§ Mr. JOHNSTONasked the Minister of Transport whether he will make available for inspection by Members, either in the Library or elsewhere, the report of the surveyors and estimate of probable costs in connection with the proposed scheme for a Forth and Clyde canal?
§ Colonel ASHLEYI would remind the hon. Member that many schemes have48W been put forward for the construction of a ship canal between the Forth and the Clyde. Various schemes were considered by the Royal Commission on Canals and Inland Navigations before the War, and by the Admiralty, and in 1918 the Ministry of Reconstruction, in conjunction with the other Departments, examined the proposals and came to the conclusion that the estimates of the cost of constructing such a canal, prepared by Messrs. Armstrong, Whitworth and Company, and others, could not be satisfactorily tested until a detailed geological survey of the route had been carried out. It is, as has previously been explained, for the advocates of the canal to make any necessary survey of this nature. In all the circumstances, I do not propose to place in the Library or elsewhere the reports or estimates put forward by any of the parties who have from time to time made proposals.