Sitting of 11 May 1948

Preamble
The House met at Half past Two o'Clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
  SOUTH SUBURBAN GAS BILL [Lords]
  Read the Third time, and passed, without Amendment.
  SOUTH LANCASHIRE TRANSPORT BILL [Lords]
  Read a Second time, and committed.
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (EXETER) BILL,
  "to confirm a Provisional Order of the Minister of Health relating to the City and County of the City of Exeter," presented by Mr. Bevan; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 86.]
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (GLOUCESTER) BILL,
  "to confirm a Provisional Order of the Minister of Health relating to the City of Gloucester," presented by Mr. Bevan; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 87.]
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (MACCLESFIELD) BILL,
  "to confirm a Provisional Order of the Minister of Health relating to the Borough of Macclesfield," presented by Mr. Bevan; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 88.]
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (NORTHAMPTON) BILL,
  "to confirm a Provisional Order of the Minister of Health relating to the County Borough of Northampton," presented by Mr. Bevan; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 89.]
  MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDER (STOCKTON-ON-TEES) BILL,
  "to confirm a Provisional Order of the Minister of Health relating to the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees," presented by Mr. Bevan; read the First time; and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills, and to be printed. [Bill 90.]
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  SCOTLAND

    Economic Conference
    Mr. Leonardasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is prepared to circulate to Scottish Members a resume of the deliberations of the Scottish Economic Conference and any recommendations made.
    The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Woodburn): As I indicated in the answer which I gave on 29th April to the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Sir W. Darling), I propose to make a statement to the Press after each meeting of the Scottish Economic Conference outlining any matters of public interest discussed. I do not think that I could serve any useful purpose by circulating a further statement to Scottish Members.
    Mr. Leonard: Would it not be, in the opinion of the right hon. Gentleman, desirable to give some of the more intimate details of the deliberations to hon. Members of this House?
    Mr. Woodburn: The point is that the Conference would have its usefulness destroyed if the discussions could not be carried on freely without the danger of being reported to hon. Members in detail.
    Mr. Rankin: In view of the fact that my right hon. Friend proposes to give hon. Members interested an indirect account of what happens, does he not think it would be much better and fairer to all concerned to let them have a direct account?
    Mr. Woodburn: There seems to be some misunderstanding as to the purpose of the Conference. It is an advisory Conference with the Secretary of State and,

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    therefore, only in so far as it leads to results and action, does it become a matter of public interest.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Does the Secretary of State think that this Conference is likely to lead either to results or to action? Is it likely to achieve any useful purpose?
    Mr. Woodburn: Certainly, it has already achieved a useful purpose.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Tell us about it.

    Sewage Disposal
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Mooreasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what steps he proposes taking to save the sewage at present being wasted and devote it to the nourishment of the land.
    Mr. Woodburn: Treated sewage is extensively used for this purpose in inland areas. But where sewage can readily be put into the sea, it would not be economic to treat it for use on the land as the cost would be out of all proportion to the value of the fertiliser.
    Sir T. Moore: Since adequate supplies of natural manure are no longer available, and since artificial fertilisers cost dollars, surely it would be more worth while, in the interests of the production of food and of the land, to adopt this plan even though it costs a little more money now?
    Mr. Woodburn: I sympathise with the hon. and gallant Member's assumption, but the conclusions of those who have gone into the economics of the scheme are that unless it is also being done for the purpose of hygiene, it is not economic to do it for this purpose alone.

    Forestry Workers (Recreation)
    Mr. Gilzeanasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what provision is being made for recreational accommodation for forestry workers in Scotland.
    Mr. Woodburn: In most areas forest workers are drawn mainly from the local community and share their recreational facilities. Where possible buildings have been made available for use as village halls, and in the planning of new villages provision will be made for halls. Recreational accommodation is available in the larger Forestry Commission hostels.
    Mr. Emrys Hughes: Is the Secretary of State for Scotland aware that in some of these forestry camps, as in Dunoon, they are not even able to hold political meetings in these recreational centres because there is some ban on them, and will he look into the matter to see if this freedom can be given to these workers?
    Mr. Woodburn: It is a matter of opinion whether politics is recreation. It might come under the heading "Education" in some cases, but I need particulars of that, and I will look into it.

  MINISTRY OF PENSIONS

    Accidental Injuries (Awards)
    Sir Ian Fraserasked the Minister of Pensions, what steps he is taking to remedy the omission from the present Royal Warrants and Orders in Council of the conditions governing the award of pensions for accidents sustained whilst on leave as detailed in Command Paper No. 6459; and what steps he proposes to take with regard to past cases considered by the Pensions Appeal Tribunal and the Judge of the High Court.
    The Minister of Pensions (Mr. Buchanan): I see no reason for amending the entitlement provisions of the Royal Warrant governing accidents sustained on leave. I am aware that the High Court held in 1947 that certain accidental injuries suffered on leave due to handling service firearms are attributable to war service and the entitlement principles laid down by the learned judge for this class of case have since been followed. I am not aware of any past cases in which the High Court judgment in question has not been followed, but I am of course prepared to look into any such cases if they are brought to my notice.
    Sir I. Fraser: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that a previous Government published a White Paper in which they undertook that walking out cases, short leave cases and men going from billets to barracks would be considered to be on duty? Is he aware that neither that Government nor this Government have implemented those extensions?
    Mr. Buchanan: As the hon. Gentleman knows, I am governed by the Royal Warrant. I have carried out the learned judge's decision which extends the

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    warrant. I do not propose to alter it in any way, but if the hon. Gentleman can bring any information which may call for a further extension, I will gladly look into it.

    Paraplegic Cases (Chairs)
    Sir I. Fraserasked the Minister of Pensions whether his attention has been called to the American all-metal folding indoor chair for paraplegics and other chair cases; and whether he will introduce this or a similar chair for British ex-Service men.
    Mr. Buchanan: Yes, Sir, my Department has been considering the question of improving the design of indoor chairs for paraplegics, and the American all-metal chair has been seen among others. As a result an improved chair is being designed and steps will be taken to bring it into use as soon as possible.
    Sir I. Fraser: Will it be a folding chair, and could some of the men see it before the design is finalised?
    Mr. Buchanan: The doctor at the hospital where this work is carried on has, to a large extent, been the designer of the chair, and he is in daily touch with the men involved. I think the men are well aware of his view on the matter.
    Air-Commodore Harvey: Can the right hon. Gentleman say when the chair will be available?
    Mr. Buchanan: The difficulty it that it is a new and improved design which we will need to get into production. I had a meeting this forenoon with my officials and asked them to proceed as expeditiously as possible.

    War Pensions (Changes)
    Mr. Michael Footasked the Minister of Pensions whether he will make a full and detailed statement on the change and improvements in war pensions introduced by his Department since September, 1945, showing the increases in benefits provided and the alterations in the terms in which pensions may be granted.
    Mr. Buchanan: The list of changes and improvements introduced since September, 1945, is so long that, with the hon. Member's permission, I will circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT. Important improvements which hardly lend themselves
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    to inclusion in a list are the more generous interpretation of the Royal Warrant, and the development in the Ministry of a very real interest in the pensioner's general welfare.
    Mr. Foot: Since it is very difficult to keep pace with the changes and improvements made by my right hon. Friend, will he consider the publication of a bi-weekly bulletin, in order to celebrate the fact that humanity is now embodied in the Ministry of Pensions?
    Mr. Buchanan: No, I know the House of Commons, and I know my politics, and I am not going to get too cocky, lest I have a very heavy fall.
    Mr. Granville Sharp: Will my right hon. Friend arrange to send to each branch of the British Legion a copy of the information which he is circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT?
    Mr. Buchanan: If I know the British Legion, I know they are intelligent students of this matter, and will make good use of the information. Hon. Members on both side of the House will see the information. If there is a general desire to have wider publication, I will consider it.
    The changes and improvements are as follow:
    From September, 1945:
    1.Unemployability Supplement increased from 10s. to 20s. a week inclusive of National Health Insurance benefit.
    2. Allowance for wholly dependent wife increased from 10s. to 16s. a week where pensioner is receiving unemployability supplement or undergoing approved treatment.
    3. Introduction of allowance of, 6s. a week for wholly dependent adult relative of pensioner where he is in receipt of unemployability supplement or undergoing approved treatment.
    From February, 1946:
    4. Increase in disablement pension rates for other ranks (100 per cent. rate for Private increased from 405. to 45s. a week).
    5. Introduction of special rate of Constant Attendance Allowance of 4os a week for cases of very severe disablement.
    6. Introduction of Special Hardship Allowance up to Its. 3d. a week for the partially disabled pensioner of the 1939 World War who, by reason of his pensionable disablement, is unable to resume his pre-service occupation or take up one of equivalent standard.
    7. Introduction of allowance for wear and tear of clothing due to wearing an artificial limb—L3 a year where pensioner wears a single artificial limb and L5 a year where he wears more than one artificial limb or a tilting-table limb.

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    8. Abolition of practice of making a deduction in respect of reduced home expenditure from the treatment allowances of a pensioner undergoing temporary in-patient treatment.
    9. Allowances payable for the wife and children of disablement pensioner if marriage took place not later than no years after the end of war service.
    10. Pension payable to widow of man who dies as a result of war service on or after 3rd September, 1939, irrespective of date of marriage, and allowances payable for children of marriage.
    11. Pension for widow over 40, or with children, or incapable of self-support, increased from 32s. 6d. to 35s. a week.
    12. Maximum rent allowance for widows of other ranks with children, raised from 12s. to 15s. a week.
    13. Maximum pension for dependent widower of other rank raised from 22s. 6d. to 35s. a week.
    14. Maximum weekly rates of parents' pensions raised as follows:

    Normal maximum for one parent from 15s to 20s.

    Exceptional maximum for one parent from 22s. 6d. to 27s. 6d.

    Normal maximum for two parents from 22s. 6d. to 27s. 6d.

    Exceptional maximum for two parents from 10s. to 40s.

    15. Method of calculating need in parents' cases improved in favour of applicant.
    16. Pension for total orphan increased from 13s. 6d. to 20s. a week at age of 15.
    17. Royal Warrant provision made for award of pension in cases of the 1939 World War in which disablement claimed more than seven years after the end of war service is attributable to or aggravated by that service, or death taking place more than seven years after the end of war service was due to or substantially hastened by that service.
    From January, 1947:
    18. Allowances for wife and children of a disablement pensioner payable irrespective of dates of marriage or of birth.
    19. Introduction of allowances for wives of South African War pensioners pensioned at World War rates.
    20. Minimum Constant Attendance allowance raised from 5s. to 10s. a week.
    21. Grants made to the Royal Patriotic Fund Corporation to enable them to increase pensions of pre-South African War widows to World War rates.
    22. Pension payable to invalid total orphan increased from 20s. to 26s. a week at age of 18.
    From March, 1947:
    23. Introduction of Constant Attendance Allowance for pensioners of wars before the 1914 World War.
    From April, 1947:
    24. Constant Attendance Allowance in cases of blindness increased from 10s. to 20s. a week.
    25. Introduction of Constant Attendance Allowance of 10s. a week for pensioners with only guiding vision.
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    26. Increase in certain assessments, as recommended by the Interdepartment Committee on the Assessment of Disablement due to Specified Injuries, applied to pensioners of both World Wars.
    From July, 1947:
    27. Clothing grants for total orphans increased, e.g., initial outfit grant for child of in increased from £10 to £12 and annual grant from £8 to 10£.
    28. Provision for clothing grants, pocket money, holiday and medical expenses extended to orphans in care of relatives.
    From December, 1947:
    29. Allowance payable to pensioner who has to abstain from work for a prolonged period after undergoing in-patient treatment increased from 9s. to 20s. a week inclusive of National Health Insurance benefit, and qualifying period reduced from three months to one month.
    30. Compensation for loss of remunerative time caused by attendance at medical examination payable irrespective of whether or not claim or appeal was successful.
    31. Increased free travelling facilities for pensioners going on leave from hospital, and for relatives visiting pensioners in hospital.
    From February, 1948:
    32. Allowances for legally adopted children and stepchildren payable irrespective of date of adoption or of date of pensioner's marriage to child's mother.
    33. Normal period of award of pension, following a resurvey board, to be two years.
    34. Allowances for wear and tear of clothing due to pensioned disablement increased from and£3 and £5 a year to £5 and £8 a year respectively.
    From March, 1948:
    35. Allowance for invalid child of disablement pensioner or widow of the 1914 World War extended beyond age of 21.
    36. Provision of medical and surgical treatment and of treatment allowances for former War pensioners under the same conditions as for pensioners of both World Wars.
    From April, 1948:
    37. Abolition of practice of making deductions from treatment allowances in respect of sick pay or wages.
    38. Where pensioner supplied with a light pair of shoes on receiving his first artificial limb, provision made for extra shoe for sound foot.
    39. Removal from Education Allowance provision of requirement that the father would have been able to provide the education had he not become a war casualty.
    From May, 1948:
    40. Special Hardship Allowance increased to a maximum of 20s. a week and extended to include the partially disabled pensioner of the 1914 World War or earlier War who, by reason of his pensionable disablement, has, since 1st July, 1945, had to undertake employment of a standard lower than that regularly followed up to that date.
    41. Provision made to ensure that on the death of a parent who was in receipt of pension the case of the surviving parent is considered at once and the appropriate award made.
    From July,1948:
    42. Modified pensions of certain widows of pensioners of the 1914 World War increased to 26s. a week where the widow is over 40 or is incapable of self-support or has children.

  POLISH RESETTLEMENT CORPS (TRAINING COURSES)
  Mr. Beswickasked the Secretary of State for War what training courses are available to officers in the Polish Resettlement Corps for which they are now granted six months' leave with pay.
  The Secretary of State for War (Mr. Shinwell): The only training courses for which officers of the Polish Resettlement Corps may be granted leave with pay are those which the officers themselves have arranged privately, on their own initiative, with civilian educational establishments or private firms. Permission to attend such a course is given to an officer only if the Minister of Labour advises that it is likely to lead to his satisfactory resettlement in civilian life.
  Mr. Beswick: These men have been told that they can now have the special concession of six months leave with pay to undertake certain training courses, yet they are unable to find out what those training courses are. Surely when making this concession the Secretary of State must have had in mind that certain training courses were available? If so, will he state them?
  Mr. Shinwell: This is entirely a matter for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour.
  Mr. Beswick: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Minister of Labour, to whom I first put the Question, said that this is my right hon. Friend's business?
  Mr. Shinwell: It obviously cannot be my business exclusively, because it relates to members of the other Services.
  Mr. Beswick: Does my right hon. Friend authorise me to go to the Ministry of Labour for the information I desire?

  BRITISH ARMY

    Temporary Officers (Income Tax Accounts)
    Lieut.-Commander Gurney Braithwaiteasked the Secretary of State for War whether temporary officers were sup-
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    plied with a statement of their Income Tax accounts upon demobilisation.
    Mr. Shinwell: No such statement was given to officers released before 1st April, 1947. Since then a statement of taxable pay and tax recovered between that date and the date of release is sent to the individual at the end of the tax year. All Army officers, however, received during their service a monthly statement of the pay credited to them during the month and of the Income Tax deducted.

    Range, Ross Links
    Brigadier Thorpasked the Secretary of State for War what is the total cost of repairing the range on Ross Links for use on 15th May.
    Mr. Shinwell: Some £270 has been spent during the past six months on normal maintenance of this range.
    Brigadier Thorpasked the Secretary of State for War how many days the range on Ross Links is to be used between now and 16th June; and what is the strength of each Territorial régiment using the range.
    Mr. Shinwell: The range is to be used on 12 days between now and 16th June. During this period two Territorial units, each with a strength of 75 will be using the range, besides a Regular unit of 60.
    Brigadier Thorpasked the Secretary of State for War what safety precautions are being taken to safeguard the inhabitants of Holy Island when the range on Ross Links is being used; and for how long daily inshore fishermen will be prevented from fishing in the proximity.
    Mr. Shinwell: Holy Island is outside the danger area of the range. The inhabitants will not be affected by firing. Inshore fishermen will be excluded from the danger area from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on the days when firing is in progress.
    Brigadier Thorp: Can the Minister assure me that Holy Island and the harbour are outside the area?
    Mr. Shinwell: That is precisely what I said.

    Troops, Haifa (Duties)
    Mr. Turtonasked the Secretary of State for War what orders were issued to the British troops in Haifa regarding the organisation and protection of refugees;

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    and what casualties were suffered by British troops in carrying out these duties.
    Mr. Shinwell: No detailed orders were issued regarding the organisation and protection of refugees. All possible assistance was, however, given to the civil population by our troops while carrying out their normal duties in the maintenance of law and order. Refugees were moved by local commanders to safe areas and help was given in the evacuation of casualties. Three British officers were wounded in carrying out these duties.
    Mr. Turton: Will the Minister clarify that answer? Were orders issued that weapons could be used to prevent the massacre of refugees, or that they were only to be used when British troops were attacked?
    Mr. Shinwell: I am afraid I could not go into such minute details—
    Hon. Members: Oh.
    Mr. Shinwell: I could not go into such minute details because these are matters which are not conveyed to us unless we ask for detailed information. If the hon. Member wishes for further information, I will try to obtain it for him.
    Mr. Turton: It is a most important matter whether British troops are allowed to use their weapons to prevent murder being committed in Palestine or have to wait until some of them are murdered before they use their weapons?
    Mr. Shinwell: It is obvious that British troops have to protect themselves, and therefore have to use their weapons if they are attacked, or if they anticipate an attack. As I have said in my reply, no detailed orders were issued. That is a matter which is left to the discretion of the commander on the spot.
    Major Guy Lloyd: Is it not a fact that the most solemn assurances were given to the Arab leaders in Haifa that Arab refugees would be protected by British troops from massacre, and those assurances were not in fact kept?
    Mr. Shinwell: The word "massacre" is entirely irrelevant. There was no massacre, and that has been made quite clear in the statements which have been issued.
    Mr. Seymour Cocks: Is it not a fact that the Arabs in Haifa attacked for five days before the Jews retaliated?
    Mr. Turtonasked the Secretary of State for War why, on 22nd April, a British civilian officer of N.A.A.F.I. was stopped by British troops from entering Haifa, and handed over to the Hagannali for interrogation.
    Mr. Shinwell: So far as I am aware, no such incident as suggested in the Question actually occurred.
    Mr. Turton: Will the Minister find out from Palestine what actually occurred and what orders were given to allow a British civilian officer to be handed over by our troops to one side; and will he make it clear that such a practice would be quite wrong, in view of the impartial nature of our commitments in Palestine?
    Mr. Shinwell: I am bound to say that as the Question was uninformed I do not feel disposed to embarrass our people on the spot by asking about a hypothetical case.
    Mr. Turton: On a point of Order. Is it not a fact that an hon. Member is responsible for the facts in his Question, and that if I said that certain things happened on a certain day I hold myself responsible for those facts?
    Mr. Shinwell: All I can say is that we have no information.
    Mr. Turton: Will the Minister send out to Palestine to find out what are the facts?
    Mr. Shinwell: May I suggest to the hon. Member that he might try to ascertain the true facts of the situation?

    Withdrawal, Palestine (Home Leave)
    Mr. Douglas Marshallasked the Secretary of State for War if he will consider giving special operational home leave to all the fighting Forces serving in Palestine on their withdrawal from that area.
    Mr. Shinwell: I regret that I cannot adopt this suggestion.
    Mr. Marshall: Is the Minister aware of the danger, restraint and difficulties which our fighting men have to suffer in Palestine, and will he reconsider it?
    Mr. Shinwell: No one is more conscious than I of the excessive strain to which our men in Palestine have been subjected, and we are in full sympathy with them in that position. It does not follow, because a soldier is engaged on active service that

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    immediately following upon it he should be granted operational leave. Apart from that there are physical difficulties, such as shipping obstacles, which stand in the way.
    Major Legge-Bourke: Are we to understand from the reply of the Minister that when our troops arc withdrawn they will not be returning to the United Kingdom?
    Mr. Shinwell: When troops are evacuated from Palestine they will proceed to areas which have been decided upon.
    Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: Was it not in accordance with an invariable practice during the war to give troops withdrawn from overseas stations the opportunity of having some leave at home, particularly after dangerous duties of the kind undergone by these men?
    Mr. Shinwell: All possible leave facilities will be provided for evacuated troops in the area, but it is impossible, because of physical difficulties which must be obvious to everybody, to provide operational leave in the United Kingdom.

    Vehicles (Census)
    Mr. Errollasked the Secretary of State for War whether the central census of A and B vehicles is still maintained at Chilwell; and how overseas units report changes in their vehicle strength.
    Mr. Shinwell: The central census of A and B vehicles is still maintained at Chilwell. It records distribution of vehicles by units in the United Kingdom, and by theatres outside the United Kingdom. Overseas units report changes in their vehicle strength to their theatre census, and the theatre census renders a quarterly return of changes in overall theatre strength to Chilwell.
    Mr. Erroll: As these units make their vehicle changes to the theatre census, why is the Minister still unable to reveal the vehicle losses of units in Palestine which must be known to the theatre census concerned?
    Mr. Shinwell: The reason, which I should have thought is obvious, is that that would entail inquiries into every incident, and that, of course, is a very big job.
    Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that during the British battles in the last war, and the previous war, those figures were known from every unit of the fighting Forces, and why is it not possible to do it in Palestine, in spite of the difficult situation?
    Mr. Shinwell: Subsequently all the facts are ascertained, but it is not easy to ascertain facts in the middle of operations.
    Colonel Gomme-Duncan: It used to be.

    Arab Legion, Palestine
    Mr. Jannerasked the Secretary of State for War what units of the Arab Legion are still stationed in Palestine; and if he will give an assurance that no troops of the Arab Legion will be stationed at places where invasion from Arab states has been threatened.
    Mr. Shinwell: Any units of the Arab Legion still in Palestine are under the command of the General Officer Commanding, and their stationing is entirely a matter for his discretion. All such units are to leave Palestine before the termination of the Mandate.
    Mr. Jannerasked the Secretary of State for War whether the attack made on Kfar Etzion by the units of the Arab Legion on 5th May was ordered by the military authorities; or what steps were taken against the units involved.
    Mr. Shinwell: My information is that no attack was made on this place on 5th May. It was attacked during the night of 3rd-4th May, but not by units of the Arab Legion.
    Mr. Janner: Is the Minister aware of the reports circulating that the Arab Legion attacked and had very large and extensive armaments at their disposal?
    Mr. Shinwell: I think it is possible there may be some confusion. Maybe the Arab Legion is being accused of having started an attack when, in fact, the attack was made by other people.

    Wife and Child Maintenance (Deductions)
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for War what arrangements exist by which military authorities can deduct from any accumulated gratuities or other moneys, payments owing to the wife and

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    children or the illegitimate children of soldiers.
    Mr. Shinwell: If "other moneys" excludes pay to which the soldier is currently entitled, the answer is none. The extent to which deductions may be made from a soldier's current pay towards the maintenance of his wife, children or illegitimate children is laid down in the Army Act, Section 145. This gives no authority to make any deduction from accumulated gratuities or other monies, excluding current pay, due to the credit of the soldier.
    Mr. Sorensen: I would ask the Minister whether he does not agree that this imposes a very unnecessary burden upon the wife or children involved and, seeing that the soldier has a moral and financial obligation to them, would it not be as well to consider them, so they may have first claim on any monies due to him?
    Mr. Shinwell: We have no power to intervene where a soldier ceases to make a contribution towards the maintenance of an illegitimate child. On the other hand, if a soldier refuses to make a contriblition towards the maintenance of his wife, we use our persuasion in order to induce him to make a voluntary contribution.
    Mr. Sorensen: Will the Minister also apply the same inducement in regard to the man's illegitimate children?
    Mr. Shinwell: So far as I know, that is being done. It is within the discretion of the Commanding Officer, and, where the Commanding Officer cares to exercise his powers of intervention, he usually succeeds.

    Married Quarters
    Mr. Sorensenasked the Secretary of State for War the total number of dwellings in the United Kingdom provided for married soldiers and their families; how many of these are modernised or conform to desirable standards; and what plans are to be implemented to meet this need.
    Mr. Shinwell: There are approximately 1,500 quarters available for married officers and 14,150 for married soldiers in the United Kingdom. Roughly one-third of the officers' and two-thirds of the soldiers' quarters are up to 1938 standards. As I stated in my Memorandum on the Army Estimates 1948–49, the provision
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    made for building at home is mainly directed towards the construction of permanent and temporary married quarters and the reinstatement and improvement of existing married quarters.
    Mr. Sorensen: Is the Minister satisfied that sufficient progress is being made in the direction he desires?
    Mr. Shinwell: Certainly not. There is a great deal of progress yet to be made, but we are addressing ourselves very vigorously to that end.

  PRISONERS OF WAR (CREDIT BALANCES)
  Sir Ralph Glynasked the Secretary of State for War if his attention has been drawn to the regulations relating to credit balances of prisoners of war released to civilian status for agricultural employment, and circulated to farmers who employ such Germans from Prince Maurice Barracks, Devizes, Wiltshire, under which these balances are not to be paid to these men, but deposited with the Director, Public Expenditure Branch, C.C.G., at the Reichsbank, Hamburg; and if he will state the reason for this, in view of the fact that these men are not returning to Germany.
  Mr. Shinwell: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Mr. Skeffington-Lodge) on 16th December, and also to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Stokes) on 8th March, of which I am sending him copies.

  TERRITORIAL ARMY

    Director
    Mr. Keelingasked the Secretary of State for War when the new Director of the Territorial Army will start work.
    Mr. Shinwell: The Director, Territorial Army and Cadets, is expected to return to this country by 24th May, after which he will take over his new duties.
    Mr. A. R. W. Lowe: Will the right hon. Gentleman reconsider the desirability of having the Director of the Territorial Army as a permanent or temporary member of the Army Council?
    Mr. Speaker: The Question was when he should start work, not whether he should be a member of the Army Council.
    Brigadier Thorp: Does the Minister's reply mean that the Director would start work on 25th May?
    Mr. Shinwell: What I said was that he was returning to this country by 24th May, after which he will be taking over his duties.
    Brigadier Thorp: The Minister does not know?

    Camp Facilities (Local Authorities)
    Mr. Keelingasked the Secretary of State for War to name the local authorities who have opposed the holding of Territorial Army Camps, or have declined to grant extra leave for them, or to pay for such extra leave.
    Mr. Shinwell: Only two local authorities have so far refused to grant any facilities for their employees to attend Territorial Army camps. These are Congleton Rural District Council, Cheshire, and Farnham Urban District Council, Surrey. In most cases reported to date, the facilities include extra leave with pay.
    Mr. Keeling: Would the right hon. Gentleman, first of all, answer the last part of the Question, that is, to name authorities who do not give pay for extra leave? Secondly, is he proposing to take any action against unpatriotic and recalcitrant local authorities? —
    Mr. Shinwell: I think that I gave the hon. Member a full answer. So far as I am aware I have given him the facts. As regards taking action against what he calls the recalcitrant local authorities—
    Mr. Keeling: I said unpatriotic as well.
    Mr. Shinwell: —recalcitrant and unpatriotic authorities, I have no power to do so.
    Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: If the right hon. Gentleman is now in a position to speak more freely than hitherto, could he indicate the political complexion of these authorities?
    Mr. Shinwell: I am not called upon to indicate the political complexion of local authorities who decline to agree to a request made by the War Office.
    General Sir George Jeffreys: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider making it compulsory for all authorities to grant this leave, and also consider making the cost chargeable to the taxpayer?
    Mr. Shinwell: I am bound to say that, on the whole, the local authorities are doing very well. If only two local authorities have been troublesome I think that indicates the very high and widespread measure of their patriotism.

    County Cadet Forces (Camps)
    Sir R. Glynasked the Secretary of State for War what arrangements have been made to give assistance to county cadet forces to arrange for camps; and if full facilities as regards catering, tentage, and other amenities will be made available to county territorial associations by Commands for these purposes.
    Mr. Shinwell: Arrangements are being made to give the fullest possible assistance to county cadet forces by the Regular Army for the organisation of, and training in, camps this summer.
    Sir R. Glyn: Will the right hon. Gentleman circulate that information to the Territorial associations at an early date, because arrangements are already being made?
    Mr. Shinwell: I shall be very much surprised if we are not already in touch with the Territorial associations about our arrangements.
    Air-Commodore Harvey: On a point of Order. Mention was made just now of Congleton Rural District Council, and hon. Members on the opposite side of the House inferred that it is in my constituency. May I make it clear that most of it is outside my constituency?

    Annual Bounty
    Mr. Heathcoat Amoryasked the Secretary of State for War if, in order to encourage territorial recruitment and in view of the heavy burden which would fall on employers in making up normal earnings of men during their annual training, he will consider the advisability of increasing the bounty to those who attend annual training, particularly in the case of married men.
    Mr. Shinwell: The territorial volunteer can qualify for a maximum annual bounty of £8 and no part of this can be earned

    1949
    if the man does not attend annual camp, unless, in exceptional circumstances, he is excused. While at the camp he receives full Army pay and, if he is married, marriage allowance of 35s. a week, or more according to rank. There is, I think, no case for further differentiation in favour of the married man. It will not be possible to increase the amount of the bounty.
    Mr. Amory: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider that the suggestion of a substantial increase in the bounty of Rio or L12 a year for a man who fulfils all the training commitments would in the long run prove a useful and economic way of promoting interest in, and increasing the efficiency of, the Territorial Army?
    Mr. Shinwell: I cannot convince myself that Territorial recruitment and interest in the Territorial Army is exclusively based on monetary considerations.

    Petrol Allowance
    Brigadier Headasked the Secretary of State for War whether he proposes to allow extra petrol additional to the present basic allowance for use by members of the Territorial Army for carrying out their duties.
    Mr. Shinwell: I would ask the hon. and gallant Member to await the statement to be made by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Fuel and Power later this afternoon.

  RE-HOUSING SURVEY
  Sir R. Glynasked the Minister of Town and Country Planning whether, in association with the Minister of Health, he will arrange for a re-housing survey to be undertaken, county by county, and for a panel of architects to be available to advise County District Councils as to the siting of new houses in villages and the utilisation of existing buildings, even when placed in Category 5 of the Housing Acts, either for village halls or dwellings.
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Town and Country Planning (Mr. King): The matters to which the hon. Member refers are mainly for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health. As to advice on the siting of new houses and the use of buildings for other purposes than dwellings, my right hon.
  1950
  Friend thinks that the arrangements suggested by the hon. Member are unnecessarily elaborate.
  Sir R. Glyn: Is the Minister aware that these houses are not looked at by a qualified architect, but by a surveyor who is not qualified to judge?
  Mr. King: The actual houses are a matter for the Ministry of Health. At the Ministry of Town and Country Planning we would be concerned only with the sites.

  NATIONAL INSURANCE

    Lapsed Contributions
    General Sir George Jeffreysasked the Minister of National Insurance whether a person who has been a voluntary contributor under the National Health Insurance Scheme but has allowed his contributions to lapse, will, on being compulsorily brought in to the new National Insurance Scheme, suffer any disadvantages as regards his rights to benefits or pensions when compared with other compulsory contributors under the new scheme.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of National Insurance (Mr. Steele): A voluntary contributor under the National Health Insurance Act who has allowed his insurance to lapse through failure to pay contributions will be brought into the new scheme of insurance on 5th July next on the same terms and conditions as other persons not insured under the old scheme immediately before that date.
    Sir G. Jeffreys: Is the Minister aware that there is an impression abroad that such a contributor, who has allowed his contributions to lapse, will indeed be brought into the National Scheme in July but, because he took up National Insurance of his own free will, and dropped it of his own free will, the Ministry will take his money from him and he will not get a pension? Is that correct?
    Mr. Steele: So far as the voluntary contributors are concerned, it is true that when they cease payment of contributions it does not necessarily follow that insurance rights cease at that time; they may go on for two years. Anyone who has any deficiency in the current contribution record will have an opportunity to make

    1951
    good that deficiency, but any voluntary contributor who has allowed his insurance to lapse entirely will come into this new scheme on the same basis as a new entry.

    Industrial Diseases, Stoke-on-Trent
    Dr. Barnett Strossasked the Minister of National Insurance how many men and women in Stoke-on-Trent were certified in 1947 to be suffering from silicosis or
    pneumoconiosis or silico-tuberculosis and how many of these were engaged in the pottery industry; and how many in coal-mining.
    Mr. Steele: Seventy-three persons employed in Stoke-on-Trent were certified by the Silicosis Medical Board in 1947 to be suffering from silicosis or pneumoconiosis, or from one of these diseases associated with tuberculosis; of these 33 were engaged in the pottery industry and 4o in coal-mining.
    Dr. Stross: Is the Minister aware that in Stoke-on-Trent an experiment is now being conducted for the alleviation and cure of this condition, at least of silicosis, by means of the inhalation of aluminium, and has he any views, or has his Department any views which he could give to the House as to the efficacy of that treatment?
    Mr. Steele: That, of course, is another question.

    "Family Guide" (Distribution)
    Mr. Jannerasked the Minister of National Insurance whether he intends to issue an explanatory leaflet to all householders on the National Insurance Act, 1946, on the same lines as the leaflet he has issued on National Health.
    Mr. Steele: Yes, Sir. A "Family Guide to the National Insurance Scheme" will be distributed to all householders in Great Britain between 24th May and 12th June. A Welsh "Guide" will also be available on request at post offices, local National Insurance offices and Employment Exchanges in Wales as from 24th May. I am arranging for copies of the "Guide" to be made available to Members in the Library of the House on 24th May, the first day of the general distribution.
    Mr. Janner: Will my hon. Friend see that they are circulated as speedily as possible, in view of the imminence of the recommendations coming into force?
    Mr. Steele: The dates we have selected for circulation are "as speedily as possible."
    Mr. Osbert Peake: In view of the large number of questions which hon. Members are receiving from constituents about this matter, would the hon. Gentleman arrange to make supplies of this leaflet available to hon. Members?
    Mr. Steele: The "Family Guide" will be made available to hon. Members just as quickly as we can make it, but, on the other hand, we have all sorts of leaflets dealing with the special points connected with the scheme, directed to special problems, and these are already being made available in the Library for hon. Members, whenever they are printed.
    Mr. MacLeod: Will the Minister see that copies are printed in Gaelic for the people of Northern Scotland?

    Eire (Reciprocity)
    Sir I. Fraserasked the Minister of National Insurance what arrangements have been made with the Government of Eire for reciprocity in matters relating to the payment of unemployment or sickness benefits or payments in respect of the confinement of women, widowhood, orphanhood, retirement, old age or death, where the insured person is obliged for health or other reasons to leave this country and reside permanently in Eire, or to leave Eire and reside permanently in this country.
    Mr. Steele: Discussions on this subject are now proceeding with the Eire Government.
    Sir I. Fraser: Will the hon. Gentleman try to bring this to a conclusion? Is he aware that if he does not he will leave the position so that people who served in the Armed Forces, and may have lived in the country perhaps for 40 years and have paid insurance, will get nothing for their payments at the end?
    Mr. Steele: That is a different matter from the question of reciprocity.

  NATIONAL SERVICE (CALL-UP)
  Mr. Beswickasked the Minister of Labour if he will give the average time between dates of registration and medical

  1953
  examination of National Service entrants, and the date at which they are finally called-up; and what steps he is taking to reduce this waiting time to a minimum.
  The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. Ness Edwards): The interval between the dates of registration and medical examination necessarily varies so widely that an average period has no significance. In a straightforward case, however, call-up normally follows about six weeks after medical examination. For the reasons explained in my letter to my hon. Friend, I am afraid that it is not practicable to reduce this period.
  Mr. Beswick: While I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his letter, which has been received, giving 3½ pages of difficulty which I appreciate, may I ask him whether he does not also appreciate that in some cases there is a delay of up to three months and more, which means an effective dislocation of the boy's life for something over 15 months, and will he see what he can do in conjunction with his right hon. Friend?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: Those difficulties normally arise in cases of boys leaving college or university. In their case, they can be called up almost immediately by individual application to the Ministry of Labour and no delay, therefore, occurs in their cases. In other cases, delay does not matter so much as they can just as well continue with their work.
  Mr. Chetwynd: Is it not a fact that these people who apply for their call-up to be expedited so that they can go to a university in October, 1949, must be accepted by the university first?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: I was referring to those who had already done their university training under the scheme. By special arrangement they can be called up immediately.
  Mr. Beswick: Will the Minister ensure that these people are aware of the fact that they can ask for speedy call-up by making such an application?
  Mr. Ness Edwards: I hope this Question and answer will give the necessary publicity.

  EMPLOYMENT

    Resettlement Grants Scheme
    Lieut.-Commander Clark Hutchisonasked the Minister of Labour whether
    1954
    he will extend the scope of the Resettlement Grants Scheme to cover men who were disabled as a result of service in the 1914–18 war.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: No, Sir. The Resettlements Grants Scheme for small business owners is a temporary Scheme for resettling in civil life, on their release from the Forces, men whose careers were interrupted by the recent war. Men who were similarly affected by the 1914–18 war were on release from service given the same resettlement opportunities under a corresponding scheme.

    Unemployed Workers, Hanley
    Dr. B. Strossasked the Minister of Labour how many men and women have been unemployed for six months or longer in the Division of Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent; and, of these how many are certified to be suffering from incapacity due to accident, chronic illness or industrial disease.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: At 15th March, the last date for which figures are available, there were 156 men and no women on the register of Hanley Employment Exchange who had been unemployed for more than six months. At 8th December, the latest date for which an analysis is available, there were 174 registered disabled persons amongst a total of 198 men who had at that date been unemployed for six months or more.
    Dr. Stross: Would my right hon. Friend state whether any other facilities are available, or will be available in the near future, in order that those who are so incapacitated and unfit for work will be able to offer their services to the community?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: I think that that question would be more properly put to my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade, who is in charge of new factories.

    Glasgow
    Mr. J. L. Williamsasked the Minister of Labour the number of men, women and juveniles registered as unemployed at employment exchanges in Glasgow on the latest available date, giving the numbers unemployed in each group for two weeks, eight weeks and six months respectively.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: At 12th April the total was 20,039 including 14,935 men, 4,776 women and 328 juveniles. The latest detailed analysis by duration of un-

    UNEMPLOYED IN GLASGOW ON 15TH MARCH, 1948.

    Duration of Unemployment.

    Men 18–64.

    Women 18–59.

    Juveniles 14–17.

    Total

    Unemployed for not more than 2 weeks

    …

    2,697

    1,047

    229

    3,973

    Unemployed for 2–8 weeks

    …

    3,319

    1,213

    130

    4,662

    Unemployed for 8–26 weeks

    …

    3,577

    1,169

    24

    4,770

    Unemployed for more than 26 weeks

    …

    4,975

    1,298

    1

    6,274

    Totals

    …

    14,568

    4,727

    384

    19,679

    In addition there were 202 temporarily stopped from work at that date.

    Waleswood Colliery (Strike)
    Mr. Osborneasked the Minister of Labour if he is aware of the second stay-in strike at Waleswood Colliery against the National Coal Board's decision to close the pit because of redundancy and high-production costs; of the appeal that has been made to the Yorkshire coalfield for sympathetic support and, since a further 20 pits, mostly in the Yorkshire area are scheduled for closing, a stoppage in the entire Yorkshire coalfield is threatened; and what steps he proposes to take to prevent such a stoppage.
    Mr. Ness Edwards: Yes, Sir, but I cannot accept the inference drawn in the second part of the Question. The third part of the Question does not, therefore, arise.
    Mr. Osborne: Is the Minister aware that that answer is totally unsatisfactory? Does he not know that yesterday 2,000 men came out on sympathetic strike at Brookhouse Colliery, 1,000 came out today at Kiveton, and about another 1,000 are coming out at Thorneliffe? Are the Government going to wait until the whole of the Yorkshire coalfield is unemployed before they do anything about it? Is that Socialist planning?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: This Government —and I hope this House—will support the decision arrived at through the ordinary consultative machinery. The decision to close this colliery was taken by the National Coal Board in conjunction with the Yorkshire area of the National Union of Mineworkers. This House ought not to do anything to encourage the mine workers to resist decisions that have been
    employment is for 15th March,and I Will, if I may, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Following is the Analysis:
    taken. We have been informed that collieries are engaged on sympathetic strikes. It is true that that happened last week and it is also happening this week, but the men come out for only a day or so and then go back again. I think we had better rely on the good sense of those responsible for the industry.
    Mr. Geoffrey Cooper: Would my right hon. Friend give more encouragement to the National Coal Board and the divisional coal boards to consult with the men at the earliest possible moment when these decisions are under consideration, so that the men do not feel that a decision is imposed upon them without any opportunity of their being able to put forward their case adequately?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: I am much obliged to my hon. Friend for that supplementary question, because it gives me the opportunity of saying that adequate consultations have taken place and are taking place in connection with the concentration or closing down of some of these collieries. The consultation starts with the miners' lodge, goes on to the district organisation, and then to the national level. At every stage the men involved are informed of every step that is taken.
    Mr. Osborne: Does the right hon. Gentleman's answer mean that the Government are quite satisfied that there will be no widespread sympathetic strikes in Yorkshire, and that, if they take place, the Government will take responsibility for them?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: It is very difficult and dangerous for a politician to become a prophet. All I was saying was that

    1957
    we should use the agreed machinery for that industry to see to it that these decisions are properly carried out.
    Mr. Gallacher: Is there not something more than economy at stake here? Surely, local human feeling has to be taken into account? Must there not be something very deep and serious in the minds of these men, that they stayed down below in a pit for day after day? How many Members of this House would be prepared to go through such an ordeal unless they felt something seriously was wrong?
    Mr. Ness Edwards: I am astonished at that suggestion. I am satisfied that the representatives of the miners are as deeply concerned about the human factor as any Member of this House.

  COMMONWEALTH (ECONOMIC CONFERENCE)
  Colonel J. R. H. Hutchisonasked the Prime Minister whether he is now prepared to call an Economic and Trade Conference with each of the Dominions.
  The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): The hon. and gallant Member will be aware from answers which I gave in the House on 22nd and 28th April, of the practical difficulties at the present time of assembling a Conference of all Commonwealth Governments on the highest level. We are, of course, in close and continuous contact with other Commonwealth Governments on economic and trade matters through all the normal channels.
  Colonel Hutchison: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this limited promise will give very considerable satisfaction? When this conference is called, will he see that the subject matter includes a plan for co-ordinated production throughout the Commonwealth without which the Marshall Plan will have only partial value?
  The Prime Minister: I should like to see that Question on the Paper.

  NATIONAL FINANCE

    Foreign Currency (Motor Race, Italy)
    Wing-Commander Hulbertasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much foreign currency was allowed to British competitors in the recent thousand mile motor race in Italy.
    The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Stafford Cripps): I am unable to trace any application for allowances of foreign currency to British competitors in the recent thousand mile motor race in Italy, and consequently no special allotments of foreign currency were authorised.
    Wing-Commander Hulbert: Does not the right hon. and learned Gentleman think that it would have been desirable to have allowed these competitors to have received some assistance? Is he aware that this motor race has added great prestige to the motor car industry here, and that that was entirely due to private enterprise?
    Sir S. Cripps: I am sure that if they had asked for it they would have had consideration.

    National Land Fund
    Mr. H. D. Hughesasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) how many properties have been offered to and accepted by the administrators of the National Land Fund; what progress has been made in transferring them to the National Trust, Youth Hostels Association, or other bodies; and what have been the costs incurred by the fund to date;
    (2) what expenditure has been incurred by the National Land Fund to date in acquiring tracts of country for public use, and in assisting the National Trust and other appropriate organisations.
    Sir S. Cripps: Five properties have so far been acquired by the State through the machinery of the National Land Fund. Of these, three have been transferred to the National Trust and one to the Youth Hostels Association. Details are shown in the statutory Statement laid before Parliament on 27th April last. The fifth has been transferred to the Minister of Agriculture for management by the Agricultural Land Commission. The total expenditure on these five cases is about £260,000. A number of other cases are under consideration.

    International Monetary Fund
    Colonel Hutchisonasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer under what clause of the International Monetary Fund's constitution has the right of Great Britain to draw its annual entitlement from the Fund been stopped.
    Sir S. Cripps: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to the reply which

    1959
    my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary gave to the hon. and gallant Member for New Forest and Christchurch (Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre) on 27th April.
    Colonel Hutchison: Does not the constitution of the I.M.F. provide for the participating countries as of right to draw a definite percentage out of the Fund? Has that percentage yet been reached?
    Sir S. Cripps: If he will read the answer referred to the hon. and gallant Gentleman will see that the whole matter is explained.
    Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman say, in reference to the Economic Secretary's reply to me and the Minute of the International Monetary Fund, what representations have been made by our representative? Can he say that that Minute has not been accepted, because of the injustice it does to this country?
    Sir S. Cripps: It was stated that we have not agreed to it.

    Unemployment Fund (Investments)
    Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyreasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what considerations are taken into account when investments of the moneys in the Unemployment Fund are made; and for what reason he is satisfied that it is correct to invest these funds in long dated securities.
    Sir John Mellorasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why the National Debt Commissioners increased the Unemployment Fund's holding of 2½ per cent. Treasury Stock, which has no fixed date for redemption, from £25,000,000 on 31st March, 1947, to £80,000,000 on 31st March, 1948.
    Sir S. Cripps: I would refer the hon. and gallant Member and the hon. Member to the reply which I gave on 17th February last to the right hon. Member for the City of London (Mr. Assheton).
    Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: As the Government have admitted that had it not been for Marshall aid very severe unemployment would have occurred this year, surely it is necessary for them to keep this Fund in a liquid state? Can the Chancellor say why he has thought
    1960
    fit to increase by over 300 per cent. the amount of money in the non-liquid form which cannot be cashed, and the capital value of which is most uncertain?
    Sir S. Cripps: Obviously, it is desirable that a large proportion of the Fund should be kept in a liquid state, as, in fact, it is kept in a liquid state.
    Sir J. Mellor: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman say why no short dated stocks were purchased during the last financial year, and why the stability of the Fund has been subordinated to Government policy?
    Sir S. Cripps: The stability of the Fund has not been subordinated to Government policy. Investments have been made with a view to getting the best return for the people who will benefit by it.
    Mr. Oliver Stanley: Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman describe long-dated securities without any termination date as a liquid investment?
    Sir S. Cripps: No, I said that a great proportion of it was in a liquid state.
    Mr. Stokes: Would not a good reason for investment in these undated stocks be, that this Labour Government would remain in office for a very long and indefinite period?
    Sir J. Mellor: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman say what has been the loss on the holding of "Dalton" undated stocks?
    Sir S. Cripps: There has been no loss because they have not been sold.
    Colonel Crosthwaite-Eyre: Will the right hon. Gentleman answer the specific point of why the Treasury have increased the holding in "Daltons" by 300 per cent.
    Sir S. Cripps: The Treasury have not increased the holding. The increase is by persons responsible for the investment because they thought it was a wise investment to make.
    Sir J. Mellorasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what regulations have been made by his Department concerning investments by the National Debt Commissioners for the purpose of Section 58 (3) of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1935.
    Sir S. Cripps: The operative instrument is the Unemployment Insurance (Investment) Regulations dated 30th November, 1921, made by the Treasury under the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1920, and maintained in operation by Section 114 of the 1935 Act. This instrument was published as S.R. & O. 1921, No. 1855, and reprinted in 1945. I am sending the hon. Member a copy.

    Government Organisation Committee
    Mr. Geoffrey Cooperasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the number of members appointed to the Government Organisation Committee; and if he will consider appointing an equal number of members from outside the Civil Service, including at least two Members of Parliament with the necessary experience, who have knowledge of large-scale organisation after consulting the Council of the British Institute of Management as to suitable names for some of these outside members.
    Sir S. Cripps: The answer to the first part of the Question is eleven. The answer to the second part is "No, Sir." The task of the Committee, subject to Ministers, is to lay down a programme of investigations, supervise its execution and apply its results; these are matters for which the Government must take full responsibility. We recognise, however, that we can get valuable help in this field from persons outside the Civil Service; a number are already helping and others will be invited to do so as occasion arises.
    Mr. Cooper: Can the Chancellor of the Exchequer say why a Committee dealing with such fundamental and far-reaching matters affecting the whole machinery of Government, such as applies in this case, is deliberating in secret and behind closed doors, and can he say whether in fact the reports of the Committee will be made available to the House?
    Sir S. Cripps: No, Sir, the reports will probably not be made available unless there is a special reason for so doing.

    Post-War Credits
    Mr. J. L. Williamsasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will give an estimate of the amount of postwar credits already paid and of the
    1962
    amount still to be paid to those of pension age.
    Sir S. Cripps: Up to 31st March, 1948, £114 million was repaid and it is estimated that during the current year another £20 million will be repaid mainly to persons who reach the qualifying age of 65, men, or 60, women, during the year.
    Mr. Williams: Will my right hon. Friend now consider reducing the age limit for this payment, or extending payment to cases of hardship below the present age limit?
    Sir S. Cripps: No, Sir, not in existing circumstances.

    Purchase Tax
    Captain John Crowderasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury why goods ordered and paid for before 9th April but delivered after that date are subject to Purchase Tax at the rate announced in the present Budget.
    The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Glenvil Hall): Because this is the law.
    Captain Crowder: Would the Financial Secretary, for the benefit of the public, say what the real position is, because he must be perfectly aware that there are goods on which Purchase Tax was increased which are being sold and on which the increased Purchase Tax has not been paid by the retailers. Surely, if the retailers have not paid the tax the public should not have to pay it?
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: That is quite a different matter from the Question on the Order Paper. If the hon. and gallant Gentleman cares to put down his Question I will do my best to answer it.
    Captain Crowder: I wrote to the right hon. Gentleman about a case in which a constituent of mine had ordered furniture and paid for it, but it was not delivered until after the increase in Purchase Tax, which my constituent had to pay. If the retailer has not paid the increased Purchase Tax, why should my constituent have to pay it?
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: The amount chargeable is the amount in force on the date of delivery. That is quite definite and that is the law.

    Control Commission, Germany (Staff Claims)
    Mr. John Lewisasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury which Ministry is responsible for dealing with compensation claims in respect of injuries suffered or diseases contracted by persons employed by the Control Commission for Germany.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: The Treasury, which administers the Injury Warrants framed under the Superannuation Acts. The preliminary investigation of the claims is done by the Foreign Office (German Section).
    Mr. Lewis: Can my right hon. Friend say which Ministry is prepared to accept the responsibility if a claim is ratified? At the moment, there appears to be some confusion.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: If it is a compensation claim it should come to the Treasury. If my hon. Friend will let me have details of any case which he has, I will sort it out and see whether it should come to us or to the Foreign Office.

    Cigarettes (Customs Duty)
    Major Gatesasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury why, in view of the shortage of cigarettes in this country, His Majesty's Customs are confiscating supplies of cigarettes which U.S. visitors bring with them; and what happens to cigarettes so confiscated.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: Cigarettes are not confiscated unless they are smuggled or the owner is unwilling to pay the duty. Perhaps the hon. and gallant Member will write to me and tell me what he has in mind. Goods confiscated by the Customs are disposed of for the benefit of the Exchequer.
    Major Gates: Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to consider any scheme for a ration of non-dutiable cigarettes for such visitors?
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: The Customs do allow a certain number in when travellers arrive, and I think that works very well.

    Tuberculosis Treatment, Switzerland
    Commander Nobleasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury how many
    1964
    people suffering from tuberculosis and recommended treatment in Switzerland have been refused the necessary exchange during the past twelve months.
    Mr. Glenvil Hall: This information is not readily available. I can say, however, that of 1,317 cases considered by the Exchange Control Medical Advisory Committee since its formation in December last, 22 involving tuberculosis of all types were not considered suitable cases for which currency should properly be provided.

  CIVIL SERVICE RESIGNATIONS (PENSION RIGHTS)
  Mr. Cooperasked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury if he will consider a scheme whereby any established members of the Civil Service may resign from their non-productive work to take up productive work in industry and at the same time preserve their pension rights and thus prevent the present system, whereby pension rights are lost, from acting as a deterrent.
  Mr. Glenvil Hall: No, Sir.
  Mr. Cooper: Does not my right hon. Friend realise that some members of the Civil Service who are keen to get into productive industry feel that it is not very consistent when Ministers exhort members of the public to go from less productive work to more productive work, if the same encouragement is not given by Ministers in their Departments for civil servants to make such transfers? Can he give the matter further consideration?
  Mr. Glenvil Hall: It has been considered, and where a civil servant goes temporarily into another occupation of the kind mentioned by my hon. Friend obviously leave is given, and pension rights are not given up. Indefinite leave is quite another matter.
  Mr. Cooper: Is it not a fundamental principle of Socialist policy that pension rights should be transferable, so that people may be encouraged to go into those jobs where they can best serve the community?

  TRADE AND COMMERCE

    Factory Overalls
    Mr. J. Lewisasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that, as a result of permission to export utility cloth, there is a serious shortage of factory overalls, which has resulted in the inability of retailers to meet demands made on them by persons who are entitled to the industrial ten coupons; and if he will make a statement.
    The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Harold Wilson): Permission for the export of utility cloths in the industrial overall range has been given only for exports to particularly desirable markets and the total quantity involved has been too small to have had any appreciable effect upon home supplies.
    Mr. Lewis: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in point of fact it is impossible to get these overalls even with the 10 industrial coupons? There must be some reason for that, and, in the circumstances, would he be good enough to investigate the matter a little more thoroughly?
    Mr. Wilson: I agree that the supplies of industrial overalls are not plentiful, but we have not had any evidence of serious difficulty or hardship in this matter. So far as exports are concerned, the total amount so far released for export has been only one-third of 1 per cent. of a year's production.

    Glass Cloths (Licensed Trade)
    Mr. J. Lewisasked the President of the Board of Trade if he is aware that the licensed trade receives only ten coupons for the purchase of glass towels, to cover a period of two years, which are totally inadequate for the purpose; and in the interests of maintaining the highest standard of hygiene in licensed premises if he will give consideration to increasing the number of coupons.
    Mr. H. Wilson: Public houses are given coupons at the rate of five per annum for every six workers. Ten glass cloths can be bought for five coupons and I am satisfied that the rate is fair.
    Mr. Lewis: Can my right hon. Friend say that he is really satisfied that the rate is fair? Has he ever tried to dry a
    1966
    large number of glasses with a small number of tea cloths?
    Mr. Wilson: Not in public houses.

    New Factories, Carmarthenshire
    Mr. Hopkin Morrisasked the President of the Board of Trade what progress has been made with the erection of factories in the Gwendraeth Valley, Carmarthenshire; and when these factories are likely to be completed.
    Mr. H. Wilson: The Ponthenry Grenfell factory is almost complete and the tenant can now start to move in. The Tumble Grenfell factory and the Kidwelly Advance factory should be ready by about August.

    Capital Projects, Liverpool
    Mrs. Braddockasked the President of the Board of Trade what special steps are being taken to ensure that numerous firms, who have intimated their desire to expand their present factories, or commence new industries, in the Liverpool area, are given special facilities to do so, in order to reduce the abnormally high unemployment rate in the area; and if he is aware that those firms awaiting to extend or erect factories can absorb approximately 15,000 of Liverpool's unemployed.
    Mr. H. Wilson: I share my hon. Friend's concern at the unemployment position on Merseyside. With regard to new building projects, I must refer her to the answer given to her by my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury on Tuesday last. Factories already complete, together with those on which work is proceeding, should, however, when in full production, provide jobs for about 16,000 persons.
    Mrs. Braddock: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there are factories requiring expansion which are still being held up for licences of various sorts, and will he consult with his right hon. Friend with reference to the whole situation of unemployment and factory building on Merseyside?
    Mr. Wilson: I have been through a very complete list of every factory where work has been stopped, and I am satisfied that it has been reasonable in each case.
    Mr. Osborne: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in his own constituency a rayon factory cannot get steel for extension, whereas materials were given for the use of football pool firms in his constituency within the last six months?
    Mr. Wilson: There has not been the steel available, but work on the factory in question, together with that on other factories in the same industry in other parts of the country, is now going on.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): I have a statement to make regarding the Business of the House.
The Opposition Motion relating to a Select Committee to inquire into the signatures to the Nenni telegram announced for consideration on Thursday after 7 o'clock, has been postponed until a later date. As the House is aware, an allotted Supply Day is being taken on Thursday and the whole of the Sitting will now be available for the consideration of the Estimate for the Central Office of Information. Tomorrow, if there is time, we propose to take the Report and Third Reading of the House of Commons Members' Fund Bill.
Mr. Eden: The hon. Member who was primarily concerned in the subject which was to have been discussed on Thursday cannot make himself available on that day. For that reason it seemed to be more reasonable and fair to the House as a whole to choose a day when he could make himself available so that the discussion could take place.
Mr. Morrison: I understand that the alteration was a result of an arrangement between the Opposition and the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. Platts-Mills).
Mr. Bowles: May I ask the Leader of the House when this arrangement was made? The Opposition were negligent in allowing the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House to explain last Thursday that next Thursday would be used for a certain purpose if they had not taken the trouble to find out if the hon. Member would be available.
Mr. Eden: On the contrary, it is the duty of hon. Members to be present in the House. The change was made solely out of consideration for the hon. Member in the exceptional circumstances. The matter should be treated accordingly by the House.
Mr. Gallacher: May I ask the Leader of the House, in view of the general acceptance of the proposal to discuss what are generally known as Communist fellow-travellers, whether we cannot at the same time discuss the Tories and their fellow crawlers in the attitude they have adopted at The Hague?

NEW COMMONS CHAMBER (FOUNDATION STONE)
Mr. Speaker: Before I ask the Clerk to read the Orders of the Day, I have a short announcement to make.
I think hon. Members will like to know that the ceremony of laying the foundation stone of the New Chamber will take place on Wednesday, 26th May, at 12 noon in Star Chamber Court. I am in some difficulty owing to the very limited space available. Therefore, I regret that it will not be possible to find accommodation for the wives or guests of Members. Some hon. Members of the previous Parliament may wish to attend and they will be welcome as far as room permits.

ORDERS OF THE DAY
  SUPPLY
  [12TH ALLOTTED DAY]

  CIVIL ESTIMATES, 1948–49
  Considered in Committee.
  [Major MILNER in the Chair]
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a further sum, not exceeding£40 be granted to His Majesty, towards defraying the charges for the following services connected with Petrol and Petrôleum products for the year ending on the 31st March, 1949, namely:

  £

  Class VI, Vote 6, Ministry of Fuel and Power

  10

  Class VI, Vote 18, Department of Scientific and Industrial Research

  10

  Class X, Vote 1, Ministry of Supply

  10

  Class X, Vote 4, Ministry of Fuel and Power (War Services)

  10

  Total

  £40"

OIL SUPPLIES
3.35 p.m.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: As I said in the Second Reading Debate on the Petrol Bill last week, we thought that as discussion on the Bill was bound to be very narrow it would be for the convenience of hon. Members on all sides if we put down the Vote of the Ministry of Fuel and Power on as early a Supply Day as convenient; to enable us to discuss both the questions of policy connected with petrôleum and petrôleum products and also the administration of the Department. I will cover certain aspects and other points will be illustrated by my hon. Friends.
I will deal first with the record of the Ministry regarding fuel oil and, in particular, the conversion from coal to oil. Their record in this respect is typical. It is a history of panic, followed by order, counter order and disorder. The Committee will remember that in August, 1946, industrialists were asked to convert from coal firing to oil firing. As an inducement a rebate of 1d. per gallon on fuel oil was offered. This rebate was confirmed in the Finance Bill, 1947. The pressure by the Government on industrialists increased during 1946 and 1947 and was accentuated during the panic which arose out of what we always regarded as the unnecessary fuel crisis of 1947. The conversion involved the firms concerned in heavy capital outlay which
1970
was bound to increase costs of production. It also involved considerable quantities of steel and considerable engineering manpower, both of which we have been told on numerous occasions are short and constitute bottlenecks. The Government were warned by practical persons of experience of the difficulties ahead. They were told that there was a shortage of tankage and oil storage in the country and that other similar shortages were bound to cause difficulties and result in delay.
It is quite clear—and it should have been clear at the time—that a policy of this kind was justified only if it was certain that adequate supplies of oil would be available for running those oil firing installations after conversion had taken pace. The pressure to convert continued until the middle of 1947, but difficulties in the supply of oil began to multiply and industries failed entirely to get any adequate guidance from the Government. They could get no assurance that, if they converted, supplies of fuel would be made available. No definite guidance was given to industries, even in the speech of the Minister shortly before Christmas 1947; yet, as the Committee will remember, by that time the basic ration had already been abolished for several weeks on the plea of the shortage of dollars. Apparently what was done by the Government was to order a survey, but we have had no indication, of course, of the instructions given to the Government officials who conducted that survey. What is quite clear is that in more than one case the impression was given to the industrial concern that the difficulties in the supply of oil were likely to prove only temporary.
No clear lead has even yet been given by the Government, and the situation today is that some firms have installed conversion machinery and have no fuel, others have installed conversion machinery and can get fuel, some are still going ahead with conversions and others are now reconverting back to coal with the approval of the Ministry. No one has any idea what the Government's policy is on this matter, and it is quite clear that uncertainty of this nature is bound to do industrial harm and hamper our efforts to increase the export trade. I hope, therefore, that the Government will give us a clear statement in the reply to

1971
be given to this Debate. What we should like to know, and what the country is entitled to know, is what is the estimate of the availability of fuel oil today, next year and the following year.
As illustrating the lack of certainty which prevails, I would only remind the Committee that the original estimate was 2 million tons of fuel oil to 3 million tons of coal, that the figure rose to 2½ million tons when the Government panicked in the winter of 1947, and that since then estimates as high as 5 million tons or even 6 million tons have gained currency. Which of these figures is correct, and is there any prospect of any firm commitment to supply oil? What policy do the Government recommend should be followed in the case of the three classes of firms concerned—that is the firm which has already completed conversion, the firm which is still engaged in conversion and the firm which is planning to convert? We should be glad of some information from the Government on that.
What is the excuse put forward by the Government for the shortage of oil in this country? It is that there has been a great increase in world consumption, and more particularly in consumption in the United States. It is quite true that the increase in consumption in the United States in the two recent years was equivalent to the total consumption in this country. It is equally true today that the total consumption in the United States is at least as great today as the total world consumption before the war. We admit that, but the question we are entitled to ask, and it is the question which the Government have never really attempted to answer, is why was this increase not foreseen. The Parliamentary Secretary, in answer to a Question on 6th April, said that despite the big increase per head in the United States the percentage increase in this country was even greater. That did not happen from one day to another. The Government must have seen that an increased percentage of consumption was taking place in this country, and it was only reasonable to presume therefore that a similar condition would prevail in the United States. What is the use of planning in these circumstances?
We are told that the increased consumption in the United States could not have been foreseen, but if rumour is to
1972
be believed many Ministers today have attached to them personal economists, and if rumour is again to be believed the unfortunate civil servants of many Departments spend a great deal of their time trying to pursuade the economic "boyfriends" of Ministers that their information and views are not as well-founded as they think. Assuming that there is some reason for the existence of these "boy friends," surely it is to foresee the type of increase which has, in fact, taken place in the United States? Two deductions can inevitably be drawn from the history of the last two months. Firstly, that in oil, as in so many other cases, the Government are far more concerned in trying to explain what are their difficulties than in devising solutions to these difficulties. Secondly, that in pre-war days people in private enterprise who made such a gross error in calculating and forecasting, as has obviously been made by this present Government, would have lost their jobs in a very short time.
At the risk of introducing some old controversies, I should now like to say a word or two about the basic petrol ration. We on this side have never believed that the abolition of the basic ration was necessary. We believe that the decision was taken in a panic, and we believe that as a result of what has happened since the Government now realise they made a serious mistake. We regret, that while trying somewhat to relieve that mistake by the institution of a standard ration, they have accompanied it with a scheme which inflicts gross injustices on holders of E and S coupons. The abolition of the basic ration was justified by the Government at the time on the grounds that we were short of dollars.
We all agree that dollar expenditure, in the circumstances in which we find ourselves, has to be reduced as far as possible, but, having said that, it still remains true that within the global figure of dollar expenditure we have to decide how many dollars should be allocated to this that and the other import, and in deciding what is the amount of dollars to be allocated to any particular import we have to balance the advantages and the disadvantages, both to the individual and to the national economy as a whole. We believe that if such factors are taken into account as loss of tourist trade,

1973
damage to the hotel industry, the inflationary effect of the loss of revenue, the expense involved in setting up the machinery for supplementary rationing, the inconvenience to the public and the unfair discrimination which has resulted as between the one user and the other, the balance lies rather towards disadvantage than to advantage.
The Government have made a great deal of play about the black market and the influence of the black market on the consumption of petrol in this country. I believe, in view of such figures as have been published, that that argument is nothing more nor less than a smokescreen. Because taking the figures of the Russell Vick Report, if I interpret them aright, the result is as follows: it was estimated that when the basic ration was in existence about 160,000 tons of petrol a year went into the black market, and it is now estimated that in spite of the abolition of basic petrol there is still a leakage in the order of 100,000 tons.
That would appear to mean that people who had basic petrol were using something of the order of 60,000 tons of petrol from the black market. The total basic ration was 800,000 tons. I suggest that 60,000 in relation to 800,000 tons was not such a figure as to justify the abolition of the basic ration and the inconvenience to which the community has consequently been put. What the Government ought to have done, if they believed that the black market was really serious, was to introduce measures such as we have been discussing during the past week; not now and not last January, but 18 months ago. Then they would have secured, if the figures are correct, a considerable reduction of dollar expenditure.
Our complaint is that the administration of the issue of supplementary coupons is rigid and unimaginative. I do not wish to delay the Committee by quoting a number of incidents, particularly as I have no doubt that hon. Members on every side of the House will be able to give instances which have come to their notice in their constituencies. I should like, however, to cite two cases. The first is that of a war widow with a semi-invalid mother, a father who is ill and not likely to recover, and a small child. In order to try, in the reduced family circumstances, to eke out her widow's pension this lady decided to start again
1974
in the profession of architect in which she had been employed before the war. She began to practice from her own home. She could not afford to buy a car herself. Her mother has a car and a microscopic allowance of petrol. The lady asked for a small allowance in order that she might save time in the journeys she had to take in her professional capacity. She was told that there were adequate public services and that there was no ground for granting her application. Hon. Members will readily realise that she is able to devote only three hours a day on the average to her profession. The rest of her time is naturally fully taken up looking after her mother, father, and child. If she had to rely upon the public services her journeys would take two hours per day out of the three that she can devote to her profession, leaving her one hour a day. In fairness to the Minister I am bound to say that in a large proportion of the cases which I have brought to his personal attention he has been able, after having the cases investigated, to see his way to some extent to meet the request, and that this is a case in point.
I wanted to cite this case and I wanted to be sure of my facts, but the actual letters had been sent to the Ministry. I sent my secretary round to the Ministry yesterday to ask whether I might have the letters back because I wanted to use the case in my speech today. My secretary was told that if she waited a short while she could have them back. She waited, and eventually she received the letters together with a further letter signed by the right hon. Gentleman, granting the lady a small allowance, for which I am most grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. Not having a "police state" mind I am quite sure that this was purely a coincidence, and a happy conjuncture which caused the letter from the right hon. Gentleman to be just ready to be signed by him so that it might be delivered with such promptitude to my secretary. The only reflection which has occurred to me has been that when the Bill which we were discussing yesterday becomes law, and if ever the right hon. Gentleman is accused of having red petrol in his car, that defence may not be the sort that would be accepted by a hardhearted magistrate.
The other case is that of the assistant to a county architect. He has to travel

1975
about the country, as will be readily understood. He has to travel to see about maternity homes, hospitals and similar institutions. One of his disabled colleagues has a small car. The county authorities authorised the architect to apply for a small allowance of petrol to enable him to run his friend's car upon official business. The application was turned down. So important were the duties of this architect regarded by the county authorities that they gave the architect permission to hire a taxi for the use of him and his assistant on their necessary journeys.
I will give the House particulars of what has happened. A typical journey I am told is about 64 miles a day. If the architect had been given petrol the total cost to the county would have been 13s. 5d. per day. The total charges for the taxi for the same day amounted to £2 0s. 11d. The car that the architect would have used is an 8-horsepower and would have used very little petrol. The taxi is 12-horsepower, using much more petrol. We have been told of the need for conserving manpower. If the architect had been given a modest allowance of petrol he would have left the car wherever he was and there would have been no waste of manpower. In fact, the taxi man has had to wait, and has in fact waited for 4¾ hours a day. The net result of this admirable administration by the right hon. Gentleman's Department, is that the county has had to pay at least twice as much, much more petrol has been used, and the taxi man's time has been wasted hanging about all day. That is the sort of administration which the right hon. Gentleman has produced and to which we object.
I will turn now to the new scheme announced by the right hon. Gentleman in April. As we understand the matter, owners of E and S coupons will have no ration in future for their unfettered use, or rather the amount will be deducted from the total of their E and S coupons. The right hon. Gentleman is in a dilemma. He either assumes that the holders of E and S coupons have been breaking the law up to now and have been using their petrol for their own purposes, in which case his action encourages them, ex post facto; or else he assumes that they have not been breaking the law and have used their petrol for proper purposes, in which case
1976
he is inflicting grave injustice upon them by reducing their E and S coupons. No wonder they are angry.
The same thing applies to members of public bodies like rural district and county councils, hospital committees and so on. They all find that because they have been patriotic in the past by licensing their cars and using them on public business with their E and S coupons, they are to be deprived of the amount of petrol for their own unfettered use which their neighbours are to get. The right hon. Gentleman made a plaintive complaint the other day that nobody loved him. Surely the right hon. Gentleman can realise that practically every motorist—a large number of the public are motorists—believes that these regulations, restrictions and rationings are neither necessary nor reasonable and that the administration of them is unduly harsh. It is only reasonable that the right hon. Gentleman is not as popular as he apparently thinks he ought to be.
What about the future? What is to be the position in three or four years time, because that is equally as important as is the position today, and what are the Government doing about the future? Are we to have panic measures such as we have seen in each of the last three years during each of the years of the remainder of the Government's life. In a speech on 8th April the right hon. Gentleman prophesied that there was to be a world shortage of petroleum, which he attributed to three factors. He said firstly, that the United States demand is growing; secondly, that there is and is going to be a shortage of tankers; and thirdly, that there is a shortage of refining capacity. What are the Government doing about each of these three factors? I am bound to say that their record so far on each of them is pretty lamentable.
It is often asked, in this connection, why, when we produce so much oil from sterling sources, we have to go to dollar sources; why do we have to buy American or dollar oil when production from companies under British control is far greater than our annual consumption in this country? The Lord Chancellor gave some figures the other day. He said that petrol production from British controlled companies amounted to 8 million tons a year. He gave the consumption for the United Kingdom as being 3,800,000 tons,

1977
that of the sterling area 5,600,000 tons, and foreign trade consumption as 2,900,000 tons, making a consumption of 12,300,000 tons, as against a production of 8 million tons, and he said that we had to provide the balance from dollar sources.
Those figures are very impressive. We should like to know this afternoon, as I am sure the British public would like to know, whether they are justified. Is the present scale of supplies which we make available to sterling countries and others outside the sterling area justified today? Is it right that so much petrol should go to other countries at our expense, when in England the basic ration has been abolished to the ordinary everyday motorist. Take the the item of 2,900,000 tons for foreign trade. I understand that it is made up as follows: for hard currency countries, 1,600,000, to soft currency countries, such as France, 450,000 tons; and to semi-hard countries—perhaps the Minister or Under-Secretary, in replying, will be able to explain what this rather nice phrase "semi-hard currency countries" means—850,000 tons.
The fact remains that there are very few countries, so far as I can discover, to which petrol is going at our expense, where restrictions are anything like severe as they are here. In Australia the basic ration is from six to 14 gallons a month, in Eire from eight to 12 gallons. In Denmark, one of the countries concerned, I believe that no rationing system exists, nor is there a rationing system in Belgium and Luxembourg. One certainly does not exist in Egypt and Ceylon. It is quite true that it is desirable in our present circumstances to export as much as we possibly can, and to reduce the dollar expenditure to the maximum possible extent. But we in this Committee are entitled to question the desirability of continuing, at a time when British motorists are so drastically restricted, to provide suplies of petrol to countries who pay for them very largely merely by running down their sterling balances. I query very much indeed whether the Government have adequately investigated this problem, and have done all that they can to see that if we are to provide petrol at our expense, the consumers in the country to which the petrol is provided should be subjected to something like the same restrictions as those to which we are subject in this country.
1978
I turn to the Middle East. Can we have any estimate from the Government—I presume that they have made one—of the effect of the recent troubles in Palestine on Haifa, for example? I understand that the Haifa refinery was turning out something of the order of 4 million tons a year—a quantity equal to five times the basic ration in England—and that it is being closed down. What is to happen to that refinery, and to the new pipe line? We shall also be glad to know, and I think we are entitled to the information, what is the forecast by the Government of the effect of E.R.P. and the Marshall Plan? Are the American Government to continue to provide us in this country with petrol and oil products in order to enable us to continue to export those products to other countries?
Finally, I come to the question of refineries. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the shortage of refinery capacity as one of the limiting factors in the next few years. What are the Government doing about refineries? There are two main developments. There is the big refinery at Abadan, the biggest in the world, which requires continual enlargement. There are plans on foot for the erection of some four new refineries in this country. Oil, and especially refined oil, is one of the best methods of obtaining dollars in hard currency that this country can possibly have. Therefore, we on this side of the House believe that the increase of refinery capacity in this country and in Abadan should be given top priority. We should like to know whether there is truth in the rumours we hear that both the planning and the construction of these new refineries and the extension at Abadan are being held up by shortages of steel. If that be the case, as I believe, we should like to know what quantities of steel are involved, and by how much does the present allocation of steel to these items fall short of what the oil companies regard as reasonable in order to make good our position over the next three or four years?
The Government have hitherto refused to issue any figures of our steel allocation. The Ministry of Fuel and Power gave us a coal budget with estimates of the allocation of coal to different industries, the domestic demand, etc. This was extremely valuable and not only helped us in this House to get a better idea of the

1979
matter but also helped the country at large. Will the Government do the same thing in regard to steel, and if not why not? We are told that steel is the main bottleneck and yet we are refused any information. We believe that refinery priority should be right at the top of the steel allocation list. When we look around we see not far from here Government buildings being erected which must take appreciable quantities of steel. The country cannot in those circumstances believe the Government's views about steel shortages.
I have said enough to show that the Government record to date so far as oil and oil products are concerned is one of failure. I do not blame the present Minister for the whole of that. After all, he inherited a pretty mess from his predecessor. There is no doubt that coal under nationalisation has a heavy load of responsibility to bear for our present difficulties in regard to oil. By its failure to produce plentiful supplies of coal for domestic industry in the winter of 1946 and the spring of 1947 it intensified at the most inopportune moment possible the home and industrial demand for oil supplies, and by its failure to expand our export trade on anything like an adequate scale, it seriously aggravated a difficult foreign exchange situation. Too late now the man mainly responsible has publicly confessed the failure of his plans. The present Minister, however, must bear a large share of the responsibility for the fumblings and failures of his own term of office. In the light of that miserable record he need not be surprised that he is not loved by all.
4.10 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Fuel and Power (Mr. Robens): In opening this Debate, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) has covered a wide field—fuel oil conversion, standard petrol, the administrative arrangements in the offices of our regional petroleum officers, the refinery programme, tankers, dollar oil supplies to soft currency countries, the Middle East situation, pipe lines, etc. I hope to cover most if not all of these points during my remarks. If I do not cover them in the same order as that in which the right hon. Gentleman raised them, it is because I want to present to
1980
the House a picture of the oil situation throughout the world, to relate it to our own position here, and to deal with all these matters as I go along.
The right hon. Gentleman very properly said that there had been an enormous increase in the consumption of oil throughout the world. It has indeed been a phenomenal increase, because by 1938 the world consumption of oil had increased to 12 times the quantity consumed in 1900, and up to that time production had kept pace with that rapidly increasing demand year by year. That is, of course, until the Second World War. Then we had enormous damage done to the oil fields in Burma and in the East Indies and damage to the refineries; and it must be remembered that in that area alone, before it was overrun by the enemy, some 10 million tons of oil was produced. The refineries in Europe and elsewhere also suffered some heavy damage but, despite all that, the production in 1946 was 390 million tons as against a figure of 278 million tons in 1938, and from 1946 to 1947, a good part of which was covered by the administration of my right hon. Friend, to whom the right hon. Gentleman attributed great failure, despite his "bungling" of the situation, oil production had risen from 390 million tons to over 420 million tons —that is world supplies. But, despite that enormous increase in production, the demand is still greater than our supplies admit of fulfilment.
Major Lloyd George: Did the right hon. Gentleman say 497 million tons?
Mr. Robens: In 1947 production exceeded 420 million tons.
Why has there been that outstanding increase in the world demand for oil during and since the war? Mainly because, prior to the war, large areas of the world suffered from under-development due very largely to the poverty from which these areas suffered. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the enormous consumption of the United States of America. I would take up his point on that subject to emphasise it, and to show how greatly the increased consumption in the U.S.A. affects the rest of the world in relation to oil supplies. If world consumption in 1938 had been at the same,

1981
rate as in the United States, something like a ten-fold increase in supplies would have been required. The increased mechanisation throughout the world and development in the less developed areas has created a huge increase, apart from the rapidly rising United States consumption. The increase in consumption in the United States between 1938 and 1946 was nearly 100 million tons, and that accounts for the greater part of the increase in world consumption. United States production has not kept pace with the domestic demand, so that, instead of being an exporter of oil—in 1938 she exported 18 million tons, this year for the first time she has become a net importer.
It will be seen, therefore, that oil availability is influenced by factors outside our control. This is most important, because the rate of consumption in the United States today is greater than the world consumption in 1938—a point to which the right hon. Gentleman referred. It shows, therefore, that a very small percentage difference in American consumption has a very marked reaction on the availability of supplies for the rest of the world. Indeed, United States consumption completely outstripped the expectation of her own experts. During 1947 the official estimate of demand had to be revised upwards on three occasions; and already this year there has been another upward revision of the demand for 1948. It is apparent that there are other people, well skilled in oil production and distribution and close to the source of supply, who are unable to make accurate estimates in the circumstances in which they find themselves.
In the British Commonwealth oil production is infinitesimal. Out of the world production of 420 million tons in 1947 only 6 million tons came from the British Commonwealth. We have, therefore, had to build up, through British interests, large oil production in foreign countries. By 1938 this production was 39 million tons. Again, I want to bring the right hon. Gentleman back to the opinion that he has so consistently put forward, on the lackadaisical way in which he says the Government have dealt with the oil situation, and to tell him that, in spite of all the difficulties and the damage that had to be repaired in the oilfields covered by British interests, production had increased from 39 million tons in 1938 to 52 million tons in 1947—
1982
an increase that, considering all the difficulties, can be regarded as remarkable.
The world demand for oil can only be satisfied provided that the British companies, refineries and tankers can be expanded rapidly. Now that the United States import oil, the Eastern hemisphere in the future will have to rely largely, if not wholly, on the vast oil resources of the Middle East where British companies have played a prominent part in development. It would be quite wrong to suggest that there has been no real planning of requirements. The British companies are fully aware of the need to expand production and have embarked on major schemes. In the United Kingdom refinery programmes ultimately costing £95 million have been mapped out. This includes something like £60 million on plant, and, when it is completed, they will be capable of handling 20 million tons of oil a year. Overseas, large investments have been prepared.
At the same time, it is necessary to have a very large increase in the tonnage of tankers to deal with the greater production that will come along. I will deal in greater detail later with tankers. The building of tankers and refineries is dependent entirely on the availability of steel, and for the foreign concessions large sums of foreign exchange are required. The House is fully aware of all the difficulties in relation to capital development, and, while steel production has been running at a very high rate, nevertheless, steel for tankers, refineries and the expansion of the oil programme must be considered along with all the other uses to which steel must be put. Although the right hon. Gentleman gave the impression that we should use all the steel required for oil production, I am certain that, if that were done, he would be complaining that we had not provided steel for agriculture, for generating plant, mining machinery and the like.
It is sensible and right that we should consider what steel is available and the major projects that have basic priorities, and allocate the steel available so as to produce the best return for the nation at large. We are doing that. It is not an easy task. It is not something that can be done by sitting at a desk and dividing the amount of steel available by some figure. The amount of steel and its uses arc being carefully worked out, and, in

1983
so far as expansion schemes for refineries and tankers are concerned, there is a high priority, ranking with the highest; but it must take its place with all the other steel requirements that are essential.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: I did ask two specific questions about steel. I said, "Will the Government give us the allocation of steel?" and, "What is the relation between the allocation of steel to refineries and the amount that the oil companies think they need?" Is it 5 per cent. or 7 per cent., or what is the figure? It is no good the hon. Gentleman saying, "We are doing this." The House and the country are entitled to have the figures, and to see whether what the Government are doing is right.
Mr. Robens: I am not sure that it is a good thing that the House and the country should know about this allocation of steel. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why not?"] I ant not proposing during this Debate on the Ministry of Fuel and Power Vote to talk about steel allocation.
Mr. Hudson: Excuse me.
Mr. Robens: Let me finish. It is certainly not my job to give the House a budget for steel, which is used in many other Departments. The right hon. Gentleman must talk to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and those responsible for the broad economic survey of the country.
Mr. Hudson: The Parliamentary Secretary obviously made that last submission through inexperience, and, therefore, I do not challenge it. But if he will take the trouble to look at the Order Paper, he will see that we included the Ministry of Supply, for the specific reason that we wanted to extract from the Minister, or whoever was speaking on behalf of the Government, the allocation of steel, and, therefore, my questions are relevant to the Debate. I do not know whether it would be in Order—I suggest it may be —if I were so minded, to move the Adjournment of the Debate, to call attention to the fact that there is no one here representing the Ministry of Supply, whose Vote is on the Paper. I do not propose to do it, but I hope the hon. Member will not pursue that line of argument.
Mr. Robens: I do pursue this line, that it is not my task to give the right hon. Gentleman a steel budget. My right hon. Friend will be replying later in the Debate, and he will probably have something more to say about the steel allocation, but I do not promise a steel budget. It certainly is not my task now.
May I turn now to the question of tankers? I will not worry the House with details of the purchases of American tankers, except to say that, of the tankers that have been brought back into commission, this country and the Dominions have had a generous share. We have not held up the oil companies through lack of dollars to buy all the tankers that the United States were prepared to sell us. At the same time, it is clear that we must go on with an extensive building programme if we are to keep up consistently with the production of oil and the increased demand. It would perhaps be as well if the House were to know the size of the task before the shipbuilders and the progress they have made.
The British tanker fleet in September, 1937, was 4,727,000 deadweight tons. Losses during the war amounted to 2,940,000 deadweight tons, and the gains were 2,444,000 deadweight tons, so that we finished the end of the war with a tanker fleet of 4,231,000 deadweight tons as compared with 4,727,000 deadweight tons at the beginning. The tonnage under construction at the beginning of 1948 for completion by 1951 was 1,130,000 deadweight tons and, therefore, the projected British flag tanker fleet at the end of 1951 will be 6,360,000 deadweight tons.
It will be seen from those figures that there has been no restriction at all upon the capacity of the shipyards to turn out tankers; indeed, every encouragement has been given to the production of tankers, not only for our own use but also as a valuable export for purchase by countries abroad. Because of the acquisition of tankers from the United States, and because of this rapid building programme, the tanker shortage has disappeared for the time being. During the current quarter, the British tanker companies have been able to cover their margin of 10 per cent. by chartering tankers in the market, but this includes the equivalent of 25 dollar tankers on continuous service. I shall return to that point later when I

1985
deal with the dollar element in sterling oil.
There will, therefore, be enough tankers available in the third quarter to cover requirements in full. While it is early yet to say with assurance that there will be enough tankers during the winter, plans are being made to charter sufficient to cover the peak winter requirements. By 1951, if trade expands according to plan, the increase in the demand for tankers will be out of proportion to the increase in tanker fleets as at present projected. The British oil companies have a large building programme in hand, and they are engaged in an energetic policy of chartering Norwegian and other flag tankers on a long term basis, but, unless more tankers are built, they will not be able to cover the estimated deficit. A recent review puts the estimated world deficit in 1951 at 100 tankers at least, even if the Saudi-Arabian pipeline and the Middle East pipeline could be constructed before 1951; and without these pipelines the deficit may easily be of the order of 250 T.2. tankers.
It is probable that part of this shortfall in world tanker tonnage availability will be made good by building in the United States, but, if we are to keep our dollar expenditure and the chartering of American tankers within bounds, let alone reduce it, we must continue to build more tankers in this country. The oil industry are fully alive to the probability of a tanker shortage. They are combining a policy of gradually increasing their own building with a policy of stimulating the independent operators to place orders for new ships by offering them the security of long-term charters. They do not wish to invest too heavily in tankers whilst the future of their refinery expansion programmes and the prospects of the pipelines are by no means certain. There is undoubtedly scope for more building in the United Kingdom if the steel and the other materials can be provided, and the right policy is clearly to stimulate to the utmost the private building of tankers in our yards, both by the oil companies and the independent owners.
Mr. Solley: In the case of the tankers which it is proposed shall be built between now and 1951, can my hon. Friend say whether all, or some, and what percentage if some, will be built in British shipyards?
Mr. Robens: The figures I gave are all for building in British shipyards.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us what is the steel allocation?
Mr. Robens: The Chairman will pull the right hon. Gentleman up for repetition if he says that again.
May I turn now to some of the points made by the right hon. Gentleman in relation to the dollar position in what is usually termed sterling oils. It is misleading to treat the United Kingdom requirements of petrol or, indeed, of any petroleum product, in isolation from the requirements of the rest of the sterling area and of our export trade in general. Although at first sight the aggregate production of motor spirit available to British companies from their various producing fields in foreign lands is apparently nearly twice the United Kingdom consumption, there are a number of reasons why this leads to a wrong conclusion. In the first place the cost of oil production of the British companies cannot be assessed purely in terms of sterling. British companies have to disburse convertible foreign exchange for royalties and expenses. For example, in Venezuela, a company's royalty and local expenses are settled in local currency, and those are convertible to United States dollars. Specialist equipment for the development of their own oil fields and the construction of their refineries, also entails some outlay in dollars, with the result that there is a substantial element of dollars or other hard currencies in the cost of producing their oil.
On the other hand, the supplies brought into the sterling area by American companies do not always ultimately entail dollar expenditure, because American companies are substantial buyers from British companies and this, of course, again saves dollars. For example, it is much more economical to all concerned that so-called British oil should be sold in, say, the Persian Gulf to American companies for disposal in the Indian Ocean area, and that British companies should buy oil from American companies in the Western Hemisphere to supply the United Kingdom. I need not enlarge on that; one is aware of the long hauls that are entailed, and the geographical situation makes it convenient. Indeed, a great deal

1987
of economy is possible by reason of ensuring that oil is delivered to its closest ports of demand, and therefore we get the interchange of British and American oil.
Additionally to that, the shortage of tankers has added substantially to the cost of oil and, for that reason alone, it is not possible to plan in terms of allocating British oil solely according to British consumption needs. We must get the most remunerative use from tankers, and, therefore, the loads have to be carried, with special consideration to the distances they must be hauled. As I have said before, that involves American oil going to British possessions and British oil going to the United States. Also a high proportion of world oil is provided by the United States and ourselves and, in the development of world oil supplies, British companies have developed extensive capital facilities for the distribution of oil in many foreign countries, and their trade in these areas is a valuable asset in our export programme.
The hon. Gentleman gave a list of some countries. It is perfectly true that some of these oil supplies go to soft currency areas but, after all, oil is essential to a modern economy and there is a point at which the diversion of supplies from such countries is no more in the interests of His Majesty's Government than of the country concerned. The relative strength of foreign currencies will not always remain as it is now, and the trade of British companies abroad is an asset of the greatest importance on the long-term view. In order to provide for their market requirements in the sterling areas and other foreign countries, British companies have had to purchase marginal supplies of petrol and other products from dollar sources, so that, apart from the dollar element in sterling oil, for the reasons I have mentioned, there is also this additional dollar element in the petrol trade of British companies. We cannot, therefore, in any case dispense with the supplies which, in practice, are brought into the United Kingdom and the sterling area by American companies from dollar sources.
Time is getting on and I want, if I can, to deal with coal-oil conversion and with the comments made by the right hon. Gentleman in relation to standard petrol and the administration of our regional petroleum officers. First, with regard to coal-oil conversion, it was only recently
1988
that we had an Adjournment Debate on this matter raised by the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll). If hon. Members will turn up that Debate, they will find a good deal of information which, with permission, I do not propose to repeat this afternoon. At the time that the coal-oil conversion programme was launched, the situation in this country was grave. We had a surplus of fuel oil, there was a grave shortage of coal, therefore it was the commonsense thing to encourage it. [Laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen may laugh, but I say it was commonsense to encourage conversion from coal to oil. That was done, and if the Government had not stepped in and tried to arrange that conversion in an orderly way, it would not have stopped conversion. Industrialists, unable to get coal, would inevitably themselves have been driven to conversion and it would have been done in a chaotic way. Industries without any real priority demands might easily have got their conversions completed before other industries with high priority demand. There would have been no question of relating the priority to coal-oil conversion, which I think the right hon. Gentleman would regard as being important, to the savings made. Therefore, coal-oil conversion, at the time my right hon. Friend stepped in, was encouraged in order that we could make the best use of what we had available at that time, that there should be some real order, and that we should help industries in relation to their programme and their importance to the nation.
The United States of America also went in for fuel-oil conversion. They also have come up against the same problem, that their demand has outstripped their supply. They, too, have had to call a halt in their fuel-oil conversion programme. The right hon. Gentleman cannot have it both ways. In the United States of America where there has been no control, where the oil supplies are near home, they allowed industry to please itself. In this country, where our position is much more difficult, we stepped in and made an orderly conversion. I will give the right hon. Gentleman some figures for which he asked, and I hope they will show that my right hon. Friend, far from leaving this position in the air, far from causing embarrassment, has done a great deal to provide an orderly change from coal to oil, but has been faced subsequently with an unprecedented

1989
demand for fuel oil, not only from our own people but from the United States at the same time, which has affected materially the available supplies in this country. The conversions which have been completed and are using oil number 1,548. They involve oil to the extent of 2·54 million tons per annum. We have authorised 291 conversions to be completed which will involve 250,000 tons of oil a year. We propose shortly to authorise a further group of 120 which will require about ·34 million tons a year, so that the balance which will remain will be about 435 cases with an estimated consumption of oil of ·94 million tons. Including pre-campaign consumption the estimated consumption is 3·4 million tons in 1948 rising to 4 million tons in a full year. Those figures do not indicate that any inefficiency was displayed by my right hon. Friend.
The small margin of authorisations that have not been completed, compared with the large number of cases which have been completed, particularly in view of the steel-works, glass-works and others of importance which have been completed under the ordinary programme, show that, having been faced with something which could not be anticipated even in the United States of America and certainly not by us—it is not British demand for fuel oil which controls the demand but it is the demand from outside—the figures prove that there has been a proper orderly conversion. I agree that it has caused inconvenience to firms who have gone so far with conversion schemes, but it is inevitable that that will happen, and as the oil comes through, we shall authorise conversion as we are able to in acordance with some scheme of priority based on the extent to which conversion has been made, and the benefit to the country at large.
Mr. W. S. Morrison: Will the hon. Gentleman tell us the total consumption of oil per annum of the groups he has given individually? What is the total consumption involved in the conversion programme of those authorised and those projected or proposed to be authorised, and the balance?
Mr. Robens: Four million tons, plus the requirement to complete those 435 cases where, it is true, they have been authorised but are now stopped, which is another ·94 million tons.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: The figures do not tally.
Colonel Lancaster: The figures the Parliamentary Secretary has given, 2·9 million tons in 249 cases and ·34 million tons in 120 cases make 3 million tons, and with the ·94 million tons it adds up to 4 million tons.
Mr. Robens: It is the pre-campaign consumption, that is, those already burning oil which brings it up.
Mr. W. S. Morrison: That is why I asked the question.
Mr. Robens: Yes, we have it clear now.
Mr. Morrison: What is the total consumption?
Mr. Robens:, It will be 4 million tons.
Mr. Orr-Ewing: Could we be given the figure of pre-conversion?
Mr. Robens: I will give the figures once more. Conversions complete and using oil are 2·54; authorised to complete conversion ·25; further authorisations ·34, and the balance that will remain deferred will be ·94.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: What is the actual consumption today?
Mr. Robens: The actual consumption today will be those figures, almost 4 million tons.
Mr. Hudson: It is 4 million tons now, and will rise to 5 million tons?
Mr. Robens: Almost.
May I turn to the position of the standard petrol, to which the right hon. Member for Southport gave some time. I am sure he did not mean it unkindly, but I wish to refute the suggestion that there has been maladministration in the offices of regional petroleum officers. I have personally visited most of the offices and found that they have hard working staffs conscientiously doing a good job of work. I have found in every case that regional petroleum officers take a personal and very deep interest in the work and are most anxious to be sympathetic in regard to petrol cases and to administer the allocation of "E" and "S" coupons with full regard to the problems that confront applicants making applications within the

1991
maxima we lay down at the Ministry of Fuel and Power. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman did not mean his remark unkindly, because those people are not able to reply for themselves. I give him the absolute assurance that the staffs have done an excellent job of work, under the most difficult circumstances.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned one of two specific cases. He referred to the case which ray right hon. Friend dealt with and about which he sent his secretary across to the Ministry. My right hon. Friend was good enough, in the welter of all the work he has to do on the Gas Bill upstairs, the Petrol Bill down here, this Debate, and the Prayer tomorrow night, to take up the right hon. Gentleman's case and to give it personal attention. I think the right hon. Gentleman owes thanks and appreciation for that, and not the suggestion that it is owing to the coincidence that, as he is raising it today, he got special consideration. If the interpretation which the right hon. Gentleman suggests had been put on the matter, the case would have been put at the bottom of the pile and would have awaited its turn. If the constituent of the right hon. Gentleman had given all the information which the right hon. Gentleman gave to us, it would never have come to him.
Mr. R. S. Hudson Mr. R. S. Hudson indicated dissent.
Mr. Robens: It is no use the right hon. Gentleman shaking his head. I have known hundreds of these cases and invariably I find that I am able to recommend allowances because the regional petroleum officer has not been given as much information by the applicant as the applicant has given to us through a Member of Parliament. I do not know whether we have reached the stage where the man who can fill in the form the best gets the best results, but certainly no regional petroleum officer can give a proper decision unless all the circumstances and all the facts are put into the application. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman and to constituents of all hon. Members that applications should be made full and complete when they are made to the regional petroleum officers. Then I am certain they will not have cases such as that raised by the right hon. Gentleman and referred to my right hon. Friend.
The right hon. Gentleman was very concerned about what had been represented
1992
to me as the most contentious part of the new arrangements for the issue of standard petrol, that is, in relation to persons in receipt of supplementary allowances who are to have the amount of standard petrol deducted. It is suggested that this is a hardship — [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."]—I am glad to hear hon. Members say "Hear, hear," because it shows that it is generally accepted by hon. Members opposite that it is a hardship for the standard petrol to be deducted from "E" and "S" holders. I repeat what the Minister has said about the petrol allocation. We had 120,000 tons for distribution. I think the right hon. Gentleman missed this point when he was discussing the 120,000 tons in relation to the petrol allowances saved by the abolition of the basic ration. The abolition of the basic ration saved a considerable amount of petrol. Having got down to that figure, this standard allowance is being given without increasing the amount of petrol, or, in other words, without digging back into the saving which has been achieved by the abolition of the basic ration. That is why there is only a small amount of petrol to distribute.
The 120,000 tons is made up of 100,000 tons we shall get from the black market and the 20,000 tons by the special review of "E" and "S" holders, some of whom are getting more than they are entitled to get. If that had been distributed to every motor user in the country, it would represent eight miles of motoring a week. Hon. Members are not going to suggest that eight miles a week to every commercial traveller, doctor or whoever holds supplementary coupons could be said to be any real advantage. It would have been greeted with derision if we had said to people whose cars are off the road, and to the men whose motor cycles are off the road, "Here are eight miles of motoring a week for you." To make it a reasonable amount, which is about one-third of the basic ration, those persons whose cars are off the road get the standard ration for roughly 90 miles a month, which we draw from the "E" and "S" holders. They get something which they have been wanting for a long time—freedom. If we had not taken the step of colouring petrol and making the leak from commercial to private tanks impossible, we probably would not have heard so much about the

1993
withdrawal of standard allowance from "E" and "S" holders.
Let us look at the hardship, and see what there is in it. I say plainly but quite emphatically that in my view there can hardly be a single holder of "E" or "S" coupons who does not get some convenience petrol. Take two men living in the same road. Both work for the same firm; one is the sales manager and the other the cashier. Both have cars, but, as the cashier has no business outside his office, he gets no business allowance, while the sales manager has business outside the office and gets an allowance. When they leave home in the morning the cashier waits at the bus stop, goes to the station and catches his train, and then gets another bus to his office. His next-door neighbour, because he is a sales manager, goes to the office by car. He is not doing anything wrong. He cannot garage his car at the office but, nevertheless, he gets an added convenience, from home to his office. The doctor, commercial traveller, or anyone else with "E" or "S" coupons, can pick up his wife and drop her in town to do her shopping, and pick her up again on the way home with the parcels. It is a great convenience which cannot be enjoyed by those whose cars are laid up. Inevitably there is a measure of convenience petrol in all the allocations which have been made to "E" and "S" holders.
Let us have a look at the hardship, if that is accepted. What is the extent of three gallons of petrol a month? Roughly, about 20 miles of travelling a week—I am taking the 90 miles now—for a month. Three-quarters of a gallon a week is to be used or drawn back from the "E" and "S" holder's supplementary balance. The inconveniences that he has is, roughly, about 20 miles. I suggest, on that, that it can never be proved to have been a hardship, bearing in mind the people who have invested their money in cars—and I have heard a lot of argument from hon. Members opposite on this aspect—and who want their cars for use and for convenience. We say to those people, "You are getting some convenience by the use of your petrol which represents about 20 miles a week, and you are no worse off, and immeasurably better off, because you have freedom in the use of your petrol."
Mr. R. S. Hudson: What an amazing argument.
Mr. Robens: It may be an amazing argument, but, all the same, I would like to see that argument refuted.
Mr. Hudson: It will be, and it will not be accepted by the "E" and "S" holders, either.
Mr. Robens: I agree that it will not be accepted by the "E" and "S" holders. Very obviously no one is getting as much as he wants, and, therefore, if they can get another three gallons a month they will press for it. -What I say to the "E" and "S" holders is this. The availability is not there. They cannot have what is not there. They can only have eight miles a week extra if we keep everybody's car and cycle off the road who has not got "E" and "S" allowances. It seems to me that there can be no question here of inconvenience, and no real question of hardship.
I have promised that I would say something about the Territorial Army. I will say this. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War indicated, in answer to a Question in the House today, that I should be making a statement about the issue of petrol to the Territorial Army. Therefore, I should like to inform the House that, as from 1st June, a bulk allowance of petrol will be made to the War Office for use in connection with the Territorial Army. The War Office will be responsible for the issue of this petrol, to members of the Territorial Army who need it in connection with their duties. The issue of supplementary allowances by the regional petroleum officers for attending drills, etc., will thereupon cease. It has also been agreed with the other two Service Departments that they will be responsible for the issue of petrol coupons to their respective auxiliary services.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: Will the hon. Gentleman say what is the amount?
Mr. Robens: There is no amount allocated. The War Office will determine the amounts to be allocated to their officers, either Territorial officers or Regular serving officers, in accordance with what the War Office decides are their individual needs. The War Office will be the sole arbitrator.
Mr. Hudson: Is this additional petrol coming out of the existing "E" and "S" total?
Mr. Robens: There will not be any additional amount. We have been providing certain petrol, through the regional petroleum officers, in connection with the Territorial Army. In connection with certain duties the War Office already provide petrol. All we shall do is to transfer that amount of petrol to the War Office for them to allocate to their people according to their needs.
Brigadier Head: Am I correct in assuming from what the Parliamentary Secretary has said—he said there will be no increase in the bulk allotment to the War Office—that any amount they allocate to the Territorial Army will come out of the existing allotment?
Mr. Robens: I did not say that, and if hon. Members understood me to say that, I am sorry. We shall transfer to the War Office from our regional petroleum officers an equivalent amount to that which was given direct from our regional petroleum officers to Territorial officers in respect of their duties. We shall leave the War Office to determine how it shall be allocated.
Major Legge-Bourke: Will the cars owners for which this petrol is issued be entitled to the standard ration?
Mr. Robens: The car owners for which petrol is issued by Service Departments will not be affected by this drawback scheme in the standard ration. They will receive the standard ration.
Mr. Orr-Ewing: The Parliamentary Secretary has said that his Department will transfer from the regional petroleum officers an amount of petrol to make up the War Office requirements. Where is that petrol coming from?
Mr. Robens: It is coming from what we gave before. We issued x hundred gallons direct from the regional petroleum officers throughout the country to the Territorial officers. We transfer that x hundred gallons to the War Office. Our regional petroleum officers no longer give any at all. The War Office will distribute it. I am sorry that I have been so lengthy, but the right hon. Gentleman
1996
did me the courtesy of advising me of the points he was raising, and I thought it only right that I should spend some time in dealing with them.
During my speech I have endeavoured to show the oil trends in the world and in the British Commonwealth. There is no use disguising the fact that, for the next few years, even if the international situation goes well and smoothly, oil will remain a problem. But it is not a permanent problem. There are vast reserves of oil in the world. Oil can bring to the people of this country, and the world, greater opportunities, because of the way in which it can be the means of opening up new territories, helping industry to be more efficient and helping us with transport. Its increased consumption throughout the world can only mark a fresh era of prosperity. In this task of developing the oil reserves, and of ensuring that the countries of the world have access to oil supplies, the British nation has a large and important part to play. The sinking of new wells, building of tankers and refineries and all the work that goes into increasing oil supplies, and thus utilising the long years of experience that we have in this field, is the way that this nation can play its full part.
I do not believe that we could have a Debate of this character without paying our tribute to those in the oil industry who have faced great physical difficulties in the winning of oil, and whose contribution to the development of overseas oil resources has placed British interests, with American, in the fore in the world's oil production. Their task has been much more difficult to accomplish, because they have developed oil in foreign lands and this has demanded great engineering skill. The demand for oil proceeds apace, and, in the task of ensuring plentiful supplies of oil for all who need it, His Majesty's Government will give every help, every aid, to those upon whose shoulders fall the physical burden of having to produce, refine and distribute this worldwide, valuable and essential commodity.
5.8 p.m.
Mr. Cuthbert: I have listened with interest to the Parliamentary Secretary, with his great mass of figures and so on relating to the oil industry, but I think his last remark interested me more than anything, that is, his tribute to the oil industry. About a year and a half

1997
ago I had the honour to go out to Southern Persia—which is the main source of oil supply from the British point of view—on the instigation of the Foreign Secretary, when we had a great deal of industrial dispute there. I was able to see then and can confirm now what the hon. Gentleman has said about the great integrity, skill and courage of those people at the oil wells.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) has put the case for hon. Members on this side of the House extremely well. I intend to deal more with what I consider to be dangers of the future and, shall I say, mistakes of the past, and where they may be rectified by the Government. I do not think it is generally known that there is an oil shortage in the world, and more particularly in America. Half of our troubles are due to that. At one time, just before the war, America was herself a great producer of oil, and she had no need to go anywhere else to get oil. But circumstances have changed considerably, and America now is one of our biggest buyers. That, incidentally is to the benefit of this nation, because America buys British oil and pays dollars for it.
I do not exonerate the Government from the mistakes which have been committed in the last two years, knowing, as most people in the industry did know, that the consumption of oil throughout the world had increased considerably. Even two years ago that was known. I think that the first mistake was that no encouragement was given to the oil industry to get more oil. What do I mean by that? I know that the industry was crying out for steel. I think that if the Government at that time had allocated more steel to the oil industry, first and foremost for the shipping part of the oil industry—to build more tankers—that would have been a great help. Secondly, they should have been given more steel for the enlargement of their refineries. That was another mistake in my opinion, and I think that most people in the industry would say the same.
Then we come to the old story of switching from coal to oil. It was obvious, at that time, that if we went on consuming oil in this country, as we did, we were bound to find ourselves eventually in the position in which we find ourselves today. I blame the coal industry for that.
1998
We will not go too far back as to what we say went wrong in the coal industry, but I think the general opinion in the oil world is that if we had gone in for getting coal, instead of nationalising the coal industry, we should not have drawn on our oil resources in this way. Those are the three mistakes made in the last two years. The main thing of course is that no great thought was given to the oil industry at that time—I am now talking of two years ago.
Most of our oil is produced outside this island. The Government, when they came into power, were occupied entirely in encouraging the people who put them in office, as far as home affairs were concerned. Oil, and things that were outside and so vital to the British nation as a whole, were not thought about in the proper way. I am sure that that is one of the reasons why we are literally screaming for oil at the present time. The Government should have thought of these things two years ago and made the allocation of steel to the oil industry a number one priority. I think there is a tremendous future for oil, about which the Government must think very seriously. Oil is going to be one of our best dollar producers. Coal is not going to be our best export; that will be oil and its products. Therefore we should be thinking about it now, and planning ahead for three or four years, to see that the industry gets everything it requires to double, and even treble, its output. I am pessimistic about coal. In the past the export of coal did a great deal to balance our economy, but in the future, if we can produce enough coal to keep our industries going, we shall do quite well. We shall have to look elsewhere for exports, and that means oil.
I want to say now that I am not a shareholder in any oil company, nor have I any financial interest in it. I am speaking purely from the economist's point of view. I have said that at the moment the oil industry is short of steel to build tankers, refineries, pipe-lines and the million-and-one things required by an oil company to produce oil to be turned into cash. Why are we short of oil? Again, I think, two years ago the Government should have thought of this from the steel point of view and should have allocated steel away from some other industry to the oil industry. If I may give examples.

1999
I have heard how, in the past year or so, we have been producing steel props for the mining industries. Why could they not have continued with wooden props, leaving steel alone? Why did we export so much steel to Russia when we required it in our own industry? I know we shall be told that we received coarse grain in return, but that could have been obtained elsewhere. I do not want to touch too much on the political angle, but it seems to me that we were exporting steel products to Russia, a nation about which we were not sure whether they were friend or foe, when we in this country require it for ourselves, not only for peace but in the possibility of an emergency as well.
Turning to the future, recently we have heard of the closing down of the Haifa Refinery in Palestine. I wonder if the Committee realises what that will mean so far as our oil is concerned? Something like four million tons is locked up there; 2½ million of that was supplied to our sterling area. That has gone for the time being. What is the position for the future? I ask the Government what is going to happen, after Saturday, about the Haifa Refinery? Are we ever going to get the Haifa Refinery going again? If we have real trouble in Palestine between Jew and Arab, the first thing the Jews will do will be to take the refinery because they may want the oil for war potential. The moment they do that the Arabs, through whose country the pipe-line passes, will cut the pipe-line, and we shall be finished again. I would like the Government to give a great deal of thought to what action they intend to take to secure our Haifa Refinery and to see that it will be safe for our future.
The real world source of oil is Persia. At the moment everything there is perfectly sweet and safe, but we must look ahead. I was out in Southern Persia about 18 months ago, and hon. Members who read the report will see that I and my two colleagues on that side of the Committee were in complete agreement that all those industrial troubles again, were caused by Communist influence. There is a party in Persia called Tudeh; they were definitely Communist and until they were shot or locked up there was no peace. A position like that might return. I want to know what the Government are thinking about in the way
2000
of protection for those enormous oilfields in Persia. They are the main source of our oil and one of the biggest sources of oil in the world.
Persia has been a very great country and can again be a very great country, but she needs assistance. It is time the British Government awoke to the fact that we must help Persia to keep democracy sound, and to see that her neighbours around her do not have the opportunity of spreading their own gospel of their way of life, which Persia may be forced to accept through our lack of interest in that country. How can we do that? Most hon. Members must have read the report of the select committee on the British Council, on which I served. The British Council should be encouraged tremendously to do good work in Persia, but I would go further than that. The Government should encourage the Persian Government by sending out experts to teach them how to build factories and to build up the industries they are anxious to build, but in which they lack capital and machinery and, indeed, the experts to show them how. If that, were done, we could carry our British way of life into Persia. They want it, and they are screaming for British influence in Persia. I admit that our name is not too good at the moment, because of the past six or seven years of neglect, but it can be restored, and we should make Persia a buffer State against any nation or any group of people who may think they have a chance of taking over that great oil producing country.
Mr. Gallacher: The hon. Member talks about taking the British way of life into Persia. When he speaks of the British way of life, does he mean profits for the private owners or nationalisation of the industry?
Mr. Cuthbert: In reply to the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) I would say that on our visit last year we learned that the British way of life is very much accepted in Southern Persia by all employees in that country and by people outside. The trouble was caused by only a small group of three or four people. That is why I said Persia is aching to have the British way of life. I do not mean profits; that is another argument. I think it will be found that the profits made in Persia are mostly made by the Persian

2001
Government, through its royalties, and they, therefore, go to the Persian people. It must not be forgotten that half of the great oil concerns in Persia are owned by the British taxpayer. All hon. Members in this Committee benefit.
I would end on this note. I feel that the oil industry, especially the British oil industry, should be left to itself to manage its own affairs. I will give the House one or two examples of what I mean. For instance, with their products, they are told practically where they have to sell them in order to get a certain amount of exchange. We can understand that in the case of dollars, but there are further ways in which they are restricted. They are told by the Treasury what sort of coinage is required and what sort of barter they must do with goods. These men are experts who know their job, and they do not need any Government interference at all. I want to see the oil industry left alone to run its own affairs, but give it steel and more steel, and let it become the greatest export of Great Britain which must, and finally will, take the place of coal.
5.23 p.m.
Mr. Edelman: While I cannot agree with the hon. Member for Rye (Mr. Cuthbert) in the whole of his diagnosis of the reasons for the oil shortage, I must agree on the essential fact that there is a world oil shortage. It sets off the improvidence of the right hon. Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) —I regret he is not here—when he asked for an increase in the petrol and oil ration.
I would recall to the Committee that during the war President Roosevelt, becoming apprehensive of the shortage of oil which was already appearing, sent a geological party under Dr. De Golyer to the Middle East to prospect and examine the opportunities for developing those as yet undeveloped areas. It was a matter of vital concern to the United States, because although between 1938 and 1946 her actual production of oil was to rise from 16o million tons to 234 million tons, her ultimate net export was only 2¼ million tons owing to the rise in internal consumption. Dr. De Golyer reported, after investigating conditions in the Middle East, that the centre of gravity of world oil production was shifting from the Caribbean area to the Middle East-Persian
2002
Gulf area. That is of the greatest importance to our security and our economy because we must increasingly rely on receiving our oil supplies from the Middle East instead of from the traditional sources. At one time Venezuela used to export oil—the bulk of its production—something like 54 million tons to Europe. Today it exports approximately half that amount to the United States.
While in the United States that shortage is intensifying itself, in the Soviet Union, where industry and agriculture has become increasingly mechanised during the past few years, there is something approaching an oil famine. Whereas in 1939 production reached something like 30 million tons, as a result of the German incursion into the Caucasus it had fallen by 1946 to a figure approaching only 20 million tons. That is one of the reasons for the Soviet Union continuing to exercise pressure on those Middle East areas which look like being the world's principal suppliers of the future. Because of the shortage in the United States we ourselves have become more dependent than ever on supplies of oil from the Middle East. When the hon. Member for Rye mentioned that the oil companies should be allowed to exercise their activities without Governmental interference, he was echoing a speech made in New York in 1947 by Sir William Fraser, chairman of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, who said:
"It is difficult to escape the idea that the international oil industry may be regarded in certain quarters as one susceptible to some measures of ultra-commercial integration. If this idea substitutes State regimentation in some form or another for the element of healthy commercial competition, I must candidly say I think it underrates the capacity of the industry to conduct its own affairs on a proper level of competence."
But it is quite clear that today oil is a matter of public concern and its acquisition and distribution should be made in accordance with public policy. Consequently, I prefer to the views of the hon. Member for Rye or of Sir William Fraser, the words which were said in this House on 17th July, 1913, by the then First Lord of the Admiralty, who said:
"Our ultimate policy is that the Admiralty should become the independent owner and producer of its own supplies of liquid fuel, first by building up an oil reserve in this country sufficient to make us safe in war … The second aspect of our ultimate policy involves the Admiralty being able to refine oil of

2003
various kinds. This again leads us into having to dispose of the surplus production but I do not myself see why we should shrink, if necessary, from entering this field of State enterprise … The third aspect of the ultimate policy is that we must become the owners or at any rate the controllers at the source of at least a proportion of the supply of natural oil which we require.—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th July, 1913; Vol. 55, c. 1466.]
Those words were spoken by the present Leader of the Opposition. It is quite clear, in view of that immense strategic and economic importance of oil that the decision as to its production and supply should not be left in the hands of arbitrary individuals and firms, but must be made to conform to public policy under Governmental control.
We can no longer allow the oil companies to have a foreign policy of their own. We have indeed reached a position in which the struggle for oil has become a potential casus belli, and for that reason it is of the greatest importance that there should be the most exact coordination of the intentions of the Government and the function of the oil companies. President Roosevelt, looking ahead and considering the difficulties, which were bound to emerge from the race to obtain oil supplies, proposed an Anglo-American Oil Agreement which had as its intention the making available of the oil resources of the world to all those who had a legitimate interest in them. At the time he also proposed a controlling agency, an International Petroleum Council in order to have an orderly and economic exploitation of oil resources. Unfortunately owing to the resistance by the great oil interests, that oil agreement was never ratified; and when at a later stage the agreement was refashioned in an emasculated form, it was even then impossible to obtain formal ratification. Consequently, like many of the notable proposals which were put forward in those days, proposals which were not only distinguished by their motives but also which would have been of the greatest practical value today, the Anglo-American Oil Agreement was allowed to lapse.
I would ask my right hon. Friend whether it is now his intention to try to initiate new conversations with the United States of America in order that we should have a common national oil policy. Conversations have been going
2004
on between the oil companies which have led to certain practical results. For example, there has been the agreement between the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and two American oil companies that the bulk of the refining of crude oil from newly-developed sources should be carried out by the Americans. This has had the effect of putting a considerable advantage in their hands, because not only is it easier and more profitable to refine oil than to undertake the possibly unproductive task of prospecting, but in addition, those who control the refineries occupy a key strategic position. It therefore seems to me to be of the greatest importance that some attempt should be made to initate a joint oil policy with the United States which will have the sanction, approval and the direction of the Government.
I want to turn to another question which was raised by the hon. Member for Rye. He very properly pointed out that the oil of Iran, like the oil of the Middle East generally, is of the greatest strategic importance to Great Britain. It is absolutely right that we should use every means to defend our interests in those areas. At the same time, I cannot believe that in the long run those interests will best be served merely by encouraging the issue of private concessions to independent oil companies, and the exclusion of other countries, including the Soviet Union, from the opportunity of extracting or obtaining a share in the extraction of oil from those areas. It is quite clear that, particularly in the case of a country like Russia, with an economy which for many years has been backward and only now is being mechanised, and where the internal combustion engine was until recently a rarity, it is only natural that such a country must require access to sources of oil.
I do not think that anybody in this Committee would say that it is improper for the Soviet Union to want to feed her engines of peace. I recognise that in time of tension it is important that we should try to pre-empt an important strategic material like oil; but, on the other hand, looking forward, if there is to be any hope and prospect of peace, we must go back to 1944 when both the Americans and we were of the opinion that it would be possible to develop the resources of the Middle East

2005
not exclusively for those who had concessions but for all those countries who had a legitimate interest in obtaining oil.
I suggest that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Fuel and Power or the Foreign Secretary should use the occasion of the present détente which seems to have been announced this morning between the United States and the Soviet Union, to try to revive the old idea for the orderly distribution and production of the Middle East oil resources. We had a most valuable experience of the rational distribution of coal for Europe under the European Coal Organisation. That Organisation was a kind of consortium of the coal producing and consuming European countries who got together to allocate according to need the coal which was available. The fact that this organisation was responsible for the allocation of coal did not in any way interfere with the particular form in which the coal was extracted in any given country. It made no difference if in one country coal was nationalised or if in another country coal was in private ownership. Today, it should be possible to create a Middle East oil organisation based on the precedent of the European Coal Organisation.
Mr. Cuthbert: The hon. Gentleman seems to forget that the oil in Persia belongs to Persia, and, therefore, there can be no question of other nations having a say in the matter; it depends entirely on what Persia wants to do. If Persia wants to give concessions to America or to Britain or to any other country she is free to do so. We cannot say that this is the world's oil; it is her oil, and it is in her country.
Mr. Edelman: The hon. Gentleman has missed my point. The oil in Persia is incidentally developed and mostly owned by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in which this country has a major share. The point that I want to make is that this organisation which I propose should be concerned, not necessarily with the ownership, but with the allocation of oil according to the needs of the consumers. The idea suggested by President Roosevelt is embodied in the Anglo-American Oil Agreement.
Mr. Cuthbert: I did not miss the hon. Gentleman's point. The point I was trying to make was that it is not for any other nation to distribute the oil of Persia:
2006
it is for Persia herself. If she likes to give concessions to foreign countries that is another matter, but it is for her, and for her alone, to decide.
Mr. Edelman: I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman should be such an absolutist in matters of national sovereignty. At the present time when we are trying to create a Western Union which would involve a diminution of national sovereignty, both politically and economically, I am surprised that hon. Members opposite should be opposed to the idea of the proper distribution and allocation of the oil resources of the Middle East under some kind of international authority. It would certainly meet with the opposition of the great oil companies who prefer to be able to conduct their business on the basis of non-interference from the Government.
If I may revert to the oil agreement which was proposed so hopefully during the war, I would say that it gives not only the greatest hope that the substantial oil resources of the Middle East would be fully developed but, more than that, it will ensure that the Middle East oil, instead of becoming a threat to peace, may be used to unite the nations. At the present time the Middle East is dangerously inflamed not merely by political differences but also by the economic struggle. If some kind of international authority supersedes the present jungle tactics of the oil companies, then, indeed, the inflammation of the Middle East may well subside and instead of the dangerous war situation that exists today we may have a healthful activity and the prospect of peace.
5.42 p.m.
Major Lloyd George: If I do not follow the hon. Member for West Coventry (Mr. Edelman) in his very interesting speech, it is not because I do not think that what he has said is of great importance. He mentioned the European Coal Organisation, without which many countries would now have been in great difficulty. I may be prejudiced because I played a certain part in bringing that organisation into being. I do not wish to detain the Committee for any length of time, but I want to deal with one or two rather narrower points.
First, I wish to refer to the position of the people in this country, whether

2007
engaged in industry or as individuals under the restrictions of petroleum in various forms which they have had to suffer for a considerable period. For very nearly 10 years our population has been very severely restricted in its use of petroleum and petroleum products. During the war period they were perfectly prepared to accept not only inconvenience, but possibly hardship, because they realised that on their greatly restricted consumption victory or defeat might depend. They could readily appreciate the need for severe restriction at that time. They knew perfectly well that when, for example, we had a tank offensive going full blast the consumption of petrol was tremendous. They also realised that the Army which was fighting in this last war, as opposed to the Army in the first war, was almost entirely mechanised. In fact, I believe it used to be said that most of our Army had forgotten how to walk. That also meant a tremendous consumption of petroleum and its products.
When the air offensive developed, particularly towards the end of the war, it was so obvious to anybody living in this country, hearing the roar of those aircraft going out at night, and then day and night, what it involved in the consumption of petroleum. I think I am right in saying that when the big Fortress raids took place, involving 1,000 Fortresses, they consumed the equivalent of one tanker's cargo, which gives a rough idea of what the consumption was. They also realised that bringing petroleum into this country could only be done at the risk of gallant men's lives. Only too often did they know of the consequences of attack upon those petroleum-carrying craft. The people of this country have shown time and time again that they are prepared to suffer inconvenience and hardship provided it is made clear to them what the reasons for the hardship are.
In 1945 the basic ration was restored, and it was accepted, small as it was, as an instalment of better things to follow. Then, two years after the end of the war, the basic ration was cancelled, and now, three years after the end of the war, a Measure has been introduced into the House of Commons which imposes penalties for the use of petroleum in certain circumstances— penalties greater than anything I can think of in regard
2008
to petroleum during the war itself. All this, three years after the war has come to an end. The reasons give have been many—the dollar shortage, the tanker shortage, and, in a lesser degree, the black market. Unless reasons are given that people clearly understand, whether we like it or not, every ingenuity will be used to circumvent the measures and to infringe them. If good reasons for the inconvenience are made clear to the people they will endure it. For instance, in 1942, when we appealed for fuel economy, the reasons for that appeal were obvious to the whole population and the response was quite remarkable. That result was achieved entirely by a voluntary appeal. People understood the reason then. Can anyone really say in this Committee that the people are clear in their minds why there are all these present restrictions on petroleum?
Mr. Solley: Yes:
Major Lloyd George: They clearly know?
Mr. Solley: Clearly, yes.
Major Lloyd George: Then the hon. Member is a bigger optimist than I thought, because he is the only one I have met up to date who thinks so. The Government themselves are largely responsible for the confusion that exists in the minds of the ordinary people in the country, amongst whom I would not include the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Solley). This is the fault of the Government. Let me give some reasons. We have been told that one of the reasons for the restriction is the dollar shortage. That was last Autumn. The basic ration was abolished because of the difficulty of acquiring dollars. Is our economic position better today than it was when the ration was taken off altogether? Logically, that must seem to be so. I am trying to explain how the ordinary man in the street gets into difficulty about this. Another reason given was the shortage of tankers. We had some very full figures from the Parliamentary Secretary today. I am a little worried about one side of them. Am I right in saying that the tanker position today is better than it was when the war came to an end? I suggest that it is considerably improved. When the war finished, our losses were practically

2009
3,000,000 tons. We gained about 2,500,000 tons. I am using round figures. At the end of the war we had 4,231,000 tons of tanker tonnage. The hon. Gentleman missed out a figure I should like to have. He said that between 1948 and 1951, 130,000 tons were to be constructed. What has been constructed between 1945 and 1948? Is the position of our tanker fleet today better or worse than it was when the basic ration was restored in 1945? That is another point that it is important the people should understand if we are to get them to realise—as a vast number today do not realise—the necessity of what is being done.
I should like to turn for a moment to the question of coal to oil conversion. Here is another aspect of the matter which confuses the ordinary man in the street. The Government's attitude to this is confusing. The Parliamentary Secretary said today that the coal to oil conversion was due to the grave coal position in 1947. Surely, he does not expect us to acquit the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor of a small contribution to that situation? It was not the right hon. Gentleman's fault that there was a shortage of coal.
Mr. Champion: What about the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor's predecessor—the right hon. and gallant Gentleman himself?
Major Lloyd George: I did not have a single industry stopped during the war, nor did any part of the war effort stop because of the coal shortage.
Mr. Champion: The industry had declined.
Major Lloyd George: I had sufficient coal supplies. I am only giving the facts. The industry had been declining ever since the war first started. As the Minister knows, many of the best coal-producing men are taken out of the industry in war, yet there was coal enough during the war. Now those men are coming back, and a great deal of the improvement in output per man shift is due to the fact that these very fine men have come back and, as everybody tells me, are working very well indeed.
The fact is that the shortage of coal was not the responsibility of the right hon. Gentleman, but that he did not take any action to deal with that situation is
2010
entirely his responsibility, because he had plenty of warnings, not only in the House of Commons but from all over the country. Whereas one may struggle through a crisis with economies if they are spread over a long period it is too late to start such economies when the crisis comes. That was the position we had in the Spring of 1947. The Minister certainly cannot escape blame for that. The Parliamentary Secretary today said we had oil in stock and it was only common sense to use it. What was there in stock?
The Minister of Fuel and Power (Mr. Gaitskell): I am sure my hon. Friend did not say we had oil in stock. He said there was a surplus of fuel oil. That is not the same thing.
Major Lloyd George: Where we keep a surplus if not in stock I do not know.
Mr. Gaitskell: It was excess of production over requirements.
Major Lloyd George: At any rate, it was there. The Parliamentary Secretary said it would be foolish not to use it. I agree, if we do not have to convert appliances from coal to oil burning. If the Government ask industrialists to change over from coal to oil burning they ought to have some security as to the amount of oil they have in the country. What happened, in fact? These industrialists, I say frankly, were misled. Questions were asked in the House only just a year ago. There was one question to the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor, asking him if he could possibly give an answer to industrialists prepared to convert from coal to oil fuel. The right hon. Gentleman replied:
"We programmed for a saving of 8,000,000 tons of coal by next year, providing the equipment was forthcoming, and we think there is a reasonable prospect of acquiring it."
Then the hon. Member for Stockport (Sir A. Gridley) asked a question and the reply was:
"As regards the question of oil fuel supplies, the oil fuel will be available. There is a difficulty about equipment, particularly tankers, but we hope to be able to save two million tons of coal in the summer, and, as tankers and material come along in the autumn, I think we can save at the rate of eight million tons by this time next year."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd April, 1947; Vol. 435, c. 2071–2074.]

2011
Can anybody wonder that people are a little confused about the oil position when the Minister spoke in that way a year ago, telling people to do everything they can to convert from coal to oil? We had a Debate on Welsh affairs not so long ago on the basis of the White Paper. In that White Paper the Government were boasting that in one refinery and other places in South Wales, by conversion from coal to oil, they had saved 480,000 tons of coal. But it meant using 300,000 tons of fuel oil.
Mr. Gaitskell: The right hon. and gallant Gentleman said a refinery. Did he mean a steel works?
Major Lloyd George: At a refinery and other places. About 51 or so. Including a refinery, I think there were 51 conversions, although I am not sure about the figure. They hoped to save 480,000 tons of coal—for export, I suppose—but at a cost of 300,000 tons of imported fuel oil. What is the good of saying people understand clearly the position in circumstances like that?
We are told the black market consumed roughly 100,000 tons. That is about one-third of the quantity wanted for this particular conversion in South Wales and about a sixtieth of what the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor told us we should be using. Just a few weeks before the basic ration was abolished we were told it was dollars, and now we are told it was due to the startling increase in the consumption in the United States of America. What is the good of the Parliamentary Secretary's telling us, as he did today, that they did not know that this was going on in America. Of course, they must have known. Their own White Paper said that in 1946 there had been an enormous increase over consumption in 1938. It says that the total consumption in the world was 397 million tons. The hon. Gentleman told us today that production was 420 million torts.
Mr. Gaitskell: Is the right hon. and gallant Gentleman referring to 1947?
Major Lloyd George: I am referring to 1947, and he was referring to 1948, but 1948 is not finished yet, so it is difficult to judge its production.
Mr. Gaitskell: I think that there is another possible explanation, and that is
2012
that there are certain losses in the process of refining.
Major Lloyd George: I was asking for information. I was struck by the figure when the Parliamentary Secretary gave it, but I did not want to interrupt him. The point I am making is that the increased consumption in the United States has been going on for some time, and it is rather disturbing to find that that is now given as the reason for our restrictions, whereas we had been told that it was a tanker shortage. A tanker shortage is not important, I suppose, if there is a world shortage of oil. Then we were told it was a dollar shortage. Now we are told it is a shortage of oil itself.
In re-introducing the basic or standard ration the right hon. Gentleman referred to the grave injustice to the holders of the "E" and "S" coupons. The only sources of black market in petrol must be the "E" and "S" coupon holders. There is no other. The right hon. Gentleman tried to remedy that in two ways—by his Bill, and by not giving the "E" and "S" coupon holders any of the standard ration. His hon. Friend's explanation did not convince me very much—the added convenience. Since when has a man been given "E" coupons for convenience? I thought he had to make a case that it was essential for him in his business.
What the right hon. Gentleman has told us is that the black market comes from the "E" and "S" coupon holders, and that people who had applied for these coupons have been cheating, and that when it comes to raising the standard ration they are going to be left out. If a man has been honest—and I like to believe that most people are—and has said, "That is the minimum necessary for me to do my work," he is being penalised by not having the standard ration which other people are to enjoy. If the right hon. Gentleman really thinks, as his hon. Friend said today that it was reckoned that a hundred thousand tons had been over-allocated, would it not have been better for him and his staff to have devoted more attention to trying to get a proper allocation to the "E" and "S" coupon holders. It is restrictions that make people ask for more than they need.

2013
May I gave an example of that in connection with agriculture? Last Autumn, in some parts of the country, it was very wet and Autumn ploughing was considerably delayed. Many of the coupons which would have been used normally were not returned, because those who had them felt that if they returned them the allocation would be cut down next time, when they would have to plough more intensively because of the delay.
I am told—and perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will correct me if I am wrong—that there is a certain amount of truth in the fact that steel and other raw materials have also been asked for in larger quantities than necessary in order to get somewhere near what is really required. It is these restrictions that make people take more than they are legitimately entitled to get. The right hon. Gentleman has a large staff in his petroleum office. When I was there, the figure was about 5,000, but no doubt now it is considerably less.
Mr. Gaitskell: It is 1,800.
Major Lloyd George: I have some sympathy with the right hon. Gentleman here because the staff were not reserved during the war and in one office alone we had a turnover of 100 per cent. of the staff in 12 months. That does not tend towards the greatest possible efficiency, but one cannot help wondering whether it would not have been better, instead of putting up this elaborate machinery, which the right hon. Gentleman is now doing, with all sorts of inspectors, and adding burdens to the police, already understaffed, for the right hon. Gentleman to have investigated more thoroughly the allocation of "E" and "S" coupons. He has admitted, through his Parliamentary Secretary, that 100,000 tons were over-allocated. That is about 12 per cent. I would like him to look into that matter, rather than have a fantastic Bill. After the end of three years, to have a Bill like the one which we had in front of us the other day is the most extraordinary thing I have seen in my life. It is an incredible thing that we should have to have a Bill of that sort, which, in my humble opinion, will be entirely unworkable.
I would like the right hon. Gentleman to apply his mind to using some of his staff—and the agricultural committees
2014
could help him quite a lot—in the allocation of petrol in agricultural areas. I believe that the road haulage people could also help him. I would like him to go to the source, which he has himself admitted, to try to get rid of the 100,000 tons of over-allocation, and get rid of all this nonsense of people going about prying and snooping. There is clearly, hardship and inconvenience in the rural areas, and I speak for a rural area. Rural areas differ and the facilities differ. Some rural areas have a far better transport system than others and some people are far better at form-filling than others. Their imagination is probably more strongly developed than that of some of their fellows, and it is quite astonishing sometimes what they can get away with.
I admit that the right hon. Gentleman has been extremely sympathetic in most of the cases which I have put before him, and I am not criticising him on that point. It is because of the system that we get this inequality. If we are to have restrictions it is important that they should be accompanied by a sense of justice. If people are all restricted, much as we disagree with it, it gives a better feeling if there is not a sense of injustice going with it. I say, finally, that it is not only important that in these cases of restriction justice should be done, but that it should manifestly seem to be done.
6.6 p.m.
Mr. Lipson: I wish to raise one point only. The Minister has granted supplementary petrol allowances to disabled men of the two world wars who require motor transport because of their disabilities and who are engaged in business. I appeal to him to allow this class to have the standard ration in addition. I know that the Minister has said that he cannot admit exceptions to his general rule, but this afternoon we were told—and I welcome it—of an exception for those engaged in Territorial duties. The class for which I plead stands by itself, and it would be an honourable exception, if the Minister could see his way to grant it. These are men who have paid a very high price to enable victory to be possible. They will continue to pay that price for the whole of their lives. Their opportunities for relaxation are far fewer than those of other people. I therefore ask the Minister to give consideration to this class of people who cannot be very

2015
numerous—those who are so disabled that to enable them to carry on their businesses they have been given a supplementary allowance. The amount of petrol involved would be very small.
I do not think that the concession would lead to what the right hon. Gentleman fears if he makes an exception—the opening of the door to an avalanche of appeals. The public would recognise that this is a very special case, and I hope, therefore, that he will not harden his heart against it. May I conclude by saying that the type of case which I have in mind is typified by a constituent of mine who was an R.A.F. pilot from 1939 to 1945, and who, as a result of his war service, has had his left thigh amputated. I ask the Minister to allow this man and the comparatively few like him to have the standard ration. If he will do so, it will be an act of grace and a credit to the Minister.
6.12 p.m.
Mr. Ellis Smith: We are considering a very important subject, and one which will grow in importance, for this is to be an age of oil. Oil is now required in all forms of life's activities. After the first world war, there was a growing demand for oil, and the second world war has made that demand much greater. It has completely changed the centre of gravity, and oil now determines to some extent the power in the world and to a large extent foreign policy. One hundred million pounds are to be spent in the construction of oil refineries in Britain. As a result of a careful study of the situation, I have no hesitation in saying that Britain's economic demands require that twice as much should be spent on the oil refineries that have been erected up to the present time. One of the finest oil refineries in the world is in production in this country.
Although I do not want to dwell on it, I want to place on record that those who between the two wars constantly raised the issue in this House of the adoption of a policy of this kind were side-tracked time after time, and little did we realise who was responsible for preventing this development. As a result of reading the American Press and the account of the Nuremberg trials we now know who was responsible for preventing that development in this country. Two
2016
other refineries are now being built near Manchester. Coal, oil and chemicals, with scientific treatment, and with enterprise, capital and drive can provide Britain with greater wealth than ever before, and if a policy of this character was adopted there would be no need for the pessimism that prevails in many quarters with regard to the future of our country. The value of by-products of oil, with scientific treatment, is enormous.
With scientific treatment, coal, which is still found in abundance in this country and which is far too valuable to be burnt in its raw state, together with oil and chemicals can provide us with enormous wealth. Labour Ministers were elected to show the same kind of courage, initiative and drive that made this country great 50 years ago. With a world oil agreement—and I shall plead for this later on because it is so urgently necessary—and with science, chemicals, coal and engineering we should put Britain on the road towards becoming a land of plenty. The importance of oil was stressed many times during the last war by the Germans. They agreed that our bombing of the Roumanian oilfields meant many victories for the Allies against Germany. There is further evidence of the importance of oil in modern economy, and its growing importance can be measured in the world increase in output since 1938, when it was 270 million metric tons. In 1947 it was 410 million metric tons. We can measure the rich oil supplies of the Middle East by the output in 1938 of 16 million metric tons, which increased in 1947 to 42 million metric tons. It is plain that the output in the Middle East could be increased in a relatively short time to 8o million metric tons.
Research shows that 50 per cent. of the world's total reserves are now to be found in the Middle East—in Iraq, Iran and Saudi Arabia. There will be world trouble over the Middle East oil unless agreement can provide for world co-operation. The Middle East is now the most important strategical centre. It is a political oil volcano which could start world war three in five, 10 or 15 years if the world continues its present drift. Palestine, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, Greece, Libya, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the control of the Dardanelles and the Mediterannean are all wrapped up in the Middle East issue, which is now an oil supply problem.

2017
At present the Middle East provides Europe with 15 per cent. of her oil needs. It is planned to increase that figure to 80 per cent. within five years and to 100 per cent, within 10 years. Thousands of years of slow development in the Middle East have resulted in minority problems amongst the many communities. Racial and religious differences of all kinds have added to a situation which the world needs to consider. The many minority problems of this conglomeration of peoples have been exploited by vested interests in most countries. A continuation of this will lead to more and more political strife and to war unless we plan to avoid it.
Many of us played our part in the first world war and planned a policy to avoid another, but we drifted into one. The time has arrived when all men and women must adopt a policy to avoid world war three. For these reasons I plead for an international oil agreement. Britain should take the initiative in calling together the chief Powers of the world to co-operate and negotiate a Middle East trading agreement rather than continue to set people against people, clan against clan, or minority against minority. We can allow them all to work out their own destiny in accordance with their own religious beliefs and co-operate together to provide the world with the oil which is now to be found in the Middle East.
I wish to ask the Minister some questions and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be good enough to take notes for him. Is it a fact that the American oil companies are to spend £1,000 million in the Middle East? Have the oil interests determined United States Palestine policy? I do not know the inside story of all this. What I do know—and I have no hesitation in stating it—is that the British people say that none of our men shall remain in Palestine one second longer than the last day fixed for our withdrawal. Others can have their oil: we want world cooperation. Their lives are too valuable for our boys to be kept in the Middle East any longer than is necessary. It is agreement that is required rather than the policy now being pursued.
What is going on in Ethiopia? [Laughter.] Are oil supplies responsible for the failure to withdraw our Army of occupation? Why should there be
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laughter? Do those hon. Members value our boys' lives? Have they played their part in any war? Did a representative of the previous Government state that Britain recognised that all mineral rights belonged to Ethiopia? If so, why has that policy been reversed? The International Co-operative Alliance recently issued a report in which they stated that conflicts over oil resources are an ever-present threat to world peace. Is it a fact that at the Zurich Conference the International Co-operative Alliance, supported by the World Federation of Trade Unions, was opposed by the representative of the British Government? If so, I ask why our representative took that attitude.
The Deputy-Chairman (Mr. Hubert Beaumont): I am sorry to have to interrupt the hon. Member but he seems to be speaking more in the realm of foreign politics than on the Vote under discussion. The Vote deals with services connected with petrol and petroleum products.
Mr. Ellis Smith: I have been carefully watching the Vote, Mr. Beaumont. If you will be good enough to refer to the Order Paper you will find that the Vote covers all that I am saying. I am giving this explanation of the conference to ask why a representative of the Government should oppose the policy of world agreement instead of advocating a policy which leads to world peace. Were British and American oil interests negotiating oil concessions in the Middle East during the war? Did they work through, or with, the Arabian Prime Minister? Did the talks on oil take place, and what did the British Ambassador in Teheran report in September, 1944?
The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member is now getting back to foreign affairs. I really must ask him to keep to the Vote.
Mr. Ellis Smith: I said earlier, Mr. Beaumont, that foreign policy is now largely determined by our policy on oil. I realise your difficulty and will not dwell too long on this because that would not be fair. All I am doing is linking up this Vote, which really covers four Votes, with the serious issue of world differences on the question of oil.
The Deputy-Chairman: It is very kind of the hon. Member to recognise my difficulties. I recognised his difficulty by allowing him to go so far, but we cannot turn this discussion into a debate on foreign affairs.
Mr. Ellis Smith: I will take note of that guidance, but I am not turning the Vote into the subject of foreign affairs. The right hon. Gentleman who opened the Debate referred to the Middle East and to many points similar to those with which I am dealing. I was pleased that he did so, because he set the basis upon which this Debate should take place. Having prepared my notes with perhaps a leaning towards the foreign affairs side of the problem, I was pleased that the right hon. Gentleman should have set the pace for others to follow.
The centre of world gravity—the centre of the world's struggle for power—has completely changed as a result of the increasing demand for oil supplies. The Government should take the initiative—we should not leave it to other people as we have done on too many occasions—because this country has more to gain by world agreement than any other country. Our needs will continue to increase. If we are to avoid a repetition of what has happened in the past; if we are to avoid serious political strife and the race for increased armaments that gives rise to war, now is the time for the Government to take the initiative to prevent a recurrence of what has happened too often in the past.
6.25 p.m.
Mr. Erroll: It was interesting to observe an arch-planner such as the hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. Ellis Smith) who apparently did not plan his own speech to keep within the subject of today's Debate. He got away into the realm of foreign affairs. I agree with him that it is hard to discuss the whole of the oil problem, since it is an international problem, without reference to foreign affairs and overall strategy.
Mr. Ellis Smith: That proves that in order to plan a speech correctly, one must take an international approach to the problem.
Mr. Erroll: The difficulty is ours rather than the Chairman's. I was interested also to observe a junior Minister referring so much to the shortages of oil resulting
2020
from the exceptional demands of the United States. We have always been told by this Government of planners that shortages and similar troubles could be avoided by wise planning and that the fault of the Tory Government between the wars was that we did not plan and we did not know what was happening. Before the war, however, there was no shortage of oil—we always had the necessary supplies—nor was there any shortage during the war. Only since the war—since the advent of the Government of planners—have these distressing shortages arisen. I would like to see the planners taking responsibility for their own errors of planning and admitting their mistake instead of blaming the United States as they usually do. The signs were there to be seen if only they had been looking for them.
Not only in the domestic field was the difficulty apparent. If, for example, they had looked at the problem of oil bunkering for ships, they could have seen an unmistakeable barometer pointing to an increasing shortage of oil. The bunkering position became extremely acute a year ago and we are still without any policy or plan from the Government as to the future position of oil supplies for ships. Although the barometer was set at the danger sign a year ago, the Government continued with its schemes for coal to oil conversion. That has been a sorry story and shows up the myth of planning, even in the domestic field, for what it is worth.
Earlier speakers have referred to some of the disappointments and frustrations experienced by manufacturers. The great folly of the Government in the coal to oil conversion programme was to advocate so much oil being used purely for its heating value and not for improving the efficiency of the plant in which the oil was burned. We saw the panic conversion of steam locomotives, which were known to be inefficient consumers of oil fuel. Incidentally, the railway companies which were about to be nationalised displayed a remarkable resistance to the edicts from the Ministry. Perhaps the Minister could say how many of the 1,300 locomotives which were planned for conversion have been in fact converted to the burning of oil fuel?
Not content with burning up large quantities of fuel oil in a way which would

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release only its heating or thermal value, the Ministry decided to encourage power stations in the consumption of oil fuel. The power station at Neasden is now burning this fuel, which could be much better employed on other purposes such as steel furnaces and the like. We are still awaiting a decision about the Bankside power station on the Thames. One reason why that scheme went through in the face of fierce opposition was that the Minister gave an assurance that it would consume oil fuel and thus there would be no danger of sulphur or smoke to the fabric of St. Paul's Cathedral across the river. Does that policy still hold good? Can the Minister, with so much bitter experience of late, still guarantee oil fuel for the Bankside power station?
There is unfortunately a tendency for us to imagine that supplies of petroleum will soon catch up with world demands. We should be taking a very complacent view if we thought that, because not only have we a great demand in connection with the uses for which petroleum is already widely known, such as motor transport and air transport, but we have a whole range of new uses which will press their claims for a share of the oil products of the oilfields of the world. To begin with, we now have jet-propelled aircraft making a new demand, although it is not necessarily for fuel of the highest range. Nevertheless, it is a demand in such large quantities that it may well upset the balanced programme of refineries in different parts of the world. There is also a great programme afoot for the mechanisation of agriculture, with which I am in entire agreement. The Ferguson tractor is being pushed strongly in connection with this programme at the present time, because it is light and handy, and uses petrol the farmer can easily get; it does not require paraffin to start it or heavy oil which is not used in connection with other agricultural equipment. This is a demand which is not only taking place in this country but throughout the world.
There is also the change-over to oil-firing in steel works, both in this country and in America, and shortly to be followed, I understand, in certain of the Dominions. All will make a tremendous demand on what is only a residue of the oil refineries, namely, viscous fuel oil. Reference has been made to the new developments we are witnessing, of new
2022
industries, such as the chemicals—from oil—industry, which will produce much-needed and valuable chemicals. These will obviously require oil or its by-products as part of their raw material. It is very questionable whether oil supplies can hope to catch up in the next decade with the ever-growing demands for the whole range of petroleum products.
It is against this background that we must envisage the steps the Government propose to take to enlarge our oil supplies. It is disappointing to learn that oilfield requirements of steel must be set off against the demands of other users of steel. At the present time, there is an overwhelming case for an absolute priority in steel for oil. It is far more important to put steel into an oilfield than to supply motor cars to, say, Portugal where they can only increase the demand for oil; whereas steel sent to the oilfields will increase the supply of oil from which all else flows. Referring to the overwhelming importance of steel in connection with oil supplies, the Parliamentary Secretary on 6th April said:
"The allocation of steel for the expansion of British oil company projects is probably one of the most productive uses to which steel can be put for the long-term export assets."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th April, 1948; Vol. 449, c. 136.]
In view of what the Minister said, an overwhelming case exists for giving the oilfields and the refineries all the steel they require, even if other users have to go short.
If only we can get ahead with our exploitation of the Middle East fields and the home refineries in the next two or three years, we shall be in a stronger position vis-à-vis America when it comes to exporting our own oil products. It is interesting to learn that the Government have sanctioned a U.K. refinery programme, and that some £95 million is to be set aside for this purpose according to the Economic Survey of 1948. I hope that this programme will go forward with rapidity. I know there are formidable arguments against U.K. refining, and they certainly had considerable weight before the war; but times have changed and the strategic balance has altered. The hon. Member for West Coventry (Mr. Edelman) spoke of the Middle East as now being the strategic centre for supplies, but he will probably agree that the centre is still nearer the Caribbean and is likely to

2023
remain there rather than in the Middle East. We do not want to pay too much attention to the old Falmouth Report. We must have U.K. refining, and much more than is envisaged in the White Paper. American estimates show that the capital cost of refinery plant works out at about 1,000 dollars per daily barrel. It will be seen, therefore, that to spend only £95 million on capital equipment for British oil refineries is far from adequate, if we project ourselves five or 10 years ahead.
It is important to go ahead with U.K. refining and to make sure that our plans are properly dovetailed into the American plans. The Middle East oil, which it is largely intended to use in British refineries, does not by any means yield the whole of the products we require. There must be an inter-supply of products between this country and America. We must send to America those products which our domestic refineries can most readily produce, and America must be able to send us hers. The Middle East oil, which the Marshall Plan envisages shall be made over to us, is deficient in certain most important respects, and is lacking in some of the middle elements which are most valuable today. The fuel oil itself is rather too viscous for satisfactory use. I hope that the Minister of Fuel and Power will not forget the importance of interlocking our developments with those in America, and will not pursue an isolated policy for the United Kingdom.
That does not mean to say that we should leave out of consideration the importance of refining in the Middle East. In this connection, it is deplorable to find that the Minister of Fuel and Power has made so little provision for the great losses which will be entailed as a result of the Haifa refinery being out of action so long this year. It is no mean loss at the present time. We must ensure, in developing our new Middle East refineries, that they are not too vulnerable strategically. If we are to secure the maximum and most rapid development, we must at all cost secure the full co-operation of America. I fear that the Minister may be too engrossed in petrol rationing schemes and in organising scarcity. I ask him to take his nose out of the private motorist's petrol tank and to look at the bigger field of international oil supplies for the next ten years. He should realise
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how essential it is that our companies, with his guidance, encouragement and approval, should plan their developments in company with the American oil companies and, where necessary, he should ensure that the Treasury do not adopt a mean view about dollars for those oils, which it is not really economic to refine in this country. We do not want the Treasury to have one policy and the Minister to have another.
There is, of course, the problem of protecting our sources of oil supply, and the Minister of Fuel and Power must have a word with the Minister of Defence on this most important matter. I hope that the Minister will allow full scope for the development of our oil industry in an international way, so that if Haifa is out of action supplies can be properly planned and allocated as between one country and another, and so that refineries can plan with a reasonable assumption of freedom of trade between the different classes of user countries. Finally, I hope that there will always be room for the small company to enter this industry, and that it will not be so organised and so technical that only the largest companies can have an effective say in the future of this industry.
6.42 p.m.
Mr. Solley: This Debate has travelled far and wide; indeed, at one stage my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke (Mr. Ellis Smith) anticipated the next Debate on Foreign Affairs. It is natural that this Debate should be fairly wide, because we are dealing with an industry which has a complex world structure and international political implications. I feel it unfortunate, therefore, that no reference has yet been made to the distribution side of the petroleum industry in this country and to the decision of the Government to dissolve the Petroleum Board. This is a matter of some substance for my constituency includes Thameshaven and Shellhaven, where we have probably one of the largest oil centres in this country.
About a year ago I was invited to attend an important meeting of petroleum workers in my constituency, at which they put to me, in no uncertain language, the proposition that the dissolution of the Petroleum Board would be a retrogressive step. They said that it was desirable, in spite of the obvious difficulties facing

2025
the Government, that this Board, formed as it was for the purposes of the war, should fulfil in peace-time the function of being a stepping stone towards the socialisation of the petroleum distribution industry in this country. I do not think I am giving away any confidence when I say that trade union representations were made to the former Minister, and that in spite of what has happened the case of the trade unions concerned is by no means a negligible one; indeed, the Minister has recommended that when the Petroleum Board goes on 30th June, there shall be no re-introduction of branded products for at least six months.
The position in six months' time may be no better than it is at the moment. Indeed, from what the Parliamentary Secretary said, the world oil position will probably be more difficult than it is now. The Government are feeling some diffidence about this dissolution and they express that diffidence in the phrase to which I have referred, in which they state that there shall be no introduction of branded products for at least six months. I could understand the dissolution of the Petroleum Board at a time when there were ample supplies of petrol and petroleum products and when there was room within the capitalist framework of society for the competitive system which existed before the war, when high-powered salesmanship was invoked to assist the motorist in choosing one brand of petrol rather than another. The position today precludes the possibility of any such effective commercial competition.
I would like to give the Committee figures which add to what the Parliamentary Secretary said about the present world position and which will, I hope better illustrate the point which I am trying to make. The world's crude oil production in 1947 was more than 50 per cent. up over the tonnage of 1938. As against that, the increase in the estimated United Kingdom total consumption for this year will be an increase of about 55 per cent. over that of 1938. In other words, although the production is going up, user in this country and throughout the world is increasing at a greater speed. Over and above that, there have been striking changes in the pattern of oil consumption. Some of those changes are in sharp contrast. For example, the most spectacular increase has been in respect
2026
of fuel, diesel and gas oils. The 1948 demand in this country has more than trebled the demand in 1938.
It cannot therefore be argued that in six months' time there will be sufficient petroleum available in this country to enable the various petroleum companies to embark once again on their pre-war competitive system of high-powered salesmanship. I ask my right hon. Friend whether he can hold out any hope of reconsideration of this decision, or of the introduction in the not too distant future of legislation to enable the Government themselves to take over the functions which were voluntarily carried out during the war by the Petroleum Board, and which could be used as a stepping stone towards the complete socialisation of the petroleum industry in this country.
Reference has been made to the world shortage of refining capacity. Of all the impediments to production in the petroleum industry, lack of refining capacity is the most serious. I therefore welcomed the Government's announcement in December last of the allocation of £95 million for the construction of new refineries in the United Kingdom, especially as the Shell group are to build two complete refineries, one at Thornton and one in my constituency, with a total capacity when in full operation of something like six million tons annually. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke, however, I cannot believe that the allocation in respect to the construction of new refineries is sufficient. I hope that the Government will look again at their allocation of steel and of capital expenditure in connection with this matter, to see whether they can permit a further construction of refineries.
The importance of constructing refineries in this country cannot be overestimated. Very shortly Western Europe, including the United Kingdom, will have to rely to a very substantial extent upon supplies from the Middle East. Unlike hon. Members opposite, I have never given up hope of concord between this country, Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union whereby there would be brought into the pool of oil supplies for this country and Western Europe some of the very substantial reserves available in the Soviet Union and in Eastern Europe. In October last when I visited the Ploesti oil wells

2027
in Roumania, I was much impressed by the desire of the Roumanian personnel to rehabilitate their industry. I hope that it will not be found impossible by His Majesty's Government to bear in mind the importance of the oil industry, not merely of the Middle East but of Eastern Europe, when they are considering the future oil supplies of this country.
The heavy increase in the overall demand for petroleum products has created larger and better local markets, as a result of which the construction of refineries has become an economic proposition in this country. Speaking with particular knowledge of the conditions in East Tilbury in my constituency, I hope that the Government will tell me whether recent developments in the economic field will have a deleterious effect upon the rapidity of construction of the refineries there, when they expect that the refineries will be completed and whether they are satisfied that there is ample co-operation between the housing authorities and the Ministry of Fuel and Power in building the necessary houses for workers side by side with the construction of factories and refineries.
I would like to refer to the very important question of the tanker fleets of this country and of the United States. This is a matter of intimate interest and importance to my constituency. I am not suggesting that the Port of London is a suitable place for the wholesale construction of tanker fleets. But if we are to have large scale construction of tanker fleets in this country the consequence for Tilbury will be that there will be available more shipping repairs for the port. I was by no means certain that the Parliamentary Secretary was sufficiently aware of the tanker position. I should like to give the Committee figures which will establish the fact that we have lost our grip on the world market, a fact which affects in turn our present and future sources of dollar earnings. In August, 1939, we and the United States had an almost equal amount of tanker tonnage. The United States had 4,434 thousand deadweight tons, as against our own 4,704 thousand deadweight tons. On 31st December, 1947, the corresponding figures were: United States, 10,858 thousand deadweight tons; we had under the half of that, 5,139 thousand deadweight tons. In 1939, we and the United
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States had an equal interest in the tanker fleets of the world. Today the United States has twice the interest that we have. In 1951, when, as has already been stated, we expect an increase of some 1,030 thousand deadweight tons, assuming that the United States of America has a corresponding increase—an assumption which is warranted—the United States will then still have twice the amount possessed by us.
I would like to ask my right hon. Friend whether the Marshall Plan is imposing any condition in relation to the construction of tanker fleets in this country. Are any conditions being laid down to limit the construction of tanker fleets in this country? I believe that the figure 1,030 given by the Parliamentary Secretary is not sufficient. I would have liked to see a more substantial increase in our tonnage for 1951, when we ought to have recovered our prewar position, that is to say, achieved a fleet equal to that of the United States. I am quite aware of the serious difficulties of the Government in relation to steel, manpower and the necessity of channelling the larger part of our industry into the export field. But the tanker and the refining industries are substantial earners of dollars. If the Government can see their way to increasing our tanker fleet above the numbers already mentioned and to giving a greater allocation of steel for the contruction of refineries, they will be doing a great service to this country in terms both of immediate and of future dollar earnings.
6.59 p.m.
Mr. Bowen: I once heard a man of great experience in the oil industry and oilfields give this advice: "If you don't strike oil in the first 10 minutes, stop boring." I want to bear that advice in mind now when I address a few remarks to the Committee. The right hon. Gentleman said at the beginning of last month that there was a very acute oil shortage throughout the world and that the situation would certainly continue for the next three or four years. Almost everybody who has spoken today has emphasised the same point. One thing which is clear is that that situation is not due to the world being short of natural resources of oil or to under-production compared with prewar years. It is due to the almost phenomenal increase in the demand for oil in many and varied

2029
forms. This factor creates serious and acute problems for the world as a whole and for this country in particular.
The increased demand throughout the world is really a welcome sign. It is associated with industrial and economic development. It is directly associated with an increase in the standard of living throughout the world, and as one who represent an agricultural constituency I would say that one factor contributing towards this increased demand is the new and ever increasing requirements in the field of agriculture for oil for various purposes. So, while one may feel a little apprehensive about the shortage and the fact that it is likely to continue for some time, the grounds which give rise to the shortage hould be a source of satisfaction to all of us. That is why I failed to apreciate the observations of the hon. Member for AltrinCham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) when he appeared to express delight at the fact that before the war there was no shortage of oil. The sole reason for that was the lack of demand, and the lack of demand was in some measure an indication of the social and economic development which was going on at that time.
All that I would say in regard to present tendencies is that so far as the world production of oil is concerned, it would appear, from the interesting figures which the Parliamentary Secretary has given us, that the world production of crude oil has almost doubled since 1938. The unfortunate factor is that the increase in production of crude oil has not kept pace with the increase in world demand. So far as this country is concerned—I hope I have analysed the statistics correctly—there has been an increase in demand of almost 50 per cent, since 1938, and clearly the extent of the demand in this country is determined by national policy. The real demand, represented by the needs of the people, if there was freedom to purchase and supplies were readily available, would be far greater than the 50 per cent. increase over 1938 which we have reached today.
The Parliamentary Secretary gave us a large amount of most interesting data, and all the information he gave us tended to illustrate the gravity of the problem. Very little of the information he gave us related to the steps taken by His Majesty's Government towards seeing that
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we make an adequate contribution towards the solution of that world problem. Our situation is particularly serious because the shortage of oil fuel is more particularly marked in the sphere of motor spirit than in any other, and also because of the fact that we have additional difficulties that arise out of the balance of payments problem.
The difficulty in connection with the world situation arises out of storage, refining and transportation difficulties and I should have appreciated the speech of the Parliamentary Secretary far more if he had given us much more detail about our contribution as a nation towards overcoming those difficulties. We have heard very little as to what is happening in regard to Haifa, and as to extensions of pipe lines. Reference has been made to the question of the steel allocation for refineries. I would have liked to have had far more specific information upon that matter. In regard to shipping we were told, and I certainly welcomed this fact as a matter in which we can take particular pride, that we have a greater tonnage of tankers than we had before the war, despite the fact that we lost almost three million tons of our tanker fleet during the war. I gather that in 1947 something like 60 per cent. of the shipping tonnage constructed in this country was devoted to tankers. What is the future policy in that respect? Is the steel allocation for the building of tankers to be increased, or what is the position? The Parliamentary Secretary left us rather in the air about that matter.
I feel that our problem in this country in relation to oil, particularly in regard to motor spirit, should be looked upon not as a national problem, but more particularly as a sterling area problem. People in this country strongly suspect that we as a nation are suffering and are called upon to make far greater contributions in hardships and irritations than the other members of the sterling area. As one who has just returned from abroad after having been in other parts of the sterling area my experience indicates that the restrictions and limitations on the ordinary private user of motor fuel are certainly more severe in this country than in many other parts of the sterling area. That has given rise to a genuine sense of grievance on the part of the British motoring public.

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That brings me to the only other topic upon which I wish to touch, namely, the position relating to the changes which are contemplated in the near future. I wish to associate myself with what the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Pembroke (Major Lloyd George) had to say about public reactions in this matter, and particularly public reactions in the rural areas. Whatever may be the position in the industrial areas, members of the public in the rural areas cannot understand why the problem is being treated in the way in which it is being treated. Rightly or wrongly, they do not think that what they are being asked to do is reasonable and proper.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: It is not reasonable and proper.
Mr. Bowen: The right hon. Gentleman says that it is not reasonable and proper, and I respectfully agree. Reference has been made to the black market. A large part of the black market is due to the fact that the public do not appreciate that this is really a matter of honour and common decency. Rightly or wrongly, I think in some measure rightly, they think that Government policy in this respect is a stupid and foolish policy. That has, in some measure, given rise to the black market.
I appreciate that in considering the question of motor fuel for the ordinary private user one has to face the problem or the desire to save all possible dollars. I feel that in comparing the amount of dollars which have been saved, particularly now by the policy in regard to "E" and "S" coupon users, with the amount of hardship, irritation and friction which have been created, the amount of dollars is far more than counter-balanced by this policy. I often think that the Government do not really appreciate how acute the problem is in rural areas. In my constituency public transport services are limited. Most of the districts have no rail services and there are extremely limited bus services. The amount of time wasted and the physical hardship to which these petrol restrictions have given rise are not, I feel, appreciated by the Government. To my mind the amount of saving in dollars by this stringent application cannot be justified.
I do feel that the abolition of the basic ration itself was a very big step. There
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is the added factor of a purely sociological character. In common with all other Members of this House I am inundated with comments and complaints relating to the way in which applications for petrol have been entertained and received. As far as the personal attention of the regional petroleum officers is concerned, I have no cause for complaint. Wherever matters have been dealt with personally by the petroleum officer I find that they have been dealt with sympathetically but that is certainly not true of the ordinary day to day application which simply goes through the routine machine. There one begins to get all sorts of anomalies. One has people in identical circumstances where one is refused petrol and another is given it.
Again one finds people being given petrol for reasons which are extremely difficult for other people to understand and other people are refused on what appear to be quite inadequate grounds. That has given rise in villages and towns to considerable friction, friction in so far as the Government and individual is concerned, and friction and unhappiness as between one section of the community and another. I get hosts of letters saying "so and so has petrol, why cannot I get it?" All that sort of thing is creating an unhealthy and unwholesome state of affairs and if anything can be done to reduce that feeling it ought to be done.
I do hope that the Minister when he comes to wind up tonight will give us further and better information relating to the efforts of the Government to see that this country makes its full contribution towards an increase in the facilities for refining, storage, and transportation of oil. I would also like him to deal further with the criticisms with regard to the "E" and "S" coupons users. I do feel that what the Parliamentary Secretary had to say about them was highly unsatisfactory. Surely what he said was only an incitement to the "E" and "S" holders to abuse the rights which they have at the moment? Surely he is inviting them to use their petrol for purposes other than those for which it was acquired, and that is precisely what will happen. It is bad for the rest of the community and bad for these people.
7.15 p.m.
Viscount Hinchingbrooke: I thought I detected in some of the speeches of the hon. Members opposite besides other petroleum products, traces of midnight oil. It was evident that some of them had carried through their prepared but undelivered speeches from last week's Debate on foreign affairs. I have listened to the hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. Ellis Smith) for six to seven years now, and much as I appreciate his cosmic planning speeches directed against World War Five, I never feel that they impinge on the more mundane topics with which the House is concerned from time to time. Perhaps the best thing that can be said of his speech is that it successfully poured oil on troubled water in Teheran, Ethiopia and the Middle East.
The hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Solley) deplored the fact that the Petroleum Board was being split up into its constituent parts. I should be correct in saying that we on this side are unanimous in our view that that is the only wise thing the Government have done on oil since they came into power. They could do nothing else, for they have no further power to retain the Petroleum Board. I quite appreciate that the trade unions are objecting. The trade union movement is particularly concerned with passengers in industry, and quite obviously when the Petroleum Board breaks up the units will again begin to compete in order to serve the public faithfully and well and will have no room for passengers in their midst.
I would like to ask the Government a number of questions with regard to the overseas oil position. I think we should get this Marshall programme aspect square. It is quite clear that we are earning dollars through the sale of sterling oil to the United States and other dollar countries. I should like a definite statement from the Government as to whether any provision has been made under the Marshall Aid programme to divert a proportion, not necessarily of American oil, within the programme to satisfy the immediate needs of this country. My right hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) stated that we were sending oil to the Empire and to the Far East. He also clearly told us that Denmark, Egypt, Ceylon and some other countries are not suffering any rationing of oil, and I would like to get the Govern-
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ment to tell us exactly what is the position of Britain relative to all those other countries. Is it generally the same as in food and other subjects that we, being one of the great victorious powers in the war, are unable to get things that all other countries can get, with the exception of our defeated enemies, Germany, Italy and Japan? I fully agree that world demand is increasing. Why is our share of that demand not more effective? Why is our share not positively increased?
I am glad to see the Parliamentary Secretary has returned to the Committee. I have no wish to be discourteous and I know it is not the first occasion upon which he has spoken to the House, but I suffered at the end of his speech from a quite extraordinary feeling of frustration. It was a speech in very simple language rather like that of a father advising his children what to do over the tea table, but his simplicity of language did not lead to lucidity or understanding. We had explanations of certain difficulties; we had excuses; we had one alibi, to use a modern term; and we had one complete blank. Nowhere was there any sign of intention, drive, enterprise or policy, and I hope that we shall get that later in the evening from the Minister of Fuel and Power. We had an alibi about the first world war having dislocated petroleum resources. Was it not true that British oil production was built up successfully in the intervening years between the wars, and is it not also true that when the tanks were roaring into France and the aeroplanes crowding above we had plenty of oil?
Why after three years of Socialism are we so lowly rationed? We had excuses. We had the excuse that the low prewar consumption in the rest of the world was due to its poverty, and the gloss which the Parliamentary Secretary put upon that, that somehow it was due to the British Governments of the time. Let me examine that argument. What is the corollary to it? It is that the present Government, by raising overseas prosperity, is depressing the home market for petrol consumption. Where does that lead us? Nowhere at all. Then we had the blank about the difficulties of refining due to steel shortage, and the refusal of the Minister to give any figures to the Committee. We then had two confusing explanations. On the tanker situation the Minister went so far as to say that

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there was no prospective shortage and yet, at the end of his dissertation on that point, he said that in 1951 there would be a world deficit of 100 tankers. I hope we shall get a further explanation of that discrepancy. His second confusing explanation was on the coal-oil conversion programme. First we had no coal, so the Government went in for oil. Then oil became scarce and the prospects for coal were better, so we went in for coal. Now some people tell us that in a few years time there will be plenty of coal, and the Minister says that the oil imports are more assured, and that therefore the coal-oil conversion programme is to go forward. If this is not order and counter order leading to disorder, to which my right hon. Friend referred, I do not know what it is.
We have not had an adequate explanation about the situation in Haifa. Of course we could hardly expect anything else from the Government. The Foreign Secretary's total absence of regard for economic strategy has landed us in a situation where one of the most valuable refineries in the world is now sterile. What does the loss of Haifa mean to the Middle East? I think my right hon. Friend said that it was £4 million a year. Will the Minister confirm that? Is the estimate true that it is equivalent to one half of the annual United Kingdom consumption of both fuel oil and motor spirit? How do the Government propose to make good the loss of Haifa to the Middle East and to other British countries? Is there not a moral case for asking the United States to do something? The share of the responsibility of the United States for the situation which has developed in Palestine is almost as grave as that of the Government of this country, and the United States is morally bound to make some contribution, not only for strategic reasons in the Middle East, but also to satisfy the needs of vast masses of people throughout that area out of her oil resources.
What have we been told today? That the United States petrol consumption is running at 500 gallons per head, which is six and a half times that of the people of this country, and my right hon. Friend told us that it is more than the entire world consumption in 1938. What sort of language is the Minister of Fuel and Power using to the United States? He made a speech the other day at the dinner of the
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Association of Engineers at which he said:
"If the United States demand goes up like that, it knocks the rest of the world sideways.… We must face up to a difficult time in oil in the next few years."
That is not facing up, that is taking it lying down. And the speech we had today was on exactly the same lines.
I would like to pass to the home situation and I have a small question to ask on home production. There is a large creosote hydrogenisation plant at Gillingham belonging to I.C.I. Is it the fault of private enterprise or lack of opportunities given by this Government that they are producing now only at half the wartime peak? Surely that is another example of lack of foresight and proper planning by this Government.
In conclusion, I offer some observations to the Committee on the subject of home consumption and rationing. Briefly, I favour a progressive abandonment of rationing and a progressive application of the price mechanism to petrol. There are two advantages to the price mechanism. Higher prices sift demand in a much fairer way than do arbitrary schemes of licensing by the Government. Furthermore, higher prices stimulate production far beyond the possibility of mere Government bulk-buying at fixed prices. On the production side, I would like to return to the price system, but of course it would require the freeing of the foreign exchange position. It would be a complicated matter, but an attempt should be made now, even by this Government, to get away from overseas bulk purchase and let the price that the consumer pays reflect itself right back in the wages of the technician at Abadan. Unless we get that situation we shall never get healthy enterprise and drive in production.
On the consumption side I would like to see the price of petrol rise by 2s. or 3s. a gallon and become known to every person as the financial luxury which we in this House know it to be from the point of view of the would economic situation. Hon. Member opposite will say at once that if that were to happen, only the rich would get the petrol. That is not true to the extent that the less wealthy members of the community would save to expend petrol on summer holidays, on necessary travelling, and so on. However, I am prepared for the general accusation which I know hon. Members will make, and I am ready to answer it by

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saying that, by and large, with exceptions—I have a favourite exception of my own, a Brazilian diamond magnate who lives in two rooms at the Savoy Hotel—wealth is a better test of social and economic value than anything else.
Mr. Gallacher: You are a test.
Viscount Hinchingbrooke: At present far too many people who ought to have petrol in this country are not getting it, and far too many people who ought not to have petrol are getting it. Who are the people who are getting it? They are the friends of bureaucracy—
Mr. Nally: Does that include the bookmakers?
Viscount Hinchingbrooke:—clerkly people of dim social and economic importance—
Mr. Gallacher: What about you?
Viscount Hinchingbrooke:—with responsibilities well beyond their worth, people, as Mr. Edmund Burke described them:
"Of low education and a mean contracted view of things."
They are getting the petrol. But who else is getting petrol? The friends of Socialism. It is going to the fleets of private cars in central Government pools and depots and is at the disposal of P.R.Os. and other personages on boards of nationalised industries. Petrol rationing was started in the war as a measure of fair play and equalisation, but it is now being used, as all rationing schemes are used after a time, to facilitate the way of life of the rulers and their friends.
Mr. Gallacher: That is the old game you played for long enough.
Viscount Hinchingbrooke: I am glad the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) admits that he would readily transfer privilege from the old order to a new order dominated by himself.
Mr. Gallacher: The noble Lord will have a job in a foundry.
Viscount Hinchingbrooke: I make three charges against the Government. I charge them with lack of foresight in conserving and fostering overseas petrol supplies; secondly, with maintaining scarcity at home and in the sterling area by adhering to methods of bulk purchase and distribution—
Mr. Gallacher: I do not think the noble Lord likes the Government.
Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Nor does the hon. Member for West Fife. Thirdly, I charge the Government with maintaining rationing, not for the purpose of fair shares which I believe should be weighted by considerations of civic responsibility, duty and importance, but for the purpose of advancing the interest, opportunities and scope of the practitioners and disciples of the Socialist Party.
7.14 p.m.
Mr. Pryde: The position of fuel oil must cause everyone a great deal of anxiety. If we look to the West we find this country is at the mercy of the dollar, and if we look to the East we find we are at the mercy of Arabian sheiks. In wartime we are a splendid target for an enemy. It would be quite easy to criticise and say that hon. Members opposite are responsible for that position, but I doubt if it is possible at the moment for any individual in this country, no matter how well equipped, to come forward and give us a quick way out of our difficulties.
However, we can always look to the future. Forty years ago there was a very prosperous industry in the Northland. Then came the cartels, and it disappeared. The district I have in mind is the Lothian district of Scotland. I want this Government to do something for themselves. It is only by doing something for themselves that they can justify themselves in the eyes of the people. Previous Governments have always failed. During the war the Germans showed what could be done in regard to low temperature carbonisation of coal. In the county of Midlothian where, 700 years ago, the first charter was granted for the mining of coal, there are 40 high grade seams of coal crying out to be exploited. On the West bank of the River Esk there are 20 seams, on the East bank of the South Esk there are 14 seams, while between there are six seams, all of the highest quality coal. On the East bank of the Esk, 40 years ago, coal was produced on which the City of London depended. It came from the Parret seam which commanded a price of £2 10s. a ton. It was taken to Leith and shipped to London by cargo boats.
In West Lothian, and in the Western portion of Midlothian, there are high grade

2039
seams of the very finest oil shale. It might be said that that part of the country is very vulnerable in case of war if refineries were set up, but I suggest that invulnerable refineries might be built into the Pentlands. The Germans showed what could be done in that way during the war and one of the great difficulties was to demolish some of the German reinforced concrete establishments. Oil from such refineries would not be so vulnerable as that brought across the sea. In Midlothian there are the Drumgray and Torbane Hill seams from which the highest octane spirit can be made.
I suggest to the Ministry that they should take the risk and spend money on such a project. They would get the men if inducements are held out to them. Labour can always be got for industries in which the highest price is paid. I suggest that we do that now. If we do it now in a few years' time we will be almost independent of foreign supplies. I do not say that we shall be entirely independent of foreign supplies, but to a great extent we shall be independent if we concentrate on low temperature carbonisation of coal. We have the quality in the Lothians, and we have the men to get it. We certainly require the houses for the labour which we have at our disposal in Scotland.
I ask the Minister to take his courage into both hands and foster this industry in Scotland which held out so much promise 40 years ago, and which in the County of Midlothian is typified by a few broken-down houses where miners live. We have the potentialities in our country and I hope the Minister will take his courage into both hands and concentrate on this, because God helps those who help themselves.
7.40 p.m.
Mr. Dodds-Parker: I am sure it is quite coincidental that the hon. Member for Midlothian and Peebles, Southern (Mr. Pryde) and I should be speaking on the same point, the question of getting oil supplies from coal. Obviously it is increasingly dangerous as time goes on for an hon. Member to try to bring up the question of cartels. I believe the hon. Member said that works were shut down as the result of cartels. If he looks further he will see that the National Coal Board are at this very
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moment doing the same thing: and that is a monopoly which he supports. Unless he and his hon. Friends are more careful, they will find they are fouling their own nest. One other point that I wish to bring to the notice of the Parliamentary Secretary is the double injury that is being done to holders of "E" and "S" coupons. It is not just the physical damage of stopping them from getting on with their own business, it is the fact that they appear to be regarded by this Government as crooks and cheats, and are treated as such. If the Parliamentary Secretary has not had the time to find this out I wish he would make inquiries, on his own side of the House, and discover for himself. The way the Government have treated "E" and "S" coupon holders has done more to annoy people, particularly in the rural areas, I believe, than any of their other activities.
If planning means anything there should have been overall planning in the last three years particularly regarding the improvement of food. No doubt many hon. Members saw the statement made by Sir John Boyd-Orr recently on his return from America. That is the sort of planning that His Majesty's Government should undertake, if overall planning means anything. I believe that same sort of planning should be undertaken as regards fuel. In the 19th century we were liberal, to the point of prodigality with our own and Nature's resources. In this phase of transient Socialism through which the world is passing, we are being liberal to the point of prodigality with the resources of other people. That will not go on. We are reaching a state where fuel supplies throughout the world are getting short. We might do something about hydro-electric power but the point I am interested in is the production of oil from coal.
In the United Kingdom most of our oil comes from overseas. We require in Britain an increasing amount of oil, not just for pleasure motoring, but for commerce and particularly for agriculture. That applies not only to the United Kingdom but overseas where there are great plans for mechanised agriculture, in Australia and Africa and elsewhere. We are becoming more and more dependent on supplies of fuel oil.
A point which may be raised under Class VI, Vote 18, is the question of

2041
research. I do not know if the Minister will be able to say anything about the new fuels upon which research is being carried out. Jet engines require a particular sort of fuel, and are extravagant in the use of it. I do not know whether under that Vote he will be able to say anything about the geological survey not only in this country, but overseas. This is, in my submission, fundamental planning of the sort which any Government should be undertaking, more than day to day details of the administration of actual production when it has reached that stage. The hon. Member for Midlothian and Peebles, Southern, raised the issue of oil from shale. It is not only oil from shale in this country in which I am interested, but oil from coal.
I realise that it is an expensive process but the Germans made considerable use of it during the war. The Fischer-Tropsch process is alleged to be the most up-to-date in the world. But I am also credibly informed that there are other firms in this country, great chemical and engineering firms, which have processes with a higher degree of perfection for extracting oil from coal. I was reading recently of plans in the United States of America involving an expenditure of 9,000 million dollars in producing oil from coal. There is in the United States of America, in sight at the moment, oil sufficient for 12 years at the present rate of consumption, and coal, at the present rate of consumption, for 3,000 years. This is the projected development in America, a country which is blissfully free from the present British type of so-called planning, and which has a Government which is doing what we consider to be the proper function of a Government—encouraging those most suited to do the job to get on with it, and to produce such important requirements as oil. I would ask the Parliamentary Secretary to tell the House what is being done about the production of oil from coal in the United Kingdom and overseas.
In regard to overseas production, I am thinking in particular of Northern Queensland where, with the help of private enterprise, coal firms which were ejected from this country, great development is now going on: where coal, I am told, can be put on board ship at the Queensland ports at 10s. 6d. a ton. Would it not be pos-
2042
sible for factories and distillation plant to be erected there to produce oil from coal? I believe, again, that projects for development in parts of Southern Africa are at the moment under consideration by the Paymaster-General. I hope that among his recommendations there will be a definite project that there shall be oil-from-coal distillation plants set up there, not only in the Union, which is outside the purview of this honourable House, but in Tanganyika, where there is coal of suitable quality for distillation, and at Wankie, which is in a self-governing colony and therefore may not come entirely in the purview of this honourable House. I would put it to the Government that that is an essential area which is now destitute of oil supplies, and where a plan for the production of oil from coal would be of the greatest economic advantage. A pipe-line from Wankie, which could take oil either to Northern Rhodesia or down South to the Union, would be a far more immediate practical proposition, in many respects, than attempting to build 600 or 700 miles of railway line to bring coal to the sea.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply could, I think, under Class X, Vote 4, tell us something of the strategic storage of oil fuel which I understand comes under his charge. Most of the points which I have put so far are economic, but I think anyone who looks at the map, and at these projects for producing oil from coal, will realise that they would be a great strategic reserve in the event of another war, to keep these areas where oil is produced from coal far away from the likely centres of immediate destruction. It would be of inestimable value to the world as a whole.
I do not know if the Parliamentary Secretary is in a position to say whether the Colonial Development Corporation could be brought in to assist in such a project as the one at Wankie which I have suggested. I believe that the Corporation could be of the greatest assistance, because the fuel could be used not only in Southern Rhodesia, but in Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland which are now under the Colonial Office. That is the sort of project, I believe, to help which the Colonial Development Corporation was formed.

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I urge the Minister to consider these points and I ask him to give us some information when he comes to wind up this Debate on the plans of the Government, so that those who are dependent upon an adequate and regular supply of oil in these various territories may be able to make their own plans and get on with the job of production.
Colonel Ponsonby: Before he sits down, would the hon. Member say how many tons of ordinary bituminous coal it takes to make a ton of oil?
Mr. Dodds-Parker: So far as I know, anything between eight and 10 tons, but I am not very certain about this.
7.50 p.m.
Mr. Crossman: We, on this side of the Committee, have been struck by two remarkable agreements among hon. Members of the Opposition. They seem to agree that there has been a grave lack of planning in our oil policy, and they seem, somewhat surprisingly, to believe that one of the healthiest signs in the world has been the outstanding increase in the American demand for oil. I cannot accept that belief.
I regard the view that the increase in the American demand is a healthy one—it really amounts to the world demand—as unfair to the Government. The real reason why planning has been extremely difficult since the war has been the totally uncalculated and incalculable increase in American demand. That is not due to the fruits of private enterprise; it is due to the most wasteful productive system that anybody has ever had—they waste more oil than any other country in the world—and also to the extremely wasteful use of their coal. They have not scientifically planned the use of their power capacity and in some installations they use oil burning when they could satisfactorily use coal burning. They have artificially produced a colossal domestic need far beyond their domestic capacity. As a result, the rest of the world is finding a first-rate political crisis in the Middle East arising out of the American shortage of domestic oil, and America has become, in the last three years, a nett importer of oil.
2044
This is really an incredible fact; a country which owns 50 per cent, of the world's resources has, owing to its wasteful methods of production and its wasteful methods of looking after its power, become a nett importer of oil and has had to go into the Middle East.
Some hon. Members on the other side remarked that there was no oil shortage during the war. It was precisely during the war, when the Americans started doing a little planning, that they discovered that in terms of war they had not enough oil in America and, consequently, the Middle East had to become a vital American interest. This eruption of America into the Middle East, this sudden American demand and interest in oil from the Middle East for domestic use in America, has made it extremely difficult for other countries—which, after all, have a better right and interest in the Middle East—to plan their development and their resources. I suggest that issue must be understood before anybody can talk about criticism of the planning by the Government. Nobody could have foreseen and planned that, because of the chaotic American economy, she would be a domestic importer of oil in 1948; no rational planning could have foreseen that degree of chaos and irrationality.
Turning to Haifa, I was very surprised to hear hon. Members opposite complaining about Haifa and saying that the Foreign Secretary had shown a total disregard in his Palestine policy to the needs of the country. I think that is wholly true, but I am surprised that hon. Gentlemen opposite who, on the whole subject of Palestine have sedulously followed the Foreign Secretary and have refused to criticise the policy of "bag and baggage," should come at this stage and say that they find anything wrong with the Government's policy. It is a queer place in which to find criticism of the Government's policy. We need to hear from the Minister a good deal more information about the situation in Haifa because, after all, Haifa has become, purely in terms of this world oil shortage, of great importance to us and the whole of Europe.
I remember, during the Debate on the Palestine Bill, we were looking gloomily towards a period of chaos and disaster in Palestine. Now it appears that this chaos will not occur. One side has shown itself highly competent in military efficiency so

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as to conquer the area allotted to it, and we can, therefore, look forward with a great deal more confidence from the military point of view to the situation in Haifa in the months to come. There is no chance of it being burned as a city in the course of a civil war; it is securely held and is in the middle of a de facto Jewish State, and the really vital issue which we must have explained is what attitude the Government will take after next Saturday when the State, which will by then have been created by force of arms, is in existence.
Will the Government be willing to change their minds at long last? For years they have said they could not look after our oil supplies except by a certain policy with regard to the Arabs, and that the military requisite of the oilfields was that we should be on the side of the Arabs, because they had some gigantic armies and if we ever came against them on the ground those gigantic armies would sweep us to the seas. But those gigantic armies have not materialised; a smaller, highly efficient Jewish army has materialised, and that army holds Haifa today and is in no danger of losing it in the future.
A few weeks ago we summarily threw Palestine out of the sterling area, despite its potash, its citrus, its oil and the other valuable resources of that country which can no longer be purchased in the sterling area. What are we going to do about the assets of Palestine now that we see a de facto strong and solvent State emerging there? I gather from the Press that we have taken hold of £50 million worth of the assets of the Palestine Government in order to have a hold on the Haifa refineries, whoever holds them after 15th May. That is not a sufficient policy and I hope the Government will recognise the fact, and recognise that the one hope of maintaining oil flowing through Haifa is to negotiate firm and solid treaties of alliance with, on the one side, Abdullah, and, on the other side, the Jewish State—the two forces in the Middle East which have emerged as the dominant partners or strugglers over Palestine. The future of our oil, in fact, depends on the skill of British diplomacy in the next four months.
When we feel depressed about Palestine I would remind the Committee that, in the last stages of the Boer War, this country felt ashamed, depressed and
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indignant, but within a few months, by a supreme act of statesmanship in the creation of the Union of South Africa, steps were taken which guaranteed the assets out there. I believe that statesmanship and conciliation today can guarantee the Haifa refinery and the other assets which are so vital to us in Palestine an3 in the Middle East. I know we cannot expect the Minister of Fuel and Power personally to answer all this, as he is not himself responsible, nor is he able to achieve responsibility over the policy which will in fact determine whether or not we get that oil—whether in fact we recognise the people who have established and proved themselves masters of the situation.
My last observation deals with the home subject of E. and S. coupons, because it probably affects my own constituency more vitally than any other. One person in seven drives a car in Coventry and we probably have a higher percentage of car-owners than any other city. I can assure the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, Southern (Viscount Hinchingbrooke), to whose speech I listened with very great interest, that if he thinks motor driving a luxury only for the rich, he should come to Coventry, where he will find a number of working men who own cars and have owned cars for years; where it has nothing to do with the rich, and where at last we have a civilisation in which the working man feels he has a right to a car as part of the lot of an ordinary civilised human being.
I believe the wealthy, prosperous businessman and hon. Members do not suffer at all under the new standard ration, because we do not work on that. We have no doubt occasionally done some pleasure motoring. Let us be candid about this. The new standard ration is given on the basis of the assumption that everybody has done a little bit of pleasure motoring. It is based on the assumption of a limited percentage of dishonesty. I have been told by the Ministry that only two people out of 10 will not receive any benefit from this ration. I suggest that this question cannot be regarded statistically. Only two out of 10 are small men—not businessmen or Members of Parliament who have a certain margin of petrol—who have been driving strictly on the exact routes given to them and who are now told, "You are to have no pleasure petrol whatsoever," whereas the

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boss, because he has had a certain margin, will be able to enjoy himself.
The Minister has told us that one of his major objects is to break the black market, and that unless we can break the black market this new scheme will not be successful. The way in which to get the public to break the black market is to give them a sense of justice, not only the well off but the small men. We all know that one's business friends have not had a shortage of petrol; they have had considerable latitude. In every case it is the small man who is limited and the big man who is not. We shall now have a sense of disgruntlement among the most honest, the most conscientious and most worthy section of the population. Such people will say that they are hit for being honest, and that if they had been dishonest and had asked for a little more petrol than they needed they would have been better off. Such a man will say, "Just because I asked for exactly what I required for my daily journey to and from work, and not an ounce more, I am going to be penalised for my honesty." That is not the way to create a public opinion to defeat the black market.
It is precisely the small man who will be driven to "fiddling." Will this small man, who is to get no standard ration but who may be getting less petrol and paying more in motor taxation, be encouraged to break the black market when two out of 10 are going to feel a sense of injury and injustice? I put this point to the Minister as strongly as I can, because we do want the black market broken. We want the standard petrol scheme to work, but it will not work unless standard petrol is given to every motorist equally, whether they have had petrol before or not. If the standard ration is given equally to everyone a sense of justice can be created. If the Government discriminate against the little man they will create an inclination to "fiddle" petrol. If two out of 10 are more inclined to "fiddle" petrol by this scheme, that is not the most efficient way to defeat the black market. I ask the Minister to give very serious consideration to that fact.
I have had a great deal to do with this problem of supplementary allowances, because many people in Coventry have written to me. I have been amazed at
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the good temper of the people who have written letters to me on this subject, and who have expressed their desire to help the Minister to break the black market. I must add, however, that there is a deep sense of frustration on the part of those people who are being penalised for having been strictly honest in their applications. They are told, "What you get for being strictly honest is that you will be worse hit than the man who was not honest." I do not know how to answer these letters. It is no good for me to say, "Statistically you are just two out of 10." The reply to that is, "That makes no difference to me." Since the Minister's aim is to break the black market, and since it is into the black market that the leak goes, it might well be an investment to create a sense of justice at the cost of giving more petrol officially rather than having a lot more petrol leaking unofficially because public opinion is outraged by a minor part of this excellent scheme.
I believe the scheme will work. I believe "pink petrol" will work, because we are a law-abiding people. On the other hand, I cannot believe that the small men who have written to me will accept this, as they feel, penalisation of their honesty which the Minister has imposed on them. I beg him to reconsider it at the cost of cutting a lot more from commercial users and farmers. We all know where the petrol is. It flows in the country. We all know the bogus farmer—the chap who is not really a farmer at all but who gets his farming petrol. We all know how the lorries work on the main road. That is where the leak is. The Minister can cut much more off commercial users. I believe he could cut enough off to give everybody an equal standard ration of petrol.
8.6 p.m.
Colonel Lancaster: At this late hour of the Debate I do not wish to cover the ground which hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have covered, and I know the hon. Member for East Coventry (Mr. Crossman) will forgive me if I do not follow him in the able speech and the very useful suggestions that he made on the question of dealing with the black market in petrol.
What I want to deal with is a matter which was referred to by the Parliamentary Secretary in such terms that I

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do not think hon. Members on either side of the Committee were able to obtain the information which they were seeking. That is the question of coal-oil conversion. Hon. Members opposite are at some pains these days to defend the former Minister of Fuel and Power, though I cannot see why they should be so concerned to do so. The former Minister is quite capable and content to dig his own grave at his own pace, and we have on record so much about this matter that any defence of the right hon. Gentleman at this moment seems to be quite pointless. On 6th March, 1947, in answer to a Question about the availability of supplies, the right hon. Gentleman, speaking about the oil requirements of coal-oil conversion said:
"There is no doubt as to an ample supply of fuel oil being available. There is no difficulty in this connection."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th March, 1947; Vol. 434, c. 632–3.]
I do not wish, however, to deal with that aspect of the matter. I would like the Minister when he replies to give some indication of the underlying principle in this matter of coal-oil conversion. We had a most helpful speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) on this question, and he raised a number of pertinent points.
There are one or two other points with which I would like to deal, and I know they are exercising the minds of industrialists up and down the country. Originally, the intention was to carry out a programme involving something in the region of 3 million tons of coal being replaced by 2 million tons of oil. In February, 1947, that was stepped up to about 5 or 6 million tons of oil to take the place of about 10 million tons of coal. So far as I am aware, and certainly during the discussion on the earlier of those two programmes, no clear indication was given of the purpose behind this scheme. Was it purely a short-term scheme to cope with the difficulties occasioned by the shortage of coal, or was it that the Government had come to the conclusion that oil firing as such for steam raising purposes was a sound proposition?
For about 20 years I was a member of the Coal Utilisation Council, and we used to consider this matter in considerable detail. Certainly at that time it had never been shown that the efficiency of oil for steam raising purposes compared favourably with that of coal. For specialised
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purposes, as my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale mentioned, it claimed preference; for use in steel production, metallurgical work, for glass making, and one or two things of that sort, it had a superiority over coal. However, for general purposes the case had not been proved. What I should like the Minister to say tonight is whether it is the considered opinion of the Government now that this scheme of conversion on a fairly big scale from coal to oil is conditioned by the shortage—temporary shortage, we hope—of coal, or whether it is because the Government have come to the conclusion that it is a very effective means of steam raising over a wide field of uses. I can hardly believe that.
The position at the moment is chaotic. All sorts of individual concerns have, as a result of the exhortation of the Government, undertaken conversion. I believe it is a fact that in certain cases their coal requirements are being denied them. We have had a list today of conversions which have occurred; 1,500 have occurred, and some 300 which are about to take place in the near future, and then a further 120. What is the principle behind all this conversion? What has been decided as regards priorities in the matter? Industrialists must know the answers to these questions. It is no good their becoming interested in the matter of oil conversion until they have a clear picture of what is the intention of the Government in regard to it, and what are the factors conditioning the Government's policy, and, indeed, what allocation of the necessary steel is likely in the near future.
The question we have asked is what is the amount of steel to be allocated for this specific purpose? We are not asking tonight for any more information than that, but since at the moment it still appears to be in the forefront of the Government's intention that this general policy of conversion should continue, I think it is only right that the Committee and the country should be told the facts about the amount of steel which would be made available for the purpose, and the amount of plant which can be reasonably be looked to in the near future, and the possibility and probability of oil supplies once the plant has been erected.
In conclusion, I come back to my original question. I think it is essential that at this moment the country should

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have a clear picture of the Government's view of the purposes of this coal oil conversion scheme. Is it merely of a short-term nature to get over our coal difficulties, or is there behind it some long-term intention for general purposes which hitherto has not been generally acceptable by those who are interested in the matter?
8.15 p.m.
Mr. Frederick Lee: I, too, had the honour of being a member of the Parliamentary Delegation which in 1946 went to Southern Persia, and in the few remarks I wish to make tonight I want to confine myself to the conditions which I found in that country. Many hon. Members during the Debate have stressed the necessity of trying in some way to ensure that the mechanisation of industry, which is now seen on a large scale throughout the world, is not stultified, and world production cut down, through inability to obtain the necessary oil supplies. The hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. Ellis Smith) went in some detail into the horrors which can come to the world unless we can solve this problem of getting an equalised supply of oil to all the countries where it is so much required.
I do not propose to go into these technicalities now, except to say that there is one thing which we must attain to secure that goal, and that is the good will of the oil workers in the Middle East, not thinking of them as in some way inferior to ourselves, or as people we can merely use or exploit because of the precious liquid gold which their country contains, and without having regard to the social conditions with which they live. One of the problems which confronted us during our visit there was the fact that during the war, because of the necessity for aviation spirit, the great refinery at Abadan had been almost doubled. Thousands of workers went to Abadan from various parts of Persia. That, in itself, meant a tremendous shortage of housing. What facilities and raw materials were available had to be used to enlarge the refinery at the very time when it was necessary to increase the number of houses in which the workers could live because of the numbers going into Abadan. They had, in fact, to put a stop to the construction altogether.
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In Southern Persia, I could not find a single brick house, a single road, or sewer, or anything at all that had ever been constructed by the Government; the whole of the houses—the towns—had been constructed by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. It is vitally necessary for our own Government to use their powerful influence in Southern Persia to ensure that the workers who produce this oil, no matter by whom it is finally used, shall have a far better consideration, both from us and from their own Government, than they have ever had in the past. There was a lack of consideration from many sources. The idea of negotiation in industry is something new in the Middle East, but I suggest to the Government that the time is now overdue when, in addition to technicians, we must send to the Middle East people versed in the knowledge of negotiations between employers and employed, people who can bring a new spirit into the oil industry of Southern Persia, so that we may ensure, not merely keeping our industry going, but an improvement of the conditions of those workers on whose labour so much depends.
Another of the troubles in that country was that the rial, the currency of Persia, was horribly inflated. I would recommend hon. Gentlemen opposite, when they talk about the necessity of getting rid of controls and restrictions, to take a few weeks in Persia to find out precisely to what dire depths a nation can degenerate when there is no type of control exercised at a time when raw materials and food are in short supply. I believe that in aiding the Persian workers in the way I have asked, much could be done to ensure that increased supplies of oil are obtained, and, what is even more important, increased understanding and good will would ensue because of more enlightened methods.
During the time I was there, the temperature was 120 degrees in the shade. The hon. Member for Bolton (Mr. J. Lewis) and I had good reason to know what the term "Abadan tummy" meant within a few hours of our reaching Southern Persia. In this great enterprise in Persia, it is a pleasure to see the manner in which many people from this country are doing a great job of work. I visited the hospital in Abadan, and I have never felt more proud of British women than when I was privileged to see the way in which those great British women were

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doing their wonderful job in trying to bring health again to broken bodies in the hospitals in Southern Persia. One of the best things which the Government can do in this connection is to ensure that more raw materials, timber and so on, are sent out from Britain for use in the building of more hospitals, schools, etc., in Southern Persia. Those are really the things that matter. The general outlook of the oil worker in Southern Persia is that it is not the job of his own Government to provide him with a house, hospital facilities, and things of that description because they had never known them from their own Government. If we are to increase the supply of oil, and to ensure more permanency in the supply of oil that is the way to tackle it. The amount of time which is lost because of injury which could yield to treatment if first aid facilities were available must be tremendous.
I hope that we shall see, in addition to all its political implications, that it is vitally important to give the workers of Southern Persia a knowledge that we in this country understand their difficulties and will do our utmost to provide them with the things for which they have yearned for so long. The standard of life in Southern Persia is higher under the Anglo-Iranian Company than under any other company there, but even so it is pretty low. I believe that we can ensure greater supplies of oil and a market for our own goods by giving the workers of Southern Persia the ability to enjoy a higher standard of life than they have had before.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House during the Debate have mentioned the possibility of greater refinery capacity both abroad and in this country. I feel that much could be done in the way of providing refinery capacity here especially as we are now facing the position that we are turning crude oil back into the wells of Southern Persia by a very clever engineering performance, about which our American friends were quite inquisitive during the time that I was there. We are turning crude oil back into the wells because we cannot create the artificial reservoirs necessary to hold it. I feel that it would be a good investment if we increased allocations of steel for creating more refining capacity in this country rather than turn crude oil back into the wells.
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I believe that we can do a great job of work by getting trade union delegations sent out to Southern Persia and by using our experience to show the people there that negotiation between employer and employee is in fact the best basis of settling many things which would otherwise result in friction of many kinds. I also believe that we have to see that executive positions in great enterprises in the Middle East are now placed at the disposal of the Persians themselves. We have to think more and more in terms of handing over control of these great enterprises to the natives of the country in which they are placed. By that method we can ensure good will. At the present time, the Middle East is virtually the cockpit in which war and everything which war brings may come at any moment. It is quite fatal for European nations to talk in terms of world peace if we turn a blind eye to what is happening in Persia and the Middle East.
We have to show the people of that country that the days of mere exploitation for the sake of taking over their greatest assets, in order to increase our own wealth, are gone; that we genuinely desire to co-operate with them, and that we will use all our efforts and ability to help them to run their industries and obtain a far higher standard of life than they have known before. By that method we can get a far better basis of co-operation in that troubled sphere with the Soviet Union, and get down to the problem of solving what is at the root of our economic problems—millions of people in dire poverty who are producing the wealth on which we in this country and in America are dependent for our existence. Let us give them more power and control of those great industries, because I am certain that in return we shall get the greatest measure of friendship we can ever hope for and eliminate the fear of recurring war, bringing in its train horrors, which would mean that all our great social experiments at home would go for nothing.
8.27 p.m.
Mr. Hugh Fraser: I am unable to follow the hon. Member for Hulme (Mr. F. Lee), except to say that as far as the handing over of valuable assets to local populations go, we have seen the results in Mexico where the local population having taken over, have asked us to

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come back. I think the hon. Gentleman is over-optimistic about the ability of certain local populations to run these things for themselves. I want to return to the speech of the hon. Member for East Coventry (Mr. Crossman) who divided his speech neatly into two parts. In the first part, he excused the Government for their inability to control events outside this country, and in the second part he referred to the legislative inference of the new petrol ration scheme especially on "E" and "S" coupon users. In the first part of his speech, the attempt to excuse the Government, his argument was that the Americans were irrational people. I do not know whether he is right or wrong when he describes the production of coal or the production of petrol in America as rational. If he believes that, the Socialists, who believe private enterprise to be irrational, should have calculated on the growth of petrol consumption. They should have made the sort of calculation which was made by a large number of oil people throughout the world.
It is all very well for the Government to keep blaming a world over which they have no control. It has always been a feature of this country, as a nation which relied on exports and imports, to be dependent on world events for its survival. If the Government are unable to arrange their policy to fit in with world trade, then they are clearly incapable of government. I would go further and say that there is blame—that there are people responsible—for our present fuel difficulties. I would accuse the Ministry of Fuel and Power, although perhaps not so much the Ministry as the Ministers. The right hon. Gentleman who is now Secretary of State for War has been accused of being a wildcatter and an exhausted gusher. A variety of accusations have been made against him. Hon. Members on the other side of the Committee may talk of baleful boredom, but I believe the Minister of Fuel and Power is something of a Marie Antoinette. Marie Antoinette said to the people, "If you have no bread, eat cake." The predecessor of the Minister of Fuel and Power said to the industrialists, "If you have no coal, burn oil."
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The whole matter wants serious investigation. The present Minister of Health once described this island as being almost entirely surrounded by fish and almost entirely constructed of coal. That we should be importing oil to burn in our factories is a serious matter and a course of action which needs defence by the Minister when he replies. It is extremely dangerous to push forward with a programme of increasing eventually the amount of fuel oil burned in our factories from something like 2 million to 5 million tons. We know that America has its fuel problem. We know also that a new policy of pushing even further forward with the burning of fuel oil in our factories entails a considerable expenditure of steel for further storage capacity, unless the Minister can tell us that we shall never have a restoration of the old petrol standard. If he cannot, a great deal of steel will be needed for the construction of the necessary machinery, blowers, and tanks inside the factories for the burning of oil. Local and regional oil storage will be required.
The hon. Member for East Coventry (Mr. Crossman) said it was odd that the Americans were undertaking large-scale oil conversion in their factories. There is nothing odd about it at all. To adopt the extravagant phraseology of the Minister of Health that country consists almost entirely of fuel in the shape of oil. It is no more odd for the Americans to make use of fuel for oil burning in their factories than it is for us to use coal. In that vast continent there are areas where the use of heavy fuel oil is more economical than coal.
To revert to our own country, it is vastly extravagant to embark on a further expansion of the burning of fuel oil, a programme which needs steel which could be more usefully employed in other ways—for example, in increasing the facilities in British controlled oilfields. The Under-Secretary dealt very shortly with the increase of production within British controlled oilfields. The figures, compared with those of the world, are not satisfactory. The overall increase in world production since the end of the war is something like 55 per cent. The increase in the British controlled oilfields is all very vague; there are the complications and difficulties of oil finance and whether it is controlled by a small group of foreign shareholders or by us. If we

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accept the figures which have been given, the British increase is a mere 33 per cent.
It may be said that areas have been bombed, that there has been damage in Burma, difficulty in Sumatra and trouble in South America, but, generally speaking all these things balance up. We can boast only of a 33 per cent. increase whilst the rest of the world can claim something like 66 per cent. That means that more use could have been made of steel; that more steel could have been used for the important and valuable oil production in Venezuela, in Abadan and in various parts of the Far East. I have visited Venezuela, where there are many complaints about shortage of steel from companies with a large British shareholding. They have to obtain most of their steel from the United States, yet at home the policy is put forward of using more steel for building up storage capacity which one day will be redundant.
I am amazed that more hon. Members opposite who represent mining constituencies have not spoken of the need of steel for producing better coal. What the Government have done is merely to increase the general tendency which is naturally away from the badly produced coal of the National Coal Board. There is a national tendency amongst industrialists to turn away, if possible, from the badly produced coal which contains 5 or 6 per cent. more ash than before the war. That is natural and is rather like the Government's attempt to increase the use of electricity by reducing the purchase tax on heaters. All these things have been ill thought out. Steel should be used to produce more pumping capacity and in increasing refining and cranking capacity in the oil fields; and in seeing that the coal we produce is of a better quality and is washed. The hon. Member for Stoke (Mr. Ellis Smith) knows, as I do, that there is at present a resistance in the sales of coal and slack in the Midlands. I know factories where there are 10 to 15 weeks' supply and power stations in the Mid-West with nine weeks' supply, even at this time of year.
Unless the Government take great care with certain brands of low type fuel or industrial coal slack, there may well be over-production; yet they go ahead with increasing the size and scope of their oil burning programme. This is not good planning. If we have fuel oil abroad it
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might well have been sold for dollars which in turn could have been expended on petrol and so help towards restoring to our people something approaching the basic ration or, at least, a fairer type of rationing than that envisaged by our present rulers. There are many questions which need to be answered by the Minister tonight, but, as things are, with the tendencies towards over-production in certain grades of fuel, to embark upon this enormous programme of increasing consumption from 2 million to 5 million tons of fuel a year is a type of folly which only such a Government as this could produce.
8.40 p.m.
Mr. Scollan: The hon. Member for Stone (Mr. H. Fraser) has touched upon a point I intended to raise. There is a modern steel-smelting works in my constituency, and I went there to see its conversion from coal to oil. After studying the whole setup, I have come to the conclusion that the Minister will be well-advised to select certain industries for oil consumption and to leave other industries purely on coal. From the industrial experience I have had for many years, I have not found that the amount of wastage in coal has varied one bit in the past to years. That is to say that the 10 per cent. dirt and stone we are getting today is not due to the National Coal Board, because we had that 10 per cent. before the Board was set up. The weekly output of coal averages 4 million tons, which means that every week there are 400,000 tons of useless dirt and stone being carried over our railways and roads.
This coal has not the necessary steam-heating qualities, and it has to be cleaned out of the boilers and carted away to be dumped. Anyone who understands economy knows it is good economics to clean the coal before it is sent out, because it saves our transport and our industries this enormous wastage and expense. It also saves our municipalities an enormous expense, because instead of dustbins containing ashes they are filled by the housewives with this useless coal which has to be carted away by the dustmen to the incinerator where it has to be dumped. All this is sheer waste.
The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member may not realise it, but we are dealing with services connected with petrol and petroleum.
Mr. Scollan: I was trying to point out how we can do without a lot of the petroleum which is being used in this country.
The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member may have been trying to point that out, but he has not succeeded in doing so.
Mr. Scollan: Then I must have put my point very badly. The petroleum which is being used in industry today could easily be supplanted by coal. I am not surprised at all at the increased amount of oil being used in America because oil is on her doorstep. On the other hand, the industrial prosperity of this country has been built on coal, because coal is on our doorstep. Most people forget that coal is the only natural asset we have. On coal and coal alone was our industrial prosperity built up, and therefore it should be used instead of oil wherever possible. We had a small shale-oil plant in Scotland. It was shut down by the Standard Oil Company as a result of internal penetration by American capital. It was not shut down as a result of nationalisation by the Labour Government. It was closed down by the Standard Oil Company because it produced oil so much cheaper. That shale-oil plant could be brought into operation today.
We cannot measure a national asset in terms of competitive prices with other countries. It is the biggest mistake any Government can make to say that we can buy cheaper abroad and should not therefore use what we have at home. What we have to do is to put all we can produce at home into the market, and to equate the prices to make our national assets a paying proposition. We know what happened about Lend Lease and how it was cut off before we had time to get our breath. We then had to beg and borrow a loan. We do not want to be put in that position today. Our potential asset lies in the low carbonisation of coal, and we should clean the coal to make it as attractive a fuel as we can. We should use it to increase our production at home, and if the Minister does that he will go a long way towards meeting this competition from abroad.
8.48 p.m.
Mr. W. S. Morrison: The subject under discussion has been so well covered by my right hon. and hon. Friends, and so much
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has been said on the various topics of this problem, that I find myself in a slight difficulty, because I have heard the points I wished to make being brought forward one by one and explained with an eloquence which I could not hope to equal. The best service I can do is, I think, to sum up briefly the arguments forming the case which the Government have to answer over the handling of this important problem of fuel oil and petrol. There is a good deal of uneasiness in the country that this matter has not been well managed, and that uneasiness has spread beyond the narrow circle of those whose vocations make them primarily acquainted with the technicalities and otherwise of oil. The man in the street is beginning to doubt whether this problem has ever been understood and grasped by the Government. I make no denial of the fact that it is a difficult problem.
I think that the reason for this uneasiness spreading among the general public, who are not acquainted with the tonnages concerned and to whom the mysteries of dollar exchanges are still mercifully a closed book, is the violent vacillation and changes of policy of the Government in regard to the two commodities of petrol and fuel oil. It is felt that if a policy existed there would have been more continuity in the sequence of events and fewer of the abrupt changes which have from time to time characterised the course of events in the last two years. The spasmodic and fitful character of the intimations of the Government in regard to this commodity give the appearance more of panic than of policy and seem to betray a lack of that fore-thought which is the very essence and foundation of planning. Indeed, the graph of petrol rationing and fuel oil policy looks like the temperature chart of a patient suffering from very high fever.
Let us take petrol rationing. The various changes are quite remarkable. It was in June, 1945, that the basic ration was re-introduced, upon a basis of 120 miles per month. In September, 1945, it was increased to some 150 miles per month. In March, 1946, it was increased to 180 miles per month. In August, 1946, it was increased to 270 miles per month. On 6th August, 1947, the Prime Minister, speaking in this House, announced that the ration would again be reduced to 180 miles per month from 1st October following; but on 1st October following, it was

2061
completely abolished. Those are very violent fluctuations in policy, so violent that they seem to preclude the existence of any continuous stream of thought in connection with the day-to-day administration in this matter.
Let me turn from petrol to fuel oil. I rely upon my figures because this matter seems to be more one of administration policy than of governmental statement. I am bound to say my figures depend upon a leading article in "The Times" today. If the right hon. Gentleman tells me that the figures given in "The Times" are wrong, I accept his view at once; but the figures are interesting. According to this article, the programme of conversion from coal to oil was announced in the Spring of 1946. The target then was to save three million tons of coal by using two million tons extra of fuel oil. After the coal crisis of February last year, which seems to have fallen upon Ministers like a bolt from the blue unheralded by any act of their intelligences although they had been warned before about it, we Were told that the target was raised to five million tons of fuel oil and later to six million tons of fuel oil, in order to save some 10 million tons of coal.
As the article points out, six million tons of fuel oil is a very large quantity and is equal to one and a quarter times the amount of motor spirit imported in 1928. The figure represented a year ago the Government's view of the future oil supplies in this country. It is only a year ago. Just before last Christmas, the right hon. Gentleman announced that the programme was to be cut. I believe that some conversions had been completed at the rate of about 2,200,000 tons of oil a year. Last month, coming down to date, the right hon. Gentleman told us that most of the firms who were in the process of converting from coal to oil would have to go on burning coal for a considerable time. "The Times" with its customary moderation of language, comments:
"This is a sharp reversal."
All these chops and changes have done great damage. They have wasted much effort, capital expenditure—the point has been made and I merely repeat it without elaborating it—steel and planning energy, while commitments of one sort and another have been undertaken to
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fulfil this programme at the request of the Government. All the chops and changes have fallen inevitably upon the people of the country without warning. The navigation of the right hon. Gentleman and his predecessor has been so erratic and they have changed their course in the river so abruptly as to be a source of embarrassment, if not even a danger, to other craft using the river. They have not accompanied their changes, of course, by giving the signal which is customary with well-managed ships, and which curiously enough is three, not two, loud hoots on the siren, signifying: "Look out. I am going astern."
Not only the policy but the reasons for the policy have changed from time to time, if not always in effect, in emphasis. Last October we were deprived of the basic ration. The case was fought by the Government almost entirely on the issue of dollars. Now we hear less about dollars. We still hear about them. Like the poor, lack of dollars is always with us, but we hear less about dollars today. Perhaps Marshall Aid, so-called, has something to do with that; but the emphasis now has shifted to the world shortage of oil in relation to the demand for that commodity. Now we are told that oil is so short in the world that even if we had the dollars we could not buy oil.
It is clear that these alternations are very bewildering and upsetting. I hope this Debate will give the right hon. Gentleman an opportunity of explaining the connecting thread, if he can find one. What is the clue which is to lead us out of this labyrinth and restore the confidence which is so badly needed in industries affected by the oil problem? It appears now that the end of the story, taking the latest utterances of Ministers, is that we have to face a natural shortage of oil for some years. That is a very different picture from two years ago, when we were told that there was plenty of fuel oil, and one year ago, when the oil conversion scheme was being boosted up to five or six million tons.
Let us examine that shortage. I am told that there is no shortage of oil in the ground. Indeed the proved reserves of oil in the world today are, I am told, greater than they have ever been. The shortage occurs in the apparatus for converting the raw material and making it available in consumable form to those who use it, and that apparatus consists of oil-

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well plant, refineries and tankers. Generally speaking the plant at the oil wells does not seem to be the main cause of this stringency, so far as I can make out. Speaking on 6th April, the Parliamentary Secretary, referring to the strange phenomenon of oil being pumped back in the Midle East said that that was not due to any deficiency at the wells themselves but to a shortage of tankers.
We are told that refining capacity is short, and an added but significant shortage will occur through the withdrawal from refining production of the refinery at Haifa, amounting to some four million tons a year. Then we are told that consumption has greatly increased. That is the melancholy picture with which we are confronted. I ask which of these factors which together account for our present stringency in oil supplies could not have been foreseen two years ago, when the conversion plan was started, involving two million extra tons of oil, or at least a year ago when, if "The Times" was right, it was boosted up to five million and then to six million tons.
Let us take the question of refineries. The "Economic Survey," with which we have just been favoured, says, in paragraph 109, in reference to the programme to improve the refining capacity, that these plans
"will, however, take some years to mature, and may be delayed in view of the current shortage of steel. Nor is it possible to speed their completion to any large extent by the import of additional petroleum equipment from the United States. For not only dollars, but oil equipment itself is short."
I should have thought that most of that forecast could have been as easily made two years ago as today. There is nothing that has altered in the period of time in the position of either oil refining plant or the provision of refining capacity to make this glimpse of the obvious a discovery which could only have been made yesterday. It must long ago have been in the minds of those who studied the problem.
The same can be said broadly of the tanker position. There is nothing about our tanker position today which could not easily have been forecast 12 months or two years ago at least. Tankers take a long time to construct, and the position should have been as clear then as it is today. I am still not satisfied, although I listened with the greatest interest to the
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informative and instructive speech of the Parliamentary Secretary, that the other factor upon which reliance is now placed, namely, the greatly increased consumption in America, could not have been foreseen more accurately than it has been. The Parliamentary Secretary claimed that we could not control the consumption in America. That is perfectly true, but it might have been intelligently anticipated.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) pointed out, the Parliamentary Secretary told us that the gross consumption in America, which is a very big place, was a large factor, yet the percentage increase in the United Kingdom was greater than the percentage increase in America at the same time. The Government should have drawn the obvious and easy deduction. Knowing that our production in our homeland is going up, knowing the greater extent to which America relies on the motor car, and bearing in mind the amount of petroleum which America uses for the manufacture of synthetic rubber, they should have drawn the obvious inference. If the percentage of consumption nearer home was rising, as obviously it was, it was a very safe bet to jump from that, and say that in the United States a greater possible increase in consumption must be intelligently anticipated. Yet nothing of that sort appears to have occurred at all. I hope I am not being unfair or unreasonable, and it is easy to be wiser after the event so that one must guard against expressing unfair judgment, but I do claim that it ought to have been foreseen if attention had been exercised.
It appears to be increasingly clear that the five to six million tons of fuel oil, which, a year ago, the Government urged industry to consume, was never in prospect at that time. My conclusion is that it was not reasonable to suppose it would be. I cannot accept the description of the Parliamentary Secretary that this proposal is commonsense. With the best will in the world it appears to be the very negation of common sense to indulge in a process of asking people to convert into the consumption of fuel which did not exist in any intelligent prospect. Nor do I take the other argument that if the Government had not taken charge of the programme we should have had unco-

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ordinated and chaotic conversion by industrialists themselves, and it was claimed by the hon. Gentleman that the intervention of the Government in this matter had produced a programme of conversion to a degree of order which otherwise would not have existed.
I hope the Minister can amplify this argument, because I find it very difficult to believe. I think myself it was not an ordered programme so much as a mere propaganda drive to convert at all costs. I am borne out by that in some interesting speeches, including the one by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Fylde (Colonel Lancaster) and the hon. Gentleman the Member for Western Renfrew (Mr. Scollan), who has just spoken. It is quite obvious that a great deal of the conversion from coal to fuel oil had been diverted for purely thermal purposes—that of steam raising. On the information before me there are cases where fuel oil has advantages over coal—in certain cases of ceramics, glass making and certain forms of steel where temperature control is the essence, but I know that a great number of people have put fuel oil not to the specific and justified processes at all, but to mere steam raising where it has little advantage over coal.
So much for oil. If the matter had been left to the public to make up their minds whether they would convert, individual industries could have taken a risk in the absence of the fuel oil supply which would have been an ordinary commercial risk, and which would have been undertaken by them on their own responsibility. Now it is the responsibility of the Government for having encouraged them to incur this expenditure and they are now without oil. Have the Government a coal-oil policy even now? If so, it would be for the enlightenment of the nation.
It is vitally important, in view of this shortage, that we must make the most of what we can get, and in this respect I would ask the right hon. Gentleman whether the Fuel Research Board is still conducting its valuable work. I would also like to ask him to examine the point made by the hon. Member for Western Renfrew about shale oil and natural gas in this country. We cannot afford to neglect our natural resources. There is also producer gas. In timber yards attached to woodlands there is a tremen-
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dous amount of waste wood which could be turned into producer gas, and so save petrol and oil considerably. I hope attention will be given to this. I would also like to know more about the German synthetic oil production. There they were able, in spite of the blockade, to power vast fleets of aeroplanes and vast armies of tanks, none of which they can now do. Is there no hope here of getting from Germany an export which will be useful to them in enabling them to rehabilitate their economy and also be useful to the rest of the world? I hope so, and I hope also that we may have an answer to my right hon. Friend's question about the proportion of steel that is being given to the refineries. It is obvious that that is a crucial point. My right hon. Friend did not ask for a steel budget, he asked what proportion the steel allocated to the refineries bore to their application, and I think the Committee is entitled to know that. The hon. Member for the Hulme Division of Manchester (Mr. Lee) pressed the same point.
Now I turn to the last part of my remarks which are concerned with the rationing of petrol. Here, again, I find that so many speeches have been made in the course of the Debate, and so many points have been put up to the right hon. Gentleman, that I can do no more than summarise them briefly. I have already described the extraordinary fluctuations of policy which have attended rationing since its inception, ending with its withdrawal completely last year. I still do not believe that the withdrawal of the basic ration was in the public interest. I believe that, though it shows a paper saving, its indirect damage to the life of the country, and in particular the countryside, to the dollar earning capacities of our entertainment and hotel industry, amongst other things, really outweighed the economy that was effected. It was very unequal in its incidence. It bore much more heavily upon the countryside than upon the town and, representing as I do a country division, I know the complete dislocation of all social and athletic life which it brought about in my remote hamlets.
Perhaps there was no greater sufferer from the basic petrol withdrawal than the right hon. Gentleman, whose office must have been inundated with correspondence from all parts of the House, bringing this case and the other. For my part, I would thank him for the way in which he has

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dealt with a big problem with which I have troubled him. When on many occasions he has seen fit to allow a claim I put forward, I have always felt what a pity it was that the man had to write to me and that I had to bother the right hon. Gentleman before the right course of action was taken. Then think of the people who do not write to their Members of Parliament—there may be some of them alive yet, for all I know. It is not a good thing to think that these people may be suffering some unjust deprivation simply because they do not like to write to a Member of Parliament.
Regional officers have been mentioned. I do not criticise them for the way in which they have done their work. The truth is that they have been overwhelmed. The right hon. Gentleman the predecessor of the Minister of Fuel and Power, has told us of the immense difficulties which are encountered when one starts to put into operation plans of nationalisation without having made adequate preparation. I think exactly the same is true of the burden which was suddenly cast upon regional petroleum officers by the withdrawal of the basic ration without proper clerical provision having been made for scrutiny of claims. The whole controversy has been somewhat clouded by the use of the term "pleasure motorist." I remember the days when there were very few motor cars about, but a man with a horse and trap was not called a "trappist." There was a much less elegant sound about that than about "motorist." The term "motorist" is apt to conjure up a very grotesque and antique figure, driving an antique car, preceded by a man with a flag and accompanied by a lady wearing a big veil.
Today the motorist is the doctor, farmer, or workingman going to work—[Interruption.] Yes, I include motor cycles and small cars, of course. I say to hon. Members opposite that no people have suffered more deprivation from withdrawal of basic petrol than some of the workingmen with motor cycles and sidecars who wish to take their wives out on Saturday afternoons. Today motoring is a method of progression, and nothing more, and we should not mix ourselves up with ideas of something antiquated and special about it.
Of the new scheme I will only say that it is not good enough. The Parlia-
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mentary Secretary said that those with "E" and "S" coupons would get something, and that was freedom. Freedom we are learning to prize and no doubt we shall get that crumb of it. Unfortunately, it falls very unequally. The hon. Gentleman also said that no user of "E" and "S" coupons did not get some convenience out of motoring. That falls from him very whimsically, and not justly. There is no doubt that if a man's sources of pleasure and amusement lie on the road which he is given petrol to follow he gets a great deal of freedom out of his motor car in that way, but there is nothing of that kind in some of the country villages. There a man has just enough petrol to do his day's work. He gets nothing more out of it, yet he keeps his car on the road the whole year round. The rural district councillor who gets just enough petrol to go 10 miles from his village to a little town where the council meets does not go for pleasure. He has freedom, but has no petrol with which to enjoy it.
The conclusion of the matter is that the Government have not met the case made against them. We shall listen to what the right hon. Gentleman has to say. I express the hope that soon he will be relieved from those barren labours on nationalisation, so that his Department can turn their attention to providing fuel and power for the people. We shall listen to what he has to say with all due deference, but I give notice that unless we on this side of the Committee feel satisfied with his defence we shall move a small reduction in his Vote.
9.20 p.m.
The Minister of Fuel and Power (Mr. Gaitskell): We have had a serious and interesting Debate, and many informative speeches have been made on both sides of the Committee. On the whole, I think that the criticisms made of my Department and myself have been moderate. Even the right hon. Member for Southport (Mr. R. S. Hudson) was rather less aggressive than usual. Whether that is the result of his South African tour, which has mellowed him in the sun, and the avoidance of even a mild English winter, I do not know.
I will endeavour to reply to the various points which have been made. Many hon. Members have spoken of the coal-oil conversion scheme, and I want to

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deal with that at some length. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary dealt with this towards the end of his very capable speech, and I shall, therefore, not have to say quite as much as would have otherwise been necessary. The right hon. Member for Southport said that this plan should not have been embarked upon without some certainty regarding oil supplies, and the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) asked how it was that the Government failed to foresee that there was going to be difficulty about the supplies of oil. He said that the signs were there for all to see.
The attitude of the Opposition to this matter is in striking contrast to the line which they took 18 months to two years ago. I was a little surprised that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale—who unfortunately I do not see in his place but no doubt he will return—who is something of an expert in this subject, seemed to overlook the extraordinary change in his own mind. On 8th April, 1946, speaking in the Adjournment Debate, that is to say, on a subject which he himself had selected, he said:
"Therefore, from that point of view as well it is most desirable that encouragement should be given to industry to convert to fuel oil wherever practicable."
He went on to say:
"I hope he"—
my predecessor—
"will be able to say tonight that he will do all he can to encourage the use of fuel oil so that industry can go ahead with the long term planning which it is constantly being urged to do."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th April, 1946; Vol. 421, C. 1765.]
That was the attitude of the hon. Gentleman in April, 1946. Yet he comes forward today and says that the signs were there for all to see. Evidently there was one blind man, anyway.
Although the right hon. and gallant Member for Gainsborough (Captain Crookshank) is not here this evening, he also made a statement on this matter in the Debate on the Finance Bill on 25th June, 1946, on the question of the removal of the duty on fuel oils. This is what the hon. and gallant Member said:
"Let us risk the £3,500,000 not coming into the Exchequer in favour of encouraging firms to go ahead as fast as possible during this critical winter. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will agree that the prospects are very bad on the coal front, and that anything
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we can do to reduce the demand for coal while the position is so bad would be to the national advantage."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th Tune, 1946; Vol. 424, c. 1079.]
Hon. Members opposite cannot maintain that they were not the keenest supporters of the coal-oil conversion programme. Again and again we were pressed by them to get on faster with this and to allow it to proceed more fully, and it is not for them now to turn round and say we should not have started it at all. The right hon. Gentleman says it was hoped supplies were available—
Mr. R. S. Hudson: I said the Government thought there was a surplus available.
Mr. Gaitskell: The Government went into the matter with the fullest possible consultation with the oil companies. Clearly, before a programme of that kind could be adopted it would be necessary to secure from the oil companies some idea of what they thought could be done, and it is a fact that at that time there was a surplus of fuel oil in this sense—that the total expected available supplies of fuel oil produced by British companies exceeded what they thought they could otherwise market. They told us—and they confirmed this to me personally when I saw them a few months ago—that at that time they supposed it would be possible to provide five to six million tons extra—and that, in fact, was the eventual programme. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary this afternoon quoted the continual change of estimates in the United States on this matter of oil consumption which, of course, is the root of the trouble. I do not think it is fair to say it was plain for all to see. Certainly the oil companies did not see it; certainly the expert statisticians in the United States did not see it; certainly the Opposition did not see it—it is something which has really surprised all of them.
Air-Commodore Harvey: When the right hon. Gentleman says there might have been five to six million tons extra available, would he have had the tankers to cope with that amount?
Mr. Gaitskell: At that time the oil companies thought it would be possible to supply that five to six million tons without difficulty. I can assure the Committee that that is what they freely admit, and I think in the oil world generally it is known that this increased consumption of the

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United States has taken everybody by surprise. For instance, on the point of tankers to which the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) referred, after the war the United States Government expected there would be a surplus of tankers and it was for that reason that they proceeded to lay up no fewer than 300 tankers. These subsequently have had to be refloated and, I am glad to say, have served within the last few months considerably to relieve the tanker situation.
Mr. Dodds-Parker: Did not the Government, in fact, direct companies to sell oil to the United States for dollars? Is not that the reason?
Mr. Gaitskell: There is no direction to the oil companies to sell oil for dollars at all. Of course, the oil companies—say the Shell Oil Company, which is the second largest or, at any rate, the third largest distributing company in the United States—are really international companies, but it is not correct to say that oil companies have been directed to sell here, there and everywhere.
Mr. Dodds-Parker: But is it not so, within the limitation that everybody is encouraged to sell for dollars wherever they can?
Mr. Gaitskell: Obviously it is very desirable that we should obtain dollars, but one has to have regard to every consideration. I will, however, deal with that point later.
We have been given a number of reasons in the Committee why the coal-oil conversion scheme had to be held up. I want to tell the Committee exactly what happened. During the first six to nine months when the scheme was introduced, early in 1946, there was in fact very little response from industry, and it was not until, first of all, we introduced the subsidy of 1d. a gallon and the subsequent removal of the duty—and later, of course, the great shortage of coal in the winter of 1946–47—that the conversion programme really got going. What did it mean that the "conversion programme got going?" It simply meant that a large number of enterprises went to the Petroleum Board and said, "We wish to convert; we want to get on the list." In April, 1947, my right hon. Friend, my predecessor, had in fact to close those
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lists—a year ago—because at that time the full programme had already been achieved. It is true under some pressure—not from hon. Members—from certain firms and industries where the conversion progress was particularly valuable, a further million tons was permitted shortly afterwards. Broadly speaking, however, it is true to say that a year ago because of the lists getting full up so quickly he had to step in and say, "That is all."
The next stage in the whole business was a certain difficulty—a purely temporary one—which we ran into, of tank cars. I do not think there is any reason for us to apologise for that. It was not easy to phase precisely all the different stages and elements in this programme, and during the summer of 1947 it appeared that there would be some difficulty because of a shortage of tank cars. At that time we asked certain firms to postpone the completion of their conversion.
Then in December last year I had to announce that those who were still in process of converting should not complete conversions until further notice. I did that at that time primarily because of tanker difficulties. There were, in fact, tanker difficulties. It was not that the Government wanted to find a new excuse. It was because the United States consumption had increased so much that they had to use tankers, which would otherwise have been available for world trade, to convey the oil largely coastwise to their cities. That created quite suddenly, and in a matter literally of three or four months, a serious tanker shortage and we, therefore, had to hold up conversions. Since then we have been examining the stages which the various conversions have reached. We have done that, and last week I announced that certain schemes would go forward and that others would have to stay put for the time being.
Surely, when the Parliamentary Secretary says that this is merely creating order, there is some sense in it. Suppose the Government had done nothing about this matter. Suppose that they had simply let any firm convert when it wished to do so, and there had been no attempt to correlate the conversions with the supplies of oil. What would have happened? I suggest that while no doubt, to begin with, in 1946 there would have been very few conversions, or many

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fewer, as soon as we ran into the coal difficulty in the winter of 1946–47 there would have been a tremendous rush of firms all anxious to convert and get oil conversion equipment, and eventually anxious to get oil. There is no doubt in my mind that they would have run into enormous difficulties. Some of them would have found that they could not complete the conversion process owing to difficulties of getting equipment, steel and so on. Others would have completed their process of conversion and then would have been unable to get the oil. We at least have seen to it—I have yet to hear of a single case to the contrary—that when a firm is converted it gets the oil. The line of argument put by my hon. Friend is perfectly fair.
It is the fact that in the United States exactly the same sort of difficulties have occurred. There have been conversions from coal to oil in the United States on a very large scale, in transport, in domestic houses, and in industry. Equally there are these difficulties occurring, despite the fact that the United States is in a very much stronger position, as far as dollars are concerned, to acquire additional supplies. I have been asked if I will give some indication to industry, through the Committee, as to the future position.
Mr. Scollan: Is my right hon. Friend not aware that a large number of industrialists are converting, or want to convert, to oil owing to the amount of dirt in the coal?
Mr. Gaitskell: There may be all sorts of reasons why industrialists wish to convert to oil, but I am perfectly well aware of the problem of the coal quality, and have spoken of it several times recently. It is mainly due to the fact that there has been an increase in mechanised mining without a corresponding increase in cleaning capacity. Cleaning capacity will have to be increased, but is bound to take a little time before it is completed.
I was saying that I had been asked to give some guidance to firms as to what the position is likely to be. I cannot possibly say here what, for instance, I think the relative price of coal and oil is likely to be in five or ten years' time. It is not, in my view, possible to give any very accurate estimate. If I were to give an opinion on that, it would be my personal opinion. It is a matter on which, to quote
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what the right hon. Gentleman said, the firms concerned must take a commercial risk. It is up to them to decide. All I can say is that for the moment, with the uncertainty of the oil situation, gravely accentuated by the closing of the Haifa refinery, which was producing nearly two million tons of fuel oil a year, we think it wisest for them to remain on coal.
As soon as there is any easing of the oil situation, as soon as it becomes apparent that supplies can be made available, subject, of course, to the foreign currency position, which I shall come to in a moment, we shall, naturally, inform the House of Commons and the country of the position; and it may be possible to make a further relaxation on the lines of the one we have already made. But we think it very much better that firms should be told to stay on coal for the moment. We think it better to say "Do not complete your conversion and go over to oil, because the Petroleum Board and the oil companies cannot guarantee supplies."
Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison: If there is a concern for which it is of outstanding benefit to convert from coal to oil for the purpose of its trade, apart altogether from the point of view of saving coal, will it be able to get the necessary licence to enable it to convert, to carry on its firing with oil?
Mr. Gaitskell: We have closed the list so far as starting conversions is concerned.
Colonel Hutchison: To everybody?
Mr. Gaitskell: Yes; we are not permitting new conversions for the moment at all. There are, of course, firms who are in the process of converting, and may be very near to completing the process, and some of those will be informed, as I announced a few days ago, that we can now supply the oil to them. If the oil position becomes easier we shall take a similar step later on.
Colonel Hutchison: Would the right hon. Gentleman agree to allow a particular firm or industry, that can make out a very high level argument for being allowed to convert, to carry out conversion? Would he examine a case like that and allow it a permit?
Mr. Gaitskell: I can give no encouragement to that, but naturally, if the hon. and gallant Gentleman has a particular

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case I shall have to look at it. However, I do not want to give any encouragement to the idea that we are going to provide oil to people who have not started conversion when there are lots of people who have already started and cannot get oil. No doubt, one would take into account some quite exceptional case where there was some substantial advantage to be gained. That, then, is what I would say tonight to industry. Now I should like to turn to a closely related subject.
Colonel Lancaster: I did direct to the right hon. Gentleman a very specific question—what was the principle underlying the Government's policy in regard to fuel-oil conversion? The right hon. Gentleman does not seem to have addressed himself to that.
Mr. Gaitskell: I am much obliged. I think the hon. and gallant Gentleman's question was, whether the coal-oil conversion programme was a short-term programme or not. The answer is, Yes, it was a short-term programme as such. But I still consider that, although the Government gave encouragement and guidance in this matter, they did not carry it through. It was for the firms themselves to make up their minds. As to the future, I am not proposing that we should encourage it because of the oil situation.
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. W. S. Morrison) spoke of the different causes of difficulties—tankers, dollars, refinery capacity, and so on. I would like to say a word on that. It is a bit complicated but I will do my best. One cannot separate any of these questions from the dollar shortage, because if we had more dollars than we have now, undoubtedly we could afford all sorts of things which we cannot afford now. We could, for instance, afford to pay for more tankers and bid more heavily for tankers, and forgo exports of oil to dollar countries, which we cannot do at the moment. Therefore, that element is present all the time. It was only not present in the case of fuel oil two years ago because there was then, in the view of the oil companies, an actual surplus which they could not market, fuel oil being largely a residue product. At the moment, that is not so, and all the fuel oil which
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the oil companies are producing is in fact marketable and is being marketed, and, therefore, if we were to import additional fuel oil we should be foregoing some foreign currency.
If one asks what is the relation of this to the increased oil consumption in the U.S.A. it is this: When U.S.A. oil consumption rises they require more tankers and that accentuates the shortage of tankers. That was the major reason for the tanker shortage that occurred last Summer and Autumn, happily now much reduced, and at the moment the recycling of oil at Abadan is not in fact taking place. We are now up against a refinery bottleneck. We have been up against a tanker bottleneck up to now. We are now up against a refinery bottleneck.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: More alibis.
Mr. Gaitskell: The right hon. Gentleman says "more alibis." I think myself that is a perfectly sensible explanation, particularly when I say to the right hon. Gentleman that he was in the Government during the war and knows how this sort of difficulty occurs. The right hon. Gentleman asked me one question which is related to this. He was talking of motor spirit, and he asked about the sale of motor spirit by British companies to soft currency countries. It is true, as the Lord Chancellor said in another place, that the British oil companies do deliver motor spirit in some quantities to what are called soft currency countries. Undoubtedly, the Shell Oil Company distribute petrol in France, and similarly in other countries. He asked, "What is the reason for this, and why must it go on?" I would ask the Committee to consider for a moment what the consequences would be if we were to tell the oil companies or order the oil companies to stop their trade with these countries. In the first place, we do not tell the oil companies to whom they can sell their oil. I think that it was the hon. Member for Rye (Mr. Cuthbert) who rather took the line that, in any case, we should not do that. I can assure him it is not in the main our practice, although it is right that the Government should on currency matters give some degree of guidance.
Many hon. Members have spoken of the great future that there is for British oil

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markets. I agree. In that connection we cannot overlook the fact that the companies concerned have got not only valuable markets in these countries but also installations, and for them to cut off all supplies of petrol to France or these other countries would have the most damaging effect on the future possibility of trade with those countries.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: I never suggested that.
Mr. Gaitskell: I am glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman say so. Secondly, we have now concluded bilateral agreements with a number of these countries with, I think, the general approval of Parliament. In many of those agreements we have agreed that there should be supplies of petrol and petroleum products from the British oil companies to those countries. There is the case, for instance, of Denmark, to which the right hon. Gentleman referred.
Thirdly, it will be known no doubt to the Committee that it was an integral part of the Marshall Plan that British oil companies should continue to supply European markets or, to put it correctly, "the participating countries." It is impossible for us to order the oil companies to leave those markets and to do nothing more. Closely connected with this question was the issue of rationing systems in the sterling area and in these other countries. Most hon. Members will agree that conditions in such countries as Australia, New Zealand, and in other parts of the Empire, are very different from conditions here as far as transport is concerned. Those countries depend far more than we do upon the use of petrol for transport and we cannot expect them to adopt the some rationing system as we have here. In some of them the administrative difficulties of rationing are very much greater.
In Eire the proportion of the agricultural population is much higher than it is here. I think that something like 80 per cent. of the petrol consumed or issued through supplementary allowances in Eire goes to agricultural districts. I discussed this matter with the Minister of Commerce when he was here. He made what I thought was a very good point. He said that if they cut out the basic ration altogether there would be practically no saving because almost everybody in the rural districts needs also a supplementary ration. I would ask the Committee to bear in
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mind also that we cannot ignore our peculiar relationship with Empire countries. Some of them—South Africa, for instance, with their gold production—can buy whatever they want in the way of petrol. It would be out of the question for us to insist on petrol rationing there.
Mr. R. S. Hudson: And Egypt or Ceylon?
Mr. Gaitskell: Egypt is not in the sterling area, and in Ceylon the total consumption is only about two or three thousand tons. It is so small that the cost of administering a rationing system would be quite out of proportion. That is a good instance of the administrative difficulties which we come up against.
I have been asked by a number of speakers to deal with steel allocations. Even if I had the figures available, which I have not, I would have no intention of telling the Committee the exact amount of steel to be allocated to different industries. The right hon. Gentleman said that we had presented a coal budget and asked why we could not do the same with steel. We did not do it with coal; what we did was to say how much coal could go to domestic consumers and to industry. We did not give figures for separate industries. It would be wrong for the Government to publish the steel allocations to different industries. There are all sorts of reasons, one of which is security. There is bound to be a great deal of misunderstanding about such figures. As hon. Members opposite will know, these figures are argued about for hours and we try to get the best possible balance. All the arguments which have been put forward could not be made public. They would be followed by a great deal of misunderstanding.
The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) says that it is all wrong for oil companies to have to state their claims for steel and that they should be given all the steel they want. That would be a most ridiculous state of affairs. What would hon. Members opposite, who show some interest in agricultural affairs, be likely to say if the oil companies had all their requirements made up at the expense of agricultural machinery? I think there was considerable anxiety shown by hon. Members opposite about the position of agricultural machinery when the Paymaster-General made a statement on the

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ending of the priority list. We cannot deal with the matter in that way. We have to balance the needs of the various claimants for steel and decide what is best in the national interest. We do attach an immense amount of importance to the refinery programme, and I fully agree with what many hon. Members said, that in the development of British company oil production we have a certain dollar winner. We recognise that, and we are anxious, within the limits set by the inevitable high demands for steel for other purposes, to give them as much as we possibly can.
Some Members have asked why the refinery programme did not go further. It is a very large programme, involving an increase in capacity in the U.K. from 4½ million tons to 20 million tons. I should have thought that that was good enough to go on with, but when the programme is completed we shall have to see how we go on. It is on a gigantic scale, and when hon. Members opposite ask why we do not do more, I would point out their absolute failure to do anything in this field before the war, which was one of the most discreditable features in their administration at that time.
Lastly, I want to turn to the various points raised on rationing. Here again we have been accused of giving a lot of different reasons for the restrictions on petrol consumption. The answer is that it is essentially for dollar reasons, as we have always said. It is true that there is a world shortage of oil, but that does not alter the fact that our problem is primarily a dollar problem, and that there is a much bigger deficit of motor spirit as far as British companies are concerned than there is of fuel oil. Essentially, it is a dollar problem. So far as tankers are concerned, I have already explained that the tanker position is rather easier now; but certainly the dollar position is just as bad.
I am really surprised at the attitude of some hon. Members on the subject of the black market. I should have supposed that everyone would agree on the necessity for suppressing the black market. There seem to be the most extraordinary misunderstandings on this subject. It is not only that we think that by suppressing it we can save 100,000 tons of petrol which is going to people who should not
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get it, and give this to people whose cars are laid up, but for the more important reason that we think it is essential to deal with the problem in this way, because so long as petrol rationing exists there will be a tremendous leak through that channel. Surely it is obvious that the smaller the standard ration we can afford, the greater will be the pressure on the black market. Therefore, it is not just a matter of suppressing it for the introduction of the standard ration, but it is essential for other purposes.
My hon. Friend the Member for East Coventry (Mr. Crossman) suggested that we could find extra petrol to give more to the supplementary allowance holders by cutting down the supply to the farmers and the commercial people. The whole purpose of the black market scheme is to prevent anything going from the farmers and the commercial people to the ordinary motorist. If that is so, we cannot cut the farmers and the commercial people any further. We would stop them from carrying on their essential business of food production and transport.
Lastly, may I turn to the vexed question of the supplementary allowance? The argument of hon. Members opposite is roughly that after all, the standard allowance will be for those who want pleasure motoring only, whereas the supplementary allowance holders get petrol only for essential purposes. Therefore, they have no pleasure motoring. Hon. Members opposite draw that sharp division between essential motoring on the one side and pleasure motoring on the other. I must say that I find that a rather curious attitude for some hon. Members opposite to adopt. When we withdrew the basic ration precisely the opposite argument was put forward, not by one but by several speakers, the argument was that there was no such thing as pleasure motoring and that all motoring was really a matter of convenience. I would quote from the speech of the hon. Member who moved the Prayer to reject the order. This is what the hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) said:
"It is sheer nonsense to suggest that in the majority of cases the basic ration is or has been used for pleasure in any sense of the term. It has been used, as hon. Members have no doubt heard from many of their constituents in the last few weeks, for a multiplicity of essential domestic purposes.… It has been used, of course, above all to facilitate people getting to their work."—

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[OFFICIAL REPORT, 29th October, 1947; Vol. 443, c. 1001.]
How anybody who has argued that way can now get up and say that we should give the ration back to everybody I cannot understand.
The facts are these: We only have so much petrol available, 120,000 tons. If we give it to everybody, it means eight miles motoring per week, and that is farcical. People would not bring out their cars which have been laid up, on that basis. It would be of no advantage to them. We have to choose in this matter. I have not the slightest doubt—and the motoring organisations agree—that, granted that that is all the petrol available, we adopted the right course. The only other argument is that we should spend more dollars. That is an easy one. Anybody can say that. They can say that the advantage of spending more dollars on petrol outweighs the disadvantages and
the inconvenience of not doing so. That argument could be used on almost every dollar commodity. It is a striking change that the Opposition should adopt that attitude from the one which they adopted during the Budget Debate. Then speaker after speaker said that in no circumstances could we afford any more dollars.
I suggest that in this Debate the Opposition have absolutely failed to make effective their charges against my Department. There is, in fact, no truth in those charges. We are admittedly dealing with a very difficult situation and we are dealing with it in the fairest and most satisfactory manner for everybody.
Mr. W. S. Morrison: I beg to move, "That Item Class VI, Vote 6, Ministry of Fuel and Power, be reduced by £5."
Question put.
The Committee divided: Ayes, 122; Noes, 239.

Division No. 149.]

AYES.

[10.0 p.m.

Amory, D. Heathcoat

Hollis, M. C.

Pickthorn, K

Astor, Hon. M.

Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)

Pitman, I. J.

Baldwin, A. E.

Howard, Hon. A.

Ponsonby, Col. C. E.

Beamish, Maj. T. V. H.

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

Poole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)

Bennett, Sir P.

Hulbert, Wing-Cdr. N. J.

Price-White, Lt-.Col. D

Bowen, R.

Hutchison, Lt.-Cm. Clark (E'b'rgh, W.)

Prior-Palmer, Brig. O.

Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.

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

Raikes, H. V.

Bracken, Rt. Hon. Brendan

Jeffreys, General Sir G

Ramsay, Maj. S.

Braithwaite, Lt.-Comdr. J. G.

Jennings, R.

Rayner, Brig. R.

Bromley-Davonport, Lt.-Col. W

Kerr, Sir J. Graham

Roed, Sir S. (Aylesbury)

Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.

Lambert, Hon. G.

Reid, Rt. Hon. J. S. C. (Hillhead)

Byers, Frank

Lancaster, Col. C. G.

Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)

Carson, E.

Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H

Roberts, P. G. (Ecclesall)

Challen, C.

Lennox-Boyd, A. T.

Robinson, Roland

Channon, H.

Lindsay, M. (Solihull)

Ropner, Col. L.

Clarke, Col. R. S.

Lipson, D. L.

Scott, Lord W.

Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.

Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)

Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)

Cole, T. L.

Low, A. R. W.

Snadden, W. M.

Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E

Lucas, Major Sir J.

Spearman, A. C. M.

Crowder, Capt. John E.

Lucas-Tooth, Sir H.

Stanley,-Rt. Hon. O.

Davidson, Viscountess

MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.

Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.

Davies, Rt. Hn. Clement (Montgomery)

McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S.

Strauss, H. G. (English Universities)

Dodds-Parker, A. D.

MacDonald, Sir M. (Inverness)

Studholme, H. G.

Dower, E. L. G. (Caithness)

Macdonald, Sir P. (I. of Wight)

Sutcliffe, H.

Dugdate, Maj. Sir T. (Richmond)

McFarlane, C. S.

Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)

Elliot, Rt. Hon. Walter

McKie, J. H. (Galloway)

Thorp, Brigadier R. A. F.

Foster, J. G. (Northwich)

Maclean, F. H. R. (Lancaster)

Touche, G. C.

Fox, Sir G.

Maitland, Comdr. J. W.

Turton, R. H.

Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)

Manningham-Buller, R. E

Vane, W. M. F

Fraser, Sir I. (Lonsdale)

Marlowe, A. A. H.

Wadsworth, G.

Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D.

Marsden, Capt. A.

Wakefield, Sir W. W

Gates, Maj. E. E.

Marshall, D. (Bodmin)

Walker-Smith, D.

George, Maj. Rt. Hn. G. Lloyd (P'ke)

Medlicott, Brigadier F.

Watt, Sir G. S. Harvie

Glyn, Sir R.

Middleton, Mrs. L.

Wheatley, Colonel M. J. (Dorset, E.)

Gomme-Duncan, Col. A

Morris, Hopkin (Carmarthen)

White, Sir D. (Fareham)

Granville, E. (Eye)

Morrison, Maj. J. G. (Salisbury)

White, J. B. (Canterbury)

Grimston, R. V.

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

Willoughby de Eresby, Lord

Harvey, Air-Cmdre. A. V.

Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.

York, C

Henderson, John (Cathcart)

Odey, G. W.

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

Herbert, Sir A. P.

O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H

Hinchingbrooke, Viscount

Orr-Ewing, I. L.

TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

Hogg, Hon. Q.

Peto, Brig. C. H. M

Major Conant and

Brigadier Mackeson.

NOES.

Adams, Richard (Balham)

Alpass, J. H.

Balfour, A.

Adams, W. T. (Hammersmith, South)

Anderson, F. (Whitehaven)

Barton, C.

Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V.

Attewell, H. C.

Battley, J. R.

Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)

Awbery, S. S.

Bechervaise, A. E.

Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

Bacon, Miss A.

Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

Benson, G.

Guy, W. H.

Porter, E. (Warrington)

Berry, H.

Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R.

Porter, G. (Leeds)

Beswick, F.

Hannan, W. (Maryhill)

Price, M. Philips

Bing, G. H. C.

Hardy, E. A.

Pryde, D. J.

Blackburn, A. R.

Harrison, J.

Pursey, Cmdr. H

Blenkinsop, A.

Hastings, Dr. Somerville

Ranger, J.

Blyton, W. R.

Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)

Rankin, J.

Boardman, H.

Herbison, Miss M.

Rees-Williams, D. R.

Bottomley, A. G.

Holman, P.

Reeves, J.

Bowden, Flg. Offr. H. W.

Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)

Reid, T. (Swindon)

Bowles, F. G. (Nuneaton)

House, G.

Rhodes, H.

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

Hubbard, T.

Ridealgh, Mrs. M.

Braddock, T. (Mitcham)

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

Robens, A.

Bramall, E. A.

Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayr)

Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)

Brook, D. (Halifax)

Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

Ross, William (Kilmarnock)

Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)

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

Scollan, T.

Brown, George (Belper)

Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)

Segal, Dr. S.

Brown, T. J. (Ince)

Irvine, A. J. (Liverpool)

Shackleton, E. A. A.

Buchanan, Rt. Hon. G.

Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)

Sharp, Granville

Burden, T. W.

Janner, B.

Shawcross, C. N. (Widnes)

Burke, W. A.

Jay, D. P. T.

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

Champion, A. J.

Jeger, G. (Winchester)

Shurmer, P.

Chetwynd, G. R.

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

Silverman, J. (Erdington)

Cobb, F. A.

Jenkins, R. H.

Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)

Cocks, F. S.

Johnston, Douglas

Simmons, C. J.

Collick, P.

Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)

Skeffington-Lodge, T. C

Collindridge, F.

Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)

Smith, C. (Colchester)

Collins, V. J.

Jones, J. H. (Bolton)

Smith, Ellis (Stoke)

Colman, Miss G. M.

Keenan, W.

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

Comyns, Dr. L.

Kenyon, C.

Solley, L. J.

Cooper, Wing-Comdr. G.

King, E. M.

Sorensen, R. W.

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

Kinghorn, Sqn.-Ldr. E.

Soskice, Sir Frank

Corlett, Dr. J.

Kinley, J.

Stamford, W.

Daggar, G.

Lee, F. (Hulme)

Steele, T.

Daines, P.

Lee, Miss J. (Cannock)

Stewart, Michael (Fulham, E.)

Davies, Edward (Burslem)

Lewis, A. W. J. (Upton)

Stokes, R. R.

Davies, Ernest (Enfield)

Lewis, J. (Bolton)

Swingler, S.

Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)

Lewis, T. (Southampton)

Sylvester, G. O.

Deer, G.

Lindgren, G. S.

Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)

Diamond, J.

Logan, D. G.

Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)

Dobbie, W.

McAdam, W.

Thomas, I. O. (Wrekin)

Dodds, N. N.

McEntee, V. La T

Thomas, George (Cardiff)

Driberg, T. E. N.

McGhee, H. G.

Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)

Dumpleton, C. W.

McGovern, J.

Thurtle, Ernest

Durbin, E. F. M.

McKay, J. (Wallsend)

Tiffany, S.

Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.

McKinlay, A. S.

Timmons, J.

Edwards, John (Blackburn)

Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)

Titterington, M. F.

Edwards, N. (Caerphilly)

Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)

Tolley, L.

Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)

Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)

Turner-Samuels, M.

Evans, John (Ogmore)

Marquand, H. A.

Ungoed-Thomas, L.

Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)

Mathers, Rt. Hon. George

Vernon, Maj. W. F.

Ewart, R.

Mellish, R. J.

Viant, S. P.

Fairhurst, F.

Middleton, Mrs. L.

Walkden, E.

Farthing, W. J.

Mitchison, G. R.

Watson, W. M.

Fernyhough, E.

Monslow, W.

Weitzman, D.

Field, Capt, W. J.

Moody, A. S.

Wells, W. T. (Walsall)

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

Morley, R.

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

Follick, M.

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

Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.

Fool, M. M.

Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)

Wilkins, W. A.

Forman, J. C.

Morrison, Rt. Hon- H. (Lewisham, E.)

Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)

Fraser, T. (Hamilton)

Mort, D. L.

Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)

Freeman, J. (Watford)

Moyle, A.

Williams, D. J. (Neath)

Freeman, Peter (Newport)

Murray, J. D.

Williams, R. W. (Wigan)

Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.

Nally, W.

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

Ganley, Mrs. C. S.

Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)

Willis, E.

Gibbins, J.

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

Wills, Mrs. E. A.

Gibson, C. W.

Oldfield, W. H.

Wise, Major F. J.

Gilzean, A.

Orbach, M.

Woods, G. S.

Glanville, J. E. (Consett)

Paling, Rt. Hon. Wilfred (Wentworth)

Yates, V. F.

Gooch, E. G.

Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)

Young, Sir R. (Newton)

Grenfell, D. R.

Pargiter, G. A.

Younger, Hon. Kenneth

Grey, C. F.

Parker, J.

Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)

Parkin, B. T.

TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanelly)

Paton, J. (Norwich)

Mr. Snow and

Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)

Pearson, A.

Mr. George Wallace.

Guest, Dr. L. Haden

Popplewell, E

Question put, and agreed to.

Original Question again proposed.
It being after Ten o'Clock, and objection being taken to further Proceeding,
The CHAIRMAN left the Chair to make his report to the House.
Committee report Progress; to sit again Tomorrow.

CIVIL AVIATION (SAFETY MEASURES)
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Wilkins.]
10. 11 p.m.
Mr. Rankin: Some 15 months ago I raised the question of safety arrangements in civil aviation. I do so again tonight. Today I read the speech which I made on that occasion, and if I had to deal again with this subject as I dealt with it then, I should not alter a single word of what I said on that occasion. I also read the reply given by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary. It was a good reply and I will start by quoting his concluding words:
"We shall not be satisfied until we reach that high standard of efficiency in which accidents will be things of the past, and we can achieve the fullest confidence of the public."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th February, 1947; Vol. 433, c. 749.]
What has happened since then? Take-off, landing and flying speeds have all increased since that date. I doubt if safety has increased in the same measure. The last half dozen accidents which have taken place have involved the finest type of British and American aircraft so far as design is concerned; in fact machines constructed and guaranteed to fly the Atlantic on three engines, have crashed on four. If we look at the last three major accidents, we find that in the Berlin air crash all those in the aircraft were killed, in the Star Tiger all were drowned, in the Pan-American Constellation crash at Shannon Airport, all were burned to death. I freely admit that two of these cases are no concern of my hon. Friend, but I quote them because of their effect on the public and because the type of craft in use is the type which is being used also in our own services.
In order to bring the problem that faces us nearer home, I asked my hon. Friend's Department to prepare me a return covering the number of accidents which had taken place, the principal causes, and also the numbers who have been killed or injured in these crashes. They were most helpful, and I warmly appreciate their consideration in this matter. The answer, I may say, will be published in HANSARD tomorrow.
2086
The return covers the period almost from the date of my speech 15 months ago, that is, 1st January, 1947, to 30th April, 1948. The return shows that so far as notifiable accidents are concerned there have been 26 on scheduled flights and seven on non-scheduled flights, making a total of 33. On the charter services, on passenger services, there were 21, and on non-passenger services 15, making a total of 36.
Air-Commodore Harvey: In fairness to the charter companies the hon. Member should say that in the 21 accidents there have been only one or two fatalities.
Mr. Rankin: If the hon. and gallant Member will give me a chance, I am coming to that point. The total number was 69 in 16 months, which is an average of four a month, or one a week. The return covers the principal causes, and does not cover all accidents. It is worth while comparing this with the world position. In the first quarter of this year, the total number of aircraft casualties, either partially or totally destroyed, in the world, exclusive of the Soviet area, for which figures are not made public—[Laughter.]—Hon. Members may laugh: I am not making a propaganda point about that, but simply stating it as a fact—the number of aircraft casualties was 296, which works out at the rate of three per day. There were 280 killed, out of a total casualty list of 522 or four a day, which gives our figures a good standing, but which should not cause any feeling of complacency.
When we look at the reasons for the accidents, we find that those due to human error of judgment were in the three Corporations, 22, and in the chartered companies, 29, giving a total of 51 out of the 69. That is a fairly serious state of affairs, and it suggests that the captains of our planes, these modern craft, are carrying heavy responsibility. I believe that in skill and experience they are unequalled, but the loading of the cockpit with all manner of aids—some of which are very necessary—is throwing a load on to their shoulders which, perhaps, is too heavy to bear. When we look at causes due to mechanical failure we find there were two accidents in the services of the three Corporations, and six in the services of the chartered companies. In four accidents involving Corporation

2087
planes every individual passenger and crew was killed, but there was no accident in the chartered companies' planes in which all were killed. Accidents involving death to either passengers or crew were five in the case of the three Corporations, and three in the chartered companies, making a total of 12 in which the entire passenger and crew personnel were wiped out or partially destroyed, and that gives a ratio of one out of every six. That is a point which should be very seriously noted. Basically the reason is that the search for higher speed because of military requirements is incompatible with the safety on which civil aviation must depend.
So long as civil aircraft is dependent on converted or potential bombers it cannot be sufficiently safe. May I emphasise in passing, from the safety point of view, the flying boats on the Trans-Oceanic routes. Our experience of what happened to that old type of American flying boat in the North Atlantic shows that, with the flying boat in use, every passenger, in my opinion, who went down with the Star Tiger would have been alive today. I would suggest that never again should any flying boat cross any ocean when the weather ships are lacking.
My second point deals with fire. Its consequences are appalling and its frequency disturbing. I would ask why diesel oil is not being used more widely today. I may be told that the type of engine prevents that. I suggest that the engine could be adapted. I am told it would mean a heavier load, because, for each brake horse power developed in the diesel we have 1·3 pounds weight in the engine as compared with one in the Merlin. But whereas ·5 pounds of petrol are required for every horse power developed per hour in the Merlin we only need ·35 pounds in the diesel, so that what we lose in increased engine weight we gain in the decreased weight of fuel. In addition, due to the lower fire point of diesel oil, the fire hazard is much less than it is with petrol. In fact, so far as safety is concerned, diesel oil is twice as safe as petrol.
My third and final point on safety features is the location of the airport. I wish to deal specifically with the airport which I know best, and which I use regularly, the Renfrew Airport. I would put
2088
this point to my hon. Friend. Does he consider that that airport is now safe for aircraft carrying the high-powered motor units of today? I have long advocated the Renfrew Airport but is it safe for the more powerful types of machine that we are using? I have quoted the large number of accidents due to the human error of judgment. Let one error of that nature happen to a pilot who is coming in to land at Renfrew with a fast moving machine—of course, I am dealing with bad weather conditions—and he is among the hills before he realises it.
In addition, he is denied the help given by ground Control approach. We have greatly increased the pilot's responsibilities by the more complicated mechanism of the aircraft. Let us not add to that responsibility by using airports which now present dangers that did not formerly exist.
10.23 p.m.
Air-Commodore Harvey: I am sure that the House is glad that the hon. Member for Glasgow (Mr. Rankin) has raised this matter, but I think he has given the impression that the British record is a bad one. That, to some extent, is rather unfortunate. We have had our share of accidents, some of them most unfortunate, but nevertheless, looking over the period and comparing it with the United States of America, the British record is not a bad one. Generally speaking it is very good.
I agree with the hon. Member when he refers to the speed of aircraft—
Mr. Rankin: Surely the hon. and gallant Member would agree that I did give a world comparison in order to show that our record is better than the world record.
Air-Commodore Harvey: It was not altogether clear, and when the hon. Member quoted the 21 accidents to the Charter aircraft I know that many of these were near-misses and not really accidents at all. It is not fair to class it as an accident if an aircraft taxis into the hedge at the end of the landing ground; that is quite different from killing a loadful of people, and one should differentiate to get the situation clear.
I believe manufacturers should spend more time in trying to reduce landing speeds—top speed can well remain where

2089
it is for the next few years—and in bringing about achievements to bring landing speeds down. That is important. The hon. Member referred to the fact that pilots have a great load of responsibility. That has always been the case—even before modern aircraft the pilot had to contend with engines which cut out every 50 miles, and his job has always been a very difficult one. The hon. Member also referred to the difficulties at Renfrew. I know those difficulties, because I was stationed there when it was a much smaller aerodrome, and on one occasion I finished up in the churchyard.
I would ask the Parliamentary Secretary, in reviewing this matter as a whole, to try to see that we get back the efficiency in radar which we had during the war. I know of his difficulties in dealing with personnel and of getting equipment, but it is important that, where aircraft are flying at high speeds in the Highlands, they should have every conceivable equipment to help bring them into the aerodrome with no chance of error. My final point is, in the selecting and arranging for the employment of control officers, will he try to raise the pay of those men so as to get the best men who are available, in order that they can render the service which the pilots want?
10.27 p.m.
Squadron-Leader Kinghorn: In the two minutes I have in which to add my views to those of my hon. Friend, I would like to say how glad we were that there was a resurrection in the churchyard at Renfrew and that we have the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) still with us. I am also glad that we did not have three by-elections after what happened to hon. Gentlemen opposite yesterday. These accidents should bring home to us that in this Debate we are discussing what is the most important transport topic in the world.
We have to do something about it. I must say the Minister of Civil Aviation set about doing something somewhere about last August, I think, in the committee to investigate accidents and many Members in the House—and people in the outside world, too, among the potential passengers and the people regularly using our air routes—were hoping that this gathering of experts, who are all gathering together our knowledge, by
2090
this time would have been able to give some information about these matters. But the last time we discussed this subject in the House we had no satisfactory answer, and the Minister still seems to refuse to let us know what the experts have decided. I think it is high time that this House should claim, on behalf of ourselves as potential by-election candidates and so on, that the general public really should know what has happened about this accident committee, and should know how we can assure that the general public in this country and in other countries—because we are hoping to earn dollars and other currency—can travel much more safely even than has been shown by the figures put forward tonight. I hope we shall get a much more satisfactory answer than that given the last time that this Debate was introduced.
10.20 p.m.
Mr. Edward Granville: I think we should all thank the hon. Member for Glasgow, Tradeston (Mr. Rankin) for raising this subject tonight. I would like to ask the Minister a question about all the technical development and research of one sort or another about which we hear a great deal, and which is going on not only in his Department but also under the Ministry of Supply. A great deal of progress has been made. I would like to ask when the result of this hard work, and this very good work, by these experts is going to be applied. They have been working—these backroom boys—for a long time, and have made great strides forward. Considerable development has to be applied to the design and construction of aircraft and airports. Will the hon. Gentleman tell us whether this fine machinery, which is being produced after all the hard work, is to be applied in the near future?
10.30 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation (Mr. Lindgren): This is one of the occasions on which one is rather sorry that the limit of a few minutes which is imposed rather restricts debate, and that hon. Members who have taken part in the Debate have been equally as restricted as I shall be in replying. In regard to the figures which were quoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin), I would observe that I once asked for figures in a Department with which I was

2091
associated, and the clerk who had prepared them came in and said, "I have prepared these figures. What do you want to prove, Sir?" That illustrates how figures in relation to anything are sometimes rather misleading unless one takes into account the factors to which the figures are related. We must first agree that this continually increasing stalling speed is prejudicial to safety, and that there must be, as the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) said, a determination on the part of the aircraft industry and of all who are associated with it so to improve design and perhaps also to get an increased cruising speed without increasing the stalling speed, and that is possible. One must call attention to the fact that speed is only one factor in relation to safety, and it is a factor which cannot be isolated.
What do we mean by speed? Cruising speed and stalling speed are two different things. I think that in fact my hon. Friend was referring to take-off and landing speed. Cruising speed is a factor which tends towards safety, particularly over long distances, particularly in bad weather and particularly in flying against head winds, etc. The high performance which cruising speed gives an aircraft enables the safety factor to be developed. A bigger point, which was made by the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield, was that in association with speed the development of aids is required or even the development of aeronautical science whereby navigational aids, approach aids, landing aids and communications are developed. They are equally as important, in fact they are more important than speed because the more they are improved the less does the increase in speed become a factor associated with the danger of accidents.
The operational efficiency has to be related to what in the main are the causes of accidents. Had my hon. Friend proceeded to develop the figures with which he has been provided, and which will be available to the House as a result of his non-oral Question, he would have seen that of the 59 accidents to which he referred 51 are attributable to the human error. The latest statistics of our American friends do not give the actual figures, or at least I have not seen the total figures, but they
2092
state that 74 per cent. of notifiable accidents are attributable to the personal error, as they call it.
Mr. Geoffrey Cooper: Does my hon. Friend think that excuses them, because does he not realise that, taken a little further, it shows that the personal factor can be eliminated, or largely reduced by proper training, and seeing that the standards are adhered to?
Mr. Lindgren: That is a point to which I was coming, but training has no relation to speed. The fact is that when it is the human element which is the greatest contributor to accidents, then surely the immediate necessity is to concentrate on those means which will tend to reduce—because I do not suppose we can altogether eliminate human error with mechanical aids—the faults inherent in human operation. It is equally obvious that the development of the training of the individual who has to carry out these complicated operations is vitally important; and the standard of aircrew training in all its branches, not only that of pilots, is the key to the problem of human error.
The other points raised related to the flying boat. I do not want to enter into a controversy in this short time in regard to the feelings which are held between protagonists on either side of the flying boats versus the land plane, but I think equally that it is unfair to use a single instance of a happening in the North Atlantic as a proof that this would happen on all occasions. My information, from those who are supposed to know, is that on the North Atlantic in particular the land plane is a much safer plane than the flying boat, and that the general conditions obtaining in the North Atlantic are such that a flying boat's chance of survival in a sea is no higher than that of a land plane.
Mr. Cooper: No.
Mr. Lindgren: Immediately there comes in the question of a difference of opinion. A point was also raised in regard to the low flashpoint fuel. There has been a controversy in the Press recently, which I think was slightly exaggerated, with regard to the development of the propeller turbine engine as against the reciprocating engine. The development of the former

2093
would enable a fuel to be used which is of lower flashpoint than that used at present.
So far as Renfrew is concerned, I would remind the House that it is the responsibility of all using any airport not to accept on to it aircraft which are unsafe in operation on that airport. So far as the Dakotas and Vikings now using Renfrew are concerned, it is a safe airport. The load of an aircraft is an important consideration in this respect. One of the runways at Renfrew is a few feet short of the standard length required for a Viking, but the standard is set for a Viking fully laden. Vikings using Renfrew are laden below capacity, the weight of the aircraft is less, and so Vikings can safely
2094
land in the smaller space there. No one will say that Renfrew is an ideal aerodrome. It has a number of obstructions which make it difficult of approach from certain directions under certain conditions, but it is an airport which is considered to be safe for the aircraft which are licensed to operate there.
I am sorry I cannot now go into my hon. Friend's question about the last statement, but I will have a chat with him about it. I cannot deal with it now because time is up.
Adjourned accordingly at Twenty Minutes to Eleven o'Clock.

HOUSING, SCOTLAND
  Timber and Steel
  Timber and Steel
  Cottages, Wamphray (Repairs)
  Cottages, Wamphray (Repairs)
  Non-Traditional Houses (Grants)
  Non-Traditional Houses (Grants)
SCOTLAND
  European Volunteer Workers
  European Volunteer Workers
  Agricultural Survey
  Agricultural Survey
BRITISH ARMY
  Married Quarters
  Married Quarters
  Tradesmen
  Tradesmen
  Bomb Disposal
  Bomb Disposal
  Cadet Force
  Cadet Force
  Personal Case
  Personal Case
  TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING (ORDER)
  TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING (ORDER)
EMPLOYMENT
  Radio Industries
  Radio Industries
  Mining (Foreign Workers)
  Mining (Foreign Workers)
  Export Trade
  Export Trade
NATIONAL FINANCE
  Tourist Travel (Swiss Currency)
  Tourist Travel (Swiss Currency)
  Economic Planning
  Economic Planning
  Sterling Area
  Sterling Area
  Bookmakers (Taxation)
  Bookmakers (Taxation)
  CIVIL SERVICE (CHEMISTS)
  CIVIL SERVICE (CHEMISTS)
TRADE AND COMMERCE
  Newsprint (Trade Fairs)
  Newsprint (Trade Fairs)
  Japanese Cloth (Imports)
  Japanese Cloth (Imports)
  Textile Exports
  Textile Exports
  Textile Production Campaign
  Textile Production Campaign
  Consumer Goods (Coupon Values)
  Consumer Goods (Coupon Values)
  Cotton Yarn (Production Figures)
  Cotton Yarn (Production Figures)
  New Factories, Development Areas
  New Factories, Development Areas
  Utility Shirts and Underwear (Prices)
  Utility Shirts and Underwear (Prices)
  Cigarettes (Packet Splitting)
  Cigarettes (Packet Splitting)
  Weights and Measures (Fees)
  Weights and Measures (Fees)
  Women's Shoes
  Women's Shoes
  Personal Expenditure (Consumer Goods)
  Personal Expenditure (Consumer Goods)
  Tourist and Holidays Board
  Tourist and Holidays Board
  Pottery Industry (Development Council)
  Pottery Industry (Development Council)
  Motor Vehicle Insurance Premiums
  Motor Vehicle Insurance Premiums
  Pamphlets
  Pamphlets
  Salvage Collection
  Salvage Collection
  NORTHERN RHODESIAN BLISTER COPPER
  NORTHERN RHODESIAN BLISTER COPPER
  PENSIONS APPEAL TRIBUNALS
  PENSIONS APPEAL TRIBUNALS
  STATUTE LAW REVISION BILL
  STATUTE LAW REVISION BILL
  TENANCIES (RACIAL DISCRIMINATION)
  TENANCIES (RACIAL DISCRIMINATION)
  MARSHALL AID (EXCHANGE OF LETTERS)
  MARSHALL AID (EXCHANGE OF LETTERS)
  BRITISH SUBJECTS, GERMANY (AFFILIATION CASES)
  BRITISH SUBJECTS, GERMANY (AFFILIATION CASES)
  ROOKS (DESTRUCTION)
  ROOKS (DESTRUCTION)
FUEL AND POWER
  Hire-Car Services, Cardiff
  Hire-Car Services, Cardiff
  Fuel Oil
  Fuel Oil
  Government Departments (Motor Spirit)
  Government Departments (Motor Spirit)
  Prosecution, Hull
  Prosecution, Hull
MINISTRY OF WORKS
  Mobile Labour Force
  Mobile Labour Force
  Cement Supplies
  Cement Supplies
  GENERAL NEWS SERVICE
  GENERAL NEWS SERVICE
  DISABILITY PENSIONS
  DISABILITY PENSIONS
  FURNISHED HOUSES (RENT CONTROL)
  FURNISHED HOUSES (RENT CONTROL)
  TEACHERS (BURNHAM SCALES)
  TEACHERS (BURNHAM SCALES)
  MILK REGISTRATIONS
  MILK REGISTRATIONS
  GOVERNMENT PENSIONERS, MALAYA (PETITION)
  GOVERNMENT PENSIONERS, MALAYA (PETITION)
  CYPRUS (CONSTITUTIONAL PROPOSALS)
  CYPRUS (CONSTITUTIONAL PROPOSALS)
  TRINIDAD (CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM)
  TRINIDAD (CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM)
  CIVIL AVIATION (ACCIDENTS)
  CIVIL AVIATION (ACCIDENTS)

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
2.34 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT JOWITT)THE LORD CHANCELLOR (VISCOUNT JOWITT) had given Notice that he would move to resolve:
That this House, while insisting on the constitutional duties of the House of Lords as the Supreme Court of Appeal, in order to facilitate the judicial work of the House during the emergency caused by the building operations now in progress, approves the adoption of the following procedure until such operations are concluded, viz.:
That all Petitions of Appeal shall, after presentation to the House, be referred to an Appellate Committee, which shall include persons qualified under Section 5 of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act, 1876, as amended by any subsequent enactment, with an instruction to hear Appeals when and where the Lord Chancellor may determine. Such Committee shall, after the hearing, make a report to the House and upon the Motion for the consideration of the Report, the Lords shall deliver their opinions to the House and the House shall thereupon give judgment.
The noble and learned Viscount said: My Lords, I rise to move the first Resolution which stands in my name on the Order Paper. I do so with very great reluctance. This is an illustration of the fact that misfortune sometimes overtakes the most worthy people, and there are few more worthy than your Lordships' House in general, and the official members thereof in particular.
The facts are these. As your Lordships well know, we have allowed the other place to use our Chamber and for the time being we find ourselves here. While we find ourselves here, there are
738
in connection with the construction of the new Chamber considerable and elaborate building operations now in progress outside, in order that room may be found for a method of heating the new Chamber. I do not know how far it is inconveniencing your Lordships at present—I hope very little, because the operations have been suspended whilst the House is sitting. But I live on the premises, and I speak rather feelingly about it. I gather, however, that what we are enduring to-day is as nothing compared to what will happen to us in the future. We are being chastised with whips to-day; the scorpions are ahead of us, because the builders are going to start driving piles. I am informed, and verily believe, that when they were driving the piles for Lambeth Bridge, the House then sitting in its old Chamber, found the noise so intolerable that your Lordships asked for the pile driving to be stopped.
The trouble about this new building is that this new heating chamber has to be ready by August of 1949. The work is already very much behind date, and it appears not improbable that there will be no heating when the new building is ready. The Minister of Works has been to see me and has impressed upon me the absolute necessity of getting on with the work and spending as much time on it as possible. Though he will withhold operations during those hours in which your Lordships sit here in a legislative capacity, he does ask, in the interests of getting the work completed, that he may be allowed to continue with it during such hours (generally in the mornings) as the House sits in its judicial capacity. I feel that we have no option but to meet his request, so far as we can. I would point out, in parenthesis, that if it means that the House in its legislative capacity is to meet at the time when normally it meets in its judicial capacity nothing would be gained.
That being so, I have put this Motion upon the paper and, if I may, I would ask your Lordships to consider it. The Motion commences in this way:
"That this House, while insisting on the constitutional duties of the House of Lords as the Supreme Court of Appeal …"
I pause there for a moment. I want your Lordships to remember that the Supreme Court of Appeal is not a particular group of Judges; it is this House itself; and a sitting of the Law Lords (as they are

739
commonly called), is nothing but a Sitting of the House. It takes place in this Chamber; the Mace is there; and it is very right and very important constitutionally that that principle should be remembered. When this matter was raised some two and a half years ago, I remember asking a question of the late Lord Salisbury—and on matters of this sort, in whatever quarter of the House we sat, we regarded him as the father and the constitutional guardian of our rights and privileges. Speaking in a Committee he said that he regarded it as a matter of the utmost importance that the Judges should be, and should regard themselves as, members of the House. He said that the House had been greatly enriched by the presence of the Judges, and I countered by saying that the Judges had been immensely privileged to be members of this House. If I recall the last few months I can easily give your Lordships illustrations of the way in which we have benefited by the opinions of the Judges expressed here.
Let it be said, of course, that the Judges are perfectly entitled to express their opinions on any question which arises. Whether they do so, or whether they do not, on any particularly burning political question, is a matter for their own good sense and good judgment. There is no limitation whatever upon their right to speak. I remember—and I know the noble Viscount, Lord Swinton, will remember—the speech which was made by Lord Simonds on the Companies Bill. I confess that I was so convinced and converted by that speech that I persuaded my colleagues to withdraw a whole clause, and the Bill, as it finally came before your Lordships' House, was radically different in that respect from the Bill which had been introduced. Only recently, on the Criminal Justice Bill, we had contributions from the Judges which, in some respects, if not all, must profoundly affect the discussions which your Lordships' House will have on that measure. Therefore, I, and I am sure all your Lordships, attach the very greatest importance to the preservation of the doctrine that the Judges are members of your Lordships' House in the fullest degree, and that a meeting of the House for judicial business is, in fact, a meeting of the House. From that it
740
follows that if we are habitually to meet in a Committee room, and if we are to continue to meet in that Committee room at the same time as the House is sitting for its legislative business, it may be impossible for the Judges who are taking part in the judicial work to continue to attend your Lordships' House. That will be a great loss to your Lordships, and to the Judges, and I therefore thought it right to emphasise, in my opening words, the constitutional duties of the House of Lords itself as the Supreme Court of Appeal.
In the second sentence I say this—
"… in order to facilitate the judicial work of the House during the emergency caused by the building operations now in progress …."
I make it plain, therefore, that this Motion is simply and solely a matter of tiding over an emergency. If, as may well happen from time to time, by reason of rain or other causes, the noise is suspended (as I like to think it will) there is no reason why the proceedings during that time should not, as before, take place in this particular Chamber. But believing as I do that there will be many days on which it will be almost intolerable to sit here and listen to the details of, let me say, an Income Tax case, what time outside the piles are being driven home, we must obviously do something to see that the litigants have their cases heard. I see no other course but for the time being to move to some other convenient place in the Palace of Westminster, and there hear the arguments. By way of illustrating and emphasising the fact that no constitutional departure is involved, I hope to be able—as I propose and intend—when the next Session starts and we resume the hearing of these cases, to preside personally over those of your Lordships who are hearing these cases. It follows, therefore, that I might well have to adjourn, in order to come back and take my seat on the Woolsack when the House meets for its legislative work.
That, my Lords, is all I have to say. The proposal is that we shall have some convenient place where, in comparative silence, I hope, these cases can be heard. We shall hear the arguments, but we shall not, of course, deliver any decisions. We shall then adjourn the matter to this House, and in this House, as before, the noble and learned Lords will pronounce

741
their opinions, in order to emphasise the fact in the future, while this temporary emergency lasts, that the decisions are, as in the past, the decisions of your Lordships' House and not of a group or section of the House. It may happen from time to time that the Lords who are hearing a case may decide to continue at some time when this House is sitting in its legislative capacity, the circumstances being such that none of them can possibly be concerned in what is taking place here. It will be for them to decide. As a general rule if any one of their Lordships hearing a case thinks it possible—possible, not probable—that he may be concerned or interested in what is taking place in your Lordships' House, it will be his duty to come here, and therefore the Committee will have to be adjourned.
That being so I propose the Resolution standing in my name. It is definitely a temporary solution of a temporary difficulty. I can understand anyone being nervous about it. I hope that the fact that we are taking these steps to meet a temporary emergency will never be used by anyone as a ground for saying that that which has been done temporarily, in view of an emergency, shall become a permanent feature of our Constitution. On that understanding and in that hope I beg to move the first Resolution which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved to resolve: That this House, while insisting on the constitutional duties of the House of Lords as the Supreme Court of Appeal, in order to facilitate the judicial work of the House during the emergency caused by the building operations now in progress, approves the adoption of the following procedure until such operations are concluded, viz.:
That all appeals shall, on being set down for hearing, be referred to an Appellate Committee, which shall include persons qualified under s. 5 of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act, 1876, as amended by any subsequent enactment, with an instruction to hear the appeals when and where the Lord Chancellor may determine. Such Committee shall, after the hearing, make a report to the House and upon the Motion for the consideration of the Report, the Lords shall deliver their opinions to the House and the House shall thereupon give judgment.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
2.48 p.m.
VISCOUNT SIMON: My Lords, perhaps I may be allowed to say a word or two upon this matter. I would say at once, for myself and, I believe, for others who have some special acquaintance with the judicial work of the House, that I think the proposal of the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor must be accepted. In view of the facts which he has set before us regarding impending noises just outside, which would make it impossible to hear the arguments and to concentrate upon the question before the House when it is sitting in its judicial capacity, there is nothing to be done for the time being but to move to another room. I confess that I am one of those who—to adopt the Lord Chancellor's own expression—feel a little nervous about this; and I will explain in a few sentences the reason for my anxiety. If, indeed, this is I purely temporary arrangement, as the Lord Chancellor undoubtedly means it to be and as the terms of the Resolution suggest that it should be, very well; it is a practical expedient which we shall have to adopt in a time of difficulty, and nothing else in particular will result. But, of course, it is in itself a remarkable departure from our traditional system, and it does contain within itself the seeds of a possible development which I should greatly deplore.
Your Lordships will forgive me for a moment if I explain how it strikes me. Hitherto, it has always been the case that the House of Lords has discharged its two great functions—one, the function of dealing with public business, whether legislation or discussion of another kind; the other, its judicial function—in the same building, with the one and only Mace on the Woolsack. For convenience, the Lord Chancellor, when he presides over judicial sittings, moves up nearer to the point where counsel stand to argue, but theoretically it is the Woolsack on which he is sitting. Now these two functions of the House are discharged alternatively. They never go on together, at the same time. The whole procedure of the House, when it is acting in a judicial capacity, is the procedure with which all your Lordships are familiar. It begins with Prayers—the Mace being on the Woolsack—and at normal times, more often than not, the Lord Chancellor presides. When a decision is reached, it

743
is put to the vote of the House, and is carried by a majority. The day's work ends with the moving of the Adjournment. It is an operation of the House. Incidentally, it is an operation which any member of your Lordships' House is at liberty at least to attend. I believe there have been one or two cases where members of your Lordships' House who are not usually regarded as learned in the law have wished to offer a few observations, but by the general good sense of this Assembly they have been suitably suppressed.
But the fact is, as I say, that the judicial work is part of the work of this House. The reason why that is important—I am glad that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor emphasised this, and I am sure he will excuse me if I do so too—is that the Lord Chancellor himself is the President of this Assembly, in whichever capacity it is acting. Consequently, these two different functions cannot go on at the same time. The Law Lords, who are most valued members of this House for every purpose, are, of course, specially appointed and specially paid in order that they may be members of this Supreme Judicial Tribunal. Of course, they can constitute the Tribunal—as they often do—without any other member being present, but often the Lord Chancellor himself presides. When he does not, an ex-Lord Chancellor, for what he may be worth, is available, and in some cases devotes a great deal of time to taking the Lord Chancellor's place for that particular purpose. If we were to drift into a system by which we allowed these two functions to continue side by side, I believe that in time the position of the Lord Chancellor would be most seriously prejudiced, because it would mean that he could not take part in judicial work.
We were all delighted to hear the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack say just now that he hoped in the period which is now approaching to be able to take more opportunities of dealing with judicial business himself. I do not in the least reproach the noble and learned Viscount. The reason he has not been available as frequently as some Lord Chancellors—to speak quite frankly—is because his colleagues in the Cabinet find him so invaluable a member that they are constantly calling upon his assistance, and
744
because they find he is so admirable an exponent of the policy which they advance, whether he is entirely in favour of it or not. For the moment those who are concerned with getting correct decisions on judicial appeals are often deprived of his guidance and leadership. When we think of how this double ròle was fulfilled by Lord Brougham or by Lord Lyndhurst or, to come to more modern times, by Lord Haldane or Lord Birkenhead, it is quite manifest how important it is that the Chancellor's position should be a dual one. If we can keep it as a dual position, as I think it ought to be, and insist that this is a purely temporary arrangement and that we must return to the principle that for both functions the House must live and work in the same place, I have no sort of regret that we should carry out this proposal. Indeed, as the noble and learned Viscount said, as a practical matter it is quite inevitable.
I was glad indeed to hear the noble and learned Viscount say firmly that he, for one, is quite determined that this temporary change shall not affect the resumption of our ordinary procedure. This is really an important matter. It perhaps affects ex-Lord Chancellors more than anybody else. Consequently I have to ask myself where I shall be if these two functions are conducted side by side. It was an Irish Member of the House of Commons who said long ago that, not being a bird, he could not be in two places at once. I suffer from the same disadvantage. It seems to me most important to insist that this is a purely temporary arrangement to meet a special emergency, and that it is not the beginning, and is not to be used as the beginning, of a change which I think would most seriously prejudice the true functions and conduct of your Lordships' House.
2.55 p.m.
VISCOUNT MERSEY: My Lords, as a Deputy Chairman of Committees I should like to support this Motion. I think it is an admirable illustration of the flexibility of the British system in general and of your Lordships' House in particular. If we are to get on with the work before the House, we must make some provision to meet the present difficulties. The proposal now before your Lordships is not entirely without precedent, for on many occasions since the House has

745
met at 2.30 p.m., a Select Committee has continued to sit while the House has been in session here. There is only one point which I think your Lordships ought to keep in mind. This Court of Parliament in your Lordships' House is the oldest existing court in the world. Not even that of the Vatican is older. It has continued, more or less in its present state, for the last 600 years, and probably for a great deal longer. It is most important that nothing should be done which could in any way contravene the ancient and important rôle that it plays in the Constitution. From what the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has said, I am satisfied that the traditions of the House, which are in his keeping and in the keeping of the learned Clerk of the Parliaments, who knows so much about this, will be adequately safeguarded.
2.55 p.m.
VISCOUNT HAILSHAM: My Lords, as an ex-Lord Chancellor I should like to add one word. I quite agree with the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor when he says it is inevitable that we should adopt this procedure, but I should like to put in a word of caution. I noticed that he said the Committee might be sitting simultaneously with this House. I do not think that is desirable or necessary. He said that any Law Lord who desired to attend in this House when the Committee were sitting would be at liberty to postulate that, and to ask the Committee not to sit. I would go further, and say that there should be no sitting of the Judicial Committee when the House is sitting, because it is important to maintain the fiction, so to speak, that the Committee are this House, sitting in Committee. I do not like the suggestion (it did not appear in the noble and learned Viscount's Motion but it did appear in his speech) that the Committee might be constituted simultaneously with the House and might continue sitting, notwithstanding the meeting of the House. If that be conceded, then I shall have no further objection. I have great reluctance in agreeing to it, because, as the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack and my noble and learned friend Lord Simon said, I think it is opening a door which might easily be forced.
2.57 p.m.
VISCOUNT MAUGHAM: My Lords, to my mind the Motion before the House is
746
one which must be approved. The step that is being taken is inevitable. I would add only that, in my opinion, this Motion does not result in any constitutional change whatsoever. What will happen is that the Committee will be appointed; and before the Committee certain legal arguments will be exchanged between counsel and the noble Lords who sit on the Committee—and sometimes between noble Lords themselves, because differences of opinion have been known. When opinion has been given in that place, which will not be the House of Lords, the matter will then return to the real Tribunal, the most ancient Court that is known in the world, as my noble friend has said, where the really technical legal business will be discharged by a Motion that the appeal be allowed or varied or dismissed. So there is really no constitutional change. I see no reason to doubt that when building operations are over we shall all return to our old places and once more be comparatively happy.
3.1 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I thank your Lordships for the way in which this Motion has been received. Perhaps I may remind you that this Order is for the present Session only. When the next Session begins, the Order will, of course, come up again for renewal, and in the light of the experience we have gained in the meantime we shall decide what to do about it. I hesitated to refer to my own position. I feel great regret that I am not able at the present time to devote as much time to my judicial work as used to be the case. I believe it to be of the greatest importance that the Lord Chancellor should be able to give a considerable part of his time to judicial work. By far the most important task he has to perform—I think it is as important a function as any Minister has to perform—is to select the Judges. I am quite certain he cannot do that efficiently unless he is kept in close touch with the Bar and hears cases argued from time to time. Therefore, if I have been unable to do it (and I have not been able to do as much as I should like), it is not that the spirit is not willing; it is, unfortunately, that the flesh, is weak and that, like the bird to which the noble and learned

747
Viscount, Lord Simon, referred, I cannot be in two places at once.
On Question, Motion agreed to, and ordered accordingly.

APPELLATE COMMITTEE.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this is a matter of machinery which is involved in the last Motion. I beg to move.
Moved, That a Committee which shall include all Lords qualified under s. 5 of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act, 1876, as amended by any subsequent enactment, be appointed to hear all appeals during the present Session and that the Committee do meet when and where the Lord Chancellor may determine and have leave to report to the House from time to time.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

INDIAN SERVICE PENSIONS.
3.3 p.m.
EARL WAVELL: My Lords, I beg to ask the question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
[The question was as follows:
To ask His Majesty's Government what progress has been made in negotiations with the Dominions of India and Pakistan on the granting of proportionate pensions to the uncovenanted European members of the services in these Dominions; whether these Dominions have agreed to grant forthwith proportionate pensions to those officers whose services have already been terminated; and whether, in view of the urgency of the matter, His Majesty's Government will send out a member of the Government to discuss these matters with the two Dominions before the end of May as they did on behalf of the Secretary of State services over fifteen months ago.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE FOR COLONIAL AFFAIRS (THE EARL OF LISTOWEL): My Lords, negotiations with the Dominion Governments on this matter have not yet started. As stated in the
748
reply to the noble and gallant Earl's Motion of April 7 last, we expect them to take place at the same time as the discussions relating to the sterling balances, which it is hoped to begin in the near future, and we are in touch with the Dominion Governments as to this. In view of the imminence of the more general financial discussions, His Majesty's Government do not consider it desirable to invite the Dominion Governments to agree to a Minister being sent out to discuss this particular question with them.
LORD CLYDESMUIR: Is the noble Earl aware that under the programme he has sketched at least a year will have elapsed from the time of the transfer of power before anything is done for these men? Those of us who are interested in this question are receiving letters indicating great anxiety. A number of these men have, in fact, already retired. Having that in mind, will the noble Earl do his best to expedite the discussions?
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: I can assure the noble Lord that His Majesty's Government are well aware of the importance of getting this matter settled at the earliest possible moment.
EARL WAVELL: Are His Majesty's Government aware, as I am from correspondence, of the growing tide of resentment among these people at the attitude of the Government, and the feeling that the matter is not being treated as urgent, while a great many of them are retiring or have already retired?
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: I cannot accept the noble Earl's suggestion that we are not doing our best.

SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS ACT, 1932.
RURAL DISTRICT OF ELY ORDER.
LORD WALKDEN: My Lords, I beg to move that this Order be approved.
Moved, That the Order made under the Act by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for extending Section one of the Act to the said area, be approved.—(Lord Walkden.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

FACTORIES BILL. [H.L.]
3.6 p.m.
Amendment reported (according to Order).
Clause 6 [Provision of seats]:
THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (VISCOUNT HALL)THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (VISCOUNT HALL) moved to omit subsection (1) and all words from the beginning of subsection (2) down to and including the first "and," and to insert in lieu thereof:
"(1) The following provisions of this section shall be substituted for those contained in section forty-four of the principal Act (which requires facilities for sitting during opportunities for resting to be provided for all female workers whose work is done standing).
(2) Where any employed persons have in the course of their employment reasonable opportunities for sitting without detriment to their work, there shall be provided and maintained for their use suitable facilities for sitting sufficient to enable them to take advantage of those opportunities.
(3)."
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, we have been giving further consideration to the drafting of Section 4 of the Factories Act as it would be amended by Clause 6 (1) of this Bill. The widely varying circumstances of industry often make it impossible to do more than frame a provision in wide general terms. The wording of the amending clause, however, appears to be unnecessarily vague and to be open to some misunderstanding. His Majesty's Government now suggest that it would be better if that wording were amended to read as in the proposed new subsections on the Order Paper. The Amendment I am now moving indicates more clearly the idea underlying the proposal—namely, that where, having regard to the nature of the work, there are reasonable opportunities for a workman to rest, provision should be made to enable this to be done. I trust that your Lordships will agree that this is an improvement and will accept the Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 12, leave out from beginning to ("where") in line 18 and insert the said new subsections.—(Viscount Hall.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Then, Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended (pursuant to Resolution of May 6), Bill read 3ª and passed, and sent to the Commons.

VETERINARY SURGEONS BILL. [H.L.]
3.8 p.m.
Amendments reported (according to Order).
Then, Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended (pursuant to Resolution of May 6):
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (THE EARL OF HUNTINGDON): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3ª.—(The Earl of Huntingdon.)
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, before this excellent Bill passes from your Lordships' House and has what I hope will be a quick passage through another place, I would like to ask my noble friend whether, on behalf of his light honourable friend the Minister, he can give an assurance upon Clause 7 of the Bill. That clause says:
"Where … the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries is satisfied that the society or institution cannot obtain the services of an adequate number of veterinary surgeons, the Minister may, if he thinks fit, grant a licence under this section to any person employed or to be employed by the society or institution."
I should like to ask my noble friend whether he can give an assurance that in granting these licences the Minister will always have strict regard to the number of qualified veterinary surgeons available. It would be a great satisfaction to the veterinary profession if they could feel that the Minister was ever watchful that this clause would not provide an open door for an unregulated number of unqualified persons to enter the profession.
THE EARL OF HUNTINGDON: My Lords, on behalf of my right honourable friend the Minister, I am very happy to give the noble Lord the assurance for which he has asked and to make it quite clear that the intention will be that, as and when the supply of veterinary surgeons improves, the number of fresh licences will be reduced, due regard being had to any extension of the society's work in poor districts not already covered. The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons will be consulted with regard to the supply position at any particular time. I hope that will satisfy the noble Lord and that your Lordships will see fit to give this Bill a Third Reading.
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: I am grateful to the noble Earl.
On Question, Bill read 3ª and passed, and sent to the Commons.

LORD HIGH COMMISSIONER (CHURCH OF SCOTLAND) BILL.
3.12 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD MORRISON: My Lords, this very short Bill will be easily understood by those of your Lordships who are normally resident in Scotland, and for the others I hope that a brief explanation will suffice to commend it. Its purpose is to increase the expenses allowance paid to His Majesty's High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. The Bill comes to us from another place, where it was subjected to a form of criticism which I am sure your Lordships would not wish to emulate. Indeed, when a Division was called, only ten members went into the "Noes" Lobby.
The Lord High Commissioner is the King's Representative, and his office dates from the Sixteenth Century. He takes up residence at the Palace of Holyroodhouse during the period of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland and, as His Majesty's Representative, is required to give hospitality, simply and without ostentation, to members of the Assembly and other representatives of public bodies in Scotland, and to invite others prominent in the public life of Scotland to meet them. In pre-war years a Garden Party was given each year in the grounds of Holyroodhouse and formed a characteristic feature of Assembly Week. In addition, two receptions were held at the Palace and several small luncheon and dinner parties took place. During the war years the scale of these entertainments was, of course, greatly reduced, but in 1946 and again last year steps were taken towards the resumption of pre-war hospitality.
So far as I can gather, the annual expense falling upon State funds for dispensing this hospitality has remained unchanged for 120 years. In fact, I believe that for even longer than that period it has stood at a maximum of £2,000 per annum, and this in spite of the changes in the value of money. It
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is true, of course, that deficits occur from time to time and have had to be met either by the generosity of private citizens or, not infrequently, by the occupant of the Office concerned. In these days, when the burden on the private citizen is heavy, I am sure your Lordships would not wish that state of affairs to continue. Last year, and the year before, although hospitality and entertainment were dispensed without lavishness and, indeed, on a strictly national austerity scale, the rising cost brought expenditure well over the £2,000 mark. The Bill, therefore, increases the provision made to a sum not exceeding £4,000 per annum.
In the circumstances which I have briefly outlined, and in view of the fact that the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland is due to take place next week, I trust your Lordships will agree to give the Bill a Second Reading and to take the further stages without delay. May I add one further comment, necessary because of certain statements made in another place and repeated outside? The allowance provided under this Bill is not a salary. It is paid to cover the necessary expenses of the office, and will be fixed at a level sufficient, and no more than sufficient, for that purpose. Sixty years ago the sum provided was defined as being:
"Not remuneration for active duties, but an allowance for the purpose of discharging with dignity the hospitable rights of an Office of honour."
That is still the position. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.—(Lord Morrison.)
3.16 p.m.
LORD TWEEDSMUIR: My Lords, I would like to make one comment on this Bill and join the noble Lord, Lord Morrison, in saying how much we welcome it. We, on our side, would like to see it become law as quickly as possible. The noble Lord is perfectly right when he says that many people confuse the expenses allowance with salary, which it is not. I believe it has become increasingly inadequate over a period of years. In fact, when I look back fourteen years to the time when my father held that Office, I do not think it was adequate even then. We all wish the Lord High Commissioner to have a sufficient allowance to discharge his ancient Office in a fit and proper manner, and therefore we heartily welcome this Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a: Committee negatived. Then, Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended (pursuant to the Resolution of May 6), Bill read 3ª, and passed.

DEVELOPMENT OF INVENTIONS BILL. [H.L.]
3.17 p.m.
Amendments reported (according to Order).
Clause 1 [The National Research Development Corporation]:
LORD CHORLEY LORD CHORLEY moved to add to the clause:
"(4) The Corporation shall, except where it appears to them that special circumstances Otherwise require, exercise their function of securing the exploitation of any invention by entrusting the exploitation thereof, on terms appearing to the Corporation to be appropriate, to persons engaged in the industry concerned.")
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move the Amendment standing in the name of my noble friend Lord Hall. Your Lordships will remember that on the Committee stage an Amendment was moved by the noble Viscount, Lord Swinton. There was some discussion upon it, and he withdrew the Amendment on the understanding that a Government Amendment would be submitted to secure the object which he had in view. This is the Amendment. The object is to place some limitation on the power of the Corporation to engage in manufacture on its own account or through some subsidiary company, and to provide that so far as may be practicable exploitation of these, inventions shall be carried out through ordinary industrial channels. I hope the noble Viscount will agree that these words meet his point and that your Lordships will accept them. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 15, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Chorley.)
VISCOUNT SWINTON: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Lord for carrying out so amply the undertaking which the First Lord gave us on the last occasion. I think the words of this Amendment are an improvement upon my rather amateur drafting. They at any rate make it plain what is the policy. They are, I suppose, what I may call a general
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direction to whomsoever is conducting this business in the future that, unless there are special circumstances, the manufacture of the articles shall be carried out by private enterprise and that the Corporation shall not engage in the manufacture themselves. I am obliged to the noble Lord for having phrased the Amendment in the way he has. I think it meets my point and I gladly accept it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Then, Standing Order No. XXXIX having been suspended (pursuant to the Resolution of May 6), Bill read 3ª; Amendments (Privilege) made. Bill passed and sent to the Commons.

BRITISH NATIONALITY BILL. [H.L.]
3.21 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, in moving the Second Reading of this Bill I cannot conceal from you that, although I do not think the Bill is controversial, it is concerned with a very complicated and difficult subject; and the problem I had in thinking out the lines of the speech which I was to make was to compress it within reasonable compass. I should have found it easy to make a long speech on this subject, and I shall find it very difficult to make a short speech. Yet I am sure that your Lordships, as a matter of general principle, and having regard to the complexity of the Bill, would rather have a short speech. I shall try to deal with the important and salient matters and not let myself become involved in matters of detail.
I start with this general principle: I believe that of all the remarkable contributions which our race has made to the art of government, the conception of our Empire and Commonwealth is the greatest. Of course it may be said, and said with truth, that it lacks a logical foundation and that it is difficult to expound or explain it. Indeed, even St. Athanasius himself would have found this subject one which called for all his skill. But, though it is difficult to expound and explain, I believe it to be a noble institution. I believe that we have managed to combine a sense of unity with a sense of individual freedom, so that it may

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fairly be said of our conception of the British Empire and Commonwealth that its service is perfect freedom. Now the link, the bond which binds us together, is, of course, primarily the fact that we are all proud to be subjects of His Majesty the King. There are other things which bind us: there is the sense of perils shared together and overcome in the past; there are the hopes for the future. But those things are not in any sense limited to members of the "family;" they are things which we share, I hope, with the countries of Western Europe. But there is something about the family which to my mind depends upon there being a common status and a common nationality. The problem is how to achieve that common status.
So far as I can see—and this is fundamental to my argument—there are only two ways in which that can be done. First, of course, you could have a common code: you could have every member State enacting the same legislation, and so you might say you had a common test of nationality through the whole of the Commonwealth. That is the principle upon which the 1914 Act was drafted. That Act extended, or was intended to extend, throughout His Majesty's territories, and it was contemplated that part of the Act would be adopted by various member States. Whether or not some question of prestige was involved, the fact was that all the member States preferred to enact their own legislation. None of them, I think, adopted the provisions which were intended for adoption. But although they all enacted their own legislation, yet their legislation was enacted in somewhat similar terms, so that substantial uniformity was achieved. I am for the moment omitting Eire, which I shall consider separately. The result was that a common status was preserved. Even so, the legislation not being precisely similar, anomalies were beginning to appear. I think it fair to add that the discrepancies were tending to increase. And, of course, there was this further drawback. It is a trite saying that he travels fastest who travels alone, and if we had to secure the consent of every member of the Empire and Commonwealth to any alteration in our laws it would involve considerable delay—in particular with regard to the law relating
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to the nationality of married women. It was known that when we here wanted to do something in regard to it we could not obtain common consent or common agreement.
But the scheme which we had—which I call the common code scheme—was completely shattered by the Canadian Citizenship Act of 1946. Let me make it quite plain that we have not, of course, the smallest complaint: Canada had every right to pass that Act, in regard to which she gave us notice of her intention. But that Act proceeds on this basis: that Canada should enact her own laws in regard to her own citizenship, and that a person admitted to citizenship of Canada should be entitled to British nationality. That is, I believe, the only alternative to the common code method, which had broken down; that is to say, to let each member State decide for itself according to its own laws what constitutes citizenship, and when that has been decided, nationality will follow citizenship. Here I want to point out that, this being the new principle, we must provide for citizenship of the United Kingdom. Our citizenship, of course, equally has British nationality, and subsection (1) of Clause 1, which I call the key clause of the Bill, sets out the position:
"Every person who under this Act is a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies or who under any enactment for the time being in force in any country mentioned in the next following subsection is a citizen of that country shall, by virtue of that citizenship, be a British subject."
I repeat, there were two ways of trying to maintain this common status and this common nationality. The common code has broken down and this conception of citizenship is the species; nationality is the genus.
I said just now that that involved that we should have what we have never had before—a citizenship of our own. We must distinguish our citizens from the citizens of other member States. I am in no doubt whatever when I say that if we had not been prepared to do that, we could not have secured their consent to the scheme. Citizenship is to be the gateway through which nationality is achieved. On that I want to make three observations. First, your Lordships will see that the citizenship which for the first time we prescribe is not "citizenship of the United Kingdom," but citizenship

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"of the United Kingdom and Colonies." That is the species. It may be asked, "Why do you add 'and Colonies'? Why not let the Colonies have their own species of citizenship? "But then you are confronted with the difficulty that either you deal with the Colonies as a group or you deal with each Colony individually. Ultimately, of course, we are responsible for the peace, order and good government of our Colonial territories; in a sense, we are trustees for the people of those territories. In those circumstances, is it right that we should differentiate between our own people and the people for whom we are trustees? We think it is not right. Of course, as a Colony achieves responsible government, there will probably have to be a new species of citizenship.
May I add one word here in regard to an Amendment which I propose to move with reference to the Channel Islands? The Channel Islands, with their long and illustrious history, could not be described as citizens of the United Kingdom; and, equally, they could not be described as citizens of the Colonies. Therefore, it is plain that we must have some Amendment to deal with their particular and peculiar position. I should not think it would pass the wit of any of your Lordships to devise an Amendment which would be satisfactory to the Channel Islands.
The next question is this. Let it be plainly understood that common nationality does not necessarily confer rights in other member States. Let me take, if I may, for example, Australia. Beyond all question, Australia is perfectly entitled to legislate for herself as to whom she shall admit into her territory as settlers. She may insist upon certain qualifications with regard to character, intelligence, creed or colour. All those things are entirely matters for Australia to decide. I mention this because I am anxious not to give rise to any misunderstanding. The mere fact that one possesses British nationality does not, and cannot in the nature of things, confer any rights in regard to any particular territory. All we can say is that, although there is no special treatment which necessarily follows throughout the Commonwealth, we hope and believe that, other things being equal, the fact that a man possesses British nationality will stand him in good
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stead in his application, whatever that application may be.
The third observation I want to make is with regard to the words "British subject," or if you like, "citizen," because never before have we had a conception of citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Here we come up against the use of the word "British" and the unfortunate ambiguity which attaches to that word. Sometimes, of course, we use the word "British" as applying exclusively to these Islands; for example, I believe the railways of to-day are called "British Railways." I remember that years ago, at a Dominions Conference, one of the delegates (I think it was the Prime Minister of Canada who was dealing with this point) picked up the paper which was before him, and which had at the head of it a phrase which was adopted in the time of Lord Rosebery:
"This document is the property of His Britannic Majesty's Government."
He made play with the fact that we did not specify which Government; the heading simply said that it was the Government of His Britannic Majesty. There is that ambiguity.
It is easy for us to accept the title "British subject." Speaking for all of us here, I am sure we want no better title. It is a title which we are proud and honoured to bear, but I quite understand that, in the case of other countries which have more recently joined our family of nations, it may give rise to some misgiving: for example, in the case of India, Pakistan or Ceylon, or perhaps even those of the older Dominions who owe their descent to other great parent races—the French in Canada, or the Dutch in South Africa. The phrase "British subject" may convey that which is quite inaccurate to our minds—some idea of overlordship or superiority, or something of that tort. If the words are a stumbling block to anybody else, by all means let us see if we cannot find an alternative term which nay be adopted, as, for instance, the phrase "Commonwealth citizen," which people may adopt if they prefer it. In fact, we are at the present time in consultation with the Dominion representatives to see whether an Amendment on those lines would be acceptable to everybody. If we adopt some such phrase as "British subject" or "Commonwealth citizen"—I am not tying myself to a phrase—States can use whichever phrase they prefer.

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I will deal in a moment, and deal separately, with three topics: married women, children and Eire. I am afraid that that is a cross division, but I think it is the only way to make the matter relatively plain. Before I come to those matters, I ask your Lordships to consider this question. In future, how will one acquire this British citizenship which, of course, involves British nationality? The first thing I would say is this. Any person being a British subject to-day remains a British subject if and so long as he has one of the qualifications which are set out in Clause 12. For the rest he may acquire British citizenship by birth (Clause 4) by descent (Clause 5) or by registration (Clause 6); that is to say, if a citizen of any country mentioned in Clause 1 or of Eire satisfies the Secretary of State that he has the necessary qualifications, he is entitled to be registered as a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Then one can acquire British citizenship by naturalisation (Clause 10), or by incorporation of territory (Clause 11). At a later stage of this Bill, some difficult problems will arise on all these matters which I shall be prepared to discuss with your Lordships, to the best of my ability. I hope we shall leave most of those details until we reach the Committee stage, if your Lordships think it proper to give this Bill a Second Reading.
Clause 13 deals with transitional matters, and that for two reasons. In the first place, we must be careful to prevent persons whose status will depend upon the passing of a citizenship law in another Commonwealth country from losing their British nationality in the interim. Secondly, we desire to enable existing British subjects who do not become citizens of the Commonwealth country to retain their existing status as British subjects by making them citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies.
Now I pass to consider the interesting topic of married women. I think I can best assist your Lordships by enunciating the propositions which the Bill establishes. The first is that in future a British woman will not lose her citizenship on marrying an alien. Your Lordships know that, save in exceptional cases, she lost her citizenship heretofore. Subject, however, to her not acquiring the nationality of her husband, she retained it. I venture to think that this reform is long overdue, and she will not
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lose her citizenship in future. Secondly, if in the past she lost her British citizenship by marrying an alien, on the passage of this Bill she will automatically re-acquire that which she lost. The third proposition is that an alien woman marrying a British citizen will not automatically acquire citizenship. She can apply for registration as a citizen, but the granting to her of that registration is a matter for the discretion of the Secretary of State. As your Lordships know, previously, an alien woman, on marrying a British subject, automatically became British. I know of cases in the courts of women of very undesirable character who came over here and, when they got to Dover, married somebody whom they would never see again. They did that with the sole object of precluding their deportation from this country. That will now become impossible.
The fourth proposition is that no alien woman who has acquired British citizenship will lose it. It would be grossly unfair if she did. The fifth proposition is that an alien man marrying a British woman will not acquire British citizenship, though such a marriage would be a factor for the Secretary of State to consider in determining whether or not the man has so identified himself with the life of this country that it is right that he should be made a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Those five propositions, which are distilled from the Bill, I believe accurately represent the position with regard to married women.
With regard to children, the existing law has some practical disadvantages. The first is this. An illegitimate child born abroad of a British father and subsequently legitimated by the marriage of the parents, does not become a British subject. In future, he will be treated in exactly the same way as though he had been born legitimate. The next point is that under the existing law a child can be included in the naturalisation certificate of his parent; but if the parent is already British he cannot, of course, be naturalised, and the child can only become a British subject by the issue of a naturalisation certificate to it which involves taking the oath of allegiance. For instance, in the last war there were many cases of British women serving in the Forces abroad who had illegitimate children born abroad. Those children, with the women already British, of course, could not

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become British until such time as they were of an age to take and understand an oath of allegiance. Another difficulty is this. An alien child cannot be adopted unless and until it has become British, and that again means unless and until it can take the oath of allegiance. In future, under this Bill, all children who need to be made British subjects can be made British by registration under Clause 7.
The corresponding propositions in regard to children may therefore, I think, be stated thus: a child born in this country or in the Colonies will be a citizen, except of course the child of a foreign diplomat. The children of the first generation born outside this country, whether abroad or in a Commonwealth country, will have citizenship. Subsequent generations born in foreign countries will also have citizenship if the birth is registered at a Consulate within twelve months, or at such later period as may be approved by the Secretary of State. Second and subsequent generations born in a Commonwealth country will not acquire citizenship unless the child does not become a citizen of that country, because we expect these children normally to take the citizenship of the Commonwealth country. The child of a citizen will also be a citizen if born in a Protectorate, Protected State, Mandated Territory, or Trust Territory, or if his father at the time of his birth is in Crown Services under His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom.
Now I pass to Eire. Here we get into a real difficulty. Your Lordships will see that British subjects, although they are citizens of Eire, can remain British subjects if they claim so to remain under Clause 2 of the Bill. I hope it will be some consolation to your Lordships if I point out that they are the judges as to whether or not they possess the qualifications which are to be found at the top of page 2, one of which is
"that he has associations by way of descent, residence or otherwise with the United Kingdom …."
If he is of opinion that he has such associations, then it is for him to assert it and not for the Secretary of State to deny. He becomes a British subject. I would further point out, with regard to children of tender years, that there is no time limit within which this has to be done, and, for instance, the matter can
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wait until the child reaches an age of discretion to decide for himself. I intend on Committee stage, however, to move an Amendment to enable the parents to apply on behalf of the child and to make it quite clear that a declaration, whenever made after the passing of the Bill, is to have effect. But I must make quite plain that we do not see how we can cover children born in Eire after this Bill comes into force. Therefore such children, even though the parents elect to remain British subjects, will not be British subjects. We cannot claim as our citizens those who are citizens of a Commonwealth country.
Difficulties similar to those which are experienced in Eire do not arise elsewhere. Your Lordships all know that Eire opposed British nationality for her citizens. Indeed, her Act of 1935, by Section 21, enacts as follows:
"Every citizen who, except by marriage, becomes a citizen of another country, ceases to be a citizen of Eire."
Section 33 repeals the common law relating to British nationality, and provides that citizenship of Eire is not to confer any other nationality. I am not sure that I understand the Eire Act—indeed I am quite sure that I do not—but I hope that an Eire citizen, being British and remaining British, will not thereby lose his citizenship of Eire.
That is really the substance of this Bill. The conception of an all-pervading common status or nationality is not primarily, not mainly, important because of its material advantages. It is, if you like, rather mystical. But none of us, I suggest, is any the worse for a little mysticism in our life. It is the mark of something which differentiates the family from mere friends. But even from the material point of view, there are, at the present time by our law, not inconsiderable advantages. The British subject is free from those disabilities and restrictions which apply to aliens. He is entitled to enter or leave the country at any time, he qualifies for the franchise, he can become a member of the Privy Council or of Parliament, and, save in war-time, under certain limitations, he can become a member of the Civil Service, and he can own a British ship. As I say, there are various material advantages. It is for each particular territory, each particular country, to decide for itself, from time to time, what privileges are to be allowed and to what extent

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they are to be conditioned with regard to British subjects or anyone else.
In concluding, I would ask your Lordships to remember that there are really two parts to this Bill. The first is that which concerns ourselves alone, as to which we can, without hesitation, make whatever Amendments we feel disposed to make. But there is another part which concerns not merely ourselves but the other member States of the Commonwealth. Your Lordships will forgive my saying that those provisions have been threshed out only after great and careful discussion. Though all parts of the Bill are entirely subject to your Lordships' wishes with regard to Amendments, I know that you will realise, with regard to the latter class of clauses, that they should be considered with a special sense of responsibility, and a realisation of the fact that we must be very careful not to do anything which might give any possible offence to any of our member States.
That is the Bill. I warned your Lordships that it is a complicated one, and I am afraid that what I have said has made it quite plain that, in that respect at any rate, I was accurate. I commend the Bill to your Lordships as being a real and practical effort to maintain something which I believe to be very precious—that is to say, the outward and visible sign of that sense of family relationship which is, and I hope will long remain, the keynote of our great Commonwealth of Nations, in which the individual freedom of each one is combined with a sense the unity of the whole. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
3.55 p.m.
VISCOUNT SIMON: My Lords, I am sure we are all exceptionally grateful to the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor, for his remarkably clear exposition of the Bill. Whilst what he has said may not make every word of it plain to every one of us, I feel that he has discharged for us all a most valuable service, for anyone who has tried to understand this Bill without an exposition such as we have just heard must inevitably have tied himself into a great many knots. Beyond all question, this is a very difficult and complicated matter, and it is perhaps worth while for a moment to point out how, historically, it has come
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about. Originally, the conception of British nationality was the simplest thing in the world. The test which decided whether you were or were not an Englishman—and here I deliberately say "English"; I am not including Scotland—was: "Where were you born?" If you were born in England, you were an Englishman; a natural-born Englishman. It did not matter what your race was. It did not matter what your father was or what your mother was. The only thing that mattered was whether you were born here. It was a feudal conception.
In contrast with that, there was another equally simple test which, generally speaking, was applied on the Continent of Europe and according to which the answer to the question, "What is your nationality?" was to be found by asking:" Who is your father?" It depended upon blood; it did not depend upon place of birth at all. That was the simple way in which these things began. The real reason why we have now reached this state of complication—whether my noble and learned friend's Bill will reduce the complication or will inevitably increase it I am not quite sure—is connected with the growth of the King's Dominions. When James VI of Scotland became James I of England, the problem at once arose as to whether or not a man who was born in Scotland after James I had come to the English throne was, in England, an alien or a native. There was a famous case called the Calvin Case—it had nothing to do with the severe and perhaps morose theologian who was at one time the tyrant of Geneva. In the same way, in the time which is ordinarily called the time of the Georges, when the man who wore the Crown of England also wore the Crown of Hanover, and when, consequently, a large number of undoubted, native-born, Englishmen found themselves established outside this island—many of them in Hanover, with their families also established there—further complication was created, and Parliament had to legislate to deal with the son born abroad of a man who was himself a natural-born Englishman. Indeed, that legislation went on to provide for the grandson, too, so that he could have British nationality, notwithstanding that he was born abroad.
The final complication—and none of us has the slightest reason to regret it—has come about much more

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recently, and is a result of development in the British Commonwealth of sovereign States, of equal power and authority with ourselves. We used to call them the Dominions, though I notice that this Bill—and I think it is the first piece of suggested legislation which does so—carefully avoids the use of the word "Dominion" and, instead, indulges in the elegant periphrasis which you will find in subsection (2) of Clause 1. Once we have the position that there are inside the British Commonwealth sovereign States with as complete power to decide in respect of their own citizens as we have for ours, and when those sovereign States proceed to legislate (as was undoubtedly intended) to decide who shall be regarded as their citizens—Australian citizens, or whatever they may be—then we enter into a situation of great complexity.
I would venture to put in my own way, in one sentence, what the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor has explained. It must be recognised that we now have in these great self-governing Dominions what I might call a two-decker arrangement: legislation which defines who are citizens and, above that, the broader proposition that these people are British subjects. We have never had that until now. English law and the whole constitutional conception has been that a man is, either a British subject or not a British subject; and so far as the law of nationality is concerned, he need not bother himself about what is called citizenship.
"John Gilpin was a citizen of credit and renown."
That meant only that he was a citizen of the City of London. The notion that we should pass legislation which defines who is or who is not a citizen in any larger sense is entirely novel. Though the noble and learned Viscount has said that this is not a controversial Bill (and in one sense I agree with him) the Bill still contains a great many points which we may legitimately ask to examine and which we may properly discuss, with every respect for those who live in other parts of the British Commonwealth.
I must confess that I greatly regret that nobody has been able to invent any attractive description of this new citizenship. Those of your Lordships who have examined the Bill will know that the combined efforts of the Government, the
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draftsmen and everybody else have been able to produce only this phrase which describes certain persons, who are defined, as
"citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies."
And we are to understand that the last five words are not five words
"sparkling for ever on the forefingers of time,"
but are a sort of portmanteau term. It is a great pity that up to the present nobody's ingenuity has been able to suggest a more attractive expression. It has some very odd results. I could not help being a little surprised at first when I looked at Clause 4, which speaks of "every person born in the United Kingdom and Colonies." That appears to be a rapid peregrination unusual for a lady about to produce a child! The person is to be born "in the United Kingdom and Colonies." The explanation, no doubt, is that this most unwieldy expression is supposed to be hyphenated and represents a sort of carrier like "Western Union," embracing several political units.
There is another thing I regret about the Bill. It may be inevitable, and I hope that what I am saying is not thought to be captious. I am saying it because I have had occasion to consider the subject, as I was Attorney-General in 1914 when the great Nationality Act was passed. One is caught up now and then by some rat her distressing reflections. As this Bill is drafted, those who are citizens of the Colonies are in a better position than those who come from the Dominions. Yes, it is so. A man who comes from Jamaica or the Gold Coast, being a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies from the beginning, enjoys that prestige without any special action on his part. He has been born in the Colonies and that result follows. But before a citizen of Canada or Australia can become a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies, he has to live here for twelve months, which the man from the Colonies need lot do, and then he has to satisfy certain special conditions. Then, if these conditions are satisfied, the Secretary of State is not only at liberty but is bound to give him a certificate, adding him to the list of citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Frankly, I regret that. It does not seem to me to be a very happy result.

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It may be asked why a citizen of Canada should want to become for any purpose a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies. I agree that so far as one can see at the moment there is no particular reason why he should. I think I am right, and the noble and learned Viscount will correct me if I am wrong, when I say that so far as concerns the right to stand as a candidate for the House of Commons or to be made a Peer, or to vote in an election if one resides in the constituency, the test is one of British nationality and not of a more local citizenship. But there may be purposes for which it is desirable for people to have the qualification of citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies. The effect of the Bill is that a man from Canada or Australia, or who has not been born in any of the places which are listed so elaborately in subsection (2) of Clause I, does not become a citizen of the United Kingdom or Colonies automatically and has to fulfil certain conditions laid down in the Bill.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (VISCOUNT ADDISON): In common fairness, I want to ask whether the noble and learned Viscount has referred to the words at the bottom of page 3—" the period of twelve months, or such shorter period." The twelve months is not always necessary.
VISCOUNT SIMON: You mean that there might be a special case in which a shorter period would be allowed? I thought that was meant to mean only a special emergency. I had no intention of leaving that out from my consideration. The point is that a man from the Colonies has not to wait at all; he is already a citizen. I rather regret that particular difference, though, of course, a Bill of this sort cannot contain everything.
I very much regret it if the effect of the Bill is in any way to shift the main, proud claim, when it is relevant to make the claim, that: "I am a British subject, and that is all that matters." We ought to look carefully at what may be the effect of starting in this country, for the first time, the idea that we must be more particular and must pick out certain British subjects and say:" You are not only a British subject, but also a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies." I think it was in 1850, if I remember rightly, that Lord Palmerston made a
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famous speech in Parliament which reverberated through the country, in which he championed the rights of a Maltese inhabitant called Don Pacifico, and profoundly declared that this humble person, who was not of the British race, not of British connections and not of a British family, was none the less civis Britannicus. I do not think Lord Palmerston's rhetoric would have sounded quite so effective if he had had to say that he was "a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies." I really wonder whether it is necessary to go in for that distinction.
As regards married women, I think the Lord Chancellor's extraordinarily clear statement, with its five propositions, will be generally accepted. I would certainly accept it. I myself have never been quite so certain that where a husband and wife belong to different nationalities there are not some consequences which may prove a little inconvenient. So long as the husband and wife are of one nationality, maybe carrying one passport, their children, wherever they are born, while they are children, will be of the same nationality as the common nationality of their parents. That will not happen now. While, on the whole, I think it is quite right to meet the claim which is forcibly made on behalf of married women, we must remember that that slight complication would seem to arise.
I will give an example of how difficult it is to work out a child's nationality by quoting from Clause 7:
"The Secretary of State may cause to be registered as a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies … the minor child of a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies."
A child, whether minor or major, is a child of two persons, the father and the mother. I am not quite clear whether this clause applies where either one of the parents or where only the father or only the mother is a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies. Certainly, in some parts of the Bill there is still a kind of priority given to the father, which I think ladies who feel strongly about the claims of married women will forgive.
For instance, Clause 5 says:
"Subject to the provisions of this section, a person born after the commencement of this Act shall be a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies by descent if his father was a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies at the time of the birth."

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In the end you have for some purposes to take a single test, and it is the male test which is chosen. Still, the main thing that has been so long asked for is achieved. For my part, I think it is right to achieve it, though I submit that we should recognise that certain complications may follow.
The noble and learned Viscount has also explained to us the provision about Eire. It is very regrettable. There are people in Eire to-day who attach value to their British nationality. This is not a question of citizenship. I thought one phrase of my noble and learned friend rather suggested that the test which is given on the top line of page 2 is the test as to whether a man is or is not to be considered a British subject. The effect of the Bill in regard to Eire is that anybody now living in that country who is, when this Bill is passed, a British subject, if he makes one of the four claims set out on page 2 and gives notice in writing to the Secretary of State, will himself remain a British subject. But, of course, it does not apply so far as future descendants of any family in Eire are concerned. They cease to be British subjects. I must say that that seems to me to be rather regrettable. The links between this country and Eire at present are in some ways very weak. I hope that they will grow stronger in time, with mutual sympathy. If there be, as there certainly are, some people still living in Eire, perfectly good and loyal supporters of their own Government, who none the less treasure the fact that they are British subjects, it is a sad thing that, as one of the consequences of this Bill, they should be told:" If you take the proper steps you may be able to establish that you are a British subject, but your descendants will not be able to do so." That is one of the effects of the Bill.
But when one has said all that, one is, I think, faced with the general reflection which naturally the noble and learned Viscount has made the principal feature of his speech—namely, that we have to take one course or the other; it is no good dithering. Though I did not actually hear the Lord Chancellor say so (it may have been an omission of mine) I had otherwise understood that the first clause, which he calls the key clause, is one which the present Government confidently think will be adopted by the
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Dominions, and that therefore we shall all start with the same proposition. That is very important. Apparently we in this country are to do it first. I gather that is the hope and the expectation, and it is rather a consolation, because it would be a great pity for us to do this if others did not do it. This Bill has not been drawn up on the terms that this change of the law is to be made if other people make it; we are doing it in faith. I hope that no difficulties may arise. But the thing I feel most about the Bill—and I hope that I do not sound as if I am seeking merely to criticise, because I understand perfectly the necessity for doing something—is the way in which it has come upon us. This conception of developing British nationality and adjusting it to the situation in the Dominions is not a new idea at all. Like most things in the British Commonwealth, this is something which changes with growth. But how did these earlier changes come about? They came about after what in those days was called an Imperial Conference. I apologise to those who object to the use of the word "Imperial," though I myself do not see anything much the matter with it. It came as a result of a Conference, not between experts, but between the leading statesmen speaking for these great areas. Not only did the statesmen meet in discussion—because there must have been many points of difficulty to adjust—but the proceedings were afterwards published, so that every-body might know what had happened, and everybody could form his own view as to whether or not the result was justified.
That is not the way in which this has come about. So far as I can understand it, this has come about as a result of what is called an experts' conference—a conference of experts. I do not doubt that they are experts, but it has come about, in the first instance, on departmental level. Apart from the noble Viscount, Lord Addison, who is bound to have known about it at all stages, I wonder a little how much time the Cabinet, as a Cabinet, have addressed to this subject, or how many people in the Cabinet really had command of this subject until quite recently.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: May I interrupt the noble Viscount? I am sure he does not wish to give a misleading impression.

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Of course, as is obvious, this is a highly technical subject, and it was therefore necessary to assemble a considerable body of experts. That was done with complete good will and common consent, and they sat for a long time discussing the various issues concerned. At the same time, however the issues concerned were freely discussed with Ministers and with one another.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: May I add to that, because there is a contribution I can make? I myself spent nearly a morning discussing this with Field Marshal Smuts, and I also discussed it with Mr. Mackenzie King. The idea that this was merely a departmental matter, discussed on that level, is quite erroneous.
VISCOUNT SIMON: I am glad to have that impression removed. The point with which I am really concerned is that the public should have the opportunity of knowing the way in which this matter has in fact developed. That is what happened at the Imperial Conferences, which, as the noble Viscount well knows, resulted in resolutions as to the direction in which things should move. I think it is difficult and hard on people who want to do right about this that they should not know what immense stakes are involved, what are the risks which we must certainly do our utmost to void, and which I am sure all persons in all parts have done their best to avoid. I think it would have been better if the ordinary people—or, at any rate, the public instructed on the subject—had known more of this and known it earlier. For myself, I knew nothing about it—I could not be expected to do so, of course—until this Bill was printed on February 17. Although I do not think the Lord Chancellor has himself said so, I believe it to be the case that the conclusion in the key clause has become (as between those who meet in the experts' conference and those to whom they reported) more or less an agreed clause. If that is so, I should very much doubt whether any criticism will stand against it. With great respect, however, I suggest that it would have been a happy circumstance if the way this matter was developing had been more generally known rather earlier than it was, by those who try to understand this subject.
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If I have sounded critical about this matter I am sorry, because although I have felt it my duty to make these observations—and I am glad to have been corrected on one of them—I desire as warmly as anybody in the land that there should be a good issue out of this Bill. But it is necessary to realise that it is of tremendous importance, and I hope with all my heart that the changes here proposed will so work out as to be for the general benefit of the community. I am glad to hear it suggested that, if "British subject" is regarded in any quarter as an objectionable phrase, there should be an alternative such as "Commonwealth citizen." Of course we shall hear of that hereafter. I apologise for speaking at this length, but it has appeared to me that of the many Bills that I have examined since I have been a member of this House there has hardly been one which, for good or for evil, may constitute so important a part of the structure and, I trust, the permanence of the British Commonwealth hereafter.
4.28 p.m.
THE EARL OF PERTH: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Samuel is clearly the person best fitted to express the views of noble Lords who sit on these Benches on questions of nationality, but he has left for Switzerland for a short visit to attend an International Liberal Conference, and it has therefore fallen to my lot to take his place this evening. Obviously, it is with considerable trepidation that I follow the two noble and learned Lords who have already spoken to your Lordships. My only qualification is that at various times in my life I have been called upon to deal with the question of nationality, and I admit that as a rule I have found it of considerable difficulty and complexity.
After studying this Bill to the best of my ability, I have come to the conclusion that the problems are even more complex than I thought, and I would therefore like to express my gratitude to the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor for his very lucid exposition of the clauses and the purposes of the Bill. Some of us have long been hoping for a new Nationality Bill. Certainly we believe that the whole of the existing nationality laws require revision and amendment. Therefore, I wish to express our gratitude for the introduction of the Bill and for the

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fact that His Majesty's Government have found the time, during a Session which has certainly been prolific of legislation, to introduce this non-controversial but highly important measure. The Bill must have required much consultation with the various Governments of the Commonwealth, and from what the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor and the noble Viscount the Leader of the House said, those Governments, so far as they are affected, are in full agreement with the clauses and purposes of the Bill. The changes in the existing nationality law proposed by the Bill are wide, and the clauses which affect the status of women show, to my mind, an almost unhoped-for progress.
May I turn for a minute or two to some of the specific clauses of the Bill itself? It is good to find that under Clause 1 the citizens of nearly all the countries of the Commonwealth will still bear the proud title of "British subject." I felt, in listening to the speech of the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simon, that he slightly underestimated the cementing effect of this particular status. It is an overriding status, and I hope that this most valuable factor and tie between the various nations of the British Commonwealth will always remain.
VISCOUNT SIMON: Of course, the noble Earl realises that that citizenship really exists now.
THE EARL OF PERTH: The noble and learned Viscount was discussing, if I remember aright, what would be the better title. I apologise if I have misunderstood him. I assume that any British subject, whether a citizen of one of the Commonwealth countries or of any other, will be entitled to full diplomatic protection and consular help from the British Commonwealth representatives if he is in a foreign country.
I think it is true, as the noble and learned Viscount Lord Simon said, that there are certain points that require mature reflection; but some of the original qualms that I felt on some of those points have been greatly mitigated by what the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack has been able to tell us. With regard to Clause 2, concerning the citizens of Eire, I was happy to learn that if a citizen of Eire gives notice in writing to the Secretary of State that he claims to
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remain a British subject on any of the grounds laid down, such as descent or residence, the claim will be granted unconditionally. I do not think any of us is quite happy about what the Lord Chancellor said concerning children born in Eire after this Bill comes into effect. But we must remember that these children may be affected by time and events. It may be perhaps seventeen or eighteen years before they have to make any choice; the position then may be happier, and it may be possible for an arrangement to be reached.
I now come to Clause 7, which seems to make one of the fundamental changes proposed in the Bill. I gather that an alien woman who has been married to a citizen of the United Kingdom will no longer merely by reason of her marriage become a British subject, but that the Secretary of State may cause her to be registered as such. I suppose we all appreciate the main reasons for the alteration of the law: there have been certain objectionable practices under the existing law, and the Secretary of State has been powerless to do anything to prevent them. But registration is now to be required in each particular case. I do not know whether the taking of the oath of allegiance ought not to be a prerequisite for registration, but whatever decision may be reached on that particular point, I hope that the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor will be able to assure us that registration will be granted almost as a normal rule. Otherwise, since in many States women married to aliens lose their nationality, we should have a considerable number of Stateless women—a position which I feel sure the Lord Chancellor and your Lordships would wish 10 avoid. That is why I hope that registration will be the normal rule and not the exception.
There is a question which I should like to ask on Clause 10 (1), which says:
"The Secretary of State may, if application therefor is made to him in the prescribed manner by any alien or British protected person of full agent capacity, … grant to him a certificate of naturalisation … "
The provisions for application are laid down in the First Schedule of the Bill. In that Schedule, by the way, an alien applying for naturalisation is always mentioned as "he" but I assume that the word "he" covers both sexes. On that point, too, I believe that the Bill refers to the Home Secretary as "he." I do

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not suppose it is the intention of the Government to exclude a woman from being Home Secretary. I think a woman might make an excellent Home Secretary.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: May I reassure the noble Earl that under the Interpretation Act the masculine gender includes the feminine? Perhaps it might have been better to make the word "she" include the word "he," rather than the other way round, as is done at present.
THE EARL OF PERTH: I am grateful to the noble and learned Viscount and I am quite reassured. I feel a little puzzled about the use of the word "immediately" in Clause 12 and other clauses. I assume that the words "immediately preceding" in the Bill mean "up to the commencement of." I wonder whether, in the interests of clarity, it might not be better to insert the words "up to the commencement of" instead of "immediately preceding." But perhaps there is some abstruse legal argument on the point of which I am not aware.
Now I come to the last clause upon which I wish to touch, Clause 14. Both the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor and the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simon, commended what was in that clause and I should like to congratulate the Government on its inclusion. The Select Committee on the Nationality of Married Women worked for years to obtain the insertion of such a provision into our nationality laws. I feel that they must be both proud and happy that their efforts are to-day crowned with success. I am sure it is right, proper and advantageous that a woman should not lose her British nationality by reason of her marriage to an alien; and, should she desire to assume the nationality of her husband, she will still be able to do so under Clause 19 by renouncing her British nationality. We must recognise that there are bound to be some disadvantages. For instance, in times of acute stress or war—I hope there never will be another war, but we have to make provision for all contingencies—if the wife is living in a country with which we are at war, she will be interned as a British subject while, if she had assumed her husband's nationality, she might have been left free, although she certainly would have been under strict
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surveillance. Against that, of course, if she were living in this country, she would not be interned and she would remain completely free. I think that is a difficulty for which there is no real solution.
There is another quite different point. If the husband and wife are not living in their own country and, as they sometimes do, they get into trouble, I presume that the husband will ask for the protection of the appropriate consular authorities of his own country while the wife will have to go to the corresponding British authority. I am not quite sure that that is going to make for conjugal unity. Coming to my next point, I would point out that there will be an increase in the number of persons holding double nationality, and possession of double nationality often leads to complicated difficulties. In spite of all that, I am quite clear that the advantages of this Bill outweigh all the demerits of which I have spoken. Therefore, we welcome this measure. I should like to conclude by expressing once again our general appreciation of the introduction of this Bill to which we on these Benches would certainly wish to accord a Second Reading. I merely add the hope that the Government will allow adequate time before the next stage of the Bill is taken.
4.43 p.m.
LORD PETHICK-LAWRENCE: My Lords, my claim to take a humble part in the discussion on this Bill arises from two reasons. In the first place, I was in on the ground floor in the discussions that took place in the Government when this Bill was originally being considered. In the second place, I have been for a long time a strong advocate of one of the major changes which this Bill proposes to enact. I think it is close on twenty-five years since I, as a new Member in another place, seconded a Motion to deal with the condition of married women, very much in the way in which it is dealt with in this Bill. I hasten to add that I think that in this measure the matter has been dealt with on an exceedingly liberal basis by making the recovery of nationality retrospective for all those British women who have been married, even though their marriages date back for a great many years.
May I, at this stage, say one word in answer to the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simon? I am sure he did not mean

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to, but I think he conveyed the impression that this Bill gives rise to a number of difficulties. Although the noble Viscount may be right with regard to some of the difficulties, I think he is really putting the cart before the horse. It is because those difficulties have arisen that it is necessary for a Bill of this character to be introduced. The difficulty is clearly set out in the White Paper which explains the provisions of the Bill. Time and again, in days gone by, alterations were desirable in the nationality laws, particularly in the law relating to the position of married women. The alterations could not be made because the British Government were anxious that every part of the Commonwealth should move in step. That desirable reform was delayed for a great number of years in consequence of that fact.
However, one of the Dominions at last took the bit between its teeth, and said that it would no longer await a general change and that, in certain aspects, it was going to change the citizenship law in its own country, whatever the other members of the Commonwealth were prepared to do. That was the Dominion of Canada. It was because one of our daughter Dominions at last took that action that a Bill of this character had to be brought in. For my part, having thought about this matter very carefully, I came to the conclusion that, in order to deal with the situation, some proposals of the kind that this Bill proposes to enact were necessary. May I put the position once again? The situation was that, as the law stood, no one member nation of the Commonwealth could take any step forward without the full concurrence of all member nations. The moment it became true that certain members of the Commonwealth were determined, willy-nilly, to take steps forward by themselves, it was necessary to differentiate between citizenship of that Dominion and the general position of a British subject. Therefore my attitude to what the noble and learned Viscount has said is this: I do not think that he did full justice to the fact that in the main this Bill represents an endeavour to deal with a situation that is a fact; it is not in itself creating a situation of difficulty. Having said that, may I add this? I quite agree with the noble Viscount that this Bill is exceedingly complicated,
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and that it does raise grave issues—as any change of importance and magnitude must do—which may not in fact have been fully thought out.
May I say a word or two with regard to the position of married women? I thought that the noble Earl, Lord Perth, put the position very clearly and very well. It is, and has been for a long time, intolerable that married women should be moved about like chattels, because they belong to their husbands, and that when the husbands said "turn" they all turned. Various attempts have been made to tinker with the position, but this is an attempt to deal with if as a whole. It has been rendered necessary, not merely by the feeling in this country but by the fact that the laws regarding nationality have been changed in some of the largest countries in the world. The United States, for instance, has changed the nationality laws, and what was at one time the best for us to do in order to keep in step with the other great countries of the world has become not so to-day.
I notice that the Lord Chancellor has had to take a little respite, but if somebody is taking notes for him perhaps he will kindly reply to this question which I would like to put to him—namely, how far the United States Government have been informed of what is being done here, and how far such discrepancies as will even now exist in this matter between United States law and British law will be remedied when they arise? For instance, unless I am mistaken, United States law in regard to married women depends somewhat on the domicile of the couple after marriage. That certainly was so in times gone by. I shall be interested to know whether I am wrong and that it has now been changed. But if there are still discrepancies between British and United States law, they will of course result in either double nationality or no nationality. If indeed that is so, what remedies is it proposed should be adopted?
There is only one other matter to which I wish to draw attention, one which I do not think has been mentioned so far in this debate. Reference has been made to two classes of people—namely, British subjects and persons who are alien. But there is a third class of persons to whom no reference has been made; I

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refer to British protected persons who have been born, and are quite likely resident, in one of the mandated territories which are looked after by this country. It is with regard to those people that I want to put a certain question to the Lord Chancellor. As I understand it, a person born in a mandated country is not, by reason of that fact, a British subject; he is a British protected person. And in order to become a British subject, he has to take certain steps and allow a certain interval of time to elapse.
In order to make my meaning clear, I think my best course would be to take a specific case which has come under my own observation. An English woman married a German during the last century. Thereby, of course, according to the law as it then was, she lost her British nationality, and both the husband and wife were Germans. They left Germany and went to live in Switzerland, but they did not assume Swiss nationality. Therefore, when their son was seventeen years of age he was still, according to German law, a German citizen and he was called up in the first World War, and took part with the Germans against this country. As soon as the war was over, he went back to Switzerland and took the earliest opportunity of obtaining Swiss nationality. Subsequently, with his mother's brother—his uncle on the maternal side—who was, of course, an Englishman, he went to Tanganyika; and there he has lived ever since; and, indeed, has had a family. From the first, his children have regarded themselves as Britishers. They have come over to this country, they have been at school in this country; but they are not British, according to the law. They have a Swiss passport, because that was the nationality that the father had acquired.
The question I want to put to the Lord Chancellor is this: What is the position with regard to those children, who are still minors and who want to become full British citizens at the earliest possible moment? What is their position if they want to go to a university? Will they have to go as aliens, or is there any means whereby they, or their father on their behalf, until they reach their majority, can obtain British nationality? If they have to wait until their majority, will they then be able to obtain British nationality on easier
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terms, and with greater favour, because they are British protected persons, having been born and living in a British mandated territory, or will they have to stand, as it were, in the queue with ordinary aliens who come from another country? That is a question that I think is important, because it does not affect merely the one case that I have described; it is one of a class of cases arising out of the whole position of people born and living in mandated territories who really have no other loyalty than that to this country. I will not detain your Lordships any further. I think the Government have brought forward a Bill which, in its final form, has been well thought out. It has gone a great deal further in the direction of bringing about complete equality of the spouses in married life than I think many people supposed in times gone by would be possible. I hope that after considering it carefully the noble Viscount who, quite naturally, saw a number of difficulties about a most complicated matter, will agree that this Bill, amended if necessary in any small way that may be desirable, is one that ought to be passed into law.
4.57 p.m.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: My Lords, at this moment in the debate I will not detain your Lordships with the detail of this extremely complicated measure. Many of the provisions—for instance, those dealing with wives and children—are utterly beyond the scope of my limited intelligence, and all I can hope is that they are correcting some of the anomalies which undoubtedly exist at the present moment. All I would seek to do is to deal with the two main principles of the Bill which are of fundamental importance and, in one respect, to plead for reconsideration in regard to one of them. In the first place, let me say that the Bill as a whole seems good, wise and timely. I congratulate the Government upon it, and upon the understanding with the Dominions upon which it has been founded. The Bill is an example of our present constitutional practice in Commonwealth affairs, of bringing the legal structure of the Commonwealth into as complete consonance as we can manage with reality—and by "reality" I mean the way in which the King's lieges think and feel, both as nationals of their own country and as members of a world-wide community. That community not only

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has no parallel in history, but is also quite unexampled among the unions, the great political systems of our own time.
What are the elemental factors in the way in which the Dominions, and, I think, we ourselves, feel about this matter? Undoubtedly one of the strongest influences, at the present time, is that of nationhood, and that is fully and properly recognised in the provisions of this Bill. Nationhood is a binding and inspiring sense of loyalty to the land which gives us birth, and it is very strong, very deep, in the Dominions. It is, after all, their lands which give the different people of the Commonwealth, the different nations of the Commonwealth, their distinctive surnames amongst the nations of the earth. Patriotism is a growth of many concentric rings, from the home to the countryside, from the countryside to the nation, from the nation, in our case, to world-wide Commonwealth, and, after that, most of us hope, to an even wider civilisation beyond. The sense of nationhood throughout the Commonwealth, and, I think, throughout all the advanced places of the world at the present time, has been immensely enhanced by the progress of social and economic reform, and it is a binding and a unifying factor such as has never been known before. Younger nations in particular are rightly jealous regarding the material, the bricks, the human bricks, the stone and the mortar, of which their communities are to be built, and they have an absolute right which we should acknowledge in the fullest terms, so far as it needs acknowledgment, of defining their citizenship, that right being essential to their sovereignty and the liberties which that sovereignty connotes.
In the second place, to be one of the King's lieges also implies membership of a wider community—a world-wide Commonwealth. I am glad, in this respect, that the noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack has indicated that there might be some change in the terminology that is used in the Bill. For my part, quite apart from sentiments connected entirely with these Islands, I am not in love with the term "British subject." If we are thinking of the Commonwealth as a whole, we must enter into the sentiments of all the peoples composing it. We must find a term for membership of the Commonwealth which
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will be agreeable to them and to their sentiments. It is no use choosing one which is merely agreeable to our sentiment or to our tradition. There is no doubt that the term "British subject" is not agreeable to many peoples of the Commonwealth. The French-Canadian, for instance, does not feel that he is British. Nor does a Dutch South African. Indeed, a Canadian of any kind may not feel that he is British in "the sense which we mean by the term. The word "subject" is also bound up with British, and is rather liable to misinterpretation. It gives a sense of being subject to Britain, and, of course, that is the last kind of thing we would wish to perpetuate. For my part, therefore, I am glad that we are not going to insist upon "British subject" as a world-wide description of the lieges of the King. I think we need another term at the present time. I should like to see the term "British citizen," confined to those who are really inhabitants by nature, by adoption, or by naturalisation, of the British Isles.
Finally, this Bill recognises, what we all know to be the fact, that the nation States of the Commonwealth are absolutely free to determine not only who are their citizens but also whether these citizens are to remain members of the Commonwealth and subjects of the King. That is a part of their sovereignty and should be recognised in legislation of this kind. Therefore, the Bill, with the other Dominion Bills—of which I understand it is only a prelude—will rightly establish both genus and species. As the noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack said, the nation States are to be absolutely free to define the status of their citizens, both as to genus and as to species. The movement towards the legal definition of these essential realities which was initiated by Canada, is, I understand, supported now by all the Dominions. There is full agreement with that here, and I warmly congratulate the skilled representatives from all parts of the Empire who promoted this legislation and got agreement upon it. While I share the anxiety which my noble friend behind me has expressed about future British subjects and the children of British subjects in Eire, I welcome the wise pro-visions of this Bill in regard to existing British subjects who are citizens of Eire. That seems to me to be, at any rate, an

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effort to promote a closer understanding, and I hope that it may develop so as to include future generations.
The present Government, under the inspiration of, amongst others, the noble Viscount who leads this House, has shown imagination and understanding in seeking a solution of these difficult Imperial questions, and I am glad to pay tribute to their activity of mind in that respect and to their considerable achievements. In one respect, however, I am anxious and doubtful about the provisions of the Bill. I have insisted upon my complete agreement with the main principle of the Bill in order completely to detach this aspect from the rest of it. The doubt which I feel regarding that part of the Bill which is purely the concern of the United Kingdom Parliament does not extend in any way to any part of the Bill which affects the Dominions. I respond entirely to the appeal which the Lord Chancellor made that we should be careful in regard to anything which would in any way affect opinion adversely in any part of the Commonwealth. I hope that I have said enough about the main principle of the Bill, about the way in which it recognises sentiment and feeling throughout the Commonwealth at the present time, to show that the last thing in the world I would wish to do would be to jeopardise, to imperil, or even to prejudice in any way, the understanding at which we have arrived with the sister nations of the Commonwealth.
I come then to the provisions of the Bill about which I am anxious. In one respect I think that His Majesty's Ministers have shown too much zeal for tidying up, at one sweep, all our untidy places. In a system like the Commonwealth there are bound to be many untidinesses. Usually it is a mistake to try and do too much at one time in clearing up difficulties, and that is what this part of the Bill tries to do. This conflicts with valuable existing rights, with reality and with ancient tradition. This is a matter appropriate only to the United Kingdom Parliament; it cannot in any way affect the principle of the Bill so far as it concerns the Dominions. Anything that I say is not intended in the least to invalidate that aspect of the Bill.
The United Kingdom has a problem peculiar to itself, in regard to this Bill
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and Bills of a similar character, in that it is closely linked to a great Colonial Empire. The Bill, therefore, establishes citizenship of a new entity, a new legal entity of "the United Kingdom and Colonies," so that all residing in that entity have the same citizenship. This is quite unlike any other national citizenships, which bind together members of a homogeneous geographical, social, political and economic whole. What we are trying to do in the Bill is to give a common citizenship to what is geographically, socially and politically a most heterogeneous community at many different stages of development. It does not bind like to like. On the contrary. It is not a recognition of reality, but a departure into complete and utter unreality. I greatly fear that in removing some of the existing anomalies, which we all recognise, it will create greater anomalies and will produce much practical embarrassment.
I submit that this is a matter on which the United Kingdom Parliament should move very carefully, and I am glad that the Committee stage of the Bill will not be taken in too great a hurry. Time is needed for reflection. I am speaking without full consultation with my colleagues, and I am speaking only for myself, because we have not had time to go into it fully. But it is recognised in all parts of the House that this is a question which should be fully discussed before we determine what course we are to take upon it. Anomalies under this part of the Bill will be legion. Let me take two instances. First, take the position of a Canadian or Australian, or a citizen of Pakistan or Ceylon. His status here will be inferior to that of millions of members of entirely primitive societies, whose contribution to the development of the Commonwealth is in no way on a par with his. Any of the King's subjects in the Colonial Empire, however primitive of mind, can come to this country and exercise the full rights of citizenship the same day as he arrives, while the Australian or the citizen of any other Dominion must, but for special leave, wait twelve months before such status is granted him. A citizen of any Dominion is less privileged under this Bill than a citizen of Eire. A citizen of Eire is able to say, "I am a British subject, and am entitled to come into this country at once, without delay."
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This legislation deals with British subjects. I do not understand why one of these Colonial subjects is in a superior position to a Canadian subject. It is quite true that he will call himself a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies, if it is an advantage to have that long name. Apart from that, I do not appreciate any difference.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: I am glad to hear that from the noble and learned Viscount. If there is no difference, why create a new special citizenship? Surely it is to make a ring fence around this country and the Colonies. Under the Bill, citizens have certain rights and privileges which cannot be enjoyed by a Canadian or Australian, unless he resides for twelve months in this country.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I will try again. Citizenship gives no rights and privileges whatever. The rights and privileges enjoyed are those which attach to a British subject.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: Is the noble and learned Viscount telling me that under this Bill a Canadian who is a British subject can come into this country, and can stand for Parliament next day, that he can own a British ship?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Certainly.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: I understood that he had to reside twelve months in this country.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: No.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: Then what is the object of creating this citizenship, if a British subject has all the rights which the new citizen will enjoy?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Because the Dominions are insisting that we shall not be in a different position from them. They create their citizens and they do not want us to be in a different position, or what might be thought to be in a superior position, from them. They say, "We are going to create citizens. You create citizens. And then the sum total of all citizens, so created will be British subjects."
LORD ALTRINCHAM: I am glad to have that explanation. But in that case I do not see why it is necessary to include
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the Colonies in the citizenship which we are creating in order to agree with the Dominions. If we are to create something of the same kind as the Dominions, we should create a United Kingdom citizenship and not go further. That, I imagine, is what they attach importance to, and that, I submit, is what we ought to do. If there is no more significance in citizenship than what the noble and learned Viscount has told the House I cannot understand the necessity for creating this new and artificial ring of citizenship, as is done in this Part of the Bill. But that is not the only difficulty. I accept entirely what the noble Lord said about the way in which this Bill affects the citizens of the Dominions. But consider its effect upon the new citizens who will be created in the Colonial Empire.
LORD PETHICK-LAWRENCE: They are citizens already.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: They are British subjects. I beg the noble Lord to realise that they are British subjects. Now they will be made citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies.
LORD PETHICK-LAWRENCE: They are British citizens and British subjects.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: I do not think it is the same thing. If it is the same thing, then there is no need whatever for the provisions in this Part of the Bill. If there is no difference, why is a Bill introduced to establish a difference which is entirely without meaning? Noble Lords cannot have it both ways. Either it means something or it means nothing. We are going to great trouble to create a new citizenship, a wholly artificial citizenship, which, according to the noble Lord, does not mean anything. I believe it does mean something. I think the fact that this great United Kingdom citizenship, or citizenship of a single entity which includes the United Kingdom and the Colonies is to be conferred at one sweep upon millions of subjects of the King—who may not understand that it is really a matter of legal convenience, without direct political significance, and who may, indeed, not unnaturally, assume that it confers a right to political equality, what-ever the constitution of the Colony to which they belong—may create needless trouble and embarrassment in the present stage of Colonial development.

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We are anxious to see that political development does not overtake economic development altogether (we had a warning on that subject from the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, the other day) and it is a mistake to establish a status which is bound to be misunderstood, and which is bound to lead to embarrassing argument. It is bound, in any case, to be in many ways a sham, because the Dominions immigration laws, whatever we may say, will assuredly continue to differentiate in practice between different types of the United Kingdom citizens, however much we may assert that they are, whatever their origin, on a par. Everybody knows how difficult and thorny these questions are. I submit that we should not gratuitously lead ourselves into even greater embarrassment. Clearly, there must be established a United Kingdom citizenship. That I fully accept. But why should that not be called simply "British citizenship"? That name covers, by ancient tradition, the peoples of England, Scotland, Wales and a large part of Northern Ireland. It is also a modern reality, for it denotes a great geographical, social and historic union which has made an exceptional mark on the history of the world.
The title of "British" is ours by every right of blood and soil, and I suggest, therefore, that it is the right and proper name for the national citizenship established under this Bill for the people of this Island. I believe, moreover, that it would be acceptable to the people of the Channel Islands. They are British subjects, and it is simple to make them British citizens as well—much simpler than trying to introduce complicated Amendments which will somehow differentiate between them and include them in this artificial union of the United Kingdom and the Colonies. Other Amendments of a complicated nature are, it seems to me, inevitable if we proceed with the Bill in its present form. I submit, then, that "British citizenship," and not "citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies," is the right name for the citizenship which is being established for these Islands under this Bill.
I would ask, as my noble friend has asked: Is it necessary to make it exclusive in any way? The noble and learned Viscount has assured us that all British subjects will in future enter the United
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Kingdom on equal terms. That is certainly our established tradition. I should not like to see any artificial discrimination established by the Bill. When my noble friend was dealing with this subject, I understood that the differentiation which he discussed was admitted by the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor, and by everybody else. But now I understand that it is questioned as to whether in this country there is any differentiation under this Bill between citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies and citizens of any other part of the Empire.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Let me try once more. Of course it is open to this Parliament, or any other sovereign Parliament, to enact exactly what laws they like. We could enact a law which would prohibit a Cornishman from going to Scotland, or a Scotsman from going to Cornwall. If we choose to enact such stupid laws, there is nothing as a matter of sovereignty to prevent us so doing. Hitherto, we have not had any law discriminating against any British subject. I hope we never shall, but I do not know. If you are minded to discriminate, you can discriminate, whether you call them "subjects" or whether you call them "citizens." As the law stands at the present moment, assuming that this Bill is passed, there will be no differentiation between the subjects of our Colonel Empire and the subjects of the Dominion of Canada.
LORD ALTRINCHAM: Let me hasten to say that it is not this Bill which establishes that right. It exists at the present moment. All I am doing is expressing anxiety lest the Bill should qualify or modify it in any way. I find it difficult to understand why, in that case, it is necessary to introduce this artificial citizenship. I hope that Part of the Bill will be more fully explained when we come to it in Committee. It seems to me that in this matter we are trying to do too much, and that the citizenship which is being here created is not real, because the peoples of the Colonial Empire are not united with us, or with each other, by the ties of which true national citizenship is made. The tie which unites them to each other and to us is simply and truly, allegiance to the King. I do not see, therefore, why it is necessary to add any citizenship to the title of "British

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subjects," of which they are proud. Soldiers of the Colonial Empire have fought with great gallantry, in vast numbers, as subjects of the King. Why seek to alter that title, which they understand and of which they are proud; a title which they will bear, until in due course—if their development proceeds as we wish it to proceed—they develop a citizenship of their own.
I must re-emphasise that the modification of the Bill which I hope will be considered would not in any way involve the principle of the Bill as it affects the Dominions. On the contrary it would, I think, commend itself to the Dominions. After all, the national citizenships established by this Bill in all parts of the Commonwealth except the United Kingdom will endure; whereas this composite national citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies must be temporary, and will not endure. In due course, it will be broken up by the progress of the Colonies. Why, therefore, seek to create an entirely artificial legal distinction, for which at the present time, it appears to me, there is absolutely no need? It seems to me that this is an attempt to tidy up and make things shipshape all round. It is, I think, mistaken in that way. It is a mistake to attempt to tidy up with one sweep, and in one measure, all the many difficult problems which exist in the Commonwealth at the present time. I hope, therefore, that further consideration will be given to what seems to me to be the only artificial and unreal provision in an otherwise good Bill.
5.30 p.m.
LORD TWEEDSMUIR: My Lords, as the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor said at the beginning of his speech, it is much easier on this subject to make a long speech than a short one. I will do my best to be brief, as the hour is late. I think the reaction of all of us, when we first opened this Bill, was, Why do we have to have this Bill, and what is wrong with the existing position? And if we do have to have it, why have it in this form? That well-known Nineteenth Century tangle, the Schleswig-Holstein case, was supposed to be understood by three people only, one of whom was unfortunately dead, one who was mad and one who had forgotten. The nationality laws of this country are not
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quite so complicated as that, but very nearly. They are laws which are not like domestic laws, which may stay the same, but inter-act on the changing laws of other countries and are a constantly writhing tangle.
It is an old platitude to say that wars bring change. I do not believe they do; they merely hasten changes that are on their way. As several noble Lords have said, including the noble Lord, Lord Pethick-Lawrence, the common code, as we call it, was being steadily whittled away. There could be no change made without a general agreement. That imposed tremendous delay on certain Commonwealth countries in times of emergency. Changes were made which only technically conformed to that. Certain Acts of Parliament have already been quoted. In 1935, Australia passed an Act by which, if an Australian woman married an alien, although she ceased to be a British subject, she did not cease to be an Australian citizen. New Zealand passed a similar Act in the following year. Events are putting a very heavy strain on nationality laws all the world over, not only because of the flotsam and jetsam of refugees and exiles, but also because of the tremendous population movement in the Commonwealth. Ten thousand Canadians have come back to make their homes in this country; hundreds of thousands of people have their names down with the shipping companies to emigrate to Commonwealth countries, in the wake of those who have gone already.
The Canadian Act of 1946, as has been pointed out, was the forerunner of this new Bill. My understanding of this Bill, and its presence here to-day in this form, is this. Because the ether Commonwealth countries agreed to follow suit we have the Bill; because it was generally agreed that we should take the next step we have the Bill to-day; because the general approach to the subject was also agreed we have it in this form. As my noble friend Lord Simon pointed out, it is something of a fait accompli; and when the expert representatives of 600,000,000 people come to agreement, it is a powerful decision. But, with my noble friend Lord Simon, I regret that decisions like this could not be reached in such a way that the public who are interested, could have some idea of what is going on.

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Now I am not going over the Bill in detail, but paragraph 7 of the White Paper which accompanies it seems to me to set out the real basis of the measure. It points out that the Bill will give a clear recognition of the separate identity of particular countries. I always think that the word "identity" is an important part of our strength. We have always sought to encourage identity and to define it, in very sharp contradistinction to other great Powers of the past. The fact that we have encouraged identity, I believe to be a source of continuing strength. The White Paper goes on to say that this arrangement will help those countries concerned, in their external relations, to define precisely on whose behalf they are negotiating. That, I think, is essential in this world of shifting peoples. Then, at the end, the White Paper refers to the common code by which the variation of nationality laws of different countries will be possible at short notice, to meet present pressing situations. As the noble Lord, Lord Pethick-Lawrence, said, steps can be taken without delay when the situation brooks no delay.
We may regret—I think we all do in some way—the departure of an old system with which we have all grown up; but there are powerful arguments for change. Listening to the debate to-day I think all are agreed that a change in some form was absolutely unavoidable, and extremely salutary. I am with the noble Lord, Lord Altrincham, in that I suspect any "tidying-up" process. I very much dislike formal documents; but just occasionally we have to have them. After all, we have no written Constitution in this country, we have nothing that resembles one in the Commonwealth, and we have very few written documents at all. Our understanding is much the stronger where nothing is written—we like it that way. But we have one or two documents, of which the Statute of Westminster is the chief example. That really brought nothing into effect; it merely recognised an existing state of affairs. Some people, who have not studied the subject, imagine that it gave the Commonwealth countries their freedom. They were free, independent, and powerful nations, and that Statute merely recognised the fact. That Statute has done nothing to weaken our real relationship. The Bill we have
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in front of us, to my mind, recognises identities that have been clear cut for years past.
I do not intend to go minutely into the Bill. I certainly welcome the provision about the nationality of women. It is changing one of the few laws which put women on a different footing from men. The most astonishing anomalies existed under the old law. An old woman who lived in Yorkshire, who had practically never been out of the county in her life and had been bedridden for years, had been married to somebody who was technically an alien, who also spent nearly all his life in this country, and who had died many years before. Under the existing law she was technically a suspicious person, and in spite of having been bedridden for many years had to be visited and checked by the police once a week throughout the war.
The Bill defines how citizenship is acquired. An instance of where citizenship and nationality really mattered was where it was a case of the last three places in the last plane from Berlin, on September 4, 1939. This Bill lays down just who are to become citizens, but not what citizenship entails. That has been cleared up, to a certain extent, since the Lord Chancellor introduced this Bill. He said in his opening words that there was a slightly mystical character about it. I must say that I was wondering what practical disqualifications or disadvantages a citizen of Fiji or Manitoba would find on landing on our shores, and I am much relieved at the noble and learned Viscount's assurance that there are none.
I would draw your Lordships' attention to Clause 20 (3) (c). That lays down that if a person is sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment in any country, he is deprived, or may be deprived, of his citizenship. There are many countries in Europe where freedom has fallen into such a grievous plight that imprisonment is a political weapon, and, in fact, in certain countries it is almost the only manifest of respectability. I agreed with my noble friend Lord Simon when he drew attention to that hideous expression "United Kingdom and Colonies." I must say that when I first studied this Bill a few weeks ago I tried to think of a better expression having just that meaning, and so far I must admit defeat. We have no word in our language which adequately describes

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the people of these islands. There is the word "English," but that is not acceptable to certain of us on the farther side of the Border. The word "British" has a far wider connotation. Some time ago there was an attempt to introduce the word "Britannic"—a good word—but it never became part of the language.
The noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor has cleared up one or two points in the course of the debate which rather puzzled me. I was very anxious to know whether it would be possible for a Dyak head-hunter from Sarawak to land in this country and become chairman of the National Coal Board—a position which I understand may shortly become vacant. I am sure he would liven up that Board. I understand that he can, in fact, hold that office, and in fact always could.
But a strong line of argument can be developed against this Bill on two points. There are those who say that while it is reasonable enough for the Commonwealth countries—to give them that name—to have their citizenship, and to define their own citizens, this country should keep "open house." We in this country are sometimes described as the "Metropolitan Dominion" and I think that that is a very good description. I cannot personally agree with that argument. I believe that if we were to stand out we should be acting completely out of our role. Although it seems a pleasant and friendly gesture to invest anyone who comes to this country, regardless of his citizenship in his country of origin, with our own citizenship, we may be thought by some to be infringing the sovereignty of the country from which he comes, whose people may consider that only they have the right to lay down what citizenship their countryman shall hold. It can be further argued that, though we are the Metropolitan Dominion, we are a Dominion with a tremendous difference. As the noble Lord, Lord Altrincham, has pointed out, there are 60,000,000 people in the Colonial Empire who are dependent on us for guidance, for security, and for their future. I think the noble Lord also said that we are welded together by this Bill into some unwieldy and unreal identity. These people are our wards. I personally do not believe that we could possibly make any arrangement by which the United Kingdom and the Colonies are separable for this status. I do not believe
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we can create two separate identities if we are to achieve the end which we wish to achieve.
For myself—and I speak only for myself—I am not in the least worried by any concept that is embodied in this Bill; in fact, I welcome it. I think that common citizenship by the creation of a series of separate and parallel citizenships is a most reasonable and constructive status. It is a trend which is going on in the Commonwealth today, and this Bill is our edition of it. The agreement that was reached by the experts representing those countries shows quite plainly, to my mind, that the status quo was not satisfactory. I regret anything that may make our relationship more formal, but I welcome anything in this Bill and in the measures which went before it which recognises the principle of identity and as the noble Lord, Lord Altrincham, said, of nationhood.
5.45 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I thank your Lordships for the reception you have given to this Bill. I knew that the underlying principles of it were difficult to follow, and I have had occasion in the course of the debate to think that perhaps they have not always been quite fully understood—which no doubt is my own fault. May I try quite simply to put the matter again? I think we all believe that it is desirable that, throughout the length and breadth of all the territories over which His Majesty reigns, there should be some conception of common nationality, whether it concerns a Dyak from Borneo or a merchant from Manitoba, or whoever it may be. The idea of a common nationality is surely one that we should strive to keep. We should, so far as we can, avoid the situation that a person is recognised as a national by one community and not by another. There are only two ways in which to keep that conception of common nationality—we cannot legislate for the other member states of the Dominions. One is by having a common code, everybody legislating in the same way. That was tried, and it has broken down. The second way is by having a new conception, and that is that everybody shall decide for themselves, by their own Legislature, who are their citizens, and that the sum total of the citizens of the various member states shall be British subjects.

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So far, I think the matter is plain. I do not think that anybody, on reflection, would doubt that this is right. There is no other course. What rather surprised me in the debate was to hear it hinted that this was a matter which a lot of departmental officials, acting comparatively recently, had thought out and evolved for themselves. This matter has a long history. I was myself Attorney-General when the preliminary work which led to the Statute of Westminister was passed. And your Lordships will find that at the Conference of Dominion Premiers which took place in, I think, 1930, the subject of nationality was discussed at length. It was discussed again at the Imperial Conference in 1937.
I have sent for certain documents which I have here. This is a record of a meeting presided over by Mr. La Pointe, whom we all remember as a most distinguished statesman of Canada. The document defines nationality and the conception of nationality and this is what it says:
"A suggestion was made that these difficulties could be overcome if each of the Members of the Commonwealth were to undertake to introduce legislation, as some Members have already done, defining its nationals or citizens. It was, however, found that some Members of the Commonwealth were not disposed to introduce such legislation. In the case of the United Kingdom in particular it was pointed out that the wide differences existing between the large number of separate territories, legal jurisdictions, and races for which the United Kingdom was responsible would render impracticable the adoption of any single classification which would be in any real sense analagous to that expressed by the term ' national ' or ' citizen ' or ' member of the community ' in the case of other Members of the Commonwealth. Moreover, it is the practice of the United Kingdom not to make any distinction between different races in British Colonies as regards civil and political rights, or the right of entry into and residence in the United Kingdom; and the paragraphs which follow must be read in the light of this position as far as the United Kingdom is concerned "—
That, incidentally, is an authority which I can quote in my own favour in connection with what I said just now about there being a common code.
Then the document goes on, and says that the meeting very much hope
"… that this matter of the conception of citizenship and the distinctions they indicate will be further considered."
And so it was. After the Second World War, Canada told us that she was going
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to introduce her new Bill of 1946, which ended completely the conception of the common code and made this new system the only system we can adopt if we want to retain this common nationality throughout the whole of His Majesty's territories.
The noble Lord, Lord Altrincham, said: "But I do not understand why you need have such a thing as British citizenship or citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies. What good is it? What does it do?" The reason for it is this. The principle upon which we are now proceeding is that British nationality shall be acquired only through citizenship. It is for each constituent part of the Commonwealth to lay down rules determining its own citizenship. Citizenship is the gateway, and the only gateway there is, through which one enters to reach nationality. Once we admit that conception it follows that, in order to carry it out, we must also have our citizenship. With regard to the phrase "British subject," I agree with the wise words of the noble Lord, Lord Altrincham, when he said: "If that is a source of offence to anybody, let us call it something else." But for the moment I prefer the phrase "British subject" as a title which, in view of our past history, I am proud to bear. If we have a conception that the genus of "British subject" is made up of the various species of citizen—and that is how we arrive at it—then we must have a species of our own citizenship.
Then we come to a question which I agree is much more debatable. Are we to have that species of citizenship applying to this country alone, or are we to have it applying to those territories over which this Parliament has the right to legislate? If we say that it is for the Parliament of any particular country to define the test of citizenship, is it not right that we in this Parliament should be able to deal both with the citizenship of the United Kingdom and also with the citizenship of the Colonies?
LORD ALTRINCHAM: I am very grateful to the noble and learned Viscount for that explanation. I should like to make it perfectly clear that, so far as I am concerned, I am not disputing the right of this Parliament to legislate in regard to citizenship throughout the Colonial Empire. Nor do I resist for one moment anything which tends to emphasise

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the bond between this country and the Colonial Empire. The only part of this conception which causes me difficulty is why it is necessary to extend this principle, that the status of a British subject or Commonwealth citizenship can be attained only through some national citizenship—why that system should be extended to people who are not citizens of any national State.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: That is a point which caused trouble at the Imperial Conference of 1937, and that was the difficulty we had to meet in 1946. After discussing the matter, we came to the conclusion that this was the only way to do it. I agree with the noble Lord that the Colonial Office and those who know about the Colonies attach great importance to the fact that in this matter we should go in with our Colonial territories as part of the one scheme. If we do not do that, the noble Lord will see the difficulty. If he accepts the principle that citizenship is the only gateway through which one can attain nationality, then if we do not have a citizenship of the United Kingdom and the Colonies but only a citizenship of the United Kingdom, we still have to deal with the Colonies. Are we to deal with the Colonies as one? Are we to have one citizenship for all the Colonies or are we going to have a separate citizenship for each particular Colony and island? Thinking this matter over, and discussing it at very great length, we have come to the conclusion that this is the best scheme to adopt. I am prepared to consider what the noble Lord has to say in answer when we get to a more detailed study of the Bill.
I should like to add here that I am not in the least proud of the cumbrous phrase "citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies"—nobody could be—but I have not been able to think of a better one. If any of your Lordships has an inspiration between now and Committee stage, perhaps he will give me advance notice of it. I will gladly consider whether we can produce a better phrase. That is the position at the present moment.
I have been asked various questions by noble Lords. I do not think I can remember them all but I will do my best to answer them. The noble Earl, Lord Perth, asked me in particular whether
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registrations would be the normal rule, in the absence of evidence that a marriage was not a bona fide one. That is so. To be frank, the reason is that ladies used to come over from France, intending to ead a life of prostitution in the streets of London. They used to marry the first man they met when they arrived here, simply and solely to ensure that they should not be deported. Such marriages should obviously be stopped; but registration will be the normal thing.
Then the noble Lord, Lord Pethick-Lawrence, asked me two questions. The first was whether or not we had discussed this matter with the United States to try to make our laws square with theirs. We have not. There have been no discussions with the United States. It is notorious that for many years their laws greatly differed from ours on the question of nationality. Of course, the less our laws differ from those of other countries, the better. I feel it is the sort of matter which might well be discussed by the United Nations Organisation. It is desirable to have the same standards if we can. However, I have come to the conclusion, and I think we have all come to the conclusion, that what we used to dread so much in the way of dual nationally is not really so bad as we used to think. In the course of two wars we have had so many instances of people who have had dual nationality that we have been able to perceive that the inconveniences in practice are not so great as one would have expected.
The noble Lord also asked me a question about a person of German nationality, technically speaking, with strict British allegiance and tradition, who finds him-self in Tanganyika, which is a Mandated Territory. There, in Tanganyika, children are born of an alien father. The position is that Tanganyika is a Trust Territory, and the birth of a child of an alien father in Trust Territory does not confer British nationality, so that the children would be aliens. It is not usual to grant certificates of naturalisation to minors on their own, but it can be done in exceptional cases. The Secretary of State would have authority to do it if he thought it proper in a particular case. Of course, if the father of the children is alive and in Tanganyika, he can apply to the Governor for naturalisation under the provisions of this Bill. If he became

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naturalised there, then the registration of any minor children in this country would be considered by the Secretary of State. I am glad to say that there is no bar to aliens going to our universities. Of course, the number of places is so small at the present time that there may be—I do not know whether there is—a tendency to confer this privilege only on children of British descent; I should hope not, however. I should also hope that in the exceptional cases put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Pethick-Lawrence, the fact that there is technically an absence of British naturalisation would not in any way count against the child.
Those were the particular questions I was asked. When I said in my opening speech that this Bill was not controversial I did not mean that there were not a large number of points in the Bill which might give rise to discussion, criticism and controversy. I meant that it was not controversial in the Party sense. I do not think there is anything at all in that sense which is in the least controversial. This is a genuine attempt to meet a very great difficulty, in the hope of preserving something which is well worth preserving. I am most grateful for the observations which your Lordships have made. Before we reach the Committee stage, the date of which has not been fixed, but which several of your Lordships have said you hope will not be too soon (and for my part I concur in that hope), the observations which have been made to-day will, I need hardly assure your Lordships, be most carefully taken into consideration.
On Question, Bill read 2ª and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

ELECTRICITY EMPLOYEES UNDER NATIONALISATION.
6.2 p.m.
LORD LLOYD LORD LLOYD had the following question on the Order Paper: To ask His Majesty's Government, (i) Why the regulations specified in the Electricity Act, 1947, Section 55 (1) have not yet been laid in draft before Parliament; (ii) How many employees in the electricity supply industry are likely to suffer loss of employment or a worsening of their position in consequence of this Act and thus be eligible for compensation under
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this section; (iii) When these regulations will be laid before Parliament. The noble Lord said: My Lords, in rising to ask the question which stands in my name on the Order Paper, I think perhaps I ought to remind your Lordships that under this section of the Act the Minister, in co-operation with the Secretary of State for Scotland, was placed under the obligation of laying draft regulations before Parliament to deal with the question of compensation for officers of this industry who suffer either loss of employment or a worsening of their position as a result of the operation of the Act. Nine months have passed since the Act reached the Statute Book, but to date no regulations, draft or otherwise, have materialised.
The Parliamentary Secretary, when questioned on this matter in another place the other day, was unable to give any indication of when the regulations would be made, but from his reply it appeared that before they could be laid discussions would have to take place with the national association which represents the interests of the employees, and it also appeared that these discussions were not concluded at that time—that is on April 22 last. When we consider that matter, and when we remember also that after the discussions have been concluded the regulations have to be thoroughly scrutinised in both Houses of Parliament, it seems clear that a further considerable delay must inevitably ensue. That, in my opinion, is a most lamentable state of affairs. The senior officers in this industry who are likely to be affected are still, after nine months, left in a state of complete uncertainty about their financial future, and no man, I suggest, can possibly give of his best with an anxiety of that kind preying upon his mind. The result is bad not only for the individuals themselves, but for the industry as well.
The Parliamentary Secretary, when questioned on this matter, tended, I thought, rather to discount the importance of that latter point by saying that few people would be involved. Actually, he was unable to produce any figures, and the estimates that I have received show that, at the most conservative calculation, 180 senior officers are likely to be involved—that is to say, they will become redundant, they will have to seek employment elsewhere, or they will have to seek posts not in keeping with the salary and status of those they now enjoy.

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That does not take into account the immediate juniors of those senior officers, who obviously will be prejudiced if their seniors are demoted. I do not think that the question of numbers is relevant, because, after all, what is unfair and inconsiderate in the case of a thousand people is just as unfair and inconsiderate in the case of one man, and we shall have reached a sorry state of affairs if the rights of individuals are considered only if there are enough of those individuals to make themselves an embarrassment to the Government of the day.
One of the main criticisms of the Government's nationalisation schemes has been the dislocation and uncertainty which they create at a time of crisis. That is inevitable, and I do not believe it would have been possible to reorganise the whole of 510 different undertakings so soon after the vesting date. But the fact that there is so much inevitable dislocation is surely a reason for making absolutely certain that where possible every uncertainty should be avoided. In this case I cannot understand why the preliminary discussions to which the Parliamentary Secretary referred were not concluded months ago and the regulations laid well before vesting day. In conclusion, I hope the noble Lord who is to reply on behalf of the Government will be able to give us some convincing answer in regard to the very long delay which has occurred. It is important that he should do so, for two reasons. First, the Government have always claimed that employees would be better off as a result of the paternal care which they would receive by the industries coming under the ownership of the State. I submit that unless the explanation for which I ask is forthcoming, on the face of it this is not a very encouraging example of that paternal care. Secondly, I cannot believe that without some such convincing explanation—I speak of course for myself, but I believe other noble Lords on these Benches agree with me—we would be justified in relying on that claim in the future, in view of the importance of the matter to so many individuals.
6.7 p.m.
LORD RENNELL: My Lords, I do not wish to detain your Lordships at this hour, but I may say that I know from my personal experience that there is unrest among people who are doubtful about their future, and good work obviously cannot be done
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by people who do not know what their prospects for the future are. I venture to doubt whether the noble Lord who has just sat down is correct in saying that a certain number of persons will be found redundant as a result of the taking over of this industry. Experience has usually shown hat staff is liable to be increased rather than decreased by actions of that sort. But, whether the numbers are increased or lot, it cannot be good for any industry for the people in it not to know what their future is, and I can say from my personal knowledge that there are people who are in a state of anxiety and worry. May I add one last comment? Before a scheme for taking over a big industry like this is brought forward in the form of a Bill, which subsequently becomes an Act, it would seem to be an elementary precaution to think out a plan dealing with the persons concerned. Where there are amalgamations or other reorganisations of that sort in the commercial world of this country, it is certainly unusual to proceed with such schemes without dealing with or considering the matter of the personnel. If that be good commercial practice, it would seem to be good criticism that the Government has not seen fit to follow it in respect of electricity.
6.9 p.m.
LORD WOLVERTON: My Lords, I should also like to support my noble friend Lord Lloyd. Having had something to do with this Bill during its passage through the House, I am also very perturbed about the situation; and I can assure your Lordships that there are a great number of people who are dubious as to what their future is to be. They have applied for jobs and they have been interviewed, but they have not yet obtained jobs. I think they ought to know whether they will be given jobs or whether they are to receive compensation and, if so, what the form of compensation will be. It was agreed in this House that the regulations should be laid in draft, as my noble friend also said, so that they can be carefully scrutinised by both Houses of Parliament. I hope that we are not going to be told now that the Ministry have not had time to get down to this matter. I have taken a little trouble to go into it, and I find that in 1947 no fewer than six Special Order-with regard to electricity were laid before both Houses of Parliament, and that ten

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Special Orders were laid in 1948. I hope, therefore, that we shall not be told that the draftsmen have not had time to get down to this. It must be most disturbing to senior and other officials in the industry that the present state of uncertainty should continue. I hope that the noble Lord who is to reply for the Government will be able to assure us that progress is being made, and will continue rapidly to be made, to clear it up.
6.11 p.m.
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: My Lords, I should like to support the noble Lord who has put these questions. In the course of the passage of the Bill, or the Act as it is now, through Parliament, undertakings were given, I understand, that any staffs to be discharged or amalgamated, should not in any case lose, in comparison with what they were formerly getting, and that efforts would be made to appoint them to offices of equal status and carrying the same rate of pay as they had previously been receiving. During the passage of the Act, a small committee, appointed by employees in the electrical industry, visited the Ministry on different occasions with the object of putting the case for the employees. They were told—and I understand that it was an undertaking—that these cases would be attended to immediately after nationalisation took place. Statements about this have been made to-day, and I personally know that these cases are not being looked after. I say that it is a deliberate breach of undertaking on the part of the Government. They have not looked after these people, and if there is any reason why they have not done so, I think they ought to tell us what it is. In any case, we ought to have from the lips of the noble Lord who is to reply on behalf of the Government an assurance that they will go into these cases and settle them as quickly as possible. That will remove from the minds of these people something that is causing them very deep and grave anxiety at the present time.
6.12 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, may I begin by saying a word in reply to the noble Viscount who has just resumed his seat? He charged the Government, as I understood him, with deliberate breach of
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faith. I should be glad if he could give me particulars of these people who, he says, have, in fact, been left without employment. So far as I know, there are none.
One of the points to which the question of the noble Lord, Lord Lloyd, is directed, is whether, in fact, there will be people left unemployed or in a worsened position. It is true that in the course of the observations which the noble Lord addressed to your Lordships' House, he said that he did not regard this as a very important part of the matter. I think he suggested that the reply given by the Parliamentary Secretary (which indicated that present information is to the effect that there will be very few of these people indeed) was really rather beside the point. The noble Lord puts the point in this question, and I should have thought it was a matter of considerable importance. The information which we have at present is that the number of cases of people who are likely to suffer loss of employment, or worsening of their position, will probably be very small. The noble Lord gave some figures which certainly did not tally with that information. In view of the information in my possession, I am afraid that I am not able to accept those figures. Upon the materials which I have before me, I cannot go further than that.
The point which seemed to exercise the noble Lord's mind particularly, however—and I think it exercised the minds of other noble Lords who have spoken also—was how long it is likely to be before the regulations will be issued, so that people who may now be in some uncertainty may be relieved. We appreciate that there may be anxiety on the part of some people, although when they realise that there are unlikely to be more than a few cases in which loss of employment will occur, I think their anxiety will disappear. As your Lordships realise, the electricity industry is an expanding industry, and although it was suggested by one noble Lord that when nationalisation takes place the result is increased employment, rather than rationalisation of the industry, that is an accusation which I certainly cannot accept.
This is an industry which is bound, under the management of the National Board, which is being set up, to expand substantially. And it will continue to expand,

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for electricity will be taken into country districts where, under the old private profit motive, it would never have appeared in a hundred years. Undoubtedly, there will be substantial increases—
VISCOUNT ELIBANK: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord for a moment? He made a statement just now which he cannot prove, and which I say is not accurate. Electricity would have been carried into these country districts. The sum of £70,000,000 was waiting in the hands of the electricity companies to be used to take electricity into the country districts. I therefore challenge that statement of the noble Lord; that is the purpose of my rising.
LORD CHORLEY: I really cannot enter into that question now, but, if the noble Viscount is right, this is an expanding industry, and it will have room for all the people who have previously been working in it. Indeed, there will undoubtedly be recruitment into this industry. The matter to which the debate has been principally directed is that of these regulations. In regard to that, the noble Lord, Lord Lloyd, said that he had expected the Government to take up a paternal attitude, and, so to speak, to produce something out of the hat in five minutes. That is not what we on this side of the House understood to be a proper approach to this sort of matter. In another place, at the time when the Bill was going through Parliament, the Minister gave an undertaking that these regulations would be properly discussed with the representatives of the industry and the workpeople.
LORD LLOYD: I hesitate to interrupt the noble Lord, but I wish to point out that he has just misquoted me. I did not suggest that the Government should produce something out of the hat in five minutes. I pointed out that they had had nine months to produce something, and I said that I wondered why they had not, in fact, produced something, as that is the normal gestation period.
LORD CHORLEY: I would point out that the vesting date was April 1.
LORD LLOYD: The Act passed on August 13.
LORD CHORLEY: Actually, the industry was taken over only on April 1. So the normal gestation period, as noble Lords will appreciate, gives us another eight months, which I hope that we shall not need. I am not in a position to give the noble Lord any firm date as to when these regulations will be forthcoming. They will have to deal with an exceedingly complicated problem. I can tell the noble Lord that discussions have been going on with the representatives of the organisations to which the Minister made a specific promise at the time when the Bill was going through Parliament. As I say, the discussions have been going on, but it has been found that there are considerable difficulties in the way of having regulations drafted and agreed and, in these circumstances, it may well be some little time before they are ready. I appreciate that the noble Lord will not regard this as a very satisfactory answer, but that is the position.
6.20 p.m.
VISCOUNT SWINTON: My Lords, having led my Party on this Bill I am bound to add a word, in view of the extraordinarily unsatisfactory nature of the answer given to my noble friend. The noble Lords who were engaged on this Bill will remember that we had a long discussion as to whether these regulations—or let me use an anodyne word, these provisions—which entitle the displaced or injuriously affected persons to compensation, should find their place in the Act of Parliament or should be put into regulations. It was pointed out that in the old days, when Parliamentary franchises were given to railways or other authorities, Parliament had always been most careful to provide in the Act of Parliament what should be the measure of compensation to people who were displaced. We were doubtful about this, and it was only on the firmest assurance of the Government that it would be much more satisfactory to the men concerned, and that their cases would be dealt with expeditiously and sympathetically, that Parliament agreed not to put the provisions in the Act and to leave them to the Minister to make. I had a great deal to do with this Bill and I certainly say that if I had not accepted at its face value the assurance that the Government were to be expeditious about this, we would not have

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accepted the proposal that these provisions should go into regulations.
This was no question of compensation to shareholders. This was a question of decent treatment for old employees. The noble Lord says, "What are you worrying about—the vesting date was only a month ago." This has nothing whatever to do with the vesting date. The noble Lord said these regulations are made by the Boards. Let him go and read the Act. These regulations are made by the Minister. We were led to understand that all this had been carefully planned, and that regulations were already drafted. The relevant date is not a month ago, but August 13, 1947, the day on which the Electricity Act received the Royal Assent. I suppose that we shall be told that the Minister is so busy preparing the next of the rabbits which he beneficently produces from time to time out of his hat that he cannot deal with this. He is the Minister on whose behalf a noble Lord will present to the House to-morrow a magnificent Bill about petrol. I do not often agree with Mr. Shinwell, but for once I find myself in complete agreement with him. The Government had much better think out the way they are going to carry nationalisation into effect before they introduce their schemes. The noble Lord says that these men need not worry, they are to be well treated. I am not sure. I am anxious to see these regulations. Unless the thing is set out in black and white, from which the Government cannot squirm away, these men will get nothing.
I will tell you why I say this. The noble Lord can carry out his own investigations and if he can deny this I shall be interested, and on the appropriate occasion he can challenge me in any respect. I speak now on the authority of one of the major companies, which was extending into rural areas. May I tell the noble Lord, as he elected to introduce this point, that I have been trying to get an extension of electricity into a rural area and cannot get it, unless I pay the whole of the capital cost of putting it there and an extra 20 per cent. on the tariff? I was told by this company that they had the habit, which is the common practice in bad private enterprise, that when men who had served them well retired after thirty or forty years, an honorarium—a tip, if you will; something more than their
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contractual rights—was paid to the men. In this case there were over a hundred men who had come to retire, and the company asked if they could pay some £500 or £700 to these men. "Certainly not," said the Minister. "What are their contractual rights? "There were no contractual rights. It was a bonus which it was the custom of the company and, I may say, the custom of all decently managed companies, to give. But it was not written in the Bill, and it was only with great difficulty that the Minister finally said that perhaps something might be given. That is the human touch which nationalisation is going to bring! I say this on the authority of the late managing director of that company, and the Minister will correct me if I am wrong in any particular.
That leads me to suppose that unless this is written in the bond, and the bond is written pretty soon, these men will receive a peculiar form of generous treatment. I take note of the possibility that, after all, nobody is to become unemployed, that the policy of full employment will take care of that. We were told, when this Bill was going through, that among the great advantages of amalgamating several hundred undertakings were the great economies that could be effected, particularly in administration. I will do the noble and learned Viscount the Lord Chancellor justice. He was anxious to say there would not be cheap and abundant electricity; but both he and the noble Viscount the Leader of the House said there would be great economies. I would be greatly surprised if it did not lead to some economies on overheads. Amalgamation is supposed to lead generally to better organisation. I think my noble friend on the Liberal Benches would feel the same. While it may be a comfort to the men (if the assurance is taken at its face value) to know that they will all be employed, at the same time I take note of the fact for future use in other measures that may come before us, that there will not be any economy in administration.

MOTOR SPIRIT (REGULATION) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1ª; and to be printed.
COMMITTEE OF PUBLIC ACCOUNTS.
Message from the Commons for leave for the Lord Robinson to attend to be examined as a witness before the Select Committee of that House: Leave given for his Lordship to attend if he thinks fit; and a Message ordered to be sent to the Commons to acquaint them therewith.
SOUTH SUBURBAN GAS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons agreed to.

HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICES.
Third Report from the Select Committee made, to be printed, and to be considered to-morrow.
House adjourned at half past six o'clock.