§ 42. Mr. Leburnasked the Paymaster-General, in view of the difficulties being experienced by coal merchants in obtaining adequate supplies of house coal, if he will give a general direction to the National Coal Board to advance the date on which it intends to deration coal supplied to merchants at the pit-head, in order to release for domestic consumption the supplies available.
§ Sir I. HorobinNo. There is no such rationing. When house coal supplies were decontrolled last July, the National Coal Board agreed with the distributive trade to continue until April this year their current contracts, based on the allocations already existing. The Board, however, arranged to supply additional quantities to any merchant requiring them, though not always in the quality of his first choice.