asked the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the Reparations Commission has yet apportioned the general liability in respect of the secured pre-War debt of the former kingdom of Hungary in accordance with the provisions of Article 186 of the Treaty of Trianon; and, if so, will he request the Reparations Commission to fix without further delay the date upon which the liability is to be assumed by the successor States of Hungary, seeing that the question of date has now been standing open for a year and a half?

The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. The Reparation Commission have now decided that the date from which the liability is to be assumed by the successor States is the 1st July, 1919.

asked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the Note of the French Foreign Office on 8th March, according to which the German ambassador at Paris, at the time of the Paris Conference, on 2nd January, declared that he had received instructions to inform M. Poincaré in an official manner that his Government had drawn up a plan to settle the reparation question, and had obtained assurances of the help of the representatives of German industry and finance for the carrying out of the programme thus elaborated, and that the German Government asked to be allowed to submit this plan to the meeting of the Allied Ministers; and why this plan was not considered by the Paris Conference and has never been considered by His Majesty's Government?

I am not clear to what Note of the French Foreign Office the hon. Member is referring, but the British Government have published full particulars of the Paris Conference, and., as regards this statement of the German Ambassador at Paris and the action of the Conference thereon, I would refer the hon. Member to Command Paper 1812, page 68.

Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of formally inviting the German Government to explain this offer which was not explained, together with such conditions as may he laid down for the offer being re-made?

For the reasons I have already given, I do not think there would be any advantage in taking such a step at present.

Was the offer that. Herr Bergmann brought to Paris ever laid before the British representatives in Paris?

No, never.