§ General CROFTasked the Minister of Munitions whether he is aware that the official statement in connection with Knight's patent shell slings that there was no ground for the suggestion that the firm had been compelled to accept lower prices than its competitors is in contradiction to the Ministry's letter of 3rd November, 1917 to Mr B. Knight (M.I.D.R. 1,274) which admitted that a higher price was allowed to the other contractors; whether Harris Lebus, of Tottenham, was given a large contract for these slings at 1s. 11d. in March, 1917, after Mr. Knight's price had been negotiated down to 1s. 10d., the excess representing eight times the royalty asked by and refused to the inventor; and whether, in view of the inventor's estimate based on official data, 936W of a saving of over £500,000 effected by his two-sling inventions of substituting folded hessian for jute webbing and his patented sliding band which together reduced the old price of 3s. 4d. per sling to 1s. 10d., he will recognise the right of an inventor to an account and supply Mr. Knight with the number and price of the articles made under his two inventions so that he can judge of the adequacy of the offer of £1,000 made to him?
§ Mr. KELLAWAYIn December, 1916, the slings were put out to public tender, and Mr. Knight's firm was given a contract for 400,000 at the tendered price of 1s. 10½d., which was the highest accepted. He was subsequently offered an additional quantity of 100,000 at a price of 1s. 10d., which was that paid to the majority of the contractors at this tendering. He accepted this "with pleasure." In March, 1917, fresh contracts were placed, and Mr. Knight's firm's tender was accepted for the price and quantity quoted. Other tenders were accepted at the same time, some dearer and some cheaper than Mr. Knight's.
The Ministry is not aware of the grounds on which a saving of £500,000 is claimed, and no claim appears to have been put forward by Mr. Knight for credit for the substitution of folded Hessian for jute webbing. The reduction in prices was due to standardisation on the basis of a large output, and to competition between producers. That it is not due to Mr. Knight's invention is shown by the fact that in one of his contracts the price for the old official pattern was 2s. 3d. and for the Knight pattern 2s. 4d. The offer of £1,000 was not due to any saving in the cost of production of the sling, but to the saving of labour in the subsequent use of the sling.