would point out that a staff college for the Civil Service would probably have a different function from a staff college for the Foreign Service. A staff college for the Civil Service, as I understand from what was said at Question time in the House a day or two ago, would be designed mainly to train civil servants in administration, and the training we want the Foreign Office staff to have is not strictly administrative but much wider than that. The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. W. Brown), who opposed with such violence these proposals, impressed me not so much by his violence, because I thought his attack was weak, as by the amount of nonsense he was talking.
  Mr. W. Brown: Will the right hon. Gentleman illustrate that? Let us have a little argument and less abuse?
  Mr. Law: I propose to illustrate it. I gathered from the hon. Member, and I must say that it is the first time I have
  1436
  ever heard it seriously put forward, that education in itself was a definite liability to anyone entering the Foreign Service.
  Mr. Brown: I did not say that.
  Mr. Law: That was the clear implication of the hon. Member's speech. The hon. Member complained that no secondary or elementary school boy would have a chance under these proposals of entering the Foreign Service.
  Mr. Brown: Certainly.
  Mr. Law: If the hon. Member means that nobody who has been to a secondary school or elementary school would have a chance of entering the Service, that is untrue; people who have been to elementary schools and secondary schools will have abundant opportunities, both under Method I and Method 2. If the hon. Member means, as I think he does, that somebody who has been to an elementary school or secondary school and whose education has stopped at that moment, and who has never been educated further or educated himself further, would not be able to get into the Foreign Service, I agree that he is probably right.
  Mr. Brown: Not probably right, but absolutely right, as the Minister knows.
  Mr. Law: The hon. Member is absolutely right in that. Somebody whose education stops maybe at 14 or 18 and has had no more education at all and whose mental age remains at that, will not get into the Foreign Service, will not get into any other Service of the Crown and, I imagine, will not get into any other responsible work.
  Mr. Brown: What about the Prime Minister?
  Mr. Law: The Prime Minister is catered for under Method 2. In his extremely interesting speech, which I am sorry I was not able to hear in full, my right hon. Friend the Member for Luton (Dr. Burgin) put the matter into truer perspective than did the hon. Member for Rugby. My right hon. Friend has had great experience in these matters, and he pointed out that this idea that the Foreign Service of this country is regarded abroad with contempt and derision was completely unfounded. As my right hon. Friend pointed out, our Foreign Service has a very high reputation, but, as he also pointed out,

  1437
  it is not perfect and it never will be perfect. It is the purpose of these reforms to make it better, and I believe they will have that effect.
  I wish there were time for me to comment on the very interesting speeches made by the hon. Members for Oldham (Mr. Hamilton Kerr) and Keighley (Mr. Ivor Thomas), but my time is getting rather short. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Keighley objects to Method 2. As the White Paper says, it is an experiment, and if those fearful things happen that the hon. Member expects to happen, the experiment will come to an end. If it is more successful than he expects, the experiment will be carried on. I would like to add that there is one right hon. Member of this House whose advice and counsel we have greatly missed to-day, the right hon. Member for Mitcham (Sir M. Robertson). It is something more than two years since the Foreign Secretary

  Division No. 9

  AYES.

  Adams, D. (Consett)

  Entwistle, Sir C. F.

  McNeil, H.

  Adamson, W. M. (Cannock)

  Erskine-Hill, A. G.

  Makins, Brig.-Gen. Sir E.

  Albery, Sir Irving

  Etherton, Ralph

  Martin, J. H.

  Ammon, C. G.

  Fildes, Sir H.

  Mathers, G.

  Anderson, Rt. Hon. Sir J. (Sc'h Univ.)

  Furness, Major S. N.

  Molson, A. H. E.

  Apsley, Lady

  Fyfe, Major Sir D. P. M.

  Mott-Radclyffe, Capt. C. E.

  Assheton, R.

  Galbraith, Comdr. T. D.

  Murray, J. D. (Spennymoor)

  Astor, Viscountess (Plymouth, Sutton)

  Gammans, Capt. L. D.

  Neven-Spence, Major B. H. H.

  Astor, Hon. W. W. (Fulham, E.)

  Gates, Major E. E.

  Nicolson, Hon. J. G. (Leicester, W.)

  Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.

  Gibson, Sir C. G.

  Petherick, Major M.

  Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P.

  Glyn, Sir R. G. C.

  Pethick-Lawrence, Rt. Hon. F. W.

  Beattie, F. (Cathcart)

  Goldie, N. B.

  Peto, Major B. A. J.

  Beauchamp, Sir B. C.

  Gower, Sir R. V.

  Ponsonby, Col. C. E.

  Beechman, N. A.

  Grenfell, D. R.

  Pownall, Lt.-Col. Sir Assheton

  Beit, Sir A. L.

  Gridley, Sir A. B.

  Price, M. P.

  Bennett, Sir P. F. B. (Edgbaston)

  Grimston, R. V.

  Pym, L. R.

  Bird, Sir R. B.

  Groves, T. E.

  Rankin, Sir R.

  Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C.

  Gunston, Major Sir D. W.

  Reed, Sir H. S. (Aylesbury)

  Bower, Norman (Harrow)

  Guy, W. H.

  Reid, Capt. A. Cunningham (St. M.)

  Bowles, F. G.

  Hannah, I. C.

  Rothschild, J. A. de

  Boyce, H. Leslie

  Hannon, Sir P. J. H.

  Royds, Admiral Sir P. M. R.

  Brass, Capt. Sir W.

  Harris, Rt. Hon. Sir P. A.

  Russell, Sir A. (Tynemouth)

  Broadbridge, Sir G. T.

  Harvey, T. E.

  Schuster, Sir G. E.

  Brocklebank, Sir C. E. R.

  Headlam, Lt.-Col. Sir C. M.

  Scott, Lord William (Ro'b'h & Selk'k)

  Brown, Rt. Hon. E. (Leith)

  Heilgers, Major F. F. A.

  Silkin, L.

  Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Newbury)

  Hely-Hutchinson, M. R.

  Smith, Bracewell (Dulwich)

  Bull, B. B.

  Higgs, W. F.

  Snadden, W. McN.

  Burden, T. W.

  Hinchingbrooke, Viscount

  Southby, Comd. Sir A. R. J.

  Burghley, Lord

  Hughes, R. M.

  Storey, S.

  Burgin, Rt. Hon. E. L.

  Hutchinson, G. C. (Ilford)

  Strauss, H. G. (Norwich)

  Butcher, Lieut. H. W.

  James, Wing-Com. A. (Well'borough)

  Stuart, Lord C. Crichton- (Northwich)

  Cadogan, Major Sir E.

  John, W.

  Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray and Nairn)

  Campbell, Sir E. T. (Bromley)

  Johnstone, H. (Middlesbrough, W.)

  Summers, G. S.

  Gary, R. A.

  Kerr, H. W. (Oldham)

  Sutcliffe, H.

  Channon, H.

  Kirkwood, D.

  Sykes, Maj.-Gen. Rt. Hon. Sir F. H.

  Chapman, Sir S. (Edinburgh, S.)

  Law, Rt. Hon. R. K.

  Tate, Mavis C.

  Cobb, Captain E. C.

  Lawson, J. J.

  Taylor, Captain C. S. (Eastbourne)

  Colegate, W. A.

  Levy, T.

  Thomas, I. (Keighley)

  Colman, N. C. D.

  Linstead, H. N.

  Thomas, Dr. W. S. Russell (S'th'm'tn)

  Cooke, J. D. (Hammersmith, S.)

  Lipson, D. L.

  Thomson, Sir J. D. W.

  Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. F. C.

  Little, Sir E. Graham- (London Univ.)

  Thorneycroft, Major G. E. P. (Stafford)

  Davidson, Viscountess (H'm'l H'mst'd)

  Locker-Lamoson, Commander O. S.

  Walkden, A. G. (Bristol, S.)

  Douglas, F. C. R.

  Lucas, Major Sir J. M.

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

  Dugdale, Major T. L. (Richmond)

  Mabane, W.

  Ward, Irene M. B. (Wallsend)

  Edmondson, Major Sir J.

  McCallum, Major D.

  Wardlaw-Milne, Sir J. S.

  Edwards, Walter J. (Whitechapel)

  McCorquodale, Malcolm S.

  Watson, W. McL.

  Elliston, Captain G. S.

  Macdonald, Captain Peter (I. of W.)

  Watt, Lt.-Col. G. S. H. (Richmond)

  Emrys-Evans, P. V.

  McEwen, Capt. J. H. F.

  Webbe, Sir W. Harold

  asked the right hon. Member for Mitcham to predigest some of his ideas and submit to him a report. That report was submitted, and though our proposals do not agree with it in every detail—or indeed altogether in principle—it has been of the very greatest help to my right hon. Friend in preparing these proposals. We have had a very interesting Debate, and I feel convinced that the House does, in the main, approve of these proposals.
  Mr. W. Brown: No.
  Mr. Law: I feel that the House considers that this is a step in the right direction, and I hope that the House will express its approval of the White Paper.
  Question put,
  "That this House approves the proposals of His Majesty's Government for the Reform of the Foreign Service contained in Command Paper No. 6420."
  The House divided: Ayes, 153; Noes, 6.

  Wedderburn, H. J. S.

  Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—

  White, H. Graham (Birkenhead, E.)

  Wootton-Davies, J. H.

  Mr. Boulton and Mr. J. P. L.

  Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W. (Blaydon)

  York, Major C.

  Thomas.

  Williams, Sir H. G. (Croydon, S.)

  Young, Sir R. (Newton)

  NOES.

  Bevan, A.

  Granville, E. L.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—

  Brown, W. J. (Rugby)

  Maxton, J.

  Mr. Kendall and Mr. Horabin.

  Davies, Clement (Montgomery)

  Stephen, C.

  MILK (PASTEURISATION)
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now Adjourn."—[Major Sir James Edmondson.]
  Mr. David Adams: I desire to raise for the consideration of the Government and the Government Departments concerned the question of the pasteurisation of all milk for human consumption.
  Dr. Russell Thomas: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. I understand that the hon. Gentleman is raising the question of the pasteurisation of milk on the Motion for Adjournment of the House. I would point out that there is a Motion on the Order Paper in the name of a large number of hon. Members in regard to this matter and that the Motion might be called at any time, and also the pasteurisation of milk is a subject of considerable interest in this House and in the country, and I do not think—and I say this with respect—it can be discussed in this rather flippant and cursory manner. I ask you, Sir, to give your Ruling in regard to this point.
  Mr. Buchanan (Glasgow, Gorbals): Is it in Order for an hon. Member to say that a Member who raises an issue on the Adjournment is doing it in a flippant fashion?
  Dr. Thomas: I said, "with respect."
  Mr. Buchanan: Because the hon. Member said "with respect," that makes it all the more dangerous. Is not a Member raising a matter on the Adjournment just as serious in pursuing his Parliamentary task as a Member raising a matter at any other particular time? Some of the Adjournment Debates that take place in this House are most important.
  Mr. Wootton-Davies (Heywood and Radcliffe): I should like to emphasise the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton (Dr. Thomas) that this important subject should not be discussed in this cursory fashion.
  Several Hon. Members Several Hon. Members rose——
  Mr. Speaker: It might be as well if I gave my Ruling. The question, of course, is one within my discretion. I have to consider whether there is any reasonable prospect of the Motion being called, and whether I should disallow a Debate on the Motion for the Adjournment. I see no reasonable chance of the hon. Member's Motion being called in the near future, and therefore the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. Adams) is in Order.
  Dr. Thomas: Further to the point of Order. I would like to make it clear that when I said "flippant" I did not mean that the hon. Member was flippant, but that the cursory nature of the discussion would of necessity be flippant. Hon. Members and myself who hold views contrary to the hon. Gentleman will not take part in the Debate, and I myself will leave the Chamber, but I shall take notice of the OFFICIAL REPORT of what the Parliamentary Secretary may say in reply.
  Mr. Adams: I regret that some of the precious moments left to me have been used in this manner. I consulted the late Mr. Speaker as to whether there was any possibility of the Notice of Motion on the Order Paper being reached, and he advised me that there was none and that I was entirely in Order in bringing the matter forward on the Adjournment Motion. I want to emphasise that milk has become the prime food of the whole nation. It is an ideal food for adults, for children and for infants, and especially in the case of the last-named in the absence of natural food. It has been described by the Ministry as priority food No. 1, and consumption under the Government auspices has risen rapidly. In 1939 it was 760,000,000 gallons and in 1941 it had risen to 946,000,000. The figures for 1942 I am advised are not yet available. Surely, when milk is under Government control and ownership, having been purchased by the Milk Marketing Board and sold by them to the Ministry of Food, under that Ministry's auspices, it

  1441
  ought to be made safe for human consumption. But being, as it is, an ideal ground for the culture of pathogenic organisms which create diseases in man, the situation appears merely to be recognised, but not officially, by the Ministries concerned. It is interesting to record that the liability to the consumer through milk-borne diseases includes germs which will produce in the human organism scarlet fever, meningitis, diphtheria, typhoid, para-typhoid, dysentery and septic throat, undulant fever, etc.
  As we all know, non-pulmonary tuberculosis attacks children more than adults and results in bone, joint and gland tuberculosis. The extent of tuberculosis alone will give us some key to the magnitude of the problem. New cases annually number between 3,000 and 4,000, and 13,000 children suffer annually from tuberculosis. Of non-pulmonary tuberculosis, which I particularise, it is agreed that some 40 per cent. of cases arise from milk. In 1942 there were 28,699 deaths from tuberculosis, while 2,000 children under the age of five died from this cause. In addition, there are the invalidism and the crippling which we witness of children throughout the country. If one adds other milk-borne diseases, surely if all these are preventable—and it is agreed that they are—we have a situation which might well be described as shocking. It indicates a great loss of life, great suffering and great waste of national and private resources and the need for a costly system of curative organisations for dealing with these diseases. In the face of that situation, which is known to the medical profession, there is placed upon the Order Paper a Notice of Motion, mentioned just now by the hon. Member for Southampton (Dr. Russell Thomas), headed "Milk and National Health," and reads:
  "That this House, recognising the unique value of fresh milk in the National diet, asks that His Majesty's Government should not, without the fullest inquiry, embark upon a policy involving the consumption of half-boiled milk, frequently known as pasteurised milk, which is still the subject of conflicting expert opinion; and further urges His Majesty's Government to pursue with vigour a policy of eliminating cattle disease, exterminate vermin, improve water supplies and establish higher standards of cleanliness and hygiene on the farm and in the transport and handling of milk on its way to the consumer."
  That Motion is in two parts. One part is a request that there should be set up the
  1442
  necessary machinery for obtaining greater cleanliness and hygiene in farms and in the transit and handling of milk with which all agree. The second asks that there should be further delay and further inquiry into the value of pasteurisation, "as it is still the subject of conflicting expert opinion." Some hon. Members who are sponsoring the Motion are in the farming profession and two others in the medical profession. It is understandable to me that farmers should declare their ignorance of the progress of modern science in this matter, for they possess neither the time, nor the opportunity, nor the inclination to study the problem. The hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) has put his name to the Motion.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Charles Williams): The hon. Member may not go into the Motion any further, or he will be debating it.
  Mr. Adams: I do not want to trespass against the Rules in any way. I must express my astonishment that two members of the medical profession should be asking at this time for a further delay in the study of this problem. It seems to me they might well be likened to the foreman of a rescue squad who, after a raid, with burning buildings around and the cries of the injured and dying, called off the squad until such time as their textbooks had been consulted as to the proper procedure. The "British Medical Journal," commenting upon this Motion——
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Member must keep his remarks clear of the Motion. It is an entirely separate matter.
  Mr. Adams: I will not refer to it further. As to whether there is sufficient expert opinion in the country in support of pasteurisation as a means of providing a safe milk supply. As far back as 18th May there was a deputation to the Minister of Food, who was accompanied by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health. This deputation was probably one of the most important that could have been collected together, and it urged the need for complete and efficient pasteurisation of milk. The deputation included representatives of the Royal Colleges, the National Association for the Prevention of Tuberculosis, the Joint Tuberculosis Council, the British Paediatric Association, the People's

  1443
  League of Health, and other bodies. Professor Picken, who is the acting Chairman of the British Medical Association, introduced the deputation by pointing out that there was no serious difference of opinion in the medical profession on the question of pasteurisation, and that few questions in preventive medicine commanded so nearly complete unanimity. Others confirmed that point of view. Prof. Garrod, of St. Bartholomew's, declared that pasteurisation must be recognised as the only complete safeguard, but that it must be pasteurisation carried out efficiently in accordance with standard regulations. Different experts gave their views on the same lines. Sir Alfred Webb-Johnson said that he had thought it his duty, as President of the Royal College of Surgeons, to join the deputation because of the enormous importance of the prevention of surgical tuberculosis. Lord Woolton, in his reply, expressed his gratitude to the deputation. He said he could not imagine a more influential one. He found it difficult to resist the weight of scientific and professional evidence which had been assembled.
  He was engaged in collecting all the necessary information regarding available machinery and labour to undertake the work which would give to the public security on this question. I propose to occupy myself the short time available, as the Minister has informed me that he is giving no other than a cursory reply——
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Mr. Mabane): I really must interrupt the hon. Member. I informed him that I had no definite statement to make.
  Mr. Adams: That is identically the same thing——
  Mr. Mabane: It is somewhat different.
  Mr. Adams:—in another form, and not very courteous to a Member of the House. To confirm the view I have stated as to scientific opinion in favour of pastuerisation, we have Professor G. S. Wilson, of the School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Professor of Bacteriology in the University of London, declaring that milk is responsible for spreading the diseases mentioned, not only from the cow but from cough-spray and fingers of the farm workers.
  Dr. Morgan: Did my hon. Friend say that the fingers of farm hands were cough-sprayed?
  Mr. Adams: I think it out of place for persons to endeavour to be humorous who possess not a vestige of humour. Pasteurisation does not impair the nutritional value of milk but occasions some loss of vitamin C corrected by fruit juice and other foods. As to the possibility of dealing with the farms, cleansing and purifying them and freeing the herds, the fact that 45 per cent. of our cows react to tuberculosis tests shows the impossibility of it. Control is found to be impossible over the personnel employed on all farms, as is a pure water supply in rural areas, the destruction of disease carrying rodents and the veterinary inspection of all dairy cows, not yet carried out, in the face of the frightful conditions of byres, yards and dairies. There are hundreds of milk farms of the most offensive character. I have seen cattle-standing knee deep in filth and some byres in Scotland so full of excrement that they are only cleansed when it becomes impossible for the milkers to get access to the byres.
  It being the hour appointed for the Adjournment of the House, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

NATIONAL FINANCE
  Old-Age Pensions
  Old-Age Pensions
  Legacies (Income Tax Assessments)
  Legacies (Income Tax Assessments)
  Gifts to Trusts (Loss of Tax Revenue)
  Gifts to Trusts (Loss of Tax Revenue)
  Agricultural Engines (Road Use)
  Agricultural Engines (Road Use)
  DEFENCE (GENERAL) REGULATIONS
  DEFENCE (GENERAL) REGULATIONS
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS
  Press Cuttings
  Press Cuttings
  Non-Industrial Staff
  Non-Industrial Staff
  FORESTRY (POST-WAR POLICY)
  FORESTRY (POST-WAR POLICY)
PALESTINE
  Government Employees (Cost of Living Allowances)
  Government Employees (Cost of Living Allowances)
  Jewish Refugees
  Jewish Refugees
FOOD SUPPLIES
  Fish Distribution (Leeds)
  Fish Distribution (Leeds)
  Sweets (Points Rationing)
  Sweets (Points Rationing)
  British Restaurants
  British Restaurants
  CLOTHING COUPONS (PROSECUTION, BRIGHTON)
  CLOTHING COUPONS (PROSECUTION, BRIGHTON)
PUBLIC HEALTH
  Milk (Heat Treatment)
  Milk (Heat Treatment)
  Voluntary Hospitals (Grant)
  Voluntary Hospitals (Grant)
  Venereal Disease (Laws, Sweden and Russia)
  Venereal Disease (Laws, Sweden and Russia)
  Nursing Homes (Domestic Staff)
  Nursing Homes (Domestic Staff)
HOUSING
  Rents
  Rents
  Farm-Workers' Cottages
  Farm-Workers' Cottages
  Prices (Control)
  Prices (Control)
NATIONAL WAR EFFORT
  Coal-Mines (Surface Workers)
  Coal-Mines (Surface Workers)
  Canteen Workers
  Canteen Workers
  Sack and Bag Industry
  Sack and Bag Industry
  Disabled Persons
  Disabled Persons
  NORTH AFRICA (BRITISH EXPORTS)
  NORTH AFRICA (BRITISH EXPORTS)
EDUCATION
  Pre-Nursing Courses
  Pre-Nursing Courses
  Local Authorities (Education Officers)
  Local Authorities (Education Officers)
  Research Expenditure (Grant-Aid)
  Research Expenditure (Grant-Aid)
  PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS (AGED PEOPLE)
  PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS (AGED PEOPLE)
  ARMED FORCES (PENSIONS AND GRANTS)
  ARMED FORCES (PENSIONS AND GRANTS)
BRITISH ARMY
  Equipment (Polishing)
  Equipment (Polishing)
  Artificial Limbs
  Artificial Limbs
  LENIN MEMORIAL, FINSBURY (DAMAGE)
  LENIN MEMORIAL, FINSBURY (DAMAGE)
CIVIL DEFENCE
  Personnel (Home Guard Training)
  Personnel (Home Guard Training)
  Fire Guard Duties
  Fire Guard Duties
  Unexploded Bombs
  Unexploded Bombs
  ANTI-SEMITIC ACTIVITIES
  ANTI-SEMITIC ACTIVITIES
  SILICOSIS (FOUNDRY WORKERS)
  SILICOSIS (FOUNDRY WORKERS)
  ROYAL AIR FORCE (ARTIFICIAL LIMBS)
  ROYAL AIR FORCE (ARTIFICIAL LIMBS)

Preamble
The House met, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
The Earl of Midleton—Sat first in Parliament after the death of his father.

SETTLED LAND AND TRUSTEE ACTS (COURT'S GENERAL POWERS) BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT SIMON): My Lords, I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill which, as your Lordships will see, is a war-time measure and is for the purpose of extending temporarily the powers of the Court under a section of the Settled Land Act, 1925, and a section of the Trustee Act, 1925. I had better explain in non-technical language the reason why this Bill has become necessary. In ordinary times, as your Lordships appreciate, when property is settled, it is the duty of the tenant for life, out of the income of the property, to meet expenses which are income expenses. Generally speaking, the capital of the fund or of the settlement is not available for that purpose.
To take a very simple illustration, the repair and maintenance of a mansion house would fall to the tenant for life to meet out of income. The tenant for life could not ordinarily be made to repair such a house, though he would do so if he could in most cases because he is occupying it. But under the conditions that now exist, what with the great height of taxation, the limitation of income, and other circumstances, it is pointed out to me that there are many cases in which it is not really possible for the tenant for life, out of what remains of his income, always to meet these burdens. Already in the law there are cases in which he could apply to the Court for special authority to vary his normal obligations, but there is no adequate provision to meet that sort of case. The proposal of this Bill is that, for the period of the war, the Court, when applied to, can authorize the use of a portion of the capital of the estate for meeting expenses which
744
in normal times would be income expenses. But the power is carefully hedged round. Our object is not merely to relieve the tenant for life. It is for the purpose of maintaining the estate for the general advantage of all interested in it, so that it should not go to rack and ruin, else those who succeed will suffer quite as much as the immediate tenant for life.
If your Lordships are interested in the actual provisions of the Bill, you will see that before the Court can make an order it must be satisfied that the action taken or proposed was, or would be, for the benefit of the persons entitled under the settlement or under the trust for sale generally. That of course would include those who come after the tenant for life. It must also be satisfied that the available income from all sources of the person entitled to possession or receipt of rents, who ought otherwise to have borne the expense, has been so reduced by circumstances arising out of the war that he is unable to bear it without undue hardship; and, thirdly, that no such person as aforesaid has sufficient income available for meeting that expense. There is a further provision, which is rather a novelty in our Statute Law, in which not only must the Court review all the circumstances of the general financial position of the applicant, but give consideration to the fact whether he has taken artificial means to avoid the normal incidence of taxation.
I believe that the object of this Bill is approved generally. I have been at pains to ascertain the views taken by some of the principal authorities and, at any rate in regard to the principle, they are all at one. I see my noble friend Lord Maugham here. Doubtless he will say what he feels about it. I have ascertained that the Master of the Rolls and my Chancery colleagues who are Law Lords feel that these are necessary and suitable provisions. By this means we shall, notwithstanding the circumstances of the war, be able to see properties maintained in the general interest of all who are concerned, although under the very harsh and difficult conditions of to-day the tenant for life may not himself have sufficient income to discharge his normal obligations. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: My Lords, it is with great regret I have to rise on

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this occasion and explain why I feel this Bill is quite insufficient to meet the difficulties with which tenants for life all over the country are confronted. While admitting to the full the excellent intentions which lie at the bottom of this Bill, I must explain to the House my own reasons for coming to the conclusion that it is insufficient to meet the difficulties which now arise. There is no law in the least of a complicated nature that I have to call to your Lordships' attention, so I hope nobody will think I am going to embark on anything of a technical character. The position is this. There are in this country a very large number of tenants for life of land and buildings, not as many I think as there used to be at the time when, so long ago as the year 1882, the Settled Land Act was passed. The position in 1882 was that if a tenant for life, who of course, only had the income of the property, was to improve the property in any way, he had to do it at his own expense. He was not bound to improve the property, and I should like to make it perfectly clear that in the normal case he was not bound to repair the property either. In many cases that was impossible. Houses grow old. Those who have been in possession of a Tudor residence or one that is perhaps older, as I have been, know the very great expense that may occasionally confront them if they are liable to repair, or if they feel bound to repair, and attempt themselves to repair.
I would add that I am afraid now and then I shall have to say something about my own personal knowledge of the matter. When I was a Judge of the Chancery Division I had, on a number of occasions, applications by tenants for life to be allowed to pull down the mansion house upon the property in order to sell the materials for what they would fetch. There were no means of selling the house itself as a residence, but there were perhaps panelling, perhaps mantels and other materials which were worth selling, and the tenant for life could no longer go on residing in the house or on the property. That is very much more common now when, as I know, quite a number of your Lordships have come to the conclusion that after this war they will probably not be able again to live in their own principal mansion house. In 1882 the Legislature o thought fit to give power to tenants for life to make a number of improvements
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on the settled land for the benefit of all persons entitled under the settlement, and when one says "all persons entitled under the settlement" one generally means the tenant for life whose interest is for his life and his own children when he dies, his eldest son, it may be, or it may be other members of his family. Those are the people who are the persons interested.
I should like now to say that any comments I make on this Bill and any suggestions which I am earnestly going to press the noble Viscount on the Woolsack to consider, are not in the least designed to affect any money considerations of the Government or the country as a whole. They are put forward simply because I think, for the benefit of the families who are interested in such a property as we are dealing with, the settled estate, something much more than this Bill provides ought really to be done. Let me remind your Lordships, because many of you are riot as old as I am, that in 1882 the Income Tax was 5d. in the pound, and there was no Surtax at all. The result was that the tenant for life of a substantial estate, which was bringing in, we will say, £1,000 or £2,000 a year, was paying on that sum 5d. in the pound for Income Tax. Out of that income he was generally well able to maintain the property, look after the agricultural interests of the estate, and keep up his roof, see after the gutters, and do the drains and all the other little things of that kind that required to be done. But there were a number of improvements which required substantial sums to be paid out in respect of them, and those were provided for in the Act of 1882.
A long list of things, with which I will not weary your Lordships because I have something to say which will take some few minutes, appears in that Act. These improvements of various sorts were authorized to be done out of capital money standing in the names of trustees and held upon the trust of the land, with the sanction of the Court. It is very easy for people who have never had anything to do with it to think the sanction of the Court is an easy thing to obtain, but I know very well, from having been concerned with this for a long time both as counsel and Judge,, that is not so, and that what with the advice of a solicitor, the obtaining of the necessary evidence, the affidavits that have to be put before

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the Court, the cost of the summons, of the counsel whom there must be in the normal case and sometimes also to appear when the summons comes before the Judge, the drawing-up of the order, the reference back to the solicitor and the surveyors to see that what is done complies with what is being allowed—all this is a very expensive business, and unless there is a substantial thing to be done it is not really worth while to go to the Court. It is much better either not to do it at all or to do it out of your own money if you can manage it.
That went on fairly reasonably with a long list of improvements that could be authorized by the Court till the Settled Land Act, 1925, was passed. In the days of the first Lord Birkenhead a number of important Acts were passed, and the Settled Land Act, 1925, was an Act which showed that the Legislature had appreciated the circumstance that tenants for life were not as well off as they used to be, and that a certain number of improvements ought to be done by the tenant for life, with a safeguard which did not require an application to the Court at all. Now between 1882 and 1925 the expenses of Government had gone up and Income Tax was then 4s. 6d. in the pound instead of 5d. Other expenses that fell upon tenants for life were also much more than they had been. The measure which was passed in 1925, which was called the Settled Land Act, 1925, contained a Part IV with reference to improvements. Sections 83 and 84 enabled a number of improvements to be effected without going to the Court at all. The safeguard was this: that where capital money was to be expended, say, in the hands of the trustees of the settlement, which is the normal case, they might apply the money towards payment of the whole or any part of any work comprised in the improvement. Reading it shortly, a certificate was to be furnished by the competent engineer or a practical surveyor employed independently of the tenant for life—that means in practice nominated by trustees of the settlement—certifying that the work or the portion comprised in the improvement, had been properly executed, and what amount was proper to be paid in respect of it. That would justify the improvement being effected without going to Court at all.
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In the alternative an order of the Court might be obtained, if the work was very expensive and if the various trustees of the settlement thought it better to get the consent of the Court. In the case of work costing £2,000 or £3,000 the cost of the application would be comparatively trifling. If they were spending a few hundreds that could be done without going to Court by getting the certificate I have mentioned which would be necessary in any case for repair of a substantial character in respect of buildings. Your Lordships may think that the improvements mentioned were only of a very special character and were comparatively trifling. That is not true at all. I will just tell your Lordships some of the improvements which that Act of 1925 authorized without going to Court at all in proper cases. They included drainage, bridges, irrigation, warping, drains, pipes and machinery for supply and distribution of sewage as manure, embanking or weiring from a river or lake or from the sea, inclosing, straightening of fences, redivision of fields, farm roads, cottages for labourers, farm servants and artisans, whether employed on the settled lands or not, the building and erection of farmhouses, offices and outbuildings and other buildings, sawmills and other mills, reservoirs, tanks, etc., for distribution of water, tramways, railways, canals and docks, jetties and piers, markets and market places, streets—I will not go on. There is a long list of things that can be done without an application to the Court.
As I say, I think it is quite true you could apply to the Court, and trustees could insist on an application for the more important of these things if a large sum was involved, but all the smaller jobs could be done without going to Court. What is the position under the present Bill, which as far as it goes is quite good and has my support? I need not tell your Lordships what Income Tax is at present; we know it is 10s. in the pound, and we know that Surtax begins at £2,000. If you are lucky enough to have what the Income Tax officials regard as an income of £20,000, though perhaps in practice it is only a fraction of that, you have to pay in Surtax a sum which I have forgotten because I have not got that income. The amount is, I think, on £20,000 and over 9s. 6d. in the pound. It goes up from 2s. to 9s. 6d. You have to add that to the 10s. I dare say some

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of your Lordships will have very little sympathy with those so rich as to have to pay the larger sums, but think of the ordinary squire who is a person of some importance in a particular district, who has got a house, settled land, farms and so forth, who has to pay 10s. in the pound on his income and perhaps 4s. or 5s. for Surtax. That means that three-quarters of his income goes direct to the State either as Income Tax or Surtax.
If he started by not being very rich and if the settled estate was not a very big one, he would not have much left when three-quarters of his income had been taken away, if he had perhaps a couple of children to educate. It is not unlawful even in these days to educate your children at a public school. If he does that a good deal of his income is gone. Then he has, we must suppose, to keep up a house of some kind. It is true that his wife is probably doing the cooking or assisting in the cleaning of the house, but food has to be bought and it is not very cheap even with the assistance of the noble Lord, Lord Woolton. Such a man as I am speaking of has got nothing left with which to repair the premises at all if his house is old and requires substantial repairs. Probably he has already let the garden go to rack and ruin. The man who used to employ three gardeners has now none at all. He has not got a car; so to that extent his expenses are reduced. But there it is. He has not enough left to repair the property.
What is it this Bill offers him? The Bill offers him the possibility of going to the Court and going into the whole of his income, which the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack very fairly said is rather a new thing in legislation. He has to go into his whole available income front all sources and the assumption of Clause 1 (2) (b) is that his available income front all sources ought to have borne the expense of the action taken or proposed, which means, so far as the individual is concerned, the repair of the property. He has got to show that that income has been so reduced by reason of circumstances arising out of war conditions as to render him unable to bear the expense. In the case of a man who has got an income from a profession, say, as a member of the Bar or as a member of any other profession, or who happens to have saved a few thousand pounds or has any sub-
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stantial number of pounds invested belonging to himself absolutely, why it should be said that he ought to have borne the expense of action taken, in which is included the repair of the roof it may be, I cannot understand. That is an idea which is entirely new to me as a lawyer. He is entitled to repair or not to repair. If the house is falling to bits it may be better to let it fall to bits. What moral or legal obligation there is to repair that house I do not know. On the footing that he has not got the money to repair it the thing appears to me perfectly monstrous.
Assume the case of a man who has not got a professional income, and who has not got income from other sources from investments belonging to him, a man who is tenant for life of a property which used to bring in £2,000 a year but now brings in only £500. Out of that he has to keep up a position in the neighbourhood, so far as it is capable of being kept up, and has to support his wife and children and, may be, educate the latter. How it can be said of him that he ought to have borne the expense of repairs I am completely at a loss to understand. The matter does not stop there. When he goes to the Court he is not to be able to get any advantage out of an application to the Court. The Court in fact cannot make an order if available income has been reduced by action taken by him for avoidance of Income Tax. This seems to me to be a penal clause. Why, if you have no other income, should you not be able to repair property at the expense of capital if there is some capital available for this purpose, because at some date or other you endeavoured to save a liability for Income Tax? And what does it mean? Most of your Lordships, I expect, or at any rate a large number of you, have handed over sums in these days to your children. Is that action taken by you for avoidance of liability to Income Tax? Of course it has avoided your liability to some extent, because you have not got as much income. Then you have been asked to invest in certain Government securities on which you do not pay Income Tax. Is that an endeavour to avoid liability to Income Tax? Again, most of us have entered into covenants to pay certain charities for a period of years, and you know perfectly well that that results in avoidance of liability to

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Income Tax pro tanto. But this subsection does not say anything about the amount by which you have avoided liability to Income Tax. If you have done anything to avoid liability to Income Tax you are not entitled to go to the Court for leave to pay, we will say, three hundred pounds or four hundred pounds, or larger sums, out of the capital of capital moneys because you have committed this heinous offence.
I protest as firmly as I can, consistently with complete courtesy, against any such clause being inserted in this Bill. I submit that it is not right. I consider that this is an illogical clause and as such it will have a hopelessly illogical effect. I am taking again the case of a man who has not got the necessary income to enable him to pay for repairs. If he cannot do the repairs, who is going to suffer? Possibly his own son, if he has a son, or some relative or relatives of his. It is the family of this man who are going to suffer, not the Government. It is said that he shall not do repairs which are really necessary and proper for the upkeep of the property because he once avoided liability to Income Tax by doing something which was perfectly legal at the time it was done. It really does not seem to me to be fair or just or logical or sensible to insert in regard to this power of application to the Court, if it is insisted on, a provision to say that if a man's available income has been reduced by his action in some way or other in the past, he is not to be entitled to ask the Court to permit the payment of some sums for repair of the property, however necessary it may be. I do not understand that, and I ask the Lord Chancellor, or rather the Government, to reconsider it and to see what can be done to make this measure a little hit fairer.
What I am suggesting, or rather what I am giving notice of, at the present time, is this. There are two things which I think the Lord Chancellor might fairly consider in the interests of the people of whom I am thinking—and here I would say parenthetically that I am not one of them because I am not a tenant for life of any income. The first is that expenditure on repairs, at any rate up to a certain amount—say a few hundred pounds, because I quite agree that if the amount is very large you might properly ask the
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tenant for life to go to the Court—that during this period of emergency, whilst Income Tax and Surtax are such as to take away so great a proportion of a man's income, up to that amount the expenditure should be brought within Section 84 of the Settled Land Act, 1925, and therefore be treated as a matter in respect of which capital money can be expended, subject to the production of a certificate by a competent engineer or practical surveyor that the work is necessary and has been properly done. That is one thing which I think would be of enormous advantage to quite a number of poor tenants for life in this country while the present state of things subsists. The other matter which I would urge the Lord Chancellor to consider is the question of omitting from Clause of subsection (3) these words which make the application to the Court one which cannot be complied with by the Judge if the income of the person making the application has been reduced by reason of action taken by him for avoidance of liability to Income Tax.
If those two things are done I think it would be of great advantage. If I may say this with reference to myself, I have had a very large experience of this type of application, for I have been concerned with it as counsel and as Judge for certainly thirty years or more, and I say that if these suggestions were adopted this Bill would be far more useful to these tenants for life of this country who are not in the position to do the work which is pointed at in this Bill. It would be far more useful to them, and what I regard as the really unjust provision in subsection (3) of Clause I would be removed so as to make it possible for an application to be made, even by a man who has been guilty of the heinous offence, at some time in the past, of forming an estate company or of taking one of the measures which so many men of means have been forced to take lawfully, in accordance with the law of the time, with a possible view of escaping or reducing their liability to Income Tax. I hope that I have not spoken too strongly on this matter. I hope that the Lord Chancellor will not in any way resent my taking the view which I have taken with regard to this Bill. I am in favour of the principle of the Bill, but I am very clearly of opinion that if it passes in the form in which it now stands

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it will be of very little use at all to the tenants for life of settled land in this country.
THE EARL OF WARWICK: My Lords, I understood the Lord Chancellor to say that the period of the operation of this Bill would be the period of the war. I would like to draw your Lordships' attention to something which I and several other people do not altogether understand. We have not yet, I believe, had a definite explanation of what the period of the war is, but none the less at this moment most tenants for life with mansions or other properties that may need considerable sums of money spent on maintenance, are away. They are kept away by the war ieself, and are consequently able to devote but very little attention to these things. But even if they could, and if it were possible under this Bill for them to obtain relief by going to the Courts for leave to spend capital money on maintenance, they being unable to find the money out of their reduced incomes, the fact still remains that it would be impossible for them to obtain either materials or labour to do the work. In fact, we are not allowed to-day to spend more than £100 on any building without obtaining a licence, which I believe is only granted, and quite rightly so, if the work is to further the war effort. It seems to me that in order to help us the period of the war should be extended to include a short time after the war, when building materials and labour will be available, and when those tenants for life, who have little or no opportunity at the moment of discovering what damage there has been or of knowing what damage there may still be in the future, will be in a position to go to the Court and put forward their case, knowing what the costs will be and what labour and materials are available for what ought to be done. No doubt there is some misunderstanding on my part, but I should be glad if the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack would explain the position.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, with regard to the point just raised by the noble Earl, Lord Warwick, he may not yet have had an opportunity of studying the text of the Bill, but I agree with him that the question does arise of whether a measure of this sort should be limited so strictly in its time of operation. That is a matter which is already being
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considered with my advisers, and by one or two persons with special experience of this type of question who are available to help me. I will look into it, and perhaps in the meantime the noble Earl will be good enough to look at subsection (6) of Clause 1 of the Bill.
I must say a word—but it will only be a word—out of courtesy, in view of the elaborate speech made by my noble and learned friend Lord Maugham. I do not know whether your Lordships fully appreciated the fact during his speech that he is in favour of giving this Bill a Second Reading.
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: I made that quite clear.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: You made it clear in your concluding sentence. The noble and learned Viscount is not against the Bill; he is in favour of it, but he thinks that in one or two respects, which I do not say are not important, the form of it should be altered. I shall be the first to recognize his great experience of this type of matter, for everyone who knows him will know that he has great experience of it; but I think that I should tell your Lordships that I have consulted almost all the eminent members of the Bench who have a very large experience of this type of application, and all the others whom I have consulted think that this Bill in its present form should be warmly approved. Possibly on the Committee stage some of them who are members of your Lordships' House may be able to attend. I am, however, very grateful to my noble and learned friend for his criticisms, and I shall certainly give fresh consideration to every point that he has raised.
There is, however, one large consideration which does not seem to have entered into his argument at all, and it is this. In. the case of any settlement, if you are going to allow the tenant for life to spend capital beyond what is permitted to-day, you are in the same degree going to reduce the amount of capital which is available for the remainder-man. The more there is for the tenant for life, the less there will be for the remainder-man. When a settlement is made, of course, the desire is to provide for the remainder-man and not simply to make things easy for the tenant for life. It is necessary, therefore, to be very careful about this. It is not a question of being

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large-minded or generous purely on one side.
My noble and learned friend made a reference to arrangements for avoiding tax. Whether the words in the Bill are right or not—and I may say that they are words which commend themselves very warmly to some judicial persons of long experience, such as my noble and learned friend rightly claims for himself—if you take some of the varieties of tax avoidance which have come before the Courts in recent years, involving the creation of companies in Palestine and elsewhere, one company selling to another and the second company issuing debentures to a third, you have there perfectly deliberate efforts to avoid tax liability, and it would seem to me a pity if, in the face of an arrangement of that kind, you should allow the tenant for life, without making allowance for such an arrangement, to spend the capital at the expense of the remainder-man. That is the reason for suggesting some such provision. We can discuss that, however, and other matters on the Committee stage. The other suggestions which my noble and learned friend has made must be, coming from him, not only disinterested but most valuable. I have not the slightest complaint that he should make them, but I do want to make it clear to noble Lords who have listened to this rather lengthy discussion, that my noble friend is in favour of the Second Reading of this Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

FOOD SITUATION IN JERSEY AND GUERNSEY.
LORD PORTSEA LORD PORTSEA had the following Notice on the Paper: To ask His Majesty's Government, whether any progress has been made in the supply of food for children in Jersey and Guernsey, and whether any information has been received as to the position as regards food at present available for these children; whether His Majesty's Government accept the principle that kinship should entitle these children to preferential treatment and whether His Majesty's Government will again consider the offer made to take a ship and food to the islands and
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will take steps for negotiations to be opened with the German Government accordingly; and to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, thanks to the Red Cross I have received a reply to a message which I sent last summer to Jersey. Fully to understand these Red Cross messages, it must be remembered that there is a twenty-five-word maximum and it is necessary to know something about the mode of thought of the sender and also of the person who replies. This reply comes from my nearest relative, a lady of nearly my own age, and it tells its own story. The story is: "Planting in the garden for food." That means that she is forced to dig and to plant in order to get food to remain alive. She is doing that at the age of about eighty. I hope your Lordships will understand what must be the comforts of living in that country at this moment! I have also read a Red Cross summary written by prisoners of war in Stalag XVII, and it says this:
"We are dining at eight. Bacon and beans, meat rolls, vegetables, tinned pears, custard, tea, coffee, Ovaltine, biscuits and cheese and cigarettes. We are always eating heartily. Parcels of food arrive safely. They are not eaten by the Germans, and cigarettes are not stolen."
Your Lordships may remember that the Government have said in this House that food could not be sent to occupied territory such as the Channel Islands because the Germans would steal it.
Speaking in the House of Commons the other day, Mr. Foot said that his latest information was that relief foodstuffs imported into Greece through the blockade had been distributed without interference by the Germans. If this is the case, where does the Government's information come from, and, without wishing to be rude, I should like to ask what it is worth. We cannot send food to the islands which are occupied territory because, we are told, the Germans would steal it, and here we have a Government official telling us that "everything arrived safely and is distributed equally." The daily papers tell us that the Germans shoot food stealers. We might learn a lesson from them; some of the stories of criminal cases that we read in the papers are very distressing. There was a very informing letter in a newspaper quite recently from a noble Lord, and there were several from Dr. Gilbert Murray and Mr. Wickham Steed. These are persons of distinction, and they call in

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The Times for aid for Greece—occupied territory—and say there is no suggestion that supplies so sent would be seized by the enemy. It appears that it is much better from the material point of view, healthier also, to be a prisoner of war in Germany than to be a people left in their own land under the enemy's heel, left as helots by the grace of the Government.
These letters, none of them more than six weeks old, synchronized with letters from the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, whose loss we deplore, and from the Archbishop of Canterbury, and with a powerful appeal by the Archbishop of York in the Church of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields on behalf of the Norman Islanders. It was given to a closely packed and appreciative audience. I shall not read these letters, but I may quote a sentence:
"Starvation is more widespread and even more terrible than has been stated. In no country under enemy occupation is food sufficient to maintain health. In many it is insufficient to keep the people alive."
How many island children can live from among those who do escape disease and death, and worse? What kind of a generation can grow up to build the new world for which we are now fighting, a new heaven and a new earth and—do not forget it—a new hell, a hell of our own fashioning, of our own contriving? I met the other day a very interesting and capable man, Mr. Kerschner, the Director of the American Friends' Service. He writes:
"The German has never taken any of our foods. Neither has the fact that we brought all the food into France enabled him to take away the equivalent of French food."
Where is the Government's case? All this is surely evidence. Will it be accepted by the Rip van Winkles of the Government?
Your Lordships will recollect that I had the sad duty of giving most of these facts to your Lordships last year. Our Government have relaxed the blockade—that apparently is their cornerstone—and hence the principle of the blockade. Food is sent to Greece and to Belgium—occupied countries—to aliens and to foreigners, to all except our own people. Why not to our own people? Mr. Foot tells us in another place that the Government are sending a hundred tons of dried milk each month to Greece. Last week's paper told us that four Swedish vessels had arrived
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at the Piraeus with a cargo of 20,000 tons of grain, vegetables and medical supplies, and Tuesday's paper told us that small bags of coffee from the Belgian Congo have been dropped by the R.A.F. on the villages in occupied Belgium. Each bag bears a label with the inscription in French and in Flemish:
"The Belgian Congo does not forget you. This is distributed by your friends of the R.A.F. Long live Belgium!"
The Belgian Congo remembers: we do not—only the R.A.F.
We heard in this House on February 25 last that the Government do not like to be outdone in generosity—generosity to foreigners, to Greeks and to Belgians; and they are Shylocks to our own. Perhaps the Government argue that His Majesty's subjects must be lumped together, or indeed put after foreigners and aliens; no preferential treatment for own own. But do we not owe them more? We deserted them, including a number of young officers and men who, having fought at Dunkirk, were given Service leave to Jersey and Guernsey, and were forgotten in those islands and are now in Greek internment and concentration camps. Do we not owe more to those of our own blood who fought for us, and are fighting for us, who are part of us, who speak and who pray in the same language and use the same form of worship, than to aliens? The men of our own race are placed after and below foreigners. Have our kindred any rights or claims to preferential treatment? They have the right, thank God! to fight alongside our men, gloriously shoulder to shoulder for England, as our young men are doing and our old men would if they could, and have always done. There are some who love England and her honour yet. I do.
I am told that the Government are acting on a principle, the bedrock principle of blockade, and so refuse to modify the rules for our own. Yet we are sending to Greece and to Belgium food which ought to be sent to our islands. Mr. Foot said the other clay in another place:
"Except for the special exceptions made in the case of Greece, our blockade policy remains as stated by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in August, 1940."
That is to say, quite clearly, the Government break the blockade for foreigners and aliens, and refuse to do it for those people who are their own kin, their own

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blood, people of their own race whom they have—shall we say abandoned? It is not an English principle to leave our own in the lurch, to do nothing for them while we do the very best for aliens. It is not holding to our traditions, to our birthright and to our principles to do these things; and those principles have made our country respected, loved, feared, and great.
If the great Dominions had indulged in the same caution and casuistry, where should we be? They would be helping, I suppose, the Axis. Had the Norman islanders so acted—and they had royal sanction for not serving outside their own islands—we should be without many brave fighting men. We should not have read the wonderful story of that very gallant Guernsey man earning the Victoria Cross the other week in Libya. To prove that the Norman islanders are not backward in their service of His Majesty, there are two recipients of the Victoria Cross in this war alone. The Government say that the islands are of no strategic value or importance. If they repeat that statement to-day, and add what the poor deluded men in the islands believe in—loyalty, faith, honour, and all these words, but words only, vain phrases made to betray simple and honest men—what then? Then I trust that your Lordships will take a hand and induce the Government, in their own words, to "think again."
The Government, your Lordships are aware, have no constitutional right—of course they have the right of might—to give up the islands. The islands belong, in the fullest sense of the word, to the Crown. There was even a moment—it is now centuries ago—when our Crown was thought to be bargaining with the Crown of France for the sale of the islands. The French knew their value. But now our islands, which command the Channel, are lost. Oh, my Lords, I am treading a stony path, and I should faint by the way if I had not some of your Lordships' sympathy in the face of Government indecision, apathy, caution, and worse. "The path of caution," said the great Elchi, whom only people of my age, perhaps, remember at all, "leads but to disgrace." I cannot be silent. I seem to hear the cries of these little starving children, and I know they are starving. I seem
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to feel their hands touching mine. My Lords, you are powerful, you are doing your chosen and arduous work. You truly represent the people of this country. You are doing your work without fear and without pay—that cursed political payment which is, to my mind, politically degrading. You can think for the country, you can fight for the country, you can act for the Empire. I appeal to you in the name of innocence—innocence suffering untold misery. Let it be before it is too late for the children.
There is talk—perhaps more than talk—of bringing the most murderous of our enemies to justice. The atrocities of the Axis people are terrible, but the Axis destroys only the bodies of its enemies—thousands, may be even millions. In my view our Government are destroying not only the bodies but the spirit, the faith, the very soul of our own people. They are creating a precedent and a reproach, if not an ignominy, which will attach to us as long as our history lasts. I do not think the Government recognize or realize, or perhaps do not trouble about, the far-reaching effect and repercussions of this act of desertion, this act of surrender, of giving up part of the possessions of the Crown—and that in panic—and remaining (that is the worst part) unrepentant. We can sneer at Pétain. A few days ago a Minister of the Crown stated in another place, "If the House of Commons thinks otherwise, then the Government must think again." Those words made my heart beat with joy, for I grasped they were extracted by fear, political fear, fear of Parliament and of the people. You, my Lords, can induce the Government to think again and to redeem the honour of this country and of her Parliament. Some love England and her honour yet. We do, all of us here.
The noble Lord, Lord Snell—I will guarantee he is not influenced by fear; I trust him, I wish to call him friend—said last week, as to accepting a percentage of a particular Report and making definite findings and immediate promises thereon, on behalf of the Government:
"The decisions arrived at are not final. Parliament can at any time it pleases call upon the Government to report progress in the carrying out of the Report."
That was a question of panem et circenses, not a question of honour, the nation's honour. Is it possible that any Govern-

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merit can be prepared to yield to the voice of its noisier followers in a matter of immediate promise of social reform with money which is not yet their own, and stand up and refuse, time after time, to listen to the claims, the right of the people of any part of His Majesty's Dominions to insist an fair treatment, if it be only to save them from starvation, even at the cost of what they call in the East the Government's "face"? The Government, of course, act collectively, a private Member acts individually. "What scoundrels we should be," said Cavour, "if we did, in our own individual capacity, that which we are prepared to do as a Government." He was not an Englishman. Your Lordships can induce the Government to think again and to redeem our honour, conveyed to them collectively and individually by the people who elect them and who pay them. You can insist that the Government's first mistaken decisions shall not be final.
The people of the Norman Islands, as your Lordships are aware, are the subjects of an ancient monarchy and of a still more ancient dukedom, and this is of very great importance from their point of view. There was a Royal Proclamation bidding them remain in their own islands. They trusted, they doubted not at all, they obeyed the message sent them, and they are in hell. They are slaves for the first time in our history by the deliberate act of the Government of a free people. Who did this thing? Who betrayed the islands? I know who did not, who could not have done so; that is the man who said we entered into this war only for honour and to do our duty and to defend the right, and that we mean to hold our own. We prepared to conquer or to perish. We were united in that solemn majestic hour; we were all equally resolved at least to go down fighting. We cast calculation to the wind. No wavering voice was heard. We faced our duty, and by the mercy of God we were prepared to die. This man did not sell us or his own honour. I do not know the name of the "thing" who tied sell us, and, indeed, I am glad not to. From my point of view, it would have been a good thing had he not been born. He is to me indescribable save in the savage terms that George Washington applied to the colleague who betrayed him, which are, of course, known to your Lordships.
But let it be betrayal, desertion, panic abandonment—no blacker page ever fouled the history of any British Government. No, not even the record of the 40,000 Loyalists who supported us, fought for us, and were cast out of the Thirteen Colonies and left to perish. It is true that in those days we had France, Spain and Holland on our backs, but even that was no excuse for such an act of perfidy. There can be no excuse, and yet the descendants of those 40,000 remained loyal and are loyal to this day. We could not sell them twice because they were too far away and too powerful. Their descendants are fighting for us now. Have the Government, I wonder, considered the future position, the status and the liberties of the Norman Islands at the end of this war? More war is certain. Let no man delude himself that we are in for an everlasting peace. Go back to Isaiah 2,000 years, to find out when you turn your swords into ploughshares, when nation shall not act against nation, and there shall be no more war. Are the Government determined to sell us, to cast away the most loyal of the loyal, and close the Channel against themselves—the Channel where once every foreign ship dipped its ensign?
Many reasons have been given to justify the Government's later policy. Leaflets, the Government said, could not be dropped lest anyone found in possession of a leaflet should be shot. The islands might suffer if anything so "spectacular"—that was the word—were done. Indeed, the islanders might be deprived of the radio. The radio has gone. We feared the spectacular and for this reason we landed on the small island of Sark. We captured a few prisoners, we bound their hands and we tried to slip them past a German post in silence. The prisoners, though they were bound, bolted, and to avoid alarming the German post we shot the prisoners as they escaped. It does not do to laugh; it is a hard laugh. Hypocrisy is the only evil which walks invisible except to God. Now our own proud people are starving and sweating blood, and a Government can be found unwilling to make any effort. Not so much as a word of encouragement or hope or help is sent to them. Yet the Government send greetings, praise, comforts, food to every alien country and to every foreigner.
Bear with me, my Lords, I am giving my heart's blood drop by drop, as I know

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your Lordships would do were you in my place. I am so conscious of the inadequacy of my advocacy, so crushingly conscious of it, and I am a new member, but, as was said nearly 40o years ago, my "armour is my honest thought and simple truth my utmost skill." I have asked repeatedly in this House, and privately, for some word of encouragement to be sent to my country, even to the sending of leaflets, as I have just stated. Not a sound. There is a grand New Zealand division which has received the country's and the Government's thanks, and most deservedly so. "On behalf of the Government and the people of the Homeland," said the Prime Minister, "I give you their exceptionally warm-hearted thanks and wish you Godspeed." Not a sound, not a whisper, has reached the islands' division, more numerous if more scattered, no less brave and efficient than the New Zealanders. Not a whisper has reached them or their parents, wives or children. And they are serving and offering all that they have and all that they are.
A further point and the last. This is as to the ship to carry food to the islands. It would have to be Jersey because Guernsey is so fortified and has such a tremendous strength of German troops in it that it would be difficult to ask the Germans to allow us to go to Guernsey direct, but they would allow us to go from Jersey to Guernsey which, comparatively, is no distance. As to a ship to carry food to the Norman Islands, since making this suggestion to the Government I have had several ships offered me, and very crowded crews, including women who are as brave as their menfolk. The ship would have to be manned by two or three Germans, and they would have to be Germans who are invalid prisoners of war—I have mentioned that before—now interned in this country. That ship is ready, and so am I. I have heard nothing whatever from the Government since making that suggestion to them except "The Germans would shoot you." I will take that risk gladly. I have shown that the German does not steal our parcels—not even our tobacco. You cannot read the daily papers without seeing innumerable cases of cigarettes and tobacco meant for the troops being stolen in this country. The German would not steal them because
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he knows if he did there would be no more sent. As I have said before, he is no fool.
The German Government would have to be consulted, but are we too proud to right a wrong? The German has shown himself in the islands to be very well disciplined, decent in behaviour and to have many soldierly virtues—in the islands. Will the Government not try to arrange matters with the German authorities? Will they not allow individual help or will they continue down the path leading to everlasting dishonour, the path which I heard Sir Edward Grey say led to death, destruction and damnation? When the war is over, when the war is won, have the Government, I ask, any plan for the future of the islands and for the feeding of these people. President Roosevelt said within the last weeks:
"We cannot escape history; no personal significance or insignificance can spare any one of us. The fierce treatment through which we pass will light in honour or dishonour to the latest generation."
Some love England—we all do, I hope—and it is because of that pride of England that I as an Englishman call upon the Government to be worthy of the Empire and to be worthy of the country. I ask the Government to be true to themselves and to do their manifest duty.
THE MINISTER OF ECONOMIC WARFARE (THE EARL OF SELBORNE):My Lords, we all have such a deep regard for the noble Lord who has just spoken and we all have such a great admiration for the heroism of the people of the Channel Islands and sympathy for them in the very distressing conditions in which they are at the present moment, that I can assure the noble Lord it is no pleasant task that falls to me to deny him or them that which we should like to give if it were within our power. I can assure my noble friend, if he will allow me so to call him—we were colleagues in another place for many years—that he is labouring in this matter under some very severe misapprehensions which I will endeavour to remove in the short time that your Lordships can spare me, and that he is not helping our fellow subjects in the Norman Islands by hysterical misstatements in your Lordships' House. I regret to have to say so, but there is no other correct description of parts of my noble friend's speech.

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My noble friend asked for a word of encouragement. He asked what were the plans for the future. I can assure him that the moment it is militarily possible we shall reoccupy the islands, and the moment we have reoccupied them we shall feed them and bring to them all the services that the people of the British Isles at present enjoy. Preparations to that end are of course being made in common with the other preparations we are making in regard to the problem of feeding reconquered Europe. What I regret so much about my noble friend's speech is the hysterical manner in which he talks about the "betrayal" of the Channel Islands. He knows perfectly well we were driver out of that part of our country by superior forces on the Continent.
LORD PORTSEA: My noble friend mows that we left the islands before the Germans arrived.
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: That does not alter the truth of what I have said. Anybody can tell with the history of Crete front of us that in face of a local Air Force superiority such as the Germans had in 1940 in that part of France, it was physically impossible to hold the Channel Islands. H we had remained there the sole result would have been the slaughter of a great many of the Channel Islanders. By that evacuation we saved them a great deal of misery. It was impossible for us to hold those islands as long as German Air Force superiority in France was what it was in 1940.
LORD STRABOLGI: Will the noble Earl allow me to interpose a moment? I am sure he does not want that to go on record. Is he aware that that argument would have justified the evacuation of Kent, which was nearer to a superior o German Air Force than the Channel Islands?
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: The Channel Islands are islands and every support to them must be sent by sea in ships subject to air attack from the enemy, whereas Kent could be reinforced from the land. Therefore the two positions are not at all analogous. The nearest analogy which this war affords is the case of Crete. It all happened nearly three years ago, but I do regret that my noble friend should speak about "be
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trayal." It was no more a betrayal than any other of the many defeats which this country suffered at that time by reason of entering into a European war with inadequate preparations.
I am however concerned, principally, with his charge against His Majesty's Government of treating—I think that I am not misrepresenting him when I say this—of treating the Channel Islanders worse than we treat some of our Allies. He laid great stress on the fact that prisoners of war in prison camps in Germany were getting their food parcels without interference from the Germans, and he asked why the same thing should not apply in the case of the Channel Islanders. Let me make the position clear. There is undoubtedly a great shortage of food in the Channel Islands, there is very considerable distress and discomfort, but there is no famine or anything that could in the least be accurately described as famine. My noble friend is quite mistaken in thinking that people are dying as a result of lack of food or that their health is being impaired.
LORD PORTSEA: Would the noble Earl give his justification for that statement so far as it relates to children?
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: I can assure my noble friend that I have very accurate information on these matters.
LORD PORTSEA: So have I.
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: I cannot give publicly the source of my information, I can only tell the noble Lord that when I went to the Ministry of Economic Warfare a year ago I was very much surprised at the amount of information I found there in regard to all the countries of Europe. That information comes constantly before me, and I am satisfied that the state of affairs in the Channel Islands is as I have described. The food situation is undoubtedly far worse in Poland and in Occupied Russia than it is in Western Europe.
LORD PORTSEA: What have we to do with Poland?
THE EARL OF SELBORNE: My noble friend asks, what have we to do with Poland? In the first place the people of Poland are our very gallant Allies, and we are in this war with them until the end. In the second place, I think it is important to realize that the food short-

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age, and the food situation generally, is much more serious in some parts of Europe than in others. The noble Lord has slid that the Royal Air Force dropped some coffee in Belgium, and he has asked why cannot we do the same thing for the Channel Islands. My Lords, there has been no appreciable quantity of food delivered to Belgium in that way. My noble friend is under a complete misapprehension if he thinks that we are feeding Belgium, and not feeding the Channel Islands. The dropping of the few bags of coffee which have been dropped in Belgium is in the nature of propaganda. It is like the dropping of leaflets, and it is not intended to be a serious contribution towards solving the food problem in Belgium. It is meant simply to give encouragement. If my noble friend thinks that a gesture of that sort would have important results if it were made in the Channel Islands, I will see that his suggestion is considered in the proper quarters.
With regard to Greece, as your Lordships know, the case is quite different. A year ago, before I had anything to do with economic warfare, a position of acute famine was reached in Greece, and it is the terrible fact that many thousands of people died there as a result. It was in order to alleviate that situation that His Majesty's Government consented to allow the blockade to be broken, and a system of food relief has been set up in Greece under the charge of the Red Cross and a neutral Swedish Commission which has made all the difference between life and death to the people of Greece. Even now, with all that relief going into the country, I do not think that it would be fair to say that the people of Greece are as well fed, at this moment, as are the people of the Channel Islands.
The noble Lord spoke about parcels reaching prisoners of war in prison camps. Of course there is no analogy there at all. These parcels are sent under an International Convention, the Geneva Convention, which provides most elaborate machinery under which the Red Cross International Organization handles parcels, sees that they get to the prisoners, has the right of inspecting the prison camps, and ensures that the transaction is checked at every stage. Through this medium English people are allowed to send parcels to their relatives who are
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prisoners in Germany, and German people are allowed to send parcels to their relatives who are prisoners in Great Britain. That is a very old organization. The Germans, it is true to say, so far as I know, have respected that part of the Convention, and food can be sent in that way to prisoners of war who are Channel Islanders as well as to others who are subjects of His Majesty without any fear of the Germans interrupting the supply.
The noble Lord cited the case of Dr. Kerschner and what he had done in the matter of sending food into France. I do not know if my noble friend is aware of it, but when Dr. Kerschner played an important part in sending food to France it was to Unoccupied France that the food was sent, and it was sent there at a time when America was a neutral country, so the situation was entirely different from that which obtains on the Continent to-day. Even so I very much doubt if it can truthfully be said that that food all reached the people of France. What I mean is not that the actual food was intercepted, but that its being sent there did make it easier for the Germans to extract food from Occupied France. That is the real problem, and it is a problem to which my noble friend did not address himself. If you allow a hundred tons of food to go to the Channel Islands, or to any of the other occupied territories, the people for whom that food is intended may very well receive it, but the Germans are able to take an equivalent amount of food out of the country.
That is what happened in Belgium in the last war. During the last war, there was an elaborate organization, sponsored by Mr. Hoover, which brought a great deal of food from America to Belgium. The Belgians got the food which Mr. Hoover brought, but Ludendorff, in the book which he wrote after the war was over, boasted that the Germans had taken very good care to take out the equivalent amount of food from Belgium. They took out the exact equivalent of what the Americans brought in, so that the unfortunate Belgians were not benefited by this philanthropic endeavour at all. The only country which was benefited was Germany. That is the root trouble with all these blockade problems. It is impossible for us to give this help to our fellow-countrymen and to our Allies who are under the German heel

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without benefiting the enemy. The noble Lord may ask why it was possible in Greece but not elsewhere. The answer is that affairs had reached in Greece a state for which there has been no parallel in any other part of Europe, and the Germans were willing to enter into undertakings and guarantees, including permitting the scheme to be administered by a neutral country, which have enabled food to be sent to Greece under safeguards which do not exist elsewhere. Even then, I do not think that it can be said that this effort has not been of some indirect assistance to the enemy. The alternative, however, was the most appalling starvation of thousands of our allies in Greece.
That is all that I can say about the matter. Until the Channel Islands are reconquered, it is impossible to send food there without the Germans either seizing it or seizing an equivalent quantity of food produced on the islands. I am sure that the Channel Islanders themselves would be the last people to demand that they should have preferential treatment over our Allies in this matter, any more than the people of London demanded that they should not be bombed as the people of Rotterdam had been. The suffering that all the occupied territories endure causes the greatest heartburning to all your Lordships, and to every member of the Government. Everything that we can do to alleviate their suffering without helping the enemy, we shall do; but, if the result of our efforts would be merely to increase the food supplies available to the Germans, we should in fact be prolonging the war and therefore injuring the very people whom we want to help.
LORD PORTSEA: My Lords, I must thank the noble Earl, who was kind enough to remind me that we are old friends, for a great deal of what he has said. It gives me confidence that my authorities and my remarks themselves are much stronger than even I had hoped, for, past master as he is in the art of replying to a debate, I cannot say that he has made out a case which in any way convinces me, or even persuades me. He spoke of the bombing of jersey and the bombing of Crete, but he spoke of them in the reverse order. Guernsey is thirty miles from the coast of Normandy; Dover is twenty miles from the coast of France. We hold Dover, we are told, because it
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is not an island. My geography must be wrong, because I have always understood that we are an island, and a very small island at that. If it was possible to hold Dover, which is a very important military station, it should have been possible to save Guernsey, which was further from the French coast and had no value at the time as a military station. Jersey would not have been worth the bombs which the enemy might have scattered over it. There is only one small town, and, if it had to be rebuilt later, it would be a very good thing indeed both for the town and for the island. That blood would have been shed there is no doubt, but I have always understood that that is the object of war. When in my young days I used to do battle with a friend, I was perfectly satisfied if I made his nose bleed; that was my object in fighting. I did not go in for battle to wash my hands in rose water.
My noble friend objects to the word "betrayal." I do not hold to any particular word, but what is betrayal? Every young islander of suitable age and strength was on this side of the Channel, fighting for the Crown. The older men were trained soldiers, and every man had his rifle. There were guns, and there was a rock fort built at the cost of a million pounds not a hundred years ago. The arms and ammunition were taken away; the guns were taken away. The flag was hauled down; the flag with the cross of Normandy and the cross of St. Andrew was hauled down by British hands, and we ran away and left the people there. I do not pretend to be a master of the English language, or indeed a master of anything, but what is that if it is not betrayal? It is abandonment, certainly; it is desertion, presumably. I say that it is betrayal. If I had a friend in jersey, and we had been the only inhabitants, and I had said to him: "My dear boy, the Germans are coming to-morrow, and I am off by plane"—if I had done that, I should not be addressing your Lordships now, and I should not be very proud of myself. A baser betrayal has never occurred in English history—and we have done some little things that I can remember. I can remember 1878, when we sent Sir Garnet Wolsey to tell the people of the Transvaal that as long as the British Union Jack was flying we would give protection to the Transvaal. Then a few Boers came in and joined us, and four years later the flag was hauled down, and

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the people had their throats slit. That was not betrayal; that was abandonment. What does it matter what it is, if you leave your friends in the lurch? That is the main point.
My noble friend will hold that the position of our own people, our own blood, in the Norman Islands, and of the people of Greece and of Poland or elsewhere are on the same plane. Well, of course, that ends the matter so far as I am concerned, because I say they are not. If I had to choose between my noble friend and any Pole, any Belgian, any Greek—if it were Leonidas himself—I should drop them and help my friend. That may be idiosyncrasy on my part; it may be even hysterical. I do not think so, and as long as I have those opinions so long will I hold that we have betrayed those islands, and that we should help them.
I thank my noble friend for the suggestion that we would drop coffee. It is not a question of the mere pounds of coffee; it is the fact that the islander will know that he is not forgotten, that he has not been betrayed. He will say: "I still count for something. I am the property, the absolute apanage of the Crown, and the Crown, through the Government, has not forgotten me and is doing what is possible and will continue to do what is possible, besides bombing us"—because of course the Government have shown that little kindness to the islands. They have bombed Jersey harbour and killed a few Germans. Well, that was at any rate an indication that they valued Jersey and had not forgotten it. But I do not want them to remember it in that regard any further. I thank my noble friend for his kind words, and more still for the kind sentiments that I seem to feel lurk behind his words. I know that he is in an official position and he cannot give me all the things I ask for. But at any rate he does give me that comfort that he is thinking, and the Government are thinking, of the islands, and that they will in good time do their best for those unfortunate people. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

AGRICULTURAL HOUSING.
LORD BEAVER BROOK LORD BEAVER BROOK moved to resolve, That a total of 30,000 new cottages
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for agricultural labourers and their families is the immediate minimum number required for the efficient conduct of the farming industry of England and Wales and for the healthy housing of its workpeople. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I know that your Lordships do not like to sit too late, so I must try and make my case for the agricultural cottages in the shortest possible space of time. I can assure my noble friend, the Leader of the House, that publication in full will appear in one of the London newspapers to-morrow; in other newspapers only in part, and if you take an average over the London newspapers you will see that my speech will get less space than it merits. But my noble friend can read it just the same, if he does not care to stay to hear it, and, if he likes, I will ask to have it on the same page as his friend "Beachcomber."
The shortage of cottages is nothing new. It has been going on ever since I arrived in England some thirty-two years ago, and in the twenty-five years or so that I sat either on the Benches on that side of the House where I made my maiden speech, or on the Benches on this side of the House—in all that time I have heard this question raised again and again, and very little good has come from any speeches made by anybody. I do not know that much is going to come from my speech, although the case, I can assure you, is absolutely water-tight. In 1937 the Ministry of Health said in a published document that some labourers had been waiting ten years for their cottages, and I hoped that the most reverend Prelate, the Archbishop of York, would be here to-day and that he would say a word in support of the plea that I make. And I would remind him that Jacob only consented to wait seven years, but on a very intricate point made by the Lord Chancellor of the day, Jacob had to wait fourteen years all told. There has been a more serious difficulty, and that was the neglect of repairs and renewals. That was widespread all through the country, and in many parts of the country there were agricultural areas that were nothing more nor less than slums. I hoped that my noble friend Lord Horder would have been here to-day so that I might have raised that issue with him, for of course the agricultural slums all over the country are a serious question in relation to the health of the country. I But I would ask His Majesty's Govern-

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ment, of which I was for some little time a member: What have you done since the war began to increase the necessary supply of agricultural cottages? What have you done to give any attention to repairs and renewals? What have you built? Nothing. What have you repaired? Nothing. And that is the indictment of His Majesty's Government.
Now they bring forward a proposal for 3,000 cottages. But since the war began 6,000,000 acres of agricultural land have been brought under the plough. It is necessary to have two ploughmen for every additional 100 acres That means 120,000 additional strength in the agricultural industry. If we have 120,000 additional strength, then we require cottages, and we can only offer 3,000. What is proposed now is only one cottage to forty additional labourers; and that makes no provision for the pre-war shortage, and none for repairs and renewals. Here in this House we have one seat for every forty Peers, but unhappily there is a great deal of absenteeism, and the absenteeism gives as space to sit clown. If it were not for the absenteeism, we might find my noble friend Lord Nathan sitting on the knee of Lord Southwood. In Norfolk, a County where ninety cottages have been provided, there are in fact 1,500,000 acres under cultivation.
Having made this general statement about the shortage of cottages, and racing against time in circler to enable others to speak and my noble friend Lord Portal to make the official answer, I am asking for 30,000 cottages. You ask me how I justify that 30,000. By putting a naught after the 3,000—that is the way I came to the conclusion to ask for 30,000. But the Minister of Health, I am told, has asked for 300,000 cottages. I am told on very reliable authority that is the figure he demands. Surely the very fact that the Minister of Health has asked for 300,000 cottages justifies me in asking for one-tenth of his demand. And, of course, I ask at the same time for the reconditioning of the cottages that are in need of repair, and in particular for pipe water. For I assure you, being sprung from the ploughman class of the community myself, that pipe water is better than electric light. Pipe water above everything is what the agricultural labourer would like. And why not give us 30,000 cottages? What is the reason? Is it
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shortage of materials? There is no shortage of bricks.
THE MINISTER OF WORKS (LORD PORTAL): I agree.
LORD BEAVERBROOK: There is no shortage of bricks, there is no shortage of cement. If we can build the cottages of bricks and cement, there is no reason why we should not build more than 3,000, for bottlenecks do not arise. There is a shortage of timber, but we all know that cottages can be built without timber except for the doors and possibly the windows; but even in the case of doors and windows we may not need to make use of timber. It is agreed, therefore, that there is no shortage of bricks, there is no shortage of cement, there is a shortage of timber, but timber is in very small requirement. There is no shortage of these materials at all. I shall come to the question of labour in a moment. That my noble friend will say is the bottleneck, but in any case, even if there was a shortage of materials and labour, should there not be a reconditioning of the cottages? Should there not be reconditioning, not on the plea my noble friend Lord Horder would make if he were here, but on the plea that these cottages are part of the whole machinery of agriculture?
It is upon the cottages that agricultural production is based. It is like a factory or industry. If I were to go to my noble friend Lord Portal and say, "Here I have a factory that is out of condition and requires some materials to put it in shape," he would say, "Take the materials away," and I would get them at once. Although the cottage is part of the system of agricultural production, there are no materials for the reconditioning of cottages. It is a policy that is misguided. It is a policy on which I have tried to bring the light of public opinion to bear for ever so long, and I hope that to-day one more step will be taken. Where it will lead to I do not know—I do not think very far.
Labour is the bottleneck, but there is ample building labour, not unemployed but idle, waiting for jobs, waiting for materials, waiting for orders, or waiting for architects' plans. There is idle building labour. There are too many airfields—far more airfields than there are aeroplanes for them. The service of airfields is in

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excess of the supply of aeroplanes—a very fortunate condition, but that happens to be the fact. As for munition works, they are going up all over the country—and hostels. My noble friend knows a lot about hostels. That word is written on his heart. But I am not urging my case for 30,000 cottages on the statement of idle building labour or on the statement of too many airfields or too many munition works building all over the country or too many hostels. I am urging it on the ground that You are taking away from the building industry far more labour than would supply the necessities for 30,000 cottages, and, You have no justification for doing so—none at all.
You have taken away in the last year—in fact in the last six months—25,000 from the building trade and civil engineering. In the first three months of this year you are taking away 28,000. You are to take 15,000 a month. These are for military service. In addition, on July 1, you are taking 35,000 who are unfit for military service and putting them on other jobs. Eighty-five per cent. represent building labour, the rest is civil engineering. In other words by July 1 you will already have taken 122,000 from the building trade for the Armed Services and for other jobs. It requires at least 3,000 mobile and 20,000 immobile labour for 3,000 cottages. Put on my naught and you get 30,000 mobile and 20,000 immobile—a total of 50,000 for my 30,000 cottages; and you are taking 122,000 away. If you applied all that great number of 122,000 to the production of agricultural cottages, you would solve the situation, and at last you would be able to accede to one of the few Resolutions I have brought forward in this House.
It is real folly on the part of the Government to take these men away for the Army and to deprive the system of food production of their services—real folly. You cannot use them as soldiers here unless there is an invasion, and it is not now Government policy to prepare to resist an invasion. I do not know; I cannot tell; perhaps not. You cannot send them abroad because the ships you might send them in are required to bring food. I do not say you could not send them abroad in other ships, but the ships bringing food to this country would otherwise be at the disposal of the Government. These ships bringing food from
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across the ocean are bringing it to feed these very building labourers you have taken away from their industry and put into the Army, thus putting an additional burden on ships bringing foodstuffs over the Atlantic when you might be relieving the burden of transport by applying that labour to building agricultural cottages here. Food production in the future as in the past demands an adequate supply of plant and equipment, and cottages are part of the plant. But even supposing you do set out on the programme of 3,000 cottages, the fact that my noble friend Lord Portal is connected with the project makes me think that something may be done. He is a man of great drive and energy, as I well know. But when will they be built? I can make a pretty good guess. "This year, next year, sometime, never." The child's rhyme just about describes the situation. The machinery of bureaucracy we have built up is a structure far stronger than the cottages themselves.
Mr. J. F. Wright, of Norfolk, one of the great agriculturists of Britain, a man who has not got a seat in the House of Commons and does not have a place in the House of Lords, but has got his two feet on the farm—he is one of the finest authorities on agriculture in the land, an authority who does not talk nonsense but real substantial common sense about the land, the sort of substantial common sense a descendant of a ploughman likes to hear—tells me there are eleven different authorities that have to be consulted, that have to be taken into consideration, before you launch on the building of ninety cottages they want in Norfolk. First of all, you have to go to the rural district council, then to the rural district council surveyor, then to the architect then to the county war agricultural executive committee; the Assistant Land Commissioner is the next visit, if you are not tired. Then you go to the senior regional architect, then you have to consult the Directorate of Land, then the district valuer, then the senior regional officer, then the allocation officer, and finally, if you have decided to build a cottage without a parlour, you have to go to Mr. A. Scott in Whitehall. Why when you want to build an agricultural cottage without a parlour you must go to Mr. A. Scott in Whitehall I do not know.
It sounds like "The House that Jack Built." It does indeed. Except that the

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"maiden all forlorn who milked the cow with the crumpled horn" will never marry the "man all tattered and torn" because they will have no cottage to go to if they do marry; so they will stay single. If they are so fortunate as to get a cottage in the by and by, what then? In rent and rates they will have to pay from 11s. 6d. to 13s. What an imposition on an agricultural labourer! What an imposition upon the ploughman of this country to make him pay 13s. a week on the wage you have set up for him by law! Deal with that section of the community decently, deal with them on a generous basis, give them the plant that is necessary to the production of the food that you so urgently need for the necessities of our country.
You have built no cottages by this beureaucratic structure. I do not criticize civil servants; I think they are a splendid body. I have nothing but praise for civil servants, particularly the men who have control of the Civil Service and manage and dominate it. They are fine public servants. That is not what I object to. What I object to is rule by Committee divorced from any control by the public, and that is what we have got at the present time—Committee rule completely divorced from any authority or responsibility of the public whatsoever. Unless Lord Maugham—I mention him because I heard him speaking so clearly discussing a legal subject in terms I could understand—and others take hold of the situation, then rest assured this system of control by Committee responsible to nobody will dominate every detail of our public and private life. We have to make a struggle against that irresponsible Committee control if we are to have a decent life in the community after the war is over, and indeed if we are to prosecute the war while it is or to the utmost extent with the intention of doing the greatest possible damage to enemy.
The farmer has to deal now with III rules and orders from the Agricultural Ministry. He needs a lawyer in his back-room or his front-roam in order to deal with those HI rules and orders. And he has also orders from the Food Ministry, from the Supply Ministry, from the Fuel Ministry and from the War Transport Ministry all rolling into him. Then, when he is least expecting it, there comes an order from the War Office or the Air
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Ministry. That may bring about either a terrible situation or a splendid situation; we cannot be sure which it will mean to the farmer. The order from the War Office or the Air Ministry will be for the taking over of his land altogether, and occasionally the farmer feels a happy release when he gets an order taking over his farm. He is done with filling up forms. He sometimes has as many as fifty forms waiting to be filled up. In nearly every case where he buys or where he sells he has to fill up a form. If he repairs a fence then he has to fill up a form in triplicate. He has to do that before he can repair his fence, and, meanwhile, his cattle may have strayed into his neighbour's field. I want to tell this to my noble friend for he can make the situation easier, particularly in regard to the supply of materials for repairing: fences, which is necessary for the farm. A proverb in New Brunswick, which also applies in Great Britain, says that good fences make good neighbours. A very good proverb that is, and I suggest to my noble friend that good fences here will make good neighbours. A farmer spends half his life book-keeping. Sometimes peasants are not good book-keepers. Accountants come from the city but ploughmen come from the countryside.
I want to say one further word, but I am anxious not to take up the time of the House much longer because I want to conform to the desire of your Lordships to go home at the hour you have selected among yourselves, without any wide consultation. I want to see you get home safely and well; therefore I will limit my remarks so that you can get home at a reasonable hour. I was going to say one word about county war agricultural committees. I hope they will come to an end when the war is over. These county war agricultural committees have cost this Government £10,000,000 a year at least; it may even turn out that £20,000,000 will be the cost of the war agricultural committees. The committees divide themselves often into twelve subcommittees. It is committees and subcommittees everywhere. The service which we are supposed to get from the county war agricultural committees is to turn bad farmers into good farmers, but you cannot turn bad farmers into good farmers by a committee meeting. It is not possible. You have to find some

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other method of dealing with that problem. I did intend to make some observations about the proposals of some noble Lords for agriculture in the future, but again for reasons of time I will say nothing further, except to hope that I have made my case for these cottages, and to suggest to your Lordships that we should not allow our farmers any longer to submit to be ruled by bankers and by brokers, by importers and by exporters, by middlemen and by milk combines. I return, therefore, to the Resolution which I submit to the consideration of your Lordships, and hope you will not be put off from supporting it by anything I have said about Committees. I know you are all members of many Committees, and I hope you will not be influenced adversely by anything I have said about such bodies, but will give your hearty support to the plea I make for 30,000 cottages for agricultural labourers. I beg to move.
Moved to resolve, That a total of 30,000 new cottages for agricultural labourers and their families is the immediate minimum number required for the efficient conduct of the farming industry of England and Wales and for the healthy housing of its workpeople.—(Lord Beaverbrook.)
LORD ADDISON: My Lords, it refreshes me exceedingly to hear the noble Lord's enthusiasm for this subject, because I happen to be one of those who have suffered much in this cause in the years that have passed. I remember very painfully that I did not always receive that consistent support from great organs of the Press which I really merited, but now I hope that those organs of the Press, which, as I think the noble Lord explained to us yesterday, he owns but does not control, will give consistent support from this time on to this cause.
LORD BEAVERBROOK: They always have; I was never faithless to the ploughman.
LORD ADDISON: We want to get houses built for the agricultural worker now. I asked the noble Lord before we came in why he did not put a naught at the end of the figure in his Motion and he gave me a very complete reply. He pointed out that in the Resolution there was the word "immediate," which of course governs everything to-day. I hope
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we shall hear from the noble Lord opposite what are the realities with regard to the difficulties of the provision of the necessary labour and materials. We shall certainly want 30,000 cottages a year for ten years. We should then begin only to approach the need, and should still be far from attaining what is really required. But I would like to say that I think we owe a real debt to the Ministry for the White Paper which provides for the large-scale organization of building labour after the war and for the training of it during the war. I hope we shall hear something about that this afternoon, because it has to be tackled at that end.
With the most profound respect for, shall I say almost fear of, the noble Lord who has just spoken, may I say that I am not quite sure he is so near realities as he would have us believe? He says he is a realist. Well, I am the Chairman of a county war agricultural executive committee and I do not recognize his description of those bodies. We have met in committee two or three times a week ever since the first week of the war, and I should like to assure the noble Lord that if he will only come along and let me be his host for one day, I will show him something of what we are really doing. I think he will see how extraordinarily imaginary is the picture he has painted of the work of the war agricultural executives. I will take this opportunity of giving the House one simple illustration. The small county where I have the honour to preside over the committee was much worse off than Norfolk. We only had fifty cottages allotted, but the notice of the allocation came in one week and within ten days of that welcome notification the Ministry had been informed of the complete agreement of all this medley of committees which the noble Lord has imagined. The Ministry was informed how many houses were wanted in the different districts, where the need was most urgent and precisely where they were to be placed in each village. The whole scheme was completed and sent back with our unanimous blessing within ten days. I do not think that the Daily Express could have been prompter than that. It was really express work.
I hope the noble Lord, if he has got that information from Mr. Wright, will have it carefully investigated, because I assure him that every one of the war agriculture executive committees welcome this

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suggestion even for a handful of cottages. It is a mere handful of cottages, but I believe the matter has been dealt with remarkably quickly. I would join heartily with the noble Lord in the hope that the effort will not be smothered by any of the machinery described, and I think we can trust the noble Lord opposite that this will not happen. If he can modify the call-up in the building trade so as to get nearer 30,000 than 3,000 cottages, that would be welcomed by all, and if that is done I think we shall feel immensely indebted to the noble Lord for bringing the matter forward.
Now I would like to add a word out of my painful experience on the subject with regard to the larger issue. It is true that 30,000 cottages would be an enormous help now. The survey to which the noble Lord alluded showed that an immense proportion of the cottages now occupied by agricultural workers are very dilapidated and very unsatisfactory. The housewife has not half a chance, and that is one of the main reasons why young men will not remain in the villages. It is not 30,000 cottages that are required in the interests of sound agriculture, nor even 300,000, but vastly more. I find that in this country 38,000 workers in the last year before the war drifted away from agriculture. Notwithstanding that, the number of people, including the occupiers of the smaller holdings, who were employed in the industry in England and Wales, was 959,000. The number of labourers who have left agriculture, the biggest industry in the country, is not less than a quarter of a million during the last generation. I am quite sure that the provision on a large scale of cottages in the country districts, with the amenities that the noble Lord talked about—with a decent water supply, so that the housewife can wash up without having to walk along the road to a pond to get water—will do more to keep men in the villages and their wives contented than almost anything else.
I remember only too painfully that after the last war I was urged to build houses. "Get on with it was shouted at me every day, not by the Press to which the noble Lord referred, but by other organs of the Press. I was allowed to make one great mistake. I agreed, although I should not have agreed, to pursue the endeavour without adequate control of material and prices. After this war build-
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ing enterprise will be enormously more urgent than after the last war, and I do entreat the noble Lord to represent to whoever is responsible for the job that the mistake that was made last time shall not be repeated. The job will have to be done by complete control for many years of prices and materials and of the whole organization in as striking a way as we now control the means of war production. Otherwise prices will soar to unholy heights, as they did last time, and whoever is in charge will be destroyed as I was. That was a mistake.
There is one other thing about which I think a warning should be given. Immediately after the war there will be an immense outcry for lots of things and the cry for houses will probably be the biggest. How many millions will be wanted I do not know, but the task will need all the mobilized labour that the Ministry can bring together. I hope that those who live to see that time will do whatever they can to prevent a recurrence of the betrayal of 1922. Some of us were parties to the promise of "homes for heroes"—I was one of them—and I have never ceased to be thankful that I went out when that promise was proposed to be broken. I have a great fear that after the enthusiasm of the war period there may come a reaction, and I hope that everyone of us will resolve that whoever is in charge shall be given complete power—even if it involves the establishment of a number of Committees—over all that is necessary to secure economic and rapid building, because if that is not done there will be sooner or later a reaction such as there was in 1922 and we may suffer similar disasters. I am delighted with the enthusiasm of the noble Lord on this subject, to which I have given faithful and suffering allegiance for more than a generation, and I sincerely hope that he will sustain it at all costs.
LORD PHILLIMORE: My Lords, it is a refreshing thought that the Addison cottage may be shortly followed by the Beaverbrook cottage, and I feel that all the agricultural world ought to be grateful to the noble Lord for bringing forward this Motion. I was surprised, if not shocked, at the moderation of this proposal. Thirty thousand cottages! They will go nowhere, as the noble Lord, Lord Addison, knows. I do not suppose it means three cottages in a parish. However, I

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rose not only to draw attention to the noble Lord's very conservative estimate, but to challenge him on a little of his knowledge about country life. Does the noble Lord appreciate that far more than 30,000 agricultural cottages already exist, but are unused by the agricultural population? The real truth of the matter is that during the depression the best cottages, the ones that would fetch the most money for the impoverished farmer, were let to people not engaged in agriculture. You cannot go to any village, at any rate in the South of England, without finding cottages which were normally occupied by agricultural workers when England was farmed as it is now farmed, now in other hands.
And if that is true, and it is true, it will be found, I think, that those cottages are best placed for the work of the farm. Naturally they were let with the farm to the farmer and they were so situated that the men concerned might get as easily as possible to their work. They were also the best of the cottages left to the farmer, for they were the ones that would fetch the higher rents. This to my mind is a very pregnant factor in the situation. Might it not be better to consider building new cottages for the people who are now in those cottages; that is to say, providing them with new homes, and handing over the older cottages to the agricultural labourers? Those older cottages, as I have said, are certainly placed where the labourers will most desire to be. It may be argued that a new cottage will be more attractive to the housewife than the old one, and no doubt that is partially true. But the rents of the old cottages may be much lower, and such buildings, after all, have many advantages that the new, quickly run-up dwellings which the noble Lord, Lord Portal, will be forced, I am afraid, to put up, will probably not possess. The older cottages will, I think, be more comfortable with their warmer walls, warmer roofs and greater number of outbuildings. They are, in fact, generally more fitting for the use to which they were intended to be put. I will not detain the House longer, but I do think that this is a very important point and one which should be borne in mind right throughout the campaign—which I hope will not be dropped—to provide the agricultural labourer with the sort of cottage he ought to have.
LORD PORTAL: My Lords, the Resolution which has been moved by my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook proposes, as we know, that a total of 30,000 new cottages for agricultural labourers and their families should be provided immediately. I have listened with great attention to his speech to-day and I gathered that he is of opinion that these cottages will not be built this year, next year, sometime or ever. I can only say that if the 3,000 which are now contemplated are not built, I imagine that his Lordship in the near future will again be having something to say in this House, for he has taken this matter up with all his accustomed fervour and zest. A great point which he stressed was that in his view no more men should be taken from the building trade, which he considers so important, to go into the Services or to work on munitions. Manpower is a very big question indeed and the people whose chief concern it is look at it from many different points of view. They have to consider all sorts of questions connected with priorities and allocations and they have to decide which needs are the most important.
I think it is only fair that I should say at the beginning of my remarks that the actual building comes under the Minister of Health, and both the Minister of Health and the Minister of Agriculture would be only too glad if they could start immediately to build 30,000 homes for agricultural workers. And it is not only 30,000 that they have in mind. They visualize, as Lord Addison has suggested, a ten-year programme which will include putting up about 300,000 cottages for the agricultural workers. Most of your Lordships are aware that just before the war started the annual rate of building of new houses was nearly 350,000, of which 55,000.were in rural areas. I tried to get for your Lordships figures showing what proportion was for agricultural workers but I was unable to do so. But let us take the 55,000 as representing the annual number which was being built at that time in rural areas. As Lord Beaverbrook has already pointed out, what has happened since the war began is simply that the houses which were then in process of being built have been finished off. Then, as Lord Phillimore has said—and this is a matter which is in the minds of everyone—one of the most important problems to be faced now is that of maintenance. The maintenance of houses has fallen very

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much behind. But it is not only the maintenance of houses that has fallen behind. The maintenance of plants in industrial buildings is also falling back in a like ratio. Moreover, the completion of the houses which were under construction when the war began has been more than offset by the number of dwellings which have been destroyed or irreparably damaged by enemy action.
The Minister of Flealth envisages for the future a programme of building 3,000,000 to 4,000,000 houses and of that scheme the building of 300,000 cottages for agricultural workers will be a part. As I have said, we are suffering now from big arrears in the matter of maintenance. The Minister of Health has publicly drawn attention to these facts. A vast amount of work will be required to bring housing conditions once again up to the standard of 1939. A start has been made—as I think my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook mentioned—on the reconditioning of houses in rural areas. In this connexion I would like to refer to what I may call the bombed areas of this country. For some time before I went to my Ministry a figure of £150 was allowed for the reconditioning of houses irrespective of first-aid repairs. During the last two months that figure has been increased to approximately £300. The Ministry of Health and my Ministry are beginning to operate on the repair of 40,000 bombed houses. We are going to get them into a proper state of repair and the country will then gain to the extent of 40,000 more homes. The first and principal reason to which Lord Beaverbrock referred for not being able to deal with more than 3,000 agricultural cottages is labour. I think it was the Archbishop of York's Committee which went into the question of reconditioning rural houses. That question is now being considered and practical steps will undoubtedly be taken when the labour is available. That I think is something to go on with.
And now I want to tell the noble Lord that I would be very pleased to accept his Motion if it were not for the word "immediate." I know that he and I will not agree on that. He has maintained that labour should not be taken away as it is being taken from toe building trade. Before the war there were in England and Wales 1,200,000 people in the building and civil engineering trades. At the present
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time there are less than half that number in those trades, and programmes which are still being carried out for the Service Ministries, the Services themselves, and for other Ministries whose work is regarded as part of the war effort, absorb about two-thirds of that labour. Moreover, before the war approximately 300,000 men were employed on the maintenance of houses, factories and other buildings. That figure has now fallen to about 170,000, and in that figure of 170,000 are included 35,000 men who are dealing with bombed houses, first-aid repairs and so on. Our difficulty is, therefore, that we have a minus number of men available.
The question of priorities in regard to building has to depend at the present time on the war effort. The noble Lord has referred to the increase in the number of agricultural workers, due to the policy of ploughing-up land and so on, but the extra numbers who have come to help in carrying out the agricultural programme are, for the most part, temporary, and for them hostels can be provided. I do not think that I know any more about hostels than my noble friend did when he was Minister of Supply, but hostels are being built for these people, and over 400 hostels and camps have been provided. The camps are used for prisoners of war, and up to 700 are accommodated in each camp. The most popular type of hostel holds about 50, but the capacity of others varies from thirty to one hundred.
In addition to these 40,000 to 50,000 unskilled workers who have been brought into agriculture, we must have a nucleus of experienced workers, and these 3,000 houses are to be built for them. That is the intention of the Minister of Agriculture, and it is supported by the Minister of Health. They work together on these questions, and they have, as Lord Addison knows, asked the local authorities to find sites for these houses at once. They are to be advised by the agricultural war executive committee of each county, and the tenants will be chosen by the committee for the time being. I understand that most of the sites will be near villages, and so the provision of water—a point mentioned by my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook—will not be as difficult as it is in the case of some farms which are a long way from water supplies. The figures which I have given show that we have only half the labour which we

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used to have, and that two-thirds of that labour is being used for the Service and Supply Ministries, while 170,000 men are being used for maintenance work generally and the repair of bombed houses. We are therefore left with very few men.
Then we come to the question of material, and my noble friend Lord Beaverbrook asks what we have. He asks whether we have bricks, and the answer is that we have bricks. He asks whether we have cement, and the answer is that we have cement. The difficulty at the present time is timber. So far as these 3,000 houses are concerned, however, we have to get over that difficulty. I regard 3,000 as a token figure. This is our first piece of planning on a long-term programme. When we talk of hostels, there is always a feeling that they are not permanent, but with these houses it is different. We must make a success of them. I am certain that after the war there will be a shortage of timber. No one should know that better than I do, because when one is concerned with the allocation of these materials one obtains first-hand knowledge of the position regarding them. We are developing designs and methods of pitched-roof construction, therefore, which will avoid the necessity of using timber.
An interesting point to consider is the increase in the cost of building at the present time. For cottages it is about 80 per cent. With ordinary buildings about 33 per cent. of the costs is for material, and about 66 per cent. for labour. For camps and aerodromes the increase in cost is not as much as 80 per cent. One of our great difficulties, with the reduced amount of labour available to us, is that those men who remain in the industry are, for the most part, the older men. Although the mellow craftsman is worth a great deal, you also need youth. In the country areas at the present time we shall have to rely a great deal on the older men, because all the younger men are being taken from us gradually. When we get down to below half a million, we shall find a great proportion of them are older men.
We shall all agree that it is necessary to provide more cottages for agricultural workers, and we may well be asked what plans we are making for this purpose. My noble friend Lord Addison has
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warned us about what may happen after the war. If supply does not equal demand prices may go up rapidly. That is a reason why, as he says, controls are imposed, and we realize the importance, until supply and demand can be brought into a proper relation, of maintaining controls. On April 21, 1942, I made a few remarks in your Lordships' House on planning and future personnel, which I said was all-important. I said:
"There is a question which is closely allied or shall I say goes hand in hand with the question of planning, and one which is bound up with my Ministry of Works… Directly the war is over, it will be essential to have this industry organized so as to cope with the vast amount of work with which it will have to deal. Most of the material required is at hand in this country. A very large number of new houses will be required, as well as repairs to many thousands, and we shall require new schools and other buildings. A well-balanced programme will have to be planned. The men to carry out this work will have to be made available very quickly. We are already well advanced in considering what will be required. The question of apprentices being taken into the trade is being thought out, and that of getting the large number of men hack both from the Services, and the munition factories, is being gone into. The training of men on demobilization is also an essential factor. We must think out a long-term programme. Your Lordships will realize that this is no easy task, made no easier by the fact that the number of our building operatives is decreasing very fast as men are called up."
The Government have now produced a White Paper which gives effect to what we were saying at that time. In this White Paper, we accept the principle of a planned building programme for ten or twelve years, with a labour force of 1,250,000. We accept the principle of regularity of employment, if the trade itself agrees as to the method. The White Paper recognizes that there will have to be a large expansion of the building industry at the end of the war. It provides for the special training of up to 200,000 men demobilized or coming out of munitions, which will be directed by the Ministry of Labour with the advice and co-operation of the Ministry of Works. It covers the training of men in the Forces before demobilization, both in this country and abroad. Apprenticeship is the normal way of entry into the industry, and arrangements are indicated for the maximum encouragement of such training within the industry, with the assistance of the Ministry of Works and other Departments concerned. It provides for the establishment

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by the Ministry of Works of an Apprenticeship and Training Council to cover the whole industry. Such arrangements will operate in the provinces and throughout the country. There is a section in my Ministry to-day which is working out the future building requirements of each Governrnent Department, of which housing will obviously, be one of the first priorities, and rural housing is a part of a good general housing programme. There are the requirements of the Post Office and other Government Departments which are now to be worked out with the number of men who are going to be introduced into the industry for the first time.
I served an apprenticeship myself in the question of providing employment in the Special Areas. The main thing one has striven for is that men should know what they are gong to have to work on from day to day, and they will be given a chance of this by the White Paper scheme. So when, after the war, a young man wants to serve an apprenticeship his father and mother will have a trade which they can be proud to see their boy enter, because he will have some continuity of work and prospect. I am in sympathy, and His Majesty's Government are in sympathy, with Lord Beaverbrook in his Resolution, but I think I have made it clear that at the present time 3,000 houses are all that can be built, with the labour and material available.
LORD BEAVERBROOK: My Lords, I take it that the Government reject my Motion. I listened with some interest to the story of what is going to be done after the war, but that is riot what I am asking. I am asking for 30,000 agricultural cottages now. That is the Motion. The fact that Saul is among the prophets and Portal among the planners does not affect this issue at all. I still want to know whether the Government are willing to increase the programme to 30,000 cottages. I am quite ready to discuss priorities of labour in this House. If the Government want to put off the issue to another day, when we can discuss priorities of labour, I will put it off to that time. But if I cannot get the assurance that the matter will be reconsidered on the basis of priorities of labour I must press my Motion to a Division. The issue as I put it to the House was that 122,000 men are being taken from the building industry now and that 40,000 would provide the cottages I am asking for. I ask
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that 40,000 of those men should be diverted to building agricultural cottages. My noble friend says "No." He goes into a discussion of the limitations of labour, but he does not answer about the 122,000 men that are being taken for the Services and for other industries. We contend that 40,000 should be directed to the building industry on account of the present need for 30,000 cottages.
The information I have given the House to-day can be got from other sources besides that very reliable farmer, J. F. Wright. It can be got from an article in The Times a week ago and elsewhere. My noble friend has made no attempt to deny the information I have given the House about the committees. My noble friend Lord Phillimore made a most valuable contribution, and I should have had something to say on the same subject if I had not cut my speech short. There are many other issues raised by my noble friend that I should have liked to discuss. He speaks about 40,000 houses that are subject to their being repaired, but these 40,000 houses are not agricultural cottages; they are for the gentry, not for the ploughmen.
LORD PORTAL: The 40,000 are in the bombed areas, in the East End and various other places.
LORD BEAVERBROOK: It is not much of an answer to my plea for 30,000 cottages to speak about bombed houses in the towns. I still submit that 30,000 cottages can be built. Even the shortage of timber can be met by the supply of beaverboard, and if beaverboard is not available it can be made here; it is only a matter of using certain machinery for the purpose. With regret, therefore, but none the less with confidence that I do my duty, I propose to go to a Division unless the proposal is accepted that we should discuss priorities of labour later on, with the intention of showing that priorities of labour are properly directed otherwise than to the building of agricultural cottages. There has been a case throughout for far more than 30,000 cottages, so surely I can hope for support from your Lordships for my modest demand for 30,000.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (VISCOUNT CRANBORNE): My Lords, perhaps I might say one word if the noble Lord still feels inclined to go to a Division.

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I must confess I think it would be unfortunate if there was a Division on this subject, and I do not think the noble Lord would be justified in forcing the House to a Division. What my noble friend has said is that the Government are in favour not only of the 30,000 cottages for which the noble Lord asks, but for 300,000 for which he might have asked if he had not been so moderate. The real difficulty at the present time is purely a man-power difficulty. I think the noble Lord recognizes that himself. I understand that he has not accepted the figures given by my noble friend, but I can assure noble Lords that the man-power situation, which is one of the utmost difficulty at the present time, has been examined and combed through again and again and again by His Majesty's Government. There is not a single man in this country now who is not doing work of essential importance. And therefore suddenly to suggest at the end of a debate that there are plenty of men for that purpose—
LORD BEAVERBROOK: The point is that I have shown that 122,000 men are being diverted from the building industry to the Services and to other industries, and I ask that out of that 122,000 a quota should be detached for building agricultural cottages, and my noble friend answers me by talking about the immense decline in building labour. He did not make any reply at all to my argument about the 122,000 men.
VISCOUNT CRANBORNE: But the clear and obvious reply is that the Cabinet, having considered priorities of labour in this very difficult situation, thought it was more necessary to divert those 122,000 men to the Armed Forces and to, the other industries of which he has spoken. It is not a thing that they have not considered. They have considered it with the utmost care. It seems to me that for the House to divide on a question of that kind at the present moment would not only create a very bad impression but would be perfectly unjustifiable. If the noble Lord wishes to press his Motion to a Division he can, but I hope every other noble Lord will come to the support of the Government.
VISCOUNT SAMUEL: My Lords, I share the hope that Lord Beaverbrook will not ask the House to put itself on record as censuring the Government for
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not providing an additional 30,000 agricultural cottages. It would be very easy to represent such a Division as a Division between those who are in favour of more adequate rural housing and those who are against it, but that would be a very wrong and unfair impression. I for my part have been interested in this cottage questian for many years before the date the noble Lord gave, some thirty years ago, when he first came to England, for I remember writing a pamphlet on this subject about fifty years ago when I was a young candidate for Parliament in an agricultural constituency.
When we are asked to vote for or against this Resolution, we naturally ask ourselves why we are requested to insist that the Government should build 30,000 cottages. Why 30,000? Has the noble Lord made a careful statistical survey of the requirements of the agricultural industry at the present time and of the actual shortage that prevails, and so built up from actual fact the statistic of 30,000? Not at all. He has taken 30,000 because it is ten times the 3,000 and one-tenth of 300,000; that figure of 3,000 being the number proposed by the Government, and the figure of 300,000 being the number the Ministry of Health have said will be ultimately necessary. Three thousand is obviously too little, and 300,000 is impracticable at the present time. Therefore, he says, "Let us plump for 30,000." On such statistical basis he asks the House of Lords to place on its records the opinion that we consider at the present time 30,000 is the figure of additional agricultural cottages necessary. As regards the priorities of labour, on which the whole matter turns, clearly that is a matter for the most careful investigation by the Government. In fact, it is one of the main tasks of any Cabinet conducting a war. If we are now to say, without any further evidence than that provided by the noble Lord's speech, that the Cabinet have been wrong in not providing labour for 30,000 cottages instead of 3,000, we are not supporting the Government in their conduct of the war. We should only withdraw our support on points such as this when we consider the evidence is clear and overwhelming. I have not been sparing in my criticisms of the Government on many occasions, and I should be quite ready to criticize them again, but I would not he prepared to support the noble Lord in the Lobby on the statis-

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tical evidence he has put forward in censuring the Government cut in their conduct of fie war for not providing sufficient labour in this particular priority.
LORD BEAVERBROOK: My Lords, I am going to ask leave to withdraw, but M doing so I would point out that the question has not been answered. It is idle for noble Lords to come to this House and present cases to the Government which are not answered. The point is that 122,000 building labourers are being diverted elsewhere. I have made a plea for cottages. That is the evidence which the noble Viscount, Lord Samuel, wants—this statement that 122,000 building labourers are being withdrawn. I beg leave to withdraw my Motion, but would point out that the Government have not answered the question I brought to this House, and very often that is because there is no answer.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

ANTI-U-BOAT WARFARE COMMITTEE.
LORD WINSTER: My Lords, I beg to ask the question standing in my name.
[The question was as follows:
To ask His Majesty's Government, how many of the Anti-U-boat Warfare Committee, have been held since it was constituted, when it last met, and who is the Minister responsible to Parliament for the work of this Committee.]
VISCOUNT CRANBORNE: My Lords, the Anti-U-boat Warfare Committee have met regularly once a week since it was constituted. Twenty meetings have so far been held. Admiral Stark, Commander United States Naval Forces in Europe, and Mr. Averill Harriman, Personal Representative of the President, attend the meetings of the Committee. As regards the second part of the question, as my right honourable friend the Prime Minister explained in another place on the 15th December, the existence of this Committee in no way supersedes or replaces the regular and systematic control of the anti-U-boat warfare by the Admiralty.
LORD WINSTER: My Lords, I thank the noble Viscount for his reply. It is not quite clear who answers for the Committee, but I can understand that that varies according to circumstances. There
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will be an opportunity of debating the matter in the near future, so I shall not press it now.

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA (GOVER NORS' ALLOWANCES AND PRIVI LEGES) (AMENDMENT) ORDER, 1943.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA AND BURMA (THE EARL OF MUNSTER): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name.
Moved, That the Special Order, as reported from the India and Burma Orders Committee yesterday, be approved.—(Earl of Munster.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CONSOLIDATION BILLS.
First Report by the Joint Committee, being a Report upon the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill [H.L.], made, and to be printed. The minutes of evidence (with the Proceedings of the Joint Committee) laid upon the Table, and to be delivered out.
COURTS (EMERGENCY POWERS) BILL [H.L.]
Reported from the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills without amendment, and to be re-committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

ADJOURNMENT: PERSONAL STATE MENT BY LORD WEDGWOOD.
VISCOUNT CRANBORNE: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn.
Moved, That the House do now adjourn.—(Viscount Cranborne.)
LORD WEDGWOOD: My Lords, on this Motion may I raise a personal issue? I am very loth to do so, but I was publicly traduced yesterday by Lord Winster, who commented on my speech unjustifiably. I seek this, the earliest opportunity of trying to put myself right. Lord Winster said this—I am quoting from his speech in the Official Report:
"Then there was the statement that the First Army are doing themselves well, that they have all the bread and beer they want and generally having a good time, but not

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fighting. I wrote the words down—'are having a good time, but not fighting'."
The words I actually used are also in the Official Report, and I would call your Lordships' attention to them:
"It seems to me that in that First Army we have too much organization and too few fighters. Are all these things really necessary? We hear that they are all doing themselves very well—bread and beer, and canteens and libraries, and welfare and entertainments. The War Office take a pride in doing it thoroughly. But that is not fighting. It is all very well for an army of occupation, it is all very well for trench warfare, such as we had in the greater part of the last war. But it is not much use for a mobile war. In the South African war—and many of your Lordships took part in that—you will remember we did pretty well on biscuits and bully for two years, and we wore none the worse for it."
I submit to your Lordships that the words which the noble Lord stated he put down are not in that speech. He put down the words having a good time, but not fighting.' If I had used these words they would have been an insult to the common sense of the House as well as to the Army, and they are not there. What I did complain of, and what I complain of still, was that too large a proportion of the Army is engaged behind the lines and too few in the front line.
The second misrepresentation was as follows:
"That was followed by the statement 'If you cannot invade Italy, because you cannot take Tunis'—these are the significant words or do not want to.' What is this insinuation? That our Expeditionary Force in Tunisia is a feint, or that we are pulling our punch because you cannot take Tunis or do not want to'? What is the suggestion? That the whole Expeditionary Force in Tunisia is engaged in a sham fight and that we really do not want to take Tunis at all? "
There again, if I had said that, the indignation of the noble Lord would have been shared by the House. What I actually said was quite different. I said:
"If you cannot invade Italy, either because you cannot take Tunis or because you do not want to, there are plenty of other places where you could be of even more use."
I did not put these commas in; they are put in by the reporters. Obviously the whole sense of that remark was, "If you cannot invade Italy because you do not want to"—not Tunis; everyone knows we want to take Tunis. "If you do not want to invade Italy, then invade some other part, and get on with it." It seems to me that that is a perfectly proper statement,
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Now, my Lords, I expect most of us, after making a speech, are a little doubtful of the exact words we have used, however certain we may be of our meaning. I went down to the Reporters' room at once to look at my speech to correct any folly such as has been attributed to me. Judge of my surprise and pleasure when I found the reporter's draft accurate even to the comma, and differing entirely from the words Lord Winster had written down. I have no objection to acquiring a reputation in your Lordships' House for saying things which may appear indiscreet when I think they should be said in the free Parliament of a free country, and of that I must be the judge, but I do object to being given a reputation for insulting the Army by deliberate misrepresentation or misquotation. I have known the noble Lord for many years in the House of Commons not well but with appreciation of his great ability, though I fear the wit of his early speeches there has turned somewhat sour in later years. We have crossed swords before on non-intervention in Spain, and I have no doubt we shall cross swords again. May I beg him to remember that in seeking to injure my reputation for common sense he risks for himself a very unfortunate reputation?
LORD WINSTER: My Lords, the noble Lord most courteously gave me notice that he intended to raise this matter. I enjoy controversy. I have never before been accused of misrepresentation. The words which I can only say I did write down yesterday, the words to which I refer, were in regard to what was said about the First Army. I am in the recollection of your Lordships who were present when those remarks were made. I think that your Lordships were of my opinion. It seemed to be the sense of the House that unfortunate reflections had been made on the conduct of the First Army, and I think, as the words stand in the Official Report, it will be agreed that they are capable of being construed as bearing that implication:
"We hear that they are all doing themselves very well—bread and beer, and canteens and libraries, and welfare and entertainments… But that is not fighting."
I really think I can hardly be blamed if I received the impression that the First Army was having an extremely good time, and was far more concerned about its beer and welfare than it was about fight-

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ing. That seemed to be the impression which other noble Lords received besides myself. Again, remembering what was said and especially the manner in which it was said, following on other remarks of the noble Lord's concerning what is happening in North Africa, I certainly think that it was an ambiguous statement quite capable of bearing the interpretation which I placed on it.
However, no one rejoices more than myself to hear to-day that the noble Lord did not intend to convey those impressions either in regard to the conduct of the First Army or in regard to the bona fides of our intentions in Tunis. I think it is very satisfactory that that has been elicited this afternoon, and if I have been guilty of any misrepresentation I assure your Lordships I should be the first to wish to withdraw and to apologize. But I must say this in addition. I regarded that speech yesterday as mischievous and misleading, and as I read it again to-day I find insinuation after insinuation made upon individual after individual, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of New York, Mr. Robert Murphy (the President's personal representative), General Weygand, Mr. Joe Kemedy—one name after another, one institution and organization after another, referred to with some slighting remark capable certainly of a certain interpretation. I must say that when I notice that the noble Lord is always so thick-skinned about other peoples' feelings I am surprised to find he is so thin-skinned in regard to his own. I cannot help remembering this afternoon many misrepresentations to which he has, in my opinon, given currency. I mention two in particular—Sir Harold MacMichael in Palestine and officials in Palestine who are doing their duty under the most difficult and arduous circumstances and who have been made the victims, in my opinion, of vituperation and misrepresentation at the hands of the noble Lord. That is all I have to say, but again I repeat that if the House considers I have been guilty of any misrepresentation of the noble Lord's remarks yesterday I withdraw and apologize.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Winster will remember the immortal novel of the late Captain Marryat, Midshipman Easy. He will remember the delightful passage describing
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the three-cornered duel. In this case I think he is rather in the position of the purser who so annoyed the other two that they both directed their fire upon him with damage which his tailor had to repair afterwards. I am a neutral in this matter. I could not be here yesterday; I am very sorry I was away but I was doing a public duty. I have read the debate very carefully and I can quite see what happened. My noble friend Lord Winster had his feelings lacerated, a kind of red film came up before his eyes; in other words he saw red and went for Lord Wedgwood. We are all three members of the same Party and I want to say this publicly. I wish my noble friend would remember we here are a very small party in a House that is always courteous and always fair, but of course is for the most part opposed to what we stand for. If we begin talking against ourselves on these matters when really we are fundamentally agreed—I know that is the case from my long friendships with both these noble Lords—we only weaken the cause for which we stand. However, I want to say this to my noble friend Lord Winster. He and I have never fallen out on political matters and I do not expect we ever will. We were brought up in the same school. I have always found myself in agreement with him on most matters. If I find myself in any disagreement with Lord Wedgwood I examine my conscience. I have been many more years in another place and in this House than my noble friend Lord Winster, and may I most respectfully ask him to examine his conscience as to attacking a colleague in your Lordships' House with all the publicity and the opening which that gives to our opponents to misrepresent us? May I also ask him to examine his conscience on the members that he assails?
LORD WEDGWOOD: My Lords, I am loth to intervene again but that is the strangest apology I have ever listened to in either the House of Commons or elsewhere. I charge the noble Lord with saying that he has written down words of my speech which are not there. They are not in the speech and never were in the speech. I conceived that for that he should apologize, but if he does not we shall know exactly where we are in future.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House adjourned.