Sitting of 4 March 1947

Preamble
The House met at Half past Two o'Clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING

    New Town (Orders)
    Mr. Sparksasked the Minister of Town and Country Planning the location of new towns designated or about to be designated; from what areas populations will be allocated to each new town; the populations proposed for each; and the stage of development now attained.
    The Minister of Town and Country Planning (Mr. Silkin): As the reply is rather long, I will, with my hon. Friend's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Mr. Sparks: Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that the designation of further new towns, or further development to existing designated new towns, will not be unduly delayed as a result of the recent High Court decisions?
    Mr. Silkin: Yes, Sir, I can certainly give that assurance.
    Following is the reply:
    Orders are in force, under Section 1 of the New Towns Act, 1946, designing areas of land as sites for new towns at Crawley and Hemel Hempstead, and I have published draft Orders in respect of areas of land at Harlow, Essex, and at Aycliffe, County Durham. The populations proposed for these towns, when fully developed, are as follows:

    Crawley

    …

    50,000

    Hemel Hempstead

    …

    60,000

    Harlow

    …

    60,000

    Aycliffe

    …

    10,000

    Whilst the new towns must be devoted to the relief of overcrowding in certain main centres, there is no question, of a rigid allocation of population from particular districts. At the same time, certain local authorities have expressed their wish to participate in the development of the new towns, including the following:
    Crawley: Croydon, Mitcham, Beddington and Wallington, Carshalton, Sutton and Cheam.
    Hemel Hempstead: Acton.
    Harlow: Tottenham, Wood Green, Edmonton, Leyton, Walthamstow, Hornsey.
    In the case of Aycliffe, the intention is to provide homes close to their work for persons employed on the trading estate there; it may be expected, therefore, that the inhabitants will be drawn from all parts of S.W. Durham. No physical development has yet taken place in any of the new towns, but the preparation of an outline plan is in hand in respect of Crawley, Hemel Hempstead and Harlow, and certain preliminary work has been undertaken in connection with the provision of essential services.

    Stevenage (High Court Decision)
    Mr. Derek Walker-Smithasked the Minister of Town and Country Planning what action he proposes to take in regard to the proposed new town of Stevenage, in view of the quashing by the High Court of the Order made in respect of it.
    Mr. Silkin: Notice of appeal against the recent decision has been given on my behalf.
    Mr. Walker-Smith: The House will await the result of the appeal with interest; can the Minister give some indication of the interim effect of the quashing of the Order? Will there be any effect on any action already taken, which may now be ultra vires, such as premises acquired, salaries paid, and so on?
    Mr. Silkin: The interim effect is, of course, to hold up the procedure.

    National Parks
    Mr. Skeffington-Lodgeasked the Minister of Town and Country Planning to what extent the proposed national

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    parks areas are affected by the Government's proposals regarding Service-training areas.
    Mr. Silkin: I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer given to the hon. and gallant Member for Spen Valley (Lieut.-Colonel Sharp) on 18th February, of which I am sending him a copy.
    Sir Henry Morris-Jones: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us when we may expect to have the White Paper promised by the Prime Minister last week?
    Mr. Silkin: That hardly arises on this Question.
    Mr. Marples: In the case of Service Departments proposing to take over parts of the land allocated to national parks, will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that there is some public inquiry or opportunity for ventilation of public opinion?
    Mr. Silkin: Certainly, Sir; the Prime Minister gave that assurance last week.

  NATIONAL INSURANCE

    Old Age Pensions
    Mr. Errollasked the Minister of National Insurance approximately how many old age pensioners have not yet received their new pension books, to which they became entitled in October, 1946.
    The Minister of National Insurance (Mr. James Griffiths): Since 21st January, pension order books at increased rates from October have been issued to some 23,000 existing pensioners. This issue has cleared substantially all cases where the pensioners' circumstances were known to my Department by October. Since October, in addition to current notifications of retirement, many pensioners have given belated notice of retirement, at or before October, the overall total up to the end of January being about 100,000. Special measures have, as I have already indicated, been taken to deal with these cases. So far as I am at present able to to estimate, the number of these cases now outstanding, including both current and belated notification of retirement, is about 20,000 for the period up to the end of January. I should add that I have now almost completed new arrangements which will considerably expedite the procedure for dealing with new claims
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    for pensions, and shall be able to announce details of these arrangements next week.
    Mr. Erroll: Does the Minister realise that we are still getting a number of complaints from our constituents regarding difficulties, and will he see that these arrears are cleared up as rapidly as possible?
    Mr. Griffiths: I appreciate that hon. Members have been anxious, and I have been anxious too, but it is because of that that I have been looking into it, to see what new arrangements can be made pending the creation of our new organisation. I think arrangements can be made during this period, and I will make an announcement next week.
    Brigadier Petoasked the Minister of National Insurance whether he is aware that hardship is being caused to thousands of old age pensioners through the failure of his Department to replace pension books which became out of date in December; and, in particular, what steps he is taking with regard to the case of Miss Moran of Braunton, Devon, which was recently brought to his notice.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: No, Sir. The individual case referred to had quite exceptional features. As I have already advised the hon. and gallant Member by letter, the delay in Miss Moran's case was mainly due to two changes of address in recent weeks, but a pension order book has been sent to her in Eire, where she is now living.
    Brigadier Peto: Is the Minister aware that in a circular issued by his Department in November, admission was made that there are many thousands of such cases where pension books are lying unclaimed in post offices? Will he not express, through the Press or through the B.B.C., clear instructions as to what pensioners should do by way of writing to post offices at which they were registered.
    Mr. Griffiths: I have taken every step, but I will look into it again to see if any further steps can be taken to make a better arrangement.
    Major Legge-Bourke: Will the Minister bear in mind that when the public assistance committees apply to Blackpool on behalf of these people they get no reply or acknowledgment to their letters?
    Mr. Griffiths: I shall be dealing with that next week.
    Mr. Usborne: When pensioners apply for new pension books, would it not be possible to give some indication of how long it will take to deal with their applications, because some people think they have been forgotten?
    Mr. Griffiths: I have stated that pensioners would help if they made application four months beforehand.
    Sir Waldron Smithers: Is not this breakdown inevitable under State control, and is the Minister aware that it would not have happened if the organisation of the friendly and approved societies had been allowed to continue?
    Mr. Griffiths: This would not have happened but for my anxiety, and the anxiety of the House, to bring these new pensions into operation before we had created the organisation to deal with it.
    Brigadier Peto: Could the right hon. Gentleman say what arrangement is made by his Department by which the supplementary old age pension and the old age pension can be drawn when people are not in possession of their pension books?
    Mr. Griffiths: Perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman will put that question on the Paper.

    Pensioners (Earnings)
    Mr. Randallasked the Minister of National Insurance whether those who have fulfilled the conditions of age and insurance are able to earn up to £1 per week regardless of whether it be in regular or occasional employment without prejudicing their entitlement to the full rate of increased pension.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: It is a basic condition for the receipt of the increased rate of pension that a person shall have retired from regular employment. If he has so retired he may be awarded an increase of pension, and may thereafter earn up to £1 a week without affecting the rate of his pension. A person may be treated as having retired notwithstanding that he is engaged, or intends to engage, in a gainful occupation if he does, so only occasionally, or to an inconsiderable extent, or otherwise in circumstances not inconsistent with retirement. The question whether the retirement condi-
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    tions are fulfilled in the individual case rests with the statutory authorities—in the last resort the umpire, who now has before him a number of cases raising issues upon the interpretation of these conditions.
    Mr. Randall: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is considerable confusion about this matter, and that it calls for a clearly defined statement as to where casual employment ends and regular employment commences?
    Mr. Griffiths: I realise that this is a very important problem, but my hon. Friend must realise that it does not fall to me as Minister to decide that; it falls to the statutory authority. The umpire has before him cases which have been raised on this issue, and as soon as I receive a decision from him I will take steps to put it before the House.
    Mr. Butcher: As this requirement about claims for pension being made after retirement was brought in in the days of unemployment, will the right hon. Gentleman consider whether it is really necessary to maintain that now, when everybody is asked to work to the maximum?
    Mr. Griffiths: We discussed this question on the National Insurance Bill, and Members of all parties agreed that the new pension should be a retiring pension. We must consider carefully whether we should wipe out that condition because of any temporary situation.
    Mr. Jennings: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that the present manpower position, according to the Government's own statement, is critical and, that being so, will he not take immediate steps to get into touch with his colleagues on this matter?

    Unemployment Benefit (Compensation Cases)
    Mrs. Jean Mannasked the Minister of National Insurance whether he will admit to the benefits of the Extension of Unemployment Benefit (1946) Regulations, persons disqualified because of long illness on compensation.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: Under the National Insurance (Extension of Unemployment Benefit) Regulations, anyone who was last in regular employment as long ago as August, 1944, may be considered for an extension of benefit. Further, if there were periods of incapacity during 1944 and 1945

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    employment as long ago as 1942 may enable conditions to be satisfied. In framing these provisions we have made the widest concession which is possible within the law as it now stands. I should point out, also, that it is one of the conditions for unemployment benefit that the applicant should be capable of work.

    Fishermen (Unemployment Insurance)
    Mr. Douglas Marshallasked the Minister of National Insurance whether he is aware that hardship is being caused to many fishermen in Cornwall because they are either excepted from unemployment insurance or, although insured, are being disallowed benefit during periods when fishing is impossible; and what action he proposes to take in the matter.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: I have recently had inquiries made into the application of the unemployment insurance scheme to the fishing industry in Cornwall. These disclose difficulties in the application of the present statutory provisions which can only be satisfactorily dealt with under the scheme embodied in the new National Insurance Act. I am, therefore, forthwith extending the field of my inquiries to other parts of the country, with a view to submitting the whole matter, as soon as possible, to the National Insurance Advisory Committee which I am now setting up. The committee will no doubt invite evidence from the interested parties and will, I hope, make recommendations on which I can frame regulations to deal with the situation as a whole as early as possible.
    Mr. Marshall: Does the right hon. Gentleman contemplate that he will be able to deal with this important matter as early as the autumn of this year?
    Mr. Griffiths: I cannot give any definite promise because it has to go before the advisory committee, and I cannot commit them as to the time they may require to investigate the matter. But if I can have a satisfactory solution and a report from the committee at an early date, I can anticipate the appointed day provided for in the new Act, and bring in regulations before then.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Will the regulations which the right hon. Gentleman envisages extend to inshore fishermen in Scotland?
    Mr. Griffiths: I want to make the fullest inquiries into the position of these men in every part of the country. I am anxious to bring all these men within the scope of the Insurance Act.
    Brigadier Mackeson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these inquiries will be welcomed by all of us who represent inshore fishermen, and will he try to get this matter through before the autumn, as it is in the winter that there is unemployment?

    Fuel Emergency (Unemployment)
    Mr. Bossomasked the Minister of National Insurance what proposals he has to ease the financial difficulties inflicted on those not protected by the guaranteed week, due to the Government's restrictions on the use of electricity.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to Questions on this subject on 19th February. No doubt the hon. Member is aware of the easement of the waiting days requirement for unemployment benefit, which is already effective.
    Mr. Bossom: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that this is a lock-out due to Government action? Is it not most unjust that men should suffer because of this action?
    Mr. Griffiths: My duty is to make what provision I can within the Unemployment Insurance Act and to take immediate steps to bring about any improvements that can be brought about.
    Mr. Sparks: Is my right hon. Friend aware that a number of men over 65 have not accepted retirement benefit because they have continued work in industry, have been temporarily unemployed, and are not entitled to receive unemployment insurance benefit? Should they not be entitled to receive benefit for that period?
    Mr. Griffiths: Perhaps my hon. Friend will put that Question on the Paper, but I would remind the House that men over 65, and women over 60, are outside the provisions of the Unemployment Insurance Act.
    Mr. Bossom: This is a grave injustice. Surely the right hon. Gentleman does not intend to inflict an injustice on these people?
    Mr. Griffiths: This Government, in 18 months, have done more for the unemployed than any Conservative Government.

    Statutory Order (Interpretation)
    Sir John Mellorasked the Minister of National Insurance, if, with reference to the expression "all other powers enabling him" contained in S.R. & O., 1947, No. 154, he will identify the powers.
    Mr. J. Griffiths: The other powers which were particularly in mind were those conferred by Section 75 (1) of the National Insurance Act, 1946, and Section 32 (3) of the Interpretation Act, 1889.
    Sir J. Mellor: Will the right hon. Gentleman say why this was not stated in the Order?
    Mr. Griffiths: I have answered the Question, and if the hon. Member wants any other information perhaps he will put another Question on the Order Paper.
    Sir J. Mellor: But surely it is reasonable to ask why the powers were not identified in the terms of the Order?

  EMPLOYMENT

    Italians
    Mr. William Shepherdasked the Minister of Labour if he is now prepared to grant permits to Italians to undertake agricultural and mining work, where they desire to return to this country for the purpose of marrying English women.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Ness Edwards): Subject to the usual safeguards, sympathetic consideration will be given to individual cases.
    Mr. Shepherd: Does the hon. Gentleman's answer indicate a change of policy? Are we to take it that, henceforth, cases can be submitted with a reasonable prospect of success?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: I do not think that I can do more than reiterate what I have said in the answer. Sympathetic consideration will be given to individual cases, and in that sense it represents a widening of the door.
    Mr. Marples: Is the hon. Gentleman aware of a case which I recently sent to
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    him, of an English girl who had a child by an Italian, that the Italian wished to return to this country to work as an agricultural labourer, and to marry the girl, but was not given permission by his Department?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: I should be obliged if the hon. Gentleman would refer that case to my Department again.

    Coal Mining (Poles)
    Mr. Osborneasked the Minister of Labour if the 15,000 Poles to be employed in the mines during 1947 is the maximum the mines could absorb; and what are the other restricting factors.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: There is no limit of 15,000 on the number of Poles to be employed in the mines. The main limiting factor seems likely to be the rate at which the Poles themselves accept this employment. The rate at which they can be trained and the rate at which they can be absorbed into the mining labour force will, it is intended, be adequate to deal with all available applicants.
    Mr. Osborne: Can my hon. Friend say how many Poles will be absorbed during the current year?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: That will depend on the rate of recruitment, and the signs of willingness on the part of the Poles to go into this employment.

    Displaced Persons
    Sir Arthur Salterasked the Minister of Labour if he will now make a further statement as to the employment of displaced persons in this country.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: My right hon. Friend proposes to make a statement on this subject in the Debate on the Economic Survey next week.

    Employers' Discrimination
    Mr. Prittasked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that a trade dispute is likely to arise from the action of a large manufacturing company in the London area, whose name has been given to him, in preparing a list of men to be re-employed when work is resumed, from which list it has omitted the names of three men prominent in shop steward and trade union activities in its factory; and what steps he will take in the matter.
    The Minister of Labour (Mr. Isaacs): Discrimination on the grounds suggested on the part of any employer is to be deprecated, and I feel confident that this view will command the support of employers generally. If, however, discrimination should be exercised against any individual worker, his appropriate action is to take the matter up with his trade union.
    Mr. Austin: Is my right hon. Friend aware that such discrimination is already being exercised in the case of the firm of L. Gardner Eccles, where employees have been victimised; and in view of the danger of a widespread stoppage of many thousands in Trafford Park, will he look into this matter?
    Mr. Isaacs: I have looked into this particular matter, and I am afraid that there are instances of discrimination. I raised this matter with the representative employers last week and they made use of almost the same terms as I have, that they would deprecate any such actions. I also raised the matter with the trade unions, and they said that if any member had a case of that sort, and it was reported to them, they would promptly take the matter in hand.
    Mr. Beswick: Can the Minister say whether he has investigated the matters specifically referred to in the Question, and whether there is any evidence of discrimination when the time comes to re-employ these men?
    Mr. Isaacs: So far as this case is concerned, I have made inquiries, but the replies which I have received are not satisfactory at the moment, and I am pursuing this matter
    Sir W. Smithers: Will not employers take advantage of this opportunity to get rid of agitators?
    Mr. Isaacs: Yes, Sir; but it they take the opportunity of getting rid of the men they do not like, they must not object if the men do not like going back to them.
    Mr. Frank Byers: Is it not the case that progressive opinion in this country strongly deprecates this type of victimisation?
    Mr. Isaacs: That was the answer which the employers gave.
    Mr. Sparks: In cases where workpeople are victimised, will my right hon. Friend
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    give directions to the local labour exchange that no further labour should be directed to those firms?
    Mr. Isaacs: I would urge on hon. Members on both sides of the House that, if they would allow the trade unions to do their job, this would be easily decided.

    Hebrides
    Mr. Malcolm MacMillanasked the Minister of Labour the number of registered male unemployed at the Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, exchange; what percentage this represents of the male insurable total in this area; if he will give an estimate of the figures for the Southern Islands of the Outer Hebrides; and what progress has been made with public works and other schemes as a short-term measure to met the problem.
    Mr. Isaacs: At 22nd February there were 2,054 insured males registered as unemployed at the Stornoway employment exchange, this represents about 48 per cent. of the estimated total number of insured males in the area at July, 1946. I regret that information is not readily available as to the numbers unemployed in the Southern Islands of the Outer Hebrides.
    As regards the last part of the Question, I understand that road works, involving an expenditure of approximately £105,000 in Lewis and Harris, have been approved, and that further road works to an estimated value of £344,000 are being examined. Offers of grants in respect of water supply schemes to a value of £250,000 in Harris and the Outer Isles and £250,000 in Lewis have been made to the local authorities concerned.
    Mr. MacMillan: Is the Minister aware that there is no complaint about the Government's figures or the financial grants? My complaint is of the time lag between the approval and making of grants and the undertaking of the work, which is a very long time, during which many of these men are unemployed. Can my right hon. Friend speed up the position by consultation with Ministers of other Departments so that these men can get to work on those schemes?
    Mr. Isaacs: It is not for me to answer about the starting of work. This matter is having constant attention by the Ministers concerned, and if my hon. Friend

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    will put the question to the appropriate Minister I think that he will be able to explain why these delays have occurred.

    Elderly Persons
    Mr. Swinglerasked the Minister of Labour if he will give an estimate of the expected addition to the labour force in 1947 in response to the Government's appeal in Cmd. 7046 for the continuance at work of men of retiring age.
    Mr. Isaacs: It is not possible to form an estimate. The number of men aged 65 and under 70 who would normally be expected to retire from work in 1947 is approximately 65,000, and it is hoped that a large proportion of these men will continue in employment.
    Mr. Piratin: Will the Minister encourage these men to stay at their work by not making any deductions from their retirement pay?
    Mr. Isaacs: I do not make any deductions from their pay.
    Mr. Piratin: But some of the right hon. Gentleman's colleagues do.
    Mr. Isaacs: I do not know that any deduction is made.
    Major Bruce: Could my right hon. Friend say whether he has been in touch with the First Lord of the Admiralty to ensure that men of retiring age, who wish to continue at work, may have the opportunity to continue their employment in the Royal Dockyards?
    Mr. Isaacs: If that is a question for the First Lord of the Admiralty, the hon. and gallant Member ought to put it down for him to answer.

    Dock Labour Scheme
    Mr. Solleyasked the Minister of Labour if the guarantees to port transport workers under the Dock Labour Scheme to be introduced on 1st July, 1947, will be on a straightforward basis and not on a four-week spread over.
    Mr. Isaacs: Perhaps my hon. Friend will examine the provision on this point included in the draft scheme which, with the draft Order, will be available in the Library this afternoon.

  NATIONAL SERVICE

    Personal Case
    Mr. Boyd-Carpenterasked the Minister of Labour whether he will reconsider the decision to call up Mr. R. R. Hall, 26, Park Road West, Kingston-upon-Thames, before the conclusion of his period of apprenticeship as a dental mechanic.
    Mr. Isaacs: In view of his age, Mr. Hall is not eligible for deferment as an apprentice dental mechanic. Deferment on industrial grounds could only be granted to a man of his age and occupation if the work he was doing was regarded as vitally necessary for the civilian needs of the country. After consultation with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health, I am satisfied that this condition is not fulfilled in Mr. Hall's case. Mr. Hall applied for postponement of his call up on grounds of exceptional hardship, but his application was refused by the Military Service (Hardship) Committee and there are no grounds on which I can contest their decision.
    Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware, from the particulars which I sent him, that this is the case of a young man who requires nine months to complete a professional training, for which his parents have made great sacrifice; and if his rules do not deal with such cases, is it not abundantly clear that the sooner they are altered the better?
    Mr. Isaacs: The rules are those which have been operating all through the period of call up. As to the first part of the supplementary question, I have looked at the correspondence with great care. The hon. Gentleman has set out the case with great clarity, but this matter has been considered by the Hardship Tribunal, and I cannot see any grounds to interfere with their decision.
    Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: In view of the fact that the war is now over, surely these hardship considerations could be given greater weight?
    Mr. Isaacs: We have also to consider the hardship of the men who are still retained in the Forces.
    Mr. Henry Usborne: Is it not a fact that some alterations were made in the rule about 1st January, when it was announced that, under certain conditions, there

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    would be option for people between the ages of 18 and 21 to decide their particular time of call up? Is that not true, and will my right hon. Friend say what were the conditions?
    Mr. Isaacs: If the hon. Member will put his question down, I will let him have the conditions in detail; but they do not apply to this case.

    Coalminers
    Mr. Sidney Shephardasked the Minister of Labour how many coalminers have been conscripted into the Services during the last 12 months.
    Mr. Isaacs: No underground coal-miners have been called up since 1941 if their services have been required in the mines.
    Mr. Shephard: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman two questions? First, will the miners who are still in the Forces be offered Class B release now, and, second, is the practice of calling up coalminers for the Forces now to cease entirely?
    Mr. Isaacs: In reply to the first part, there is a Question on the Order Paper on that specific point, which I shall be answering later. In reply to the second part, we are not calling up coalminers in the present circumstances.

    Rate of Release
    Mr. Wyattasked the Minister of Labour the approximate age and service group for demobilisation that will haw been reached in each of the three services on 31st March, 1948, if the target of 1,087,000 men in the Forces announced in the White Paper on Defence of 14th February is reached; and what the maximum length of wartime service will be among those still not demobilised on 31st March, 1948.
    Brigadier Lowasked the Minister of Labour whether he is now in a position to announce the release programme up to 31st March, 1948.
    Mr, Isaacs: The rate of release from the Forces does not depend only on the reduction in their total strength. It depends to a large extent on the rate of intake both of men called up and of volunteers. It is not possible, therefore, at this stage to give the information asked for.
    Mr. Wyatt: Is my right hon. Friend aware that I have only asked him for an estimate? He must have a fair idea of how many people are likely to be called up. It should be perfectly simple to make the necessary calculations and to give an answer, because there are many people in the Services who want to know.
    Mr Isaacs: I do not know much about mathematics, but I do not think that I can make mathematical calculations on a guessed estimate. The real point is that we do not know how many men will volunteer, and the extent to which they volunteer will make a difference in the number which we can release. Until we know that, I cannot give any figures.
    Mr. Chetwynd: Will the Minister make it clear that it is still the policy of the Government that all people who served before 1st January this year will be released before the present conscripts are released from the Forces?
    Mr. Isaacs: I can only repeat the answer which has been given on several occasions—that that is the hope of the Government and that we will carry it out if possible.
    Brigadier Low: Will the Minister reconsider his answer, and if he cannot give a programme up to 31st March, which I admit is difficult, will he give it up to the last date for which he can foresee it? Does he not realise that if he cannot make these mathematical calculations, there are tens of thousands of members of the Forces concerned who can and do make these mathematical calculations, which often, result in great disappointment to themselves?
    Mr. Benn Levy: Will my right hon. Friend attempt to make an estimate on the basis of the present rates of volunteering for the Services, with the proviso that if the rate varies, his estimate will, of course, vary accordingly?
    Mr. Isaacs: We will give the figures to the end of this year as soon as it is possible to do so with accuracy. It would be wrong to make a guess as to what will happen after the end of this year, because that might only lead to disappointment.
    Mr. Swingler: Will my right hon. Friend give a definite assurance, rather than express a hope, that men called up before 1st January this year will be definitely released before those called up later?
    Mr. Isaacs: I understand that hope springs eternal in the human breast. I can only say that that is the intention of the Government. Untoward things may happen over which we have no control, but subject to that, it is the intention of the Government to keep that pledge.
    Mr. James Callaghan: Is it not possible to say, quite frankly, that in no circumstances will a conscript called up after 1st January be released before men called up before 1st January?
    Mr. Isaacs: I can only repeat that that is the intention of the Government.

    Call Up, 1946–8
    Mr. Swinglerasked the Minister of Labour the total number of men called up for military service during 1946; and the estimated numbers to be called up during 1947 and 1948, respectively.
    Mr. Isaacs: The number of men called up for military service in 1946 was 260,000. The estimated number to be called up in 1947 is 175,000 and according to present estimates, a similar number is likely to become available in 1948.
    Mr. Swingler: Will the Minister now state what possible factors would prevent men called up before 1st January being released before those called up after 1st January?
    Mr. Isaacs: I may carry a Biblical name, but I am not a prophet.

    Coalmining
    Mr. Douglas Jayasked the Minister of Labour whether he will restore the full option as existing before 1st January, 1947, for all men liable for call up for the Forces to volunteer for underground work in the coal industry; and whether he will give full publicity to the present arrangements.
    Mr. Isaacs: The new arrangements are more comprehensive than those hitherto operating. For the next five years a young man who is now registered or who registers in future for military service and goes into underground coalmining before he receives an enlistment notice in the normal course, will not be called up so long as he is satisfactorily employed in that work; but if he leaves that employment he will be regarded as available for call up if men of his age class
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    are being called up at that time. An announcement to this effect has already been issued to the Press, and the arrangement is being brought to the notice of all young men by means of a printed slip at the time of registration.
    Mr. Manningham-Buller: If a man is called up will he be able to count his service in the mines, for which he has opted, as service for the purpose of release?
    Mr. Isaacs: Not under this scheme.
    Mr. Symondsasked the Minister of Labour if he is prepared to offer immediate release from the Forces to men wishing to be trained as miners.
    Mr. Isaacs: No, Sir. It is not considered that out-of-turn release from the Forces would be justified in the case of inexperienced men solely on account of their expressed willingness to enter training for coalmining employment.
    Mr. Symonds: Is not this rather putting the cart before the horse? No miners no coal, no coal no industrial resources to keep an Armed Force going.
    Mr. Isaacs: But it is still felt that if men want to get out of the Army to go into coalmining many months must elapse before they can be of use and it would be better to let them finish their term in the Services and use other men in these ways.
    Mr. Mikardo: Why spend all these months training Poles as miners instead of Britons?
    Mr. Isaacs: Because we have to train someone, and we are training those who are immediately available.
    Mr. Marples: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that people volunteering to work in the mines who have gone to the labour exchanges have not received any acknowledgment for six or seven weeks?
    Mr. Isaacs: I should be grateful indeed if the hon. Gentleman would send me any examples of that. The recruiting officers of the Ministry of Fuel and Power and my own Ministry have been actively successful in these cases, and if the hon. Gentleman will give me an example of that I will take the matter up.
    Mr. Marples: I certainly will.
    Mr. S. Shephard: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the supplementary question which I put to him on Question 18—have Class B releases been offered to the underground miners still in the Forces?
    Mr. Isaacs: I understood that my answer covered it, but I realise now that it did not. All miners in the Forces have been offered release, whether Class A or B, but some of them have decided not to take advantage of it.
    Mr. Shephard: Underground or surface?
    Mr. Isaacs: Underground and surface.

  SCOTLAND

    Rural Water Supplies
    Mr. MacLeodasked the Secretary of State for Scotland why he invited local authorities to phase their regional schemes for rural water supplies and to put their smaller schemes in order of priority, in view of the fact that he is not going to accept their recommendations.
    The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Westwood): Local authorities were asked to divide their regional schemes for water supplies into sections and to classify their smaller schemes in order of priority so that I might have their views when making a selection of schemes or sections of schemes to be considered in detail for purposes of grant under the Rural Water Supplies and Sewerage Act, 1944. In making that selection, I have given the fullest consideration to views of the local authorities concerned and have been able to accept them save in one or two exceptional cases.
    Mr. MacLeod: On what grounds does the right hon. Gentleman base these selections, because in my constituency the county council would not select them in the way they have been selected?
    Mr. Westwood: It would take rather a long time at Question time to deal with that, but I am willing to discuss the matter which my hon. Friend has in mind after Questions.

    Agricultural Tractors
    Mr. Snaddenasked the Secretary of State for Scotland how many tractor-binders and Fordson tractors have been
    232
    allocated to Scotland for the 1947 harvest.
    Mr. Westwood: 138 imported tractor binders have been allocated to Scotland for the 1947 harvest. There is no allocation system for the distribution of home-produced binders but I am informed that the manufacturers hope to meet all Scottish orders on hand for tractor binders for this year's harvest. In addition, although production is restricted, the Ford Motor Company expect to deliver 500 Fordson tractors to Scotland between 1st March and mid-August against orders approved by agricultural executive committees.
    Mr. Snadden: Is the Secretary of State aware that tractor allocation is completely inadequate in my own area, for, whereas 60 have been applied for, only 10 have been allocated, which is quite impossible?
    Mr. Osborne: Can the Minister state whether Scotland is getting more than her fair share compared with England?
    Mr. Westwood: That is not the Question on the Order Paper.

    Hill Farming Grants
    Mr. Snaddenasked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he is aware that applicants for improvement grants under the Hill Farming Act, 1946, cannot yet obtain the necessary form of application; and what steps he proposes to take to make these available.
    Mr. Westwood: I expect that the first supplies of the necessary forms and explanatory matter relating to these grants will be ready for distribution by the end of this week.

    Shops (Security of Tenure)
    Mr. Carmichaelasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is aware that small shopkeepers in Glasgow are still being threatened with eviction from their premises if they will not purchase at a high value; and, in view of the fact that such evictions will create a serious situation for their registered customers, he will immediately, particularly in cases where foodstuffs are concerned, requisition the premises.
    Mr. Westwood: I have had a number of complaints about insecurity of tenure of shopkeepers in Glasgow and I am considering the question of an inquiry into

    233
    the subject of shop tenancies. The exercise of requisitioning powers for the maintenance of food supplies is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Food to whose notice I have brought the hon. Member's representations.
    Mr. McKinlay: Is the Minister aware that the Coal Board are now joining the happy throng and evicting people from their houses?
    Mr. Carmichael: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the very urgent question of food which is involved? Since the tenants are being advised to vacate premises by the second week in May, does he not agree that at this late date it is time something was done, because it is not merely a question of occupying shops, but it affects the inability of thousands of people to get their regular food supplies if the shops are vacated and no new registration arrangements are made to meet the situation? Can I have an assurance that in his consultations with the Minister of Food some report will be submitted at a very early date?
    Mr. Westwood: As I have already indicated I have taken all the immediate steps that were open to me to deal with the food side of the question referred to by the hon. Gentleman in his supplementary question.
    Mr. Willis: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this is happening not simply in Glasgow but all over Scotland, and will he press on with the inquiry in order to get something done?
    Mr. Westwood: I will certainly press on with the setting up of the committee necessary to carry out the inquiry.
    Mr. Rankin: Will the Secretary of State keep before him the peculiar position of shopkeepers whose living premises are at the back part of their shops?
    Mr. Westwood: All these points will be considered.

    Rossie Farm School
    Mr. Rankinasked the Secretary of State for Scotland the reasons for the dismissal of Mr. W. S. Low from his position as headmaster of Rossie Farm Approved School, Angus; if he is satisfied with the conditions under which the school is being administered; and if he is aware that the staff is inadequately
    234
    trained for carrying out the work of this large approved school.
    Mr. Westwood: Following an examination of conditions at Rossie Farm School by a sub-committee of the managers, the latter asked the Scottish Education Department to carry out an independent investigation before a decision was taken on a recommendation by the sub-committee that Mr. Low should be dismissed. This inquiry was undertaken by His Majesty's Senior Chief Inspector of Schools, and in the light of his report the managers decided to implement the recommendation. The difficulty of strengthening staff and improving training facilities in present circumstances is appreciated but the managers were satisfied that in addition to such other action as may be practicable to meet these difficulties a change in the headmastership was essential to the efficient conduct of the school.
    Mr. Rankin: Would the Secretary of State say whether or not Mr. Low was invited to give evidence before this commission?
    Mr. Westwood: I cannot answer that question without notice.
    Mr. Gallacher: Has not this man been mistaken for the Low the Tories are after?

    Rural Housing
    Colonel J. R. H. Hutchisonasked the Secretary of State for Scotland when it is proposed to introduce legislation to give effect to the recommendations of the Central Housing Advisory Committee in respect of rural housing in Scotland.
    The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Buchanan): The report of the Central Housing Advisory Committee on rural housing is applicable to England and Wales only. The report by the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee on the modernisation of houses in both urban and rural areas in Scotland is in the Press, and I will make a statement when it is published, which I hope will be possible in April.

  SERVICE PENSIONS (WIDOWS' CHILDREN)
  Mr. Championasked the Minister of Pensions if he is aware of the hardship caused to widows of men whose death

  235
  resulted from war service if they have physically infirm children who are incapable of earning their living, who have reached the age of 21 years and, as a result, are not eligible for an allowance; and if he will amend the provisions governing such awards in such a way as to enable widows to maintain these children without having to seek public assistance.
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions (Mr. Blenkinsop): The arrangements made after the 1914–18 war enabled an allowance to be granted to the widow of an ex-Serviceman in respect of a child up to but not beyond the age of 21. After that age it was held that the person concerned should be dealt with under any appropriate social service provision. I am afraid that having regard to the long lapse of time there would be insuperable difficulties in now reviewing these arrangements.
  Mr. Champion: Is the Minister aware that the number of cases is so small and the cost to the Exchequer so slight that it would be justifiable to look at them again having regard to the fact that it presses hardly on widows who have this type of child?
  Mr. Blenkinsop: I am conscious of the difficulties in these cases but we have no knowledge of the number that might be involved. It is a matter which ought clearly to have been dealt with at the end of the last war when the cases arose.
  Mr. George Wallace: Is the Minister aware that this is not the only type of case causing hardship and that I have a constituent aged 68 with a mentally defective child of 42, and since this does give an instance of unexampled mother-love does he not agree that these cases deserve the sympathy and interest of the country?

  FUEL EMERGENCY (U.S. COAL)
  Mr. Walter Fletcherasked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the risk that the Government's coal target for 1947 of 200,000,000 tons will not be obtained, he will consider, with a view to early action, schemes for borrowing an emergency coal stock to be repaid in later
  236
  years in coal, not cash, from the U.S.A., who have already shown their practical sympathy, with this country in their recent offer of coal shipments.
  The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): I have nothing to add to the reply which I gave to the hon. Member for East Surrey (Mr. Astor) on 18th February.
  Mr. Fletcher: May I ask the Prime Minister two questions; first, since during the coal Debate the chief spokesman for the Government continually asked for constructive suggestions to be made, does he not consider this cold—almost icy—shouldering of a constructive suggestion very reprehensible; second, is not any scheme, the essence of which is the obtaining of coal without coming down on the dollar fund, to be considered, and is he so certain of achieving his target that he can afford to put it aside?
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Member is quite mistaken in thinking there is any icy cold shouldering. The matter has been given very great consideration, and if he will study my reply he will see that we did not consider that we were justified in attempting to divert supplies of coal from America which were going to other European countries which need coal as much as we do.
  Earl Winterton: Since we import many things from America which we need much less than coal, what is behind the Government's refusal? Are they afraid of letting it become known that we are not quite so dependent on the miners as some hon. Members opposite seem to think?
  The Prime Minister: If the noble Lord had listened to my reply he would have seen that the reason was quite obvious. This is not the only country in the world suffering severely from a coal shortage. I pointed out that we were not justified in diverting coal which was going from the United States to countries in Europe which were quite as hard hit as we are.
  Mr. Fletcher: May I ask the Prime Minister if he has not misunderstood the essence of this question, since there is no connection at all between borrowing coal and diverting it from the rest of Europe, and the scheme which I have suggested is one to borrow coal and to repay it in coal later on?
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman must realise that however he phrases it it is a demand on the available coal.
  Mr. Godfrey Nicholson: Has not the whole thing been worked out in figures, and do we know exactly what America's surplus exports to countries in Europe are? Are they rationed, is there a system of priorities, and so on?
  The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman must have heard many questions concerning the European Coal Organisation which arranges supplies for the countries in Europe.
  Mr. De la Bère: It is that to which we object.
  Mr. James Hudson: As the coal would have been diverted from places where it is very badly needed will the right hon. Gentleman take into account the fact that there was very great satisfaction expressed in the country at the action he took?
  Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Will the right hon. Gentleman make a direct approach to the United States to find out whether they will send coal not only to the impoverished countries of Europe but to us as well?
  Mr. Gallacher: Then we will give the noble Lord in exchange.
  The Prime Minister: These matters are very fully considered by an organisation to which the hon. Gentleman below the Gangway objects, but which we think is a useful one for getting the coal to the areas which need it most.
  Mr. Fletcher: I beg to give notice that in view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment at the earliest opportunity.

  NATIONAL FINANCE

    Fuel Emergency (Effect)
    Mr. Osborneasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what are the estimated repayments of Pay As You Earn to date, due to the industrial stoppage through the coal and electricity crisis.
    Mr. Osborne: Has the Chancellor no powers of estimating, or, if he has not,
    The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Dalton): It is too early to say.
    238
    has he no civil servants who can do it for him?
    Mr. Dalton: It is too early to say because in most cases the employers are themselves handling this matter, and I thank them for their co-operation. I am not going to burden them with a lot of inquiries as to what will happen. It is too early now, but later on a statement can be made.
    Mr. Osborneasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the estimated net loss of national income due to the coal crisis and electricity cuts to industry.
    Mr. Dalton: This figure will be reflected in the Statement of National Income and Expenditure which will be published next year.
    Mr. Osborne: By 1948 lots of things may have happened. Does the Chancellor realise that in the White Paper he recently published he said that £7 thousand million of income was chasing £6 thousand million of goods, and cannot we know how much is being lost?
    Mr. Dalton: Clearly it is quite impossible to give those figures at the present. We must see how recent events affect the course of trade and employment in the months that are to come. It is quite impossible at the moment. I have every desire to give more information as soon as I reasonably can, but, as in the case of the previous Question, the hon. Member is really in advance of events. We cannot say yet.
    Mr. Oliver Stanley: But 1948 is a very long time away. Surely the right hon. Gentleman will be in a position before then to make an estimate of the effect of this on the national income for the next year? How can we discuss the Budget without that?
    Mr. Dalton: We will have a try, but I say that we will certainly be in a position not merely to give an estimate but to make a definite statement as to the effect at the time that I indicated to the hon. Member. Before that we may be in a position to give an estimate, but not yet.
    Mr. Nicholson: Would the right hon. Gentleman consider publishing a document to be known as "20 months of Labour misrule"?
    Major Bruce: Will the right hon. Gentleman resist the temptation to increase the number of civil servants which would be required in order to provide the information asked for by hon. Members opposite?
    Mr. Churchill: Are we right in assuming that in the near future—either at the time of the Budget or before it—the right hon. Gentleman will endeavour to give us some idea of the definite changes which have been wrought in our situation by the recent stoppage?
    Mr. Dalton: Yes, Sir. I have no desire to conceal anything from the House. I am only anxious to distinguish between an estimate and a firm statement of the effects of events which have taken place. It is a matter on which, as I indicated to the hon. Member in reply to his first Question, I shall be at the disposal of the House from time to time in the Budget Debate and at other times to give the best estimates as events develop.
    Mr. Osborne: May I ask, as it was my Question, if the right hon. Gentleman is aware that if the country really knew how much had been lost, the right hon. Gentleman could then make an appeal to the employers and the workers to make it up?

    Sterling Balances
    Mr. W. Shepherdasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what extent in 1946 goods were supplied against sterling balances which accrued from other than current transactions.
    Mr. Dalton: I would refer the hon. Member to my reply to the hon. Member for East Aberdeen (Mr. Boothby) last Tuesday.
    Mr. Shepherd—
    Mr. Churchill—
    Mr. Speaker: The Front Bench must not gatecrash on a back bencher. Mr. Shepherd.
    Mr. Churchill: I rise—[Interruption]—to a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. With very great respect, I would like to submit to you that I had no idea that the hon. Member who asked the Question was rising in his place—[HON. MEMBERS: "Look round."] May I also submit to you, Sir, that your application of the
    240
    word "gatecrash" is wholly unwarranted?
    Mr. Speaker: It is always my custom that when an hon. Member asks a Question he is entitled to the first supplementary, and if a Member on the Front bench wants to get up, surely he can look round to see if the hon. Member who put the Question has risen. Personally, I do not see, if the right hon. Gentleman does not look round, what the difference is between that and gatecrashing.
    Mr. Churchill: With great respect, Mr. Speaker, as you have gone out of your way to inflict this censure on me, may I— [Interruption]—to inflict this censure on me in terms of unusual Parliamentary language—"gatecrash" is a slang expression—[Interruption]—may I place on record, as a very old Member of this House, my regret that you should have thought it necessary to take such action?
    Mr. Speaker: If the right hon. Gentleman takes offence at the expression "gatecrash," I am very sorry, but I thought it explained exactly what I meant.
    Hon. Members: Hear, hear.
    Mr. Churchill: It is not your cheer.
    Earl Winterton: You got a cheer from Mrs. Braddock.
    Mrs. Braddock: Is it in Order, Mr. Speaker, for the noble old man opposite—[Interruption.]
    Mr. W. Fletcher—
    Hon. Members: Order.
    Mrs. Braddock: —to make reference to myself by my own name instead of as the hon. Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool?
    Mr. Speaker: I did not hear a thing, as a matter of fact. I do not know what the noble Lord said.
    Earl Winterton: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker, may I—
    Mr. Gallacher: He is always being offensive.
    Mr. Kirkwood: He is the rudest man in the House.
    Earl Winterton: I am delighted to hear that the hon. Member thinks so. On a point of Order, Sir, may I—[Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members should let the noble Lord say what he wants to say.
    Earl Winterton: May I say that I apologise to you, Sir, for having inadvertently used the hon. Lady's name when I should have referred to her by her constituency? I am very much ashamed of having used such a name.
    Mr. Churchill: If I am not gatecrashing now—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—perhaps I may be permitted to ask a supplementary question—
    Mr. Kirkwood: If you behave yourself.
    Mr. Churchill: The supplementary question which I wished to ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer was about the 1946 goods supplied against sterling balances which accrued from other than current transactions. I was going to ask whether in the total statement of exports from this country, there was account taken of the fact that a large proportion of the exports of this country are merely the payment off of sterling balances which
    242
    bring in no reciprocal contribution to the wage fund?
    Mr. Dalton: There is, of course, such an element, as the right hon. Gentleman indicates, contained in the export trade. It is not, I am glad to say, at present very large, and I hope that as a consequence of the negotiations which we have embarked upon, and which we have in mind to continue, it can be kept well within bounds.
    Mr. Driberg: Mr. Speaker, is it not clear from the events of last night and this afternoon that the party opposite—
    Hon. Members: Sit down.
    Mr. Speaker—
    Hon. Members: Order.
    Mr. Speaker: If I am on my feet, everybody else should remain silent. I do not think the last supplementary question had anything to do with the Question on the Order Paper.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Motion made, and Question put,
"That the Proceedings on Government Business be exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House)."—[Mr. Arthur Greenwood.]
The House proceeded to a Division.
Mr. De la Bère (Evesham) (seated and covered): On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. Owing to the intervention of senior Members on the Front Bench, my Questions 50 and 51, which were almost on the very brink of being taken, were not able to be taken. May I have your permission to postpone them to an appro-
priate date next week in view of their great importance? I could not get round to the Table because I thought that at any moment you would call me; in fact, I think once you did but, in the noise, no one could hear.
Mr. Speaker: I quite agree. I think there were some rather exceptional circumstances. I was going to call the hon. Member, and therefore I will allow those Questions to be postponed.
Mr. De la Bère: May I extend to you my hearty thanks, Mr. Speaker?
The House divided: Ayes, 283; Noes, 129.

Division No. 101.]

AYES

[3.31 p.m

Adams, Richard (Balham)

Daggar, G.

Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)

Adams, W. T. (Hammersmith, South)

Daines, P.

Herbison, Miss M.

Allighan, Garry

Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.

Hicks, G.

Alpass, J. H.

Davies, Harold (Leek)

Holman, P

Anderson, A. (Motherwell)

Davies, Hadyn (St. Pancras, S. W.)

House, G.

Anderson, F. (Whitehaven)

Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

Hoy, J

Attewell, H. C.

Deer, G.

Hubbard, T.

Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.

Delargy, H. J.

Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, W.)

Austin, H. Lewis

Diamond, J.

Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

Awbery, S. S.

Dobbie, W.

Hughes, H. D. (W'Iverh'pton, W.)

Ayles, W. H.

Dodds, N. N.

Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)

Ayrton Gould, Mrs. B

Driberg, T. E. N.

Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.

Bacon, Miss A.

Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)

Janner, B

Balfour, A.

Dumpleton, C. W.

Jay, D. P. T.

Barstow, P. G

Dye, S

Jeger, G (Winchester)

Barton, C.

Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

Jones, D. T. (Hartlepools)

Battley, J. R.

Edelman, M.

Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)

Bechervaise, A. E.

Edwards, A. (Middlesbrough, E.)

Jones, J. H. (Bolton)

Belcher, J. W.

Edwarcs, N. (Caerphilly)

Keenan, W.

Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J

Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

Kendall, W. D.

Benson, G.

Evans, E. (Lowestoft)

Kenyon, C

Berry, H.

Evans, John (Ogmore)

King, E. M.

Beswick, F.

Ewart, R.

Kinghorn, Sqn.-Ldr. E.

Bing, G. H. C.

Fairhurst, F.

Kinley, J.

Binns, J.

Farthing, W. J

Kirby, B. V.

Blenkinsop, A.

Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)

Kirkwood, D

Blyton, W. R.

Follick, M.

Lang, G.

Boardman, H.

Forman, J. C.

Lee, F. (Hulme)

Bottomley, A. G.

Freeman, Maj. J. (Watford)

Leslie, J. R.

Bowden, Flg.-Offr. H. W.

Freeman, Peter (Newport)

Lever, N. H.

Bowles, F. G. (Nuneaton)

Gallacher, W.

Levy, B. W.

Braddook, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl, Exch'ge)

Ganley, Mrs. C. S.

Lewis, T. (Southampton)

Brook, D. (Halifax)

George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)

Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.

Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)

Gibbins, J.

Logan, D. G.

Brown, George (Belper)

Gibson, C. W

Longden, F.

Brown, T. J. (Ince)

Gilzean, A.

Lyne, A. W.

Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.

Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

McAdam, W

Buchanan, G.

Gordon-Walker, P. C.

McGhee, H. G.

Burden, T. W

Granville, E. (Eye)

Mack, J. D

Byers, Frank

Greenwood, Rt. Hon. A. (Wakefield)

McKay, J. (Wallsend)

Callaghan, James

Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)

McKinlay, A. S.

Carmichael, James

Grenfell, D. R.

Maclean, N. (Govan)

Castle, Mrs. B. A.

Grey, C. F.

McLeavy, F.

Champion, A. J.

Grierson, E.

MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)

Chetwynd, G. R.

Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

Macpherson, T. (Romford)

Cobb, F. A.

Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

Mann, Mrs. J.

Cocks, F. S.

Gunter, R. J.

Manning, C. (Camberwell, N.)

Collick, P.

Guy, W H.

Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)

Collindridge, F.

Haire, John E. (Wyeombe)

Marquand, H. A

Collins, V. J.

Hale, Leslie

Mathers, G.

Colman, Miss G. M

Hall, W. G.

Medland, H. M.

Comyns, Dr. L.

Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R

Mikardo, Ian.

Cook, T. F.

Hardman, D. R.

Montague, F.

Cooper, Wing-Cmdr. G.

Hardy, E. A.

Moody, A. S.

Corlett, Dr. J.

Harrison, J.

Morris, Lt.-Col. H. (Sheffield, C.)

Corvedale, Viscount

Hastings, Dr. Somerville

Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)

Cove, W. G.

Haworth, J.

Moyle, A.

Crawley, A.

Henderson, A. (Kingswinford)

Mulvey, A.

Murray, J. D.

Ross, William (Kilmarnoek)

Usborne,-Henry

Nally, W.

Royle, C.

Vernon, Maj. W. F

Naylor, T. E.

Segal, Dr. S.

Viant, S. P.

Neal, H. (Claycross)

Sharp, Granville

Wadsworth, G.

Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)

Shawcross, Rt. Hn. Sir H. (St. Helens)

Walkden, E.

Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

Shurmer, P.

Wallace, G. D. (Chislehurst)

Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)

Silverman, J. (Erdington)

Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)

Noel-Buxton, Lady

Silverman, S. S (Nelson)

Warbey, W. N.

O'Brien, T.

Skeffington, A. M.

Watkins, T. E.

Oldfield, W. H.

Skeffington-Lodge, T C.

Watson, W. M.

Paget, R. T.

Skinnard, F. W

Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)

Paling, Rt. Hon. Wilfred (Wentworth)

Smith, Ellis (Stoke)

Wells, P. L. (Faversham)

Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)

Smith, H N. (Nottingham, S.)

Wells, W. T. (Walsall)

Parker, J.

Smith, S. H, (Hull, S.W.)

Westwood, Rt. Hon. J.

Parkin, B. T

Snow, Capt. J. W.

White, C. F. (Derbyshire, W.)

Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)

Solley, L. J.

White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

Pearson, A.

Sorensen, R. W

Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

Peart, Capt. T. F.

Sparks, J. A.

Wilkes, L.

Piratin, P.

Stamford, W.

Wilkins, W. A.

Poole, Major Cecil (Lichfield)

Stewart, Michael (Fulham, E.)

Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

Popplewell, E.

Stokes, R. R.

Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)

Porter, E. (Warrington)

Stubbs, A. E.

Williams, J. L. (Kelvingrove)

Porter, G. (Leeds)

Swingler, S.

Williams, W. R. (Heston)

Price, M. Philips

Symonds, A. L.

Willis, E.

Pritt, D. N.

Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)

Wills, Mrs. E. A

Proctor, W. T.

Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

Wilson, J. H.

Pursey, Cmdr. H

Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)

Wise, Major F.

Randall, H. E.

Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)

Woodburn, A

Ranger, J.

Thomas, I. O. (Wrekin)

Woods, G. S

Rankin, J.

Thomas, George (Cardiff)

Wyatt, W.

Reid, T. (Swindon)

Thomson, Rt Hn. G. R. (Ed'b'gh, E.)

Yates, V. F.

Rhodes, H

Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

Young, Sir R. (Newton)

Richards, R

Thurtle, E.

Younger, Hon. Kenneth

Ridealgh, Mrs. M.

Tiffany, S.

Robens, A

Timmons, J.

TELLERS FOR THE AYES

Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvenshire)

Titterington, M. F.

Mr. Simmonds and

Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)

Tolley, L.

Mr. Hannan

Rogers, G. H. R

Turner-Samuels, M.

NOES

Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.

Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)

Neven-Spence, Sir B

Aitken, Hon. Max

Hare, Hon. J. H. (Woodbridge)

Nicholson, G.

Amory, D. Heathcoat

Harris, H. Wilson

Noble, Comdr. A. H. P

Baldwin, A. E.

Harvey, Air-Comdre. A. V.

Nutting, Anthony

Barlow, Sir J.

Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C.

O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H

Baxter, A. B.

Herbert, Sir A. P.

Osborne, C

Beechman N. A

Hinchingbrooke, Viscount

Peto, Brig. C. H. M

Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)

Hollis, M. C.

Ponsonby, Col. C. E.

Boothby, R.

Howard, Hon. A.

Poole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)

Bossom, A. C

Hudson, Rt. Hon. R. S. (Southport)

Prescott, Stanley

Bower, N.

Hutchison, Col. J. R. (Glasgow, C.)

Raikes, H. V.

Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.

Jarvis, Sir J.

Rayner, Brig. R

Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W

Jeffreys, General Sir G.

Renton, D.

Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.

Jennings, R.

Robinson, Wing-Comdr. Roland

Bullock, Capt. M.

Keeling, E. H.

Ross, Sir R. D. (Londonderry)

Butcher, H. W

Kerr, Sir J. Graham

Sanderson, Sir F.

Carson, E.

Lambert, Hon. G.

Savory, Prof. D. L

Challen, C.

Lancaster, Col. C. G

Scott, Lord W.

Channon, H.

Langtord-Holt, J.

Shephard, S. (Newark)

Churchill, Rt. Hon. W. S.

Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.

Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)

Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.

Lindsay, M. (Solihull)

Smiles, Lt.-Col. Sir W

Cole, T. L.

Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)

Smithers, Sir W

Conant, Maj. R. J. E.

Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)

Snadden, W. M.

Corbett, Lieut.-Col. U. (Ludlow)

Low, Brig. A. R. W

Stanley, Rt. Hon. O.

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

Lucas, Major Sir J.

Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.

Crothwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E

Lucas-Tooth, Sir H.

Strauss, H. G. (English Universities)

Crowder, Capt. John E.

MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.

Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray)

Darling, Sir W. Y.

McCallum, Maj. D.

Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)

De la Bère, R.

Macdonals, Sir P (I of Wight)

Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A (P'dd't'n, S.)

Teeling, William

Dodds-Parker, A. D

McKie, J. H. (Galloway)

Thornton-Kemsley, C. N

Drayson, G. B.

Maclay, Hon. J. S.

Thorp, Lt.-Col. R. A. F

Duthie, W. S.

MacLeod, J.

Touche, G. C.

Eden, Rt. Hon. A.

Macpherson, Maj. N. (Dumfries)

Vane, W. M. F.

Elliot, Rt. Hon. Walter

Maitland, Comdr. J. W.

Walker-Smith, D

Erroll, F. J.

Manningham-Buller, R. E

Wheatley, Colonel M. J

Fleming, Sqn.-Ldr. E. L

Marlowe, A. A. H

Williams, C. (Torquay)

Fletcher, W. (Bury)

Marples, A. E.

Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)

Fox, Sir G.

Marsden, Capt. A.

Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl

Fraser, Maj. H. C. P. (Stone)

Marshall, D. (Bodmin)

York, C.

Gage, C.

Mellor, Sir J.

Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)

Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D.

Molson, A. H. E.

Gomme-Duncan, Col. A. G

Morris-Jones, Sir H.

TELLERS FOR THE NOES

Grant, Lady

Morrison, Maj. J. G. (Salisbury)

Mr. Studholme and

Grimston, R. V.

Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cireneester)

Major Ramsay.

Question put, and agreed to.

ORDERS OF THE DAY

  SUMMER TIME BILL
  Order for Second Reading read.
  3.44 p.m.
  The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Ede): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
  On 26th February, I made a statement to the House indicating that the Government desired to introduce this Bill which it considers necessary for dealing with the fuel situation during the present year, and for guarding against a similar position in the future. Summer time is regulated by the Summer Time Acts of 1922 to 1925, which lay down that a single hour of summer time shall operate from a date in the middle of April, to a date at the beginning of October. Soon after the war began, it was thought necessary to modify these dates in the interests of war production. Emergency powers for the purpose were taken under the Defence (Summer Time) Regulations. In 1941 further powers were taken which allowed the introduction of what came to be known as double summer time. The periods of single and double summer time varied from year to year during the war, according to the conditions prevailing from time to time. With the end of the war, these emergency powers were given up by the revocation of the Defence (Summer Time) Regulations, and we have no power under which we can renew those powers by regulation. For this reason, it is necessary to promote the present Bill.
  It was with very considerable reluctance that the Government decided to reopen this matter. It is true to say that in some urban centres double summer time was welcomed during the war period. But, in agricultural areas it was always resented, and even in urban areas a large number of people thought double summer time had a detrimental effect on the health of children, It was therefore, with some pleasure that I went to Scotland in the absence of my right hon. Friend, the Lord President of the Council, to take his place at a Privy Council held in Holyrood Castle, at which the wartime regulations were repealed, and, as I have shown from time to time in answer to Questions put to me in the House, I have never regretted
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  that in normal circumstances that step should have been taken. I was very careful in the statement I made not to emphasise the amount of fuel that will actually be saved by this arrangement, for the saving of fuel is so small in its absolute figures as to be fairly negligible. The best estimate I can give is that there will be a saving of some 120,000 tons of coal in respect of the generating stations, and 10,000 tons in respect of gas and domestic supplies, as far as the additional period of single summer time is concerned. The period of double summer time which we propose will enable an additional saving to be made of some 20,000 tons, making a total of 150,000 tons in all. It is therefore quite clear that if it were merely a question of the absolute saving of fuel, it would not be right to introduce this Bill. What I was very careful to point out was that the enactment of this Measure would enable us to make more effective use of the fuel which is available, and that is the ground on which I must rest my case.
  The problem that confronts industry is to spread the electricity load, particularly so as to enable the generating plant to cope with the demand for electrical power. We have to flatten out the peak so as to make quite sure that only on the rarest possible occasions will it go above the generating capacity of the country, until such time as the generating plant can be brought up in power to our reasonable maximum needs. If full resumption of work takes place on the basis of a month or six weeks ago, the result would simply be to overtax the power of the generating plant at a good many peak periods, and either supplies would have to be cut off entirely, or the voltage would have to be reduced. Neither of those is a desirable thing to happen in any effort to overtake the losses in production which have been sustained during the past few weeks. Until the new plant on order is installed and operating, the only method of obtaining the maximum production possible in the circumstances is to arrange the hours of working so that the load is kept continuously within the capacity of the generating plant. Therefore, it is for this purpose that the maximum use must be made, in industry, of our daylight hours. It is obviously in the interests of the health and efficiency of the workers that where, by arrangements between the industries in the different localities, work

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  can be spread over the daylight hours so as to relieve the load, this should be done. No greater contribution to assist industry towards that end can be made than by the institution of summer time and its extension to double summer time for as long periods as can be justified by the arguments which I have just used.
  It would be quite inadequate simply to provide that particular undertakings in an area should start say two hours earlier than normal. Transport must be provided, supplies must be delivered, restaurants and canteens must be open, and all the various services on which the workers in industry depend must be in full working order, if we are to get the maximum benefit out of any arrangements which industry can make for staggering daytime work. By the device we propose, all services automatically fall into line. For this reason this use of summer time will be an undoubted advantage, and will particularly assist industry in solving the difficult problems with which it is faced. It will facilitate the staggering of hours, and will render possible double day shift working wherever industry feels that such an arrangement will best meet the case. Without this extension of summer time, staggering of hours will be most difficult, and will place an unfair burden on the section of industry affected.
  Double summer time, as I said earlier, has been popular with townspeople in general, since it provides increased opportunities for recreation, and if we are asking people to carry on a sustained heavy industrial output at the maximum this aspect of the subject should not be lost sight of. From the point of view of agriculture the problem is exceedingly difficult. If single summer time begins much earlier in the year than the beginning of April, dairy work has to be done by artificial light, and after the dairy work is completed a gap is liable to occur before there is enough light to enable other work to be started. A prolongation of single summer time after the beginning of October increases the difficulty of harvesting some cereal crops, and particularly of dealing with potato crops and sugar beet crops, when work has to be done under conditions which are much wetter than are likely to obtain if the sun has been up for a longer period.
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  A period of double summer time also makes the farmer's work much more difficult, because of the gap after the time at which milking ceases, and, later in the year, because harvesting has to be held up until the dew is dry. These difficulties are weighty and formidable, and I ask the House to believe that the Government gave the fullest consideration to them before embarking on the course which they have felt obliged to pursue. I am exceedingly grateful—and I express the view of the whole of His Majesty's Government—for the way in which recognised leading agriculturists, while not abating their opposition, in ordinary times, to an enactment such as this, have faced the fact that in the industrial situation which confronts us, this Bill is inevitable if we are to afford industry the opportunity, during the next few months, of making up the leeway that has occurred owing to recent circumstances.
  I might say a few words about the structure of the Bill. We propose to take powers in this Bill whereby, in future years, it will be possible to bring into operation summer time and double summer time by Order, and thus avoid having to come annually to the House with a Bill. It is quite clear that the shortage of electrical generating plant cannot be made good this year or next year in its entirety. Until we can make good the shortage of electrical generating plant, it would be wrong to mislead people into imagining that if we enacted this Bill only for one year, we should not have to face similar circumstances in the future. By proceeding by Order we are able, each year, when we make the Order, to have regard to the circumstances of the year in which the Order will operate. I hope that as time goes on we shall be able to ask for a less drastic sacrifice on the part of the agricultural community than we are asking this year.
  I can assure the House that as far as my own personal predilections are concerned, I would be the last person to want to introduce summer time at all. In fact, I might even find myself in agreement, on personal grounds, in normal circumstances, with the New Clause which is on the Order Paper in the name of the Junior Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert). But we do not live in normal times. These circumstances which

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  we have to face, particularly the shortage of electrical generating plant, are hard facts which we must take into our consideration. It is upon that basis, and upon that basis alone, that I commend this Bill to the House.
  3.58 p.m.
  Captain Crookshank: We have listened to a careful description of the Bill from the right hon. Gentleman. I was looking forward to the argument that he would put before the House for this drastic Measure, because I was not quite certain what real reason he would produce for this Bill. I shall comment briefly on what he has had to say, but I would like to say this on behalf of my right hon. and hon. Friends, about the position we take up in regard to this Bill. The right hon. Gentleman has pointed out how grave the fuel position is. He has also pointed out that in actual saving of coal, this Bill will have negligible results, but that from the point of view of the staggering of daytime working and double day shift working—he gave us a rather technical description of what was involved—it was of great importance to have this Measure at this time of crisis. That is the whole issue—that this year is a year of crisis. Whose fault it is is another matter. We need not be acrimonious upon that subject this afternoon. Let us in this House accept the fact that, through one reason or another—good or bad management by the Government—we are in a position of really serious industrial difficulty. Therefore, it is up to the Government to make proposals, in so far as they can, to mitigate the position.
  This is the first of the proposals that they have made. For all I know, it may be the only one they are ever going to make. But it is the first, and it is brought before us as being due, in the words of the right hon. Gentleman, to the fuel position, and the need of guarding against a similar position in the future. In so far as it deals with the year 1947 and its difficulties, then as such, hon. Gentlemen on this side of the House will not oppose the Bill on its Second Reading. We recognise, as the right hon. Gentleman has recognised, that there is a lot to be said for and against an extension of summer time or double summer time. There is a lot to be said for the
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  point of view of the educationist. Like the right hon. Gentleman, I have had letters from people telling me the difficulties that may be involved there.
  There is, of course, the much greater interest of agriculture which comes in here. When the right hon. Gentleman made his announcement the other day, my right hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Eden) asked whether consultation had been taken with the appropriate agricultural interests, and the right hon. Gentleman answered that the Government
  "has been in touch with the agricultural community and with their appropriate representatives but my right hon. Friend"—
  that is the Minister of Agriculture—
  "assures me"—
  that is the Home Secretary—
  "that they recognise the national situation and in the circumstances of the times they do not press their protests."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th February, 1947; Vol. 433: c. 2084.]
  That, I must say, is a great contribution to aid the nation in its emergency. Let no one be under any misapprehension. The difficulties that this causes to the agricultural industry are immense, particularly when according to the dates which have been selected in the Bill summer time is to begin as early as 16th March, and is to last until 2nd November. No doubt some of my hon. Friends will explain in greater detail some of the difficulties, involved. I merely assert that the agricultural community by accepting this proposal through its representatives—whether it was the National Farmers Union or the Agricultural Workers Union with whom the Minister has been in touch—are making a great gesture of self-sacrifice in the interests of the nation, and that should be recognised on all sides. I do not know that I can put it in any better words than those which the National Farmers Union itself employed in this matter when they said:
  "Accordingly the Union feels that they have no alternative to acceptance of that decision and to asking their members, in spite of these added difficulties to do their utmost to minimize their effect upon production and to continue with unabated or even extra effort, the struggle to provide every ounce of food possible for the nation."
  That is the position, as I understand it, of the main agricultural interests. We can only be thankful that they should have put their own views aside on this occasion and not pressed their very

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  natural hostility to this Measure, but called upon all their members to rally round and do the best they could in the circumstances, looking upon it as an extreme measure to meet a great crisis. That is the present situation. The right hon. Gentleman just now said that the Bill was inevitable—I quote his own words—in order to give industry opportunity, in the next few months, to make up the lost ground. That is all right for 1947, but I very much abject, and so do my hon. Friends, to making this a permanent Act. I have no idea of how long the crisis is going to last. I imagine it will last, at least, as long as the lifetime of the present Government, but after all, the Minister of Fuel and Power, in one of his usual weekly prophecies when the trouble first started, did say on 7th February that he expected the trouble would not last longer than three or four days or, at the most, a week. That was the difficulty arising out of the shortfall of coal.
  One had hoped that the Government would be sufficiently optimistic to think that this particular emergency with regard to power could be dealt with within the next 12 months and that there would be no need for a permanent enactment. The right hon. Gentleman has, however, put before us some considerations to the effect that the shortage of generating plant is such that it cannot be made good this year or next year and, therefore, we must have a permanent Act. On the spur of the moment, without taking any advice on the subject, I am unable to comment on the question of whether new generating plant can or cannot be provided in a sufficient amount to deal with the situation next year. But that does not alter the argument which I would like the right hon. Gentleman to consider. He is taking power under the Bill to extend and alter summer time and double summer time in future by Order in Council. I think that if he will consult the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Agriculture, who is sitting beside him, he will find that the farmers agreed in the national interest not to carry their protest any further with regard to this Bill, but they did express the view that the machinery should be such that an affirmative Resolution procedure should be adopted and that it should be the business of the Government every year to see that this matter came before the
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  House. We have some Amendments on the Order Paper upon that point, and we propose to discuss them later.
  Apart from that, I should like to direct the attention of the right hon. Gentleman also to the proposition that if the Government have to have a Debate, as they may have to have a Debate every year, if they make this a permanent Act, they might just as well make it a 1947 Act and come next year, or the year after, and ask, as they are doing today, for a Bill to be passed. It does not really make much difference in the length of time, where the Government ask for all stages to be taken on the same day, as they are doing today because there is a crisis, or whether the Government have to have an Order of one kind or another. But it is a much greater safeguard to us all that it should be done by legislation. Therefore, I hope that before we finish with the Second Reading, the right hon. Gentleman can give us an indication whether he is liable to accept that position.
  I have nothing more to say except to sum up our point of view. We recognise—unfortunately we cannot help recognising—that we are in the middle of a great crisis. We feel that the Government are entitled, if they think it is going to help, to ask us all to assist in this respect. The agricultural industry, which is the industry most concerned, have taken that view. We do not take any contrary view, but we do say that this is requiring a great deal from the industry and, for that reason, we do not think they or the nation should be asked to give the Government these powers in perpetuity. We do not believe that this crisis will go on for ever. Why should we? Surely, we must have some hope left for the future, in spite of the terrible times through which we are living because of the maladministration of His Majesty's Government. Surely, we can hope, at least, that at some time in the 'fifties—or even in the 'sixties or 'seventies, if we live as long as that—we may get back to a state when we do not need to have double summer time because of the fuel crisis. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to accept our assistance in facilitating the Bill today for this year, but also to look kindly upon the Amendments which we shall propose later particularly those which seek to make this a Bill for 1947 only.
  4.10 p.m.
  Mr. Wilfrid Roberts: I was very interested in the first part of the Home Secretary's speech. There is a case, and I think a strong case, for summer time in present conditions. One cannot help wondering, though, whether the full effects on and the full cost to the agricultural industry are not sometimes minimised, not by the Minister of Agriculture, but by the Government as a whole. While it may be possible to get some sort of estimate of the value of summer time, in respect of convenience and the little saving in fuel and power which it might bring, it is almost impossible to estimate, on the debit side, the extent of the inconvenience and loss to agriculture, because it is spread over innumerable farms and it arises from that cumulative waste of time which summer time does mean in agricultural processes and from other difficulties which vary from place to place.
  Some agricultural workers who were willing during the war to work overtime are now less willing to do so. On some farms, crops will deteriorate in the summer for that reason, and it is very hard to evaluate exactly what that loss is. Nevertheless, it is a very definite loss, not only to the farming community, but to the country as a whole—a loss that could be measured, if we could get all the information, in hard cash—and one wonders whether the Government have fully realised that. It is especially a hardship in the north of England and in Scotland. I see an Amendment on the Order Paper proposing to leave out Scotland, but I suppose that is not practicable. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why not?"] I hope it is not practicable, because I feel that it would be an injustice to the part of the country from which I come. Perhaps that is not a good reason, but it would be inconvenient to change times on crossing the Border into Scotland.
  However, there is a very strong case on the ground that the inconvenience and loss caused in the North of England and Scotland are much greater than in the South, and, if we have a year, not as bad as last summer, but a fairly normal year, in the North of England, farmers may find, as they did last year, that they have only one week in which to get their hay, which is the basis of their production. They might find that if they did not get their hay during that week, it would be lost for that
  256
  year. The extra inconvenience and the slowing-down of the machine which summer time causes may seriously affect the efficiency and productivity of the farms. It is in the light of that situation that we support the views expressed by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank). I would, however, earnestly beg the Government, while admitting the necessity for summer time this year, not to make it a permanent institution. The Government may be able to foresee what will be necessary next year. In that case, they should let us have a day or a half day for a Debate on the subject, which will give an opportunity for proper consideration of the whole question at that time,
  If the Government feel that they cannot do that—and I do not think they will be as busy, legislatively, next summer as they are at present; I can hardly believe that that will be possible—there is another and very sound Amendment on the Order Paper, which they might accept, providing that this Bill should run for only two years. I suggest that the Government could give us the concession of agreeing to that Amendment, so that the matter might be discussed in 1949, when, according to the President of the Board of Trade, we may look forward to having increased generating power. A minor concession that might also be given, is that, instead of making this matter subject to the negative Resolution procedure, they might make it subject to the positive or affirmative Resolution procedure, which, while it does not allow of Amendment, would at least ensure a Debate. There is a series of concessions which the Government could make to the farming community along these lines.
  Personally, the concession I would prefer is that Clause 1 (2) should be left out, so that the matter would be fully debated next year. Under the procedure which the Government are now adopting, they may do one thing which is particularly detrimental to agriculture. I hope they are not going to do it, and I would like some information about it from whoever is to reply to the Debate. During the war, we had single summer time in winter. I see it is not the intention of the Government to have it next winter, but, who knows? By this time next year, they may be wanting one hour's summer time in

  257
  winter, and that is particularly burdensome to agriculture.
  There is one other question I would like to ask, and I am glad that the Minister of Agriculture is here. There is no doubt that this unexpected reintroduction of summer time is going to cost the farmer something. Is this an occasion for consideration of a review of prices? How does the Minister of Agriculture regard that? Undoubtedly, it is going to cost every farmer something, and it will cost the country as a whole something, and, if that is so, I do not know why that cost should be borne by agriculture. There are two basic industries which are fundamental to the life of the country at the present time. One is coal, and the other is agriculture. Coal is actually throwing some of the burden on to agriculture. I do not know why the agricultural community should carry that burden, and I therefore hope that the Government will give some concession. I would like the Minister of Agriculture to give us any estimate he can of what this is going to cost, and whether he thinks it would be right to reconsider prices as a result of this Bill; and I would also like to ask the right hon. Gentleman for an assurance that we are not going to have summer time as a permanent feature.
  4.19 p.m.
  Mr. Driberg: Personally, I have always been one of those foolish and illiterate people who can never remember whether to put the hands of the clock forward or backward at the beginning of summer time, or why. I do understand, nevertheless, what summer time, and still more double summer time, means to people living in, the country. Therefore, I want to assure my right hon. Friend that, although this Measure will he accepted as a necessity, so far as I can judge in my part of the country, it is, none the less, regretted most intensely. The attitude among my own constituents, so far as I have been able to take soundings in the last few days, since it was announced, has been that they will certainly accept it if it can be, not merely asserted, but proved to be necessary. It is not only the agricultural community, strictly so called, who are affected by it, but all dwellers in the countryside, and culturists in the countryside who are affected, but people who work at factories in the small country towns, and who live, perhaps, as much as eight or
  258
  many in towns also. It is not only agri-10 miles away from those towns, and have to go to and from them daily.
  This Measure is also rather unfortunate in its effect on schoolchildren. With the increasing tendency to urbanise rural schools, which I deplore—the tendency to transport children daily long distances to and from their schools in the nearest town—the question of summer time becomes a serious consideration. I had occasion recently to draw the attention of my right hon. Friend the Minister of Education to the case of a dozen or two children in my own constituency who attend a grammar school some 15 miles away, and who now have to leave their homes by 6.30 each morning in order to be at school by 9 o'clock. Under double summer time, they will have to leave their homes at what would normally be 4.30 each morning, and still be away for 12 hours daily. All these different classes of people in the countryside, young and old, are affected. Therefore, I feel that this House is right to treat this Bill, not as something quite perfunctory, but as something which has to be carefully considered before it is agreed to.
  I agree with the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) who spoke from the Opposition Front Bench, and with the hon. Member for Northern Cumberland (Mr. W. Roberts) who spoke from the Liberal benches, and who asked whether it need be made, even permissively, a permanent thing. I cannot believe that, by the end of 1948, at any rate, we shall not be better off as regards generating plant than we are at the present time. We have already heard from the Minister of Supply, and from the various other Ministers responsible, of the active steps that are being taken to procure more generating plant pretty quickly, not only from Army and American Army surplus supplies, but from other possible sources, including, I suppose, the slowing down of exports of generating plant. Surely, it is not too much, at any rate, for those of us in this House who represent rural constituencies, to ask that the matter should be allowed to run for two years, but that, after that, the Government should come to us again and say, if necessary, "We find that we still need this Measure." This is not a party matter; it is a matter which affects right hon. and hon. Members of all parties. Therefore, although I do not

  259
  think that any of us would oppose the Second Reading of this Bill, I, personally, shall feel strongly inclined to vote for the Amendment in the name of the hon. Member the Junior Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert) if he should chance to catch the eye of the Chairman during the Committee stage of the Bill.
  4.24 p.m.
  Mr. Baldwin: I wholly support the statements that have been made up to now in this Debate, but I want to register my protest on behalf of the agricultural community. When I say the "agricultural community" I mean, not only the farmers, but the farmworkers and their wives and children. In a discussion of this matter with one of my colleagues, the suggestion was made that I was pleading for a selfish minority. It is wrong to regard the agricultural community as a small minority. I believe it comprises probably three or four million people, men, women and children, and there are many other workers who have to get up early in the morning. If anybody doubts that fact, I suggest that he should get out into the streets of London at 7 o'clock in the morning, and see for himself the number of people going to work at that hour. What it means is that the agricultural workers and other workers, who have been looking forward to the time when they can get to their work in daylight, are going to be put back into the darkness. That, I think, is entirely unfair.
  The leaders of the industry have accepted this proposal in what they look upon as a time of crisis. I must say that, if the only saving achieved by this Measure is 150,000 tons of coal, I cannot see that it is worth while, because, in my opinion, a great deal of that saving will be offset by the extra cost which will be placed upon the agricultural industry by the payment of overtime, and the loss of crops which may result. We are dealing with this problem now because of the fuel crisis. It may well be that, at some future time, we shall be involved in a food crisis, and I believe that a step of this kind is one way of helping towards such a crisis. May I point out how it affects the farming industry? At the present time, we rely very largely on prisoner-of-war labour. Unless further regulations can
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  be brought into force, those prisoners of war will leave the farms at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, which means that they will actually be leaving at 3 o'clock ordinary time, just when the industry is getting into stride with the harvesting of its hay and corn. I ask hon. Members to consider what it means to a farmer who has a gang composed of two or three regular men, and two or three prisoners of war who have to leave the gang in the middle of the afternoon. The result is that the whole gang is upset, and the hauling is more or less disturbed. A considerable loss of hay and corn may result. I must say that the men are not fond of working overtime for a great number of hours, and the farmers will have to my a considerable sum for overtime.
  I appreciate the remarks of the Home Secretary about the way the leaders of the industry met him, and I hope that the Cabinet will convey to the Minister of Agriculture the suggestion that a vote of thanks should be returned to them for so doing, also that any increased costs placed on the industry because of the introduction of summer time will be reflected in increased prices for the crops. Personally, I have never been a believer in the number of hours saved by summer time. In my opinion, it is at this time of the year, and before summer time comes into force, that the hours of daylight are wasted. I wonder how many hon. Members and how many thousands of other people did not waste a few hours of daylight this morning. I think that the putting forward of the clock is a childish way of getting people out of bed, and of persuading them that the sun is rising at some time other than the natural time. If we have got to get up earlier in the morning, surely in order to do so, it is not necessary to alter the clock? We should leave it unaltered.
  I believe that summer time not only does a great injustice to the farming industry, but that it is extremely harmful to children. In March, mothers will be getting their children up an hour earlier to go to school. They will get used to that, but, when April comes, they will have to get them up another hour earlier. By the tune the children have got used to that, double summer time will have increased the hours of daylight to such an extent that mothers will have difficulty in getting their children to sleep during the hours of daylight. By the time they have got them used to it, they will have to put

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  the clock back in August and again in November—four changes of the clock in five months. There is another point; it will be harmful to the production of milk. I am sure it will affect milk production. Therefore, on behalf of the agricultural industry, I wish to register my protest against this Bill.
  4.31 p.m.
  Mr. Collins: The hon. Member for Leominster (Mr. Baldwin) has merely reiterated very dolefully what we who represent rural areas are well aware of, and what my right hon. Friend has already said, namely, that this change will be a great handicap to agriculture and people in rural areas. But I think a case has been made out for recognising that the change is unavoidable, and the farming community have accepted it because they are convinced that it is a national necessity. I would like to ask the Minister whether any consideration has been given to the assistance which the Government might give to the agricultural industry towards mitigating the effects of this change. We are all aware that cows do not watch the clock, and that an alteration in milking time, due to the alteration of the clock, will have a bad effect. But I can well remember when this change was first introduced in the first world war, that a number of old-fashioned farmers made their own arrangements. I am also aware that milk has to be ready to be collected at certain times. But I would like to know whether it is possible for the Government Departments concerned to consider ways and means of assisting the industry to adjust itself, in order that the consequences of this change can be materially lessened.
  Mention has been made of the employment of German prisoners of war and the fact that they must start work at a certain time, so that possibly an hour or two of the value of their work is lost. But is there any reason why they should not start an hour or even two hours later? Is it not possible for an arrangement of that kind to be made? Is it not possible, even in the case of school children, for hours to be altered say to the extent of one hour? For example, county education authorities have power to alter meal times so that during the present fuel crisis the meal times of school children who have their lunch at home, should be more in accord with the meal times of their
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  fathers, thus avoiding two lots of cooking. The times of markets, I suggest, could also be temporarily altered. Such alterations are made in other circumstances to meet emergencies. I see no reason why we should not take a commonsense attitude and say, "Well, the clock has been changed, and 8 o'clock now becomes 7 o'clock; instead of starting at 7 o'clock, we will start at 8 o'clock." With the cooperation of the Departments concerned, other matters could be adjusted accordingly. We know that some farm produce has to catch a train, milk being the predominant one, and, with the good will which exists and the common sense which one always finds in farming communities, and with the assistance of Government Departments I see no reason why a great deal could not be done in this matter.
  I am astonished that a practical farmer like the hon. Member for Leominster has thought fit to give us this dull account, every word of which may, be true, but without the slightest suggestion that it is possible, as indeed it is, to mitigate the effect. Therefore, I ask my right hon. Friend to say whether these points have been considered and, if not, whether he will give an assurance that they will be investigated so that the effects of this step, which we all regret, should be as limited as possible.
  4.35 p.m.
  Mr. Snadden: I do not think my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Mr. Baldwin) painted too gloomy a picture. One thing we are inclined to forget is that this proposal comes at a most extraordinary time. It is generally recognised that the demands made by the fuel crisis must rank first in priority over any other considerations. But there is no doubt that the re-imposition of double summer time—and, single summer time as well, of course—has come as a profound shock to the agricultural community at the worst possible time. It will certainly impose a very heavy burden, and possibly a crippling burden, on food production, particularly on dairy farmers. It comes at a time when the farmer's mind is full of anxiety and under very great strain as to what he is going to do about the 1947 food production programme. I have farmed all my life, and I do not ever remember a time when I felt less happy or had more anxiety as to how I could get

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  my crops into the ground in time than this year.
  The harvest of 1946, of unhappy memory, was possibly the worst which had been known for 50 years. Autumn cultivation, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, was held up; we did not get it properly done. Then we have had these very severe storms and intense frosts—the greatest for 55 years, I am told. That has completely dislocated cultivation, and in my part of the country the plough has not been at work for nearly two months. All over Great Britain thousands of acres are waiting for the thaw, and for the plough. Even if we had perfect weather today, and continuously for a fortnight or three weeks, there is nothing more certain than that the sowing time would be delayed at least a month and possibly six weeks. That means, first, lighter crops and, as the hon. Member for North Cumberland (Mr. Wilfrid Roberts) pointed out, it also means higher costs. On top of that, the fodder for our livestock is running out. In the hill districts farmers are faced with what may result in complete disaster. There are thousands of ewes all over our country, and in the hill areas of Scotland in particular, which may never see lambing at all. Even if the snow disappears, the ground is like stone. These ewes have reached a critical period of the year when lambs are about to arrive, and there is nothing for the ewes to eat.
  In addition, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, the farming industry faces a shortage of machinery, feeding stuffs and labour. Even the production of fertilisers has been held up because of the fuel crisis, and farmers are told that if they have not got them already they can consider themselves lucky if they get them for the sowing season. The added burden imposed by this Bill, in my view—and I know something about this, having opposed it all along, even during the war period—may be the last straw. I think it is greatly to the credit of the agricultural industry that they have accepted what may prove to be a knockout blow, after all the troubles they have had this year, and after the patriotic and loyal way in which they have done their job.
  The Government have decided to allocate extra food and consumer goods to the miners because they are priority pro-
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  ducers. They are to be given an incentive to produce more. I, personally, take no exception to that at all. I realise the importance of coal, and the hard nature of the work of the miners. But agricultural workers and farmers are also priority producers. I suggest to hon. Members opposite who sit for mining constituencies, that we cannot even get coal without food. Why should not the Government treat the agricultural worker—who will have to put in a very much longer day as a result of summer time—on the same basis, and give him a little more fuel, and allocate more consumer goods to the rural areas in order to give an incentive to produce the food necessary to feed the miners to get the coal? The case for the agricultural workers is just as strong, and it is made doubly strong by this Bill. I will not go into all the reasons why double summer time is so much disliked, and even feared, by the farming community. Time after time we have heard them in this House, and it would only weary hon. Members to go into them now.
  I would, however, remind the Government that, quite apart from the physical strain on the farmer—and on the farmer's wife as well, because she has to look after the children and the men, and do all the cooking at ridiculous times—this Bill means increased costs of production. A farm, as we know, is not like a factory. Even if the clock is advanced farmers have to wait until the sun comes up in order to carry out the preliminary work. I will give the Minister an example from my own part of the country. Where I farm we grow a very heavy crop of a particular kind of hay called timothy, of which we can produce three tons to the acre. Now, I cannot touch that hay when cut, until 10 o'clock in the morning, because of the amount of dew on it. That 10 o'clock will now become 12 o'clock, when, in any event, the men go off for their mid-day meal. Therefore, we will not start our hay making operation until after lunch, at one or half-past one o'clock. By 5.30 p.m. the men must be paid overtime rates. Thus, anyone can see this infliction will mean increased costs of production. If the Government say that because of the conditions imposed in this Bill these increased costs to the farming community will be met, they will have done something. But I do not expect they will go to that length today. I warn

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  them, though, that if they do not they will be presented with another bill at a later date, namely, the bill of increased costs of food production due to double summer time.
  As my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) pointed out, we dislike the permanent nature of this Bill. We do not like the idea of the Order in Council, which, I understand, can only be prayed against, sometimes perhaps at midnight or two o'clock in the morning. The Government should come forward with an affirmative Resolution, put forward by themselves, which will be subject to proper discussion in this House. Having dealt the farming industry a cruel blow, at a time when we are very sorely pressed for food, and after one of the worst spring seasons ever known, the very least the Government can do is to assure the agricultural industry that this Bill will not he a permanent affair, and that we will have an opportunity to discuss the merits of the case brought forward by the Government, not merely by means of a Prayer from hon. Members on this side of the House. I say to the Minister, for what it is worth, that the next crisis into which we shall get will be a food crisis, and this Bill brings that crisis nearer. If the Government feel bound to impose summer time and double summer time, it is up to them now, having done so, to pay far more attention to the needs of food producers, to give them more coal in the country areas, to give them more machinery, more feeding stuffs and more labour, and to give them as little summer time as possible.
  4.46 p.m.
  Mr. Stubbs: Although I think summer time and double summer time may be necessary in the present crisis, I share the view of the hon. Member for North Cumberland (Mr. W. Roberts), when he said he hoped we would look at this Bill again in 12 months' time. I share that view because whoever gets any advantage out of the working of summer time or double summer time, it certainly is not the agricultural worker, or persons employed in the rural areas. I ask the Minister, when he replies, at least to tell the House whether, in meeting the increased difficulties of the farmers, an arrangement has been made with the Minister of Fuel and Power for more fuel to be provided
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  to the farmers. They will certainly need more oil when the milkmen have to get up at three and four o'clock in the morning owing to double summer time, and have to do the milking in the artificial light of oil-lamps. I should like to know what arrangement has been made in that direction.
  I now wish to put forward a plea for the children. In my area the women go out to work with the men. The children have to be got up very early, even now; they have to be fed, and they then roam about until school time. Under the operation of summer time and double summer time it can be realised what will happen to these children. They will play in the streets and will be late getting to bed. The mothers will have to get the children up very early in the morning, with rushed breakfasts; and they will then be turned out because the mothers have to go to work. They will get only a scratch meal at midday, either provided by the school or from food which they have taken to school. Then, after school hours they will have to roam about until their mothers come back at night time. This is a very serious thing in child life. The women of the countryside will be obliged to make a great sacrifice in meeting the circumstances arising out of either summer or double summer time.
  With regard to the food, I want to point out that men who get up at 3 o'clock in the morning will want a meal when they come in after milking the cows. They will want breakfast, as well as dinner and tea; I do not think the amount of food we have in these days will run to supper as well. Are we to give more food to the men who work on the land? After all, they produce the food for others, and they ought to have sufficient for themselves, their wives and children. Let me tell hon. Members what happens in my area, in the Fens, at the moment. The woman of the house has got to pack food for her man when he goes out. After Monday, what will that poor woman put up for her man who works in the Fens? I had a case only recently of a farmworker, who told me that his wife had made up for him a roast potato, a bit of bread and margarine, and a morsel of cheese to take with him to work in the Fens on a hot summer day. The same would be the case at the present time. He said that there was a pub close by where he could get a pint of beer. That man has to go from where he lives to where he works, and back

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  again, all on a roast potato, a bit of bread and margarine, and a morsel of cheese. If they are to be called on now to work in double summer time it will mean a longer day for them.
  Hon. Members may say what they like, but the farmworkers will not go to bed earlier. This proposal means a longer day, and there is a limit to human endurance. One can go on, but, of course, the strain will find one out; and agriculture does not gain in the long run if the men engaged in it are not in the physical condition to do the hard, laborious work they are called upon to do. Farmers and farmworkers will make the best of it; but if the country believes we are going to get increased food in these circumstances it will be deceived. So, I sincerely hope we shall look at this again.
  The children today are the men and women of tomorrow. By what we are doing today, we may do them a great mischief. They do not get proper rest and proper food. We are calling upon these people to sacrifice more than, I believe, they need be called upon to sacrifice, even in the present circumstances. I am not an expert. I do not know whether the crisis really does demand double summer time. I am not so sure that it does; and one thing I am sure about is, that summer time and double summer time are no use to the agricultural industry. We work by the sun in the countryside. We have always done so, and it is so now. Whenever agriculture is worked by artificial time, it is bound to suffer. I regret that circumstances necessitate this Bill. I sincerely hope that next year, we shall have another look at it; I hope that circumstances will be better then, and that the crisis will not be with us at all, and we can get back to working in the countryside under natural conditions.
  4.54 p.m.
  Sir Alan Herbert: I am sure that the whole House appreciated the kind, the sympathetic, the almost apologetic manner in which the Home Secretary introduced this Bill. Personally, I, like most people—like everybody, I think—am prepared to meet him in the same spirit, and to agree to it for this year, and next year. I am rather more optimistic than the Home Secretary. In my Amendments I have
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  assumed that after next year we shall be out of our difficulties. He seemed to think the crisis might go on for ever.
  The Amendments I have suggested, if I may mention them, are to the effect that, at the end of next year, 1948, the Summer Time Act should be repealed, and opportunity given to the House to review the whole principle; because, after all, the principle of summer time has not been on view since 1925. If this Bill goes through in its present form, it will never be on view, unless it is the subject of a repealing Bill. There is no Private Members' time; I do not think there ever will be Private Members' time in the lifetime of the present Government. I am sorry, but that is how I feel. This is a subject which it is impossible to raise on the Adjournment. Therefore, this is the first opportunity of attacking the principle and it may be the last for a long time. If the right hon. Gentleman, in addition to his sympathetic words to me, for which I thank him, had given any indication that he would accept my Amendments, I should not be making this speech; because I do not want to delay the proceedings on this Bill for a moment, for I agree, reluctantly, that we must have it, because of the crisis. But since he has not done so, I cannot miss the opportunity of attacking on behalf of thousands of citizens the principle of summer time, and of moving Amendments later on, to give an opportunity of attacking it again. I am only an university Member.
  Mr. Pickthorn: Why "only"?.
  Sir A. Herbert: In relation, I was going to say, to the farmers. Twelve years ago I announced to my university electors that I knew nothing about agriculture. Nothing has happened since then to alter my opinion. But there are others besides farmers concerned with this question. Seafaring men, who use tide tables, are caused considerable inconvenience by these arrangements. I remember when I was in Newfoundland that the fishermen there were just as hostile to this business as the farmers. They came home from sea to find that all the stores were shut. I imagine that in this country, in the fishing ports, seamen, who come in from the sea to find all the pubs shut at what will be 8 o'clock by sun time, will have similar objections. Speaking of practicalities, I have often wondered why the teetotallers have never raised their voices

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  against these arrangements. They must know that many labourers and other honest men have their first beer of the day at 11 o'clock in the morning; but now, if we have double summer time, they will start drinking at the godless hour of 9 a.m. by the sun.
  As a university Member, I have other objections to the principle of summer time which may seem fanciful to some, but are very real to me, and to many thousands of my fellow citizens. First, we all hate public, national lying. I hate to have that great clock above our heads not telling the truth. Hon. Members may laugh, but I feel passionately about it. I hate to think that Big Ben, that great bell which has been such a voice in the councils of the world, will be heard booming, through the B.B.C., all around the world, for half the summer, Berlin time, and for the rest of the summer, Moscow time. I do not need to inform hon. Members that Berlin lies in longitude 15 degrees East, and that Moscow is in longitude 3o degrees East—rather more—and that if we advance the clock one hour, we shall use Berlin time, and if we advance it two hours, Moscow time.
  Mr. Paget: Will that not be rather for the convenience of Moscow?
  Sir A. Herbert: The convenience of Moscow was not present in my mind; they, unfortunately, have ruined the whole thing by having permanent single summer time. My second objection has already been referred to by another hon. Member. I think that summer time, single or double, is the most frightful confession of weakness of which the human race has ever been guilty. By all means let us change our habits according to the seasons. Even the dumb animals do that. Even the uneducated cock does not crow at the same time all the year round. But let us change our habits without necessarily changing the clocks. I do not see why it is not possible for us to get up one hour earlier because it is good for us, because it is good for trade, or even because it is good for the country, but it is possible if we are deceived by a silly mechanical trick with the clock. That is an idea which must be repugnant surely to anybody who has the smallest respect for the human race. Surely, in the normal times to which the Home Secretary referred—I do not say now—especially when the Government either
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  run or control so many things, it should be the simplest thing in the world for the Government to say that, from a certain date, all Government offices would begin work one hour earlier, and it was hoped that industry would follow suit. The only snag, I quite agree, would be the railway timetables, but in normal times, when there is more paper and less panic, that would be fairly easy to get over by having a second timetable.
  Thirdly, what about the navigators, and the great position of this country in the world of navigation? An hon. Gentleman deprecated, with my hearty agreement, the possibility—and it is a possibility—that the Government may, under this Bill, at some time bring in permanent single summer time. A great many people in this country want that, and I believe that Russia and possibly other countries have already done it. Suppose all the countries of Europe decided to do that, decided, in other words, to abandon Greenwich time. Let them do it—we cannot stop them—but surely this country should be the last to abandon Greenwich mean time? It is no small thing that the prime meridian runs through a small but historic suburb in the East of London. It is no small thing that you can steam seven miles down the river from this House and pass from West to East longitude. It gives me a thrill every time I do it, and I invariably draw the attention of my passengers to the experience which they are enjoying. It is no small thing that all the navigators and seamen of the world fix the position of their ships and aircraft by reference to Greenwich and Greenwich time. The stars themselves are fixed by reference to Greenwich time. [Laughter.] They are. In a humble amateur way, I am a deep sea navigator, and I tell the House that all over the world navigators at this moment are turning up their tables and finding the Greenwich hour-angle of the sun, the moon, the planets and the stars. That is a terrific thing; it is not a thing to throw away lightly.
  Suppose, as I say, that the whole of Europe decides that it will have permanent single summer time and we, because of our fuel crisis, decide to do the same thing. I am sure that, if Hitler had conquered the world, the first thing he would have done, being a man of some imagination, would have been to say, "The prime meridian shall run through Berlin

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  and not through Greenwich." And, of course, the same thing could be done in another way. If you want to have permanent single summer time it is quite easy to do it without changing the clocks. It can be done by changing the maps and putting the prime meridian 15 degrees to the West, out in the Atlantic. But then we shall talk not of Greenwich time but of Iceland time or of Teneriffe time. I will not go on with this, but it is the kind of thing which ought to be gone into by some committee sometime before the end of next year.
  Quite apart from all these very practical affairs that we have been discussing, do not let us get it into our heads that Greenwich mean time is just some pedantic scientific nonsense which does not really matter. It is one of the great glories of this country that all the nations have agreed that Greenwich and Greenwich time shall be the centre of all astronomy and navigation. It would be a terrible thing if we got into the habit of saying that it does not really matter, although I suppose that not one among a million citizens really knows what Greenwich mean time means. Indeed, I wonder about this House. I hope that the next speaker will briefly explain what is meant by "Greenwich mean time." I do hope that the right hon. Gentleman will consider my Amendment, which I think is a better Amendment than those of the right hon. Gentleman, with the exception of his Amendment to leave out Clause 1 (2), because the other Amendments do accept the principle of summer time. I want this House, at the end of next year or the beginning of 1949, to challenge the whole principle. Let us believe that Greenwich mean time means something. That Greenwich is the centre of astronomy and navigation is a thing that we must not throw away; let the Empire go if you must, but cling fast to the Prime Meridian.
  5.7 p.m.
  Mr. John E. Haire: I will not follow the hon. Gentleman the junior Burgess for Oxford (Sir A. Herbert) into the mysteries of Greenwich mean time, but I will congratulate him for introducing this new angle into the long history of the controversy on summer time. I think it is pleasing to note that the House today
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  is accepting what is normally regarded as a traditionally controversial Measure with comparative peace and calm and thanks to the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down a sense of humour. Perhaps hon. Gentlemen opposite are exhausted after the efforts of yesterday. Tempers were often frayed in this Assembly over this annual contest between God's time and what was called "Lloyd George's time" and today we seem to be accepting it, and only asking for an occasional reference back to the House, so that we may once again, as the hon. Gentleman has asked, reconsider the principle.
  I think the House will agree that the benefits which this Measure, introduced during the first world war, has conferred upon both children and adults have, taken by and large over the country, been incalculable. And, as hon. Gentlemen will be glad to know, those benefits have been conferred without a single penny being imposed on the overloaded taxpayers of this country. It is also interesting to note that, when this Measure has come annually before the House, we have started talking about summer time while outside there have been wretched conditions. This Measure has been discussed in the midst of blizzards and high winds, to the accompaniment of hail and rain, and today this slow-dying frosty winter is making yet another effort to snow—the last, I hope. I think it must be said, in case it goes out to the contrary, that in this Bill, the Government are not attempting to introduce summer weather with summer time. The Government are now being blamed in certain quarters for almost everything, including the weather, and I am told that a wag the other night sang the traditional ditty to the words:
  "It ain't gonna snow no mo', no mo',
  It ain't gonna snow no mo',
  'Ow the 'ell can the Government tell
  That it ain't gonna snow no mo'?"
  Today we forget past controversy and approach the problem from a new angle because we are in the midst of a fuel crisis. Today we are approaching this Measure as a fuel saver. Single summer time, and double summer time later on, must be regarded by the House only as an expedient, and nobody must think, either in the House or in the country, that this will cure the fuel crisis. The Home Secretary has told us that it will confer upon the coal stores of this country only some 150,000 tons, the pro-

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  duction merely of a quarter of a day. Therefore, there is the danger that when this Measure goes out to the country, people may think that here is the panacea of the fuel crisis. We must guard against that. We must still request our fuel consumers, and particularly domestic fuel consumers, to go on with voluntary saving, and later on to do their utmost to make a success of whatever rationing scheme may be imposed. I was horrified, as no doubt many hon. Members were, to read in the columns of a newspaper this morning a reference to the fact that the writer had overheard a conversation between certain ladies who said that when they went out they switched on all the, electric fires in order, by that means, as they said, to bring down the Government sooner. That is not the sort of contribution we expect from any people, whatever may be their political views.
  I do not want to follow certain hon. Members opposite in discussing the agricultural issues, although I believe them to be very real. There are many farmers in my constituency who deplore the introduction of this Bill. Equally, I feel that we should congratulate the farming community and the land workers on the way they have accepted the disadvantages brought by this measure as their contribution towards overcoming the present crisis. Undoubtedly, it will be burdensome for them, but they are doing their bit towards helping us through. At the same time, I was interested that the age old arguments of the past with regard to the cow were made, and one hon. Member said he was certain the cow did not watch the clock. I think that all the references to the cow in this controversy, both on this occasion and in the past, have been exaggerated and probably much resented by the cow. In fact, the cow, being a remarkably versatile animal, can adapt herself to the changing clock if given a certain degree of regularity. There are certain advantages to the agricultural community in this Measure, as I think hon. Gentlemen will appreciate. No hon. Member has pointed out that, as a result of the Measure, there will probably be an increased potato yield. I understand that it will facilitate the gathering of the potato crop as a result of the increase of daylight in the evenings, when volunteer labour can be obtained. That will be useful, especially when we consider how much of last year's potato crop is still ungathered.
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  I feel there is also another aspect of the Measure which the Government must consider. They are conferring upon the whole community a considerable amount of leisure time in the evening. They must consider whether they can provide better facilities for recreation and recuperation than have been provided in the past. I hope they will use the voluntary efforts of the many people who will now be available. I suggest to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture that he should go out of his way this year to increase the number of allotment holders. We are urged to grow more food. I believe the available time which double summer time will give could be used in that direction, because I believe the Government must give the lead to our people in using this time to the advantage of the whole community If they do not do so, this Measure will largely be wasted. Above all, the advantage of this Bill is that it will save a little fuel, and anything which contributes to that end is well worth the support of the whole House and of the country. When the present fuel difficulties cease, we can think again.
  5.15 p.m.
  Mr. McKie: I am very glad to have the opportunity of following the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. John E. Haire), who spoke in such strong terms to the Government about certain of the provisions of the Bill, and I very much hope that the Home Secretary will pay due heed to the hon. Member's warnings. The Home Secretary told us that he did not intend to rest his case on the very paltry saving of fuel which this Measure will bring about, but that rather he hoped that, as a result of the additional hour to which the re-introduction of double summer time will lead, we should be doing something towards making up the leeway which the prolonged stoppage, owing to the crisis, has occasioned in industry. All I have to say, with regard to that, is that when double summer time was first proposed under the Defence Regulations in 1941, by the then Home Secretary, now the Lord President of the Council, the right hon. Gentleman made no attempt to suggest that the imposition of the additional hour, which at that time ran for five or six months, would lead to increased wartime production. I do not remember him ever using that argument.
  At that time we had only one very short Debate on the whole matter. This was

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  due to the insistence of an hon. Lady, whom I am sorry to say is no longer with us, Mrs. Mavis Tate, who formerly represented the Frome Division; she was successful in raising a Debate on the Adjournment on the evening following the Home Secretary's announcement. The then Home Secretary replied to the Debate. The hon. Lady rested her case against the introduction of the additional hour almost entirely from the point of view of the agricultural industry. An important point to remember is that, to the best of my recollection, the right hon. Gentleman, in replying to the Debate, met the hon. Lady entirely on that ground, and did not suggest for one moment that it would lead to increased wartime production by industry. Or was it a serious omission on the part of the Lord President of the Council, as Home Secretary at that time, because he could not see, looking ahead some five years, the fearful conditions into which a Government entirely of his own party would land us? At that time, having met the hon. Lady's argument, the right hon. Gentleman pointed out the value and benefits that would accrue to the dwellers and war workers in the bombed areas of Britain, in London, Coventry, Birmingham and other industrial areas, who, as the result of the additional hour of double summer time, would have time to engage in relaxation, tilling their gardens and allotments, and so on. Not once did the then Home Secretary suggest that the Measure would give an increased stimulus to production. It is for this reason that I was interested to hear the Home Secretary rest his case entirely on that assumption, for it can only be an assumption. I hope the right hon. Gentleman is right. Although I deplore the lack of foresight of the Government, I sincerely hope, not that the Government will get us out of the crisis, but that we, by assisting the Government in a legitimate way, may be able to lift the country out of the crisis; but I very much doubt whether this Measure will have the effect which the right hon. Gentleman told us this afternoon it would have.
  Now I would like to say a word on this matter from the agricultural point of view, and to reinforce very strongly what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for West Perth (Mr. Snadden) about the pre-
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  judicial effect that the Government's proposal will have upon the agricultural industry in Scotland. I was also very glad to hear what was said by my hon. Friend—I hope he will allow me to call him so—the Member for North Cumberland (Mr. W. Roberts). He alluded to the fact that there is an Amendment on the Order Paper which may be moved during the Committee stage to exclude Scotland from the scope of this Measure. I will not go into that aspect of the matter now, further than to say that I was rather surprised to hear my hon. Friend suggest that this proposal was not a practical one. I would remind him and anyone else who thinks like him—he has now left the Chamber—that in the great American. Union, the time differs from State to State. For example, the time in New York is different from the time which prevails in New Jersey. If my hon. Friend made inquiries into the time in the 48 States of the American Union, he would find very many different times.
  While the farthing community in Scotland, as well as in England and Wales, will accept this Measure because they believe that it is necessary that the Government should have it in order to try to lift us out of the present crisis, they certainly do not welcome it. Many harder things would have been said than have been said about the baleful effect which this Measure will have upon the farming section of the community. I was particularly glad to hear what was said by the hon. Member for Leominster (Mr. Baldwin). In Scotland, we have had one of the most severe winters—I know this is true of the whole of Britain—on record. In my constituency, nothing has been done with regard to ploughing for about six weeks and even if the thaw should come reasonably quickly we are bound to have one of the latest seed times on record, because our very large ploughing programme has hardly been entered upon at all at the moment. Probably the seed time will not begin before the end of April and a great deal of it may not be done until May. Consequently, we shall have a very late harvest and the crop consequently may be very light. A late harvest will mean an increased cost of production to the farmer.
  When the Home Secretary replies—I should like to hear a reply from the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scot-

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  land—I hope he will be able to indicate that the Government will seriously consider doing something in the way of making up for the great patriotic effort of the agricultural community of Great Britain, to compensate them for the great and additional handicap which will be laid upon them by this Bill. I suggest he might consider recommending a better price to be paid for the products, of the farming community.
  I would like to stress, for the benefit of hon. Members who may be in danger of forgetting it, the great importance that the agricultural community will have in Britain's economy over a very long period ahead. The Government, by their lack of foresight and bad administration, have landed us and themselves in the present terrible plight. I say this in passing that we were told, when the White Paper was first produced and before the crisis had developed in its most acute form, that it was touch and go whether we should be able to pull through. If it was touch and go then, how are we to pull through now after about six weeks of crisis? Surely not by the addition of an hour of summer time?
  That is all I have to say. In common with my fellow agriculturists in Scotland I will do nothing to hinder or impede the Government in regard to this Measure which they think is necessary, but I deeply deplore the fact that it is considered necessary to re-introduce something which we were promised, even in the war years, would never become a permanent feature of our national life. I gravely doubt whether the Government can hope very much from this Bill in pulling us out of a terribly difficult situation.
  5.26 p.m.
  Mr. Lambert: I was very dubious when I heard first of all about the proposal to impose double summer time. The speech of the Home Secretary has done nothing to allay my fears. Neither did the speech of the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Haire). If I told the Devonshire farmers that cows were self-regulating and could therefore accommodate themselves with ease to the change of time they would regard the suggestion with utter contempt. The hon. Member also suggested that double summer time would help with the lifting of the potatoes. I would like to tell the hon. Member that potatoes are normally
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  lifted in October and November when summer time has finished.
  Many hon. Members have suggested that the food situation will be the next crisis in this country. I am afraid that I agree with them. It may well be that we shall soon have to face a food Dunkirk. Double summer time can do nothing but aggravate the situation as it must make the production of food more difficult and therefore lessen the production of food. It will do it for this reason: One of the greatest difficulties farmers have to contend with is shortage of labour. They will have to call upon their workmen to work longer periods of overtime in order to get in the harvest. The farm worker, though most patriotic, is not anxious to work more overtime than he feels is necessary. He already works long hours, the inducement of extra pay is nullified because not only will he have to pay extra taxes but there are no goods in shops which he wants to buy.
  I therefore urge the Government, if they really think it is necessary that we should have double summer time, to give the food producers some recompense. For instance, the prices of farm produce should be revised. I have always felt that those prices were very much too low. This is illustrated when one takes into consideration the level of farm rents. I have looked up the rents of several thousand acres in Devonshire and I find that the rents are 2s. 9d. per acre lower today than they were 60 years ago. Last year the farmers had a very bad year; at a National Farmers' Union dinner only a week or two ago a bank manager told me that he could point out two or three farmers at the dinner who last year had lost £500. I would not only urge the Government to increase the prices of all farm produce, but I would ask them to give the farm workers some added inducement to work.
  I understand that the miners get extra coal and are to get extra food, and I would suggest that the farm workers get extra food also and are brought up at least to the scale of the miners. If the interests of agriculture are again to be sacrificed, this time because the Government has blundered, agriculture may well suffer a blow from which it can never recover. In a few years time, one might well describe the state of agriculture, if

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  I may paraphrase the words of the poet Goldsmith, thus:
  "Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, Where officials accumulate, and farms decay."
  5.31 p.m.
  Mr. Dye: I would not have intervened in the Debate but for the speeches from hon. Members opposite, which make one feel that we must be back at the beginning of the century; it was then that there was a great deal of talk about summer time. Looking back over that period, I cannot see that agricultural production has decreased, or that there has been any deterioration in the health of the children. On the contrary, the health of the children has improved, and agricultural production has gone up. No Members opposite have brought forward any facts in this Debate to prove that, by altering the clock by one hour at certain times of the year, there has been a definite and measurable decrease in agricultural production, or in the health and welfare of the children. I cannot follow their argument at all. There used to be old people who absolutely refused to change their clocks, because they said it was God's time and anything else was the devil's time. When I look back to see which farms and villages in Norfolk have made the greatest contribution in the output of food, I find it is not those old-fashioned people who have never changed their ideas and methods, who have sat down and said a new thing will flatten them out, but the farmers who have buckled to, brought in more machinery and made their farms up to date.
  There are two factors which will influence the production of food this year and next year. Firstly, it will depend on the amount of machinery brought to the aid of the men in the field, and, secondly, on the co-operation between the men and the employers. If there is a proper spirit between the farmers and the farm workers, this Bill will not affect the output of agricultural production. In this respect, it is pleasing to note the reaction of the National Farmers Union. They have reviewed the matter as statesmen, and have said, if this is necessary in the interests of the country, then they will see that it does not adversely affect production. Hall the farmers of the country make up their minds to get the good will and full co-
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  operation of the men, I do not think agricultural production will be adversely affected. If any fanner had been asked whether a cold and dull January and February in 1947 would affect the output of milk, he would have said "Yes, it would." But what are the facts? The old cows have given more milk because of the efficient management of the farmers, and the fact that farm workers have got up early in the morning, in the dark and cold, and have seen to the care and comfort of the cows, and got in the milk. When I was a lad, more than half the farm workers in Norfolk went to work at 5 o'clock in the morning, but now it is 7 o'clock or 7.30 before they go to work on some of the farms. Therefore, if we advance the clock by two hours we are only getting back to the days of our fathers, who used to tell us that:
  "Early to bed and early to rise,"
  "Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."
  The only reason for this Measure is that the habits of the people have changed over the last 40 years. They lie in bed longer in the mornings and work shorter hours, having more leisure in the afternoons and evenings. The farm worker appreciates it as much as anyone, for it has enabled him to take part in bowls, tennis and other things, and no one is any the worse for it. Today they are getting what they always wanted, a little more leisure and pleasure and social life, and an opportunity to mix with other workers when the day's work is done. I want to express my appreciation of the attitude of the National Farmers Union in regard to this Measure, and to make an appeal to farm workers to take it into consideration, and not to let it interfere with the work of harvesting. If the Government have any influence with the farm workers, this will not adversely affect the position, but in so far as it enables better production of machines in general, and agricultural implements in particular, it will be an aid to the farmers to get in bigger crops than ever before.
  5.39 p.m.
  Sir Peter Macdonald: I was very interested to hear the views of the hon. Member for South-West Norfolk (Mr. Dye), who spoke with such assurance of the point of view of the National Farmers Union in regard to this Measure. The Home Secretary's expression of the views of the National Farmers Union was

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  a very qualified one, and was not as wholehearted as the hon. Member led us to believe. I am convinced that this qualified acceptance was given without a census being taken of the branches. I am convinced that if their opinions had been taken before the statement went out, it would have been quite a different one.
  In spite of the fact that we know there is a crisis, I am convinced that anyone who represents any agricultural community would be failing in his duty if he did not express his feelings in regard to this Bill. We have had opinions covering a very wide range of territory, from the North of Scotland to the South of England, from the West, and even from the Fenlands and Border country. None of these people accepted this Measure in anything but a spirit of sacrifice, and I regard the situation in the same way.
  I fail to see what good it is going to do to the industry of this country. We are told that this drastic Measure is being sprung on us because it is to assist industrial production in this country. What are the two great industries in this country? Surely, they are coal and agriculture. They are basic industries, which employ the greatest number of people in the country, and without which we could not survive at all. Will double summer time, increase coal production at the face? It will have no effect whatever, and I do not think that a miner would demand double summer time unless it enabled him to attend football matches, which might in itself be commendable, but has nothing to do with the production of coal at the face. The views of agricultural communities in all parts of the country have been expressed today and, without exception, this Bill has been received with disfavour.
  Recently, the Minister of Agriculture sent for the chairmen of agricultural committees, and persuaded them of the importance of increased food production this year. He counselled them to go back to their counties, and put everything they knew into greater production of food this year, to step up production by 10 to 20 per cent He said that we were living today on the American Loan, that we would have to spend dollars to buy food, and that dollars would be scarce in the autumn. Greater production of food was, therefore, essential if we were to survive in the years to come. Anybody who has read the Government's White Papers
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  cannot help but be convinced of that fact. It is obvious that we shall be short of dollars next year, and that there will be great alarm in the autumn, when our dollars begin to run out. Is this the time to put this added burden on agriculture? It is a burden—a burden on milk production, and on the agricultural labour force. In order to step up food production, the farmer must consider his labour force. He is told that German prisoners of war on whom we largely depend for labour today are to be sent back this year, or during the next 18 months. They are going back at the rate of 15,000 a month, and when the farmer asks where he will be able to get alternative labour he is told, "Out of the Forces, or civilian life." Anybody who knows anything about the situation of agriculture today in the rural areas realises that it is impossible to get people on to the land because there are no houses available for them. The repeal of the Housing (Rural Workers) Act has been a serious blow to the reconditioning of agricultural cottages. That was a retrograde step. Since then, whatever measures have been taken to build houses in rural areas, and they have been very few—
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hubert Beaumont): I have allowed the hon. Member to travel very far, and he must now come back to the Bill.
  Sir P. Macdonald: I was giving reasons why it will be impossible for agriculturists to get labour, and step up production this year. Among other reasons, there is the shortage of agricultural machinery and feedingstuffs. What the farmers ask, and rightly, is why the sacrifices which have to be made as a result of the bungling and incompetence of this Government should be borne by them alone? Why should they always have to bear the burden of mistakes made by the Government? What recompense will they get for those sacrifices? If double summer time is introduced it will increase the overtime on farms, which will then increase the cost of production. What steps will the Minister of Agriculture take to recompense farmers for the losses they will make on production?
  Mr. Alpass: All those contributory factors to the cost of production will be taken into account by the Government in fixing prices.
  Sir P. Macdonald: The hon. Member has been courageous enough to make that pledge. He will have to get the Government to live up to it, otherwise he will have a great deal of trouble to face in his constituency, especially from agriculturists. On behalf of the farming community in my Division, I must express the strong feelings they have on this subject. At their recent conference, they asked whether this question of summer time was likely to be brought up again this year, and I felt justified in giving them an assurance that it would not. Now it is flung upon them as a result, as I have said, of the bungling and incompetence of this Government. It is just as well that they should know who is responsible, and I shall lose no opportunity of telling them.
  5.49 p.m.
  Mr. Royle: I have listened with great interest to this Debate, and I am sure that the House must be getting the impression that nothing is good about the introduction and extension of summer time. I appreciate that the provisions of this Bill may be disadvantageous to the agricultural community, but there is another point of view—that of the urban districts—which has not so far been put forward. I represent a wholly industrial constituency, which consists almost entirely of poor, mean, miserable streets, into which the sun rarely penetrates. I am concerned about getting this extra two hours of daylight for the health and benefit of the people in my constituency. There is a section of the community which will welcome the introduction of summer time and double summer time without any reservation whatever.
  Colonel Gomme-Duncan: When the hon. Member talks about extra daylight, will he say where it is coming from?
  Mr. Royle: People in constituencies such as mine will have the advantage of extra daylight in the evening. When they finish work they will be able to get out into the country, away from the meanness and squalor to which they are accustomed, and have the opportunity of enjoying God's sunlight and fresh air.
  Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Is it impossible for them to get up earlier in the morning and go out?
  Mr. Royle: Perhaps the hon. and gallant Gentleman has no appreciation of, that kind of life. The man who is working in a
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  cotton mill or an engineering factory cannot get up in the early hours to take his walk into the country, and get back in time to start his work. I am putting forward a plea for this Bill, and we should remember that there is a point of view quite adverse to that of the agricultural community. I am all for helping the agricultural community. I believe that agriculture is a basic industry, and that the agricultural community should be assisted as much as possible, but I do not want it to be forgotten that there is a section of the community that requires our attention just as much, and that so far as the children are concerned, in constituencies such as those which I have mentioned, fresh air is often as important as sleep, and these children are not getting it. The suggestion offered by the hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. Collins) would overcome the child problem with regard to summer time, if the education authorities would adjust the school times. Even in the squalor which I have mentioned, there are men endeavouring to provide more food for their families on small allotments, and the two hours which will be provided by this Bill will be invaluable to them. We should not regard this Bill as wholly bad, because there are points in it which are of advantage to at least one section of the community.
  5.52 p.m.
  Lieut. - Colonel Sir Walter Smiles: I wish to point out how this Bill applies to Northern Ireland. Mine is an agricultural constituency, and I have received a good many letters on the subject of this Bill. I will quote one of them as an example.
  "In the interests of agriculture and also of children and young people, and in view of the fact that we are already half an hour in advance of London time, it is hoped that you will do your utmost to prevent the adoption of double summer time in Northern Ireland."
  That letter was sent to a Member of the Northern Ireland Parliament, who says that the question of daylight saving does not come within the province of the Northern Ireland Government; and so he has passed the buck to me. That was the gentleman who occupies exactly the same position at Stormont as you do here, Mr. Deputy-Speaker.
  I look at Clause 3 of this Bill in its application to Northern Ireland and I have read in the Library the three Acts which are mentioned in that Clause. As far as I can see, after my perusal of them

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  this Bill, when it is passed at Westminster, will apply in Northern Ireland. With the exception of the farmers, I have had no other objections from Northern Ireland. The general idea of the people there is that anything which they can do to help this country through its coal and fuel crisis, they are willing to do. At the same time, I hope that it will be remembered that in Northern Ireland we are always half an hour ahead of England and Scotland, and when people here clock in at 8 o'clock, the Northern Ireland workers have, as the sun goes, already done half an hour's work. I hope that whoever is to reply will clarify the situation with regard to Northern Ireland.
  5.56 p.m.
  Mr. York: I wanted to oppose this Bill, and the reason why some of my hon. Friends dissuaded me from that course was because this Government, at long last, have produced this one ewe lamb to get us out of a crisis. They advised me not to discourage them by opposing this Bill from any course which would bring this country from the very depths into which they have plunged it. Had it not been for that, I would most certainly have joined with my hon. Friend the junior Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert) in opposing this Bill root and branch, because I feel as strongly as he did that it is wholly wrong to tinker about with the clock; moreover, it shows the depravity into which this nation is falling if it needs to alter the clock in order to get us up at a reasonable hour. What is required, apparently, is that workers in factories shall start at an earlier hour. I believe that is the whole cause which this Bill is designed to promote. If that is so, instead of having a cumbrous Measure like this which puts to great inconvenience the most important industry in the country, would it not have been far simpler for the consultative committees of the various industries, the joint committees of the trade unions, and the employers to have got together to alter the hours in those industries?
  Major Cecil Poole: Does not the hon. Gentleman realise the implication of what he has suggested? Does he not understand that all the railway companies in the country would have to alter their timetables to enable this to be done?
  Mr. York: I must draw the attention of the House and the country to the appalling
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  prospects with which we are faced as a result of the new nationalised industry which this House has tried so repeatedly to thrust upon the country. If it is impracticable in localities to alter the timing of trains and buses under the new nationalised system, we are in for a very sticky time. It seems to me that this Bill is really all of which this Government are capable, and the prospect appals me.
  I want to make two points. The Home Secretary admitted that the agricultural industry would be put to grave inconvenience in having the time extended, in which it would have to work in artificial light. As a matter of fact, I make out the situation to be something like this. On 16th March sunrise is at 6.8, which would mean light about quarter to seven. On 20th April, which is the normal time in former years of summer time coming into effect, sunrise is at 5·5, so that there is light somewhere about 5·50. By starting summer time on 15th March, supposing the dairy farmer starts at six in the morning, he will have three-quarters of an hour in artificial light under the old proposal, and nearly an hour and three-quarters under the new proposal. I submit to the Home Secretary, who is an important Member of the Government, that that constitutes a strong case for allowing agricultural industry to have priority of the highest order in connection with electricity supplies.
  At the moment, all over the country we are trying to induce the electrical power companies to do some of the arrears of work which have been hanging over for the past seven or eight years in regard to new connections. We are very much behind in that sphere. We are told that it is quite impossible, because the Government forgot to order any insulators to be made, or forgot to buy any poles. [Interruption.] I think that I am making a perfectly proper point on a matter which is of great importance to the agricultural industry and to the rural areas in general. They have not got the normal supply of new connections the need for which might have been anticipated, and certainly they have not started to work off any of the arrears. Therefore, I suggest that a case has been made out by the Home Secretary himself for high priority for the agricultural industry in this matter of new connections. I think enough has been said on the question of additional food, but I would add

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  that if it is possible to obtain additional supplies of food for mining areas, it should be possible to secure the same for agricultural districts.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): I really do not see what that has to do with this Bill.
  Mr. York: If I might put it to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, it has been argued by a number of speakers that the added strain of double summer time on the agricultural workers will mean that they will need more fuel of a food nature, and, therefore, the same arrangements that have been made for the coal mining industry ought to be made for the rural areas. I was merely enforcing that point, and I will not continue it if you think that I should leave it. I would end by saying that many Members of the House take exception to the proposal contained in this Bill. At the moment, although we are prepared under protest to give the Government their Bill, we object most strongly to the permanent powers which are being taken, and also to the fact that the Government can put the new regulations in future years, into effect without coming to this House for a positive Resolution. If the Government can meet us on those points I feel they would go a long way to repay us for refraining from opposing the Second Reading of the Bill.
  6.5 p.m.
  Mr. Kendall: I have listened to the speeches on this Bill with great interest. There are a number of things that are very true about the Bill. Number one is that the Government are going to pass the Second Reading, and number two is that there is no innovation about the Bill. I remember that in the last Parliament we discussed double summer time from time to time, and the only objections that were ever raised by the Members of the Tory Party were generally raised in respect of the agricultural community. If we were ready to have double summer time during the war years, it is certainly right to have it at present because of the very grave difficulties in our industrial life. I feel that no argument whatsoever is needed to support the necessity for working the maximum number of daylight hours possible. When answering a question that was asked by my hon. Friend the Member for West Salford (Mr. Royle), an hon.
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  Member opposite also asked from where were we to get the extra daylight hours. That was rather a silly question. Most folk in the country are accustomed to work to the clock. Whether the cows are accustomed to work to the clock is entirely another matter, but the fact is that people will get out of bed when the alarum clock rings, based on the time which is in operation.
  Major McCallum: We cannot get alarum clocks.
  Mr. Kendall: The hon. and gallant Member wants to clear his ears out and he will see how well he can hear. [Interruption.] I was merely replying to the hon. and gallant Member's interjection. [HON. MEMBERS: "Order, order."] I know that hon. Members opposite are very good at shouting "Order, order" when they do not like something which is said in answer to an interruption.
  Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: On a point of Order. Is it in Order for the hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Kendall), when referring to hon. Members on this side of the House, to use the expression, "Clear your ears out"?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I did not hear the expression myself, but if the remark was used it was certainly not in good taste.
  Mr. Kendall: I accept your Ruling, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and I should have referred to the party as a whole and not to a particular Member. The situation which has been adopted is one which will mean that the agricultural community are going to be a little bit embarrassed as they have been during the war years when double summer time was in operation. That is true but owing to the needs of the agricultural community—and I represent one equally as well—
  Mr. York: Not as well.
  Mr. Kendall: —and perhaps it is as important as most agricultural communities in this country of ours—I will give way if the hon. Member opposite wants to say something.
  Mr. York: I merely said "not as well."
  Mr. Kendall: Perhaps a great deal better than the hon. Member. If the hon. Member would like to look at his election figures and compare them with mine he will see that mine are pretty good.

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  [Interruption.] Does someone else want to have a go? The agricultural community is certainly going to be a little embarrassed but not any more embarrassed than the industrial workers would be, and when one weighs up the two problems, based on the necessity of conserving as much electricity and power as we possibly can in this present day and age, I think that there is no argument for any challenge to this Bill. The main strength behind my argument is the fact that the Party opposite are not going to challenge the Bill by going to a Division. I should like to say in conclusion that the farmers and farm, workers will still get on with their jobs extremely well during the war, and from the economic standpoint I think it is absolutely essential that this Bill should go through for at least the length of time during which we are in our present difficulties in the industrial field.
  6.10 p.m.
  Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: There seem to be two tactics of approach to this Bill—that adopted by the Home Secretary of quiet reasonableness, and that adopted by the hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Kendall) of noisy unreasonableness. I am perfectly certain that hon. Members on both sides have a marked preference for the former. I believe that that is so, notwithstanding the fact that the hon. Member for Grantham, speaking from a somewhat unexpected tactical position among the Government supporters—I assume that he is working his passage—
  Mr. Kendall: From time to time I have found it necessary to try to tone up either one side of the House or the other. Last week I endeavoured to help out the Tory Party because they were in such terrible difficulties, and today the Government are very welcome to my support.
  Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I should be the last person to dispute the necessity for toning up the Government, but I am inclined to think that the particular method used and its particular application are unlikely to be successful. Before passing from the distasteful subject of the hon. Member for Grantham, I must deplore his introduction into this Debate of repartee which, while it may be suitable for certain types of company meeting, is entirely unsuitable for this House of Commons.
  Major Poole: On a point of Order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, is it in Order in this House to cast aspersions on a company meeting which may have some interest for hon. Members?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I do not think that the remarks of the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) were exceptionable.
  Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: If I am touching upon matters which the hon. and gallant Member for Lichfield (Major Poole) finds embarrassing, I apologise to him. In his usual conciliatory manner the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State quite clearly indicated that his enthusiasm for this Bill was somewhat limited, and he made it abundantly plain to this House that he was introducing it only because of the stark necessity of the fuel situation. In those circumstances I must register my protest that on a Bill whose origin was stated by the Home Secretary to be that, and which bears on its back the name of the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Fuel and Power, no representative of that Department has been on the Front Bench opposite throughout the afternoon. I should be the last person in this House to desire to distract the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Fuel and Power from administrative tasks which are manifestly beyond him to activities in legislation, but in view of the fact that the right hon. Gentleman regards himself as having ample time to nationalise electricity I submit that it is quite wrong that on a Bill of the nature of the present Measure, whose cause and origin we have been told, there should be no attempt whatever by any representative of his Department to be present to assist the House in its deliberation.
  The only other matter to which I desire to invite attention is this. The Home Secretary's argument was to my mind a compelling one in favour of summer time this year. I think he made out his case for that, but what he made no case for was the indefinite continuance of that state of affairs without reference to the House of Commons. His argument would have been stronger had he applied this Bill solely to the present year. It would have been tenable if he had applied it to next year, but surely it is untenable to apply it quite indefinitely and simply by Order in Council subject only to Negative Resolution. If it has done nothing

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  else this Debate has made it perfectly clear that this is a matter upon which opinions vary far from on party lines. I need only refer to the very sincere and most powerful speech of the, hon. Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Stubbs) who made it quite clear that this Bill strikes a serious blow to his constituents. In those circumstances, surely it is right that this House of Commons should be used as the forum in which, in future years, one consideration should be weighed against another? It does seem quite deplorable that the only method by which this matter will ever again be able to come before the House of Commons, if the Bill stands as it does now, will be by Prayer, late at night against an Order in Council.
  I do hope that the hon. Gentleman who is to reply may be able to yield to what I think is the universal feeling of this House that the least we are entitled to demand is an Affirmative Resolution which can be debated before summer time is applied in any subsequent year. I notice that the Parliamentary Secretary's head is moving in an encouraging direction and I shall certainly welcome a concession in this direction—as I am sure will all hon. Members—because it seems perfectly clear that if hon. Members are to do their duty to their constituents on a matter on which opinions vary, and by which interests of all kinds are very much affected, it is important that this question should not be put beyond discussion in this House.
  There is one other matter to which I hope the Minister will also refer. As far as I can recollect when double summer time was applied during the war the necessary adjustments were made by Order in Council to the licensing laws. The House will appreciate that the closing hour of public houses is a matter which cannot be divorced from hours of work, and that if the time at which work is done is altered it is desirable in certain areas—particularly agricultural areas—to make some adjustment of the hours of closing of licensed houses. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary may be able to indicate that that matter has not been lost sight of, and that some provision similar to that introduced during the war is being considered by the Government. There is no reference to it whatsoever in the Bill, but I have no doubt that the immense powers of delegated legislation to which
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  the Government cling so closely these days would provide a remedy if the Government desired to make one. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour may be good enough to deal also with that point. Finally, I can only say that my attitude to the Bill is that. of the Home Secretary—one of resolute resignation.
  6.20 p.m.
  Mr. Hurd: I wish I could agree with the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter)—
  Major Poole: The Tory Party divided again.
  Mr. Hurd: —in having been convinced by what the Home Secretary said. I thought that the case he made was a remarkably thin one. We have all hoped that there must be some real advantages attaching to summer time. The particular advantages which he laid before us were not very compelling—a saving of fuel of 150,000 tons, a very small quantity, and the possibility that double summer time will enable double shifts to be worked, I assume not only in factories but in transport and so on. We should like to know a little more about the Government's intentions on those lines.
  The Government must have weighed up the pros and cons rather more carefully than they have divulged this afternoon. The gains were outlined by the Home Secretary. The losses of course are on the food production side. It has been mentioned that the agricultural community is being asked to make drastic sacrifices. Please do not let the House look at this question from the point of view of helping agriculture. It is not a matter of helping a lame farmer or a poor farmworker over the stile. It is a matter of enabling the agricultural community to produce what the country must have this year and next year. We have already unhappily tasted a coal crisis. I fear that we shall soon be feeling a food crisis. We have had bad conditions for getting on the land, and the work is much behind. By this Bill we are imposing handicaps on the agricultural community at a time when it needs all the enabling Measures it can possibly get from Parliament.
  What are these handicaps? First, we shall require the working farmer and the farm worker to put in a quite fantastic working week. Already the minimum

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  working week in agriculture is 48 hours. If the farmers and the farmworkers are to get the hay in—a very vital product for next winter's milk—and if they are to do the very urgent jobs that must be done during the summer months, the average working week in farming will be 60 hours. I am sorry to have to say that. I wish it were not—it is much too long—but that is a debit we have to put on one side of the account. While the farming community, both masters and men, are carrying that debit, please do not let us have any more claims for 4o hour weeks or 42 or 44 hour weeks in other industries. It will not go down at all well. We must have some equality of effort and sacrifice in getting this country out of the mess into which it has drifted.
  The other item on the debit side is the overtime which will be necessary for the 800,000 working farmers and farmworkers of this country—I exclude some gentlemen farmers who perhaps may not work the full hours. If they put in the extra time which will be necessary and do the job expected of them it will cost the consumers another £8 million this year. I am sure that the Minister of Agriculture sitting on the Government Front Bench will confirm that the extra cost in overtime arising from the imposition of summer time and double summer time will be recompensed to the farming community. I estimate that about £8 million will be required this season to make up the extra fully-earned pay to the workers and in compensation to the farmers for the extra time they put in. That is an item this House should recognise, because it will come back to the taxpayer or the consumer of food in the very near future.
  I was not convinced by what the Home Secretary said. He could have made out a much stronger case. I most firmly support the Amendment which we shall be considering later that this matter should come up for review each year before this House. We should be given a much clearer and more convincing balance sheet than we have been given this afternoon. The farming community accepts this as an inevitable necessity. We recognise the frailty of our brothers in the towns who cannot work by the sun unless they have an alarm clock set to an artificial time to tell them when they have to get up. We are not convinced, and we hope that in future years a much fuller and more carefully drawn up balance sheet will be pro-
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  vided so that the House will be given all the facts before it imposes summer time in any future year.
  6.27 p.m.
  Mr. John Morrison: I intervene for a minute or two as one who is himself responsible for farming and also as one who represents an agricultural constituency. It has not been strongly enough emphasised that the difficulties of farming have been very grave over recent months. After the very late harvest, autumn sowing on the land has made everything very much behindhand. After that, in this hard weather which we are still undergoing, ploughing and spring work on the farm has been completely stopped, and there is no doubt that it has put the timing of agriculture for production in this year's harvest very considerably behindhand. It has been mentioned that the leaders of the agricultural community accept the imposition of summer time, and no doubt under a feeling of national patriotism they do so, but they only do so owing to the grave crisis. I can assure right hon. Gentlemen opposite that the branches in the country—I attended one on Saturday night—feel very strong regrets and indeed resentment at this necessity, and do not accept the fact that the provisions of the Bill must go on indefinitely.
  A point not previously mentioned is that the person who is more affected by the imposition of double summer time in the countryside is not the farmworker himself, whose difficulties have been mentioned, and not the farmer, whose additional burdens and costs have been spoken of, but the smallholder, the independent man working on his own. He gets up by the sun and goes to bed after shutting up the chickens, at a later hour than would otherwise be the case. Something ought to be done for him. As an independent man, he is not getting the extra ration which is supplied to the agricultural workers, and this longer day will be very considerably felt by such small men. I hope, therefore, that the Government will agree that this Bill should not go on indefinitely, and that next year we shall consider it again if necessary, though we hope very much that it will not be. However, as the number of crises increase, as indicated by my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank), it remains to be seen how many more there will be, by this time next year.
  6.30 p.m.
  Mr. David Renton: I wish to make it clear in the first place that, after very full consideration, I am against this Bill. I do not intend to divide the House on it but it is my duty to my constituents to voice the protest which they have made. In doing so, may I say that although I represent an agricultural constituency, I shall not stress further the disadvantages to agriculture? I intend to go right back to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman who moved the Second Reading of this Bill. He advanced certain reasons which may be summarised by saying that he put forward this Bill in the hope that it would increase output. I think that is a fair summary of his positive arguments. He said that there were disadvantages, but that those disadvantages have to be overlooked in view of the present circumstances so that output may be increased. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that the arguments he put forward about an increase of output are illusory.
  May I quickly run through some of the points which he raised in that connection? He said first that it was necessary to spread the load, to flatten out the peak period. In saying so, I think he was not thinking of fuel economy but of the shift system which it is proposed to introduce. So far as the flattening out of the peak load is concerned, so to rearrange people's lives that they get up during the hours of darkness instead of daylight, is, I think, creating a peak load which could be avoided. If there is an answer to it, I shall be grateful to know. My second point is that the right hon. Gentleman said that this rearrangement of the clock would facilitate the staggering of hours—again, no doubt, referring to the shift system. If it would facilitate that, I would be inclined to withdraw my protest against this Bill, but he merely said that it would facilitate the staggering of hours and did not say why. I am unable to see why, and should be grateful for a further explanation. Surely the main point about the staggering of hours is to stagger them irrespective of the clock. Staggering is a defiance of the clock, and no rearrangement of the clock will facilitate the staggering of hours. At first sight, a legitimate argument might appear to be that people will get more leisure in daylight. "At first sight," I said, but it has to be re-
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  membered that that would be an argument, not merely for a temporary Bill of this nature, but for permanent double summer time and I do not think it is suggested that that should be introduced.
  Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: But it may be.
  Mr. Renton: That may well be, but I think the right hon. Gentleman, in mentioning that, was putting it up as a minor argument. In any event, I doubt whether even that is sufficient advantage to outweigh the many disadvantages which, it is agreed on both sides of the House, are in the proposed system. The position is this: it cannot increase the happiness even of urban dwellers—and I have been an urban dweller as much as a rural dweller—to arrange their lives in such a way that they have to get up in the dark and in the chilly damp of the early morning, when they could get up at a slightly more comfortable hour. Although there are those people who will give anything for an extra hour in the evening, I suggest that they will not enjoy it. I feel bound to point out, having listened carefully to this Debate, that this Bill will be getting a Second Reading merely because most people in this country live in towns.
  Finally, we have to remember that this double summer time will be a great disturbance to that most valuable human perquisite which has something to do with output—sleep. This Bill murders sleep. For those people who have to get up early in the morning, it will mean that in summer they will have to go to bed more nights while it is still light, and before the sun has set, than they would normally have to do even under one hour of summer time, and
  "Sleep, that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care,"
  is a thing with which the Government should be very reluctant to interfere.
  6.36 p.m.
  Mr. Charles Williams: I, unlike most hon. and right hon. Members who have spoken today, do not happen to have a large number of agriculturists in my division, and I would therefore say one or two things about a speech which was made earlier in the day by my hon. Friend the junior Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert). He pointed out that, apart from the agriculturists, there would be another very hard working, very industrious class of

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  men who have great difficulties, at any rate when the weather is bad—the seafaring population. You may alter the clocks, but even this Government—although I do not disclaim that they may be responsible for the weather—cannot as yet completely control the tides, for the tides are governed by certain immutable laws, although I would not be in the least surprised to see the Home Secretary trying to pass a law to do even that. This point was put far better by the junior Burgess for Oxford University than I can put it, but there is a serious problem in connection with navigation and the ports of this country owing to the fact that four times a year there is an entirely artificial change in the clocks, and we are not endeavouring in any way to meet them on that point. That point is worth emphasising as one of the smaller but real objections to this Bill.
  I am sure the Home Secretary must have been pleased that he had such an easy wicket to play on today, because although the House of Commons is entitled to say—whatever the hon. Member for Grantham (Mr. Kendall) may say—"Here is a Bill we accept in principle, here is a Bill against which we do not intend to divide," we still have the right in this House to put the point of view of our own constituents, and we have had the interesting fact that some of the most strongly worded speeches against the Bill have come not from these Benches but from the Benches behind the Government. In other words we have been criticising this Bill today as a Council of State trying to arrive at what is best. The right hon. Gentleman has this further advantage: he knows that there never has been a time in either of the last two wars, or on any other occasion when any section of the agricultural community have not at once worked in accordance with the wishes of the Government of the day and always put the national interest first.
  That is the thing which stands to their credit. There were no strikes, no lockouts, and no trouble of any sort, but they went on quietly doing their job. It showed that they were determined to do their best to help the country. That does not mean that they are complacent. I am not sure that the Minister of Agriculture has not been rather complacent about the burdens put on to the part of the community he is supposed to be looking after. Perhaps he may be speaking later
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  on, and will tell us of the great fight he had to put up for this or that point of view.
  I have one or two words to say in criticism of the Home Secretary's statement. He regretted, and I am sure this was quite genuine, that there was not a regulation under which this could be done. If there had been a regulation, the House of Commons would be silent except that possibly there might have been a Prayer. He naturally rejoiced in it.
  Mr. Ede: I neither rejoiced in it, nor regretted it. I merely made a statement of fact in regard to the history of the matter.
  Mr. Williams: I am very glad to hear that the right hon. Gentleman neither rejoiced in nor regretted it, but merely made a statement of fact. But the whole time he looked very unhappy, and when be said it would not come on next year, he cheered up. I have seldom seen him smile in this House, but I have seen him smile at his own stories. I think he was quite right to emphasise to the House that in considering this Bill we should think of the health of the children. I have had a letter from a school teacher deeply deprecating the fundamentally bad effect of this on children as a whole. I am aware that from certain points of view it is good so far as the towns are concerned. Undoubtedly from the allotment holders' point of view it is a very valuable thing. Probably that is the most valuable thing that will happen, because, generally speaking, anyone working on his allotment works ten times as hard as in a factory. Those two effects may balance each other. But we ought to have a definite inquiry to see what the people who really understand these things believe will be the effect on the people, and especially on the children of the country.
  I have no objection to the Bill coming in today. I fully realise that it has to be brought in, and I recognise that the whole trouble is due to recent circumstances, as the right hon. Gentleman said at the end of his speech. Of course it is. We must blame the storm a little. But people will say that the real trouble is that the circumstances have been so "mucked about" by the Government that this sort of thing has to be done. I was astonished when the right hon. Gentleman was saying so clearly that its effect on agriculture would

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  be bad, that he did not in any way say how the Government were going to smooth that over. That could easily have been done. He could easily have said that as we are piling on the hours for the agricultural labourer, and adding to the burdens on agriculture, we must try to ensure that they have the fullest possible results and that those engaged in agriculture should have as much food as they need, in the same way as the miner gets his coal. The Government might have said a great many other things of that type. I am hoping that these gifts will come out of the mouth of whoever replies to the Debate. I do not know whether the Minister of Agriculture will have the courtesy to get up to reply to many valuable speeches made from back benches, including some of the back benches behind him. I hope he will do so. If not, perhaps the Under-Secretary will reply and he is, of course, a kindhearted man. He may be able to tell us that the time has come to ask the miner to give part of his coal to the agricultural worker. After all, they have five tons to our one, though I will not go into that question.
  I regret that this Bill has to be introduced, but I accept it in the spirit in which I believe the whole House accepts it, that it is a very unfortunate necessity due by 90 per cent. to the Government's mess-up and muddle. I hope this Measure will only last for a year, so that we can have a fuller understanding of those evils which the Home Secretary himself admitted, arose under the previous legislation, and that it will not be made a permanent Measure, until we can have a real inquiry into whether the advantages are really on one side or the other.
  6.49 p.m.
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Ness Edwards): The Debate was opened by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary in a manner which has been commended by both sides of the House. He was followed by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) in very much the same tone. I propose to copy their example, and, if I can, I will endeavour to meet some of the wishes which have been expressed from both sides of the House in regard to certain modifications.
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  If we had not brought the Bill in, the first condemnation we would have had would have been from the opposite side of the House, because this Bill is one of the steps which, in our view, must be taken, first, in order to save fuel and, secondly, to get the most continuous production; and thirdly, it is to create the conditions which will lead to an opportunity to increase the output of coal. I should have said first that we are aware that all the arguments that have been used about the Bill tonight were used in 1925, and during the war, in relation to an exactly similar proposition, for the very reason that during wartime it was necessary to have provision of this sort. Substantially the same reasons apply today. During this Debate we have had echoes not only of the Debates during the war, but of the great controversy of 1925, and, I think, of an earlier Debate when the general principle was the subject of discussion in this House. The Government would not lightly bring this proposal forward, especially double summer time. They would not bring it forward unless they were actuated by motives which were above suspicion, and for reasons of considerable substance.
  It is generally agreed that the burden which is to be imposed upon the agricultural community is a heavy one. The sacrifice that has to be imposed upon them is one which no one likes to impose. In this connection, I wish to associate myself with the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough in paying the compliment he did to the high sense of duty that obviously actuated the President of the National Farmers Union in agreeing to give the fullest cooperation in the implementation of the proposals contained in this Bill. In order that it should be made quite clear, and be put on the record, perhaps I ought to read it. He said that on behalf of the farming community he must repeat and continue to urge the agricultural objections, which would apply with even greater force than usual in the forthcoming summer, in view of the heavy programme in front of the industry, the delay caused by the bad weather and the shortage of labour. He added, however, and I should like to underline this, that nevertheless, the serious position facing the country must be recognised, in spite of the adverse repercussions on the agricul-

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  tural industry. If the Government's proposals were to be carried out, he trusted that, with the full co-operation of the workers, the agricultural output would be maintained in the face of these new difficulties. In my view that is the statement of a man with a high sense of national responsibility, putting aside his narrow industrial interests in the interests of the nation at the present time.
  Sir P. Macdonald: It is not stated in that statement whether the President had consulted with the branches of the National Farmers Union.
  Mr. Ness Edwards: I should imagine that the President of the National Farmers Union is in a good position to know the feelings of the people he represents. That must be the basis on which the Government carry on their negotiations with industry.
  Together with that declaration by the President of the National Farmers Union, I should also like to refer to the appeal made by my hon. Friend the Member for South West Norfolk (Mr. Dye). He appealed to the agricultural workers to give the maximum co-operation, with the farmers, in order to make the best of this situation which has been created for them.
  Mr. Renton: Will not the hon. Member agree that that appeal was made only after the Government decision had been reached, and that the Minister of Agriculture agreed to it without the Agricultural Workers' Union having been consulted? They were merely informed afterwards.
  Mr. Ness Edwards: At all stages, I think, everyone has been aware of the necessity for the measures proposed in this Bill. After all, these discussions are carried on by the Minister of Agriculture. I am advised that both sides of the industry have been informed at every stage. The Government have taken the decision. They do not seek to farm out their responsibilities. The Government have taken their decision, but they have, from stage to stage, kept both sides of the industry informed of the position.
  I come to the point about which most hon. Members have felt aggrieved. It was put by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Gainsborough in the first speech following that of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.
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  The right hon. and gallant Gentleman said that in his view the House ought to have a chance, by means of an affirmative Resolution, of discussing this matter every year. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has authorised me to say that he accedes to that request, and whilst the form of words already proposed may not be acceptable, a form of words will be devised to give effect to that undertaking. That will indicate to the House that in this matter we want to carry everyone with us. We want to do what is right, and to get the largest measure of co-operation in relation to this Bill which we can possibly get, in all quarters of the House and the country. I was asked by the hon. Member for North Cumberland (Mr, W. Roberts) whether or not it was the intention to have summer time in winter. I can give him a categorical undertaking that that is not the intention.
  I was also asked about Northern Ireland. I am informed that this Bill will apply to Northern Ireland in exactly the same way as it will apply in England, Wales and Scotland. The Northern Ireland Government have been consulted, and are in full agreement. In that sense, the full terms of the Bill will apply to Northern Ireland.
  Sir W. Smiles: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would assist the Government of Northern Ireland in getting electricity, poles and plant for the farmers there, as they have half an hour less light in the morning?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: That is scarcely a matter which comes within the terms of this Bill.
  What are we doing to assist the agricultural community? I announced last week that farmers' wives were invited to make their applications now for domestic servants from among the displaced persons. In that way we are giving them a preference over other private households in this country. As soon as the hospitals and institutions are supplied with servants, the farmers' wives are next in order of priority. We hope we shall be able, in this way, to give them some relief.
  I come to the reasons for the Bill from the Ministry of Labour point of view. As my right hon. Friend said, there is an estimated saving in a year, under these proposals, of 150,000 tons of coal. But that saving is estimated on the basis of

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  there being no staggering, either of working hours or of the working week, or of having the double day shift. It is anticipated that we shall get a larger saving than 150,000 tons by spreading the work over the daylight period. The next point is that there is a feeling that by having double summer time, by the proposals of this Bill, we shall be able to work, and more conveniently get, a morning shift and an afternoon shift. If there are night shifts the load will be even more flattened and spread over the 24 hours, but there are great difficulties in working a night shift in many industries, and it is desirable that it should not be done in some industries, but that there should be a morning and afternoon shift Then there is a less load. The tendency is to try to get a staggering of shifts in the morning and afternoon rather than to have a day shift and a night shift. We think these proposals will enable us to get that arrangement far more easily than if we had not got the proposals contained in this Bill. The whole question is the subject of discussion in various localities, and we are satisfied that the negotiations which are going on are taking into account the proposals contained in the Bill.
  Mr. C. Williams: On this figure of 150,000 tons a year, is the hon. Gentleman aware that it was said the other day in the House that the miners themselves have 100,000 tons a week? In other words, this saves only 1½ weeks' supply of miners' coal.
  Mr. Ness Edwards: That is not the end of the story. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will listen to the end of the story in this connection. I said that this Bill does three things. First, it enables us to effect fuel economy; second, it enables us to get continuous reduction of the local load on the generators; and, third, it creates the conditions in which we can get a greater output of coal. It is with that third condition that I wish to deal now. If we have the provisions contained in this Bill we can work the winding and screening at the collieries on two shifts in daylight. We can have a morning shift winding coal in daylight and an afternoon shift employed on winding and screening coal. All will be done in daylight. That means we shall get a better result. The job will be more quickly done. I am sure everyone is aware of the great loss of output
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  which has resulted from the inability to provide empty wagons at the collieries and to get rid of wagons quickly even when they are there.
  We think this proposal will enable us to get a far better clearance at the collieries. If we can have two shifts employed on shunting wagons over a longer period in daylight that, too, will bring a better result. In regard to transport generally on the railways and in the shunting yards, if we can organise two shifts dealing with that work in daylight, we -are bound to get a better result both at the colliery and at the consumer's end. On the question of loading ships at docks, here again we can employ two clear shifts during daylight and that ought to give us a much better clearance in the turn round of ships.
  Sir P. Macdonald: What has that to do with the production of coal at the coal face? That is the cause of the shortage today.
  Mr. Ness Edwards: I would have thought that every hon. Gentleman in this House knew that one of the limiting factors at collieries has been the inability to transport the coal after it is produced. We have lost millions of tons of coal because of the inability of our transport to shift it. These proposals will help to get the clearance of the transport. They will help to get transport moving quickly and regularly.
  Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, is it not a fact that mare coal was transported in January this year than in January of last year?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: If one has due regard to the tremendous quantity of vehicles brought into operation and the terrific efforts that have been made, the number of trains which have been staffed and the concentration of effort, that will be well understood. We want to give the maximum service to the country and not to interfere with the normal services in order specifically to provide rolling stock to shift coal. I am sure that point will be appreciated by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Then there is the question of unloading coal at power station berths. That has been one of the limiting factors in London. If we can have two clear shifts working in daylight, that will help a great deal. Last, but

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  not least, if we have a double shift—a morning and an afternoon shift—employed in open cast mining, both shifts working in daylight, there are very great possibilities that we shall get a very much greater output of coal from this type of mining. Those are the considerations which actuate the Government in bringing forward these proposals. In regard to the one major point upon which the House has pressed for consideration—the question of bringing in the affirmative Resolution—that is conceded. In view of that, I ask the House to give this Bill a Second Reading.
  Mr. Driberg: Before the hon. Gentleman sits down—
  Mr. Speaker: Sir Ralph Glyn.
  7.5 p.m.
  Sir Ralph Glyn: I was loth to interrupt the Parliamentary Secretary because he gave a very full explanation. However, there are three points that I would like to put, which possibly can be answered by one of the right hon. Gentlemen at present sitting on the Government Front Bench. In regard to coal and transport, I would only say that what is wanted is an improvement in the calorific value of the coal which is supplied. I believe it is a fact that the railways of this country have carted something like 8 million tons of dirt through faulty screening. If anything could be done to improve the screening as a result of daylight saving, that would be of great advantage to the industry of this country. Do not let us hear anything more after the passing of this Bill about slate and dirt being delivered to industry to clinker boilers and retard production.
  Another point is that during this Debate various matters have been raised which closely affect agriculture. I hoped that the Minister of Agriculture would have seen his way to get up and give us an assurance that while agriculture—as usual the Cinderella of industries in this country—is going to suffer a loss of anything between £6 million to £8 million in overtime payments, those losses will be made up. I should have thought that the Minister of Agriculture would have seized this opportunity to assure the House that they would be made up, and that the industry would not suffer. It is all very well to say that agriculture is
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  showing a very fine spirit. It certainly is, but it should be remembered that these people have to live and that their position is difficult at the moment. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see his way, before we get to the further stages, to give that assurance.
  A third point which I want to make is in regard to education. The Home Secretary has had very great experience in this connection. I appeal to him, as appeals are being made from the back benches, to consider that this daylight saving business upsets the homes of rural workers especially with regard to school hours. I cannot conceive why it is not possible for the Ministry of Education to give permission to authorities in the counties to enable them to stagger school hours in order to meet the inconvenience of parents. At present it puts a heavy burden on the wife of an agricultural labourer with children who has to arrange food to fit in with children's school hours. The Home Secretary must also be aware of the fact that owing to children running riot in the evenings, and staying up very late instead of going to bed, they frequently get into mischief. One of the things on the debit side in this matter, apart from the effect on the health of children, is the great difficulty which will confront the authorities in keeping children out of mischief and trying to prevent more children drifting into activities which have been such a heavy burden recently on the police forces of the country.
  Mr. Driberg Mr. Driberg rose—
  Mr. Speaker: I thought the hon. Member for Abingdon (Sir R. Glyn) merely wished to ask a question. I am sorry I did not call the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg).
  Mr. Driberg: With regard to the assurance given by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour—for which we are most grateful, and which, as he will agree, was pressed on him by Members on this side as well as in the Opposition—could he say whether Amendments embodying it will be introduced in another place?
  Mr. Ede: I propose to move a manuscript Amendment when we get into the Committee stage, to redeem the pledges which have been given by my hon. Friend.
  Mr. Driberg: Thank you.
  Sir Frank Sanderson: Did I understand the Minister to say that the net saving in coal would be 150,000 tons per year? Is that what I understood him to say?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: I said that the estimate of the net saving due to the introduction of this Bill, without regard to staggering or anything else, was 150,000 tons.
  Sir F. Sanderson: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that that saving is equivalent to the output of coal for one and a half hours? That is the only saving.
  Mr. Ness Edwards: Every mickle makes a muckle.
  Bill accordingly read a Second time.
  Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
  Bill immediately considered in Cornmittee.—[Mr. Collindridge.]
  [Mr. HUBERT BEAUMONT in the Chair]

  SUMMER TIME BILL

    CLAUSE 1.—(Summer time and double summer time for 1947 and subsequent years.
    7.12 p.m.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: I beg to move, in page r, line 17, to leave out "Great Britain," and to insert "England and Wales."
    The purpose of this Amendment, as I think will be quite clear; is to remove Scotland from the operation of double summer time. Let me say at once that I recognise that the Government have gone a long way in forestalling criticism by limiting the incidence of double summer time to the period from 13th April to 10th August, but, even so, this period is a period of 13 weeks, and the imposition of double summer time for one third of a year will have a serious effect upon the agricultural industry, and particularly upon the agricultural industry in Scotland. I will try to show why Scotland is a particular case.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr. Hurd) reminded the House during the Second Reading Debate that we had with us now a fuel crisis, but that we might well have with us before very long a food crisis, and the question of the pro-
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    duction of food depends very much upon this question of double summer time. There is no doubt about the serious effect which the imposition of double summer time will have upon food production and upon the manpower employed in agriculture. There are two points that I want to make in regard to this.
    First of all, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cumberland (Mr. Wilfrid Roberts) said earlier this afternoon that hay was the basis of milk production, and those of us who understand these things know how, at the present time, many stock farmers in Scotland are looking anxiously to the dwindling stocks of hay and wondering whether they will last out during this bad spell of weather. If the sun does not really dry the grass until 10 o'clock by Greenwich mean time, that means, under double summer time, that we cannot get into the fields to deal with the hay harvest until 12 o'clock midday. That means working overtime at the other end of the day, and, even if the workers are prepared to do that, it will add greatly to the cost.
    The second question is about milk. The special difficulty of dairy farmers has been mentioned more than once during the Second Reading Debate. Under the system of double summer time, the cows will have to be milked at something like 2.30 a.m. and 2.30 p.m. The vitality of human beings and of cows is just about at its lowest at 2.30 a.m., and there is no doubt that the milk yield will suffer. The temperature in the byres is about at its highest at 2.30 in the afternoon, and there is little doubt that the quality of the milk will suffer. But it is not only a question of hay and milk. Seeding will be interfered with, as well as turnip sowing and the clipping of sheep. All these things will be seriously interfered with by the imposition of double summer time.
    I had a telegram handed to me as I came into the House this afternoon. It was from an eminent agriculturist whom I have never met, but he sent me this telegram on the question of the Amendment which my hon. Friends and I have placed upon the Order Paper. He estimates—and he is an expert in these matters—that the imposition of double summer time in Scotland, on the terms proposed in this Bill, will mean a loss of two and a half days' effective work per week and a loss of tens of thousands of

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    tons of produce. This is a very serious thing indeed. In the Church calendar, 13th April, on which date double summer time is to be introduced, is Low Sunday, and it will be, indeed, a very sad Sunday for the whole of the countryside in Scotland if this Measure is persisted in. The special difficulties of agriculturists were recognised when the first Summer Time Act was introduced into this House in 1916, when Mr. Herbert Samuel, as he then was, used these words:
    "Of course, agriculturists must work by the sun and not by the clock. That always has been and will continue to be done; consequently, farmers will not really be affected."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th May, 1916; Vol. 82, C. 1321.]
    While it is conceivable that such arrangements may be possible in remote parts of rural Scotland, it is quite clear that it would be impossible in the industrial belt of central Scotland and near large towns, because workers will not work on the farms, or indeed anywhere else, at different hours from those of workers in the rest of the community. The reason is obvious. The shops will be opening and closing, the buses and trains will be running, and all the other services will be operating in accordance with one time, and the hours of work of a certain section of workers would, in this instance, be in accordance with another time. While it is not possible to make a dividing line between town and country, I maintain that it is possible to make a dividing line between one part of the United Kingdom and another. It is possible to make a division between England and Wales, on the one hand, and Scotland on the other.
    I now want to deal briefly with what are, I think, the only two objections that can be raised to that proposal. The first is that we must have one rule for the United Kingdom, and that it is administratively difficult, if not impossible, if there is a division at the Border. To that, I say that it is not really difficult at all. When one travels on a train coming South, one would alter one's watch one hour as one crossed the Border.
    It is exactly what we had to do before the war when we travelled to the Continent. As we stepped ashore from the boat, we altered our watches. My hon. Friend the Member for Galloway (Mr. McKie) reminds me that in America there are differences of time between one State and another, and I am sure that it will
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    be within his recollection that there are differences of time between the towns and the countryside within one State. But that position has not been found to be administratively impossible in America.
    The second objection is that some people might say—indeed, the Home Secretary has said so himself—that they recognise the special difficulties of farmers, and the fact that they are in a difficult position, but that the overriding need at the present time is to save fuel. Of course that is absolutely true, but, as far as the proposal to introduce double summer time affects Scotland, it is not going to save much fuel. First of all I should like to say two things which are germane to the point that Scotland is quite different from England in this respect. There, we have very much shorter hours of darkness during the summer nights, so that, between the middle of May and the middle of July there is virtually hardly any darkness. However early one gets up in the morning, one need seldom put on the light, and however late one goes to bed at night there is no need to use electricity or any other form of lighting.
    The second thing is that there is a proposal to introduce staggered hours of work. It just happens that in the newspaper, the "Evening Express," in which it was first announced that summer time was to be, introduced from 13th April to 10th August this year, the next heading was a rather curious one. It read:
    "Staggering work hours. Government plan will affect 7,000,000. From our Political Correspondent. Government plans for staggering hours of industry and working night shifts in factories… involve about 7,000,000 workers.…"
    If industries are going to stagger their hours of work, they are, surely, going to use almost as much power and fuel during the night hours, because of the people who will work during the night.
    I want to ask the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, who looks as if he is ready to reply to this Amendment, two questions. Has the Secretary of State made any estimate of the saving which would be involved if this Amendment were accepted? Perhaps I should put it the other way round, Has the Secretary of State made any estimate of the saving which will be made in Scotland by the imposition of double summer time during this period? In other words, has he made any estimate of the breakdown of the

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    20,000 tons, which is all that is going to be saved in the United Kingdom by the introduction of double summer time? In parenthesis, let me say what a tiny amount that represents—just one hour's production of deep-mined coal. That is all that is going to be saved by the imposition of double summer time in 1947. I should like to ask the Joint Under-Secretary of State whether any estimate has been made of what is going to be saved in Scotland by the imposition of double summer time. Did the Secretary of State consult representative farming opinion in Scotland before bringing the proposals forward?
    In conclusion, I want to say that I was very glad to hear that the Home Secretary has agreed to the principle of an annual review of this question by the House of Commons. I think that that is a great improvement, because it is becoming a common experience that, once regulations have been made, we are apt to be saddled with them, like the Old Man of the Sea, for much longer than we had anticipated. Farmers thought they had seen the last of double summer time. They are most anxious to play their part in the crisis which they had no part in bringing about, but they want to be sure of the real necessity for proposals which are going to interfere so much with the production of food from Scottish land. That is the reason why I move this Amendment this evening.
    Colonel Gomme-Duncan: I strongly support what my hon. Friend the Member for West Aberdeen (Mr. Thornton-Kemsley) has said, and, in particular, I want to say that a very different atmosphere from that existing earlier in the day has already been produced by the statement made by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour that this matter would come up each year for consideration by this House, and not on a negative Resolution. Let us be frank and say that that assurance has altered the whole complexion of the thing.
    I should also like to know whether farmers, as opposed to the National Farmers' Union, were consulted. I admit that the Minister must say that he has to negotiate with the National Farmers' Union, but I hope he will answer the question whether other farmers were consulted before the decision was taken, and
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    were not merely informed after the decision was made. I want to make it perfectly clear that I have never yet met any farmer in my part of Scotland who was not bitterly opposed to the imposition of double summer time. What we have got to think of is its effect on food production, not the convenience of the individual farmer. Of course, we are in a state of crisis, and we must face unpleasant facts, but I maintain that the question of food production is the most important thing. I have no doubt that a crisis in food is coming along which, I believe, will probably make the crisis in fuel fade into insignificance. I hope that will not be so, but I am afraid that it will. A possible food crisis must be considered very carefully in this matter. No doubt the Home Secretary has plans, which he covers up with his laughter, for dealing with this and helping his unfortunate right hon. Friend the Minister of Food, who is now going round the United States, like Oliver Twist, asking for more, and getting none. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman is going to help him out, as, otherwise, I cannot understand his laughter. But we must be prepared for such a crisis, and must not be caught unaware as we were over the fuel shortage.
    There is one other point. Double summer time is based on two fundamental follies. The first is in thinking that one can get more daylight by advancing the hands of the clock. One cannot get more daylight than there is in 24 hours, do what one will. The second folly is that we have come to believe in our enlightened age that, in order to make people get up at six o'clock in the morning who are unwilling to do so, we have to pull their leg by altering the clock and telling them that it is seven o'clock instead of six. I think that in an enlightened State we have touched bottom in stupidity if we have to say that, and that those two fundamental points show on what a poor basis this proposal of the saving of daylight stands.
    I will not go further, except to say that that is a view very strongly held in my part of Scotland, and they are words which one will hear used there on any market day. I hope that when the Joint Parliamentary Secretary comes to reply, he will give us an assurance on the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for West Aberdeen, and that we shall be able to go back to our constituencies and say

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    that Scotland has been properly consulted on this matter, and will always be consulted before such things are done, and will not just drag along behind the decision of the Ministry of Agriculture. I know that the Joint Under-Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture is in a very strong position. That is why he looks so proud, and I do not blame him. I hope we shall not take much longer over this matter, but it is important to realise that Scotland is in a very different position from England and holds very strong views on the subject.
    7.30 p.m.
    Mr. Boothby: I intend to speak for only a moment or two to say that the fuel crisis has, of course, had certain beneficial effects, in that it has aroused us to the urgency of the situation, but it has also had two most unfortunate results. The first is that it has given the Government the chance of introducing a whole series of Measures which are designed permanently to shatter enterprise, and I think this is one of them. I share the views of my colleagues on this side of the Committee who have expressed their gratitude to the Home Secretary for the concession that he has made. If he had not made it, he would have been faced with a very formidable insurrection from north of the Tweed. We console ourselves, to some extent, by reason of the fact that we shall get the chance of reconsidering this matter in a year's time. But it has further given to His Majesty's Government the opportunity to extend the iron grip of Whitehall over Scotland as a whole, and what we are worried about is that in the whole of this business Scotland has never been consulted. I would be inclined to take a bet that the whole of this summer time proposal was arranged and organised without any reference to the Scottish Office, just as everything else in this country is being organised and arranged without reference to that Department. We are regarded as being far below the status of a Crown Colony in these matters. Never have Scottish affairs been brought to the pass to which they have been brought in the present circumstances.
    Everybody in this Committee knows, except possibly the Government, that the fuel crisis will be succeeded by a food crisis, and in no long space of time. Scotland is a great producer of food, and
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    I suggest that food production in Scotland should have priority over everything else, with the possible exception of the production of coal itself. It has been pointed out in this Debate by my hon. Friend the Member for West Aberdeen (Mr. Thornton-Kemsley) that in Scotland we have much more light than you have in England; it lasts much longer and there is much less darkness. That also applies, of course, in other respects.
    My second point is that cows have always shown an invincible reluctance to changing their habits, and I would point out to His Majesty's Government that cows are not intellectually aware of the existence of the Socialist Government in this country. That is their good fortune. It does not mean that they will conform as readily as the patient and long suffering public to the rigours and hardships which are now perforce imposed as a result of this administration on the people of this country. I would only beg hon. Members to remember that animals cannot be ordered about. They will not play their part in a totalitarian regime in the same way as human beings are expected to. The Government must bear this in mind, and if they take into account the fact that we have more light in Scotland and that our cows do not recognise the existence of the Socialist Government, they will realise that this double summer time, which has a very deleterious effect on food production, ought not to be continued beyond the supreme period of crisis.
    Lord William Scott: I remember very well that about two years ago the hon. Member for West Perth (Mr. Snadden) and I used to make frequent visits to the then Home Secretary in an endeavour to get double summer time removed, and on those occasions we were always told that the chief obstacle was the Minister of War Transport who believed that it would be impossible for the railways to function as was necessary in time of war unless we had double summer time. So it was with some feeling of relief this afternoon that I noticed that the difficulties of the railways were, apparently, completely omitted from our Debate. We have dealt almost entirely on the other side, with the difficulties of agriculture, under this intended scheme. We know that Scotland is more affected, owing to its geographical position, than any other part of Great Britain. The

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    question has arisen as to whether it is possible to separate Scotland from this scheme without any inconvenience to trade and traffic, and the reason for this Amendment is that those who have subscribed to it, or who are speaking on its behalf, believe that such is possible. As one who has lived part of his life in Canada, I should like to tell the Committee that all the year round, summer and winter, in war and in peace, there are three different times in that great Dominion. There is the maritime time on the Atlantic, there is the prairie time, and there is what is known as the mountain or coast time. If one gets into a train on the Atlantic seaboard and travels through the Dominion, one passes through three different times, and one puts one's watch backwards or forwards if so inclined. It has created no difficulties for the Canadians, and I suggest that we in the old country are just as capable of dealing with those difficulties as the Dominions are.
    As regards Scotland, we know this Measure will be a tremendous imposition on agriculture, and when the Joint Parliamentary Secretary comes to reply I would like him to make it clear beyond any doubt as to what consultation has taken place with the farmers of Scotland. I was privileged to attend a meeting of my local N.F.U. on Monday of last week, and at that meeting the one predominant hope was that I would be able to do something to mitigate the danger of having summer time or double summer time once more imposed upon them. I told them that the least we could fear was that we should have it as a temporary measure. I do not believe the Home Secretary can appreciate what a load was lifted off many of us when we learned this afternoon that this will be merely a temporary Measure. It makes the whole difference to the hard working community engaged in agriculture in Scotland to know that this is merely a temporary Measure. But there is one thing which they will want to know, and that is the expected saving which will be achieved, first of all by the ordinary summer time, and secondly by the double summer time as it affects Scotland. I suppose that of a figure of 150,000 tons of coal, it might be suggested that one sixth of it might be attributed to Scotland, but, with its peculiar geographical position and its long hours of daylight, I would be very much
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    surprised when the reckoning was made, to find that more than 10,000 tons of coal were saved.
    Let us remember that quite a large percentage of Scottish power originates from water and not from coal. I would like the Parliamentary Secretary to tell us what the burden that has been put upon Scottish agriculture is likely or expected to save in terms of tons of coal. It would be interesting to see how that would work out in actual practice over a number of months. I hope that reasons will be given for resisting this Amendment, other than that of the railways, because I understand no difficulty has ever been met in any other country from the point of view of railway or road traffic, on the question of the change of hours. There is very good reason for believing that Scotland might be exempted from this Measure.
    Mr. Gallacher: The hon. Member for East Aberdeen (Mr. Boothby) did not have to tell us that cattle were not intelligent. The fact that they have tolerated the landlords for so long, is enough to convince anyone of that.
    Mr. Boothby: I should like to point out that I never said cattle were unintelligent. I said they were intellectually unaware of the existence of the present Government. That seems to me to be the highest form of intelligence.
    Mr. Gallacher: Which means they were unaware of any change taking place, and unaware of what was going on. If the cattle had sufficient grey matter, the landlords would have been chased off the land long ago. The hon. Member said that there will be a food crisis; that we are living in a period of general crisis, and this is the final and fatal crisis of the whole system. Everyone knows there is a fuel crisis, a food crisis and a crisis in housing; it is just a continuous state of affairs. I return to the question of double summer time. I am glad it is to be for only a year, and that then we can reconsider it. While I do not accept the argument put forward in regard to the differences in the Dominion of Canada when travelling 3,000 miles East or West, it is obvious that people's watches have to be changed owing to the natural course of the sun. Anyone travelling East towards Germany has to change his watch when he gets into Germany. But a different situation arises if you have two countries in the relative positions of England and Scotland, and

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    two different times in the day. In America, where they have different legislation for the various States, all kinds of confusions arise between States. Anyone travelling there realises the confusion that exists.
    Mr. McKie: Why?
    7.45 p.m.
    Mr. Gallacher: Maybe the hon. Member for Galloway (Mr. McKie) has a mind that is accustomed to dealing with all kinds of puzzling situations, and this sort of difficulty does not affect him in the least. At any rate, I experienced a lot of difficulty and a certain amount of confusion. Of course, some hon. Members opposite will say I am more or less always in a state of confusion. As has been mentioned, in Scotland—and the Joint Under-Secretary should take note of this—for a considerable part of the summer, from the middle of May till well on into July, no one considers the dark; only the latter part of the gloaming and the early part of the dawn are considered. At 10 o'clock at night it is still daylight, and with double summer time it means it will be daylight at midnight. Now if anyone has to get up at five o'clock in the morning it means going to bed at about 10 o'clock at the latest; but anyone doing that would go to bed in daylight. Then he is supposed to sleep in the hours of daylight and get up before daylight has arrived, between the gloaming and the dawn. That is certainly not a healthy situation, neither for the people of the country nor for the people of the towns.
    Up to the moment, nobody seems to have suggested that the townspeople will be troubled by this. For many years I had to get up at half-past four in the morning in order to get to my work, and that was not beneficial. After many years of that sort of thing it was discovered it was much more beneficial to production to start work at seven or eight o'clock instead of at six o'clock; that meant getting up at about half-past six. After the 1914–18 war that new system, of starting at eight o'clock, was found to be much more beneficial. Now, we are to go back from eight o'clock to six o'clock, although we do not put it that way; we simply say that we are still getting up at half-past six and starting work at eight o'clock. In point of fact, we are returning to what was recognised to be very undesirable from the point
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    of view of production. When the eight o'clock start was introduced it proved to be much better from the point of view of production. Therefore, I ask the Minister to consider this very seriously, particularly in regard to the way in which it affects Scotland.
    If we had double summer time in England and a different time in Scotland, I am afraid all kinds of confusion would arise. There are a number of examples which I could give, but I do not desire to put forward a number of particular points at the moment. For example, the railway service has been mentioned. There might be goods going into Scotland from England early in the morning, but owing to the difference in time, there would be nobody to attend to them. There might also be difficulty in regard to the sending of messages and news. I admit it would be very advantageous to the "Daily Worker," so far as the Scottish edition was concerned, because we have always had great difficulty in getting it up there early in the morning However, I am certain there are many disadvantages, and it would cause great confusion. At the same time, understanding the situation in Scotland, we must all recognise that double summer time cannot possibly help production, either in the towns or in the country, in Scotland.
    Sir William Darling: This is a very important matter, and I hope our English friends will bear with us in our examination of it. This Bill to amend the Summer Time Acts has a certain melancholy satisfaction for me. It was first introduced into the House of Commons on a Private Member's Bill. It is rather Gilbertian that this Government, which has been less mindful of Private Members' opinions than any previous Government, should now rest upon the late Mr. William Willett for salvation in their hour of need. But I let that pass. I think it is worth bearing in mind, however, that sometimes Private Members can give to this House of Commons some ideas which even powerful Governments may desire, in the future, to use for their safety.
    It is difficult for me to understand the reluctance of the Government—and I imagine there is some reluctance—to accept this Amendment. I agree with my hon. Friends, that there has not been much consultation on this matter. The

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    Government Front Bench has fewer Scotsmen on it than any Government Front Bench for the last 25 years. [An HON. MEMBER: "A hundred years."] It is doubtful if they know that Scotland is comparable with the land of the midnight sun, that we have light continuously during the summer months, and that this is a determining factor in this consideration. I want to know from the Joint Under-Secretary, if he will help me, why he insisted, with the authority of his youth and capacity, on having the Health Bill for Scotland. Why did he insist on having an Education Bill for Scotland?
    The Deputy-Chairman (Mr. Hubert Beaumont): The hon. Member is now far away from the Bill.
    Sir W. Darling: I was referring to the Amendment, and attempting by illustration, which, I thought, was quite effective, to show that the Joint Under-Secretary and his colleagues in the Scottish Office have, for good reasons, separated Scotland from its senior partner in health, education, and in agriculture; and I was wondering whether there was some reason—the fact that you called me to Order indicates there is some reason—why, in this case, they are following the example of the Civic Restaurants Bill, in which they first included and then excluded Scotland.
    The Deputy-Chairman: This has no relation to the Amendment. There is no occasion to remind the Committee about those Measures.
    Sir W. Darling: I am grateful for your guidance, Mr. Beaumont. As you rightly point out, there is no occasion to remind the Committee, for it is very well within the memory of Scotch Members. Apart froth this important question of the daylight which we have in Scotland—for four months of the year there is really no dark at all—there are some other considerations. In Scotland, our electricity power is produced by water, and the Summer Time Acts have no bearing on that fact. It is also to be borne in view, I think, that Scotland is unique in this respect, that it exports to England and Wales fuel and power—it exports coal, and it exports electricity on the grid. We are exporters in this sense, and Scottish public opinion will have that very clearly in mind when this Bill is made known to it. We are,
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    also, as I am reminded by my hon. Friends, who are more closely associated with agriculture than I am, a food-exporting part of the United Kingdom, the only food-exporting part of the United Kingdom. The only cereal which is exported from this country is Scottish oatmeal. That, surely, is very relevant; and there are considerations of that character which must weigh very strongly with us. I farm, I am engaged in distribution, and I am also chairman of an electrical business which produces plant—
    Mr. Willis: On a point of Order. Are we discussing an Amendment to the Bill, or the interest in electricity of the hon. Member, or the exports of Scotland?
    The Deputy-Chairman: We are discussing an Amendment to the Bill, and at the present moment the hon. Gentleman is in Order.
    Sir W. Darling: I thought the hon. Member for North Edinburgh would like me to refer to an important Edinburgh business—
    Mr. Willis: I am not a director of that industry.
    Sir W. Darling: The hon. Member may not be a director, but I think that, like his right hon. Friend the Minister of Fuel and Power, he will appreciate the importance of those engaged in the electricity industry, and the importance of the manufacture of transformers and generators. It would seem to me that, if we want to make up for the shortage of fuel and power which has arisen through the crisis, consideration should be given to the industries to which I refer, which are not getting any exceptional priority. We are told that the saving will be 150,000 tons of coal. That means a saving of something like 10,000 tons in Scotland by this Measure if it is carried through. I submit that the saving is a very trifling one when we bear in mind that Scotland is a fuel and power exporting country. To take from us this 10,000 tons of coal and present us with double summer time is a bargain which will not be acceptable to Scottish public opinion. Scotland wants to know what steps the Secretary of State has taken to bring before the minds and eyes of his colleagues in the Cabinet that Scotland has longer daylight than England. The Lard

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    President of the Council, happily, last summer visited Scotland, and one of the observations he made was how long the daylight lasted, though the days were not long enough for the opportunities he wanted to admire Scottish ways of life. I am sorry he is not here tonight, because he would have had that in mind—that Scotland is in a different latitude, which gives her a greater length of daylight. If the Government have that in mind, they cannot do otherwise than accept this Amendment.
    Major McCallum: I want to ask the Joint Under-Secretary of State if he will reply to the question already put to him. What saving in fuel, coal fuel, will double summer time effect in Scotland? It will be nil. What is obvious is, that this Bill is being applied in this way to parts of the country in a phase of panic. It will be within the memory of this Committee that, when the electricity cuts were first brought in, and the order went out that everybody was to switch off lights from 8.30 or 9 o'clock in the morning, until noon, and so on, it was naturally pointed out very rigorously in certain parts of Scotland that they could supply their own light by hydro-electricity. Yet that electricity had to be cut off. It seems to me that the decision to include Scotland in this double summer time proposal has been arrived at in the same panic-stricken way. I would ask the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland to remember that there are large parts of Scotland, particularly in the Highlands and other agricultural parts, where, instead of welcoming double summer time, even during the war, they refused to have it. They carried on their farm operations in accordance with sun time. It would save a great deal of trouble to Scottish agriculture if double summer time in Scotland were abolished and it would not lose the Government, or the Minister of Fuel and Power, one fraction of an ounce of coal.
    The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Thomas Fraser): I am going to suggest at the outset that the Opposition have not made a case for their Amendment. Indeed, I suggest that we have mainly had a continuation of the Second Reading Debate. I am disappointed, because I thought hon. Members were going to advance cogent reasons why this Bill should not apply to Scotland. [HON.
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    MEMBERS: "We did."] They have not advanced such arguments at all. First they adduced all the agricultural arguments against the Bill that were adduced throughout the Second Reading discussion. Those arguments were, indeed, equally applicable to the whole of the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Hear, hear.
    Mr. Fraser: The only point made by hon. Members opposite was that in summer time the hours of darkness are shorter.
    Mr. McKie: In winter the hours of darkness are longer.
    Mr. Fraser: Yes, in winter the hours of darkness are longer, but this is the Summer Time Bill.
    Mr. McKie: It prolongs it a single hour.
    Mr. Fraser: This is dealing with summer time. It was not argued that the longer daylight hours in summer time in Scotland made double summer time less necessary to enable double shifts to be worked, and so on, in other industries. That argument was not made, although the Parliamentary Secretary, in winding up the Second Reading Debate, put great stress on the advantage of double summer time, in that it will enable double shifts to be worked in industries where they will not otherwise be possible. Industrial workers work, not to the sun, but to the clock. Hon. Members in speaking to this Amendment did not make that argument at all, and if they had I would have admitted that in fact—
    8.0 p.m.
    Mr. Gallacher: Is the hon. Gentleman not aware that the double shift can work very effectively at the present time from 6 o'clock to 10 o'clock, without making any change in the clock?
    Mr. Fraser: Yes, in midsummer, and I was just proceeding to confess that the argument on those grounds for double summer time was not so good in Scotland as it is in England. I confess that straight away, but I would remind hon. Members that, likewise, the fact that we have shorter hours of darkness in summer in Scotland makes the inconvenience rather less to agriculture in Scotland than it is to agriculture in England and Wales. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Hon. Mem-

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    bers seem to forget that we have longer light in summer time because, in the North, the sun rises earlier than in the South and sets later. We have longer daylight hours than they have in the South.
    Lord William Scott: Surely, the Joint Under-Secretary, who deals with agriculture in Scotland, knows that the reason why Scotland feels this double summer time more than the Southern part of England is purely a question of dampness in gathering the crops, whether hay or corn? That dampness is prolonged longer into the day in Scotland than it is in England, and it is not a question of how many hours of daylight there are, but of how long that dampness lasts on the ground.
    Mr. Fraser: It may be a fact that the dampness in the North makes it a great inconvenience to the agricultural community to have this movement of the clock during haymaking time, and it would equally be an inconvenience during the corn harvest, but it cannot have escaped the notice of hon. Members that whereas the farmers in England will have started, and in the very far South will not only have started but have finished, their corn harvesting operations before double summer time comes on, the farmers in Scotland for the most part will not have started corn operations when double summer time comes on. Taking the hay making and the corn harvest together, it will be found that the Bill makes even less inconvenience in Scotland than it does in the South. However, we are not boasting about that at all; we do not like it, it will not be welcomed by the farmers, we all know that, and the Home Secretary, in moving the Second Reading, admitted it. The confession was again repeated by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour in winding up. I would remind hon. Members, when they talk about the difference in hours of daylight between England and Scotland, that really the great industrial Clydeside is not so very far North of Tyneside. It is very convenient for hon. Members when talking about the difference between Scotland and England to compare the far North of Scotland, the land of the midnight sun, with Somerset or Devon. I ask them to remember that industrial Clydeside, where such a large part of the population
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    of Scotland works and lives, is not in fact so very far North of industrial Tyneside.
    I have been repeatedly asked what the fuel saving in Scotland would be. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, replying to the Second Reading discussion, made it perfectly clear that the case for this Bill does not by any means rest entirely on the fuel that will be saved in consequence, and I think my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, in moving the Second Reading, was very careful not to put too much stress on the amount of fuel to be saved. I cannot tell hon. Members precisely what the fuel saving in Scotland will be. All the advantages adduced by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary in speaking for the Government during the Second Reading Debate in regard to England and Wales are equally applicable as regards Scotland.
    Major McCallum Major McCallum rose—
    Mr. Fraser: No, I do not think I can give way. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary talked about the movement of coal from the pit tops. Is it pot equally important that, during the summer months, we should endeavour to facilitate the movement of coal from the Scottish pit tops, as we do from the English and Welsh pit tops? I ask hon. Members to believe that this double summer time will be a very great convenience in many of our coal mines in Scotland. I have worked in the coal mines in Scotland, in mines miles from the main road, where one had to walk across the moors for miles to get to the pit top. In the winter double shifts could not be worked at all, and in the summer double shifts could be worked only with great inconvenience, and with the work stopping whenever darkness came down at night. This double summer time proposal will enable more work to be done in the late evenings in those coal mines.
    Sir W. Darling: In the pits?
    Mr. Fraser: Yes, in the pits, because if the coal is not taken straight away from the pit tops the men down below cannot go on mining the coal and shovelling it up to the pit tops. Hon. Members conveniently forget that the transport of coal, the taking away of the coal from the pit

    325
    tops as it comes up from the pit, is very essential if there is to be continuous work underground.
    The other question I was repeatedly asked was whether there had been proper consultations with the farming community in Scotland or whether—as it was alleged, "as usual"—a decision was taken in England and we in Scotland were just tacked on.
    Sir W. Darling: Like the civic restaurants.
    Mr. Fraser: The answer is that I invited the officials of the National Farmers' Union in Scotland to come and talk to me at the same hour as the National Farmers' Union officials came to talk to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture. [An HON. MEMBER: "In London?"] I had my discussions in Scotland, in Edinburgh, but my right hon. Friend had his discussions in London. The point is made that it was after a decision had been taken. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, replying to the Second Reading Debate, said that we were not farming out our responsibility on to any other people; we in the Government had to take the decision, we kept these people informed, we had discussions with them, we discussed with them the inconvenience to which agriculture would be put and we did not expect the National Farmers' Union officials to say that agriculturists would welcome this proposal. Of course they will not, they do not like it, nor do the agricultural Ministers like it very much, but the officials of the National Farmers' Union have recognised, although they make their protest and put their agricultural arguments, the inevitability of this Measure in the circumstances. That is the position. There have been the same discussions in Scotland as there have been in England and Wales. I submit that, at the outset of the discussion on the Amendment, hon. Members opposite rather announced beforehand that much of their thunder had been stolen by my right hon. Friend agreeing to make this Measure subject to continuance after one year only by affirmative Resolution. I submit that a good case has not been made for treating Scotland differently from England. After all, we live in a very small island, and the American analogy is not worthy of consideration. As my hon. Friend the Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher)
    326
    said, there is every reason for setting the clock to suit the sun in a vast country like the United States of America or the Soviet Union. If there were the same time in New York as in Los Angeles—
    Mr. Boothby: It is not a question of East to West, but of North to South. The hon. Gentleman does not seem to grasp the light business. May I remind him that a clear photograph was taken of South Street in Aberdeen in the middle of the night and subsequently published under the libellous title "Aberdeen on a Flag Day?"
    Mr. Fraser: I have replied to the point about the longer hours of daylight in Scotland and I have given it as my opinion that that being so, the inconvenience is perhaps rather less to Scottish farmers than it is to English farmers, arid the argument in favour of the application of the Bill to Scotland is almost, if not quite, the same as it is in regard to the rest of the United Kingdom. I do not think any hon. Member on any side really thinks that it is feasible to have two different sets of time in Great Britain.
    Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: I have great sympathy with the Joint Under-Secretary of State, especially when, belonging to a naturally argumentative race, he pointed out that we had not advanced all the arguments against the Bill that we might have done. "A Daniel come to judgment" he pointed out that, as there was longer daylight in Scotland, summer time was not, in fact, as necessary in Scotland as in England. I do not know whether the Home Secretary will thank him for pointing out an omission in the arguments which have been brought forward from this side, or whether he will, in fact, say that his business was not to bring forward a complete argumentative case for the Bill, but to get the Bill through as soon as he could. He brought forward only one argument in favour of getting the Bill now, namely, the undertaking not to prolong it after another year; but as I listened to the argument, I was not sure that he was not withdrawing on that point also. We would prefer that this should be a Bill for a year. What we feel is that the procedure of affirmative Resolution will be used to prolong this Bill. I would like to know, before we part from the Measure, on which leg the Government are standing. Are they standing on the

    327
    leg that this Bill is only for year with a chance of its being prolonged, or on the leg that this is a Bill which may possibly go on from year to year? It makes a great difference to us in Scotland. We have no intention whatever of suffering this process year after year in Scotland.
    8.15 p.m.
    Sir A. Herbert: Or in England.
    Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: That may be, but I merely say that, as far as Scotland is concerned, if it is intended to continue this, English Members will need to look out for themselves but we in Scotland in another year will certainly not permit this process to be continued. I counsel my hon. Friends on this occasion, the Ministers having made their concession and having asked for it on bended knees—[Interruption]. I never heard a responsible Minister bring forward a Bill and say that he hated it very much, that he was willing to change it from a permanent Measure into a Bill to be carried on from year to year at the sufferance of Parliament, and then on that understanding beg the House, in view of the muddle into which the Government had got, to give them the legislation for one year only. That is what I call bringing forward a Bill on bended knees. [Interruption.] Nobody knows which way the knees of the hon. and learned Member for North Hammersmith (Mr. Pritt) bend.
    We are discussing a matter which is of importance to us, and indeed, of very great importance to us, North of the Tweed. I do not think the Joint Under-Secretary of State gave full weight to the arguments which had been advanced—the argument of geography, the argument that Scotland was a self-supplier—both these arguments of very great importance—and that Scotland was an exporting country. The hon. Gentleman did not give full weight to those arguments; nor did he give weight to the fact that the great industrial region of the Clyde to which he referred, although it may not lie very far North of Tyneside, lies a great way West of Tyneside, and that alters the incidence of daylight and dark in the community of the Clydeside. The real danger is that the Government, having found this way to make overdrafts on the sun, may be led into further and further desires to live, in this as in other things, on overdrafts, and that, although the Home Sec-
    328
    retary has said that the Government do not now desire to prolong summer time into the winter, this may be the beginning. That is a very serious hardship as far as the Clydeside is concerned. As the hon. Gentleman well knows, to have the dark prolonged until half-past nine or twenty minutes to ten, as it is under summer time, in the winter in the Clydeside is a serious handicap to the industrial community there, and if we are to be dragged at the tail of the English decision on this, we may find that we are simply dragged at the tail of the English later on in regard to prolonging this into the winter months also.
    For these reasons, I do not feel that the Under-Secretary of State has fully met the case which has been made from this side. The industrial argument which he brought forward was, admittedly, an argument that he was unable to substantiate. He said he was not able to give any indication of the saving in coal which might result, although the Home Secretary was able to give a fairly close estimate of the saving in coal which he thought would result from the Measure. The Under-Secretary of State said he thought it might be an advantage in coal mines, although there it seems to me that one has an argument which is not in favour of dispensing with the Measure, because, as far as we can see, coal mining will be a very essential industry for some time to come, and any Measure which could produce any more coal would be very desirable, and, therefore, the argument which the hon. Gentleman brought forward with regard to coal would justify the Government in maintaining this Measure from year to year for some considerable time to come. The Under-Secretary of State made the best case he could, but I do not feel that he made a case which could do more than justify me and my hon. Friends on this occasion, and for this occasion only, holding our hands and saying we will not press the matter to a Division; but the hon. Gentleman did not justify the Bill as now drawn, and did very little to justify the Bill even drawn in the terms in which it will be after the Home Secretary has acceded to pressure from this side, and inserted a provision concerning an affirmative Resolution which, in the first place, he was unwilling to grant.
    Mr. McKie: I shall, of course, comply with the request made by

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    my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Scottish Universities (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot) to hon. Members on this side to hold their hands on this occasion, but I must say—and I hope the Under-Secretary of State will take my words in good part—that I was disappointed by the tone of his reply. As I listened to the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland I thought that he had rather missed the atmosphere of the Committee. That was not the case when the Home Secretary made his statement earlier in the evening. The Under-Secretary handled the matter in a rather different way, and I am sure that he did not show a just appreciation of the values to which hon. Members on this side of the Committee attach such great importance in connection with this matter.
    The Under-Secretary of State made great play with what he described as the long periods of daylight which we have in Scotland in the summer months. He made a reference to the dairy farming situation in Scotland. I was fortunate enough to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, during the Debate upon the Second Reading. Therefore I shall not go with the same attention of detail into some of those wider aspects of the subject into which I should be quite justified in going and raising again on this Amendment.
    I do, however, want to enter a caveat in regard to what the Under-Secretary of State said about dairy farming in Scotland. It is, of course, true that in the summer months we do have a very long period of light. We might almost say:
    "There shall be no night there."
    When we have double summer time, our dairy herds will be milked as usual in 1947, but instead of being milked at the normal time of half past four or five o'clock in the afternoon, it may actually be half two or three o'clock in the afternoon. I am sure that the Under-Secretary of State will remember, on reflection, that in Scotland that part of the day is sometimes even hotter, on a warm summer day than the noontide hour. There is not the same justification for asking us to milk our cows earlier in Scotland as there might have been in respect of English and Welsh dairy herds.
    I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman failed to catch the atmosphere of this
    330
    Debate, but I would like to ask him two questions. First of all, in reply to my noble Friend the Member for Roxburgh and Selkirk (Lord William Scott) he said that he had met in London, with his right hon. Friend, representatives of the farmers. I understand the hon. Gentleman to be indicating dissent. I understood him to say that he had had conversations here in London.—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] The OFFICIAL REPORT tomorrow will decide between us. Are we then to understand that there have been no conversations? Did not the hon. Gentleman say that conversations had taken place somewhere with representatives of the National Farmers' Union of Scotland? I do not think the hon. Gentleman was asked this further question, so I will ask him now: I will ask him whether any conversations were initiated with representatives of the Farm Servants' Union of Scotland. The Minister of Agriculture was pressed yesterday upon that point during Question time, in respect of the agricultural workers of England and Wales. In his reply to the question and also in reply to the supplementary question, that Minister gave a most evasive answer indeed.
    Can the Under-Secretary give me any answer at all to my question? I am not suggesting, and I am sure that my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Scottish Universities will not suggest, that the farmers of Scotland fail, as dairy producers, to realise the gravity of the present situation. They certainly do realise it, but they very much resent the imposition once again and in time of peace of the double summer time period. They resent it all the more because it is an imposition which might have been avoided if due foresight had been exercised and proper provisions had been made. I will not elaborate that point, Mr. Deputy-Chairman. The spirit of patriotism has always animated the agriculturists of Scotland, particularly those in the extreme South-West corner where is situated the constituency which I have the honour to represent. It is a great dairy producing area. It is the largest branch of agriculture in the constituency. The dairy farmers there very much resent the imposition of this double summer time.
    I will end by saying that I wish the hon. Gentleman had caught the spirit of

    331
    the Committee this evening better than he did and that he had replied in the same spirit as was exhibited by the Home Secretary earlier in the afternoon when he gave us an assurance that this matter of double summer time will be subject to annual review by this House, inasmuch as yearly legislation will be necessary—if the present Government exists for another year. I hope that the succeeding Government will not be so foolish as to run itself into the mess which the present Government has brought upon itself, and which has resulted in the Measure which has been before the House this afternoon.
    Nevertheless, the Under-Secretary of State has gone some way to meet us. If he had not done so, we should certainly have been minded to divide upon this Amendment. I deplore the way in which the Under-Secretary addressed the Committee, and I ask him once again to give an assurance about consultation with the farmworkers. Such consultations should be a matter of great importance to a Socialist Under-Secretary of State as well as to the party which he represents, and I hope he is in a position to say something about them.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: My hon. Friend and I intended to divide the Committee upon the Amendment. Since then there has been an announcement that the Bill is to have a limited life of one year. That concession makes a great difference to Scottish farmers, who do not wish to be behind their English colleagues in making a contribution, however slight it may be, to a solution of the fuel crisis. That being so, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    8.30 p.m.
    Captain Crookshank: I beg to move, in page 1, line 19, to leave out Subsection (2).
    This Amendment is one of a series, which stand or fall together. The purpose of them I can indicate briefly. The object of the Clause is to lay down that during this year's crisis, summer time will last between 16th March and 2nd November, and that the period of double summer time will last from 13th April to 10th August. The Bill goes on to say that for any other year, from 1948 onwards, a new procedure is introduced. I understand that the Government of the day either can do nothing at all, in which
    332
    case the ordinary statutory summer time will go on, or can decide that there shall be a different period of ordinary summer time; or they can decide that there shall be a different period of ordinary summer time and also of double summer time. If they decide on either of these two, they can make a draft Order in Council, which, under the Amendment proposed by the right hon. Gentleman later on, will be produced to this House in draft, and, therefore, can be debated on the affirmative procedure. It seems to me that under this Subsection summer time can be, in spite of what the Joint Under-Secretary said, introduced throughout the year. There is nothing to limit that happening, as was done in the war.
    The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Ede): It was not limited in wartime. It was actually done in wartime.
    Captain Crookshank: I know it was done in wartime. I used the word "limit" in the sense that there is nothing in this Subsection which prevents that happening in peacetime. We did it in wartime under Defence Regulations, but the same powers are inherent under this Subsection. I wanted to be sure that in passing this Subsection, among other things, we are making it possible for summer time to be introduced throughout the year, as it was during the war, by Order in Council. That seems to me to be a very great change in policy. Up till now, with the exception of during the war, the Act of years ago passed out of the consideration of this House. The hon. Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert) wants to bring it back and have the issue raised again, according to his speech on the Second Reading, but in normal years we did not debate the question of summer time, and it automatically came along each year. I am surprised that any Government looks forward to this as being a question for annual debate, which seems to me to be what will happen in future. I should have thought they would be much happier to leave things as they were, taking special powers for the year 1947, which we have already granted, and leaving it at that. That is the object of these Amendments.
    We have heard three Ministerial speeches today, and one of the oddest things which seems to emerge about this fuel crisis, or power crisis, as I see it

    333
    described in some newspapers, is what an extremely small amount of coal has made all the difference. In the first place, it was the small amount of coal which made the difference between adequate stocks to carry us over the II or 12 days, and here the difference in saving of fuel is only about 150,000 tons. One hopes that all these factors will have been got right after 1947, and for that reason it makes it unnecessary for the Government to take these powers in perpetuity. If through some mischance we cannot build up the stocks, or provide the generating plant necessary during the next 12 months, then it would be much better for the Government to come down to the House again and say that they require another Act for another year before going back to normal, leaving the question of summer time on the Statute Book for good and all. I did not realise how pessimistic the Government were about our prospects. I hoped they would not find it necessary to bring about this considerable hardship to great sections of the community for any period longer than necessary. I think it would be neater and tidier that we should make this Bill the 1947 Summer Time Act, and leave it at that.
    If, next year, it is necessary to have a different form of summer time from that which is on the Statute Book—and I am not persuaded that it will be necessary—then the best thing that the right hon. Gentleman can do, in the circumstances, is to ask the House for the powers he then requires, and to give us what he cannot give us now—a real balance sheet. One of my hon. Friends, who is very knowledgeable in these matters, estimates that the cost to the agricultural industry may be as much as £8 million, and that the extra labour may well run into 10, 12, or 15 hours a week per workman. These are very serious factors. If it is necessary for that sort of expenditure in time and labour to be continued after 1947, we say that the right thing for the Government to do is to come to the House, with all the formality and importance of a Bill which can be amended, as distinct from an Order in Council, which cannot be amended. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will, on mature reflection, be willing to accept this Amendment.
    Mr. Ede: The right hon. and gallant Gentleman has placed his case before the Committee, as I heard his right hon. Friend the Member for North Leeds (Mr.
    334
    Peake) say, most persuasively, but I am not like the king in the Scriptures, who was almost persuaded. I think it would be misleading the country—something which I am exceedingly reluctant to do—on this matter if I were to accept the Amendment on the arguments which have been put forward. I was careful this afternoon, as I was when I made the original announcement last week, not to base any part of the case for this Bill on the absolute saving of fuel. If all we were to get out of this Bill was a saving of 150,000 tons of fuel, it would be quite wrong of us to ask the country to submit to the- inconveniences that the Bill inflicts. At no stage have I put that forward.
    I cannot believe that anyone expects that our electrical generating plant can be raised to such a capacity next year as would enable us to feel that we should not have to resort to something of this kind—not for the same period—next year. If I were to accept the Amendment it would be thought that I had accepted the view that there is some way out of that position. Generating plant of the magnitude we require cannot be picked up and installed at such short notice. As I understand the position, the generating capacity of our electrical plants is about 8½ million kilowatts. The maximum that the plants may be called on to carry is about 11 million to 12 million kilowatts.
    That will leave a margin that cannot be covered by a collection of small isolated plants, although that may help in dealing with the situation in particular localities, and in carrying out certain works, such as the conversion of coal burning plant to oil and the erection of oil burning plant. Work of that magnitude cannot be carried out in anything like the time which the right hon. and gallant Gentleman would ensure, if this Amendment were carried. I cannot, for these reasons, accept the Amendment. I desire, and His Majesty's Government desire, to make it quite plain to the country that, in this particular matter, with which we are mainly concerned, the difficulties which will confront us will certainly continue next year, and will also influence the course of industry, and the range of hours to be worked, in the following year. That arises from the fact that, during the war years, orders were not given for this plant. No one is to blame for that. Had the orders been

    335
    given, the plant could not have been made, when we were devoting all our energies to the production of war material in the places where this plant is generally made. Therefore, the immediate action of the Government has no bearing on the position in which the Government finds itself, and I cannot mislead the country by accepting this Amendment.
    I authorised the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour to make an offer in the course of his reply to the Second Reading Debate, which was generally welcomed in the House at the time. I have promised, on the next Cause, to move an Amendment which will ensure that this matter will be brought before the House, for as long as it is necessary to vary the Statute provisions for summer time, by submitting an affirmative Resolution asking the House to confirm a draft Order in Council. That will ensure that, every year, it will be the duty of the Government to place a Resolution on the Order Paper of the House and, in as much as it may be an important matter, I have no hesitation in promising that it shall be put down for discussion at a time of day when it is possible to have a reasoned and sustained argument upon it. We do not propose to treat it like a Sunday cinema opening Order such as we have on the Paper this evening, when my very presence, on one occasion, to move it, incited the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to inquire whether there was not something extraordinary about the Order, because a Secretary of State thought it necessary to move it. We intend to treat this matter seriously.
    As soon as it is possible to avoid these variations from the Statute period of summer time, it will not be necessary to submit such a Resolution to the House, and, of course, it will be open every year to the House to contest the Resolution on the ground that the circumstances which made the Bill necessary this yeas no longer remain, at any rate, to the extent which is foreshadowed in the draft Order. to which the Resolution will be related.
    Sir Alan Herbert: Will it be possible to amend the Order?
    8.45 p.m.
    Mr. Ede: It will not be possible to amend the Order, but in the event of its being unacceptable to the House—as Orders have been in the past—it could
    336
    of course be withdrawn and a new one submitted. That is not unknown, although I admit it is unusual. I think it ought to be noted that I was pressed for some amendment by hon. Members on my own side of the House as well as by hon. Members opposite. In all the circumstances I feel that the offer I have made to the Opposition is a very fair one, and I want to emphasise that I will not do anything which leads the country to think that as far as concerns the generation of electricity and the moving of coal from the pits short term remedies are likely to be successful. I wish, as I am sure does every hon. Member, that it were otherwise, but I am compelled to make it plain that on those two issues, which are the important matters dealt with by this Bill, we cannot lead the country to believe that the difficulties will be confined to this year only.
    Captain Crookshank: The right hon. Gentleman has made his position clear. He thinks that if he accepted the Amendment it might give a false impression of how quickly we can get out of our difficulties. Of course, it also bears the contrary interpretation of showing to the world into what difficulties the Government have allowed the country to get without any preliminary warning. All this argument about the lack of generating power has only burst upon the conscience of this country within the last few weeks. There were no preliminary rumblings or warnings about it, and to that extent I can see the right hon. Gentleman's difficulties.
    Mr. Ede: Before the war I was very closely connected with the administration of the distribution of electricity in this city, and I knew at that time that we were, on occasion, shedding loads and that certain generating stations were sometimes in great difficulties. Naturally, those difficulties have greatly increased during the war as the result of increased consumption and the obsolescence of some of the plant. I assume that that was not known to people other than those connected with the technical side of the industry.
    Captain Crookshank: That is so, and that is why it has all come rather as a shock and a surprise to the nation. What the right hon. Gentleman has so very properly said this afternoon, warning us

    337
    that it may continue, is all to the good because in the past we have not had sufficient authoritative warnings of the dangers into which we were drifting.
    Mr. Gallacher: There is a reason for that.
    Captain Crookshank: Has the Communist Party a view?
    Mr. Gallacher: It took a matter of 18 months before we could realise to the full the extent of the mess which the Tories had left behind.
    Captain Crookshank: That is a very odd commentary from the hon. Gentleman because I had understood from what had been said in previous Debates that one of the difficulties and one of the reasons for the shortage was that so much plant had been sent voluntarily and freely to Russia. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman was not aware of that, but it has certainly been stated here as being one of the contributory causes of the shortage in this country. We quite recognise the position of the right hon. Gentleman with regard to the electricity undertakings, and we very much welcome his statement that in due course he intends to move an Amendment which will make it unnecessary for my right hon. Friend and myself
    to move Amendments directed to a similar purpose, in order to make it necessary for the Government to bring down a draft Order in Council each year, if they wish to extend the powers, or change the dates in order that it may be discussed here.
    The right hon. Gentleman has gone further and said that so far as he is concerned he would see that those Draft Orders came down and were debated at a reasonable hour in the day. All that is most satisfactory. What is still unsatisfactory is that in all that procedure it is impossible to amend a draft Order in Council, and our view is that it would be better to make this Act the 1947 Act and leave it at that. We do not want to prolong the argument any further. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will recognise that we want to make our protest on that point. If my hon. Friend is prepared to ask the Committee to come to a decision now, that ends that subject for this evening and we will go on to discuss the Amendment my hon. Friend has offered which makes it unnecessary to proceed with our other Amendments.
    Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out to the word 'any' in line 19, stand part of the Clause."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 282; Noes, 120.

    Division No. 102.]

    AYES.

    [8.51 p.m.

    Adams, Richard (Balham)

    Buchanan, G.

    Driberg, T. E. N.

    Adams, W. T. (Hammersmith, South)

    Burden, T. W

    Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)

    Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)

    Callaghan, James

    Dumpleton, C. W.

    Alpass, J. H.

    Carmichael, James

    Durbin, E. F. M.

    Anderson, A. (Motherwell)

    Castle, Mrs. B. A.

    Dye, S.

    Anderson, F. (Whitehaven)

    Chamberlain, R. A

    Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

    Attewell, H. C.

    Champion, A. J.

    Edwards, John (Blackburn)

    Austin, H. Lewis

    Chater, D.

    Edwards, N. (Caerphilly)

    Awbery, S. S.

    Chetwynd, G. R

    Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

    Ayrton Gould, Mrs. B

    Cobb, F. A.

    Evans, E. (Lowestoft)

    Bacon, Miss A.

    Cocks, F. S

    Evans, John (Ogmore)

    Baird, J.

    Collick, P.

    Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)

    Balfour, A.

    Collindridge, F.

    Fairhurst, F.

    Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J.

    Colman, Miss G. M.

    Farthing, W. J.

    Barstow, P. G.

    Comyns, Dr. L.

    Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)

    Barton, C.

    Cook, T. F.

    Follick, M.

    Bechervaise, A. E.

    Cooper, Wing-Cmdr. G.

    Forman, J. C.

    Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J

    Corbet, Mrs. F. K. (Camb'well, N.W.)

    Fraser, T. (Hamilton)

    Berry, H.

    Corlett, Dr. J.

    Freeman, Maj. J. (Watford)

    Bing, G. H. C

    Corvedale, Viscount

    Gaitskell, H. T. N

    Binns, J.

    Cove, W. G.

    Gallacher, W.

    Blackburn, A. R.

    Daggar, G.

    Ganley, Mrs. C. S

    Blenkinsop, A.

    Daines, P.

    Gibson, C. W

    Blyton, W. R.

    Davies, Edward (Burslem)

    Gilzean, A.

    Boardman, H.

    Davies, Ernest (Enfield)

    Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

    Bottomley, A. G.

    Davies, Harold (Leek)

    Goodrich, H. E.

    Bowden, Flg.-Offr. H. W.

    Davies, Hadyn (St. Pancras, S.W.)

    Gordon-Walker, P. C.

    Bowles, F. G. (Nuneaton)

    Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)

    Greenwood, Rt. Hon. A. (Wakefield)

    Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl, Exch'ge)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Grenfell, D. R.

    Braddock, T. (Mitcham)

    Deer, G.

    Grey, C. F.

    Brook, D. (Halifax)

    Delargy, H. J.

    Grierson, E.

    Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)

    Diamond, J.

    Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

    Brown, George (Belper)

    Dobbie, W.

    Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanelly)

    Brown, T. J. (Ince)

    Dodds, N. N

    Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

    Guest, Dr. L. Haden

    Mathers, G.

    Smith, H. N. (Nottingham, S.)

    Guy, W. H.

    Mayhew, C. P.

    Smith, S. H. (Hull, S.W.)

    Haire, John E. (Wycombe)

    Medland, H. M.

    Solley, L. J.

    Hale, Leslie

    Mikardo, Ian.

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Hall, W. G.

    Millington, Wing-Comdr. E. R.

    Soskice, Maj. Sir F.

    Hamilton, Lieut -Col. R.

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Sparks, J. A.

    Hardy, E. A.

    Moody, A. S.

    Stamford, W.

    Harrison, J.

    Morgan, Dr. H. B.

    Steele, T.

    Hastings, Dr. Somerville

    Morley, R.

    Strauss, G. R. (Lambeth, N.)

    Haworth, J.

    Morris, p. (Swansea, W.)

    Stross, Dr. B.

    Henderson, A. (Kingswinford)

    Mulvey, A.

    Stubbs, A. E.

    Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)

    Murray, J. D.

    Summerskill, Dr. Edith

    Herbison, Miss M.

    Nally, W.

    Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)

    Hewitson, Capt. M.

    Naylor, T. E.

    Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

    Hicks, G.

    Neal, H. (Claycross)

    Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)

    Hobson, C. R.

    Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)

    Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)

    Holman, P.

    Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

    Thomas, I. O. (Wrekin)

    House, G.

    Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)

    Thomson, Rt. Hn. G. R. (Ed'b'gh, E.

    Hoy, J.

    Noel-Buxton, Lady

    Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

    Hubbard, T.

    Oldfield, W. H.

    Tiffany, S.

    Hughes Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Oliver, G. H.

    Timmons, J.

    Hughes, H. O. (W'lverh'pton, W.)

    Orbach, M.

    Titterington, M. F.

    Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)

    Paget, R. T.

    Tolley, L.

    Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

    Paling, Rt. Hon. Wilfred (Wentworth)

    Tomlinson, Rt. Hon. G.

    Irving, W. J

    Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)

    Turner-Samuels, M.

    Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.

    Palmer, A. M. F.

    Ungoed-Thomas, L.

    Jeger, G. (Winchester)

    Pargiter, G. A.

    Vernon, Maj. W. F.

    Jeger, Dr. S. W. (St. Pancras, S.E.)

    Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)

    Viant, S. P.

    John, W.

    Pearson, A.

    Walkden, E.

    Jones, Rt.. Hon. A. C. (Shipley)

    Peart, Capt. T. F.

    Wallace, G. D. (Chisiehurst)

    Jones, D. T. (Hartlepools)

    Piratin, P.

    Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)

    Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)

    Poole, Major Cecil (Lichfield)

    Warbey, W. N.

    Keenan, W.

    Popplewell, E.

    Watkins, T. E.

    Kenyon, C.

    Porter, G. (Leeds)

    Watson, W. M.

    Key, C W.

    Pritt, D. N.

    Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)

    Kingdom, Sqn.-Ldr. E.

    Proctor, W. T.

    Westwood, Rt. Hon. J.

    Kinley, J.

    Pursey, Cmdr. H.

    White, C. F. (Derbyshire, W.)

    Kirby, B. V.

    Randall, H. E.

    White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

    Kirkwood, D.

    Ranger, J.

    Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

    Lee, F. (Hulme)

    Rankin, J.

    Wigg, Col. G. E.

    Leonard, W.

    Reid, T. (Swindon)

    Wilcock, Group- Capt. C. A. B.

    Lewis, T. (Southampton)

    Rhodes, H

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Lindgren, G. S.

    Ridealgh, Mrs. M.

    Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

    Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.

    Robens, A

    Williams, D. J (Neath)

    Logan, D. G.

    Roberts. Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)

    Williams, J. L. (Kelvingrove)

    Longden, F.

    Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)

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

    Lyne, A. W.

    Rogers, G. H. R.

    Williams, W. R. (Heston)

    McAdam, W.

    Ross, William (Kilmarnock)

    Willis, E.

    McEntee, V. La T

    Royle, C.

    Wills, Mrs. E. A.

    Wilmot Rt. Hon J

    McGhee, H. G

    Sargood, R.

    Wise, Major F. J.

    Mack, J. D.

    Scollan, T.

    Woodburn, A.

    McKay, J. (Wallsend)

    Segal, Dr. S.

    Woods, G. S.

    Mackay, R. W. G. (Hull, N.W.)

    Sharp, Granville

    Wyatt, W.

    McKinlay, A. S.

    Shawcross, C. N. (Widnes)

    Yates, V. F.

    Maclean, N. (Govan)

    Shawcross, Rt. Hn. Sir H (St. Helens)

    Young, Sir R. (Newton)

    McLeavy, F.

    Shurmer, P.

    Younger, Hon. Kenneth

    MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)

    Silverman, J. (Erdington)

    Zilliacus, K.

    Macpherson, T. (Romford)

    Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)

    Mann, Mrs. J.

    Simmons, C. J.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES

    Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)

    Skinnard, F. W

    Mr. Snow and

    Marquand, H. A.

    Smith, Ellis (Stoke)

    Mr. Michael Stewart.

    NOES.

    Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.

    Corbett, Lieut.-Col. U. (Ludlow)

    Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)

    Assheton, Rt. Hon. R.

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

    Harvey, Air-Comdre. A. V.

    Baldwin, A. E.

    Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.

    Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C.

    Barlow, Sir J.

    Crowder, Capt. John E.

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Beechman, N. A.

    Darling, Sir W. Y.

    Herbert, Sir A. P.

    Bennett, Sir P.

    Dower, Lt.-Col. A. V. G. (Penrith)

    Hogg, Hon. Q.

    Birch, Nigel

    Drayson, G. B.

    Hollis, M. C.

    Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)

    Duthie, W. S.

    Hulbert, Wing-Cdr. N. J.

    Boothby, R.

    Elliot, Rt. Hon. Walter

    Hurd, A.

    Bossom, A. C.

    Foster, J. G. (Northwich)

    Jennings, R.

    Bower, N.

    Fraser, Maj. H. C. P. (Stone)

    Keeling, E. H.

    Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.

    Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.

    Kendall, W. D.

    Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.

    Gage, C.

    Kerr, Sir J. Graham

    Bullock, Capt M.

    Gammans, L. D.

    Lambert, Hon. G.

    Byers, Frank

    Gates, Maj. E. E

    Langford-Holt, J.

    Challen, C.

    George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)

    Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.

    Channon, H.

    Gomme-Duncan, Col. A. G.

    Lindsay, M. (Solihull)

    Clarke, Col. R. S.

    Grant, Lady

    Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)

    Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.

    Granville, E. (Eye)

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir H.

    Conant, Maj. R. J. E.

    Grimston, R. V.

    MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.

    340

    341

    McCallum, Maj. D.

    Osborne, C

    Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray)

    MacDonald, Sir M. (Inverness)

    Peake, Rt. Hon. O.

    Studholme, H. G.

    Macdonald, Sir P. (I. of Wight)

    Pickthorn, K.

    Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd't'n, S)

    Mackeson, Brig. H. R.

    Pitman, I. J.

    Teeling, William

    McKie, J. H. (Galloway)

    Ponsonby, Col. C. E.

    Thornton-Kemsley, C N

    Maclay, Hon. J. S.

    Pcole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)

    Vane, W. M. F.

    Macmillan, Rt. Hon. Harold (Bromley)

    Prescott, Stanley

    Wadsworth, G.

    Macpherson, Maj. N. (Dumfries)

    Price-White, Lt.-Col. D.

    Walker-Smith, D

    Maitland, Comdr. J. W.

    Raikes, H. V.

    Watt, Cir G S. Harvie

    Manningham-Buller, R. E.

    Rayner, Brig. R.

    Wheatley, Colonel M. J.

    Marples, A. E.

    Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)

    White, Sir D. (Fareham)

    Marsden, Capt. A.

    Roberts, W. (Cumberland, N.)

    White, J. B. (Canterbury)

    Marshall, D. (Bodmin)

    Robinson, Wing-Comdr. Roland

    Williams, C. (Torquay)

    Medlicott, F.

    Ropner, Col. L.

    Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)

    Molson, A. H. E.

    Savory, Prof. D. L.

    Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

    Morrison, Maj. J. G. (Salisbury)

    Scott, Lord W.

    Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl

    Mott-Radclyffe, Maj. C. E.

    Smithers, Sir W.

    York, C.

    Neven-Spence, Sir B.

    Snadden, W. M.

    Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)

    Nicholson, G.

    Spence, H. R.

    Noble, Comdr. A. H. P

    Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Orr-Ewing, I. L.

    Strauss, H. G. (English Universities)

    Major Ramsay and

    Lieut-Colonel Thorp.

    Question put, and agreed to.

    9.0 p.m.
    Sir A. Herbert: I beg to move, in page I, line 19, to leave out from "to," to "His," in line 20, and to insert:
    "the year of 1948."
    I do not wish to detain the Committee, and I am still more anxious that the Committee should not detain me. On the Second Reading of this Bill I explained the reasons for this Amendment. It should be read in conjunction with my proposed new Clause, which provides:
    "The Summer Time Acts, 1922 and 1925 shall cease to have effect on the thirty-first day of December, nineteen hundred and forty-eight."
    Briefly, the effect is to give the Government this power in this year of crisis and, alas, possibly in the next year of crisis, but to provide the whole summer time business shall be repealed on 31st December, 1948. I will not weary the Committee with the reasons why I consider that to be a good thing. In his Second Reading speech the Home Secretary kindly indicated that he had some sympathy with my point of view, but he said that because of the present crisis, we must have it this year and, because of the position of generating plant, we may need it in the second year. So far we are in agreement, and if he does not accept my Amendment but likes to insert "1949" or 1950 on the Report Stage. I do not mind. Surely, however, His Majesty's Government must have some idea when things will be easier. I give them two years. I am optimistic, perhaps, and the right hon. Gentleman may say, "No, not even in two years is there any hope of it being better." I am anxious, however, that the principle of summer time should be introduced only temporarily and, if necessary, reviewed
    342
    and brought up again.
    I am not impressed by some of the right hon. Gentleman's arguments except in so far as one is impressed by any crumb which falls from the rich man's table, because the principle of summer time will remain on the Statute Book, reviewable every year in the form of a Statutory Order, but not capable of Amendment. All my hon. Friends will be able to do will be to criticise whether it starts on 3rd April or 4th May, or whatever it is. In other words, the principle of summer time is one which I hate and detest. The Home Secretary expressed sympathy with my Amendment, and I hope that he will accept it, or that he will, between now and the Report stage, introduce an Amendment making it the year 1949, or 1950, or any year in which he thinks the crisis will have ceased.
    Mr. Wilfrid Roberts: Another point which arises is that there are great objections to legislation by Order in Council, whether there is an affirmative Resolution or not—
    The Chairman (Major Milner): I am sorry, but that is not under discussion. The question is whether the Order should be restricted to the year 1948, and the form of Orders in Council is not under discussion here.
    Mr. Roberts: If I might finish my sentence, I think it is relevant. The House decided on that issue, and I was going on to say that if this Amendment were accepted by the Home Secretary, then, after 1948, he could do what, to my mind, is the right way of dealing with this, that is, introduce another Bill, which would be subject to Amendment, and provides an opportunity for a very much fuller discussion than an annual Order in

    343
    Council of whatever sort. It would provide at the end of the period of two years, which the Home Secretary says is the period for which he is sure he requires this, an opportunity for a complete review of the position. The hon. Member for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert) hopes that summer time can be completely done away with in two years' time. Some of us would like to hope that that may be so, but the Home Secretary may not be so confident. This Amendment would still give that opportunity, and would leave it open to the right hon. Gentleman to introduce a short Bill, which would be much better than having a Resolution, and would give the House the opportunity of a much fuller discussion. I hope the Amendment will be favourably considered.
    Mr. Ede: For the reasons I gave in regard to the last Amendment, I cannot accept this Amendment. I think that if the hon. Member the junior Burgess for Oxford (Sir A. Herbert) wishes to have this issue raised, he must seek some other opportunity of raising the general issue of the continuation of summer time.
    Sir A. Herbert: How and where?
    Mr. Ede: I am not this evening going to do anything which would indicate that the difficulties I alluded to on the last Amendment can be overcome in their entirety by the end of 1948. I deprecate the use of the word "crisis" as indicating the state of affairs that I expect at that time, but that we shall be in difficulties, with regard to the matters which have been mentioned time and again, at the end of 1948, I have no doubt at all. That is the attitude I have adopted since the beginning of this Parliament when I was asked to curtail other arrangements I had to place before the House. For those reasons, I cannot accept the Amendment, although I stand by everything I said with regard to my personal position, and only my personal position, when I spoke on the Second Reading.
    Sir A. Herbert: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his kindly tone, but when he suggests to me that I can raise the main subject in some other way, I ask him "When and how?" I said, on Second Reading, that the Government have taken away Private Members' time; otherwise, I could introduce a Bill on a Friday to abolish summer time, and have it discussed. That has all gone, and I am sure
    344
    that it will not come back during this regime. I cannot raise it on the Adjournment of the House because it would involve legislation, and there is no other way of doing so, other than on this particular Bill.
    The Chairman: The abolition of summer time really does not arise on this Amendment. I have given the hon. Member the junior Burgess for Oxford University (Sir A. Herbert) some latitude, and I hope that he will not go further into the question of the repeal of summer time, which does not arise on this Amendment. It is not competent to discuss that.
    Sir A. Herbert: The right hon. Gentleman said that I could raise the general issue on some other occasion. I say that it is not possible. The other thing I would say is that I have offered the right hon. Gentleman the opportunity of saying that 1947 is no good, that 1948 is no good. Then why not 1949? Surely he can issue a challenge to the world that we hope that things will be better by 1949, so that we may have some hope? If he is wrong he can bring forward another Bill. But I do not wish to labour the matter. I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman cannot be more accommodating. As I do not wish to detain the Committee, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
    Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
    Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    CLAUSE 2.—(Provisions as to Orders in Council under S.I.)
    Mr. Ede: I beg to move, in page 2, line 15, to leave out Subsections (2) to (4), and to insert:
    "No Order in Council shall be made under this Act unless, after copies of the draft thereof have been laid before Parliament, each House presents an Address to His Majesty praying that the Order may be made."
    That carries out the promise I made earlier. I hope that it will be acceptable to the Committee.
    Amendment agreed to.
    Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Clauses 3 and 4 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Bill reported, with an Amendment; as amended, considered.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That the Bill now be read the Third time."
    Mr. Ede: I would like to express my thanks to the House for the temper in which this discussion has been conducted, and for the rapid progress they have enabled the Government to make with this Measure.
    Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed.

POLISH RESETTLEMENT BILL
Order for Consideration, as amended, read.
"Bill, as amended, re-committed to a Committee of the Whole House in respect of the Amendment to Clause 1, page I, line 7, standing on the Notice Paper in the name of Mr. Ede."—[Mr. Ede.]
Bill immediately considered in Committee.
[Major MILNER in the Chair]

POLISH RESETTLEMENT BILL

  CLAUSE I.—(Power to apply Royal Warrant as to pensions etc. to certain Polish forces.)
  9.15 p.m.
  The Secretary of State for Home Affairs (Mr. Ede): I beg to move, in page I, line 7, to leave out "while serving," and to insert "in consequence of service."
  This is a drafting point that was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) on the Committee stage. It does more clearly indicate that people are entitled to pensions under this Measure.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
  Bill reported, with an Amendment; as amended (in Committee and on recommittal) considered.

  NEW CLAUSE.—(Provisions as to discipline and internal administration of certain Polish forces.)
  (1) The Polish forces mentioned in paragraphs (a) and (b) of subsection (1) of section one of this Act shall be under the command of a person of British nationality appointed by the Secretary of State, being a person appearing to him to have a good knowledge, and to be experienced in the administration, of British military law, who shall be called the Administrator of Polish forces under British command and is in this section referred to as "the Administrator."
  (2) Members of the said forces shall be under obligation to observe, in matters concerning
  346
  their discipline and internal administration, the rules in force as to those matters under the law of Poland on the first day of January, nineteen hundred and forty-five, and a member of any of the said forces who contravenes or fails to observe any of the said rules in relation to which a punishment is thereby prescribed shall be guilty of an offence against this section and shall, on conviction thereof in accordance with the provisions of this section, be liable, subject to the provisions of this section, to the punishment prescribed by those rules:
  Provided that no person shall be liable by virtue of this section to the punishment of death.
  (3) Jurisdiction to try members of the said forces alleged to be guilty of such contravention or failure as aforesaid, and to award sentence on conviction thereof, shall be vested in the Administrator and shall be exercisable by him in accordance with such procedure and in such manner as he may determine, and he shall have power for the purposes of his jurisdiction under this subsection to administer oaths.
  (4) The Administrator may exercise in relation to members of the said forces all such powers as are conferred by the said rules on naval, military and air force courts and authorities.
  (5)The Administrator may delegate, generally or in particular cases, to such person or persons as he may think fit, power to do things that are within his jurisdiction or power under the two last preceding subsections, and any such delegation may limit the exercise of a jurisdiction or power so delegated as respects the measure of punishment that may be awarded thereunder or in any other respect, or make it subject to confirmation or review by another such person or persons or by himself or to any other conditions, and may include power to sub-delegate:
  Provided that no person shall be imprisoned, or shall be held in detention for any period longer than three months, pursuant to any sentence of imprisonment or detention awarded in exercise of any jurisdiction or power delegated as aforesaid unless the sentence is confirmed by the Administrator.
  (6) His Majesty may by Order in Council provide for the application to the said forces, subject to such adaptations, modifications and exceptions as may be provided by the Order, of subsections (2) to (5) of Section one, Section two and subsections (2) and (4) of Section three of the Visiting Forces (British Commonwealth) Act, 1933, and any Order made under this subsection may be varied or revoked by a subsequent Order in Council.
  (7) In the case of any act or omission constituting an offence against this section which also constitutes an offence apart from this section, nothing in the preceding provisions of this section or done thereunder shall affect any jurisdiction to try a member of the said forces for the offence apart from this section in respect of such an act or omission, and when a member of the said forces has been convicted or acquitted on such trial there shall

  347
  be no jurisdiction to try him under this section in respect of the same act or omission.
  (8) As respects any period between the first day of January, nineteen hundred and forty-five, and the passing of this Act, the powers conferred by subsection (1) of Section one of the Allied Forces Act, 1940, shall be deemed to have been exercisable in relation to the said forces by reference to the law of Poland in force on that day and as if the said forces had not ceased to be recognised by the Government of Poland, and any Order in Council made under or by virtue of that Act shall be deemed to have had effect accordingly.—[Mr. Ede.]
  Brought up, and read the First Time.
  Mr. Paget: On a point of Order. I apologise in advance if this is a somewhat substantial point of Order, because it raises a question of considerable constitutional importance. My point of Order is that this new Clause is out of Order as being outside the scope of this Bill. To put the matter in slightly different words, it is out of Order because it raises principles to which this House has not given a Second Reading. The principles of this Bill are that it is to provide machinery for absorbing the Polish forces into our Constitution and to make our Ministers responsible for them. The first seven Subsections of the new Clause have that same principle. They are there for the same purpose—to bring the Poles within the rule of our law and to make the Minister responsible for them. I do not take any objection to the first seven Subsections. Indeed, I have another proposed new Clause on the Order Paper which is designed to preserve the principles of those seven Subsections, should my submission on this point of Order be successful. My criticism is directed to Subsection (8). I say that that raises a new principle, involving that which is fundamental in our Constitution and our principles of civil liberty.
  That Subsection is, I submit, contrary to the fundamental principle that no man within the jurisdiction of our law, whether he be an alien negro slave, whether he be an Irish rebel, bearing French arms, shall be deprived of his liberty save by due process of law, and that no man shall be punished save for a breach of the known laws of the land. That is the principle here involved.
  The situation at the present moment is this. A number of people within our jurisdiction have been, and are being, unlawfully deprived of their liberty.
  348
  That situation has arisen by reason of the fact that the Visiting Forces Act provided that the powers there conferred Upon the authorities of armed forces in this country, were only such powers as were conferred upon them by the law of their country. With regard to Poland, when the visiting army of Poland ceased to be recognised by the Government of Poland, there was no power at all, and hence, from that date, people in those forces have been imprisoned for things which were not crimes, by courts which were not courts and are serving purely illegal sentences. The question was decided by the courts on an application for a writ of habeas corpus by Eugenius Zytomerski. When the matter came up, the writ was granted, and then the matter came before the High Court. I am glad to see that the learned Attorney-General is in his place; because in this case a man was imprisoned without any justification in law at all. [Interruption.] What happened was that—
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): The hon. Gentleman is now arguing the question on the merits. I understood that he was raising a point of Order.
  Mr. Paget: I am raising a point of Order, but I am afraid I was diverted. These people are at present unlawfully detained. What are the points of principle raised by this new Clause—points of principle to which this House has not given a Second Reading? The first point of principle is that the new Clause is an act of indemnity. It forgives those who have committed wrongs against the civil liberties of individuals within our jurisdiction. I do not say whether it is right or wrong in these circumstances. It may be right, but it raises an important principle. It is a serious matter. Not only are we forgiving wrong-doing, but we are saying to people who have been unlawfully deprived of their civil liberties that they are to be denied a remedy which the courts would give them. It may be right to do that, but it is a matter of principle that is wholly extraneous to this Bill, and one to which this House has not given a Second Reading.
  The second principle which this new Clause raises is the principle of attainder. This Bill provides that people who are at present in prison for no offences against the law, because they have been sent there by officers who have no authority under

  349
  the law and by courts which are not courts under the law, these people who are today wrongfully deprived of their liberty, shall stay in prison. That is attainder, and it has the further effect that, since they are to stay in prison by Act of Parliament, they can only be let out by Act of Parliament. Nobody can review these sentences. Under this Bill, the Polish authorities cease to exist. The new administrator does not take over. It may be right, or it may be wrong. I do not know, but I do say that it involves a new and important principle which does not arise under the Bill.
  Finally, the third new principle raised under the Bill is the principle of indulgence. What this new Clause says, in effect, is not that a man shall be forgiven for the sins he has committed up to date, but that he shall be forgiven for the sins he is going to commit up to the time that this Bill receives the Royal Assent. This is the first time on which this Parliament has ever been asked to pass an indulgence for invasions of civil liberty yet to be committed. That may be right, or it may be wrong, but, in my submission, it raises a principle. Indeed, it is the principle upon which Martin Luther challenged the Church of Rome, the princple of indulgence. It may be that all the 97 reasons against that principle were bad reasons; I do not know. This House does not know, because this House has not considered this principle on Second Reading, and it is a principle wholly extraneous to this Bill.
  This is a Clause of hidden pregnancy. I say that it should not be allowed to proceed to a concealed birth. It may be necessary that these things should be done, but, in my view, they should be done in a proper, constitutional manner, and the principles which they involve should be considered by this House on Second Reading. This House has always been jealous of the principle of civil liberty, and it is a principle which we should guard. There may be occasions on which we ought to depart from it, but it should only be departed from after due consideration, and not in a hole and corner manner such as by a Clause introduced for the first time on the Report stage.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I understand that the hon. Member has been good enough to submit his grounds to Mr. Speaker, and Mr. Speaker has given his Ruling as follows. He says:
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  "The question I am asked to decide, in so far as it is a question of Order, is whether Subsection (8) of the new Clause to be moved by the Home Secretary is so alien to the purposes of the Bill as to put the Clause itself outside the scope of the Bill. The purposes of the Bill are set out in detail in the long Title. There are some half dozen. The purpose of the proposed new Clause is not one of these, and I must have regard to the scope of the Bill. I find that the scope is of such a miscellaneous character that I cannot hold that an additional provision for the internal discipline of certain Polish Forces is alien to it, though, of course, it necessitates an addition to the Title. I understand that the hon. Member does not dispute that the new Clause, apart from Subsection (8), is within the scope of the Bill. The grounds on which he objects to the Subsection are really no more than arguments on the merits. It is true that the Clause has retrospective effect, but that does not make its inclusion in the Bill out of Order."
  Mr. Speaker says that these and other objections should be raised on the Clause. I see that the hon. Member has an Amendment on the Paper, which would give him an opportunity of doing so.
  Mr. Mikardo: Further to that point of Order. I understood from the Ruling which you have just been good enough to read to the House, Major Milner, that it is Mr. Speaker's view that the Clause would demand an addition to the Title of the Bill. Does this not mean that so long as the Title remains as it is at present, and in anticipation of the passage of any Amendment altering the Title, it must, therefore, be out of Order to consider a Clause which is out of Order so long as the Title remains as it is?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: No, there is an Amendment down which, in due course, if the- House approves, will amend the Title.
  9.30 p.m.
  Mr. Mikardo: With great respect, may I submit that, supposing it came about that when we reached the Amendment seeking to alter the Title, this Amendment were defeated, clearly the Clause which we should then have passed would be out of Order, because the Title would then not fit it?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: One must presume that the House acts consistently and that, having made one Amendment, it makes another appropriate Amendment to deal with that Amendment.
  Mr. Leslie Hale: I rise for the purpose of submitting two points of Order. The first one, which I submit with great respect, is whether it is in the power of the Chair to give a Ruling on a point of Order submitted to the Chair outside the House and ruled in advance of the Debate or of the hearing of the argument submitted in this House. The second point of Order which I desire to raise on this new Clause, which is quite different from the one put by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), is that this new Clause seeks to impose or provide for the administration in this territory of a wholly new system of law which is not understood by any Member of this House; which, so far as I am aware, is in a language which is not known by any Member of this House; which is not defined in the Clause; which is described as the law of Poland on 1st January, 1945; which may be the law of Poland or the law of Germany or the law of Russia, according to whether one accepts the rule of de facto or de jure law; which must be interpreted by some tribunal; which can in this country only be determined by one tribunal which, I submit, must be the Royal Courts of Justice of this land, and which, under the terms of this Clause, will be called upon to make a decision upon Polish law which they do not understand, to give a Ruling on the date when Polish law ceases to define to whom it applies and in respect of whom it is to be administered, to decide whether an appeal lies under the provisions of this Measure to the courts of Germany or Poland or to the courts of this country—
  Mr. Speaker: That is a very excellent argument against Subsection (8), but it is not a point of Order.
  Mr. Hale: May I, with respect, add one sentence? The point I am trying to put is that for the first time in a 100 years, this Clause is bringing the Parliament of this country into conflict with the judiciary in a way in which the judiciary would have a right to say that Parliament, for
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  the first time in its sovereign history, has attempted to pass an Act which it is not entitled to pass.
  Mr. Speaker: That is a good argument, but it is not a point of Order. That argument can be made when the Amendment is moved in due course.
  Mr. Pritt: On a point of Order. I would venture to put a point very shortly, following upon what my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) has said. There must be a difference between what can be argued against the merits of a Clause and what may be submitted as being out of Order. Surely, it is clear that Subsection (8) does attempt to introduce into the law of this country, on Report stage, for certain purposes, and in application to certain persons, the law of another country. There is nothing in the Title or in the proposed Amendment to the Title to suggest that this is an Act for the purpose of introducing, in application to certain persons, the law of a foreign State. I submit for that reason alone that this part of the Clause must be out of Order.
  Mr. Speaker: All I can say is that I have looked very carefully into this question, because I was courteously apprised of the matter beforehand, and I am advised that this is in Order so far as Parliament is concerned.
  Mr. Sydney Silverman: Further to that point of Order, Mr. Speaker. I rather understood that what my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) was saying was this. He gave a list of new principles which he says are in the Clause. I do not know if they are in the Clause or not. No doubt, they would be equally arguable, if the Clause were in Order, on the Amendment which is on the Paper with regard to that Subsection. I rather thought the argument he was putting to you, Mr. Speaker, was that these matters in the proposed new Clause are, of themselves, so alien to the purpose of the Bill, and so alien to the purpose of this proposed new Clause as defined in the margin, that they cannot possibly be within the scope of the Bill to which the House has given a Second Reading. It would seem that if the proposed new Clause does contain the matters to which

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  he referred they are quite outside those matters which the House considered when it gave a Second Reading to the Bill.
  Mr. Speaker: I think we can discuss all those matters when the Amendment to which I have referred is moved. I should suggest it is a legal question, if I might venture an opinion. After all, this Bill has to go to another place, where there are legal authorities who will, having now seen the red light, no doubt look into the matter in advance. I do not suppose they will hesitate to take action if it is legally wrong.
  The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Ede): I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a Second time."
  I believe this proposed new Clause is unprecedented in the history of this House, because we have to deal with a situation which is unprecedented in English history. But one of the great advantages of this House is that, when no precedents exist to deal with a practical situation, the House creates a precedent to solve the situation that confronts it, and to give guidance to future generations should they be faced with similar difficulties. Inasmuch as this is an unprecedented situation, this proposed new Clause has given me, as the Minister responsible for submitting it to the House, the gravest anxiety; and this is the third edition of the Clause which has appeared on the Order Paper. I ought, at this stage, to express my thanks to the hon. Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) for the way in which, since the Committee stage of the Bill, he has assisted me in the drafting of the first seven Subsections. I say that because it is due to him that that should be said. I ought also make it clear that from the first he has expressed the views with regard to Subsection (8) which he briefly expressed this evening. I have heard them at greater length.
  What is the situation with which we have to deal? We had an ally for whom we went to war; the invasion of whose territory was the cause which brought us into the war. There have been changes in the Government of that particular State. Certain nationals of that State, some of whom enlisted direct into the Polish Army while it was still on Polish territory, and others of whom joined the Polish Forces at subsequent stages, have,
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  in the end, been left, in conjunction with our Forces, in various parts of the world after the Government of Poland to which they first owed allegiance had passed away. I am trying to state, as uncontroversially as I can, what I know is very controversial history, and trying to state merely the facts as they seem to one who has never owed allegiance to any Government of Poland.
  There was a complicated stage at which there were two Polish Governments, one in Warsaw and one in London, with both of which, as I understand it, at one stage we were, at any rate, in connection. Then a stage arrived at which this country decided no longer to recognise the Polish Government in London; and the only Polish Government which we recognised was the Polish Government in Warsaw.
  Some of the Poles who were then serving with our Forces did not find it possible to give their allegiance to the Government in Warsaw, and they had no desire to return to Poland. They had fought in alliance with this country, and they were, at the time to which I am now alluding, actually under the command, the final command, of British officers, although they had their own Polish units. We are faced with the difficulty that we have to make arrangements, in this territory and elsewhere in the world, for the daily sustenance and discipline of these men; not merely these men, but of certain people who, at one stage or another, have become connected with them. The Government are confronted with the difficulty that exists with regard to the position of these people in this country. As far as I know, legally, they are at the moment a more or less voluntary association of aliens who have been admitted into this country. They are in this country, without having gone through the normal processes of the immigration law. There is no invasion of this country, that I can trace in its history, that has any relationship to the cicumstances that now exist.
  Therefore, we have, as a practical proposition, to discover some way in which we can, first, maintain these people, and, secondly, arrange for their future existence in this country or elsewhere. The main Clauses of this Bill deal with two groups of the people who are comparatively easy to deal with. We have offered to every one of the persons who are dealt with by the main Clauses of the Bill two alterna-

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  tives, either that they shall return to Poland—and some 60,000 have accepted that alternative—or that they shall join a body, which is under military discipline in this country, although it is a noncombatant unit, known as the Polish Resettlement Corps, in which they are given training. The classes are held in the English language, and where these people prove capable of it, they are given training; they are even sent to certain training schools for particular industries, in the hope that some of them may be absorbed into the labour force of this country; others have expressed the wish to emigrate from this country, when trained, to foreign countries. The people who accept one or other of these two alternatives are dealt with in the Clauses of the Bill that we have already considered.
  9.45 p.m.
  We are faced now with two other groups of people. There are some people to whom those two alternatives were offered as long ago, I understand, as last September—and I believe, in a few cases, even earlier. We have said, "Do you desire to go back to Poland, or will you join the Polish Resettlement Corps?" They say in effect, "We make neither choice: we are doing very nicely, the British rations are very good, and circumstances in the camps are not too bad, and we are quite willing to stay here. We thank you very much, and we hope you will not unduly press the question without giving us very long previous notice of it." We have to deal with those people who, in return for very generous treatment, are trying to be tough with us. My experience when I was under military discipline was that if anybody wanted to be tough with me the best thing, if he was subordinate to me in rank, was to be tough with him.
  I do not think the people whom I have just described will excite any very great amount of sympathy anywhere in this country. They have had two quite reasonable alternatives submitted to them and, if they do not accept one or the other, very well; I think the proposal that was read out on a previous occasion by the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Lipson), that the third alternative should be to take them back to the continent of Europe, make them a present of 400 marks and wish them the best of luck as they depart from our responsibility, is
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  a not unfitting way to bring their association with us to an end, much as I regret that that should be the case with regard to any particular individul.
  We have also to realise that we have no disciplinary powers over those people other than those which I possess as Home Secretary to deport an alien who, for one reason or another, I think is better out of the country than in it, and I have some difficulty in dealing with them between the time I reach that conclusion and the time when I can arrange for a ship to take them somewhere else. In addition, I am faced with the difficulty of dealing with the people now abroad but who may be brought to this country between the time when I first have cognisance of them and the time when they also exercise this choice. It would be most unfair to the people of this country to have 70,000 or 80,000 of those people here, under no discipline, able to leave their camps as and when they like wander about the country, and, with a very inadequate knowledge of our language, attempt to fend for themselves. As Home Secretary I have had some difficulty in the past with some of these people. Isolated individuals previously connected with the Polish forces have been actively associated with black market operations in London, and a number of them have appeared before the courts and have received comparatively severe sentences.
  There was one man who wandered off from a Polish camp and managed to evade all arrest or detention for three months. Having left the camp with nothing, in three months he had amassed a bank balance of £10,000. That is pretty good going. [An HON. MEMBER: "Private enterprise."] Whether it was private enterprise or not, I am sure it is not the kind of thing that will be supported anywhere in the House. [Interruption.] I wish hon. Members would not tempt me to make retorts that would not add either to the pleasantness or the shortness of our proceedings. These people are not deserters from the Polish forces, because the Polish forces, as Polish forces, have ceased to exist. These are a collection of private individuals who are here; there is no power to hold them in a camp, there is no power to deal with them if, inside the camp that we have provided for them, they are refractory, except by bringing them before the civil courts of the

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  country, and frankly, I do not know what a court of summary jurisdiction could do with a man who was accused of being out of a camp after "lights out" at night.
  Mr. Gallacher: Will the right hon. Gentleman explain whether this applies to the Polish Resettlement Corps, or does it just apply to the A and B forces within the Polish Resettlement Corps, so that some are in it, and some are out of it?
  Mr. Ede: I had hoped I had made it quite clear that it does not relate to anybody in the Polish Resettlement Corps. He has made his choice; he is in the Corps; and as such, he is under the discipline of the British. Army. For temporary purposes, he is an alien member of the British Army, and in the Clauses that we considered during the Committee stage, we made arrangements whereby he could be enrolled in this force even if it consisted of 100 per cent. of Polish subjects. This does not apply to the Polish Resettlement Corps. It relates to those people who have either refused to join the Polish Resettlement Corps, or have not yet had the choice put to them, so that I can deal with them in a way that will preserve law and order in their ranks. As I said earlier, I have been much helped by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton in what I hope is the logical sequence of the first seven Subsections of the new Clause. In the first Subsection, in order to deal with the problem I have described, I arrange for the appointment of an administrator, a person who appears to the Secretary of State to have good knowledge and to have been experienced in the administration of British military law, and all these forces who are not in the Polish Resettlement Corps, and who have not exercised the option of going back to Poland, will be brought under his supreme authority.
  Then. Subsection (2) places these people under a direct statutory obligation to observe, in matters of discipline and internal administration, the rules in force as to these matters under the law of Poland as it existed on 1st January, 1945. That, of course, is one of the matters that has already been raised. I think it is essential that, when I have these people together in the circumstances I have explained, they should be subject
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  to a military law which they understand. It is not merely a question of what we understand, but of what these people who are in these forces understand themselves, if we are to have a spirit of discipline that will enable these units to be carried on until they have made their final selection on the alternatives submitted to them. The Subsection further provides that any member of that force who contravenes any of those rules in respect of which punishment is provided by Polish law, shall be guilty of an offence against this Section of the Statute and shall be liable to the penalties provided in that law.
  I am assured that Polish law does not provide for the infliction of corporal punishment upon a man for any of the offences committed under that law and that, generally speaking, the law is milder in its administration than is British military law. The offences, and the punishments therefor, in the code of discipline which has regulated the conduct of these men for years and with which they and their officers are familiar, will be continued in force, by virtue of this Act of Parliament, and thus derive its authority in this country or wherever these people may be within the sphere of British influence, from this Act of this Parliament.
  Mr. Warbey: I wonder whether my right hon. Friend would make it clear whether he sees any legal difficulties to placing these men under British military law, if that were thought desirable.
  Mr. Ede: Yes, I see the difficulty that these men are not acquainted with British military law. These units are not of long duration. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War has not sufficient British officers and British warrant and non-commissioned officers at his disposal to enable these units to be staffed entirely by British officers and British warrant and non-commissioned officers.
  Mr. Hale: Would the right hon. Gentleman allow me to ask him a question? How many of the 7,000,000 people who were called up for military service during the war were acquainted with British military law at the time of their call-up?
  Mr. Ede: Not very many, I imagine, but after all they could speak the English language. The trouble with these men is that more and more the people who are coming into the units with which I

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  am now dealing cannot speak English and their whole experience has been of Polish military law. They have served in places not in this country but in various other parts of the world where they had no opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of the English language. The death penalty cannot be inflicted.
  We have now established the position in which we have an administrator who is in supreme command, and we have a body of law to which these people are amenable. If they commit offences against that law they are liable to trial and punishment, according to the standards set out in that law. Subsection (3) vests jurisdiction for trial and punishment of members of these Forces for contravention of the rules, in the administrator, and provides that the procedure for dealing with the offences shall be such as the administrator may determine. That is to say, we give him the power of determining the procedure which is to be followed so as to be quite sure that it is a procedure which, as he is responsible to the Secretary of State, will descend from the Secretary of State through him down to the humblest part of the administrative machine that may be involved.
  10 p.m.
  Subsection (4) centres in the administrator and vests in him all the powers conferred by the rules on Naval, Military and Air Force courts and authorities. He will thus have all the necessary powers to enable him to act, including powers to review awards for offences against discipline. That is to say, the administrator has authority, no matter what the punishment awarded may be, to review the punishment, and if he thinks that it is inconsistent with British standards, to have it reviewed. Subsection (5) enables him to delegate his powers, under the two preceding subsections, to other persons. This delegation, I am sure the House will recognise, is necessary, since the men must be dealt with by their own commanding officers. subject to review of awards, and making the awards subject to confirmation in suitable cases. If the sentence is for more than three months, it does not become operative, unless it has been confirmed, and the administrator will be able to specify the punishment which may be imposed by officers of varying ranks, and the offences which can
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  only be dealt with by a tribunal consisting of more than one officer. Subsection (6) brings in certain provisions of the Visiting Forces (British Commonwealth) Act. 1933, which enables the commanders of detention barracks or other suitable persons to receive on competent authority a person who has been awarded a punishment under the foregoing subsection.
  Mr. Solley: Do I understand that the Visiting Forces (British Commonwealth) Act, 1933, which was passed as a result of a request of the Dominions, provides that courts in this country shall have no jurisdiction over Dominion troops in accordance with the terms of section 1 (2)? Does the Home Secretary suggest that if we pass this Clause, we shall be ousting the jurisdiction of the High Court in respect of any offences committed by Polish nationals under the Clause?
  Mr. Ede: It a man is accused of a criminal offence, which the civil law of this country deems to be amenable to the civil courts of this country—if he commits a military offence—he will be dealt with, but he will be dealt with through the chain of authority I have described.
  Mr. Solley Mr. Solley rose—
  Mr. Ede: This is a very detailed and complicated matter, and I am doing my best to explain it. If he commits a military offence, he will be triable under this Section. His trial will go up the chain of authority, and the matter can be raised in the House by questions to the Secretary of State, just as the workings of certain courts martial abroad and in this country have, in recent months and years, been brought before this House. He will be in this respect exactly in the same position as a British soldier. Subsection (6) ensures that if one of these men deserts from his unit and takes to a life of crime, or is found absent from his unit without leave, he can be dealt with and taken back to the unit, in the same way as a British soldier who similarly absents himself without leave. Subsection (7) provides that members of the forces who commit offences against the ordinary criminal laws of the United Kingdom should be amenable to those laws but it further provides that if any such member has been convicted or acquitted by a criminal court he cannot be tried a second time by a military court for the same offence. That

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  is as far as I managed to get with my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton before we parted company. I hope that any subsequent discussion tonight I shall, so far as the first seven Subsections are concerned, receive the valuable support of his authority and legal knowledge. I thank my hon. Friend very much indeed for the way in which he has assisted be to have a Clause which, on the face of it, could be clear as to what we are proposing to do, and while it is difficult, I hope that in these first seven Subsections we have managed to achieve that. When I come to Subsection (8) I realise that I am on more difficult ground. This Subsection frankly faces the fact that since 5th July there have been a number of people in this country who have been in Polish units which, in fact, had no legal existence at all—
  Major Bramall: Can my right hon. Friend say when this fact was known, because as recently as this month I asked the Secretary of State for War a Question about it, and he gave me the categorical answer that this was legal under the Visiting Forces Act.
  Mr. Ede: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War will be speaking later in this Debate, and I have no doubt that he will deal with that point. At this moment, I do not want to be drawn into an argument, because I am merely trying to state the facts as I know them, and to explain the remedies I am proposing to apply to the difficulties that are created by the present situation. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton was not quite accurate when he said that a decision was reached by the courts recently. What happened was that the day before the case was to have been decided the man was released, and it was, therefore, no use proceeding with the application.
  Mr. Paget: But it continued so far that the Crown was ordered to pay his costs.
  Mr. Ede: I have no doubt that the learned counsel employed by him was very happy to hear of that result.
  Mr. S. Silverman: My right hon. Friend ought not to leave that point there, because if my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) is right, that the Crown were ordered to pay the costs in these proceedings,
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  that involves judgment by that court that the man was right in his contention.
  Mr. Ede: My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General who was, I think, engaged on the case assures me that that is not so. But if that point is to be argued I shall ask him to deal with it, because I have no wish to engage in a legalistic argument with the terrible array of forensic talent that I see below the Gangway. It has been in the interests of this country that a semblance of military authority has been established over these men, and, by some means or other, they have been reasonably kept together, and under a state of discipline. Therefore, Subsection (8) frankly puts the position that it can no longer be contended that these forces have in fact been a legal military force, and that certain actions may have been taken in those circumstances, which might entail unfortunate consequences for people, who, at the request of successive British Governments, have maintained discipline over these men. We, therefore, frankly bring before the House a Subsection which is an indemnity for these people, if, in fact, they have been placed in any jeopardy as a result of their actions.
  I ought to make it quite clear—and there is an Amendment on the Paper which raises the issue—that I am advised that the power of the Administrator to review sentences applies from the passing of this Act to any sentence which may have been passed on men who have been in these units prior to the passing of the Act. If a man is still serving on the day the Act passes, it will be competent for the Administrator to review the sentence and to secure that a punishment more in accordance with British standards of justice, if he thinks it right, shall be imposed on the man, in reduction of the sentence which may have been imposed.
  I apologise to the House for the length of time which I have had to take in explaining this Clause. It was a matter which presented very great difficulties the other evening. I have done the best I can to ensure that this unprecedented situation which confronts us shall be dealt with by a Clause, which, I think, is reasonably easy to understand on the face of it, and which does ensure that these men shall be under reasonable discipline until they make a choice as to whether they go into the Polish Resettlement Corps or return to Poland. If

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  they make the first choice, they then come under the previous Clauses of this Bill, and get all the benefits that there are ensured to them in those Clauses. If they make the second choice, we shall be very happy to assist them in their passage back to Poland, as was explained on a previous occasion. But, if they decline to make either choice then by having this Bill, we are more easily and certainly able to deal with them in a manner which will commend itself to this House than has been the case hitherto. If we do not deal with them in a way which commends itself to this House, then the House can call His Majesty's Government to question with regard to what may happen to any individual man.
  Mr. Speaker: It might perhaps be for the convenience of the House, if I point out that there are three Amendments to this Clause and I propose to call them all. It may save a lot of redundant discussion if hon. Members know that these Amendments are to be called.
  10.15 p.m.
  Mr. Osbert Peake: The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department has taken some time in explaining this new Clause to the House. I also have given some time to the consideration of the various forms of this Clause, which the right hon. Gentleman has placed upon and has withdrawn from the Order Paper from time to time within the last fortnight. You, Mr. Speaker, ruled that this Clause was within the scope of the Bill and, whilst I would not seek in any way to challenge your Ruling, I must say I feel, like the great Duke of Wellington on another occasion, that it must have been "a very close run thing." You, Sir, have ruled, and if the consequential Amendment to the long Title is made it is clear that this Clause might be brought within the scope of the Bill.
  It is really an appalling Clause. I want the House to look at it, if they will, free of all prejudice as far as the present Government of Poland is concerned. I see in the Press that the Government of Poland have objected very strongly to the right hon. Gentleman's Clause. Quite apart from that, and sympathising as I do with the difficulty in which the right hon. Gentleman finds himself, I still cannot find much to be said in favour of this Clause. It seems to me to cut across
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  almost every constitutional principle which has been established in this country for centuries. It enables alien law to be enforced in this country by alien courts. It not only does that for the future, but it is retrospective. It provides for the enforcement of alien law, which, as the hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) has pointed out, is out of date. It is not alien law at the present time in any country in the world.
  Mr. Hale: It is not even law.
  Mr. Peake: In fact, it is not law anywhere at the present time. I ask the Committee to look at Subsection (2) of the new Clause. It says that members of the said forces, that is the Polish forces under British command, who have neither joined the Resettlement Corps on the one hand nor gone back to Poland on the other,
  "shall be under obligation to observe, in matters concerning their discipline and internal administration, the rules in force as to those matters under the law of Poland on the first day of January, nineteen hundred and forty-five, and a member of any of the said forces who contravenes or fails to observe any of the said rules in relation to which a punishment is thereby prescribed shall be guilty of an offence…and shall be…liable…to the punishment prescribed by those rules:"
  It may well be that under Polish military law as it existed at 1st January, 1945 soldiers may have been liable, for all I know to the contrary, to be flogged for quite a petty offence. The right hon. Gentleman suggests that Polish military law is milder than British military law, but before the House comes to a judgment on an issue of this sort, we ought to know what Polish military law was on 1st January, 1945. Until we are so informed, it may well be that the punishments are more severe and, in fact, may be of a character of which the people of this country would wholly disapprove. Yet we are invited to hand over to a gentleman who is known as the Administrator, the power to enforce this alien law to carry out these alien punishments and to do so without any right of appeal to any British court of law. In the difficulty in which we find ourselves I very much prefer the solution suggested by the hon. Member for Luton (Mr. Warbey). If there is to be military law imposed upon these people surely it should be British rather than any foreign law? Then at any rate we could ask questions of the Secretary of State for War in regard to punishments imposed or sentences of courts-martial.

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  As it is, as far as I can see, it will be impossible to raise any question in this House relating to any of these decisions, judgments or sentences imposed by the administrator or delegated by him to Polish subordinates.
  Mr. Paget: Surely the whole effect of this Clause is to make the Minister responsible so that all those things can be dealt with in Parliament.
  Mr. Peake: Which Minister does the hon. Member suggest is made responsible?
  Mr. Paget: The Home Secretary.
  Mr. Peake: I shall be extremely surprised if the Home Secretary is to be found answering questions relating to punishments imposed on Polish soldiers under the law authorised to be enforced under this new Clause.
  Mr. Ede: The right hon. Gentleman has partly put himself in this difficulty by omitting certain words when he read Subsection (2) of the new Clause. Line 13, for example, says:
  "…shall be guilty of an offence against this section…"
  The right hon. Gentleman omitted the words, "against this section" when he read the Subsection to the House.
  Mr. Peake: Quite frankly, I do not see that the inclusion of those words makes any difference at all.
  Mr. Paget Mr. Paget rose—
  Mr. Peake: The punishment to be imposed is a punishment under the law in force in Poland on 1st January, 1945, and if the right hon. Gentleman is going to be prepared to answer questions relating to the enforcement of discipline over these Polish soldiers in this House he will have to justify the action taken by the administrator in accordance with the law of Poland as it existed on 1st January, 1945. It seems to me a strange thing that any Minister should stand at that Box and justify anything on the ground that it is according to the law as it existed in a foreign country on a given date in the past.
  Mr. S. Silverman: Would the right hon. Gentleman not agree that that is a little better than the position was right throughout the war from the passing of the Allied Forces Act until 1st June, 1945? In those days, while the same law applied there was no possibility of any British Minister, any Member of this House or any court
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  in this country having any say in the matter at all, whereas now they will have.
  Mr. Peake: I entirely agree that this is an improvement upon the position as it existed during the war, but of course one can justify things in wartime which cannot possibly be tolerated in times of peace. During the war, with all these different Allied Forces here of all sorts of nationalities, it was in fact the only practicable way of dealing with the question of their discipline, but here we are nearly two years after the conclusion of the war. At this stage, owing to the failure to recognise that the Visiting Forces Act of 1940 ceased to apply in July, 1945, we are faced with the difficulty of having to devise some system of enforcing discipline upon Polish forces on our soil and of making the provisions of that law retrospective. In all the time I have been in Parliament I have only seen two worse Clauses than this upon the Order Paper, and those are the two previous Clauses which the right hon. Gentleman put down to deal with this matter and has since withdrawn—
  Mr. Ede: At any rate they are getting progressively less bad.
  Mr. Peake: As the right hon. Gentleman has said, they are getting progressively less bad, but even this Clause is a bad Clause. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not provoke a Parliamentary crisis by pressing it on the House tonight. He had much better take this Clause away and give it some further thought and consideration—[Hon. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."]—and if necessary introduce a new form of it in another place. I can assure him that feeling on this matter is strong in all quarters of the House, and that he cannot possibly force this Clause through in its present form without the strongest possible objections and without doing violence to the consciences of a great many of his own supporters. I therefore beg the right hon. Gentleman not to waste hours of time tonight, as I am afraid he is going to do, as he did during the Committee stage of this Bill, but to withdraw the Clause fairly soon and take it away and give the matter much more careful consideration than he has given it so far.
  Mr. S. Silverman: When my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary had the previous new Clause on the Order Paper, I put down an Amendment

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  with the purpose of taking away all reference to Polish or any other foreign military or civil law, and substituting for it a reference to British military and civil law so that these persons, in whatever corps they were retained, and for whatever period they were retained, would be subject to British law as it would apply to British citizens in the like case in or out of the British Armed Forces. I am therefore under some obligation to explain why I have not put down that Amendment to the Clause now upon the Order Paper. In the interjection I made just now in the right hon. Gentleman's speech, I gave an indication of my reason.
  The great objection to the other Clause was that it continued in peacetime all the disadvantageous effects of the Allied Forces Act, 1940, long after any conceivable need for that Act remained. The criticism of the right hon. Gentleman opposite, whatever merit the criticism might have had, came with singularly ill grace from a Member of the Government that was responsible for the Allied Forces Act at the time and carried it through against objections that were made in many quarters of the House at the time. The right hon. Gentleman said that these things were necessary during the war and it was the only practicable way. I never believed that, and I said so on the Second Reading of that Bill. Other hon. Members of this House took the same view, notably the right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Clement Davies)—
  Mr. Driberg: And the Secretary of State for War.
  Mr. Silverman: I will say nothing about that because it might lead me into a series of reminiscences which would be out of Order I will not run my head against that. I thought that the sting of those objections was removed by the first seven Subsections of this Clause now before the House. They do no more than take Polish military law as it was at that date—Polish military law as it always applied to the Polish Forces under the Allied Forces Act—and incorporate it into the law of this country for this category of persons, because that kind of law is better for them than our own kind of law in the circumstances in which they find themselves.
  Mr. Peake: Can the hon. Member really defend a proposal which might enable a Polish soldier to be flogged by order of a Polish court without any appeal to any tribunal in this country?
  10.30 p.m.
  Mr. Silverman: I do not think I would defend it, and if there were any reason to think that Polish law was even as severe as let alone more severe than our own military law, then I would be against this Clause. What is being applied to them in this Clause is exactly what has been applied to them with the unanimous consent of this House for the last six or seven years under their own Government exiled from their own country, and not responsible to anyone. It was no answer to say that these were under the authority of the Polish authority in London. It was never a Government.
  Mr. Hale: In what words in this new Clause is it suggested that there is a right of appeal to the courts of this country; and in what words is it suggested that the right of appeal to the supreme court of Poland is being taken away?
  Mr. Silverman: I do not know what right of appeal to the supreme court of Poland there might ever have been, but once we give legislative sanction to this Clause, and make it part of the law of Great Britain, then those persons who-are charged with exercising the functions given to them by our legislative act, are answerable for any exceeding of their powers to our courts, just as our own military officers would be answerable in our courts for any exceeding of authority committed by them in our own Army towards our own soldiers subject to the -prerogative, certiorari and mandamus, and the rest of it.
  Mr. Scollan: How could I, as a Member of Parliament, challenge the Minister about someone exceeding his powers under Polish law, when I do not know what the Polish law is?
  Mr. Silverman: I think the answer to my hon. Friend's question is this: He would not desire to ask a question unless he had notice on the basis of a complaint

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  of which he had been made aware. Anyone who came to him with a complaint would presumably tell him exactly what he was complaining about, and that could he investigated, and a question directed at the Secretary of State for War, who would assume responsibility for the acts of the Administrator appointed by him.
  Mr. Driberg: One does not raise a question in this House without verifying the facts, and how in this case can one verify them?
  Mr. Silverman: I should have thought it would be perfectly easy. If a British soldier came to me with a complaint, and I knew nothing about British military law, I would find myself in no difficulty in ascertaining on the facts given by him whether there is a question I am justified in putting down.
  Mr. Gallacher: I raised a question about the case of a foreign soldier in which there was an allegation of thrashing. If someone came to me with a complaint about a Polish soldier I should not know whether it was Polish military law or not.
  Mr. Silverman: I am bound to say that if you have to apply British military law to the people in this Corps in these circumstances, then the Polish soldier who wanted to make a complaint would find himself in a very much greater difficulty in knowing whether an offence had been committed against him under British military law, than he would be in knowing whether an offence had been committed against him under his own law; that is to say, under the law under which he had been serving ever since 1940.
  Mr. Solley: I am rather puzzled whether the hon. Member is arguing in favour of Subsection (2) of this Clause. I see that his name is appended to the first Amendment, which seeks to exclude Polish law. I would be obliged if the hon. Member would say whether he is in favour of Polish law or English law in this matter.
  Mr. Silverman: In what I have said so far, I have not suggested that there are not a number of respects in which I would like to see this Clause amended. I would like to see Subsection (8) go altogether, and other Subsections amended. But what I am arguing at the moment is, that what
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  ever kind of law you are going to have should be understood by these persons, and embodied in our own legislative code; that there should be a Minister answerable for it in the House of Commons, and that there should be a right of appeal to the High Court.
  Mr. Hale: My hon. Friend has said that already.
  Mr. Silverman: That is why I did not put down again, on this Clause, the Amendment which I put down to the previous Clause which would impose British military law alone. Having said that, I would like to ask my right hon. Friend to explain why it is necessary to have such a Corps at all. If you do not have it, you do not need this kind of Clause, or any other kind of Clause. What this Bill is for is to say what is to happen to people who wish to go back to Poland, and what shall happen to people who wish to go into the Polish Resettlement Corps. My right hon. Friend said that supposing they did not make any choice, he must do something with them. If they do not make any choice, he can make the choice for them. He can so draft his Bill that anyone to whom the whole Bill applies would be compelled by a certain date to make his election between the two courses, or if he failed to do so, to have one or other choice between these two made for him. That would be perfectly fair, and would get rid of the whole difficulty. I do not see, for the life of me, why it is necessary to have this kind of limbo between those who are prepared to go back to Poland, and those who go into the Polish Resettlement Corps. Why do you want the Corps at all? It is bound to give rise to all kinds of misunderstandings. It is bound to give further strength to international suspicions. It is bound to give further argument to those who are already claiming that the existence of a Polish militarily disciplined force, operating under Polish military law and established under extinct Polish military law, is a danger to the new States which are being formed, and is an impediment to improved relations between our country and the new Poland. I can see that if it is necessary to have this intermediate Corps at all, it is necessary to have a code of discipline. I can see that it is better, on the whole, to have a code of discipline, provided you have

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  safeguards in the courts and in the House of Commons. I concede both of these things, on the basis that it is necessary to have this Corps at all. But I cannot see that it is necessary to have this intermediate arrangement, or to be landed with this source of international mistrust.
  Professor Savory: I want to reply very briefly to some remarks which were made by the Home Secretary in introducing this Clause. The right hon. Gentleman divided the Poles into three categories, namely, those prepared to go back to Poland, those who will willingly come into the Resettlement Corps, and those who refuse to do so. The right hon. Gentleman spoke at rather considerable length on this last category, and I think actually made a threat that, in certain cases, those people would be deported to Germany. [Interruption.] I believe the Home Secretary has patience in this matter. I would like to say that since he spoke on the second reading of this Bill, I have inquired of some of my Polish friends as to why some Poles do not wish to join the Resettlement Corps. I would say that some of the reasons may appear to be very strange to some right hon. and hon. Members, but I will tell the House what they say. The Home Secretary should give an assurance which may encourage these people to join the Resettlement Corps. Poles, like the Irish, have very long memories, and one of the strongest memories which they have is of the Napoleonic Corps of San Domingo, and of the fact that those Poles sent to San Domingo were completely exterminated. I ask the right hon. Gentleman—will he give an assurance that these Poles will not be sent out of the country? If he will do that, he will be doing a very great work.
  Mr. James Callaghan Mr. James Callaghan (Cardiff, South) rose—
  Professor Savory: I shall not keep the House for another minute. I am trying to put my point as briefly as I can. Some malicious people, and I know who they are, but I will not disclose more than that, have spread rumours. The rumours are that these people who go into the Corps will be sent out to Burma where they will be used to clear out swamps, and there is—
  Mr. Callaghan: Jolly good idea.
  Professor Savory: That is the rumour which has been spread.
  Mr. Callaghan: Plenty of our chaps have had to do it.
  Professor Savory: The Home Secretary should give an assurance that none of these Poles who join the Resettlement Corps will be sent abroad. I repeat that if he would do this, he would do a very great work. Some of these Poles would like to set up by themselves. There are some, such as cobblers, who would like to start in their own trade, and others would like to join together in twos or threes to open, perhaps, a sweet-shop. But the difficulties of getting the necessary licences, and the fact that there would have to be a British subject placed over them is a deterrent to these Poles. Another thing which is causing them anxiety is this. It is, I would tell the House, a very strong reason. There has been published in Warsaw a statement that Poles who join this Resettlement Corps will, ipso facto, be deprived of their Polish nationality. That statement has been broadcast, and it has acted as a very strong deterrent against their joining this Corps. Furthermore, the Poles are also afraid that if they are compelled to register, as of course, they must, if they join the Resettlement Corps, the fact will be known in Poland and reprisals will be taken against their relations—against their wives and children, as has been done in innumerable cases hitherto.
  Mr. Bing Mr. Bing (Hornchurch) rose—
  10.45 p.m.
  Professor Savory: No, I intend to finish my speech. If something could be done to reassure these Poles that the names of those who register in this Resettlement Corps will be treated as confidential, and will not be known outside this country, that will have a reassuring effect. I assure the House that these Poles are placed in a very difficult position, and I implore the Home Secretary to show how sympathetic he can be towards them. I deprecate the use of the word, "tough," because I think that is a rather deplorable word to use towards these gallant men. I ask the right hon. Gentleman

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  to be very sparing of such language, and I further implore him not to use the threat that those Poles who either do not go to Poland or do not join the Resettlement Corps, will be deported to Germany. To send them back to the people who have treated them with such intolerable barbarity, not only in their own country, but in Germany, is Ito do something Which the Home Secretary, even at the last moment, would hesitate to do. It would have a deplorable effect on the whole Polish nation, not merely here, but on the six million Poles throughout the United States.
  Such a threat should never be used. The threat has been made to them—exactly as the Home Secretary Stated—that they will be allowed 40o marks, and that they will be permitted to take only £10 out in our currency. That is having, on the Poles, a deplorable effect. There is no need to exercise these threats. A certain amount of patience and persuasion, and the assurances I have asked for publicly from the Home Secretary, will, I feel certain, from the conversations I have had since the Second Reading, have a most salutary effect, and make it absolutely unnecessary for him to put this threat into operation.
  Mr. Bing: Would it be possible for the hon. Gentleman to use his great enthusiasm and eloquence in this cause to convince the Government of Northern Ireland to receive even one of these Poles, as up to now they have refused to accept any?
  Mr. Hale: I do not intend to follow the remarks of the hon. Member for Queen's University (Professor Savory), partly because I was unable to follow the relevance of what he said in regard to this new Clause and, secondly, because I do not desire to take any part whatever in a discussion on the general merits of this Bill. I rise purely to deal with the merits of the new Clause. We are grateful to the Home Secretary for his very careful and detailed explanation of what the new Clause is intended to mean, but I want to find out, if I can, what it really does mean, and to submit, with great respect, that it does not mean what my right hon. Friend said it was intended to mean. I have had, for many years, a great respect for the learned ability of my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr.
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  Paget), but I cannot congratulate him on this particular effort—
  Mr. Ede: I accept responsibility for this Clause. I thanked my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) for the assistance he gave me in drafting it, but the responsibility is mine, and not his.
  Mr. Hale: I am much obliged. I was not holding my hon. Friend responsible, but only saying that I do not agree with some of the points in the new Clause. May I, therefore, deal with the new Clause piecemeal? Subsection (1) provides that an administrator shall be appointed with a knowledge of British military law. He is to be of British nationality, but not of British nationality by birth necessarily. He may be a person who was a Pole and who was created British by the action of the Home Secretary administratively a day or two before his appointment. He is to have a knowledge of British military law for no known reason whatsoever. British military law is the one qualification he need not have. He can ignore that completely.
  Then we come to the main provision, and I do regard this as raising the most serious, the most profound, and the most disastrous constitutional issues. It is laid down that this administrator, who is not to have any knowledge of law at all, except British military law—who may, indeed, have acquired that experience by service in the Army, who need not necessarily have a judicial training or experience, or any special legal education or experience—is to administer a wholly new legal system which is to be based on the law of Poland on 1st January, 1945. The selection of that date really is quite remarkable, because on 1st January, 1945, Poland had been occupied by a hostile power for over five years, and of course, it follows that no manuals of Polish military law had been published for five years at least, that there was no effective legislative authority which could make the law, that there were various Governments each claiming the power to legislate, that there was a Provisional Government in London which had been purporting to legislate and issuing decrees, and so, if it were a question of what was Polish military law on 1st January, 1945, one could have at least a hundred opinions on any given subject. One could abide by the law of

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  the Provisional Government, by the law as stated in 1939, or one could endeavour to build it up on the basis of the decrees made since internally, or possibly published by underground sources. But it does not rest there. It is our habit to recognise the laws de facto, or the law of the Government de facto, rather than the law of Governments de jure, in this matter. We recognise General Franco and the law he lays down under his—
  Vice-Admiral Taylor: The hon. Gentleman says that no Polish military law had been introduced five years previous to 1945. What law did the Polish military officers apply with regard to their forces?
  Mr. Hale: I do not know. All I can say about that is that there were a great many complaints.
  Vice-Admiral Taylor: There may have been complaints, but they must have had a Polish military law which they carried on with regard to their forces.
  Mr. Hale: That really is not so. Even British military law varies according to the circumstances and the position of the forces, and the state of danger in which the forces are placed and the personnel administering it.
  Mr. Blackburn: That is absolute tripe.
  Mr. Hale: The hon. Member says that is "absolute tripe." I am always grateful for any contribution. All I can say is that I speak as one who was in some way responsible in the administration of military law during the last war, and certainly the law with regard to the administration of courts martial on active service which was laid down by this country, is very different from the administration of courts martial in time of peace, and the administration and the punishments that can be imposed when a regiment is in battle are different from those that can be imposed when a regiment is on home stations.
  Mr. Blackburn: I beg my hon. Friend's pardon for the language I used, but the point being put quite rightly by the hon.
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  and gallant Member for South Paddington (Vice-Admiral Taylor) was that there was such a thing as Polish military law. My hon. Friend answered by saying that, apparently, there was no such thing as Polish military law, because it was indifferently administered. It matters not whether there is a good judge or a bad judge, whether there is a correct decision or an incorrect decision, the law remains the same, and in any event, despite the unevenness of the administration, there is no doubt that there is one.
  Mr. Hale: I apologise to the hon. Member if my earlier remarks were inaudible.
  Mr. John Foster: Has the hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) considered the fourth alternative—that the law of Poland on the first day of 1945 could only have been the law which the present Government of Poland says was the law of Poland on that day?
  Mr. Hale: That is most interesting and it is a most valuable addition to the Debate. In the first instance the Government of Poland may vary from day to day or month to month. No Government has ever taken responsibility upon itself to say what its law was 18 months ago. That would be a very bold judgment and decision. You cannot declare an individual law without saying what it is. The second and most vital point which occurs to me—
  Mr. Paget: Surely the hon. Member has not read the Clause? It says:
  "in matters concerning their discipline and internal administration, the rules in force as to those matters under the law of Poland on the first day of January, 1945."
  Mr. Hale: That is an even more valuable contribution.
  Mr. Gallacher: On a point of Order. I want to ask if this matter cannot be taken by the learned Attorney-General before the legal House of Lords?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hubert Beaumont): That is not a point of Order that I can deal with. I think we had better let the hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) continue his speech.
  Mr. Hale: May I say that I do sincerely believe this to be a grave constitutional

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  issue and in the circumstances I do not propose to give way any more while I am developing my argument. There is a serious question as to whether the law of Poland on the first of January, 1945, was the law of Germany or the law of Poland. Someone has got to decide what was the law of Poland on the first of January, 1945. I want to ask the learned Attorney-General to say who is charged with that decision. I want to know who is charged with the decision as to what was the law of Poland on the first of January, 1945. If it be the administrator, who is a man who knows only British military law, what are the sources of information available to him? How will he make himself conversant with and cognisant of Polish criminal law? These matters of internal administration may cover all the crimes known to the law and quite possibly some not known to the law. The Home Secretary suggested that the real purpose of this provision was to deal with men away from their camp after 10 o'clock at night.
  Mr. Ede: I must protest at the suggestion that that was the real purpose of this provision. I suggested it might be difficult for a British civil court to deal with such a matter. I had in mind the Amendment in the name of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) to deal with the trivial kind of offences which are offences against military law but which are not offences against civil law.
  Mr. Hale: May I say that I thought the Home Secretary's argument was that we could not use British law because it may not cover trivial matters. I did not say that you cannot use British military law. I said that these people understand Polish military law, and I was dealing with people who are subject to the law as well as those who adminster it. If it is necessary for soldiers to understand military law, how many of the 7,000,000 British soldiers in service in the last war understood our law, or, indeed, had any chance to understand it. Was it not almost a prohibited thing to have a copy of King's Regulations available at all? It was extremely difficult to get the manual of military law if you were in the Services.
  Mr. S. Silverman Mr. S. Silverman rose—
  11.0 p.m.
  Mr. Hale: I did say I would not give way to the hon. Gentleman because he sug-
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  gested that I had misrepresented him. I will give way when I have developed my argument, but up to now I have had little opportunity of doing so. I ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General who is to decide. Is it the Administrator? If it be the Administrator, to what appeal is he subject? My hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. Silverman) said that there would be a prerogative writ issued from our High Court in the case of any Polish soldier aggrieved by the action of the Administrator. I see no authority for that. It would of course be so, if this were subject to English law, but we are superimposing the law of a different country upon our system.
  Let me put the second point. If my hon. Friend will refer to Subsection (3) he will see that it is not even necessary for the Administrator to abide by any code of conduct. He is given power to conduct trials without evidence, without hearing or without witnesses. It is clearly implicit in that he can conduct his jurisdiction according to such rules as he thinks fit. I think that is most undesirable in any circumstance. I want to follow this up, because if a man is to be tried according to Polish law as it was on 1st January, 1945, clearly he has all the rights of appeal that are given by Polish law to a military subject tried by a Polish military court, and if, as one is bound to assume for a moment, Polish law has some similarity to ours—this House is in the very unhappy position of not knowing what are the rules of law to which we subject these people by this Clause—if the rules of law be the same as ours, then of course, the High Court of Britain has power to call into question the judgment of military courts, and, in the same way, the High Court of Poland may have power to call into question the decision of these courts.
  I require an answer to this question. If there be under Polish law a right of appeal to the High Court of Poland, how is it to be exercised? What facilities are to be given? How are the witnesses to be transported? Who is to pay the costs, and who is to guarantee the safe return of the people sent to hear the appeal? If the Polish court of appeal deals with the matter in absentia is there still a right by prerogative writ, to appeal to the High Court of this country. Assuming that it

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  gives a decision conflicting with that of the High Court of Poland, what happens then? I want to point out one minor drafting omission in this Clause. It says that you cannot impose the penalty of death. I happen to be an opponent of capital punishment, and I welcome that provision, but what is going to be substituted? If you abolish the death penalty without substituting anything else, it means that the murderer must go free, because then the court has no power to impose any penalty at all.
  I want now to deal with a substantial constitutional issue. My hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne said that all these matters can be impugned in the courts of Great Britain. If that be so, are we really asking our judges of the High Court to endeavour to learn a completely new code of law? I gather that my hon. Friend suggests that one may have to know in certain cases what is the law of certain other nations, but in such circumstances an expert lawyer gives evidence on that one point. We have to assume that association with the law calls for some profundity of knowledge—knowledge of legal principles, of legal practice and, indeed, of legal history. All this is going to be a closed book to our High Court as regards Polish law, and apparently they are going to be called upon to administer judgment merely on a knowledge of Polish law as it existed on 1st January, 1945, by some persons who could not have been there at that time, and on a mere tittle of evidence.
  Mr. Ungoed-Thomas: Surely that frequently happens in our courts now?
  Mr. Hale: The hon. Gentleman has not been following me. That is precisely what I have been saying, but it is most undesirable to administer a whole code of law without knowing any of the principles on which it is based, and without knowledge of the events which have taken place. Then we are to have this extraordinary conflict of law which is absolutely fundamental. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) referred to a writ of habeas corpus issued by some Polish citizen in recent days. As I understood the position the Attorney-General went there intending to argue that the writ would not apply. What I am saying is
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  that when the question of habeas corpus was raised with regard to a Polish soldier it was the intention of the Crown to argue that a writ of habeas corpus could not be issued because he was a Polish person serving in the Polish Forces. I was asking for information from the Attorney-General.
  The Attorney-General (Sir Hartley Shawcross): I will answer that point in due course.
  Mr. Hale: It would be much more convenient to have it answered now. (HON. MEMBERS "Answer."). Very well, I must take it on the basis of the alternative. Either it is the point of the Crown that a writ of habeas corpus does lie or that it does not. If it is claimed by the Crown that a writ of habeas corpus does not lie, this means the abolition of the greatest Measure of safety that has ever been passed in this country and one of the great bulwarks of our liberty. I have been rather expecting the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General to get up and say, "I want to move a small consequential Amendment to include the repeal of the Statute of Magna Carta, the Habeas Corpus Act, and so on."
  Let me take this one step further. Supposing a British subject to be imprisoned by a Polish military court. Can he issue a writ of habeas corpus? And supposing there to be a question of whether a man has opted to be a member of the Polish Resettlement Corps or of the Polish Forces. Who has jurisdiction then? Can that be met by writ of habeas corpus? Of course, if it can, the whole question is then raised as to whether the imprisonment is illegal or legal. Then you have the whole question going to the British Courts to determine the whole body of Polish law as it stood on 1st January, 1945. I think that that is a matter of fundamental difficulty.
  Let me come to Subsection (8), which even the right hon. Gentleman regards as a somewhat unhappy child. This is the Subsection which gives virtual indemnity for anything which happened before the passing of the Act or, as my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne has said, anything which occurs before the Act actually comes into force. It would, as I understand it under the rules, give an

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  indemnity if a Polish officer had wrongly imprisoned a British subject. As I understand it, and subject to correction, there is no right of appeal and no right of question. It merely says that the status quo shall be observed, and, indeed, on more technical reading of it it means that if a person is in prison he remains in prison until a special Act of Parliament amends this Bill and it must be passed by this House and another place before the person is released. It is a dreadful Clause to put before us at this late hour on the Report stage of a Bill dealing with something else.
  I ask the right hon. Gentleman to deal with one other point. What really is to be the position where we come into conflict with jurisdiction? I know there is a Clause now to extend this same position under British military law, but in British military law the civil courts are supreme. They have a preponderant jurisdiction over all matters amenable to their jurisdiction. Here we have a position in which sentence passed by one court shall have no relation to another. What is to be the position if a British subject and a Polish subject engage in a common enterprise within a Polish camp? Under whose jurisdiction will they come and who will be the administrator? Under what set of laws will they be tried? Will the Pole be tried under Polish law or under the law of Britain, and will the British subject be tried under British law or under Polish law? It may be more than a technical offence, because if the, parties are engaged in a conspiracy, unless they are tried together the effect is that a conviction on both fails. We may have this horrible position in which a whole set of different laws apply and under which people engaged in a common enterprise are treated by different tribunals. I say with all seriousness and great gravity that some of us who have read this Clause feel very deeply about it. Certainly the Government are proposing a fundamental amendment to our Constitution. Certainly we are embarking on something which has not been done before. We feel that in doing this the Government are not merely imperilling the rights of this army but of all British subjects, too, and we feel that they may create a direct conflict between the Judiciary and the Executive, which might be of vital importance to our Con-
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  stitution. I appeal to the Home Secretary, whom we are anxious to help in his difficulties, to try to find a solution amenable to all parties, and I ask him to withdraw this Clause and think the matter over.
  The Attorney-General: I listened with great interest to the arguments which have been raised in the course of this Debate, but I confess I think that sometimes they were perhaps a little academic and a little detached from the practical realities of the situation which exists here. We are seeking to deal with a temporary situation in regard to the Polish forces—I use that term in a neutral sense—and we cannot close our eyes to the fact that a great many members of that force do not speak the English language at all, and certainly do not know the first thing about English law in general or English military law in particular. What we are seeking to do in regard to the forces in these circumstances for this transitional period is to continue to apply to it, with certain' new and very significant safeguards, the operation of a system of law which has without difficulty been applied to it hitherto, namely the military law which was upheld by the Government of Poland on 1st January, 1945, and which Government we recognised.
  11.15 p.m.
  In, the first instance—and I deal with a question which was put to me by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale)—it will be for the person to whom the powers are delegated by the Administrator under the Clause, to ascertain what that body of law is. That is a task which has been imposed on the officers of this Force ever since they came here in 1940, and which they have hitherto succeeded in discharging without any great difficulty. In the second instance it will be for the administrator appointed by the Secretary of State to ascertain as a question of fact what that body of law, that is to say, the body of law recognised by the Government and which was recognised by His Majesty's Government on 1st January, 1945, may happen to be, and eventually it would be for the courts of this country to ascertain what that body of law in fact was. They would ascertain that in the way they have to 'ascertain problems of that kind in many cases which come before them from time to

  383
  time, and they would ascertain it in any case where a Polish soldier, alleged that he had been dealt with in a way which was not in accordance with the law in force on 1st January, 1945.
  In such a case—and here let me answer the second point put to me by the hon. Member for Oldham—such a soldier would certainly be entitled to apply for habeas corpus, to bring an action for damages for wrongful imprisonment or to exercise any of the other remedies which are available to a person living in this country, whatever his nationality may be, if he is proceeded against otherwise than in accordance with the law of this country. I say in regard to the Zytomerski case, which has been mentioned that it was never in my mind to suggest that habeas corpus did not lie in such a case. What I might have had to argue if the question arose, and it did not arise, was that although the Polish soldier was entitled to apply for habeas corpus, those who had him detained were entitled to say that under the law in force in this country his detention was legal under the Allied Forces Act, 1940—
  Mr. Solley: Will the Attorney-General allow me to ask a question based on what he has just said? He said in effect that in the last analysis the Courts of this country could intervene in suitable cases and if the right machinery is put in motion. I would like to draw his attention to Subsection (6) of this Clause which says in effect that with suitable modifications, Section 1 of the Visiting Forces Act, 1933, shall be enacted in the form of an Order. Has he observed the terms of Section 1 (3) of that Act which says follows:
  "Where any sentence has, whether within or without the United Kingdom, been passed upon a member of a visiting force by a service court of that part of the Commonwealth to which the force belongs, then for the purposes of any legal proceedings within the United Kingdom the court shall be deemed to have been properly constituted, and its proceedings shall be deemed to have been regularly conducted, and the sentence shall be deemed to be within the jurisdiction of the court and in accordance with the law of that part of the Commonwealth…."
  Does he say, in the light of that, that if that is re-enacted under this Clause there is any remedy at all on the part of a Polish national who desires to appeal to the High Court in this country?
  The Attorney-General: If my non. Friend will look at Subsection (6) he will see that there is nothing in that Subsection which in itself applies the whole of Section of the Visiting Forces Act, 1933. I will presently indicate the way in which that Act has already been applied, the limited purposes in which it has been applied, and the manner in which it might—not necessarily would—be applied in the future. I really do suggest to the House that there is no great principle of constitutional law involved in this matter. I say at once that I would be the last to support anything which affected any inroad on these fundamental principles of our constitutional laws inscribed in the Constitution in the days of the Tudors and the Stuarts, to which reference has already been made. The position here is at once simple and, I venture to think, unique. Certainly it is simple in this sense, that what it is intended to do is to put beyond legal doubt the continued validity of action which until recently at all events was admittedly legal. Until the unilateral action taken by the present Polish Government it was, admittedly legal, and even now, although its legality may be in doubt, it has been done in good faith and in circumstances which really left no practical alternative in the hands of those responsible for the continued administration of the Polish Forces in which discipline has still to be maintained, despite the fact that the present Government no longer continue to recognise this force as part of the existing Polish Army.
  It is simple in that sense, and it is unique in this; that the necessity for maintaining discipline in a force of foreign origin of this kind in the United Kingdom has not arisen before, apart from the circumstances which arose during the war, and are not likely to arise again. It is not correct to say that the illegality of the action taken by the officers of the Polish Forces in continuing to enforce discipline in these Forces after they had ceased co be recognised by the present Polish Government was in any way admitted. The habeas corpus proceedings in the case of Zytomerski were not prosecuted to a conclusion. There was no judgment.
  Mr. Julius Silverman: Were not costs awarded against the Crown?
  The Attorney-General: Costs were awarded against the Crown, but I will be perfectly frank about this. That is one of the reasons why costs were awarded against the Crown. The matter is one of considerable legal obscurity, and two views are held about it, but it does not of necessity follow—and I put it no higher than this—that the unilateral action of the Polish Government in withdrawing their recognition of the Polish Forces resulted in the Allied Forces Act of 1940 being no longer legally applicable.
  Mr. Solley: On a point of Order. Is it in Order for the learned Attorney-General to say what he has just said when, in effect, it is a challenge to the decision of the King's Bench Division in a recent case?
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The remarks of the right hon. and learned Gentleman are quite in Order so far as I am concerned.
  The Attorney-General: I would like to make it clear that I am challenging no decision at all of the High Court. I have made it abundantly clear to every hon. Member of the House except my hon. Friend that no decision in that case was given at all. The question was not argued by either side, there was no judgment at all—the question did not arise because the body of the person in respect of whom habeas corpus proceedings were brought had already been released.
  Mr. S. Silverman: I understand that no decision was given in that case for the reason that has just been given—that the detained soldier was released. Here there was a question of real legal difficulty. Could the right hon. and learned Attorney-General explain to the House why that occasion was not used for obtaining a decision upon it.
  Mr. Julius Silverman: Why did my right hon. and learned Friend, consent, if he did consent, to the award of costs against the Crown?
  The Attorney-General: For the reason that I thought the matter was one of great difficulty, and in the circumstances of that case I did not consider it expedient to argue it at that time. I am not saying now, and I do not want to suggest to the House for a moment, that the Allied Forces Act of 1940 continues to apply. I am saying that there are two views upon this matter, and it must not be assumed,
  386
  as some hon. Members assume, that I have accepted that the detention of the Polish soldier Zytomerski or any other soldier detained in similar circumstances, is illegal. I merely say that that was not decided in this case. What happened was that before the Act came to be argued before the Court at all, the Polish officers —and I am using that phrase in a neutral sense decided on advice, which had been given some weeks before by the chief psychiatrist to the British Army, that Zytomerski was not a person who could usefully be retained in the Polish Forces. He was therefore discharged. That obviated any necessity for a legal decision being given on the question of the legality of the actions which were taken in this case.
  As far as I am aware, though I can only speak for myself and my Department, no member of the Polish Forces has made any claim that he has been illegally dealt with, that he has been illegally detained, or has sought to exercise any kind of remedy. There may, or may not, be such cases. I can simply say that none have so far been brought forward. On the other hand, the disciplinary powers of the officers who are at present administering the Polish Forces have admittedly been questioned, and in those circumstances, since the Forces must continue to be administered, since discipline must continue to be maintained, since there is no suggestion whatever of any bad faith on the part of the officers concerned, no suggestion of any arbitrary exercise of power by them, it seemed right to us to resolve the legal doubt which existed about this matter by the provisions which are contained in this new Clause. There is no great constitutional principle involved in this; there is nothing clandestine about it, nothing secret about it. The House is fully master of the position. Here is this Bill dealing with miscellaneous transitional matters. This is essentially a transitional matter. Parliament, if it passes this new Clause, will merely be permitting for a few months longer the continued operation of that system of law, the operation of which was expressly provided for in the Act of 1940, and the application of which has never been challenged in this House as being inconvenient, as giving rise to hardship, as causing injustice, during the whole period of seven years. It is nearly two years since the war ended, but until

  387
  this Clause was put on the paper a few days ago, no Member of this House thought it right to get up and say that there was anything unconstitutional in the provisions of the Act of 1940, or in the way in which those provisions were being operated at present. Nor had any hon. Member sought to say in this House that there was any hardship, any inconvenience, or any injustice in the application of Polish military law to Polish soldiers.
  Mr. Scollan: May I ask my right hon. and learned Friend to deal with this point? A very serious situation arises in Scotland, where a large number of these men are to be billeted. Under this Clause you are going to impose in Scottish law, which is entirely different from English law, an extra-territorial right in regard to these people. You are doing so by passing this Clause in an English Parliament. That is a breach of the Treaty of Union.
  11.30 p.m.
  The Attorney-General: Well, I must say that the law of Scotland is certainly ground upon which, having many of the qualities of an angel, I fear to tread. I do not intend to pursue the point which has just been put by my hon. Friend. All I would say to him is this—and it will answer some other hon. Members who have spoken—that if any constitutional questions are involved here, as to whether it involves any abrogation of the Act of Union, the answer is that that principle has been involved since 1940 and it has never occurred to anybody. It must be remembered that Parliament is omnipotent in these legislative matters. I have not spoken of the political aspects of this Clause. But so far as the legal aspects are concerned, the position is clear. Parliament is omnipotent in matters of this kind. It has been said that Parliament can do anything except change a man into a woman, although I see no insurmountable objection to Parliament indulging in even this process. But it might well be that the physiologists might have something to say, and I will not pursue the claim.
  The matter is entirely a matter for Parliament. There is no legal, nor, I venture to suggest, administrative reason why this matter should not be dealt with virtually in the same way as it has been dealt with in the last seven years. I agree that it may occasionally happen that cases
  388
  may come before one of the courts of this country, and the law as at 1st January, 1945, will then have to be ascertained. There is, I assure hon. Members, nothing novel about this. Our courts frequently have to decide matters of this kind. They decide them in Admiralty cases, and in actions concerned with foreign marriages. One could make a catalogue of the cases which arise, and the cases are decided according to the particular matter before the court. The matter here raises no legal nor constitutional issue. It is simply one of convenience. I have no doubt that we could deal with this matter in the way contemplated by one of the amendments. For instance, we could ascertain what was the military law in force in Poland on 1st January, 1945. We could ask the War Office staff, assisted by armies of translators, to re-produce every line of Polish military law. Then, having ascertained what it was, we could embody it all in an Order in Council, and then reenact it as part of English law. We could do all that—it is one way of dealing with this matter. But the only benefit to accrue would be that we should have re-enacted the laws which had hitherto bound the members of the Polish Resettlement Corps in a language which they no longer were able to understand. It would apply to members of the Resettlement Corps, and, therefore, for this one reason alone, we think it better not to go to that lengthy process, but to deal with the matter not in this way, but in a way which a member of the Polish Forces has understood for the past seven years, and which he is able to understand during the few months in which this is in operation.
  Mr. Paget: If my right hon. and learned Friend will look at Section I of the Visiting Forces Act he will see that it provides that these Poles should be controlled by such laws as are conferred upon them by the law of Poland. What power has this law of Poland conferred on the armed forces of Poland at the moment. Were not affidavits filed by the Polish Government to the effect that they had no such powers?
  The Attorney-General: I do not quite follow the question. Perhaps it is my stupidity, but I thought I made it clear that the body of law which will be applied under this new Clause is not the body of law which may be recognised by the existing Polish Government, but is that which was recognised by the Government

  389
  of Poland, which itself was recognised by His Majesty's Government.
  Mr. Paget: But are not many of these people in prison?
  The Attorney-General: It is a matter of great obscurity. That is why we want this Clause.
  Mr. Pritt: I have listened to a great many of the things that have been said tonight, and I have mixed feelings about this Clause. I feel a great deal of sympathy with the proposition which is covered by the first Amendment. It is a good idea—and I shall have some sympathy from the Opposition for this point of view—that we should know the law that we are passing. It is said by the Attorney-General that it is a great disadvantage that these Poles should be expected to obey a law which they do not understand, and which is in a language they do not understand. But they are in no worse position than about 90 per cent. of the people of this country, so there is nothing much in that. The Attorney-General said that the Poles were foreign people whom we could not put under our own military law. Let us think for a moment of the position of the British Army. In the Levant, for instance, it was difficult to discover a British "other rank" who spoke English. There were Greeks, Maltese, Cypriots, Austrians, and Germans. When I was in Cairo recently, it took me 25 minutes to discover a fellow-subject who understood what I said. We have never had the remotest difficulty, up to now, in applying, to a large number of people, British military law, in giving them orders, although I do not mean, by that, telling them to form fours. Now the right hon. and learned Gentleman says that we must apply an old and obscure law to these Poles, because some, although having been in this country for many years, cannot speak English.
  We are asked to apply a law which is to be ascertained as at a date in 1945, but as has been pointed out several times, this is the law of a country which had been occupied by an enemy State for a good many years before that. Law should he something not dead, but living. You might as well seek to apply the law of the Holy Roman Empire as to apply that of Poland, which has had no real existence as a living body of law since 1940. We are asked to apply that law, and we are
  390
  told, incidentally, that there have been no complaints about it. Anybody who was in the last Parliament, and who followed those matters, had complaint after complaint after complaint both about the terms of that law and about the administration of it. I remember that Sir James Grigg, who would have merited the epithet of "tough," actually consented to several large bodies of Polish troops being removed from the Polish Army solely on account of the way in which they had been treated by this so-called Polish military law.
  Mr. Zilliacus: May I point out that the military law in question was the law of the Polish semi-Fascist dictatorship?
  Mr. Pritt: I had that in mind, and I am glad that it has been mentioned. I remember one occasion when complaints about this law were so numerous that I was asked to call on the very courteous gentleman who was described as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of that thing described as a State. He received me with great courtesy, and he told me that if I put before him any complaint by any Polish soldier, he would produce for me within twenty-four hours a signed statement by that soldier repudiating the complaint. That is the law about which we are told there is no complaint, and we are asked to apply it now under the difficulties that have been pointed out by a great many hon. Members. With regard to the extent to which the British courts would test it, I respectfully agree with the Attorney-General that it is quite plain that you could try habeas corpus. It is plain you could try certiorari, but it is not an easy task to convince [Interruption.] Certiorari is a procedure whereby you can challenge and stop anything that is being done without jurisdiction, but in order to decide whether it is without jurisdiction or not, if you are dealing with a Clause that applies holus-bolus, you will find it very difficult indeed to discover whether it is within the jurisdiction or without, because it is so difficult to discover what the law is, and until you know what the law is, you cannot say whether a thing is outside it. That is not a conclusive objection, because the courts and lawyers do solve difficult problems. They would not be paid so much if they, did not do so.

  391
  The Attorney-General frightens us with armies of translators. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of words were translated in the course of the war. Every message sent to the illegal underground in Poland from the Bayswater Government was translated by the Foreign Office before they censored it. There is no difficulty about translation. One need not be too slavish about it. One might find that it would be sufficient to apply large chunks of British military law. If you want to tell Polish soldiers the exact effect of the law about being out after 10 p.m., it might be difficult, but if you want to say "You will have trouble if you are not home by 10 p.m.", if he is a well-disciplined fellow, he will be home by 11 p.m., and it is quite as easy to apply the military law of England as it would be a translation of the Polish code. There is no serious difficulty about that.
  11.45 p.m.
  I was a little perturbed by the Attorney-General on one point. I remember long years ago, when I was on the benches opposite, and a very distinguished gentleman used to occupy the office of Attorney-General, and used to make his explanations. One began by believing that thee could be an explanation; then the learned Attorney-General would give his explanation, and we did not realise it was one. There was one point in which the right hon. and learned Gentleman reminds me of his distinguished predecessor and that was when he suggested that the legality was very doubtful and was not decided in the recent case. The first point that shocks me is the doubt thrown on the legality of Polish forces recently. I should have thought there was no doubt. I think it was a great pity that anyone should have cast a doubt. If the legality is in doubt, why not get it all cleared up? Why have all this discussion at all? I feel, if there has been any doubt at all, that the learned Attorney-General has neglected his duty, and that when he had a clear opportunity he passed it by. I refuse to accept the story that we have heard about the habeas corpus procedure. The psychologist should come to the assistance of anyone who swallowed that tale. I think this matter should be dealt with. In a way it is an insult to the present Polish Government to treat the matter on any other basis than by saying that there is
  392
  justification for the existence of this body of people only as a collection of alien friends all dressed alike.
  I agree with the Home Secretary that the real difficulty here is that these people have not some method of discipline. I want some form of legislation, not too objectionable and something which will not take too much occupation of public time. When the learned Attorney-General tells us that there are no constitutional objections, one can take comfort from the fact that he would not have said that, if he had heard the Debate. Therefore we can excuse him. They were made very plain by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget). It is quite wrong for him to say that it is the same since 1940. In 1940 we passed legislation of the type we had passed before saying that if there are people in this country owing allegiance to another State, let them be withdrawn from the ordinary duties they owe to the law of this country and give it to the country to which they owe allegiance. Here you have alien friends in this country who may owe allegiance to the new State. We should not be discussing them if they did not. You are now legislating with regard to people who owe a duty to obey the laws of this country, and who for some months have been in a kind of legal vacuum. You are also legislating retrospectively. You are saying you are going to treat them legally until the Act comes into force, and you are applying a wholly new form of control with an Administrator who can apply whatever procedure he likes and do anything except hang them. Yet we are told this is not a constitutional innovation. I admire the hon. Member for Northampton. I think he was very scrupulous when he said, in effect, that this may be all right but that we must know what we are doing. I think his argument that this was a constitutional innovation was a very sound one.
  I am all in favour of constitutional innovations, but I do object to being told by the Attorney-General that there is not one here. He ought to be very pleased that there is. I hesitated very much in trying to bring an intelligent mind to bear on the problem because I do not like lawyers' arguments at all. This Clause is bad, but no Clause on this difficult problem, can be very good. My own personal feeling—and I speak with a

  393
  certain degree of objectivity in the matter —is that the right hon. Gentleman should give up this objectionable idea of applying this objectionable law, which nobody understands and lay down what law is to be applied in an Order in Council. We have passed laws by Orders in Council more complicated than that and I feel it would be workable if that could be done. I apologise for having detained the House so long on a matter of law but it is also a matter of importance.
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. William Whiteley)rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
  Question put, "That the Question be now put."
  The House proceeded to a Division.
  Mr. Warbey: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker—
  Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member places an Order Paper on his head. Last night I ruled that that was not in Order.
  Mr. Warbey(seated and covered): On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. When the discussion on this new Clause was opened, you said that you intended to call the Amendments. Those Amendments have not been called and they raise important points of principle.
  Mr. Speaker: I can correct the hon. Member. I cannot call the Amendments until the Clause has been read a Second time. Then, naturally, I call the first Amendment.
  Mr. Driberg (seated and covered): On a point of Order. We were promised a reply by the Secretary of State for War during this Debate.
  Mr. Speaker: Of course, such a reply would be given during the discussion of the Amendment.
  The House divided: Ayes, 169; Noes, 53.

  Division No. 103.]

  AYES.

  [11.53 p.m.

  Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)

  Fletcher, E, G. M. (Islington, E.)

  McKinlay, A. S.

  Anderson, A. (Motherwell)

  Follick, M.

  McLeavy, F.

  Awbery, S, S.

  Forman, J. C.

  MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)

  Balfour, A.

  Fraser, T. (Hamilton)

  Macpherson, T. (Romford)

  Bechervaise, A. E.

  Freeman, Maj. J (Watford)

  Mathers, G.

  Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J

  Gibson, C. W.

  Mitchison, G. R.

  Blackburn, A. R.

  Gilzean, A.

  Monslow, W.

  Blyton, W. R.

  Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

  Morgan, Dr. H. B.

  Boardman, H.

  Greenwood, Rt. Hon. A. (Wakefield)

  Morley, R.

  Bottomley, A. G.

  Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)

  Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)

  Bowden, Flg.-Offr. H. W.

  Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

  Moyle, A.

  Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl, Exch'ge)

  Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

  Nally, W.

  Brook, D. (Halifax)

  Guest, Dr. L. Haden

  Neal, H. (Claycross)

  Brown, T. J. (Ince)

  Haire, John E. (Wycombe)

  Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)

  Buchanan, G.

  Hall, W. G.

  Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

  Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)

  Hamilton, Lieut. -Col. R.

  Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)

  Carmichael, James

  Hannan, W. (Maryhill)

  Oliver, G. H.

  Champion, A. J.

  Hastings, Dr. Somerville

  Paget, R. T.

  Cobb, F. A.

  Herbison, Miss M.

  Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)

  Collindridge, F.

  Holman, P.

  Pearson, A.

  Collins, V. J.

  House, G.

  Peart, Capt. T. F.

  Colman, Miss G. M.

  Hoy, J.

  Plaits-Mills, J. F. F.

  Comyns, Dr. L.

  Hubbard, T.

  Popplewell, E.

  Corbet, Mrs. F. K. (Camb'well, N.W.)

  Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

  Porter, G. (Leeds)

  Corlett, Dr. J.

  Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)

  Pritt, D. N.

  Crawley, A.

  Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

  Pursey, Cmdr. H.

  Daggar, G.

  Jeger, G. (Winchester)

  Randall, H. E.

  Davies, Edward (Burslem)

  Jones, D. T. (Hartlepools)

  Ranger, J.

  Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

  Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)

  Reid, T. (Swindon)

  Deer, G.

  Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)

  Ridealgh, Mrs. M.

  Delargy, H. J.

  Keenan, W.

  Robens, A.

  Diamond, J.

  Kenyon, C.

  Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)

  Dobbie, W.

  Key, C W.

  Ross, William (Kilmarnock)

  Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)

  King, E. M.

  Royle, C.

  Dumpleton, C. W.

  Kirby, B. V.

  Sargood, R.

  Dye, S.

  Kirkwood, D.

  Segal, Dr. S.

  Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

  Lavers, S.

  Shackleton, Wing-Cdr. E. A. A.

  Edelman M

  Leonard, W.

  Sharp, Granville

  Edwards, John (Blackburn)

  Levy, B. W.

  Shawcross, Rt. Hn. Sir H. (St. Helens)

  Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

  Logan, D. G.

  Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)

  Evans, John (Ogmore)

  Longden, F

  Skeffington, A. M.

  Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)

  Mack, J. D.

  Smith, S. H, (Hull, S.W.)

  Ewart, R.

  McKay, J. (Wallsend)

  Snow, Capt. J. W.

  Fairhurst, F.

  Mackay, R. W. G. (Hull, N.W.)

  Sorensen, R. W.

  Soskice, Maj. Sir F

  Turner-Samuels, M.

  Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)

  Sparks, J. A.

  Ungoed-Thomas, L.

  Williams, D. J. (Neath)

  Stamford, W

  Vernon, Maj. W. F.

  Williams, J. L. (Kelvingrove)

  Steele, T.

  Wallace, H. W. (Walthamslow, E.)

  Williams, W. R. (Heston)

  Stewart, Michael (Fulham, E.)

  Watkins, T. E.

  Willis, E.

  Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)

  Watson, W. M.

  Wilson, J. H.

  Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

  Wells, W. T. (Walsall)

  Woodburn, A

  Thomat, D. E. (Aberdare)

  West, D. G.

  Yates, V. F.

  Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)

  White, C. F. (Derbyshire, W.)

  Younger, Hon. Kennett

  Thomas, I. O. (Wrekin)

  White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

  Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

  Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

  Timmons, J.

  Wigg, Col. G. E.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

  Titterington, M. F

  Witkins, W. A.

  Mr. Joseph Henderson and

  Tolley, L.

  Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

  Mr. Simmons.

  NOES

  Agnew, Cmdr. P. G

  Gage, C.

  Orr-Ewing, I. L.

  Astor, Hon. M.

  Gomme-Duncan, Col. A. G

  Peake, Rt. Hon. O.

  Barlow, Sir J.

  Hogg, Hon. Q.

  Price-White, Lt.-Col. D

  Birch, Nigel

  Hollis, M. C.

  Ramsay, Maj. S

  Bossom, A. C.

  Keeling, E. H.

  Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)

  Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.

  Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H

  Smithers, Sir W.

  Buchan-Hepburn. P. G. T

  Lindsay, M. (Solihull)

  Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.

  Bullock, Capt M.

  Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)

  Strauss, H. G. (English Universities)

  Challen, C.

  McKie, J. H. (Galloway)

  Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray)

  Conant, Maj. R. J. E.

  Macmillan, Rt. Hon. Harold (Bromley)

  Studholme, H. G.

  Corbett, Lieut.-Col. U. (Ludlow)

  Macpherson, Maj. N. (Dumfries)

  Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd't'n, S.)

  Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O E

  Manningham-Buller, R. E.

  Thorp, Lt.-Col. R. A. F

  Crowder, Capt. John E

  Marples, A. E.

  Vane, W. M. F.

  Darling, Sir W. Y.

  Marsden, Capt. A

  Wheatley, Colonel M. J.

  Drayson, G. B.

  Mcdlicott, F.

  White, J. B. (Canterbury)

  Foster, J. G. (Northwich)

  Molson, A. H. E.

  Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl

  Fox, Sir G.

  Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)

  Fraser, Maj. H. C. P. (Stone)

  Neven-Spence, Sir B.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

  Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P M

  Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.

  Mr. Mikardo and Major Bramall.

  Question, "That the Clause be read a Second time," put accordingly, and agreed to.

  12 m.
  Mr. Bing: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Clause, in line 8, to leave out from "administration" to the second "and," in line 10, and to insert instead thereof:
  "such rules as may be made by His Majesty by Order in Council."
  The object of the Amendment is thus to substitute Rules made by Order in Council for
  "the rules in force as to those matters under the law of Poland on the 1st day of January. 1945"—
  the proposal in the new Clause.
  If there is one thing which is clear about this Clause—and there are a great many things which are not at all clear—it is that it seeks to enforce the law of what I might call the Lublin Polish Government—that is the Government which at that time was at Lublin and known by that name. I am sorry to see that when we come to this important point the Attorney-General does not seem to be on the Front Bench. Perhaps he does not think that this is a matter for his attention. I am glad to see that he is now coming and perhaps he will give the matter his attention. I would have thought that that was one point which would have been
  396
  abundantly clear to the Attorney-General. Perhaps it was so clear to him that he skated over it and said that that was a matter for the courts to decide, but he failed to add that there is only one direction in which the courts could possibly decide. It is so clear that I did not seek to fortify myself with any particular references in order to argue the point. I thought it so well established as a point of international law that there was no need to argue it.
  May I say to the Attorney-General that surely it is quite clear that once a Government has been recognised, whatever we may think of the law it has exercised in the past, that law becomes the law of that country. I would remind the Attorney-General of an American case of which I have a note and which has been developed and has now been accepted in a line of English cases. The American Chief Justice said this:
  "If the party seeking to dislodge the existing government succeeds "—
  that is exactly what happened in regard to the present Warsaw Government—
  "and the independence of the Government it has set up is recognised"—
  that is exactly what happened—
  "then the acts of such a Government from the commencement of its existence are regarded as those of an independent nation."

  397
  So that the law which we are asked to enforce by this Clause is not the law of Poland which was enforced in this country at the end of 1944, but is quite clearly and definitely—I do not think the Attorney-General will contradict me—the law of Poland as administered by the Lublin Government in a particularly confused period, 1st January, 1945.
  But suppose for a moment that I am wrong. Then the Attorney-General and the Home Secretary are in much greater difficulties, because what was the Polish Government in power on 1st January, 1945, in this country? What were the laws it was making? It is a most unfortunate day to choose. May I recall to the House what the right hon. Member for Woodford (Mr. Churchill) said about that particular Government which came into power just about that date? The right hon. Gentleman said, in the Debate of 15th December, that this Government had been:
  "….entirely reconstituted in a form which in some respects I certainly am not able to applaud."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th December, 1944; Vol. 406, c. 1481.]
  Although the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Woodford was not able to applaud it, we are now going to apply its laws after some two years have elapsed. What were the laws in force as to discipline and internal administration of Poland at that date? I am sorry that the hon. Member for Queen's University of Belfast (Professor Savory) is not here, because he would be better able to advise the House on the actual details of Polish law than I am, but we can discover the main principles by referring to the Treaty mentioned in the first Clause of this Bill. I call the attention of the Attorney-General to Article 1 which is part of the law of Poland in force, according to his argument, on 1st January, 1945. It says:
  "Polish Armed Forces (comprising land, air and sea forces) shall be organised and employed under British Command, in its character as the Allied High Command, as the Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland allied to the United Kingdom."
  Then the Treaty gives details of the rules these people are to obey under Polish law. If one looks at Appendix II, Article 4, one sees:
  "The soldiers of the Polish Land Forces will take an oath of allegiance to the Polish Republic."
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  Can the Attorney-General tell us how this rule, which was in force on 1st January, 1945, is to be enforced, and perhaps he will tell us to whom these people owe allegiance? Quite clearly it is not to the British Crown, because the rules in force on 1st January, 1945, expressly exclude that. They cannot own allegiance to the London Polish Government, because that Government has ceased to exist. If the Attorney-General's interpretation of the law is correct, they cannot owe allegiance to the present Polish Government because on that date, according to his argument, it had not come into being.
  We make a grave mistake if we regard this matter on a purely legalistic basis. We are concerned much more with administration and I will put one or two difficulties about administration. First, the laws of Poland prescribe certain ranks which will be held in the Polish Forces in times of war. We are now in times of peace, but we are giving Polish soldiers, unlike British troops, the right to retain their wartime rank in times of peace. That is not satisfactory. We have had at one time or another discussions about the propriety of income tax reductions for people who work overtime, but according to this Clause, provided these people work, as it were, sufficient under-time, they do not have to pay income tax at all. For under Polish law, not one of them will be liable to English income tax.
  The present position of the Polish Forces is that, so long as they do not go into the Resettlement Corps and do not do any work, they do not pay any Income Tax. Once they come under British law in the Polish Resettlement Corps they have to pay Income Tax. It seems to me to be rather undesirable we should offer them this inducement not to enter the Resettlement Corps.
  Perhaps the learned Attorney-General will tell us what really are the Administrator's powers under the law of Poland. We do not know what they are. We know there are rather peculiar rules which deal with lunacy among the Polish troops, and if one looks at the various cases which have arisen one sometimes finds they are cases of people who are not charged with any crime. but are just certified as insane by some Polish officer and thus can be held indefinitely. This is a matter of some importance and I would mention one

  399
  case which seems to make it of considerable importance. At the 5th Polish Military Hospital until the end of January this year there was a certain Dr. Dering employed as the surgeon and physician of that hospital. I think it is generally agreed he was exactly the same person who was the chief medical officer at the Auschwitz concentration camp. He remained in that position till the end of hostilities, and he then proceeded to join the Polish Army and was appointed as physician in charge of this hospital. That is a man who was able, when habeas corpus cases come along to give these psychiatrist reports and to say that a man is not fit to plead. That is a matter which requires looking into.
  What is the administrative position? As I understand it, the whole difficulty of the learned Attorney-General is that it would be too much trouble to translate and make a code in English, but it seems to me that if this House is going to prescribe a law we should at least know what that law is, even though it may involve us in some little trouble in setting out what it is. If the Administrator is going to know what it is, or if the English courts are going to interpret it, then surely they are at least entitled to a translation. Would it not be better to make a translation in the first place?
  In conclusion, there are two points I would like to make. Does the learned Attorney-General know what the law of Poland is at the present moment? In this case he ought to tell us whether he considers it to be the law of the present Polish Government, which I should think it most clearly is. In that case I think he should pause, for what may have been a very valuable code during the advance through Poland—it probably allows for commissars—might now be out of place. If, on the other hand, it is the law of Poland that was in force on 1st January, 1945, it converts these unfortunate persons into soldiers who owe allegiance to no one, and we shall have made them into a kind of statutory bandit or pirate at law. That does not seem to me to be the best way for this House to legislate. I do hope that this particular provision will be reconsidered very thoroughly, and some steps taken to effect an alteration in this Clause which, in my submission, is in its present form quite meaningless and purposeless.
  12.15 a.m.
  Major Bramall: I beg to second the Amendment.
  I am at some disadvantage in speaking immediately after my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing), who has proposed the Amendment with his customary brilliance. I also feel at a disadvantage in not being a lawyer because, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Hammersmith (Mr. Pritt) remarked, this is a lawyers' benefit this evening.
  But I think we can have a look at this Amendment, and see how it is designed to improve this Clause without going too deeply into the legal technicalities. We have some advantage in that we have already heard the answers of the learned Attorney-General, and of the Home Secretary, on some of the points which are raised in this Amendment, on the Second Reading of this Clause. Two points struck me particularly. One was the fact that the Home Secretary stressed the difficulties of the situation, and its unprecedented nature. But I would tell him, with great respect, that however difficult a situation may be, that is no excuse for a Minister coming here and putting forward a solution which obviously is totally inadequate. The fact that the case is difficult does not, to my mind, constitute an adequate excuse for promulgating a law which is in itself bad, and which in future will create even greater difficulty. The second point was that it is necessary to have some law governing the Polish Forces which they can understand; and with the reservations made by the hon. and learned Member for North Hammersmith and the hon. Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) that that is a privilege denied to a great many people who come under our law, I would say that there is an equally important principle to be observed, namely, that this law which we enact or affirm for these Polish Forces should be law in accord with our canons of justice. Since we are enacting or affirming it by British Statute, it should be in accord with the British canons of law. I know nothing about Polish law. The law we are here enacting or affirming may be perfectly unexceptional, but, on the other hand, as has been said by the hon. and learned Member for North Hammersmith, from what has been heard in the past there appear to have been considerable blemishes. One has heard

  401
  stories that the law and administration of Polish military courts has been used for specific political purposes directly contrary to those which the Government which is moving this Clause, desires to effect; that Polish military discipline has been used for the purpose of deterring people from going back to Poland, for punishing people who have expressed a desire to take advantage of the facilities which are being given to them to go back. There seems to me in this case to be a very definite legal difficulty. Among the things which are part of any body of law are the attributes of allegiance which the subject owes. That matter has been touched upon more than once in this Debate. The fact is, that these people at present owe no allegiance to any known sovereignty. But as the law of Poland stood on 1st January, 1945, as it was enacted and enforced by the London Government, there is no doubt that anyone who owed allegiance to the Lublin Government was a traitor to the London Government. It is equally true that anyone at present who owes allegiance to the so-called London Government is a traitor in the eyes of the Government of Warsaw. Therefore, we are saying, since we are crystallising the law as it was on 1st January, 1945, that these people are, in fact, traitors, in that they owe allegiance to a body which is now the Government of their country, and which is recognised by His Majesty's Government. It seems to me that we are putting them into an extremely difficult position in that respect.
  The second point in which this law is extremely unsatisfactory is that it is a dead law to which we refer when we say that it is the Polish law of a particular date which shall be enforced by the courts, and enforced under British Statute. I am not a lawyer, and, therefore, I am not in a position to check my argument here, but it appears to me as a layman, as a mere plain man, that since we are enforcing Polish law on a particular day, that law can never be amended, however unsatisfactory it may show itself to be in the conditions which hereafter arise in this Force. There is no means by which the law can be changed, because the only law which can be legally enforced in the Polish Corps is the law on a particular day in the past.
  The final point which I should like to touch upon is that of the international repercussions which will result from this
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  Clause we are trying to enact. I am certain hon. Members do not want to put us in a position where we are intimidated by any foreign Power or government to pass into law something we consider not to be right. But when we do something in this House which is regarded by a foreign country as a definite affront, we should take notice of it. The Polish Government regard the passage in a British Bill which proposes to enact as the law of this country Polish law at a time when that Government was not even in existence, with great disaproval. Furthermore, it proposes that we shall say that Forces which have been declared by a Polish Government not to be the Forces of the Republic of Poland, are in fact, Forces of that Republic. We say that we disregard the action of the Republic of Poland' in disavowing these Forces, and furthermore, we say that we recognise law which is not the law of the Government of Poland at the present time. We recognise law of the Government of Poland which preceded this Government, and which has been disavowed by this Government. Therefore, I suggest to the House that the only way in which we can get round this difficulty is to find some easily attainable means of enforcing discipline among these people. I suggest that an Order in Council shall be made which will enact any law that is appropriate, and that law might well be this Polish law. But if an Order in Council is to be enacted, this Polish law must be gone through, and we must satisfy ourselves that this particular section of Polish law it is proposed to enact is in accordance with British canons of justice; that there is nothing exceptional in it, and we must be prepared to defend it to this House. Without causing any undue inconveniences—and I think that the difficulties of translation are exaggerated—by suggesting we are going to leave these people without discipline and control, I claim this would provide a means of carrying out the intention of the Government without trespassing against the wishes of a foreign Power and without offending against things which they consider to be fundamental.
  The Attorney-General: The points which have been raised by the hon. Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing) and the hon. and gallant Member for Bexley

  403
  (Major Bramall) are very interesting, and very subtle, but they are exceedingly academic at the same time. I would ask the House to remember that all that we are seeking to do here is to continue, for a further seven months, or so, that which has been in practical operation for the past seven years, subject to this great safeguard, that the whole Polish force is being brought under British control and British command.
  Mr. Scollan: Why not British law?
  The Attorney-General: Under the Clause as it now stands, members of this force will owe obedience to the British administrator. Let me make that perfectly clear.
  It will be under the command of the British administrator, who will be a British subject appointed by the Secretary of State and who will, in turn, be responsible to this House in regard to him. They will owe local allegiance to the British Crown. They will be bound in matters of administration and discipline by the law of Poland, as sustained by the Polish Government recognised by His Majesty's Government on 1st January, 1945. No question of taking any oath of allegiance to the Polish Republic now arises. That obligation was imposed on Polish soldiers at the time of their entry into the Polish Forces. New members are not now being recruited into these forces, and that obligation is not a recurring one. Polish procedural law will have no application in these matters. Subsection (3) of this Clause vests the jurisdiction to try cases in the administrator as the commanding officer of these forces, and his delegates.
  We could deal with this matter by promulgating a code of law by an Order in Council. That would be a possible course. If we took that course Members will realise that we should, in practice, have to reimpose on the Polish forces substantially the same body of law which is contemplated by this Clause, to which they are used and with the rules of which they are familiar. We must face the practical necessities and realities of this extraordinary situation. Here is a Polish force which exists—we cannot shut our eyes to that—a force which, so long as it continues to exist—and it will not continue to exist for long—must continue to
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  be administered and disciplined. It has hitherto been administered and disciplined under the law of Poland, substantially as it was in 1945. I beg Members to think that the practical commonsense thing is to say, "During demobilisation, for the few months that this force will remain in existence, let us continue to operate the code which has applied to them hitherto, subject to the important safeguard that now they are under the command of a British administrator, a person who can remit penalties if they are improper, who has a responsibility to the Secretary of State and, through the Secretary of State, to the Government."
  Mr. Scollan: What is the point of saying it is only temporary when the right hon. and learned Gentleman cannot tell us how long it will last? It may last for many years.
  The Attorney - General: This House will have very adequate and ready control over the policy of His Majesty's Government in regard to the existence of this force. Some members of the force will go into the Resettlement Corps, and become members of the British Army. Some will go back to Poland. As soon as they have been sorted out—and the process is going forward now, at a very rapid rate—this force will cease to exist. This Bill deals with transitional matters, and this Clause deals with a transitional matter.
  12.30 a.m.
  Mr. J. Foster: This Amendment has one advantage in that it eliminates one reference to the law of Poland as it was on 1st January, 1945. The hon. Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing) asked what was the law of Poland on 1st January, 1945? I am afraid I shall have to take the House into a rather subtle argument which, in my submission, is, nevertheless, a sound one, as to what the law of Poland was on 1st January, 1945, according to our notions now. It may sound a paradox to a layman, but the law in force in Poland on 1st January, 1945, which we would have said was in force in 1945, is not the law of Poland in force in 1945. It sounds absurd, but in my submission it is so. In English law, a question of foreign law is a question of fact, and there have been cases where an English court has found that French law, for instance, founded on

  405
  Ist March was so and so, and on 1st June has found that exactly the same point in French law was exactly the opposite. That is the first thing. It is a matter of fact.
  Let us take the case of a couple coming from France and being married here, and then, later, there being proceedings of nullity. Evidence is given on the question of fact by French lawyers. It is said that this couple did not have the consent of their parents. In French law, French people who marry abroad and do not have the consent of their parents are not married in accordance with French law and hence, the court would say, on 1st January, 1910, that the people were married in England, and that they had not the capacity to be married, because, according to French law, the marriage was nullified. The French law would give a case from the Court of Cassation which is clear on the point. Then, the next year, the Court of Cassation reverses its decision. Take, then, the case of a French couple, married on exactly the same date as the other couple, coming before an English court. The evidence is given about the Court of Cassation having reversed its decision. The question is exactly the same: What was French law on 1st January, 1910? The evidence that is given on French law is that French law has changed. The English court does not say, "What did we think the law of France was on 1st January, 1910?" The English courts are not allowed to do that. They have to say, "What is the evidence of French lawyers now as to what the French law on 1st January, 1910, was?" It is the opposite.
  That is the fallacy of this Clause. It is a matter of applying international law. It is a well-known problem, and the technical name is "the classification of law in time." As one would expect, many learned books have been written by German lawyers on it. What happens now? An English court has to decide what was the law of Poland on 1st January, 1945. The Clause says so. The only evidence we can have is the evidence of Polish lawyers. Their evidence must be that the law on 1st January, 1945, is the law which the present Polish law says was in force on 1st January, 1945. The Polish Government, like many refugee Governments, or non-refugee Govern-
  406
  ments that sprung up in countries that were occupied, were faced with a very difficult legal problem. There had been laws passed in, say, Norway, by the refugee Government and laws passed by the Norwegian Quisling Government, and the Norwegian Government are faced with a difficulty in that they cannot wipe out the whole of the laws passed by the Quisling Government, because that would make legal nonsense of such things as marriages, births, and so on. What they say is that, during the German occupation, this is what the law of Norway was, and they supplement the law passed by the refugee Government by adding a few Quisling laws and one of their own, and they say, not what is the law since the liberation only, but they add that the law of Norway since the occupation was so-and-so.
  The Polish Government have done the same thing. They were faced with a more difficult legal problem. There had been German laws of the Gouvernement General, and they say that in 1945 the Polish law was so-and-so. Let me give one more illustration. The Vichy Government passed many laws in France. For instance, they passed a company law. In 1945, the English courts, faced with the question of what was French company law, would have said, "It is French law up to 1940, the day of the occupation by the Germans, or perhaps 1942, the date of the occupation of the unoccupied zone, plus any laws passed by the De Gaulle Government when it was recognised." But in 1947, if they were asked what was the French law in 1945, there would be a very different answer because the French lawyers would have said that the De Gaulle Government did not recognise the Vichy company law but that since De Gaulle went back they have incorporated the Vichy company law. Therefore, the French lawyers in 1947 would be telling the English court what the law was in 1945, and that would be different from what the English court would have been told by the French court in 1945.
  That is what is happening here. There can be no other answer to the question in an English court today. Suppose a man complains that he has been imprisoned under the Provisional Government of 1945. If he does he will have an unanswerable argument when he says that the only Polish law in 1945 is the law which the present Polish Govern-

  407
  ment say was the law in 1945. That touches in the point raised by the hon. Member who spoke before the Attorney General that that law cannot be changed. But it can be changed because the sovereign body in Poland is the present Government and it is they who decide not only what the law is now, but what it was before. We cannot freeze the law as it was in 1945, and then say in 1947 that however much the Poles have changed it, we cannot recognise it. We have got to recognise it, unless the law is altered. Therefore, I do submit that this Clause as it is today cannot work and for that reason it would appear to be desirable to accept the Amendment.
  Mr. Piratin: I hope the learned Attorney-General and those responsible on the Government Front Bench will accept the Amendment. I am impressed by the argument of the hon. Member for Northwich (Mr. J. Foster). He reminds me of a joke which was current when I was a boy. You asked your friend what was the name of the Prime Minister in 1906. If you knew your history you would remember that it might have been Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. The answer, however, was "No, it was the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Limehouse" (Mr. Attlee). I think that is the essence of the argument put by the hon. Member for Northwich, and it is a very sound argument why the learned Attorney-General should accept the Amendment. I did not get up to make jokes but to make two brief points which in some cases have been referred to.
  One point that occurs to me is that the learned Attorney-General addressed himself to the question put by the hon. and gallant Member for Bexley (Major Bramall), who, I think, was the first person to raise the matter, namely, the international consequences of what is involved. We have heard a lot from several hon. Members on the judicial and legal aspects of the question on which i am not qualified to speak. To me, this is a matter of common sense and politics. This is a political establishment. I put this point that this is an additional insult to the Bill to which we saw fit to give a Committee reading last week. Hon. Members may recall that the Minister was asked why there had been no consultation with the present Polish Government. They
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  would have liked to have been consulted about the character of the Bill. But the Minister did not see fit to answer the point I made. Here, on this occasion, we understand, and as the hon. Member for Bexley has said, the Polish Embassy have intervened on the matter, have stated that they do not agree that this Clause should go through in the way in which it is proposed and that they also have indicated that they would hold themselves free to take such steps as they see fit, whatever that may mean. It may mean that the matter may be raised with the United Nations organisation. It may mean that it may be taken up through some other diplomatic channels, but, surely it is a matter which should be given attention and no hon. Member on the Front Bench tonight has yet addressed himself to this question and I think certainly hon. Members on this side would like to hear an answer to this question.
  What is the attitude? Are we still to Haunt the interests and the sovereignty of the Warsaw Government and are we still to go on as though no such Government existed? The other point I have in mind is that I remember being told when we were discussing it on the Committee stage that we are going to help these Poles in this country to find their feet again. Expressions have been used about their developing towards the British way of life. I put it that what we are saying is that these Poles, a large number of whom do not want to face the present in this country or the future in Poland, are being helped to remain in the past by still being provided with the law of the old prewar Polish Government. I had the impression that that was the last thing we wanted to do. The impression I had was that we wanted to show them the so-called British way of life, if we could not encourage them to return to Poland. Yet, on the contrary, when we come to this particular Clause, the Minister is endeavouring to secure for them that they should live in the past, as some of them still desire to do. I hope, therefore, that further consideration will be given to this and that this Amendment, which is meant to help the Clause and not to obstruct it, will be accepted, and that the whole of the Bill will be improved thereby.
  The Attorney-General: I wonder if the House will allow me to say a few words. I do not want to follow the hon. Member

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  into the political aspects of this matter, but I do want to say something in relation to the point raised by the hon. Member for Northwich (Mr. J. Foster). No one could refrain from being impressed by the extreme subtlety of his argument, but I am bound to say that I entirely reject it as being in any way applicable to the provisions of this Clause in this matter. The position is really exceedingly simple. The court, the officer, the person exercising the functions delegated from the Minister would have to ascertain, whether by the rules in force on 1st January, 1945, it was an offence, for instance, to disobey an order which had been given by a superior officer. Evidence would be given by lawyers as to that fact. Lawyers might differ about it; they do even in England now and again, but there really would be no difficulty on the part of the court, or the person exercising the delegated powers, in ascertaining the true facts. All that the court, or officer, would have to do would be to consider the position as it existed on 1st January, 1945. The officer puts himself in that position, he ascertains whether it was an offence to disobey an order at that time, and, if it was, he imposes the penalty which was provided for at that time. There is no difficulty about the matter whatever, and there is no reason to go into the very subtle academical reasoning advanced by the hon. Member for Northwich.
  Major Bramall: Does not the Clause say, "Under the law of Poland"? Would not all these people, the administrator, the officer, and so on, have to ask themselves what would have been their position under the law of Poland? In view of that, surely, the arguments of the hon. Member for Northwich apply, that they would have had to find what was the law of Poland. Is it not true, as he said, that that can only be found by reference to what the Government of Poland decided what the law of Poland was on that date.
  The Attorney-General: My answer to that is "No."
  12.45 a.m.
  Mr. James Callaghan: I think it is a pity that the Attorney-General did not wait before intervening since now he will have to request the leave of the House to speak yet a third time in order to
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  clear up the small point I wish to make. I am rather impressed by the arguments which have been put by supporters of the Amendment up to the moment. I think, however, there is one consideration which would lead me to give my vote to the Attorney-General. That is if, in fact, this existing corpus of land law which has gone on for seven years is to continue for a period of only seven further months. That was what I understood the Attorney-General to say, but the point I am still not quite clear about, and upon which I should like an answer from the right hon. and learned Gentleman, is why this is only to continue for a short period of seven months.
  When the Attorney-General went on to explain why, he said it could not continue to exist because of rapid demobilisation which will mean that there will be one of two courses open to these men. Either they will return to Poland or they will go into the resettlement corps. I may be very stupid, but I have tried to follow this, and I thought we were dealing in this new Clause with the third class of people who were neither going back to Poland, nor going into the resettlement corps. That, as I understand it, was the Home Secretary's argument during the Second Reading Debate. If, in fact, I am not being so stupid as I think I am, why is it that this is to last for a period of only seven months? May I have an assurance that in fact it will last for a period of only seven months, in which case I am inclined to give it? But if, on the other hand, this Clause is dealing with this—I thought—rather worthless crowd of people who are neither willing to work here, according to the Home Secretary, nor prepared to return to Poland, then should say that if we are going to get tough with them we had better start "getting tough" in this direction—to use the Home Secretary's own words.
  How can we be sure that they are not going to take advantage of the situation, if indeed they have taken advantage of it so far, to go on in the present vacuum between the past and the present which seems to exist under this Clause? How are we to be sure that they are not going on under that, for so long as we are prepared to pay them their living expenses? In that case it seems to me that for an indefinite period, and not

  411
  for seven months, these men will be living under this code of law about which the lawyers do not seem able to agree. In those circumstances, if they are to go on living in this country for an indefinite period, then they must come under something like this Amendment. I do not care whether it is this particular Amendment or not, but they must come under a body of living law, to which we can have access and reference, and which they can understand if they apply themselves to it.
  Mr. Driberg: I have listened with great interest and respect to the speeches of my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General and various other eminent constitutional and international lawyers; but, like by hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Bexley (Major Bramall), I am not a constitutional or any other kind of lawyer myself. I am a simple back-bench legislator trying to find my way through a legalistic labyrinth from which the learned Attorney has done little to rescue us by lolling outside the labyrinth and saying, "There ain't no maze—there's no such creature as the Minotaur." Really I do think that he and the Home Secretary between them—although I must pay a tribute to the patience and good humour which the Home Secretary has applied to this very difficult problem—have put the House in rather a tangle.
  Furthermore, it is not only the House but I think that the present Polish Government does not know what is happening here and what is in the mind of my right hon. Friend. The Attorney-General will know as well as I do the contents of the Note which was forwarded by the Polish Government two or three days ago to the Foreign Office, and he will be aware that the second specific complaint in that Note was of the infringement of Polish sovereign rights in that the former Polish armed force under British command, recognised as an independent allied authority, will have conferred upon it "the right to impose punishment on Polish citizens in accordance with Polish law." Stated simply like that, without any definition, it would seem that the present Polish Government imagines that the code of law which is to be applied in that part of the Clause which we are seeking to amend is the
  412
  present Polish law. I do not think that that can be the case, for reasons advanced by my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Bing), but I have not heard the Attorney-General reply whether that is so or not.
  Mr. Scollan: On that one point, is it not the case that the present Polish Government have not changed all the laws of Poland since 1939, and consequently they must come under some of the present laws of Poland?
  Mr. Driberg: Yes, some, but, as my hon. Friend will agree, that kind of half-Way house is rather unsatisfactory, for one does not know where one is. At any rate I agree with the hon. Member for Bexley that it is unfortunate that this step should be taken at this moment, when, at last, trade negotiations are about to be opened up with the new Polish Government, after all the long months of obstruction by the Foreign Office.
  There are several questions which the Attorney-General has not yet answered. I do not suppose he will ever answer them if he continues talking to the Home Secretary instead of listening to some of the questions which we respectfully address toward him.
  The Attorney-General: I am listening.
  Mr. Driberg: There are two small questions which I want to address to him and which I hope he will answer. The first was originally raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham (Mr. Hale) at an earlier stage, but is still relevant on this Amendment. It is, how is it that the Administrator is to be "experienced in the administration of British military law," and why, since it is specifically stated that he will deal with Polish law, is he not to have experience of Polish law? It is not British law which he will be called upon to administer, but possibly an obsolete Polish code. Can my right hon. and learned Friend answer that?
  The Attorney-General: I will answer it.
  Mr. Driberg: Can he also answer the point about Income Tax which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Horn-church? That seems to me to be an important point. The part of the Clause, which we are seeking at present to amend, seems to me most particularly to tend

  413
  towards the building up, despite what the learned Attorney-General has said, of some semi-permanent, coherent, necessarily indigestible alien bloc within our society. I think it is relevant to this part of the Clause to examine the state of mind in which some of these people are at present, in relation to the legislation which we are now discussing. Since the Second Reading of the Bill, various Polish newspapers, published in this country for the Polish troops, have commented at some length on the speeches on the Bill made by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. This is particularly relevant to the idea that we should impose an alien legal code in this country, because the Home Secretary expressed the hope that those who did not choose to go home to Poland would become assimilated into the life of this country. Yet on 14th February one newspaper, the "Polish Word," says, rather scornfully:
  "Mr. Chuter Ede expressed the hope that Poles who remain in Great Britain will be assimilated into the British community and will acquire the British way of life…. We do not intend to consider ourselves as candidates for de-nationalisation. We do not consider our sojourn in Great Britain final and permanent. We believe that conditions in Poland will undergo—within a time difficult to define at present—such a change that we shall be able to return to our motherland."
  The "Polish Daily and Soldier's Daily" of 15th February—
  An Hon. Member: Published here?
  Mr. Driberg: Yes, published in this country on paper allocated by the British Government and financed by the British taxpayer—said:
  "Polish emigration is and must be fundamentally of a political character; and because it is a political emigration conditions prevailing in Poland must influence its existence. This is particularly so on the question of the return of the emigration to Poland and the question of its assimilation in Great Britain. The emigration will return to Poland, in its majority, when our country is free: the emigration rejects assimilation into other countries."
  Hon. Members: Oh!
  Mr. Driberg: I suggest to the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General that when that kind of propaganda is being offered to the Polish troops—and I know it is naturally present already in many of their minds—it is extremely unwise and dangerous to impose the part of this Clause
  414
  which we are at the moment seeking to amend.
  The Polish soldiers are not all in the mood expressed in those newspaper editorials. I paid a visit to a Polish camp in my own constituency during this last weekend, because I happened to have heard that there were some difficulties and hardships there and I dislike to think of any human beings, however our political views may differ, undergoing unnecessary hardships. I talked with a good many of the officers and men, with this Clause and, in particular, this Amendment, very much in my mind. These were extremely gallant men, many of whom had fought at Monte Cassino, and I was rather favourably impressed with the reasonable spirit they showed. Although they had what may, without offence, be called the familiar Polish prejudices, they realised that the only two possible alternatives for them were either to return to Poland or to go into the Polish Resettlement Corps. Indeed, in that one camp—where, as I say, they had all the familiar prejudices—they estimated that as many as 20 per cent. would be opting in the immediate future to return to Poland; which I thought rather hopeful. It is because so many of them are so sensible in accepting the two alternatives that I suggest to the learned Attorney-General that it is foolish and wrong to take this step of imposing an alien legal code in this country, which must, above all other things, tend to crystallise the present unfortunate situation.
  The more definite the tendency is, especially by the imposition of such an alien code, towards the isolating of these Poles in their own quasi-military formations, the more unlikely it is that any substantial further number of them will decide to return to Poland and the more difficult it will be to assimilate them, through the Polish Resettlement Corps, into our society and to disperse them throughout it. Since these are the two alternatives which commend themselves to His Majesty's Government and to most hon. Members in this House, I feel bound to support this Amendment to a Clause which seems calculated to obstruct them.
  1.0 a.m.
  Mr. Solley: I desire to support this Amendment because I venture to think it meets most of the objections which have been raised in this Debate. A number of

  415
  legal points have been taken, and, with great respect to the Attorney-General, I do not think he dealt with them with the seriousness and earnestness which these issues deserve. My main objection to the Clause is not a legal but a political one, but before I deal with the political aspects of this Amendment, I should like to say just a word or two about one legal aspect which I do not think has received the attention it deserves. We, as legislators, are being asked to give statutory authority to a code of laws described as the law of Poland in January, 1945. For the purpose of my argument, I do not care what particular policy or code this may be, but what I do know is that I am being asked to give statutory authority to a code of laws which has not been placed before me, and about the contents of which I know absolutely nothing. It may contain rules and regulations which are contrary to my conception of justice, and it would be entirely contrary to the spirit of this House to ask this House to acquiesce in such a plea, not knowing the effect of it. Having said that, I venture to add that whatever legal objections there may be this Clause, the objection I have raised is, at least as important as any of them, and is sufficient reason for supporting the Amendment.
  As to the political objections to the Clause, reference has been made to the attitude of the Polish Government. Let me say at once that this House has the sovereign right to do as it pleases in connection with legislation that emanates from this House. Nevertheless, it is the policy of this Government to try to achieve a greater degree of amity with the Polish Government, and I should have thought it would at least have been reasonable to consider the effect of this Clause on the Polish Government. Rightly or wrongly, it is the considered view of the Polish Government, and one which they expressed to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary on 1st March of this year, that this Clause, or any clause of like character, constitutes an infringement of Polish sovereign rights. Their view may be right or wrong, but it is a very serious matter to ask this House to put its seal on legislation which is so regarded by our Ally, and by a Government with which, I hope, we shall try to seek more friendly relations than have existed in the past. Just consider
  416
  for a moment what we are being asked to do. We are being asked to set up in this country a body of what might be described as friendly aliens who are defined as a Polish Force, and who will have a quasi-military set-up, and to which some sort of code of Polish law will apply. I can conceive of nothing giving greater affront and insult, to the Polish Government; and I venture to think that the difficulty is one of our own making. It would be a simple matter to meet the objection, which is in my submission a reasonable objection, of the Polish Government, by passing this Amendment. That would remove one of the most objectionable aspects of this Clause, namely, the administration of a body of Polish citizens in this country by Polish law without the consent, and indeed contrary to the request, of the Polish Government. For these reasons, I shall certainly support this Amendment, and I hope that by right hon. Friend, the Home Secretary will see whether he can in any way, meet the wishes of those of us on this side of the House who have the interests of Anglo-Polish relationships at heart rather than the interests of Polish Fascists, who seem to be of more concern to hon. Members on the other side.
  Mr. Warbey: I want to take up the first point made by the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Solley), namely, that this House is asked to incorporate into the Statutes a body of law of which it knows nothing whatsoever. That might not be a material point if the further operation of the law had nothing to do with us. What we are doing now differs fundamentally from what was done in the Visiting Forces Act, to which earlier reference was made. On that occasion, having passed the Act, the whole jurisdiction and following through of the consequences of that Act, were left to the Governments actually in being in this country. But under this Bill, this House is itself adopting responsibility for the continuing consequences of this Bill. We are appointing an Administrator who is responsible to the Secretary of State, who is himself responsible to this House. Therefore, we are being called upon to exercise a continuing responsibility in this matter in respect of law of which we have no knowledge. We do not know, first of all, to which particular body of law reference is being made. It may be one of three or four alternative bodies of law. It is all very well for the

  417
  learned Attorney General to make ex cathedra statements that the law of Poland on 1st January, 1945, means the law as operated by the Polish Government then existing, which was recognised by His Majesty's Government of that time.
  Mr. Paget: That is what the Clause says.
  Mr. Warbey: The Clause does not say that.
  Mr. Paget: Yes it does; look at it.
  Mr. Warbey: If the learned Attorney-General would say whether that is precisely and clearly defined, and is not merely an interpretation, a statement made by himself, that would clarify the point, which has certainly worried a very large number of hon. Members beside myself. Secondly, even having defined this particular body of law to which we are making reference, we still do not know what that law is, what is its form, whether it is in accord with our own canons of justice, and what penalties it may involve upon persons domiciled in our territory. I suggest that this is the most objectionable feature of this whole Clause—the fact that we are asked to exercise a continuing responsibility, but are unable to exercise it, because we do not know what are the terms of reference within which our responsibility has to be exercised.
  Mrs. Leah Manning: I thought this Amendment would cut out some of the more objectionable features of the Clause which has been so many times traversed tonight, but I was rather amazed by one remark of the learned Attorney-General. He said that this was a transitional Clause, and would only last for something like seven months. If it is true, I want to ask why we want it in the Bill at all. By speeding things up, I think we should get these troops out of this country before this very dubious provision is on the Statute Book. I understood that this Clause covered two groups, and not one. I understood that it covered those who have not made this option, who number about 16,000, and the group to which no option has been given, who number about 25,000. I should like the learned Attorney-General to say if we can dispose of the 16,000 and the 25,000 in such a short period as seven months. If we can, I suggest that we should do things more
  418
  quickly, and then there would be no need for this Clause at all.
  The Attorney-General: I do not know if the House will allow me to speak again at this point, but there are several matters requiring answer. The answer to the hon. Lady is that the Clause does apply to the two bodies she contemplated in her question. I do not want it to be understood that these people will be disbanded in seven months. I do not want to bind the Government to disband them in any given period. But these forces are being disbanded as rapidly as is possible, and that is the intention of the Government. They are being dealt with as quickly as they can be absorbed into the Resettlement Corps, or repatriated, and I thought that the Home Secretary made the position very clear when he spoke some time ago.
  Mr. Warbey: The Home Secretary did say earlier that this Clause would relate to those who refused either to return to Poland or to go into the Resettlement Corps.
  The Attorney-General: I think perhaps the hon. Member for Luton (Mr. Warbey) was not in the House at the time, but it has been made perfectly clear that the Government do not intend to acquiesce in anything which is taken as allowing these people to remain at the expense of His Majesty's Government. The Government have put the choice to the members of this force. The choice has been made quite clear—go into the Resettlement Corps, go back to Poland, or go elsewhere. If that choice is not voluntarily accepted, His Majesty's Government have ample powers to force the decision upon them. It is, I repeat for the third time, abundantly clear that there is no intention to maintain this force in being beyond a limited period. It is being rapidly demobilised, and the House itself will have ample control over His Majesty's Government and will be able to make quite sure that this force is not maintained in being longer than is necessary for the purpose for which it continues to exist.
  1.15 a.m.
  Mr. Benn Levy: The corollary of what the Attorney-General has been saying, that the Government have in mind a time-limit—seven months has been mentioned, although not very firmly—is

  419
  that there must be some time-limit in the Government's mind beyond which they are not prepared to allow indecision to go. If there is that time-limit, could not the question which has already been posed be answered? Why should it not be a brief enough time-limit to obviate the necessity for this provision.
  The Attorney-General: It the time limit were seven weeks, we should not obviate the difficulty. Here is a force which is not at the moment, or it may not be, governed by any body of law relating to discipline and administration. That is a situation which obviously cannot be allowed to continue, whether for seven weeks or seven months, or whatever it may be. I cannot state what the exact period is. Not all of these men are back in this country yet. All I can say is that the period will be as short as His Majesty's Government can possibly make it, but however short it may be, you have, until that period has elapsed, got to maintain discipline in one way or another. We have suggested that this is the commonsense way to do it, by maintaining for a few months longer comparatively—in relation to the seven years that have already gone, a comparatively short time—the rules which have hitherto been in operation.
  May I pass very rapidly to the other points that were put to me? I think it was the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg), who asked me why is it provided that the administrator to be appointed under the Clause is to be experienced in British military law. The answer is very short and very simple. It is so that nothing shall be done in the operation of this code of rules, in its administration, in the infliction of punishments under it, which is startling or repugnant to British conceptions of military law and justice. If it were found that any of the penalties which were being imposed were such as to startle a British administrator familiar with penalties which would be imposed in British law in matters of that kind, he would be entitled, as commanding officer, to intervene in regard to the matter.
  Mr. Driberg: Who is to be the responsible administrator in regard to Polish law since the Administrator himself is not required to know anything about it?
  The Attorney-General: The Administrator is entitled, under this Clause, to dele-
  420
  gate to appropriate people. He will no doubt delegate to people who are, and who have been, familiar with the administration of this system of law. He will supervise their administrative system to ensure that nothing is done in the course of their administration which would be startling to British ideas of propriety and justice.
  Mr. Warbey: Is not the Attorney-General, in effect, now saying that the Administrator will have the power to amend the Polish military law in order to bring it into line with British military law, in which case, why not go straight to the point?
  The Attorney-General: I am not saying that. I am saying that if anything is done in the course of the application of this code of rules which is contemplated by this Clause, if any sentence is imposed which seems to be quite out of proportion to what would be awarded in similar circumstances in ordinary British forces under British military law, the administrator would be aware of that because of his knowledge of British law, and would be able to intervene. It seemed to us an advantage, in appointing an administrator over this force, which was to be subject to British command for the future, that the person appointed to administer it should be one familiar with the laws relating to the administration of British forces. That seemed to us to be an advantage, and seemed to give some measure of protection against rules of law which hon. Members have been attacking as being harsh and unjust and inconsistent with British ideas. I think the hon. Member for Maldon also asked me a question about Income Tax. There is nothing in this Clause which affects liability to Income Tax. I would not wish to give any final opinion on a matter which was put to me at short notice in a branch of the law which is one of considerable complication, but I say at the moment, certainly in this Clause and in the Bill as a whole—but certainly in this Clause—there is nothing which would affect liability to Income Tax or exclude it.
  Mr. Driberg: Can the Attorney-General kindly tell the House what the facts of he present situation are? With regard to those members of the Polish forces who have not agreed to go into the Polish Resettlement Corps or to return home to Poland, do they pay Income Tax at present?
  The Attorney-General: I am afraid I could not answer whether, in fact, they are paying Income Tax at present. I do not know. Whether they are liable to pay Income Tax under this Bill is another matter. I can see nothing to exclude any such liability. The hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Solley) and the hon. Member for Luton put the point that they object to giving legislative effect to a code of law about which they say they know nothing, but apparently they are quite prepared to give carte blanche to the Executive to impose any code of law, known or unknown, which the Executive may choose.
  Mr. Solley Mr. Solley rose—
  The Attorney-General: I have given way a great many times. It has been very difficult for me to complete more than one consecutive sentence without giving way, and I cannot give way any longer at this hour. There is no doubt at all about the position. All that has to be done by an officer who, under his delegated powers, is administering discipline in this force in the future is to ascertain whether a soldier who, for instance—I a m taking one particular class of offence
  —disobeyed an order which was given to him on 1st January, 1945, could have been awarded any penalties if he had been tried for that offence on 2nd January, 1945. It is a very simple issue of fact. There has been, and there will be, no difficulty in ascertaining it. If he could have been awarded a penalty, that penalty may still be imposed, subject to the supervision of the administrator. If he could not have been awarded a penalty, it could not be. I ask the House to say that this really is a simple and commonsense way of dealing with this troublesome and unique situation, and to agree with it.
  Mr. Whiteley Mr. Whiteley rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
  Question put accordingly, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the proposed Clause."
  The House divided: Ayes, 107; Noes, 21.

  Division No. 104.]

  AYES.

  [1.22 a.m.

  Adams, W. T. (Hammersmith, South)

  Hollis, M. C

  Robens, A.

  Anderson, A. (Motherwell)

  House, G

  Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)

  Awbery, S. S.

  Hoy, J.

  Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)

  Bechervaise, A. E.

  Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)

  Ross, William (Kilmarnock)

  Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J

  Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

  Sargood, R.

  Blyton, W. R.

  Jeger, G. (Winchester)

  Segal, Dr. S.

  Boardman, H.

  Jones, D. T. (Hartlepools)

  Shawcross, C. N. (Widnes)

  Bottomley, A. G.

  Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)

  Shawcross, Rt. Hn. Sir H (St. Helens)

  Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl, Exch'ge)

  Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)

  Simmons, C. J.

  Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)

  Keenan, W.

  Skeffington, A. M

  Callaghan, James

  Kenyon, C.

  Skinnard, F. W.

  Champion, A. J

  King, E. M

  Smith, S. H. (Hull, S.W.)

  Cobb, F. A.

  Lavers, S.

  Snow, Capt. J. W.

  Collins, V. J.

  Logan, D. G.

  Soskice, Maj. Sir F.

  Colman, Miss G. M

  McKay, J. (Wallsend)

  Stewart, Michael (Fulham, E.)

  Comyns, Dr. L.

  Mackay, R. W. G. (Hull, N.W.)

  Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)

  Cooper, Wing-Cmdr. G.

  McLeavy, F.

  Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

  Corbet, Mrs. F. K. (Camb'well, N.W.)

  Macpherson, T. (Romford)

  Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)

  Crawley, A.

  Marples, A. E.

  Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

  Davies, Harold (Leek)

  Mitohison, G. R

  Tolley, L.

  Delargy, H. J.

  Monslow, W.

  Ungoed-Thomas, L

  Diamond, J.

  Morgan, Dr. H. B.

  Vane, W. M. F.

  Dobbin, W.

  Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)

  Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)

  Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)

  Moyle, A.

  Watkins, T. E.

  Dumpleton, C. W.

  Neal, H. (Claycross)

  While, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

  Ede, Rl. Hon. J. C.

  Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)

  Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

  Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

  Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

  Wigg, Col. G. E.

  Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)

  Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)

  Wilkins, W. A.

  Forman, J. C.

  Oliver, G. H.

  Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

  Freeman, Maj. J. (Watford)

  Paget, R. T.

  Williams, W R (Heston)

  Gilzean, A.

  Paton, Mrs. F (Rushcliffe)

  Willis, E.

  Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

  Popplewell, E.

  Yates, V. F.

  Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)

  Porter, G. (Leeds)

  Younger, Hon. Kenneth

  Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

  Pursey, Cmdr. H.

  Hall, W. G.

  Randall, H. E.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES

  Hannan, W. (Maryhill)

  Ranger, J.

  Mr. Pearson and

  Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)

  Ridealgh, Mrs. M

  Mr. Collindridge.

  NOES.

  Baird, J.

  Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)

  Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)

  Grossman, R. H. S.

  Mikardo, Ian.

  Smith, C. (Colchester)

  Driberg, T. E. N.

  Piratin, P.

  Solley, L. J.

  Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

  Platts-Mills,. J. F. F.

  Warbey, W. N.

  Hale, Leslie

  Pritt, D. N.

  Wyatt, W.

  Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)

  Royle, C.

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES

  Levy, B. W.

  Scollan, T.

  Mr. Bing and

  Mack, J. D.

  Silverman, J. (Erdington)

  Major Bramall.

  Question, "That the Question be now put," put, and agreed to.

  Mr. Peake: I beg to move, "That further consideration of the proposed Clause be now adjourned."
  I move this Motion in order to endeavour to elicit some statement from the acting deputy Leader of the House as to the intentions of the Government with regard to further progress with Business tonight. You indicated, Mr. Speaker, that you intended to call two other Amendments to the new Clause. In the four and a quarter hours since 9·15 we have got the Second Reading of the Clause and disposed of one of the Amendments. In addition to the two Amendments to the new Clause there is another Clause standing in my name, to which I attach some importance, and some further Amendments, and at the present rate of progress we should be getting fairly well on with this Bill at about 5·30 or 6·0 this morning. It would, therefore, be interesting and convenient to hon. Members, many of whom have been in this House on Standing Committees since 10·30 this morning, to have some statement from the Government as to how far they intend to go.
  Mr. Ede: There are two Amendments remaining on this new Clause. The first should not, I think, take us very long. The second was very largely debated on
  the original Motion for the Second Reading of the Clause, and that may have some effect on the length of the discussion on it when it is called. I hope that we should be able to dispose of these two Amendments in a not unreasonable space of time. After that there is the right hon. Gentleman's own Clause dealing with naturalisation. He attaches some importance to it, and it is an important matter with which I shall have to deal. After that, I think, the remaining Amendment is a drafting one arising out of something to which my attention was drawn by the right hon. Gentleman on the Committee stage of the Bill where I endeavoured to meet the point he raised, and I would not imagine that that would be more than formal. After that there is the Amendment which deals with the alteration of the Title of the Bill, which, if this Clause is added to the Bill, will be purely formal. I should have hoped that with the exercise of some patience and with forbearance on the part of hon. Members we ought to be able to complete the Bill at no very distant hour.
  Question put, "That further consideration of the proposed Clause be now adjourned."
  The House divided: Ayes, 22; Noes, 130.

  Division No. 105.]

  AYES.

  [1.36 a.m.

  Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.

  Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.

  Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd't'n, S.)

  Astor, Hon. M.

  Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)

  Thomas, J. P. L. (Hereford)

  Barlow, Sir J.

  Macmillan, Rt. Hon. Harold (Bromley)

  Thorp, Lt.-Col. R. A. F

  Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.

  Marples, A. E.

  Vane, W. M. F.

  Darling, Sir W. Y.

  Peake, Rt. Hon. O.

  Fox, Sir G.

  Ramsay, Maj. S.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES

  Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.

  Smithers, Sir W.

  Major Count and

  Hollis, M. C.

  Strauss, H. G. (English Universities)

  Mr. Studholme.

  Keeling, E. H.

  Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray)

  NOES.

  Adams, W. T. (Hammersmith, South)

  Braddock, T. (Mitcham)

  Cooper, Wing-Cmdr. G.

  Anderson, A. (Motherwell)

  Bramall, Major E. A.

  Corbet, Mrs. F. K. (Camb'well, N.W.)

  Austin, H. Lewis

  Butler, H. W (Hackney, S.)

  Corvedale, Viscount

  Awbery, S. S.

  Callaghan, James

  Crawley, A.

  Baird, J.

  Champion, A. J.

  Crossman, R. H. S.

  Bechervaise, A. E.

  Cobb, F. A.

  Davies, Harold (Leek)

  Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

  Cocks, F. S.

  Delargy, Captain H. J

  Bing, G. H. C.

  Collindridge, F.

  Diamond, J.

  Blyton, W. R.

  Collins, V. J.

  Dobbie, W.

  Bottomley, A. G.

  Colman, Miss G. M.

  Driberg, T. E. N.

  Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl, Exch'ge)

  Comyns, Dr. L.

  Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)

  Dumpleton, C. W

  Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)

  Skeffington, A. M.

  Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

  Mikardo, Ian.

  Skinnard, F. W

  Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

  Mitchison, Maj. G. R.

  Smith, C. (Colchester)

  Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)

  Monslow, W.

  Smith, S. H. (Hull, S.W.)

  Forman, J. C.

  Morgan, Dr. H. B.

  Snow, Capt. J. W.

  Freeman, Maj. J. (Watford)

  Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)

  Solley, L. J.

  Gallacher, W.

  Moyle, A.

  Soskice, Maj. Sir F.

  Gilzean, A.

  Neal, H. (Claycross)

  Stewart, Capt. Michael (Fulham E.)

  Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

  Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)

  Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)

  Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)

  Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

  Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

  Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

  Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)

  Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)

  Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

  Oliver G. H.

  Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

  Hale, Leslie

  Paget, R. T.

  Tiffany, S.

  Hall, W. G

  Paton, Mrs. F (Rushcliffe)

  Tolley, L.

  Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)

  Pearson, A.

  Ungoed-Thomas, L.

  House, G

  Piratin, P.

  Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)

  Hoy, J.

  Platts-Mills, J. F. F

  Warbey, W. N.

  Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)

  Popplewell, E.

  Watkins, T. E.

  Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)

  Perter, G. (Leeds)

  White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)

  Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

  Pritt, D. N.

  Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

  Jeger, G. (Winchester)

  Pursey, Cmdr. H

  Wigg, Col G. E.

  Janes, D. T. (Hartlepools)

  Randall, H. E.

  Wilkins, W. A.

  Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)

  Ranger, J.

  Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

  Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)

  Ridealgh, Mrs. M

  Williams, W. R. (Heston)

  Keenan, W.

  Robens, A.

  Willis, E.

  Kenyan, C.

  Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)

  Wyatt, W.

  King, E. M.

  Robertson. J J. (Berwick)

  Yates, V. F.

  Layers, S.

  Ross, William (Kilmarnock)

  Younger, Hon. Kenneth

  Logan, D. G

  Sargood, R.

  Zilliacus, K.

  Mack, J. D.

  Segal, Dr. S.

  McKay, J. (Wallsend)

  Shawcross, C. N. (Widnes)

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

  Mackay, R. W. G. (Hull, N.W)

  Shawcross, Rt. Hn. Sir H. (St Helens)

  Mr. Popplewell and

  McLeavy, F.

  Silverman, J. (Erdington)

  Mr. Hannan.

  Macpherson, T. (Romford)

  Silverman, S S. (Nelson)

  Bill read the Third time, and passed.

  Mr. S. Silverman: I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Clause, in line 52, to leave out Subsection (8).
  I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be amenable to this matter because he has made mention of it. I am going to say—and I do not wish to take very long about it as some of the matters were covered in the Second Reading Debate—that I base my arguments upon the assertion that everything that was done in respect of this Amendment and the internal management of this force from 1st June, 1945, has been done illegally. There was no valid authority for doing it, the Allied Forces Act did not apply, and in the absence of the Allied Forces Act, there was no other law enabling discipline to be applied and persons to be tried and imprisoned. I want to know from the Attorney-General, if this Amendment is resisted, whether he is prepared to assert positively that there was any legal validity in these proceedings at all—
  1.45 a.m.
  The Attorney-General: May I deal with that point at once? I thought I had made it clear. I make no such assertion. All I say is that the point had not been decided the other way. It was a matter on which two views are held.
  Mr. Silverman: I understand that. The Attorney-General said it several times. But that leaves me free to say—and he
  426
  says he is not prepared to deny it—that there was no legal authority for all these things being done, and that when he had an opportunity to persuade a court that there was some legal validity, he definitely refrained from taking that opportunity, making that assertion or getting that judgment. The position in which the House now finds itself is that we are entitled to say—and nobody can deny it —that there was no legal validity behind these acts.
  What does Subsection (8) do in this situation? In cases where people have been imprisoned and are now imprisoned in circumstances for which even the Government will not say there was any legal justification, we are seeking now in a Bill dealing with a totally different matter not merely to indemnify people against these acts of civil tyranny but to perpetuate the tyrannous acts which were committed. In a Subsection of a new Clause added on the Report stage in a way which necessitates even altering the Title of the Bill, we are proposing to legalise a whole series of illegal tyrannous acts.
  It may be that on proper consideraton, with all the facts before us, knowing exactly how many people are involved, knowing where they now are and with some opportunity of reviewing each case in detail, the House might deem it right

  427
  to justify retroactive effect in relation to all these things, for which there never was any legal justification at the time they were done. I submit that the House will not do that except on a patient and careful further investigation of all the facts in each individual case, and we ought not to be asked to do that kind of thing in this sort of way.
  I should like to know whether, if the Government insist on our doing it in this way, they can tell us how many people are in fact affected, because there appears to be among members of the Government who have spoken on this matter from time to time considerable doubt or difference of opinion. I will not quote all the varying statements that have been made from time to time by Ministers on this matter but content myself with one very short quotation. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour said that somebody to whom he is replying:
  "Made another point about the existence of Polish discipline, and its being applied to the Polish Forces in this country. My information is that that terminated in July, 1945, and that since that date there has been no application at all of Polish military law in this country."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 12th February, 1947: Vol. 433, c. 475.]
  Is that right or wrong? If it is right the Government do not need this Subsection because, on that view of the matter, there are no acts to justify its continuance. There is nobody to indemnify, and there is no person imprisoned. If it is wrong, then I think the House is entitled to know what is right before it accepts Subsection (8). What is the extent of this evil to which we are expected to give retroactive legal sanction? How many persons did it affect? How many people are in gaol? For how long are they in gaol? Where are they? In what circumstances were they sentenced? What were they alleged to have done wrong? How did they come to be where they are? We cannot give a blank cheque of indemnity even to a Government, and certainly we cannot give a blank cheque of indemnity to a private army. That is the situation with which we are faced, and I do not want to make a wrong argument about this.
  Hon. Members on the other side of the House will judge for themselves, but I do say to my hon. Friends on this side that on this point it does not matter what
  428
  they think about the merits of the Bill as a Bill. It does not matter what they think about the merits of this particular Clause as a Clause. Nor does it matter what they think about the last Amendment on which the House divided. That is quite a separate point, and one which I hope will appeal to my hon. Friends here. If the Government want to do this kind of thing they ought not to do it in this haphazard and slipshod fashion, but they ought to come forward with a Bill which we can examine in the light of day, both metaphorically and literally, and examine on its real merits.
  Mr. Paget: I very much hope that the Minister will reconsider this Subsection. After all, there are fewer people in the world today who are enjoying civil liberty under the law than perhaps at any time within history. At this time, when the very principles of civil liberty—the ideas that a man shall not be punished save by due process of law, and that his liberty shall not be taken from him save by due process of law—are being challenged throughout the world, we, one of the last of the free Parliaments, should be very careful to guard that principle. We should not treat it in any cavalier spirit. The Attorney-General has said, "Well, it is a matter of doubt. There is one opinion here and one opinion there as to whether these people are illegally imprisoned." With very great respect, it is as clear as a pikestaff that they are illegally imprisoned.
  The only authority that can be adduced is the Allied Forces and Visiting Forces Act, and that Act says that where military forces are in this country their officers shall have all such powers as are conferred upon them by the laws of that power—in this case Poland. We all know that the law of Poland does not confer on the Armed Forces here any power whatever, and it has not since July, 1945. It is really idle to argue that there is any doubt whatever that everything which has been done since then is illegal, and that every one of these people who have been imprisoned have been wrongfully imprisoned. As they have suffered, I say that it might be perfectly right to introduce an Act of Indemnity. It probably is. It might be perfectly right, even, to produce what I said amounts to an Act of Attainder, and to say that these illegal sentences shall be made good

  429
  by Parliament, that these are fundamental invasions of the principles of freedom under the law, and that it is really a disrespect for that principle to treat it in this casual manner. If we find that this very serious thing has been done, that personal liberty has been unlawfully invaded, this is a case when the Government who are responsible for that unlawful invasion of civil liberties ought to come to Parliament with proper respect, and say that a very serious thing has been done; that they are sorry, but that accidents do happen, and that this serious thing must be put right in the proper way.
  Mr. Mikardo: I want to make one or two points to which no reference has been made during the proceedings on this Bill. When the point at present under consideration was being argued on a point of Order earlier on, and later, on the Clause itself, it was argued entirely on legal grounds. Hon. Members who are lawyers more or less kept a closed shop on this subject, and I know with what temerity a layman ought to enter into a lawyers' birthday party, because he tends to be looked upon with the enthusiasm with which a vegetarian looks upon a caterpillar in his salad. I am not going to bother the learned Attorney-General by putting any legal argument for him to answer. I never enter into legal arguments, and when I hear lawyers' arguments I cannot understand them. Perhaps that is because when lawyers speak in Latin they pronounce it vilely, and when they speak in English they are so ponderous, with their Greek prefixes and Latin suffixes, or their Latin prefixes and Greek suffixes. However, I want to make a layman's point which carries on the point referred to by one or two of my hon. Friends; and that is the international political repercussions of this Clause, and particularly of the Subsection, and still more particularly of the passage in the Subsection:
  "as if the said forces had not ceased to be recognised by the Government of Poland."
  That Subsection makes it quite dear that this is an armed force, and makes it quite clear, also, that this is an armed force antipathetic to the Government of Poland.
  2.0 a.m.
  I would ask the House to recall that in the early nineteen-thirties, at the Preparatory Commission of the Disarma-
  430
  ment Conference, questions of this type were actually considered. The Preparatory Commission of the Disarmament Conference set itself to finding a definition of "an act of aggression," and following the report of the then Greek delegate, an act of aggression was defined as including the maintenance by one nation upon its territories, forces which were hostile to another nation. By that definition, the powers sought by Subsection (8) of the Clause is an act of aggression. It is quite feasible that the Polish Government, which is already given evidence of the fact of what is agreed by this Clause as a whole, may well ask the successor to the League of Nations—the United Nations organisation—whether it accepts the interpretation and definition of this procedure as to the constitution of an act of aggression by ourselves in retaining those Polish Forces on our territory. H.M. Government might well find themselves in embarrassment if such an interpretation were allowed by the United Nations organisation for the present Polish Government.
  One has only to consider how this House would react if the boot was on the other foot. Let us suppose that a number of the citizens of this country fled the country, terrified by the tyrannous fears of loss of liberty which put right hon. and hon. Members opposite into such a state of mind yesterday. Let us suppose that they fled to Spain, and took their currency with them, and the Government of Spain proceeded to indemnify them from their obedience of the law of taking their currency with them by treating them as if the law of Great Britain prior to 1945 applied to them. Suppose that we had a Communist uprising, and the leaders of that uprising—supposing it were not successful, fled the country and we held them guilty of treason, while the Polish Government held them to be guilty according to the laws before the date of the uprising. I would like to say I do not include among the leaders of that uprising the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher), who is much too kindly and mild-mannered a man for that.
  The point I have just made is not an academic question. In the first half of the eighteenth century, the Stuart pretenders found refuge in France, and they set up a Court—I do not know if they set up any

  431
  sweet shops as well—and were treated by the French Government as though living under the laws of Great Britain as they applied prior to 1689. These people lived under the pre-1689 law. They kept court, and I believe they even had a small Scotch army. I do not know if they called it the Scottish Resettlement Corps, but, in any case, His Majesty's Government found themselves very aggrieved by the situation and held themselves prepared to go to war on these grounds. This friction in the second half of the eighteenth century persisted, and there was war between Great Britain and France during that time. I say with great seriousness that we should not allow ourselves to be let in for a situation in which we can be held to be responsible for that sort of thing.
  I want to make a last point. This House has always, in particular, been very chary of passing retroactive legislation, because retroactive legislation can be an extremely dangerous weapon in the hands of the Executive, and I am quite sure than hon. Gentlemen opposite, who always keep a watchful eye, quite properly, upon the arrogation to itself by the Executive of undue power, will appreciate this. I remember, although I was not a Member of the House at the time—I was an avid reader of HANSARD, however—that during the war it was necessary to bring in a piece of retroactive legislation in order to exculpate some members of the personnel of the Home Office and the National Fire Service from the effects of some errors which had been made in the past, and although this was non-controversial, and although these actions had been carried out in honest error and in the direct assistance of the war effort, nevertheless the present Lord President of the Council came to the House and, in a tone of the greatest humility, begged the House to forgive him for having to introduce a piece of retroactive legislation. This, let the House note, was legislation to protect people who might otherwise have been condemned.
  Here, as my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. Silverman) has pointed out, on the Report stage of a Bill, on a Clause drafted for the third time, we are, so to speak, if I may use the term without being ruled out of Order, gate-crashing the Statute Book. I hope, Sir,
  432
  you will not consider that to be an un-Parliamentary expression. There is very good authority for it, and there is some authority for the suggestion that it is un-Parliamentary. Here we are gate-crashing the Statute Book in this way with something that the House has always been very chary about accepting. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who has won the admiration of the House for his patience and tolerance in this matter, and who has such a fine sense of what is proper in these matters, will see his way clear to look at the matter again.
  Mr. Gallacher: I want to put to the Minister a point which I hope he will consider very seriously. He and the Attorney-General have said that they want to get rid of this particular group as early as possible. This Subsection deals with this particular group, a group which, according to the tone of voice of the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General, are going to be something of a nuisance. They will not go into the Polish Resettlement Corps, they will not go back to Poland. The Home Secretary and the Attorney-General said that they want to get rid of them as quickly as possible, and that if they do not go pretty soon, the Government are in a position in which they can take action to get rid of them. Here we have a situation in which we are to get rid of these fellows as early as possible. It may be in a month's time, it may be in six month's time, or it may be in 12 month's time.
  I do not know what is the time limit which the Government have in mind, but these people are to be got rid of. There is the Polish Resettlement Corps, there are those who will go back to Poland, and we shall get rid of the group to which this Clause applies, but even when we get rid of them, there will still remain the lads who are in gaol. The evil effects of what has been done will remain. It is clear that there is to be this sorting out of the whole of this situation, and surely, those who have been illegally imprisoned should be given the opportunity of coming into the Resettlement Corps or going back to Poland. Surely, we cannot have a situation in which, having finally got rid of this particular group, and this particular group having been got rid of, the Clause ceasing to operate and this Subsection which gives indemnity ceasing to operate, the men who were

  433
  illegally imprisoned will still be in gaol? I do not think that is a situation that can be justified.
  There is another thing to be said in regard to the political side. I am quite certain that there is not a precedent in the history of this country for such a Subsection as this. This Parliament has no sovereign right to impose the laws of another country on its nationals in this country. It can treat them as aliens and impose its own laws, but this Government never, to my knowledge, had any right, of ever claimed to have any right, to make the laws of another country applicable to the nationals of another country in this country. I may be told that there was in 1940 a Visiting Forces Act, but that was passed as a result of consultations with the Governments of the countries involved, and I believe that in most cases it was done at the request of the Governments involved. It was an arrangement between Governments.
  I challenge the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General to give the House a precedent for a Clause of this kind. I suggest that if they have any respect for the Government of another country, the Government of Poland, and if they are concerned to get rid of this particular group at the earliest possible moment, there should be no question of indemnifying what has been done. Far the best thing to do would be to release those who have been imprisoned and give them the opportunity to enter the Polish Resettlement Corps or go back to Poland, and then have only the one problem, and a problem that should be settled at the earliest possible moment—a Government decision that this particular group has got to decide one way or the other, or the necessary action will be taken with regard to them.
  Mr. Ede: I can give the hon. Members some of the information for which they have asked me. Only two people have been sentenced in the last three months under the powers that these Polish forces thought they possessed, and there are only 10 people in detention at the moment. That is the statistical information for which I was asked, and I hope it gives hon. Members some idea of the extent of the problem with which we are faced.
  Mr. S. Silverman: Can the Home Secretary add to that information any information about the length of the sentences, and, if we pass this Clause, how long they will remain in detention?
  Mr. Ede: I cannot give the last information for which I have been asked.
  Mr. Driberg: Can my right hon. Friend say whether the men who were sentenced illegally to detention have been released pending the passing of this legislation?
  2.15 a. m.
  Mr. Ede: All the information I have is that they are in detention now. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]. I do not think there is any need to say "Oh." As usual, I am trying to be as frank as I can with the House. It is far better to make a clean breast of things, because if one tries to hide anything, hon. Members are only the more gratified when they find it out, as they usually do. That is the position. I give this pledge to the House, that as soon as the administrator is appointed, his first task will be immediately to review the sentences of any men who may then be in detention and to make any adjustment of those sentences he thinks right having regard to all the circumstances of the case in the light of the powers with which the Clause is armed. We will endeavour to bring this state of affairs to an end as soon as possible.
  An Hon. Member: May I ask the Home Secretary under what powers he will be able to review these sentences, which surely come under an entirely different Subsection?
  Mr. Ede: He will be entitled to review sentences under the powers given to him in Subsection (4) of the Clause. I have taken particular care to ascertain that his jurisdiction will extend to that extent and I hope it may be accepted that I have endeavoured to make quite sure that the pledge I have given can be made operative. I want to point out that people are only protected where in good faith they acted in the exercise of the powers they thought they possessed. In bad faith, they are outside the jurisdiction of the law of Poland. Where they have inflicted a sentence on a man they still remain liable for any damages he may be able to recover even if this Clause is passed. It is purely confined to indemnifying them

  435
  against acts they took legally within the powers they thought existed.
  I share the liberal views expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) with regard to the general principles here. It is to my mind a shocking thing that this state of affairs should have existed. I do not think that at any stage in the discussion of this clause I have concealed my views on that from the House. There are certain people, all of them Poles, who are not acquainted with the civil law of this country and the rights that those people had from 5th July in this country, but who went on exercising, with the knowledge of the British Government, the powers they had previously been exercising. I do not think the Government could do other than ask the House to indemnify people who had so acted in this matter. The only question that really arises—I am sure the House will have accepted that proposition—is whether it should be done in this Subsection or whether there should be a separate Bill of indemnity to secure the same results.
  I hope, in view of the frank statement I have made as to the limited number of people who are now detained and the promise that the circumstances shall be immediately reviewed, the House will feel that although this is a very exceptional course to adopt it is one probably most convenient to the House and amply safeguards all the points raised by my hon. Friends. I sincerely hope the House will adopt that view and allow us to retain this Subsection in the Clause. They can rest assured that we will take every effort to see that any injustices which may have been done shall be remedied within the limits of our power.
  Mr. S. Silverman Mr. S. Silverman rose—
  Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member has not the right to speak.
  Mr. Silverman: I was going to ask leave—
  Mr. Speaker: If any hon. Member objects, the hon. Member cannot speak.
  Mr. Silverman: I wanted to ask your leave, Mr. Speaker, to withdraw the Amendment. I hoped such a request would be in Order. I think it is customary, when such a request is made, to give
  436
  a reason, and I was endeavouring to do that, but, of course, if hon. Members object, I will refrain.
  Mr. Speaker: If the hon. Member wants to say anything on it, it must be by leave of the House.
  Mr. Silverman: I hope I may get it. I only want to thank the right hon. Gentleman for the spirit in which he has met this Amendment and for the information he has given, and to say that, having regard to the smallness of the number of people affected, and the undertaking he has given to review even that small number of cases, we do not think it is right to press this Amendment to a division.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Proposed Clause added to the Bill.

  NEW CLAUSE.—(Residential qualification for naturalisation.)
  The Secretary of State may at his discretion permit the whole or part of any period of service in any of the forces specified in subsection (I) of section one of this Act to be included in the period of five years residence required by the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act, 1919.—[Mr. Peake.]
  Brought up, and read the First time.
  Mr. Peake: I beg to move, "That the Clause be read a Second time."
  This new Clause is, I think, one of some importance and, although the hour is late and the House is cold, I think I must explain it quite shortly to the House. The period of residence preceding naturalisation is five years, including one year immediately previous to the grant. Had these Polish soldiers, many of whom are going to be absorbed in our social and economic life, been serving in the British forces, that service would have counted towards the period of residence qualification as a condition of naturalisation. I am not in favour of wholesale or easy naturalisation. It is an individual matter, and great care must be and, I believe, is exercised by the Home Secretary and by his officials as regards the grant of certificates. It is entirely a discretionary matter, but many of these Polish soldiers, had they been serving in British units, would have already secured the necessary residence qualification. They have, in fact, of course, been serving under British command, but they have been serving in Polish units, and for that reason they have

  437
  acquired no entitlement by virtue of constructive residence to make an application for naturalisation.
  Many of these men have been serving under British command, although not in British units since quite early in the war. They are going to be absorbed into our national life, and yet many of them only set foot in this country for the first time last year, and we have been told today that some of them have not yet reached this country. That means that all these men, having served under British command for five or six years past, may still have to wait another five years in this country before they can make even an application for naturalisation. All that my Clause does is to enable the Home Secretary, in cases where he thinks fit, where he is satisfied as to the bona fides of the applicant, as to his good character, as to his ability to read and write the English language, to count the whole, or part of the service of a Polish soldier under British command as if it were residence here for the purposes of naturalisation. The Claim is so just and obvious that I commend it with every confidence to the House and the right hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. Michael Astor: If the Home Secretary does not accept this Clause he will be penalising these Poles who fought with such gallantry and zeal against Fascism because their actions were of a general rather than a particular character. As my right hon. Friend has said, had the nature of their conduct been an exception rather than the general rule they would have served in British units, and all this period of time would have counted towards their naturalisation. If the Home Secretary does not accept this, whatever else he may say he will not be acting with justice and equity in this matter. For my part, I feel that if there is to be a discrepancy in our treatment of our Allies it should be in favour of the Poles rather than of the French, or whoever else it may be because these Poles are really stateless today.
  The other point is that what my right hon. Friend is asking the Home Secretary to do is not to take any very excessively hazardous action in this matter. The strings are in his hands the whole time. Harking back to what I said on the Second Reading of this Bill, I feel that what the Home Secretary would be doing in fact
  438
  would be giving the Poles some form of prospect and hope in this country. In order to get the maximum out of these people, and in order that they may work for society and for us, what is really needed is a prospect for the future as much as any material benefits which are granted under this Bill.
  Mr. Pritt: The first point that occurs to me is that the Clause is, in fact, unnecessary I suggest because the Secretary of State always has power if he chooses to waive the five years provision for anybody. If it is indeed necessary, then this is being offered to one only of the many groups of nationalities who showed gallantry during the war, and I think it would be very wrong to extend this privilege to the Poles without extending it to a great many other nationalities.
  Vice-Admiral Taylor Vice-Admiral Taylor rose—
  Mr. Pritt: No, I am not giving way. We are always told about the gallant Poles, and there is no doubt whatever that a number of them fought very gallantly indeed for us. But so much has been said about them and so little about others who fought just as gallantly, that a few of us obtained the facts from the Secretary of State for War a few months ago. Twelve thousand of these Poles joined the Army after hostilities were over. I do not, of course, know how many of those are involved here, but I should think practically every one of them because they joined at a time when they were unlikly to be killed and when there was nowhere for them to go but to come to England. Of the remainder, according to the particulars from the Secretary of State for War, approximately one half had fought against us in the German Army.
  That does not mean half the number. One does not know. It may be three-quarters or only a quarter of those involved. But many of us remember the great difficulty we had when a large number of these people came into the Forces on our side. They were captured in North Africa and were presented by Polish officers there with the very simple alternative of going into a prisoner of war camp as German prisoners of war or accepting service in the then Polish Army on pretty well the same basis as any soldier, plus £10 sterling. A great many of them came into the forces in that way. Some of them

  439
  fought very gallantly with us but some of them did not.
  2.30 a.m.
  Then we had the trouble from their ferocious anti-Semitism, which resulted in large numbers of Jews in the Polish Army being withdrawn to save their lives by Sir James Grigg and put into the British Army. They did not get the advantage of the five years rule, which was an example of rough justice. As I said, some of these Poles fought gallantly but some of them were undesirable characters. Many of them were anti-Semitic, others were anti-British and practically every one of them was anti-Soviet. Notwithstanding all that, the proposal is that Poles should be selected out of thousands of nationals who fought with us, including those who fought for Facism before they accepted the £10 and then fought against Fascism, for naturalisation as British citizens. It is a suggestion that should not be entertained, and I hope the Home Secretary will oppose this Amendment.
  Mr. Ede: The law of naturalisation works with regard to individuals and not with regard to classes. Each individual application is examined on its personal merits. I have to consider whether I will admit a foreigner to what I regard as a great privilege, namely British citizenship, and, therefore, it would have to be understood that if this Amendment were accepted it would mean that each individual Pole would still have to justify his application for British nationality by his character. The right hon. Member for North Leeds (Mr. Peake), who was at the Home Office for some time, knows that these personal cases are most carefully investigated every time an application is made. I do not think that five years of life, during which a person can be living in British atmosphere, and in circumstances that would enable one to judge of his capacity to be a responsible British citizen, is too short a period of time for me to act in this matter.
  Mr. Paget: Take the case of a Polish young man married to a Northampton girl. He served in the British Army and transferred at his own request to the Polish Air Force as a member of an air crew. He has a home in Northampton and yet he cannot get a priority. Has the Home Secretary not any discretion ire a case like that?
  Mr. Ede: No. Good taste as that young man showed in marrying one of the hon. Gentleman's constituents, I do not want do anything that will open the door, because I can assure the hon. Gentleman that I get from Members of Parliament and others an endless stream of letters suggesting all sorts of reasons, not very dissimilar in many cases from that submitted by the hon. Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), why I should exercise a discretion which the law very wisely kept from me. I want to make it clear to the hon. and learned Member for North Hammersmith (Mr. Pritt) that I have no discretion in this matter at all. There must be a residence of five years.
  I am faced with another great physical difficulty at the moment. There are now awaiting consideration 22,000 applications for naturalisation, 7,500 of whom have been granted priority under schemes which I announced to the House. That does not mean that they get less than the five years' testimony which I have described and which I require, but that certain people who were of assistance to us during the war effort, or who had made their application before the outbreak of war, shall be given a priority. Last year I granted 4,431 certificates, the great bulk of them in the last six months of the year. In January of this year I granted 1,235 certificates, and although February is notoriously a month with fewer working days than January, actually more certificates were granted in February than in January. By the time that I can work through the existing lists, these people will become eligible with their five years of residence in this country. I cannot hope to work off my existing lists in less than that time.
  I am quite certain that if I were to admit this for the Polish Forces, I should then be pressed to make a similar concession with regard to the other Allied Forces who have members who have married British women or who for other reasons desire to take up their life among us and become naturalised. I have endeavoured in framing this Bill to be as generous with the Poles who fought for us and with us as I can possibly be, and it is not without regret that for the reasons I have given, I find myself unable to accept the new Clause.
  Mr. Harold Macmillan: I hope the House will forgive me for making

  441
  one or two observations even at this late hour. The right hon. Gentleman, in the tone in which he has spoken, has shown his deep sympathy, as indeed he has throughout the whole of this Bill, for the Polish Forces, but I am disappointed that he could not accept a Clause which is purely discretionary and which would merely give him the opportunity, if he thought fit, not to select a whole class but to select individuals within this particular class for some special advantage. The Home Secretary has said that if he were to take it in respect of the Poles, he would have to take it in respect of other Allied Forces, but there is really no comparison with, say, the French Forces. The French Forces have a home, a democratic home, a country for which they have fought and to which they are proud to return. The Polish story—I only feel impelled to say something tonight out of a deep sense of loyalty and gratitude to them, having seen the Polish Army in action for nearly two and a half years—is the most romantic story in the whole history of war. They are a people whose Odyssey, whose great trek through the world, is absolutely unrivalled in history, who fought with greater gallantry under our command than any force I have known, whom I have seen in action and who are in a special position because, whatever may be one's view or the view of the House as to the decision they have thought right to make, they are left the most unhappy people in the whole of this world. They have no home. Three-quarters of this Force was raised from a part of Poland which is no longer Poland.
  I know these men, I have seen the battalions, I have seen their records, seen the printed and written pages, heard their songs and attended their conferences. They have nothing. And when they knew that their home was lost when the agreement was made which deprived them of any home, they fought the same. They never wavered. They brought no recriminations against us; their commanders never raised with us the slightest indication they would waver for a moment. It is a story so pathetic and so terrible, that if we could, we should make just this one gesture to give the right hon. Gentleman not the duty, of course, to make a wholesale naturalisation, but the right to waive for these men what he has for many others. There are many admirable and splendid men, I have no doubt, among the figures he has given us to whom he
  442
  has granted naturalisation because they have complied with the five years residence rule. But why did they comply with that five years rule? They were refugees who reached our shores and who somehow managed to get the residence. But were not they residents who served under General Alexander?
  What does residence mean? To serve under a British commander in the greatest battles in history of our Empire? Residence is purely a technical term, and what better residence could you have than to serve in a British Army with a Polish division, to serve under a British commander and be subject to greater pressure than any man has ever been subjected to in the whole history of war, and never to waver for one moment in their loyalty? I am not judging whether it is right or wrong. The hon and learned Gentleman the Member for North Hammersmith (Mr. Pritt) took, I thought, too limited a view of this matter. Men are entitled to their views, their hopes, their dreams.
  Though at times there was very great pressure on General Anders himself, he never raised with us the slightest doubt that, however great the pressure upon him and upon everything in which he believed, he would swerve. I do not know of any case in history like it. We ought to realise that it is not wholesale naturalisation we are seeking, but that the right hon. Gentleman should give the same right to these men who served corporately as if they had come into our Forces one by one as refugees across the sea. Many of them did, and, at the request of the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor, transferred to the Polish Army. Had they not followed that request they could have stayed in our Forces, but because they did that which we wished them to do, because they followed what we advised them to do, they lost this five years.
  I do not think it is asking very much, and I do think it would make a tremendous difference. The purpose of this Bill is to bring them into our life and to get them to help us, and to give them some future and something to look forward to, to give them something so that they can say, "Well, if we come and join your community we shall work for you a long time as a grateful servant." But five years after seven years of hopelessness, and after a march through the whole of the world, after two years in

  443
  prison, as many of them were in Russia! It is not very much to say they have not to do five years before they become eligible. I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to think about this. I know how sympathetic he is, I know how he feels, as we all do. We do not wish to carry this to a Division, but could he think of this again and perhaps at a later stage in the Bill, or in another place, he might find himself able to make a concession which, I think, would be deeply valued by those men, and which I believe every British soldier who has fought side by side with them would be proud to think that the British Parliament had done for them.
  2.45 a.m.
  Major Legge-Bourke: May I add my brief word to the very moving appeal made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley (Mr. H. Macmillan)? I have rather deep feelings over this matter, because my own regiment fought under General Anders in Italy, though I was not serving with it myself at that time; and my own brother was a prisoner of war with General Bor Komarovsky. So I feel that I have some particular attachment to the Poles in this matter. I would ask the Home Secretary to reconsider the matter in the light of this one point—to realise that there are, as I have said on two previous occasions in this country a great many Poles who are uncertain at the moment what they want to do. If he could see his way to accept this Clause, I think it would encourage a great many to make up their minds once and for all, and I think he would find that a great many would make up their minds to stay in this country. I am not one of those who would encourage them to go back to Poland. I believe that we ought to welcome them here. But whatever the cause, I think the most tragic group of these people are those who feel that perhaps one day they may be able to go back, and therefore are not prepared to accept the Polish Resettlement Corps at the moment, because they are not quite sure how they stand. I do ask the right hon. Gentleman to bear in mind that particular group, and if he can possibly see his way to accept this Clause, I believe he will pay them a debt of gratitude which we most certainly owe them.
  Mr. Ede: I can only speak again with the permission of the House. No one could be other than deeply moved by the speech of the right hon. Member for Bromley (Mr. H. Macmillan). He spoke not merely with great eloquence, but with a knowledge, through his association with these men, which I am quite sure deeply impressed everyone who listened to him. One of the difficulties is that I am advised that the Clause in its present form might be difficult to work. The right hon. Gentleman has been in this House long enough to know that that is the stock answer of Government spokesmen whenever an Amendment is moved from the other side of the House. He has been long enough on this side of the House to know that it is sure to be his first line of defence. But I am willing to consider getting some discretionary powers in another place in words which would sufficiently circumscribe that discretion so as to protect myself from the inevitable pressures that come once a breach is made in the very strong ramparts with which Parliament has surrounded the Secretary of State in dealing with these matters. I will endeavour to see if I can find a form of words which will enable me to get quite accurate and sufficient information about even the bravest soldier to determine whether he is on every ground suitable for admission to British civilian life. If I can find that form of words, I will endeavour to meet the views which have been put forward.
  Mr. H. Macmillan: So far as my right hon. Friend and I are concerned, I can only thank the right hon. Gentleman very much for the spirit in which he has met our view. I do not think it would be reasonable for us to ask for more. I quite appreciate his position, and I know that when he makes a pledge of this kind he does his best to carry it out in the spirit, as well as the letter. In the light of that, I would like, on behalf of my right hon. Friend, to ask the permission of the House to withdraw the Clause.
  Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Hubert Beaumont): Formal permission to withdraw must be asked by the right hon. Member who moved the Clause.
  Mr. Peake: In view of what has been said, may I ask permission to withdraw the Clause?
  Mr. Francis Noel-Baker: I think that the statement which has just been made by the Home Secretary has caused some dismay to myself and to some of my hon. Friends on this side of the House. As the Home Secretary is well aware, I have often taken up the case of members of Allied Forces in an exactly parallel situation to that of these Polish troops. I had personal experience during my service in the war, of Greek, French, Dutch, Belgian, and other foreign armies. Some of these men were under British command, and then transferred, and they are in an exactly parallel position. The right hon. Gentleman shakes his head, but I assure him that this is the situation. I agree that there may not be so many of them, but they wish to settle in this country for exactly the same reason as do these Poles, but when I have asked the Home Secretary to use discretionary powers, the right hon. Gentleman has said that these powers do not exist. There are members of the forces of other Allies, some of whom transferred at our request, and did dangerous work for various British departments during the war. I suggest that if the Home Secretary is going to give an assurance that he will get round these limitations by his discretionary powers so far as the Poles are affected, he ought to do the same for these other people. I do not want to make comments about these Poles, but some of us consider these members of other Allied armies to be better examples for democracy. We also remember that they were wrongly made victims of persecution.
  Major Legge-Bourke: May I put to the hon. Gentleman one point? None of these other countries is in the same position. [HON. MEMBERS: "What about Greece?"] None of these countries is suffering limitation of its boundaries, or the government of a totalitarian régime.
  Mr. F. Noel-Baker: It would not be right on this occasion to go into the circumstances concerning Governments of various countries. But I am concerned with individuals. There may be individual Frenchmen, Dutchmen, or Belgians, who do not wish to return to their own country. They are, as individuals, in exactly the same position as individual Poles. These people, who fought with us, wish to become British citizens, too.
  Major Bramall: I would not have intervened at this late hour, but for the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke), which I think went contrary to the direction which he intended. He made the point that a number of these people, if assured that they could obtain British naturalisation, would make the final decision not to go back to Poland. That is what hon. Members opposite desire, to stop these people going back to Poland; but I think it is the Government's intention, and the wish of the majority of hon. Members on this side, that as many of these people as possible should go back to Poland, and it seems to me that the Government will be doing one added thing to detract from the likelihood of these Poles returning to Poland, which the Government themselves regard as the right thing for them to do, by giving them preferential treatment over all other Allied forces in the matter of naturalisation. I hope that the Home Secretary will bear that point in mind when considering this matter.
  Mr. Driberg: I hope the Home Secretary will be able to say that the enlargement of the discretionary powers which he is seeking will extend, so far as he can make it, not only to Poles, but also to other nationalities. I share his expression of admiration for the extreme and impeccable and, indeed, moving eloquence of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bromley (Mr. H. Macmillan) but it would be quite wrong to limit this privilege only to the Poles; and with all respect to the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Ely (Major Legge-Bourke), although I agree with him that the cases of France and Belgium are quite different, the case of Greece seems to me to be the exact converse to that of Poland.
  Mr. Ede: I intervene again with the leave of the House. The right hon. Gentleman opposite will see the difficulty into which I have got myself by trying to be reasonable towards him, and of course, I must have regard to all the views that are expressed in the House with regard to this matter. It is quite clear that I could not in this Bill give myself power to deal with Greeks. In fact, some of my hon. Friends have been reluctant to allow me, in a Bill dealing with Poles, to deal with Poles. The wider general discretion, which was just what I feared I should be driven into if I made the

  447
  slightest concession, would, of course, involve me in another Bill. While I still stand by what I said to the right hon. Gentleman, hon. Members will realise that the subsequent trend of the discussion is something which I must bear in mind when I have to make my final decision.
  Question, "That the Clause be read a Second time," put, and negatived.

  CLAUSE 2.—(Allowances from the Assistance Board.)
  Mr. Ede: I beg to move, in page 3, line 46, to leave out from "of," to "as," in page 4, line 2, and to insert:
  "a body of Polish forces entering the United Kingdom and dependent thereon or on members thereof."
  This is an Amendment that redeems the promise I made to the right hon. Member for North Leeds (Mr. Peake) to do a little to clear up the somewhat awkward wording which dealt with the question of the followers and dependants. I hope that this does make it clear that it is not merely the people who are attached to the Corps as a whole, but people who may have been in some way or another linked up with individual members of the Corps, who are brought within the scope of the Clause.
  Amendment agreed to.

  CLAUSE 8.—(Provisions as to service in the forces.)
  3 a.m.
  Vice-Admiral Taylor: I beg to move, in page 9, line 14, at the end, to insert:
  "(2) Notwithstanding anything contained to the contrary in the King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions, Volume 1, Section 385, or in any other provision, any member of the Polish resettlement forces shall be eligible for enlistment in His Majesty's Navy."
  The object of this Amendment is, of course, that personnel in the Resettlement Corps may be permitted to enlist in His Majesty's Navy as they are now permitted to enlist in the Army and the Air Force. Under present King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions, no alien is allowed to enlist in His Majesty's Navy. Therefore, my Amendment is to remove that disability, so that the personnel of these forces may, if they wish to do so, have the opportunity of enlisting in His Majesty's Navy. There is no question about the services and the efficiency of the personnel of the Polish Navy. They are small in
  448
  numbers, but they did immensely good service with us during the war, although not so great as the service done by the Polish Army and Air Force. I know from letters I have received how keenly the personnel of the Polish Navy feel on this matter. They feel—wrongly, I admit—that they have been let down. They do not understand that the Regulations prohibit them from enlisting in His Majesty's Navy. I think we are agreed, at any rate on this side of the House, that for the personnel of these forces we should do all we can to assist them in the terrible position in which they find themselves at the present time. If this Amendment is to be accepted, there are two points which I wish to raise. One is that the administration of those who enlist in His Majesty's Navy shall not be under military control, but shall have their own control. There is also the question of the pay rates in the Polish Navy, which are somewhat different from ours, and I hope that if this Amendment is accepted, that matter will be looked into. I hope that the Amendment will be accepted by the Government.
  Major Legge-Bourke: I beg to second the Amendment.
  It is with some trepidation that I salute the quarter-deck for the purpose of supporting this Amendment. I feel there is little that need be added to what my hon. and gallant Friend has said, and if I have risen to second the Amendment, it was with the desire to assist in piping the Poles on board.
  The Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty (Mr. John Dugdale): I quite appreciate the point that has been made by the hon. and gallant Member for South Paddington (Vice-Admiral Taylor), but I think he does not quite appreciate the position as it exists today, which is briefly as follows. Under King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions,
  "persons born out of His Majesty's Dominions are only to be entered if proof is produced that both parents are or were British subjects."
  but that is not a law, and it does not require amendment. Exceptions can, in fact, be made, and I can assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that in this case the Admiralty do intend to make the exception that he requires. I hope this assurance will satisfy him.
  Vice-Admiral Taylor: I am very much obliged to the Parliamentary Secretary for

  449
  that decision, which will give great satisfaction to these men who have served us so well. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

  TITLE.
  Amendment made: In line 13, after "Crown," insert:
  "to provide for the discipline and internal administration of certain Polish forces and to affirm the operation up to the passing of this Act of provision previously made therefore."[Mr. Ede.]
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read the Third time."
  3.5 a.m.
  Mr. Driberg: I only rise for a few moments. I want to ask when we are going to have the long awaited and long promised speech by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War. Many hours ago the Home Secretary was asked a direct question by the hon. and gallant Member for Bexley (Major Bramall), and he said that the Secretary of State for War would answer in due course tonight. Later on I raised a point of Order, seated and covered, and you, Mr. Speaker, assured me that my right hon. Friend would be speaking in the course of the proceedings. Can my right hon. Friend now answer that question: when, and at what moment of time, was it realised that all this procedure had been illegal?
  The Secretary of State for War (Mr. Bellenger): I do not know on what authority my right hon. Friend informed the House that I should be speaking. Certainly it was not on my authority and I am not in a position tonight to give my hon. Friend the information for which he has asked. If he places such importance
  450
  on this matter I will endeavour to give him the information in the form, perhaps, of a letter, if I may.
  Mr. Driberg: Thank you very much.

  SUNDAY CINEMATOGRAPH ENTERTAINMENTS
  Resolved:
  "That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section r of the Sunday Entertainments Act, 1932, to the County Borough of Barrow-in-Furness, a copy of which Order was presented on 28th February, be approved."
  Resolved:
  "That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section 1 of the Sunday Entertainments Act, 1932, to the Borough of Chingford, a copy of which Order was presented on 28th February, be approved."
  Resolved:
  "That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section 1 of the Sunday Entertainments Act, 1932, to the Urban District of Bolsover, a copy of which Order was presented on 28th February, be approved."
  Resolved:
  "That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section r of the Sunday Entertainments Act, 1932, to the Rural District of Dorking and Horley, a copy of which Order was presented on 28th February. be approved."—[Mr. Oliver.]

  ADJOURNMENT
  Resolved: "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Michael Stewart.]
  Adjourned accordingly at Nine Minutes after Three o'Clock a.m

  SERVICES LAND REQUIREMENTS
  SERVICES LAND REQUIREMENTS
NATIONAL INSURANCE
  Unemployment Benefit
  Unemployment Benefit
  Personal Cases
  Personal Cases
  Crofters and Fishermen
  Crofters and Fishermen
EMPLOYMENT
  Disabled Persons, Newcastle
  Disabled Persons, Newcastle
  Glasgow
  Glasgow
SCOTLAND
  Fishing Boats (Timber Licences)
  Fishing Boats (Timber Licences)
  Universities (Agricultural Students)
  Universities (Agricultural Students)
  Sheriffs-Principal (Private Practice)
  Sheriffs-Principal (Private Practice)
  Water Supply and Drainage (Schemes)
  Water Supply and Drainage (Schemes)
HOUSING (SCOTLAND)
  Aluminium Houses (Dampness)
  Aluminium Houses (Dampness)
  Glasgow
  Glasgow
MINISTRY OF PENSIONS
  Artificial Limbs (Manufacture)
  Artificial Limbs (Manufacture)
  Disablement Pensions
  Disablement Pensions
NATIONAL FINANCE
  Cable and Wireless Limited (Board)
  Cable and Wireless Limited (Board)
  Polish Girls' School, Pitlochry
  Polish Girls' School, Pitlochry
  Private Undertakings (Profits)
  Private Undertakings (Profits)
  Purchase Tax (Electrical Appliances)
  Purchase Tax (Electrical Appliances)
  Gold and Dollar Holdings
  Gold and Dollar Holdings
  Capital (Movements)
  Capital (Movements)
  Adverse Trade Balance (Brazil)
  Adverse Trade Balance (Brazil)
  British Assets, Brazil
  British Assets, Brazil
  CIVIL SERVICE (STAFF REDUCTIONS)
  CIVIL SERVICE (STAFF REDUCTIONS)
  COUNCIL OF FOREIGN BOND HOLDERS
  COUNCIL OF FOREIGN BOND HOLDERS
TRADE AND COMMERCE
  Tobacco (Imports)
  Tobacco (Imports)
  Cigarettes (Rationing)
  Cigarettes (Rationing)
  Newsprint
  Newsprint
  Basket Making (Willows)
  Basket Making (Willows)
  German Pottery
  German Pottery
  Statutory Rules and Orders
  Statutory Rules and Orders
  Utility Clothing and Leather
  Utility Clothing and Leather
BRITISH ARMY
  N.C.Os. and Men (Fraternisation)
  N.C.Os. and Men (Fraternisation)
  Married Quarters, Middle East
  Married Quarters, Middle East
  T.A. Married Quarters (Evictions)
  T.A. Married Quarters (Evictions)
  Bovington Camp
  Bovington Camp
  A.T.S., London
  A.T.S., London
  Demobilisation
  Demobilisation
  Requisitioned Premises, New Brighton
  Requisitioned Premises, New Brighton
  Mention in Despatches (Emblem)
  Mention in Despatches (Emblem)
  Personal Cases
  Personal Cases
  Women Clerks, East Africa
  Women Clerks, East Africa
  Home Strength
  Home Strength
  O.R. 1 Recruits
  O.R. 1 Recruits
  Welsh Battalions
  Welsh Battalions
  Local Colonial Forces
  Local Colonial Forces
  Malayan Soldiers (Pay and Gratuity)
  Malayan Soldiers (Pay and Gratuity)
  Record and Pay Offices
  Record and Pay Offices
  Glenridding Camp
  Glenridding Camp
  Deferred Release Officers
  Deferred Release Officers
  Troops, Denmark
  Troops, Denmark
PRISONERS OF WAR
  Pet Rabbits
  Pet Rabbits
  Camp Commandants (Allowances)
  Camp Commandants (Allowances)
  Relaxation of Restrictions
  Relaxation of Restrictions
  Food
  Food
  ASSESSMENT APPEAL TRIBUNALS
  ASSESSMENT APPEAL TRIBUNALS
ARMED FORCES
  Release Group Numbers
  Release Group Numbers
  Coal Mines
  Coal Mines
  DISTURBANCES, ERITREA (SENTENCES)
  DISTURBANCES, ERITREA (SENTENCES)
  ECONOMIC SURVEY (GOODS AND SERVICES)
  ECONOMIC SURVEY (GOODS AND SERVICES)
  COAL INDUSTRY (INDUSTRIAL SUPPLIES)
  COAL INDUSTRY (INDUSTRIAL SUPPLIES)
  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS (PUBLICITY EXPENDITURE)
  GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS (PUBLICITY EXPENDITURE)
  ESPIONAGE COMMISSION, CANADA
  ESPIONAGE COMMISSION, CANADA
  GAS OIL SUBSIDY
  GAS OIL SUBSIDY
  FUEL EMERGENCY
  FUEL EMERGENCY
  GOVERNMENT PAINT AND DISTEMPER
  GOVERNMENT PAINT AND DISTEMPER
  SUGAR BEET (LABOUR)
  SUGAR BEET (LABOUR)
  BILLETING OFFICERS, KENT
  BILLETING OFFICERS, KENT
FOOD SUPPLIES
  Sweet Ration
  Sweet Ration
  TUBERCULAR DISEASES (DEATHS)
  TUBERCULAR DISEASES (DEATHS)
  Potatoes
  Potatoes
  CABLE AND WIRELESS STAFF
  CABLE AND WIRELESS STAFF
Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers.

  POLICING OF HIGHWAYS AT NIGHT.
  THE EARL OF IDDESLEIGH: My Lords, I beg to ask the question standing in my name.
  [The question was as follows:
  To ask His Majesty's Government whether they can give an assurance that any considerable extension of the working of night-shifts in industry will be accompanied by an improvement in the present arrangements for the policing of public highways during the hours of darkness.]
  LORD WALKDEN: My Lords, this is a matter which will no doubt be considered by the responsible chief officers of the Police in the light of local conditions and the available resources of manpower.

SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932 (COUNTY BOROUGH OF BARROW-IN-FURNESS ORDER).
LORD WALKDEN: My Lords, I beg to move that this Order be approved.
Moved, That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department under the Act, for extending Section 1 of the Act to the County Borough of Barrow-in-Furness, and laid before the House yesterday, be approved.—(Lord Walkden.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932 (BOROUGH OF CHINGFORD ORDER).
LORD WALKDEN: My Lords, I beg to move that this Order be approved.
Moved, That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Depart-
60
ment under the Act, for extending Section 1 of the Act to the Borough of Chingford, and laid before the House yesterday, be approved.—(Lord Walkden.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932 (URBAN DISTRICT OF BOLSOVER ORDER).
LORD WALKDEN: My Lords, I beg to move that this Order be approved.
Moved, That the Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department under the Act, for extending Section 1 of the Act to the Urban District of Bolsover, and laid before the House yesterday, be approved.—(Lord Walkden.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CROWN PROCEEDINGS BILL, [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT JOWITT): My Lords, in moving the Second Reading of this Bill, I have it in command to acquaint the House that His Majesty the King, having been informed of the contents of the Crown Proceedings Bill, is prepared to place the interests of the Crown at the disposal of Parliament in connexion with the Bill. It gives me, I confess, some little satisfaction to be able to move the Second Reading of this Bill. It may be true, as people often say, that in the past reforms have been held up by lawyers and the legal profession, but I think I may fairly say that all the lawyers I know have been pressing for the introduction of this Bill, or something like it, for many years past, and it certainly has not been the fault of the legal profession that this measure was not passed some time ago.
The object of the Bill, in a sense, is to put the Crown, so far as may be, in matters of litigation in the same position as the subject, so that a subject who wants to bring an action against the Crown may proceed as though he were proceeding against another subject. It gives me some satisfaction, too, to think that it is my Party who are responsible for introducing this Bill, though I confess it is in no sense a Party measure.

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Sometimes on both sides tempers are apt to be rather frayed and one side is apt to label the other with the name "Hitler" or some other like term of endearment; therefore it is satisfactory to think that if we are marching on the road to serfdom at least to-day we are having a little pleasant interlude and are doing something to facilitate proceeding against the Crown and to prevent the little man from being crushed by the juggernaut of the State. It gives me some satisfaction to realize that it is my Party who have produced this Bill after it has been projected for about twenty-five years and Jain in its pigeon hole for some twenty years.
On other general considerations, I have come to the conclusion that this path of law reform puts me rather in the position of a mountaineer who scales one peak only to discover when he gets to the top that there are a great many other peaks he also has to scale. It is not very much good facilitating procedure against the Crown unless we take the next step and see that no one is precluded by lack of means from bringing those proceedings. It is not my custom, as your Lordships know, to make promises, but I sincerely nope that in a not far distant future I may be able to bring in a Bill to implement the recommendations of the Rush-eliffe Report. I hope, further, that in the very near future I may have some announcement to make to your Lordships with regard to the question of the reconsideration of legal procedure, particularly with a view to seeing whether we can reduce the cost of it.
The Denning Committee have done a very good piece of work in connexion with divorce, and it occurred to me that a similar committee might usefully investigate the question of County Courts and also the other divisions of the High Court. Then I am very anxious to embark on a project of consolidation and of getting a branch of the Parliamentary Counsel's Office that really can devote its attention to the consolidation which is sadly needed. Another matter which we have neglected almost entirely between the wars is the reform of Statute Law—the clearing up of some of the mess on our Statute Book. That is really a task which calls for urgent attention. I mention these things so that you may be aware that my task is by no means done
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after introducing and piloting this measure.
I will be as brief as I can and try to set out the circumstances in which this Bill has become necessary. Certainly as early as the Thirteenth Century the rule had become established that the King could not be impleaded in his own Court—that is a survival of feudal law. Another maxim of almost equal antiquity which has played a very great part in the development of our constitutional law and theory is that the King can do no wrong. The combined effect of these two laws or two maxims have made themselves felt, even to this very day In the Sixteenth Century it was decided that in so far as matters of contract were concerned the King, who is himself the fount of justice, should allow claims in contract to be brought against him. I have always found it difficult to explain why, by a parity of reasoning, the same principle did not apply to what we call torts, the private wrongs committed by one person against another. But these maxims to which I have referred were introduced at a time long before there was any appreciation of the distinction between the King in his personal capacity and the Crown as head of the State. Nowadays when the Crown—that is to say, the titular head of the State—is indulging in multifarious activities, trading and the like, I think it only fitting that all these old difficulties in the way of impleading the Crown should be swept away. Your Lordships will notice, of course, that nothing in this Bill affects the King in his personal capacity. It would foe inconsistent with the Royal dignity that the King himself, in respect of his own acts, should be impleaded in his own Courts.
So far as contract was concerned, the position stood in this way. You had a claim arising out of contract against the Crown, but you could not sue, as of right, in the ordinary way; you had to bring a Petition of Right, and you had to get the Petition endorsed with the words: "Let right be done." I confess that I think the grievance here was a matter of form rather than of substance. I became Attorney-General nearly twenty years ago, and I found that there was then a well-established tradition that the Attorney-General should always recommend that the fiat be granted in any case where tnere was any sort of case against the Crown. Sometimes, if he was in grave doubt as to

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whether there was a case, he would recommend that the fiat be granted and demur to the proceedings. I think that the grievance has been rather exaggerated by the more modern textbook writers. Certainly, in my own experience, the fiat has never been refused, except in the sort of case which was so utterly misconceived that if it had come into Court the Judge would inevitably have dismissed the action, at much greater cost to the particular person concerned.
In Scotland—and I speak with great hesitation about the Law of Scotland—I understand that so far as the law of contract was concerned, it was well understood that if a person thought he was aggrieved by breach of contract he was able to start an action against the Lord Advocate, representing the Crown, and start it as of right and not as a matter of grace. The effect of this Bill is to apply to both contracts and tort. It is in matters of tort that the real difficulty has arisen. The doctrine was: "The King can do no wrong," consequently, you could not, and are not able to-day, to bring any action of tort against the Crown. That does not matter very much so long as you can designate the particular person who has done you wrong. To show what I mean, perhaps I may give your Lordships a very simple illustration. If you are run down through the reckless driving of a Post Office van, what you do is to bring your case against the driver. The Crown will stand behind the driver, will conduct the litigation in his name, and will, if necessary, pay costs and damages. But, of course, even in those cases, difficulties do arise, because there may be a question as to whether the employer in an ordinary case, would have a defence, when, for instance, a question of common employment arises, or supposing it is questionable as to whether the driver on the particular occasion was really acting on the Crown's behalf or was engaged on some joy-ride or frolic of his own.
Those matters cannot be investigated by the Courts, because whether the Crown does or does not stand behind a particular defendant is entirely a matter for the Crown to decide. It is not just an issue. Consequently, we have had considerable difficulty in knowing how to deal with these matters with regard to the defence of common employment. Therefore, a scheme has been invented whereby we
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have, first of all, an arbitration to ascertain whether, in fairness, we ought to stand behind a particular defendant. Then, when we have got the arbitration concluded, if the answer is "Yes," we have an action, and we fight in the name of the particular defendant. So, even in those cases where a particular wrongdoer can be identified, some difficulty does arise.
But the real difficulty that arises is in those cases where a particular wrongdoer cannot be identified, for in those cases there is ex hypothesi no one behind whom the Crown can stand. You cannot bring an action against the Crown for a tort, and consequently the Courts are closed. Let me give your Lordships another illustration. Supposing that somebody is run down through the negligent driving of an Army lorry, and that he or she is unable to get the number of the vehicle. The injured person finds that along that road at that particular time there was a succession of Army lorries. Inquiries are made, and each particular driver is quite certain that he was not the one concerned in the accident. There is then no way in which that question can be litigated in the Courts. The most you can do is to have some kind of arbitration—friendly arbitration. Or take another case, of which an example arose quite recently. Some soldiers, carrying out an exercise with flame-throwers were alleged to have started a fire which burned some ricks, but no one could say which soldier, If any, was negligent. An action could not be brought against the officer in command of the party. He was not the employer of the solders, he was a mere fellow-servant of the Crown. In a case like that an action cannot be litigated in the Courts.
Take another illustration. A bomb is discovered to have been placed with some material which is being removed by a contractor. The material is removed to a place on the contractor's own land, and there, suddenly, the bomb explodes and does considerable damage. No one can say what individual is responsible for putting that bomb there. Take yet a further case. Some children wander on to what had been a minefield, a minefield which had been protected by fences, notice-boards and so forth. Owing to the shifting of the sand-dunes the fences have become covered with sand and the boards also, and the children are injured by the explosion of a mine. No one can

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say what particular person was responsible for the state of affairs which led to the accident, and so an action in the Courts cannot be brought.
The Crown, who have been most anxious to have these matters heard in the Courts, have resorted to the device of nominating some defendant. But your Lordships' House held recently—and, if I may say so, the decision was manifestly right—that you cannot nominate a defendant. Such a thing is quite misconceived, and, consequently, there is no way in which these actions can be reviewed by the Courts. Although we do the best wc can to avoid injustice by means of friendly arbitrations and the like, your Lordships will agree that that is a very unsatisfactory state of affairs.
Now, just a word about the history of this particular matter. It was in 1921—that is more than twenty-five years ago—that the then Lord Chancellor, the Earl of Birkenhead; obviously thinking that steps should be taken to make the Crown liable alike in contract and in tort, set up a Committee. That Committee originally consisted of twenty-four people, and it was indeed an all-star cast. There never has been a stronger Committee appointed, and they started their work in 1921. I see in front of me my noble friend Lord Schuster. He was Chairman of the Sub-Committee of the Committee, and everybody who knows that noble Lord, and knows his eagerness and his energy, is aware that he was not designed by nature to drive fat oxen. Yet, my Lords, that Committee sat through the years 1921, 1922, and 1923, until in 1924 Lord Haldane had become Lord Chancellor. Lord Haldane said: "Never mind about considering whether it is desirable that the Crown should become liable alike in contract and in tort; assume it to be desirable and feasible, and prepare a Bill for me."
That may have shortened the proceedings. But 1924 passed, 1925 passed and 1926 passed, and in the year 1927 a Bill was produced. I am bound to say that the Bill then produced was, structurally, not a very satisfactory Bill. If the noble Lord, Lord Beaverbrook were here—I wish he were because he would enliven us all—he would here have his perfect example of his theory about a committee. Here was the most distinguished committee ever appointed; it sat for nearly six years.
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and then produced a Bill which I am bound to say was not a very satisfactory Bill. Yet any single one of that Committee, had they devoted themselves to this question for six months, would have been able to produce a far more satisfactory Bill. There the matter was left. Some two years later I became Attorney-General, and I found this Bill. I was advised by the then Parliamentary draftsmen that the Bill in the 1927 form was not satisfactory, and I suspect that all my predecessors in this office have received the same advice. I further found there were great misgivings about the Bill on the part of the Service Departments. I found too, that amongst some very distinguished lawyers on the Opposition side of the House there were even greater misgivings. We were able to do nothing then, and it is a fact that from that date to this nothing has been done in the way of introducing or carrying forward any Bill dealing comprehensively with this subject.
I am perfectly certain that this thing calls for more than tinkering; what we have to do is to deal with this matter on thorough and drastic lines. When I became Lord Chancellor I found that, though they were very anxious I should introduce this Bill, my colleagues were quite unwilling, for very good reasons, that I should be able to avail myself of Parliamentary Counsel. As your Lordships can readily understand, with this mass of legislation Parliamentary Counsel are a very overworked body of men, and to ask them to undertake the very complicated and difficult piece of drafting was difficult. Fortunately for me, I discovered that mere was one of that select band who had been Parliamentary Counsel, but who had resumed his practice at the Bar—Mr. Cooke—and I was able to induce him to undertake the task of drafting this Bill for me. I enlisted the aid of the Treasury Solicitor, Sir Thomas Barnes, and he has been full of enthusiasm for this Bill and has been able, though not without some difficulty, to overcome the misgivings of the various Departments concerned, particularly the Service Departments. All the credit for this Bill is entirely due to these two men. They have done a really good piece of work.
I turn to the Bill to make a few observations about it. I am quite sure the Bill can be improved, and that it will be improved by the criticism and help your Lordships will give it. I might say at once

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that I think one method of improvement would be to start a new opening clause to make plain at the very outset what is implicit but not plain in the Bill at the present time. I would start off the Bill with a clause like this:
"Where any person has a claim against the Crown after the commencement of this Act and, if this Act has not been passed, the claim might have been brought either—

(a) upon the assumption that His Majesty's fiat were granted by petition; or

(b) by an Action in the High Court against an officer of the Crown;

then the claim may be enforced as of right without the fiat."
That makes it quite plain that this relates to contracts and to tort, and, indeed, to all these matters where obviously you would, had you been granted a fiat, have proceeded by Petition of Right. We must consider whether this is wide enough to extend to such matters as patent and copyright, because if it does not we must put in the appropriate words to see that it does. I am very anxious that this should be wide and all-embracing, and covering the whole sphere. That will be within the new opening clause. It is in the Bill already, but it is rather hidden away, and the Bill needs to be carefully looked at to see that it is there.
Then we come to what is now Clause I. Under subsection (I) (a) we deal with vicarious liability; in paragraph (b) with the responsibility of the Crown to its own servants, and in paragraph (c) with any other claim arising out of ownership or control of property. I am very anxious that this clause also should be all-embracing. I think I have covered everything, but if not I am, willing to enlarge it.
I pass now to the group of clauses, Clauses 3, 4, 5, and 6, dealing with shipping, which put the Crown in regard to ships in the same position as the subject. They are technical, but I am able to tell your Lordships that the industries concerned have expressed their agreement with these clauses. When we come to Clause 7, I should remind your Lordships that this experiment we are now making has already long been the law in some of His Majesty's Dominions and Colonies—particularly in Australia and South Africa. They have Acts on the lines of this Bill, and they have worked well. In Clause 7, I am proposing to give protection to the Post Office. For the first time we are making the Crown liable in law in respect
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of the registered parcels, but, as your Lordships will see, in lines 9, 10 and 11 of page 6, we are protecting the officers of the Crown against civil liability except at the suit of the Crown. The Dominion Acts do not contain these words "except at the suit of the Crown", but I think it right that we should have them in, so that if there is any gross case the Crown can take the necessary proceedings. Until now, by reason of Section 13 of the Post Office Act, there has been no liability in respect of registered parcels.
Clause 8 of the Bill is drafted on the lines of Clause 29 of the Bill of 1927. In some respects, however, it is much less wide. Here arises rather an interesting question. (I put these observations in the forms of questions, and I shall not attempt to answer them.) I have often wondered what is the true legal position as between two persons in the armed forces of the Crown, one of whom is injured by the negligence of the other.
To give a simple illustration, let me take the Charge of the Light Brigade. Could a trooper who took part in that Charge, whose leg was shattered by a cannon-ball, have brought an action against Lord Raglan (I think it was), to recover damages on the ground that Lord Raglan had blundered? When the "Victoria" and the "Camperdown" came into collision, could a sailor who went down in the "Victoria" have brought an action against the Admiral for giving an order which, as he would say, brought about the damage? Have you to empanel a jury in the King's Bench Division to determine whether there was or was not a case of negligence? And consider the case of Passchendaele. Could a soldier who was injured through sticking in the mud at Passchendaele have brought an action against Sir Douglas Haig alleging that he had not properly considered the nature of the terrain or the effect of the bombardment on the drainage system? And would Sir Douglas Haig have been able to answer: "Well, I quite realize all those things, but I had to do this because the French were being hard pressed at the time"? Have a jury to be empanelled to try all those questions which are obviously quite unfitted for them? Therefore we make it quite plain here that there must be no action in respect of these matters, either against the Crown or against a servant of the Crown, behind whom of course the Crown would have to

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stand if such an action were allowed in respect of these matters.
Let me be quite frank: this clause (together with Clause 7) is one of the clauses that I have been pressed and indeed compelled by the Service Departments to insert in order to overcome the misgivings or, if you like, the reluctance which they feel, and have traditionally felt, about the introduction of this Bill. Therefore, although I am quite prepared to consider textual Amendments to this clause, I must make it plain that this is one of the clauses which I have had to say I will see is in the Bill. Clause 9 deals with the prerogative, and with action under statutory powers—the prerogative is the residuum of the rights of the Crown, outside Statute, which are necessary in respect of such matters as the defence of the realm, the conduct of the Armed Forces, dealing with aliens, and so on, and an instance of the statutory rights is, of course, the billeting of soldiers. Clause 9 deals with these matters. Clause 10 makes the Bill retrospective to February 13, 1947. That was the date of the introduction of the Bill.
Then we get a group of clauses dealing with jurisdiction and procedure. Your Lordships will notice that Clause II abolishes all the proceedings mentioned in the First Schedule. Students of the law yet unborn will bless us if we do away with writs of capias ad respondendum, writs of subpoena ad respondendum. writs of appraisement, writs of scire facias, writs of extent, writs of diem clausit extremum and various other matters of that sort. I am quite sure that here I shall have the strong support of students of the law. In Clause 13 we allow the Crown to be impleaded in any County Court. In the 1927 Bill it was a particular County Court, but of course we attach to that certain rights regarding change of venue which come under Clauses 17 and 18, which raise points that may well be discussed in Committee. In Clause 24 (I am taking a few of the more important clauses) we abolish the right which the Crown technically have to imprison for debt. The effect of the Debtors Act, 1869 was to do away with imprisonment for debt, save in certain specified cases. But the Debtors Act did not apply to the Crown. People are imprisoned for debt nowadays because there is some evidence of means and it is established that they could pay but will
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not pay. In respect of death duties and purchase tax alone do we provide that this right should remain in the Crown, and that is because in both those cases the person proceeded against has received the money into his possession and is in the position of having failed to pay over that which he has received.
Then a word on discovery. I am quite satisfied in my own mind that the Crown must have the right to say that certain documents or sometimes certain classes of documents shall not be produced either in litigation to which the Crown are a party or litigation between two ordinary parties. I will give your Lordships an illustration of the sort of case I have in mind. In many of the Service Departments there are periodical reports on the conduct and credentials of junior officers by their seniors, and if there was the slightest chance of those documents being made public or brought up in a Court of law you would at once lose that complete freedom which officers feel they have today in setting out exactly what they think, and the public interest would be the loser. I say further, having discussed this matter with the Judges, that I am quite satisfied that the Judges would think it most undesirable that they should have the task of deciding whether documents should or should not be protected from disclosure. Very often you cannot tell, merely by looking at a document, whether it should or should not be protected. You must know all the circumstances which led up to the document, and for a Judge to inform himself of all those matters might mean that he would have to be closeted, as it were, with one party to the litigation without the other side being there. This matter has been very fully dealt with recently in the case of the "Thetis," and anybody who thinks that the reason we do not entrust this matter to the Judges is that we do not trust them, must have failed to read the "Thetis" judgment.
Having said that, I must add that I think this particular jurisdiction which is vested in a Minister of the Crown, to say that a certain document is not to be produced—a document, mark you, which is relevant or no question could arise—is one of the most serious matters that any Minister can consider. The administration of justice is of the; greatest importance. Every relevant document ought to be produced, and it is only if the Minister

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really applies himself to the particular question as to whether the public interest overweighs the ordinary principle of disclosure that he is justified in making an order. I make those remarks because in a recent case an ex-Minister did commit himself to a statement which seemed to me to indicate that he did not realize the risk and what a serious task a Minister was undertaking when he made this sort of order.
From my own experience, I can say that two of my colleagues have come to me with regard to litigation, and I have been pleased to find that obviously they have asked for advice. If I could not give them definite advice, I told them to whom they could apply. But they were obviously regarding it as a very serious matter indeed. I am satisfied that if this thing is so regarded by Ministers there is no danger of abuse, and I think we must leave it in that way. We contemplate in Clause 31 that there will be Rules of Court. The first subsection of Clause 36 makes it quite plain that this does not apply to proceedings by or against His Majesty in his private capacity. Part V has application to Scotland. This Bill, unlike the 1927 Bill, applies to Scotland and there are also facilities for applying it to Northern Ireland if the authorities want to do so.
My Lords, that is the Bill, and I ask your Lordships' help with regard to it. From the experience which I have had in the last week or so, since this Bill has been introduced, when I have had the most generous help that has been forthcoming from your Lordships in all quarters of the House—and this goes quite outside political activities—I have no doubt that I shall get that assistance. I want to try to get this Bill through with expedition. At the same time I want great care to be taken, and I am relying upon your Lordships to help me to get this Bill as perfect as we can. I want that because our chance of getting this Bill into law is to send it down in good time, and to send it down as a piece of projected legislation in which we have all taken our share and played our part. The chance of getting it on the Statute Book will be completely destroyed if this is regarded as controversial legislation. Our chance of getting it on the Statute Book depends upon all Parties pressing that it should be put on the Statute Book
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and I sincerely hope they will. Your Lordships will find me very ready to consider any Amendments to improve the Bill. However, I do want you to realize, in regard to the protective clauses which 1 have had to concede to the Service Departments and to the Post Office, that my hands are somewhat, but not entirely, tied. I am grateful to your Lordships for having listened to me for so long, and I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
LORD RAGLAN: The noble and learned Viscount having referred to my great grandfather by name, I would just like to say that his responsibility for the Charge of the Light Brigade is not regarded by historians as by any means so certain as the noble and learned Viscount suggested.
3.11 p.m.
VISCOUNT SIMON: My Lords, I am very glad to have the first opportunity, after the interesting and exhaustive speech of the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack, of saying to the House that I welcome this Bill with all my heart, and I congratulate the noble and learned Viscount on being in a position to introduce it to-day. With his concluding observation I am in particular sympathy, for, after all, the thing which ultimately matters here is not a question of praise or criticism; what matters here is not the introduction of the Bill—though I praise the speed with which that has now been done—but the carrying of the Bill into law. We shall not alter the lot of people who find difficulties with the present law unless this Bill reaches the Statute Book. I wish to assure the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, at once, not merely on my own behalf but I am sure on behalf of many others, that he will find in us nothing except the most genuine desire to assist the end which he so rightly defined in his final observations.
It is true that the existing law inflicts embarrassment, and even a denial of ready justice, to a certain number of people who deserve better treatment. One may roughly divide the whole subject, not perhaps quite accurately, into cases where the claim is one that arises out of the contract which a man has with the Crown, or some analogous case, and

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the cases where what he complains of is that he has been injured by the action of a Crown servant, though he had no previous contract with him. I am very giad indeed that the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, proposes to bring out clearly at the beginning of the Bill that this is a Bill that deals with both, because I have met one or two people who have found it a little difficult to appreciate that as a matter of fact the Bill does provide for both.
The claim which has been brought by what is now called a Petition of Right is, of course, a claim which is made against the Crown itself—the Crown is the respondent—and it is a claim which is brought where a man alleges that there has been a breach of contract with the Crown, or in certain other cases where he says that the Crown has got his property and he ought to have it back. It is quite true (and I am one of the ex-Attorney-Generals who know it very well) that at present, apart from the fact that the procedure is rather special, there is an obstacle in the way of a man who has a claim of that sort against the Crown, because he cannot launch his claim in the Courts until he has got what is called a fiat, whether it is correctly called a fiat of the Attorney-General or a fiat of the Crown I do not stop to say, but in practice the principle that is endorsed is: "Let right be done." Only when that has been done can proceedings take place. I ought to point out—the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, did not happen to mention it—that that is of course a very convenient procedure to stop silly claims. But I entirely confirm his statement—it certainly was so in my time as an Attorney-General—that the Attorney-General will always grant his fiat, although he may himself feel that the claim when it comes to be investigated is a great deal of nonsense. He will not, however, grant his fiat if he thinks that the man is really off his head and is talking complete nonsense, and that really for his own sake the matter ought to be stopped. One result of the change which is made in this Bill—a change which I thoroughly approve—is that that particular method of stopping what may be called a hopeless claim against the Crown, will no longer exist. Everybody is entitled now, under this Bill, to issue his Writ against the Crown alleging a breach of contract, although as a matter of fact his case
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might be quite absurd. I am afraid there are quite a number of people in this country who do entertain the most curious notions as to when they have a right to claim damages for breach of contract with the Crown. Against that, of course, there is already in the law a provision which I think is called the Vexatious Action Act, so that if you have an individual who persists again and again in a completely foolish claim, there are methods under which it can be stopped, in the interests of everybody, including himself. I am glad that the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, says that he is going to make plain in the early part of the Bill that it does abolish the Petition of Right, and all that; and that even in cases where the claim is a claim for breach of contract, it will be started and continued, in exactly the same way as if the claim were a claim against a fellow subject.
As regards the tort provisions, they seem to me to be very good. If I may just mention one point to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, it is as to whether he really needs to put in line 2 of Clause I, "in tort". However, that is a technical question much better reserved for the Committee stage. The broad purpose of this Bill is absolutely right. The noble and learned Viscount is, in my judgment, completely justified in saying that it is urgently needed. I am delighted that we have now the opportunity of considering it thoroughly, and, I hope, without much loss of time, and of sending it to another place early enough in the year to make it really clear that a Bill so carefully examined, and so universally supported in a House which contains many members well qualified to judge its terms, ought to be put on the Statute Book forthwith.
When this Bill first appeared on February 13 some of us took it upon ourselves to undertake a little preliminary examination of it. Such Law Lords as were available were good enough to join me. We went through the Bill in private, in advance of to-day's debate, in order that we might ourselves get on as far as possible, and thus save time in examining the clauses through which the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, has now taken us. I think that was a useful contribution, which I know my noble and learned friends and I were willing to make. I had the real happi-

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ness of writing to the Lord Chancellor when our consideration—and it was a very thorough one-—was over, to tell him that he might he assured that especially those who are called the legal members of this House were satisfied that this was an excellent and well-drafted Bill, and that we should unitedly do everything we could to facilitate and promote its progress.
One of the matters to which we drew attention was the question whether it would not perhaps be desirable that on the face of the Bill the abolition of the old-fashioned way of making a claim against the Crown by Petition of Right should appear as clearly as there appears in the text the right of the subject to bring an action for tort against the Crown. I have no doubt that the same ideas have occurred to others and to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, himself. And, as we have just heard, that is one of the things which he means to propose in Committee. I do not feel any doubt whatever that on this Bill we shall get complete co-operation and a common desire to see it carried promptly but carefully through this House.
As the noble and learned Viscount has referred to the matter, perhaps I may say a word on Clauses 7 and 8. Your Lordships will appreciate that although this Bill is primarily designed to secure that a citizen may bring his claim against the Crown by the same process and with the same ease as that with which he can bring a claim against a fellow subject, that is not the only matter which is dealt with. The last three lines of Clause 7 (I) are an example of that. Clause 7 is the Post Office clause. The first part of the clause provides that no proceedings in tort shall lie against the Crown in respect of things done with a postal packet. There is a new provision about registered letters, which I dare say will be some set-off, but lines 9, 10 and 11 on page 6 have nothing at all to do with claims against the Crown. They provide that no private citizen may bring any claim against a servant of the Post Office, so far as that claim is based on a civil liability, for anything a servant of the Post Office does in the course of his duties as a Post Office official.
I see the reason for that, and I shall not attack it when the Committee stage comes. I think, however, that we should
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understand what it involves, because it has the merit of being rather amusing. Unless I misinterpret it, it means—I am putting a very unlikely case—that if I, with my own eyes and in the presence of witnesses, see die local postmaster collecting letters addressed to me at my private address and observe that he is engaged in tearing them all up or throwing them into the fire, I cannot bring any action against him for damages in a Court. That sounds rather severe, but the answer, I have no doubt, is, first of all, that that sort of thing is very unlikely to happen, and secondly, that in such cases the Crown itself could, and would if it thought proper, take civil proceedings. I merely call attention to it because the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, has done so. I do not think I have misinterpreted it, although I have quoted what may seem to be an extravagant instance.
As to Clause 8—about which my noble friend behind me very properly intervened on grounds of historical accuracy—it is extremely easy to justify that clause by imagining that the complaint of the soldier is in respect of something happening in the middle of a battle. But it applies to a great deal more than that; it applies, of course, to any case in which a soldier meets with an injury owing to the negligent conduct, it may be, of his superior officer. It says in terms that such a soldier (or a sailor or airman—and I think it was probably the case of the airman which was very much in the minds of those who drafted this Bill) shall not bring any civil action for damages against a colleague or a superior officer, even though that person has been negligent and has hurt him, so long as they are engaged in the performance of their duties and service.
To take a simple example, if a Government aeroplane crashes and it is found that the crash is due to the negligence of the pilot in landing, no member of the crew can bring any action against the pilot for damages, and, what is more, no action can be brought against the Crown. That, of course, is not really a provision for securing that individuals may bring proceedings against the Crown in the same way as they bring proceedings against anyone else; it is, so far as it goes, a provision which prevents a claim being made by one member of the Armed Forces against another member when they are

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both engaged in the performance of their duties. Now that I have heard the reason for that from those who assisted the Lord Chancellor, I can only say that I have formed the judgment that the provision can be justified, and when the Committee stage comes I shall make no attempt to ask for it to be reversed.
I would like to say one thing in conclusion. While it is a very long time since this sort of subject was considered by that very distinguished Committee (I had nothing to do with it, so I can speak entirely from the outside), I think the acute need for this Bill has been increasingly appreciated in quite recent times. The two special cases which the noble and learned Viscount mentioned are both cases which have come very much to the front of lawyers' minds in quite recent times. During the last war, when there were road accidents occurring from time to time owing to the reckless driving of Army vehicles the method which was first adopted was one which had gone on for a generation and longer. The claim was made by the injured man against the driver and, as the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, said, it was left to the Crown to decide whether the Crown would stand behind the driver. Perhaps the Crown thought: "Well, this man was wearing uniform, but as a matter of fact he was not discharging his duty; he was taking his best girl for a drive round the country, and we are not responsible in any way for that, any more than a gentleman who has a private car and a private chauffeur is answerable for his man having run over somebody when he was simply on a joy-ride." It seemed very hard that a decision of that sort should rest with the Crown without appeal.
Therefore, when I was Lord Chancellor, with the assistance of the noble Lord, Lord Schuster, and others, we devized an arrangement which the Fighting Services accepted. It was really that the question as to whether a private employer would be liable for his servant's injury, on which the Crown might undertake to stand behind the negligent uniformed man, should not be left to be decided by the different Departments—the War Office or whatever the Department was—but that we would agree to refer the question in every case that arose to a distinguished King's Counsel who would be selected for the purpose, and who would simply report on
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his own investigation: for instance, that if negligence was proved against the man, it was a case in which, according to their ordinary principles, the Crown should accept responsibility. We therefore tried to get over that obstacle, and to a large extent I think we did get over it.
A difficulty still remains, however, if you do not know who is driving the vehicle. You cannot start an action unless you know the person whom you ought to serve with the writ. The other difficulty, which the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, also mentioned, is a long inherent but only recently appreciated difficulty. It was last autumn, here in your Lordships' House, sitting in its judicial capacity, that the matter was first made entirely plain. There had recently been an attempt to say, "We will get over these cases where we do not know who ought to be sued, by nominating somebody who shall be treated as though he really was responsible and then, after we have tried the case, the Crown will pay." That is, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, in very firm language—and I was glad to hear him say so although I was largely responsible for it—very bad law. You cannot make a person responsible for negligence unless you prove his negligence, and there are cases in which you cannot even imagine a substitute for the Crown. That is so particularly in cases where the injury is one which arises from a failure of the Crown, on premises which they occupy, to take proper care of the people who are invited or permitted to go there.
All those difficulties are swept away by the noble and learned Viscount's Bill, and I think he is very greatly to be congratulated on having put before us so well constructed and so complete an instrument, as I can assure your Lordships this measure is. I have heard my noble and learned friend, in connexion with some other Government Bills, commend the Bill to the House by saying, "Well, of course, I hate this Bill"—we have all heard that, and it is a very good gambit—"it revolts my sense of everything which is decent and just, but it is absolutely necessary that your Lordships should pass it." If I may imitate a gentle rebuke which my noble and learned friend was pleased to administer to me, I think the Lord Chancellor has rather too much

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of a habit of defending Government measures by that particular opening. But this time it is quite different. I am glad the noble and learned Viscount likes it, and I like it, too. I am perfectly prepared to give honour where honour is due. Whether or not it was a wise observation for him to say that he particularly liked it because it would contribute so much to the reputation of the Labour Party, remains to be seen. I admit, of course, that you may have a piece of excellence which covers a multitude of sins, and it will remain in the future to be decided by the people of this country whether some of the other proceedings of the Government which he adorns are sufficiently compensated for by this most useful piece of legislation.
Lastly, do let us all form up behind him. Never mind about arguments, about origins and the other difficulties; let us form up behind him and get this Bill through the House with real care, by common consent and after looking really closely into its provisions. When all is said and done, the introduction of this measure by itself does nothing at all to help the people who are suffering. The thing which will help them—and I believe the noble and learned Viscount, The Lord Chancellor, will succeed in this—is that the measure should find its way, with our united effort and with the good will of another place, on to the Statute Book. If that happens, any part that any of us have played in the past in trying to urge this reform forward will be most abundantly compensated.
3.38 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF READING: My Lords, I am genuinely glad to have an opportunity of contributing to the congratulatory chorus which has hailed the introduction of this Bill into the House by the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack. I am all the more glad because I have been in the recent past amongst those who have continuously assailed him for the failure of the Government to produce this Bill, the need for which has been so widespread and so long delayed. At the same time, we all realized that if we were anxious to see a Bill of this kind, so indeed was he; and if it has not made its first appearance at an earlier date the fault lies not with him but with circumstances beyond his immediate control. The more literary-minded amongst those who produce antique sundials by mass production
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are apt to inscribe on their costlier products lines which may perhaps indicate what has been in the mind of the noble and learned Viscount:
"If time lets slip a little perfect hour O take it, for it will not come again."
It would appear that advertently or inadvertently the Government have let slip an hour of this kind, and our thanks are due to the noble and learned Viscount for having been so alert to seize upon it.
This is, I venture to think, essentially a Bill to be first introduced into this House, where the great weight of legal knowledge and experience which is available can concentrate upon it and give it due consideration without undue delay. But the purpose of introducing the Bill is not to silence a few importunate critics, but to abolish an injustice which has existed for far too long and which has been not only an anomaly but indeed something of a scandal. The Bill goes a long way, if not indeed the full way, to establishing the position we should all wish to see. If it has been necessary for some time and is now long overdue, it is all the more urgent and important in these days, when the widening sphere of influence of Government Departments impinges on the individual citizen in so many ways and at so many times, and consequently the question of actions against the Crown has become a far more immediate and personal question than it may have been in the past.
I welcome the alternative opening clause which the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor has now suggested. I had intended to indicate to him that perhaps he had not dressed his shop window in the original Bill to the greatest advantage, because he did give the impression, even to those who read it quite carefully, that it might be confined to cases of civil wrongs or torts and not extend to other branches of the law. But by a clause in the form, or something approaching the form, he has now indicated, I think that that danger will be averted, and anybody, be he lawyer or layman, with an inquiring mind will discover at once its all-embracing character and the fact that at one attempt the whole of the existing obstacles have been swept away.
I do not propose to go into the actual clauses of the Bill at this stage although when the time comes for Committee we may wish to investigate them in more

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detail. I would pause only to say this. I realize the necessity of something in the nature of Clause 8, both in the inherent facts of the situation and also from the pressure of the Service Departments to which the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has very frankly referred. I cannot pretend to any great affection for it, but I would like to make one very brief observation in regard to particular aspects of Clauses 8 and 9. I am always slightly disturbed by the intervention in the course of litigation of persons entitled to decide in advance by giving a certficate matters which, in my view, should form part of the questions which ought to be decided at the actual trial as matters of evidence, and not be ruled out by the mere production of a certificate by some superior authority. When the Committee stage comes I will take the opportunity to say something on those lines. For the rest, I will only conclude, as I began, with congratulation to the noble and learned Viscount. It may be that in the course of time this Bill which he has been so largely instrumental in introducing may come to be known as Lord Jowitt's Act and in that way enshrine his name amongst those reformers who have given added prestige and stability to the great fabric of British law.
3.45 p.m.
LORD WRIGHT: My Lords, I intervene at this moment to say a very few words of congratulations, which I feel I must say, to my noble and learned friend, the Lord Chancellor, who has at last succeeded in introducing this Bill into the House. There have been, as we all know, very considerable difficulties before that consummation could be reached; but we have the Bill here now, and I do hope that as the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has been so successful in getting it here he will be equally successful in getting it on the Statute Book with as little delay as possible. Some of us have gone through the provisions of this Bill in detail, and there are only some very minor matters, so far as I know, which will need consideration at a later stage. I should certainly deprecate, with all my power, the interposition of any difficulties which might delay the passing of this measure into law. I wish to associate myself completely with the two noble Lords who have just addressed your Lordships.
3.47 P.m.
LORD SIMONDS: My Lords, I hope the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack is not already weary of praise and congratulation, for in truth I rise only to swell that chorus. But I have a special interest. I was one of those to whom so long ago as 1921 the noble Viscount's predecessor in office entrusted the task of considering the whole question and ultimately presenting a Bill. I do not know whether, after what the noble and learned Viscount has said, I should describe myself as one of a star cast—certainly a star of a minor constellation—or as one of those, I am not sure whether it was fat oxen or lean oxen, which the noble Lord, Lord Schuster, was accustomed to drive. But we laboured in that task and eventually did produce a Bill, and we presented it to the Lord Chancellor. We were proud of that Bill, and I was not only distressed but surprised to hear the words in which the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, spoke of it, because no word of criticism ever reached us then or thereafter.
I suppose that the Government of the day had done nothing more than to pursue a traditional and recognized method of dealing with a difficult and an embarrassing, though urgent, business. They committed it to a Committee or Commission and then forgot all about it. Now, twenty years later, the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, has produced this Bill, and though there may be points to be dealt with in Committee I will do no more to-day than to give it my unqualified approval and welcome. It is obviously not a Bill which makes for popular appeal. There is no clarion call in the title. It brings fuel to no man's grate, but I think that it is a Bill of great constitutional importance. As I look into the future, and see dimly the shape of things to come, it seems to me that there is an ever-widening area in which it is all-important that every man should get justice, not as of grace or favour but as of right. That, in brief, is the purpose and the result of this Bill. So, my Lords, I do venture to congratulate the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor. Those who know him best are most fully aware how heavy is his burden and how grave and manifold are his preoccupations. The more honour to him then, that he has found time to introduce

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this Bill, and I congratulate him most sincerely upon it.
3.52 p.m.
LORD SCHUSTER: My Lords, unless I interpose for a few moments between your Lordships and the Second Reading of this Bill, I fear that historians may take as wrong a view of my history as they appear to have taken of that of the great-grandfather of the noble Lord, Lord Raglan. I am not sure who were the oxen, fat or thin, which I was supposed to drive. Whether they included the slim figure of my noble and learned friend who now sits on the front Opposition Bench, or my noble friend Lord Simonds, I am not certain. But I can say this: they needed no driving. The obstacle to the introduction of a Bill on these lines did not lie in any reluctance of successive Lord Chancellors to put it forward, but in other causes, which, for the sake of harmony, I will not now describe. It is true that I was one of the pack that found this fox and hustled him out of the covert, but by whom and why and how he was headed back is best forgotten—if it is known.
On the Bill itself I wish to say three things. First, I think it was a source of great anxiety to everyone who had the handling of the Bill, or the proposals for the Bill, twenty years ago, lest having been introduced, it should be seriously amended in Committee in either House, because the old Bill represented an extremely difficult and delicate balance between the rights of the subject and the necessities of the Administration. If I might do so, I would venture to urge upon the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor—if he needs any urging—that the clause, for example, which protects the Post Office, subject only to those few words to which the attention of the House has already been called by my noble and learned friend, and the clause with respect to discovery, are the extreme limit which the interests of the Administration can allow. It was largely the fear that analogous provisions to those might be altered in Committee that hampered and made difficult previous steps towards this very much desired legislation.
Of the other two things which I wish to say, the first is that I cannot remember now—it is a long time ago, and I do not know if my noble and learned
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friend Lord Simonds remembers—what we were trying to save when we tried to save the Prerogative of the Crown. I understand even less now, when I see how our clause has been reproduced. It is a Committee point and I do not want to argue it now, if ever; I only want the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, to consider, between now and the Committee stage, whether that particular saving is indeed required and, if so, whether very appropriate words have been found for the purpose. My last observation but one is this: our old Bill was drafted by the most elegant draftsman of his time—if I may use such an expression. He was assisted in his work by his successor in the office of Chief Draftsman to the Crown. He had around him a cluster of people who were, at any rate, well versed in Parliamentary draftsmanship, and in justice to their memories (though many of them are still alive; one happens to be in India, and another in Switzerland) I cannot accept the suggestion that my learned friend (and I do not use that phrase in any conventional sense) Mr. Cooke has produced a measure that, from the point of view of artistry, is any improvement on that which Sir William Harrison and Sir Maurice Dwyer produced twenty years ago.
But I pass from that and, leaving aside all the pastoral epithets, forgetting the analogies about oxen and so on, I desire to say how grateful I am to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, that this bantling, which was so largely my own twenty-six years ago, should now have had life breathed into it by him. I trust that he will continue the process of acting as bellows and that, finally, with its lungs well expanded, it will pass through not only this House but the House below and receive the Royal Assent at this Table.
3.57 P.m.
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: My Lords, I too join in approval of the Bill which is now before your Lordships. I am only afraid that there may be some suspicion in the public mind of the unanimity of lawyers on this subject! It really would have been some comfort to me to have heard some hearty attack on the Bill which I could have disposed of in a few short words, without any hesitation. But there it is. We all agree with the objects of the Bill, and I wish only to say a few

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words with reference to some of the provisions in it and some of the speeches that have been made. May I first indulge in one little piece of history which your Lordships may care to add to your recollections of the Charge of the Light Brigade. The leading case, or practically the leading case, on torts by the Crown or officers of the Crown, which, of course, is the main subject of this Bill, was connected most closely with the House of Lords and with the other place.
In 1834 some officers of the Crown proceeded to destroy the Exchequer tallies which had accumulated into a very great pile, and they employed people to burn them in the stoves that then heated the House of Lords. By the negligence of someone, the House of Lords was burnt down, adjoining buildings were burnt down and the House of Commons was also destroyed. In the course of the con-fagration, furniture belonging to the Speaker of the House of Commons was involved. He lived in a house which was part of the House of Lords and which was, therefore, a portion of the Royal Palace of Westminster. After he had ceased to be Speaker, he brought an action to recover the value of his furniture, alleging negligence by the servants employed by the Crown to burn the tallies. He failed. That is, I think the most distinguished and leading case of modern times On the subject of torts by officers of the Crown. It is to be found reported in the first volume of Phillips Reports.
I have introduced that story to emphasize that, in my belief, the method of dealing with torts from which the Crown was free before this Bill constitutes the most important part of the operation of this Bill. I was exceedingly glad to hear, when the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, began his speech, that he proposes to introduce a new clause of an introductory character which will place it beyond any doubt that contracts as well as torts are dealt with by this Bill. In that respect I want to call the attention of the Lord Chancellor to one thing. Speaking without having had the opportunity of seeing the clause before me, I believe it would be unwise to think that all contracts are included within the area of this Bill. My knowledge of this branch of the law may be a little rusty, but my knowledge is to this effect: that although the great majority of contracts, and all actions for property, could have been brought by
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Petition of Right with a fiat from the Crown, there were certain exceptions of great importance, and, in particular, the great exception that contracts of service made by the Crown with officers of the Army, the Navy and, more recently, the Air Force, and similar contracts with, civil servants of the Crown with the Crown, were not permitted to be brought by Petition of Right.
That, I would respectfully suggest to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, ought to be looked into, because when I read the Bill I came to the conclusion, with that view of the law, that it was intended to observe that exception which had existed in the case of Petitions of Right so far as they were employed to implement contracts made by the Crown. I thought it was not intended to cover such cases as actions for salaries, pay, pensions, and breaches of contract of service, by soldiers, sailors, airmen, and civil servants who were direct servants of the Crown, and that they were to be left outside, to be dealt with according to the discretion of officers of the State. I confess that, having thought that was the view entertained by the promoters of the Bill, I was not prepared to say that they were wrong, and I see strong reasons to preserve that exception as regards soldiers, sailors, and airmen, although I am not so sure that I see any reason for preserving it in the case of civil servants. However that may be, I think your Lordships will all agree with me it ought to be clearly established, one way or the other, how far the Act extends in that respect. That is the most important point that occurs to me at the present time.
Having carefully considered what was said by noble Lords who have spoken before me, I should like to add that, for my part, having criticized it and having at first thought that I could improve it, I have come to the conclusion that Clause 8 is in substance good and is not, so far as I can see, capable of any substantial improvement. I would add, in regard to the doubt my noble friend Lord Schuster has expressed in reference to the precise area which Clause 9 is intended to cover, that I thought it would, cover the matter I have already referred to—namely, contracts of service with soldiers, sailors, and the others. If it does not, I would merely observe in passing that the word "prerogative" has an enormously wide range, and might be held to cover matters which

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are not really intended to be applicable to, or to be covered by, the provisions of Clause 9. Having said that, I wish to add a word of congratulation to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, for bringing this Bill forward. To remove any doubts in the minds of anybody who happens to be here, I will add that for my part I do not propose to embarrass the passage of this Bill by framing Amendments between now and the Committee stage. If anything occurs to me I shall be content to submit it to the consideration of the Lord Chancellor in a more or less private manner, and I will not weary your Lordships with it on the Committee stage.
4.7 p.m.
LORD LLEWELLIN: My Lords, I feel it is rather bold of me to take part in a debate of this sort. Noble Lords who have so far spoken are either at present holding or have in the past held very high judicial office. At least, they are King's Counsel. I merely talk as an ordinary man. But this is a measure that will affect quite a number of ordinary men and, therefore, I think it is just as well that one of them should stand up in the House and welcome it, as I now do. I am extremely glad to hear that the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack intends to insert the clause which he outlined to us in his opening remarks this afternoon. When I read this Bill, I was in considerable doubt as to whether by getting rid of the old Petition of Rights we were securing something in its place so as still to enable the subject to sue the Crown in contract.
There is one point in regard to contractual liabilities to which I would refer and which is, so far as I can see, completely omitted from this measure. I see no reason why the Statute of Limitations should not run against the Crown, and we might well take the opportunity of having the same limit within which the Crown must bring an action if they wish to sue a subject. I am rather methodical with my receipted bills, and at the end of every six years I tear up the bills of the year that is covered by the Statute of Limitations. I have a pile—it is getting a very big one—in which I have receipts that I have kept for more than seven years. They are receipts for Income Tax, because I never know when an action may be brought against me for some Income Tax
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I have previously paid. I think the time has come—and I suggest this to the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor—when there should be some limit, so that the Crown will have to be as active as the subject has to be in bringing actions against the subject.
I look upon this measure as not only in some cases abolishing injustices, but as, in many more cases—I believe the vast majority, since a lot of the injustices were covered because the fiat of the Attorney-General was given and the case was brought—simplifying the procedure. The simpler the procedure in law, the cheaper is the law, and the more expeditious it is. And so I think one of the great advantages which this Bill will confer will be by making the law cheaper than it was under the cumbrous old method of Petition of Right. It will be more expeditious, and that is a very great advantage. Incidentally, I am delighted to see the abolition of some of these old forms. I remember being struck with alarm and despondency when I practised at the Bar in suddenly finding that if I wanted to pursue some action for a client I had to go by way of Latin or English information, things about which I must admit I knew very little. Indeed, I looked to-day at the forms to be abolished, and I quite frankly admit that there were one or two I had never heard of. I am very glad to see all those forms going.
There are one or two matters on which I should like to comment, not by way of making Committee points at this stage of the Bill, but merely to give an intimation of subjects it might well be worth looking at later. Perhaps, however, the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, can give answers to them now. In Clauses 3 (3) and 4—these are the shipping clauses—there is the expression: "This subsection shall be deemed always to have had effect." When one finds a sentence like that in the Bill, and it is affecting all sorts of legal rights, one would like an explanation as to why it is there. I appreciate that going back to the date when this Bill was introduced in February is all right, but when you see with regard to two new sections that they shall be deemed always to have had effect, goodness knows how many years back that may carry one and what the effect may be. There is no doubt some very good reason for putting that in, but it is the kind of reason I should like i to know.

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With regard to two clauses that have been mentioned, I believe that Clause 8 is absolutely essential. I have no hesitation whatever—not that hesitation which the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack had—in saying that I do not think there can be any action by one member of the Services against another. They have just got to take the risk of that common employment in which they are all engaged.
VISCOUNT SIMON: When they are on duty.
LORD LLEWELLIN: When they are on duty, according to the way the clause is drawn. Coming to Clause 7, I have not looked up all the Post Office Acts, but I should like to know whether previously one could bring an action in tort against a servant of the Post Office, because those words at the end of Clause 7 (I), "except at the suit of the Crown," do not seem to me to alter the position very materially. To bring an action in tort (I shall be corrected here if I am wrong) some damages must have flowed from the tort committed, and I do not see what damages the Crown will have suffered. If the postmaster burns the letters of my noble friend sitting beside me on this Bench, I do not see how an action in tort would be grounded. So I doubt whether those words would be very effective. Of course, the Postmaster-General can get rid of the postmaster; no doubt he would, that is the normal way of dealing with the matter. But I doubt whether those words at the end of Clause 7 (I) could or would ever really be used.
Before I pass from Clause 8, I should like to draw attention to one phrase. I agree with the noble Marquess, Lord Reading, that certificates have to be very carefully dealt with, and although I am prepared to agree that "a certificate of a Secretary of State" is all right, I do not like the words "a certificate of the Admiralty." It ought to be (no doubt in practice it would be, but I would like to see it in the Bill) "a certificate signed by two members of the Board of Admiralty." "A certificate of the Admiralty" might be a certificate just from any clerk who could write on Admiralty paper. We ought to see that certificates of this sort are given only by the highest authorities. If I may refer to the words which the noble Viscount, Lord Maugham, mentioned, I must say that I think the words in Clause 9 (I), "in the lawful
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exercise of the prerogative of the Crown or of any right conferred upon the Crown by any Statute," are extremely wide. I should have thought that those words were doing a great deal to get rid of the other benefits that are being brought by this measure.
I do not want to occupy your Lordships' time unnecessarily, but there are one or two points to which I would like shortly to refer. With regard to Clause 17 (2), I see no reason why the consent of the Crown should be necessary. The words are:
"The trial of any civil proceedings by or against the Crown in the High Court shall be held at the Royal Courts of Justice unless the Court, with the consent of the Crown, otherwise direct."
I do not see why it is necessary to hamper the decision of the Court in that case, and why the assent of whoever is appearing for the Crown should also be required. With regard to Clause 18, though it may be quite right for the Crown to ask for the proceedings to be transferred to the High Court, I think we ought to put in some provision that, if that is clone, the parties concerned in a test action will not have to pay additional costs because of the action of the Crown in transferring the case from the County Court to the High Court.
The only two other matters on which I should like to comment are in Clause 31. I should like to see Clause 31 (2) (b) and 31 (2) (e) completely omitted, because I do not see why the Crown, more than anybody else, should have the power to impose interrogatories on the other side without the leave of the Court. In all these procedural matters, I should have thought that the whole point of this Bill was to try and put the two parties on a completely equal footing. We must preserve the right of the Crown to protect secret documents; and we must preserve immunities with regard to people in the services of that sort; but when we come to certain procedural matters in Court, we ought to put the Crown on exactly the same footing as any other party to a case. That is why I should like to see those paragraphs omitted.
Before I sit down, I cannot refrain from commenting on Clause 31 (3), where we get Rules of the High Court—Rules which are not subject to either affirmative or negative resolution of this House—made under this subsection which may revoke

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any enactment. I think that is a bit sweeping. Revoking enactments by Orders in Council that have to be scrutinized by the Houses of Parliament may be one thing, but revoking enactments by Rules of the High Court, which have not to go through that procedure is the kind of thing that one ought not to let slip into the Bill. It is a bad provision in what I would otherwise describe as an extremely good measure. I have outlined those points only so that if he wishes the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack may take the opportunity of talking some of them over, if he does not deal with them this evening. I believe the wish of us all is to get this measure speedily on the Statute Book, and to have it go from this House to another place in so perfect a form that there may be no necessity to amend it in that other place. We all wish this measure success, and we will go forward in our determination to see it on the Statute Book before this session ends.
4.22 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I am very grateful to your Lordships for the reception which you have given to this Bill and for the kind things which you have said about it. The Committee stage of this Bill will, I hope, be taken on Thursday week. If any of your Lordships have any points of difficulty or any points which you would like to discuss, I am sure that the Treasury Solicitor will be only too willing to discuss them. There are just one or two points I would like to mention because I think they may assist some noble Lords. The noble and learned Viscount, Lord Maugham, mentioned a point about servants of the Crown which I will certainly look at. My understanding of the matter is that they serve at the pleasure of the Crown and nothing in this Bill is intended to interfere with that relationship.
I remember very well the noble Viscount, Lord Buckmaster, sitting in this House in a judicial capacity and presiding over a Court, being extremely indignant because, for some reason or other, somebody had managed to get a case before the House in which some servant of the Crown was suing for damages for wrongful dismissal, or something of that kind. The noble Viscount, Lord Buckmaster, was surprised that any
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such action could be brought by any competent counsel and that he could argue that a servant of the Crown could possibly maintain such an action.
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: If the noble and learned Viscount will allow me to say so, I have no doubt that they do serve at pleasure, and therefore it is obvious that they cannot sue for wrongful dismissal. But I was thinking of the other cases of suing for money which they had earned, or pensions to which they were entitled.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I understand that, too. But if you look at the form of the grant of a pension you will find that it is not paid as of right, but as a grace, and no action could be brought there at all. With regard to what the noble Lord, Lord Llewellin, said about limitations, I should like, if I may, to give him this advice. If he looks up the Limitation Act of 1939—I think it is Section 30—I believe he will find that it does bind the Crown. Except in regard to Income Tax, the Crown are bound by limitations. As to the questions he raised with regard to the Post Office clause, he will find that the Crown as bailees have the right to bring an action just as though they were the owners of the letters in question. I have forgotten the name of the case—I think it was Wingfield—where the mails which were in possession of the Postmaster-General were lost by negligence on a ship at sea, and the Postmaster-General, although he was not the owner of the mail but was merely carrying them, was as bailee entitled to recover the full value of the mail.
The noble Lord, Lord Llewellin, asked me about Clause 9, dealing with the prerogatives. The noble Lord will observe that the words are "in the lawful exercise." Directly you can establish that anything which has been done has not been done lawfully, then you are altogether outside the protection of that clause.
LORD LLEWELLIN: "Anything properly done."
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: "Anything properly done in the lawful exercise."
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I think if the noble Lord has regard to the adverb and the adjective, he will find that that clause is not so very far amiss. With regard to the other points, I know the

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answers to them but I do not think I need detain your Lordships at present; suffice it to say that I will look into them. With regard to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Llewellin, about the Admiralty, I am inclined to think that we may need some small Amendment to deal with it. I am grateful to your Lordships for your consideration of this Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

APPELLATE JURISDICTION BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.

BIRTHS AND DEATHS REGISTRATION BILL.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
LORD AMMON: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend the Earl of Listowel I beg to move that this Bill be read a Third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(Lord Amman.)
LORD BROUGHSHANE: My Lords, I am indeed glad to be present this afternoon when this Bill receives a Third Reading. As is well known to your Lordships I have taken a great interest in this matter for a good many years. The Bill just passed will relieve the forebodings and anxieties of quite a considerable number of our fellow citizens. There are approximately 53,000 illegitimate births in this country every year, and therefore at the end of fifteen years, when these children will have attained adolescence, some 800,000 persons born out of wedlock will be in existence. Many of these young people have in the past lived in a state of foreboding of the day when they would have to produce a birth certificate which would disclose the fact of their illegitimacy. I trust that this Bill will relieve those forebodings and anxieties as well as the fears of persons who have adopted children and dread that it should be disclosed that such children are not their own. I agree with the noble and learned Viscount, the Lord Chancellor, that the Government are entitled to praise at the promptitude with which they have dealt with this matter. I personally am very grateful to them.
On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed.

COUNTY COUNCILS ASSOCIATION EXPENSES (AMENDMENT) BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order) and passed.
AGRICULTURAL WAGES (REGULATION) BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), with the Amendment, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

GIFTS FOR GERMANY AND AUSTRIA.
4.30 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD rose to ask His Majesty's Government, what facilities can be given for the sending of gifts of food and clothing in bulk for distribution through approved agencies in the British Zone in Germany and in Austria; and to move for Papers.
The right reverend Prelate said: My Lords, the Motion down in my name covers a limited subject and I propose to keep well within its limits. I will assume that there is general agreement in regard to shortage of food in many cities in the British Zone and in regard to shortage of clothing, at least among the expellees in the British Zone. These facts are now widely known in this country, and there are a great many people who want to do something to relieve the situation. No single individual can send much, but collectively something appreciable can be sent. To my knowledge, our responsible officials over there want these extra supplies of food and clothing to be distributed through welfare organizations where they are most needed and to the people who need them most. I think it is true to say that they recognize that such gifts from various sections of the community over here to different sections of the community over there have, in addition to their material value, a psychological value in that they encourage morale and also sharing among the German and Austrian people themselves. One's plea, therefore, is that this flow should be encouraged and allowed to take place smoothly and quickly, but for some reason or other the flow is not so quick as some of us would wish.
First, a word about the food. It is widely known now that permission is given for individuals over here to send parcels of rationed food up to 7 lb., by post to addresses over there. That permission

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has brought great relief to the minds of many who have relatives and friends over there. But I would point out that there is no ground for supposing that these personal gifts go of necessity to those whose need is greatest; they merely go to those who happen to have someone over here who knows them. As a method of relief, it is chancey and casual, and it is not really what the welfare officials over there most want. Alternatively, of course, one may send a parcel through "Save Europe Now" or some other organization, which can then be sent on to a welfare organization over there, but it has always to be a 7 lb. parcel. One knows that brown paper and string are in very short supply in the British Zone, but they are also in rather short supply in this country. I cannot see the sense in requiring, if you have several thousand pounds of stuff to send and when obviously it is much easier to pack it in, say, 70 lb. parcels, that you have to send it in 7 lb. parcels, which all go to the same organization.
One asks: Why so fantastic a regulation? So far as my researches enable me to find out, it is because some people m positions to exercise authority think that if a group collection is made in any locality, individuals who are not really in a position to give anything may be persuaded by a mass emotion to give more than they need. Mr. A., who dines or lunches regularly in an hotel during the week, may, out of his superfluity, give 10 lb., and his action may persuade Mrs. B., who feeds at home, to give 10 lb. out out her scarcity. I cannot believe that life works like that. My observation of the local collection is that there is no competition whatsoever in sacrifice, and that in fact it enables many people who can only give a very little indeed, not 7 lb., to give it for the relief of their consciences and for the good of their neighbours overseas. I hope, therefore, that such regulations may be withdrawn, and certainly in the Churches we should like to feel that we could collectively send these gifts to similar groups over there, believing that such action is worthy. There is also evidence that where it has happened, it has had the results on. would wish to see. I can pass on evidence of that to the noble Lord who is to reply.
Just a word about clothing. Here, too, one would like permission to send direct to the welfare organizations over there. The point which I would like to make about clothing is that it does seem rather an unnecessary strain on transport that gifts from all parts of the country should all have to be sent up to London to be transported from the Thames. Why could not other centres be used in other parts of the country, so that the very long delays which are at present bound to exist might be obviated? I have no doubt that the Government wish this voluntary action to be carried on in this country, and that they do realize that our officials over there are greatly frustrated by the position in which they are placed, and that the sufferings over there are indeed great. A great deal does depend on this work going forward smoothly and quickly.
May I make one practical suggestion? During these months of the winter emergency would it not be possible to use R.A.F. transport for this purpose? I speak without any real knowledge, but I am told that training flights might possibly be used to carry some of these goods across to the other side without deflecting them from their essential purpose. In one or two cases this has been done, but I would ask whether the R.A.F. might not be used, for the next month or two while winter is still with us, to facilitate the quick despatch of relief where it is most needed. As the admirable secretary of "Save Europe Now" said to me only last week, it is not only that food and clothing are urgently needed but that they are needed quickly. It is because I am conscious, as many of your Lordships are also conscious, of the need to make that relief quick that I beg to ask this question of His Majesty's Government and to move for Papers.
4.38 p.m.
LORD HENDERSON: My Lords, I am sure that we have all listened to the right reverend Prelate not only with interest but with sympathy and understanding. Human misery and suffering, whatever the cause—and in this case we all know that the primary cause is one for which the aggressive Nazi leaders and their followers must accept responsibility—make a powerful appeal to the common spirit of brotherhood and compassion. The right reverend Prelate said that a good deal was being done and that he

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wanted the flow to be maintained. I think it will be agreed that our capacity to help is limited—limited by circumstances, and not by any lack of the will to give assistance where it is sorely needed.
The first point the right reverend Prelate raised was with regard to freedom to send bulk collections from this country to group interests in Germany or Austria. There is no difficulty, so far as I know, in that sort of dispatch of food and clothing, but I must point out to the right reverend Prelate that there are very important reasons why there should be centralized despatch from this country. In the first place, it makes checking and the arrangements for shipping easier. The second point is that it is better from the standpoint of zonal distribution that it should be done in this way. All bulk contributions are sent to the zonal welfare sub-committee which represent the five major German voluntary relief organizations, and they work to a key-plan which aims at getting the assistance where it is most needed, and ensuring that this sort of assistance is properly distributed.
Another reason is the question of transport difficulties. The demand for shipping space for relief goods has to be considered with large claims for essential goods. It is thought—and I believe there is a good reason for thinking—that where there is a large relief organization which is being steadily filled with contributions and which is responsible for the transmission of those contributions to Germany, if it knows that the flow will continue it can look ahead, and without waiting for the actual receipt of the goods it can make arrangements for shipping space in advance, and thus very considerably reduce the amount of time which is taken between the receipt of goods at the depot and the actual shipment.
The right reverend Prelate asked whether it was possible for goods to be dispatched from ports other than London. I understand that the main shipping port is London, but there are other ports in the country—Hull, Newcastle and Bristol—from which ships ply to Germany. So far as I am aware, none of the organizations has so far made any use, or has applied to use, shipping going from those ports. I do not know of any reason why it should not be done, and I should have thought that if these organizations had found some difficulty in the existing system they might collectively, out of
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their experience, be able to suggest improvements to the responsible authority. I am perfectly certain that the authorities would give proper consideration to any such suggestion. As regards speeding up transport, I have looked into this matter with very close attention, and I can assure the right reverend Prelate that as a result of my consultations I do not believe that decentralized despatch, as distinct from the centralized despatch through approved organizations, would produce any speedier time-table.
The central fact is that applications for shipping space for food and clothing in bulk, as well as essential goods which have to be sent to Germany, are decided at a regular interval by one authority, and there is no advantage in going direct to the shipping agents instead of to the control office who deal with the shipping space requirements of "Save Europe Now." I went into this matter this morning with the official primarily responsible, and I am assured that to increase competition for shipping space would not lead to increased total consignment of goods. The right reverend Prelate also referred to the use of air transport. As regards carriage by plane, the only training flights to the Continent at present undertaken by Transport Command consist of regular freight-carrying services to Bückeburg, Hamburg and Vienna, and there is no space capacity normally available. The right reverend Prelate may be interested to know that the Royal Air Force has recently been able to transport by its regular transport services, thirty tons of clothing for "Save Europe Now," but this arrangement was on a strictly temporary basis. The space capacity arose as a result of the daily newspaper loads for the Services in the British Zone being sent by surface transport, in order that increased traffic over Christmas and the New Year period could be carried without an increase in the number of services. It has been found necessary to arrange for the carriage of newspapers by air to be resumed, and I am afraid that the air-carrying assistance now being granted on a temporary basis will come to an end.
As the House knows, the Royal Air Force is not nearly so well off for transport aircraft and crews as it used to be. It is rendering important services to civil aviation during the initial period, when the Ministry of Civil Aviation's own re-

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sources are not adequate for the responsibilities that have to be discharged. Also, we all know that the Service is experiencing the serious effects of demobilization. The outgoing of skilled men from the Service has been considerable, and the problem of manpower is a difficult one. Training commitments have been undertaken which have necessarily been delayed owing to the application of transport planes to assist civil aviation.
Bomber planes could not be diverted to the task of carrying relief to Germany and Austria without seriously interfering with Bomber Command's training plans. Both these Commands are at present seriously under strength and it is therefore out of the question for them to undertake a regular commitment in regard to the carrying of food and clothing consignments to the Continent. If there is any space available from time to time in these Royal Air Force planes, we feel it could best be utilized by carrying penicillin, insulin and other urgently needed medical supplies. I can only regret, therefore, that I am unable to hold out any hope to the right reverend Prelate of being able to bring into active service for this purpose transport planes of the Royal Air Force.
I come finally to the point that the right reverend Prelate mentioned—namely, the question of group collection. It is perfectly true that, hitherto, by and large, the system has been that arranged under the scheme for the despatch of 7 lb. parcels. It is recognized that while there is no lower limit to the weight which may now be sent as a gift food parcel, the cost of sending a parcel of less than 7 lb. is disproportionately high. Collection is, therefore, no doubt a convenient and easy way of contributing for those who cannot spare more than an odd one or two cans of food. In present circumstances, the collector finds himself with the task of packing gifts into 7 lb. parcels, which must then be posted direct or through "Save Europe Now".
The right reverend Prelate referred to the apparent waste of labour, and of packing and string, but I think he knows that the Ministry are alive to these considerations, for it was stated in another place on February 15 that the Minister was considering whether arrangements could be made which would allow food collected
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in this country for relief abroad to be shipped in bulk. The right reverend Prelate will realize that I am not in a position this afternoon to anticipate what the decision of the Minister may be. Frankly, I do not know, but I feel that the right reverend Prelate should be able to find some measure of encouragement out of the fact that the Minister is now considering these proposals. The least I can do—and this I naturally undertake to do—is to bring to the Minister's attention the observations which have been made by the right reverend Prelate this afternoon, and I am quite sure he will give them the attention and consideration which they deserve.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SHEFFIELD: I thank the noble Lord for his reply and for the trouble he has taken. I feel my Motion has served its purpose if it has emphasized the word "quickly." The winter lingers, suffering remains and people die. One does hope that if there is relief here to be sent it will reach its destination while the winter is with us, and not when the year is getting on towards the autumn. I beg leave to withdraw my Motion for Papers.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

  NATIONALITY OF MARRIED WOMEN.
  NATIONALITY OF MARRIED WOMEN.
  SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932.
  SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932.