:I do not propose to say many words tonight. The time has come when action rather than speech is required. Eighteen months ago in this House I prayed that the responsibility might not fall upon me to ask this country to accept the awful arbitrament of war. I fear that I may not be able to avoid that responsibility. But, at any rate, I cannot wish for conditions in which such a burden should fall upon me in which I should feel clearer than I do to-day as to where my duty lies. No man can say that the Government could have done more to try to keep open the way for an honourable and equitable settlement of the dispute between Germany and Poland. Nor have we neglected any means of making it crystal clear to the German Government that if they insisted on using force again in the manner in, which they had used it in the past we were resolved to oppose them by force. Now that all the relevant documents are being made public we shall stand at the bar of history knowing that the responsibility for this terrible catastrophe lies on the shoulders of one man—the German Chancellor, who has not hesitated to plunge the world into misery in order to serve his own senseless ambitions.

I would like to thank the House for the forbearance which they have shown on two recent occasions in not demanding from me information which they recognised I could not give while these negotiations were still in progress. I have now had all the correspondence with the German Government put into the form of a White Paper. On account of mechanical difficulties I am afraid there are still but a few copies available, but I understand that they will be coming in relays while the House is sitting. I do not think it is necessary for me to refer in detail now to these documents, which are already past history. They make it perfectly clear that our object has been to try and bring about discussions of the Polish-German dispute between the two countries themselves on terms of equality, the settlement to be one which safeguarded the independence of Poland and of which the due observance would be secured by international guarantees. There is just one passage from a recent communication, which was dated 30th August, which I should like to quote, because it shows how easily the final clash might have been avoided had there been the least desire on the part of the German Government to arrive at a peaceful settlement. In this document we said:

" His Majesty's Government fully recognise the need for speed in the initiation of discussions and they share the apprehensions of the Chancellor arising from the proximity of two mobilised armies standing face to face. They would accordingly most strongly urge that both parties should undertake that during the negotiations no aggressive military movements should take place. His Majesty's Government feel confident that they could obtain such an undertaking from the Polish Government if the German Government would give similar assurances."

That telegram, which was repeated to Poland, brought an instantaneous reply from the Polish Government, dated 31st August, in which they said:

" The Polish Government are also prepared on a reciprocal basis to give a formal guarantee in the event of negotiations taking place that Polish troops will not violate the frontiers of the German Reich provided a corresponding guarantee is given regarding the non-violation of the frontiers of Poland by troops of the German Reich."

We never had any reply from the German Government to that suggestion, one which, if it had been followed, might have saved the catastrophe which took place this morning. In the German broadcast last night, which recited the 16 points of the proposals which they have put forward, there occurred this sentence:

" In these circumstances the Reich Government considers its proposals rejected."

I must examine that statement. I must tell the House what are the circumstances. To begin with let me say that the text of these proposals has never been communicated by Germany to Poland at all. The history of the matter is this. On Tuesday, 29th August, in replying to a Note which we had sent to them, the German Government said, among other things, that they would immediately draw up proposals for a solution acceptable to themselves and

" will, if possible, place these at the disposal of the British Government before the arrival of the Polish negotiator."

It will be seen by examination of the White Paper that the German Govern- ment had stated that they counted upon the arrival of a plenipotentiary from Poland in Berlin on the 30th, that is to say, on the following day. In the meantime, of course, we were awaiting these proposals. The next evening, when our Ambassador saw Herr von Ribbentrop, the German Foreign Secretary, he urged upon the latter that when these proposals were ready—for we had heard no more about them—he should invite the Polish Ambassador to call and should hand him the proposals for transmission to his Government. Thereupon, reports our Ambassador, in the most violent terms Herr von Ribbentrop said he would never ask the Ambassador to visit him. He hinted that if the Polish Ambassador asked him for an interview it might be different.

The House will see that this was on Wednesday night, which, according to the German statement of last night, is now claimed to be the final date after which no negotiation with Poland was acceptable. It is plain, therefore, that Germany claims to treat Poland as in the wrong because she had not by Wednesday night entered upon discussions with Germany about a set of proposals of which she had never heard.

Now what of ourselves? On that Wednesday night, at the interview to which I have just referred, Herr von Ribbentrop produced a lengthy document which he read out in German, aloud, at top speed. Naturally, after this reading our Ambassador asked for a copy of the document, but the reply was that it was now too late, as the Polish representative had not arrived in Berlin by midnight. And, so, Sir, we never got a copy of those proposals, and the first time we heard them —we heard them—was on the broadcast last night. Well, Sir, those are the circumstances in which the German Government said that they would consider that their proposals were rejected. Is it not clear that their conception of a negotiation was that on almost instantaneous demand a Polish plenipotentiary should go to Berlin—where others had been before him—and should there receive a statement of demands to be accepted in their entirety or refused? I am not pronouncing any opinion upon the terms themselves, for I do not feel called upon to do so. The proper course, in our view—in the view of all of us—was that these proposals should have been put before the Poles, who should have been given time to consider them and to say whether, in their opinion, they did or did not infringe those vital interests of Poland which Germany had assured us on a previous occasion she intended to respect. Only last night the Polish Ambassador did see the German Foreign Secretary, Herr von Ribbentrop. Once again he expressed to him what, indeed, the Polish Government had already said publicly, that they were willing to negotiate with Germany about their disputes on an equal basis. What was the reply of the German Government? The reply was that without another word the German troops crossed the Polish frontier this morning at dawn and are since reported to be bombing open towns. [An HON. MEMBER: "Gas? "] In these circumstances there is only one course open to us. His Majesty's Ambassador in Berlin and the French Ambassador have been instructed to hand to the German Government the following document:

" Early this morning the German Chancellor issued a proclamation to the German Army which indicated clearly that he was about to attack Poland. Information which has reached His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom and the French Government indicates that German troops have crossed the Polish frontier and that attacks upon Polish towns are proceeding. In these circumstances it appears to the Governments of the United Kingdom and of France that by their action the German Government have created conditions, namely, an aggressive act of force against Poland threatening the independence of Poland, which call for the implementation by the Governments of the United Kingdom and of France of the undertaking to Poland to come to her assistance. I am accordingly to inform your Excellency that unless the German Government are prepared to give His Majesty's Government satisfactory assurances that the German Government have suspended all aggressive action against Poland and are prepared promptly to withdraw their forces from Polish territory, His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom will without hesitation fulfil their obligations to Poland."

[An HON. MEMBER: "Time limit? ".] If a reply to this last warning is unfavourable, and I do not suggest that it is likely to be otherwise, His Majesty's Ambassador is instructed to ask for his passports. In that case we are ready. Yesterday, we took further steps towards the completion of our defensive preparations. This morning we ordered complete mobilisation of the whole of the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force. We have also taken a number of other measures, both at home and abroad, which the House will not perhaps expect me to specify in detail. Briefly, they represent the final steps in accordance with prearranged plans. These last can be put into force rapidly, and are of such a nature that they can be deferred until war seems inevitable. Steps have also been taken under the powers conferred by the House last week to safeguard the position in regard to stocks of commodities of various kinds.

The thoughts of many of us must at this moment inevitably be turning back to 1914, and to a comparison of our position now with that which existed then. How do we stand this time? The answer is that all three Services are ready, and that the situation in all directions is far more favourable and reassuring than in 1914, while behind the fighting Services we have built up a vast organisation of Civil Defence under our scheme of Air-Raid Precautions. As regards the immediate man-power requirements, the Royal Navy, the Army and the Royal Air Force are in the fortunate position of having almost as many men as they can conveniently handle at this moment. There are, however, certain categories of service in which men are immediately required both for Military and Civil Defence. These will be announced in detail through the Press and the B.B.C. The main and most satisfactory point to observe is that there is to-day no need to make an appeal in a general way for recruits such as was issued by Lord Kitchener 25 years ago. That appeal has been anticipated by many months, and the men are already available.

So much for the immediate present. Now we must look to the future. It is essential in the face of the tremendous task which confronts us, more especially in view of our past experiences in this matter, to organise our man-power this time upon as methodical, equitable and economical a basis as possible. We, therefore, propose immediately to introduce legislation directed to that end. A Bill will be laid before you which for all practical purposes will amount to an expansion of the Military Training Act. Under its operation all fit men between the ages of 18 and 41 will be rendered liable to military service if and when called upon. It is not intended at the outset that any considerable number of men other than those already liable shall be called up, and steps will be taken to ensure that the man-power essentially required by industry shall not be taken away.

There is one other allusion which I should like to make before I end my speech, and that is to record my satisfaction, and the satisfaction of His Majesty's Government, that throughout these last days of crisis Signor Mussolini also has been doing his best to reach a solution.

It now only remains for us to set our teeth and to enter upon this struggle, which we ourselves earnestly endeavoured to avoid, with determination to see it through to the end. We shall enter it with a clear conscience, with the support of the Dominions and the British Empire, and the moral approval of the greater part of the world. We have no quarrel with the German people, except that they allow themselves to be governed by a Nazi Government. As long as that Government exists and pursues the methods it has so persistently followed during the last two years, there will be no peace in Europe. We shall merely pass from one crisis to another, and see one country after another attacked by methods which have now become familiar to us in their sickening technique. We are resolved that these methods must come to an end. If out of the struggle we again re-establish in the world the rules of good faith and the renunciation of force, why, then even the sacrifices that will be entailed upon us will find their fullest justification.

I was not a Member of this House as some hon. and right hon. Members were 25 years ago, when we were confronted with a similar struggle. That was a grave time, but this is an even graver time. This is the turning point in human history, and we are now facing a situation which, in the history of mankind, has never been faced before in this country. The die is cast. It has been my privilege and my very heavy responsibility to act, on the last two occasions this House has met, as spokesman for my party and the movement which I represent. On both occasions I endeavoured to put clearly and briefly the attitude which we, as a party, have taken. I epitomised the very solemn declarations made by British Labour in recent years. What I then said still holds. I withdraw nothing as to our criticisms of Government policy in the past, and our views as to the heavy responsibility which lies upon them as factors in creating the present situation; but to-day that is past history. We are facing a new situation, and on the two occasions on which I have addressed the House I put our constructive attitude. I now reaffirm, and say, for the third time in this House during the present crisis, that British Labour stands by its pledged word. We shall, at whatever cost, in the interests of the liberty of the world in the future, use all our resources to defend ourselves and others against aggression.

The right hon. Gentleman appears to have left another loophole. His communication gives the German Government an opportunity of withdrawal. There can now be no withdrawal, and in any event this nation is in honour bound. I would read Article I of the Anglo-Polish Treaty, an Article which bears only one meaning. It reads:

" Should one of the contracting Powers become engaged in hostilities with a European Power in consequence of aggression by the latter against that contracting party, the other contracting party will, at once—"

at once—

" give the contracting party engaged in hostilities all the support and assistance in its power."

The Prime Minister's words have been firm. He has uttered words from which he cannot, and I am sure he would not wish to, escape, but we are building our hopes upon sand, if we think that the German Government are going to give any kind of favourable response to the appeal which has been made. The act of aggression has already taken place. Herr Hitler has put himself grievously in the wrong. He has become the arch-enemy of mankind. He has been guilty not merely of the gravest, basest treachery to this Government and this people; he has been guilty of the basest treachery to all peoples to whom in the past he has given promises. The right hon. Gentleman quoted almost the exact words which I used in the House on Tuesday. I said that the issue of peace and war rested in the hands of one man. I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman has to-night put it equally emphatically.

I never thought that I should quote with approval from a document of which Herr Hitler was the author, but in the proclamation to the Army which he issued at 6 o'clock this morning he said:

" In order to put an end to this lunacy I have no other choice than to meet force with force from now on."

That is a sentiment echoed by practically every Member of this House. Then he goes on to say:

" I should like to assure the whole world that November, 1918, will never repeat itself."

With that I entirely agree. And that brings me to what we are to fight about.

The party to which I belong, which may have faults but which can never be accused of cowardice, will issue its statement to-night to this country and to the world on the view it takes. That view, I think, is the view which I have expressed on previous occasions. I quote just one sentence:

" The British Labour Movement therefore calls upon all its members to stand solidly behind it in resistance to aggression."

From that attitude we shall never depart. We shall enter the struggle without passion against people. I was glad when the Prime Minister used words which we had used in our official declaration. We have no quarrel with the German people; but while we have no passion against people we shall enter this struggle with a grim determination to overthrow and destroy that system of government which has trampled on freedom and crucified men and women—many of them friends of my own—and which has brought the world back to the jackboot of the old Prussianism. In the process of this struggle there will be far-reaching social and economic changes which at the moment no man can foresee, but out of the smoking ruins of the struggle will arise a new order of society. Once the gunfire ceases and the roll of the war drums dies away, after the greatest price mankind in all its history has ever paid to learn its lesson, dictatorship will have been destroyed for ever and organised labour here, and elsewhere in other lands besides ourselves, will play its part in building a new world from which war will be banished and in which a new order will be established.

There is a view among those who are now our enemies that might is right. I believe that right is might. I believe that at long last right must win, whether it be internationally or whether it be nationally. There is in the human spirit something which may be tortured and which may be temporarily suppressed but which can never be destroyed, and that is its determination to keep alive and keep fully aflame the lamp of liberty. My last words are these: I look forward, as we all do, with a very sad heart and with a sorrow that none of us can express, regarding the sufferings which must fall upon hundreds of millions of people, but, however great the suffering, however poignant the agony and whatever the sacrifice may be, I know in my heart that freedom and mankind's hope for the future cannot be quenched. I know that liberty will prevail;

The Prime Minister has spoken this afternoon almost the gravest words that a statesman can utter. He has spoken not only for himself and for his party, and not only for the Government of which he is the head, but for the nation as a whole; and my hon. Friends and I support him in the stand which he is now taking. The issue we are debating this afternoon is that of peace or war, the gravest that can come before Parliament; but we are not starting a war. In the height of our controversies last year, when many of us were strongly criticising the Prime Minister's policy and methods, I not only made it clear that I did not doubt, but I paid a positive tribute to, the Prime Minister's unsparing devotion to the cause of peace. During recent weeks the Government have left nothing undone to contribute towards a freely negotiated and peaceful settlement of Germany's claims on Poland. It was not Britain, it was not France, it was not Poland that refused to come to the table to negotiate; it was Herr Hitler.

It is now abundantly clear that the war started not this morning in Poland, but three years ago with the occupation of the Rhineland, the war to establish the domination of Nazi Germany in Europe and in the world, the war in which successive, and temporarily successful, moves have been played in Spain, Austria, Czecho-Slovakia and, last of all, in Russia. Every move has strengthened the forces of aggression and weakened those of law, reason, negotiation and peace. Now, if Poland were to be obliterated, not for the first time, from the map of Europe, Nazi denomination would be established, directly or indirectly, over every country in Europe East of the Rhine, its resources would be strengthened by theirs, and France and Britain would be left alone either to receive its onslaught or to submit to the extinction of liberty in Europe. I am not going to take up the time of the House in discussing what the Prime Minister himself refrained from discussing, the terms of the German broadcast last night. Suffice it to say that if a powerful nation is to be allowed to order a weaker nation to send to its capital city a plenipotentiary, empowered to discuss and conclude a settlement of a dispute on terms of which its own government is in ignorance, that is government by force and ultimatum; and when such things are happening—and, as the Prime Minister said this afternoon, so long as the Nazi government exists in Germany—there can be no freedom, order or peace in Europe.

Now, vigorous action must be taken by us, in conjunction with our Allies, to sustain the common cause of freedom. It is essential, therefore, that ample powers should be given to the Government, and therefore my hon. Friends and I will support the Bills which have been introduced into the House today. It is also essential that an instrument of government should be created, free enough from the routine work of administration to plan ahead and strong enough to act vigorously and swiftly. It is necessary that we should make the best use of those great resources of man-power and material which we have at our disposal. While it was in one respect gratifying that the Prime Minister was able to tell us that there were so many men volunteering that the fighting Services had as many as they could at the present time handle, it is very important that those fighting Services should be themselves in a position to handle increasing numbers as quickly as possible. Hence, the necessity for a War Cabinet.

Let us, too, in this solemn moment set the goal of our endeavour clearly before us: not the aggrandisement of our country and Empire, not merely the defeat of Nazi tyranny. Tyranny has been defeated before, aggression has been defeated before, dictatorship has been defeated before; and it has sprung up again. Let us keep before us the necessity for constructive effort, for the creation in Europe of that new order which, before the emergence of National Socialism in Germany, we were beginning slowly, with many setbacks, but on the whole not unsuccessfully, to build, an order based not on the sanctions of power politics but on the moral law, in which freedom, justice and equality of economic opportunity will be guaranteed to nations great and small alike.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The Currency (Defence) Bill, which is an absolutely essential Emergency Bill, is necessarily of a technical character. It deals with three separate financial measures which are stated in the first, second and third Clauses of the Bill. As regards the first Clause, it was necessary 25 years ago, at the beginning of the War, to set up an Exchange Account, which was financed by a Vote of Credit, but now we have already an Exchange Account—the Exchange Equalisation Account. Therefore, the first Clause of the Bill provides that that shall be used for necessary purposes that arise in war—I am referring to page 1, line 12—

" in such manner as they (the Treasury) think expedient for securing the defence of the realm and the efficient prosecution of any war."

As the House knows, at present the Equalisation Account has certain definite functions, and this enlarges the purposes for which the Fund may be used. Subsection (2) of Clause I removes the limit which had been set by legislation to the amount which might be issued to the Exchange Account. The present limit is £550,000,000 and this removes that limit. Sub-section (3) provides for dealing with an excess of sterling assets in the Account. That is the first matter.

The second matter is very plain, if one reads Clause 2. We believe that we have made adequate provision to provide sufficient supplies of legal tender in spite of the difficulties which may develop in the course of the emergency. If it turned out that there was a shortage, Clause 2 will provide that there might be a temporary use as currency of postal orders. As some hon. Members will remember, that was done 25 years ago. We think we have made adequate arrangements this time for a sufficient supply of ordinary currency.

The third matter is dealt with in Clause 3, which deals with security for certain special war advances. Arrangements have been made for advances by the Bank of England but out of Government funds, first, to approved banks in order to enable them to meet demands from their customers for currency, and secondly, to approved acceptors whose bills are normally discounted on the London market. These advances and interest thereon will be a floating charge in favour of the bank which will rank prior to all other floating charges on the assets of the borrower. It is not expected that any large amount of advances under the first head will be necessary. Such as there are ought to be repaid quite quickly. As regards the advances under the second head, that is, advances to approved acceptors, they will be required to repay whatever they collect upon the bills, but the balance will not be repayable earlier than six months after the end of the emergency. I think that the House can be assured that the technical arrangements in these Clauses are justified and need not be further explained. They have, of course, been carefully planned beforehand.

This Bill is certainly a very wide Measure, and I would remind the House that it does not arise by way of a repetition of what was done in 1914, when the financial situation was entirely different. At the outbreak of war in 1914 we were still handling gold coin, and it was necessary to have a bank moratorium to close the banks—I think it was for three days—during which pound notes were hastily printed, and the public were told that they would be accepted as legal tender. We are already on a paper currency and therefore there is no danger of a depletion of the gold reserves in consequence of a run on currency for currency purposes. Therefore, we are now breaking new ground in this particular proposal, and it is necessary for the House to envisage a little of what is being done. As far as the first Subsection of Clause 1 is concerned, the object, as I understand it, is more theoretical than practical. It is merely to allow the Exchange Equalisation Account to be used for certain objects for which it is not entitled to be used at the present time.

As far as the practice of working the Fund is concerned, I gather that there is no essential difference contemplated. In Sub-section (2) we are faced with a very grave change. Until now the House of Commons has kept control of the total amount of the Fund. The Government are here asking, not only to substitute a higher limit, but to sweep all limits away. It is a very large power, and before this Measure is passed we must extract from the Chancellor of the Exchequer some undertaking as to the manner and extent to which this very wide power is to be used. As I see the proposal, if it were thought desirable to make some loan in effect to some foreign country, the Government, by means of the Exchange Equalisation Account, could make such a loan to an absolutely unlimited extent by buying the foreign currency and sub- stituting it for the sterling in the fund. It is essential that the House should have some undertaking from the Chancellor of the Exchequer as to the form in which he proposes to use it, and to what extent he really intends to use it. I do not want him to give details which it is not desirable to give, but it is a very large power, and we must have some understanding as to how the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Government propose to use it.

As to Clause 2, it seems rather an extraordinary proposal to make postal orders legal tender. I should have thought that there were very grave disadvantages in that proposal. As I understand the Clause, the Government do not necessarily propose to do it, but to take powers to do it, if necessary, by Order in Council. We should again get from the Chancellor of the Exchequer some assurance that, in the ordinary course of events, the Government are not very likely to put that Order into effect, and that, if it is done, it will probably be of a temporary character.

I have only this to say with regard to Clause 3. During the last War, there is not the least doubt, by the methods of finance adopted by the Government of that time the banks of this country were able to make enormous sums by which they held people of this country to ransom when the War was over. It may be only a very small action that the Government are taking at this time, but it is in accord with what happened then, namely, that the banks were able greatly to increase their lending power by credit which was not their own, but which was provided by the Government, and therefore, by the country as a whole. Hon. Friends sitting behind me on these Benches will desire to watch with the very greatest care the action taken by the Government at the present time which in any way corresponds to the action taken during the last War and which resulted in the consequences to which I have referred.

The right hon. Gentleman has asked me a question, and, with the permission of the House, I will answer it. He asked me, as regards Clause 1, whether there were limits on what might be done under it. Of course, there are none. I could not have made entirely plain to the House the real nature of Clause 1. In the last War we had to create a special account for the Exchange Account. It was out of that Account that purchases of various kinds were made in the course of war—purchases of gold or of securities and other things. There is no point in making a separate account of this kind, because we have the Exchange Equalisation Account, but we must enlarge the powers and purposes for which the Exchange Equalisation Account can be used. Sub-section (I) really has this effect, and I will put it as simply as I can. Instead of the Exchange Equalisation Account remaining an account which can be used only for purposes of checking undue fluctuations in exchange—which is the aim of the existing Act—it could be used, for example, for purposes of buying gold or securities for war purposes. I could not give an assurance as to the limits to be set on the uses of the account. The point is that we are asking the House to give us this authority to use the Exchange Equalisation Account on wider terms than before. As regards postal orders we do not expect to have to use them, but, as in the last War, we have made arrangements to do so if necessary. It is clearly a power which might have to be used, and in the circumstances I hope the House will give us this authority.

Does the right hon. Gentleman contemplate transactions running into tens, hundreds or thousands of millions? The money under Clause I (2) might increase the Exchange Equalisation Account to astronomical dimensions which might be used for purposes which the House would not approve?

With regard to the proposal in Clause 2 to make postal orders legal tender may I ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether it is intended to issue the orders for this purpose free of the usual poundage. The proposal seems practical and might be useful.

Sub-section (2) says that bank notes issued by a bank having power to issue such notes in Scotland shall be legal tender for the pay ment of any amount in Scotland. I have forgotten my banking law and I cannot recollect the present position I think there is some limit to the amount which may be paid in Scotland in the form of Scottish bank notes. Will my right hon. Friend point out what exactly is the change proposed?

Like my hon. Friend, I should not like to commit myself precisely on a question of Scottish banking law. There is, however, a limit, and the object of this sub-section is to remove that limit. In reply to the point raised by the hon. Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. White), I have made inquiries. Suppose the occasion arises when postal orders might be used, the poundage on them would not be charged, but the postal order would be stamped in such a way as to show that for the time being it was used as currency.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The purpose of Clause 1 and the Schedule referred to in that Clause is to make the necessary Amendments in the relevant Statutes in order to confer on prize courts power to deal with aircraft. During the last War although military aircraft played a considerable part there had been little if any development in civil aircraft and aircraft as a means of carriage. Since the War the matter has claimed the attention of international lawyers, and there was a committee of experts at the Hague in 1923, on which sat representatives of the British Empire and of other Powers. That Committee recommended that aircraft and goods carried by aircraft should be made the subject of prize proceedings and that the principles applicable to them should be made analogous to those that had been laid down as applicable in the past in international law to vessels at sea and their cargoes. That recommendation of the Committee is embodied in Clause 1, which makes the necessary Amendment conferring jurisdiction upon the prize courts. These Amendments are in accordance with international law and a necessary development of the principles to which I have referred in their application to this new form of transport.

Clause 2 extends the existing procedure to the establishment of prize courts in Protectorates, Mandated Territories and any other country or territory in which for the time being His Majesty has jurisdiction in matters of prize. The existing legislation is confined to British territory and possessions, but it might be desirable to set up prize courts in protectorates, Mandated Territories or elsewhere where His Majesty has jurisdiction. Clause 3 removes certain doubts and makes it clear that Admiralty Courts established under the Sections set out are prize courts within the Act. Clause 4 defines the extent of the Act. It extends to the Commonwealth of Australia and the Dominion of New Zealand, at their express desire and consent.

Can the Attorney-General, in a few words, give us some information as to the constitution of the Admiralty prize courts? If it be necessary to extend the law relating to prize courts in regard to aircraft, are steps being taken to see that there is on those courts someone with a special knowledge of aircraft? I do not recollect in any detail what the prize law is, but I am certain that it would be an advantage to the constitution of these courts to have sitting on them someone with specialised knowledge of aircraft.

That is a matter which can be dealt with in rules. It is not, of course, necessary for me to give an exhaustive description of prize courts, but, broadly speaking, our own Admiralty Court is a prize court. Prize courts in the colonies can be set up under the Colonial Courts of Admiralty Act, 1890. It may be desirable in aircraft cases to have an aircraft assessor sitting on the court, and the suggestion is one for which I am grateful to the hon. Member. It would not be an appropriate matter to be dealt with in this Bill, but I repeat that I am grateful to the hon. Member for having drawn our attention to it.

We have examined the Bill within the short time at our disposal, and we raise no objection to it.

Can the Attorney-General tell us now or later why Canada is omitted from the list? I notice that the rest of the Empire seems to have been covered. Perhaps there is some special explanation for this.

The Dominions not in the Bill are Dominions who desire to deal with the matter in their own legislation.

Will the Attorney-General explain the meaning of Part II of the Schedule, which provides that the provisions of the Naval Prize Act, 1864, are inapplicable in relation to aircraft or goods carried therein taken as prize? Is it the intention to exclude from this Bill the provisions of the Naval Prize Act in relation to awards respecting aircraft?

No, Sir. The Sections referred to are inapplicable to aircraft. For instance, Section 30 is a section which enables six ships of less than 100 tons to be included in one adjudication. Obviously, that section is inapplicable to aircraft. The various sections which are not included in the Bill are not applicable.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The substantial Clause of this Bill is Clause 1. Sub-sections (1) and (2) of that Clause reproduce the same Amendments to the Government of India Act, 1935, as would have been effected by Clauses 4 and 5 of the Miscellaneous (Amendments) Bill, which has already been passed in another place and is awaiting consideration by this House. Sub-section (3) deals with a connected point which has come to light since the Miscellaneous (Amendments) Bill was drafted, and which it was intended to cover when the Bill came to this House. The main provision is contained in Subsection (1). The origin and purpose is as follows: Generally speaking, the scheme of the 1935 Act is that executive authority follows legislative power. Consequently the Government at the Centre has executive authority in connection with the subjects in List I, over which it has exclusive legislative power. Likewise the Provincial Governments have executive authority and power in respect of all the matters in List II, over which they have exclusive legislative power. In respect of matters contained in the Concurrent List the arrangement is that as the matters are of their nature primarily provincial, the concurrence of the Centre is merely needed in order to secure legislative uniformity where necessary, the executive authority, generally speaking, being in the Provinces.

The general position is secured by Section 313 of the Government of India Act, but I think there is no doubt that the restriction on the Centre contained in Section 313 was insufficiently considered by the framers of the Act of 1935 in its relation to Section 102. Section 102 clearly recognises that in war conditions it might be impossible to maintain a rigid legal distinction between the powers of the Central and Provincial Governments and therefore Section 102 enables the Governor-General to declare by proclamation that a grave emergency exists whereby the security of India is threatened, whether by war or internal disturbance. By that proclamation the Centre derives exceptional and emergency authority to legislate in connection with matters in the Provincial Legislative List. As the Act stands, however, the restriction imposed by Section 313 brings it about that while the Centre can legislate on Provincial subjects they cannot acquire the executive authority necessary to deal with these matters. For instance, they cannot issue directions to the Provincial Governments as to war-time policy in relation to subjects in the Provincial List. They cannot supervise instructions issued by the provincial governments themselves and in particular the Central Government cannot make rules or regulations with regard to Provincial Subjects nor can they effectively legislate to give themselves the necessary power, because it has been legally established that the making of rules is not a legislative but an executive power.

The Government of India, therefore, to be able to legislate in order to give themselves this power, requires covering authority in the Government of India Act, hence the necessity for this Amendment. Subsection (1), it will be noted, is confined strictly to war emergency, it does not extend as does Section 102 to questions of internal disturbance. It has a twofold effect. In the first place paragraph (a) makes the Central Government legally competent to issue instructions to the Provincial Governments as to the exercise of their own executive power, and paragraph (b) enables Acts made, under Section 102, by the Central Government dealing with Provincial Subjects to confer powers on the officials of the Central Government whether by Central legislation itself or by rules made there under. There is attached the same proviso as that attached to Section 102 by which the exercise of these powers requires the prior sanction of the Governor-General and thereby ensures that these powers are confined to the appropriate case. Sub-section (2) is a consequential Amendment to Section 124 of the main Act and Sub-section (3) removes a doubt as to whether a proclamation under Section 102 is to be held back until war has actually taken place or whether it can be brought into operation when there is the threat of the imminence of war—in other words it is putting the Government of India in the same position as Parliament placed the Government last week in this country when we passed the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act. Clause 2 merely makes the provision of the Bill retrospective from 1st April, 1937.

This Bill is a war Measure and as such we make no criticism upon it. But I should like to say one word as I myself, for a short time 10 years ago, was concerned in the matter of the Government of India. I hope that my words will reach those colleagues in India with whom we cooperated in trying to set up a free democracy there. I hope that they will realise that in the struggle in which we are about to enter their cause is ours and our victory will be theirs.

May I express a sincere hope that some of the provisions of the Bill will not be carried beyond the period of the national emergency? I look upon the Bill with a certain amount of appre-*hension. There was on the stocks on the beginning of the emergency a Bill which itself was rather suspicious. Its provisions seemed likely to abrogate in some measure such mild extension of democracy to the Indian peoples as was contemplated in the original Bill. It must be admitted that this Bill does severely limit such powers as the Provincial legislatures already possess, and seems to give rather more power to the Central legislature which, as we know, is far less democratic than the Provincial legislatures. This is possibly one of the worst fruits of the grave position in which we find ourselves. It certainly limits the development of democracy in India, and I am afraid will be viewed with a certain amount of apprehension by Indian nationalists. Therefore I hope we may have an assurance that the Bill will only last as long as the actual emergency exists, and that when that comes to an end the Bill will be repealed or at any rate the dangerous Clause in the Bill will be withdrawn.

I hope that when the Bill is passed the hon. and gallant Member will complete the necessary arrangements to make the position clear to the people of India. There is among the Congress people and those who represent the Indian people a very great deal of sympathy with this country in her fight for liberty. Even those who have been imprisoned lately have shown by their writings and speeches the greatest sympathy with this country in its stand against Hitler. I suggest that this spirit is not one which should be lightly thrown away and should not be ridden over roughshod by the machine. I hope that these powers will be kept in the background, and in that case a great deal more will be undertaken by the vast masses of the Indian people in any fight for liberty.

I should like to thank very much the right hon. Member and the hon. Lady for the sentiments which they have expressed with regard to the community of interests between India and this country in the present crisis. With regard to the point raised by the right hon. Member, I think he and the whole House can be perfectly sure that the Bill does not interfere with the normal relationship between the Centre and the Provinces as laid down by the Government of India Act, 1935, but I think it will be recognised that this measure of executive authority is really what one might call the common-sense complement of the power of legislation which was expressly put into the Act of 1935. I do not think there is anything of a very far- reaching character. As to the length of time that the Bill will operate, the hon. Member for West Leyton (Mr. Sorensen) will, I am sure, not wish me to give any specific post-war pledge at this moment, but I would like to emphasise the point again that these powers do not follow to the full extent the powers already given as regards legislation by Section 102. They specifically refer to the question of war emergency and do not refer to the question of internal disturbances. I hope that with that assurance the hon. Member and the House, and indeed India, will be satisfied.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill really comprehends in one Bill a series of measures which were brought into operation during the last War. The aim of the Bill is to make less onerous the burdens which may come upon His Majesty's subjects on account of obligations which they have incurred or on account of rights which other people have against them, which exists in time of peace. It is for lightening these burdens, subject to certain exceptions, that the Bill is introduced. The general scheme of the Bill is that in the main in a series of cases where people have rights against others they should not be permitted to proceed against them except with the leave of the court. Clause 1 deals with cases where there has been a judgment, where somebody's right has crystallised in a judgment by a compe- tent court. In those cases there shall be, after the passing of the Bill, no power to enforce the judgment where that judgment is based in the main on a judgment for the recovery of a sum of money. Exceptions are recognised in the proviso, and the exceptions mainly are cases of recovery of damages for tort or where somebody has got a judgment for a sum of money for the loss, say, of a leg. Those are exceptions which will still be enforceable after the Bill is passed, and other exceptions are cases in which no sum of money is recoverable otherwise than in respect of costs; any matter of bastardy or affiliation orders, and cases of fines and penalties are outside the scope of the Bill.

In Sub-section (2) the Bill deals with a* class of right which people are able to enforce without obtaining a judgment. A scheme of inhibiting methods of self-help appears in paragraphs (a) and (b), subject to the proviso under Sub-section (2). This Sub-section (2) prevents people from availing themselves of remedies, such as distress, or the appointment of a receiver, or re-entry on land, which they can invoke without previously obtaining the judgment of the courts. Included in these provisions is one which prevents a company from being wound up merely because it has not complied with a notice served upon it requiring it to pay its debts. The provisos there will apply to the power of sale of a mortgagee in possession either of land or property— those are (a) and (b) —and (c), a somewhat anomalous saving as it may appear at first sight to some hon. Members, as it did to me, for pawnbrokers, the saving of a right which was saved during the whole course of the last War. The real reason is because, if it were not so, no pawnbroker for the period of the war would be able to dispose of his stock. He would be inhibited by the general provisions of the Bill from getting rid of it. Paragraph (d) is a saving in a case where there has been a receiver appointed as the result of an application to the court.

Sub-section (3) makes it impossible to enforce the judgment of the court whenever given, either before or after the Act, for the recovery of possession of premises on the ground of non-payment of rent, except of course with the leave of the court. In all these cases the remedy can be applied only with the leave of the court. Therefore the most important Sub-section in the Bill is Subsection (4) of Clause 1, which sets out the circumstances to which the court must look before it grants leave and, broadly speaking, the criterion that the court will apply is whether non-satisfaction of the obligation which exists is due directly or indirectly to war. Sub-section (1) (5) enables the court to stay bankruptcy or winding-up proceedings. Sub-section (6) enables Orders in Council to be made to deal with the exceptional kind of case of warehousemen, docks, railway companies and so on which have statutory powers to deal with goods that are left with them. I suppose even in the course of a major war there will be people who will leave their portmanteaus at Charing Cross Railway Station for a long period and forget to recover them, and there does not seem any particular reason why a railway company should not after a reasonable time have power to sell the goods. His Majesty may, therefore, by Order in Council deal with that special kind of case. The remainder of the Bill deals with the interpretation and there is a Clause applying it to Scotland and to Northern Ireland subject to certain modifications.

A number of my friends who have professional qualifications on these topics have given a hasty glance at the Bill and we do not propose to take any exception to it. I do not myself find it very easy to follow this kind of question, but I gather that it deals with obligations which one may have entered into and which one could normally discharge, but which in an emergency one ought not to be called upon to discharge, and we are going to be given protection. That is what I gather from the lessons that I have been taking. It occurs to me that these exceptions seem rather a miscellaneous lot. I should like to know whether they are based on any principle or are in fact due to a number of exceptions the necessity of which was realised as the result of the experience of the War between 1914 and 1918. If that is the case, it will appear to me a very good explanation.

Like the right hon. Gentleman, we take no exception to the Bill, but there is one point that I should like to bring to the attention of the Solici- tor-General. He referred in particular to Sub-section (4) on page 3, as being the criterion which the court would endeavour to apply. It seemed to me, on looking hastily at the Clause, that the words are rather unduly narrow, because it seems that, if the court is going to exercise its discretion in favour of the debtor and relieve him from the immediate obligation to pay his rent or whatever it may be, the court must be satisfied that he is unable immediately to satisfy the debt by reason of circumstances directly or indirectly attributable to a war in which His Majesty may be engaged. Does not the word "unable" rather fetter the discretion of the court more than it needs to be fettered? One can imagine circumstances in which it would be fairly possible for the debtor to satisfy the debt by giving up everything he had, so that it would not be possible to say that he-was unable to satisfy the debt, yet it would be a matter of extreme hardship to have to pay then and there. It might add to the effectiveness of the Bill if slightly wider language were used in this Sub-section.

In general the House must of necessity approve the Bill, which confers something in the nature of a conditional moratorium in connection with certain transactions, but there is one matter as to which I am in some little doubt. Whilst certain remedies are only exercisable by the leave of the court, I am not quite clear that the ordinary procedure of suing for rent in default is dealt with. If I make default in payment of rent can I be sued and made to pay without being able to plead the extenuating circumstances which in other cases I should have the advantage of? I am aware that that is permissible in the case of recovery of the possession of land, but is it equally applicable to the ordinary case of suing for rent in default, where the tenant ought to have similar protection to what is given to other debtors.

In that case it is either suing for the recovery of a sum of money, and therefore prevented without the leave of the court under Subsection (1), or it is a company with a claim for possession of land, it is true that the landlord could proceed to the extent of getting judgment, but he could not get any further than that. He could not recover his land without the leave of the court, so that you get the same conclusion in either case, that the court has to apply the test of whether the inability to comply with the demand for rent is due to circumstances directly or indirectly attributable to the war.

It is not permissible to apply for the protection of the Act apparently until after judgment has been obtained and execution threatened.

I think that is right if the claim is one for possession, but I do not think the hon. and Gallant Gentleman is right as regards the other claim. Supposing there is a claim after the Act for rent alone, then, as he says, it is at the stage at which you come to execution that the Act operates. There must be hundreds of cases where no one would wish to see people who could perfectly well carry out their obligations relieved merely because there happened to be an emergency. This brings me to the second point of the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Foot). These words stood the test of the last Great War and they proved themselves sufficiently wide to enable the courts to exercise a really wide and unfettered discretion. If looked at through a microscope, it may be that the words '' unable immediately '' merit some of the criticism which the hon. and learned Gentleman directed to them, but when they are read in conjunction with the remaining words of the Sub-section "directly or indirectly attributable" he will see that they are very wide indeed. The hon. Gentleman knows as well as I do how desirable it is not to submit a fresh set of words to the test of the Law Courts when an existing set has already proved satisfactory.

Lastly, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Keighley (Mr. Lees-Smith) asked with regard to the exceptions. I agree that they are a curious looking assortment, but these, too, survived the last War and they were operated without any great difficulty and they raised no objection. We have simply endeavoured, as far as we could, to codify the law.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The objects of this Bill, which relate to the position of the Services, are mainly as follow. In the first place, to authorise, for the duration of the emergency, enlistments into the Armed Forces, the present position being that enlistments are required to be for a fixed period. The second object of the Bill is to enable enlistments for general service for the period of embodiment into the Regular Army; that is to say, instead of a Territorial joining a given regiment, he may join for general service in the Territorial Army. The third object of the Bill is to authorise compulsory transfers from corps to corps, and the posting of soldiers to any unit of the corps. That is an obvious provision in time of war; and indeed, it operated in the last War. At the conclusion of hostilities the soldier may come to his own regiment or corps, but he may be transferred, in accordance with the exigencies of the Service, during a war or a period of emergency.

The fourth object of the Bill is to authorise ordering the Territorial Army and the Auxiliary Air Force to go out of the United Kingdom. At present, under the Statutes prevailing, it is not possible to take them out of the United Kingdom. Of course, that was a restriction which was removed during the last War, as we propose to remove it during the existence of the present emergency. The last object of the Bill is to authorise the temporary demobilisation of members of the Armed Forces during a period of emergency or embodiment. It may be that they would be required in industry, and this provision is to enable their services to be utilised in a civilian capacity and to demobilise them temporarily. If the purpose for which they have been released terminates, then they will, of course, remain under their obligations. I do not think there is anything startling in this Measure, which is one which is to be expected in the circumstances.

Hon. Members on this side offer no objection to the Bill, the provisions of which appear to be reasonable in the present emergency, but I want to address to the right hon. Gentleman a question which arises from what he said about temporary demobilisation. The right hon. Gentleman and hon. Members will recall that during the last War some difficulty was experienced in releasing men from the Services for the purpose of engaging in industrial occupations. It has been suggested that in any future war production will be one of the first lines of Defence, and, therefore, we must conserve the labour that may be required for our purposes. I want to have an assurance from the right hon. Gentleman that the machinery for the purposes of this temporary demobilisation will be sufficiently flexible to prevent any difficulty arising. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has considered the machinery, or whether that is a matter to be left to the commandant of the particular corps or any person appointed for the purpose, or whether there is to be something in the nature of a committee established, to which claims would be presented, presumably by employers of labour or by Government Departments—for example, the Ministry of Labour—if the services of men engaged with the Forces were required for industrial production. I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to give us what information he can on this matter.

I do not think it is entirely irrelevant to raise on this Bill the question of the relations of hon. Members of this House to the Auxiliary Forces. The position in that respect is, I think, a little obscure, or at all events a little anachronistic. I would ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he can give us any enlightenment on the matter and whether he intends to deal with the matter in Defence Regulations or in some early legislation. As I understand the position, it is that if Members of the House are members of the Auxiliary Forces, at least in the commissioned ranks, after mobilisation, in the event of a General Election taking place, for instance, they would not be permitted to stand for Parliament. Anyone who is not at present a Member of Parliament, but who is a prospective candidate for Parliament, in the event of a General Election or a by-election in the constituency for which he is prospective candidate, would, by reason of his serving in the mobilised Auxiliary Forces, be prevented from standing as a candidate for Parliament. I think the right hon. Gentleman will agree that, in the circumstances in which we find ourselves, that is somewhat anachronistic, and that there is room for a clarification of the position. The second point I want to raise is that Members of the House may not accept certain appointments, or may not be appointed to certain ranks in the Armed Forces, without thereupon immediately losing their seats as Members, by reason of the fact that there are certain appointments known as offices of profit under the Crown. The acceptance of such office or rank by an hon. Member would mean immediately that an hon. Member serving his country in the Armed Forces would automatically cease to be a Member of the House. I speak subject to correction, but I believe than an hon. Member can be a commanding officer of a battalion without running any risk, but if he is appointed adjutant, he immediately loses his seat as a Member of the House by reason of his accepting an office of profit under the Crown. Certain higher ranks in the Armed Forces cannot be held by hon. Members without their forfeiting their seats in Parliament. I hope that, in the public interest and from the point of view of the Armed Forces, this matter will be put right in the Defence Regulations, or that the right hon. Gentleman will find Some other means of dealing with it.

I should like to ask a question arising out of the right hon. Gentleman's explanation that under the Bill a Territorial can volunteer for general service instead of distinctive service in one Arm. Will this apply to existing Territorials? Suppose that a Territorial in an anti-aircraft battalion decides later that his services would be more useful in, say, the infantry, would it be possible for him to transfer from one Arm to another? There is another question I want to ask which concerns more than the right hon. Gentleman's particular Department. Take, for instance, men in the balloon barrage. They are in the Royal Air Force, but I can imagine that in the course of a few months we might decide that the air menace had been sufficiently conquered as not to require in the balloon barrage more than the men who are rather elderly, and not the young men. In those conditions, could men manning the balloon barrage transfer from the Royal Air Force to some other service altogether, where they would be more suitably employed?

The right hon. Gentleman has referred to the powers which are being taken under Clause 3 to transfer a soldier from one corps to another or from one unit in a corps to another. The right hon. Gentleman knows the part which esprit de corps plays in the armed forces, and he also knows that there are many men who, even if they are to be called up compulsorily under these powers, would prefer to serve with a particular unit or corps. Hon. Members from Scotland know the strong feeling which exists among Scotsmen in favour of serving with Scottish regiments, and there are others of my hon. Friends here who would prefer to serve in units with which they have special associations. For instance, if I were called on to serve, I would like to go back to my old regiment. I hope, therefore, that the right hon. Gentleman will use these powers sparingly and will bear in mind that there are strong reasons, may of them traditional, why individuals choose to serve in particular units. It may be that there are other members of a man's family serving in a unit and that he would like to be in the same unit. There is another feature to be considered. In transferring a man from one corps to another you may reduce the pay which that man, when he enlisted, expected to receive. For all these reasons I hope that, consistent with military requirements, the right hon. Gentleman will use these powers as little as possible.

I wish to put a few points on this Bill arising out of my own experience. Clause 4 states that notwith- standing anything in the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act a man may be transferred without his consent to any corps, and may be posted without his consent to any regiment or battalion. I ask that this Clause should be used with care and with due discretion. Most Members of the Territorial Army have a special interest in the branch of the Forces which they have joined. They may be anxious to serve along with their own pals, or it may be that the unit is associated with a particular area in which they are interested. A certain amount of local patriotism may enter into their choice of a corps. This spirit is stimulated; the men become interested in the corps and they respect the people from their own locality who hold commissioned rank in that corps. This spirit has been developed particularly in the Territorial Forces, and therefore I hope the Secretary of State will recommend all commanding officers to use this power with great discretion.

My next point concerns technical men, many of whom have been trained in skilled trades, and who have joined balloon barrage units, or the anti-aircraft section or the Tank Corps or other technical branches of the service because of some special interest arising out of their own experience. While I realise that we are now faced with a situation in which we must all be prepared to sink our individual differences, we must at the same time remember that we are living in a democratic State and that a certain amount of latitude and of "give and take," consistent with the national well-being, should be allowed. In that way we can weld our people together in a manner which is unknown in other parts of the world. I hope, therefore, that special attention will be paid to the position of these technical men.

I wish to refer, in the next place, to-the conditions under which men are serving. Certain criticisms have been levelled by certain public people and in the Press against some of the Militia camps. I visited a number of these camps during the Recess along with a man who is a specialist in the building industry, and I have no hesitation in saying that there is no justification whatever for the criticisms which have been made by certain people and in the Press on this score. I wish to pay a tribute to the officials of the War Office who have been responsible for the lay-out of these camps. It is true that certain suggestions for improvement can be made, and I hope that opportunities will be given for stating the men's point of view, in order that those who have to live in the camps may make practical suggestions and any justifiable grievances eliminated. But, as I say, fundamentally there is no justification for some of the criticisms which have been made.

The other day, I visited a certain place. I do not propose to mention the name because I do not want to get anyone into trouble. I saw that a number of men had been billeted in a certain building. I put a number of questions to the men, when the officers were not present. I found that the men were satisfied with the food and the treatment which they had received, but that for one week they had been sleeping on ground sheets laid on concrete. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that that is not good enough. These men are entitled to be provided with palliasses. I am the first to make allowances; I realise the difficulties and the fact that Defence is the first consideration. Nevertheless, if we are to have the maximum of efficiency in Defence, if we are to get the best out of the men, if we are to create the proper spirit among the men, we ought not to ask them to put up with conditions of that kind. Nothing should stand in the way of the men receiving all the comfort possible. I know that they are prepared to put up with a good deal in these days, but they ought not to be expected to put up with conditions of that kind while they are serving at home. It will be soon enough for them to expect such conditions if they go abroad, but it is not playing the game, and it is not encouraging the spirit of our people, to have such conditions at home, and I appeal to the Secretary of State to see that all justifiable grievances of this kind are met. Where the grievances cannot be dealt with, where, for instance, it is a question of transport and certain things cannot be obtained, I would be the first to make allowances, but no excuses should prevent grievances of a legitimate character being dealt with. As I have said, we are living in a democratic State and only the best is good enough for our people, having regard to the conditions under which our men are serving.

My final point is this. I was speaking the other day to a man who is responsible for running a section of one of the most important industries in this country, and I learn that concern is being felt as to the amount of skilled labour which is available in certain respects. It was pointed out to me that the armed forces are drawing away a large amount of skilled labour, and I realise that in these days of a mechanised Army and a large AirForce, it is necessary to have a considerable amount of skilled labour in the Forces. I hope, however, that due regard will be paid to the needs of industry, particularly as regards instrument-makers and pattern-makers and skilled men of that character. I hope that the Secretary of State for War will not in this connection overlook the problems of industry.

Naturally I do not wish to delay the passage of this Bill or any of the other Bills on the Order Paper, but I wish to take the opportunity of endorsing what has been said by the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) in regard to the national character of the regiments which are being formed. I take it that what he said applied not only to the existing Army, but also to the contemplated expansion of our Forces which was mentioned earlier by the Prime Minister. In relation to that, I would ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, as far as Wales is concerned—there are Scottish Members who can speak for Scotland—to take particular notice of the national aspect in connection with these forces. There are elements of a nationalistic character arising now in various parts of Wales and Scotland, and I think it would be a great misfortune if we should attempt to do what was done in the earlier part of the last War, with certain unfortunate consequences, and not allow men to join in units having relationship to their own locality, county, or nationality. I hope my right hon. Friend will give special facilities in this regard, because I am sure that, if he does, it will encourage the esprit de corps and the service which the men will give.

I should like to say a word in support of what has been said by the last three hon. Members who have spoken with reference to the use of these wide powers in regard to allocating men, not only to different units, but to different Services. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman has the whole thing very fully in mind, and I imagine that he wants to have these powers for use only when it is absolutely necessary to use them. If he could give an assurance that that is his object and that there is no intention of any wide dispersal of men from their existing units, it would give general satisfaction. There is no doubt at all that people who join different units, as, for example, the South Staffords, will be infinitely better fighting men because they are associated with those they know, from whatever part of the country they may come, with their own friends, with local associations; and, from a military point of view, I feel sure that it would be far better if they were kept in their own units as far as possible and not dispersed in other regiments.

From what little I have seen of the work of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War in the last two or three weeks, I must say that it has had very remarkable results. He would not claim that the Army to-day is perfect, but he has made very remarkable improvements, and it is to-day a very powerful fighting force indeed. The House is aware that we have seen these Bills only for a very short time, and I could wish that we had had a greater opportunity of perusing and discussing them, but that is not possible. I am, however, very seriously concerned with this Bill particularly. I hoped that the right hon. Gentleman would, perhaps in compendious terms, give us the principle of it—something on these lines: May we understand that, notwithstanding the very drastic powers which the Bill gives to the right hon. Gentleman, there will be under it no breach of any existing agreement or term of service except by way of an extension of period of service or in this matter of transfer; that is to say, will existing rights, and particularly existing agreements and pledges, be fully kept, notwithstanding the powers given by the Bill? The right hon. Gentleman knows that he and I have had cases of that sort up between us in regard to allocations during the last War. I am sure that all of us would wish to see that nothing of that sort can possibly take place again.

I notice that there are certain savings here, in regard to Territorials in particular, whereby a man, for example, cannot be ordered out of the United Kingdom unless he has signed an agreement accepting such liability, and similarly with regard to a man who has signed an agreement relating to the particular corps or unit to which he has been transferred. Can we be assured that there is no power to commit a breach of any existing agreement or term of service, except in these matters of transfer and extension of service, or can the right hon. Gentleman enumerate those matters in which such an alteration is possible? I think we ought to be quite clear on this matter, because otherwise these questions come up year after year, and it is very desirable that we should know precisely what we are doing in such an important matter.

There is another short point. I notice that the power to enlist Regular soldiers and transfer them without consent to other corps applies only to soldiers. Is there an existing power in regard to officers, and, if not, why are they not subject to equal liabilities with the ordinary soldier? I would remind the right hon. Gentleman that there is the question raised by an hon. Friend behind me as to existing rights of seniority, of pay, and so forth, being fully safeguarded in these matters of transfer and extension.

I should like to raise a single point of particular interest to hon. Members and of general interest to our constituent's. A good many of us are Territorials who either are now called up or will shortly be called up. I, myself, am on the Territorial Reserve and will no doubt be summoned. What is to be our position then? At present a Territorial can attend his drills in the evening, and it is a form of recreation for him, but when the Territorial Army is embodied we shall be giving full-time national service outside this House. I suppose that we shall be expected to perform our duties as adequately as we are able both in the Army and" in this House, but we cannot do that unless some arrangement is made by which we can get adequate leave to attend our constituency and this House and to do the other jobs that we ought to do. It will be helpful if my right hon. Friend can assure us that adequate leave will in fact be granted in order that we may perform those duties. [An Hon. Member: "With pay."] I do not mind whether it is with pay or not, but I am concerned that the interests of our constituents shall not be neglected. Let us not forget that we are still representatives of the people and that their interests must be safeguarded by us, and some assurance by my right hon. Friend would indeed be welcome.

By leave of the House, I will endeavour to reply to the arguments and points which have been put to me. Most of them converge. The British Army, of course, is based on the regimental system, and the War Office by tradition is fully conscious of the importance of conserving the spirit of the county or of the corps Therefore, the whole of the prejudices of those who govern this matter would be in favour of keeping the man in the unit of his choice. If he were a Welshman or a Scotsman, the intention would naturally be to allow him to remain in his own unit or to post him to a unit closely approximating, in spirit or geographical connection, to his own unit. But in war it does happen that when there are casualties you cannot always observe mathematically the exact proportions of any particular unit, and men must be transferred. It is not intended to use this power for the sake of doing so, but only to maintain the efficiency of the Service, and at the conclusion of hostilities the man will always go back to his own unit. No pension rights will be sacrificed, and no rights whatever will be sacrificed. It is not intended to put a man into a certain post in which he would get less pay, unless by his own fault he has been demoted. I think the House may rest assured that a man's general status will always be conserved. If a man were injured in some particular way, he might have to serve in another corps rather than in his own corps temporarily, but it will be the intention, as it has always been, to conserve the man's status. I hope I have dealt with all the aspects of that question that were put to me forcefully by hon. Members.

The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Keighley (Mr. Lees-Smith) was con- cerned with a slightly extended aspect of this particular case which we are now discussing. He apprehended that a man might be transferred not only from one regiment to another or from one corps to another, but from one service to another. There is no power taken here to subject a man to such a transfer. He can be transferred within his own service, but not from one service to another. Therefore, I trust the right hon. Gentleman will be satisfied upon that point. Another series of questions came from the hon. Gentleman the Member for Seaham (Mr. Shinwell), who was anxious that industry should not be made to suffer. He asked whether we had worked out a comprehensive scheme for transferring soldiers back to industry. The position will roughly be this. In the Regular Army the question does not arise, because we are dealing there with professional soldiers. It arises in the Territorial Army and discussions are now proceeding between the Ministry of Labour and the War Office with a view to releasing these men from the Territorial Army.

The Prime Minister has explained this afternoon that we have at the moment in the Army most of the man-power which we require. We shall require certain categories of skilled personnel, about whom an announcement will be made, but in the obtaining of the rest of our manpower as and when we require it we desire to proceed in an orderly fashion, and a Bill will be introduced as the Prime Minister explained. We have already adopted the principle in the Militia of the calling up of a particular class, and that is how all continental countries proceed. Regard will be had in this Bill, I assume, to any method of exemption that will be required. The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Central Wandsworth (Colonel Nathan) was concerned about the position of Members of Parliament, many of whom are in the Forces. In the Great War 25 years ago no difficulty, I think, was experienced. Many hon. Members then served in various Forces, some of whom are sitting before me, including the hon. and gallant Gentleman who asked the question. They had no difficulty when they were on leave from the front in attending to their duties in the House of Commons and it would be the desire of the Government to secure that hon. Members who belong to the Forces should have as much liberty as is compatible with their duties to become candidates or to discharge their ordinary political obligations, although I think the imagination of the hon. and gallant Gentleman was rather stretched when he asked whether they would be spared to fight in a general election. I do not think that that is in the sphere of probabilities at the moment. At any rate, the proper liberties of Members of this House will be conserved. My hon. Friend the Member for East Fife (Mr. Henderson Stewart) asked a similar question and I think I have covered his point.

The hon. Gentleman the Member for Stoke (Mr. E. Smith) paid a very generous tribute, which I am glad to acknowledge, to the conditions of the men in the Militia camps. He wanted to make sure that no unreasonable hardships will be imposed on those concerned. He was good enough to say, what I highly appreciate, that on the whole these conditions were very good, but that there were cases, as there always must be, of exception. I do not know where these men were who lay upon concrete, but naturally that should not be the case normally. It is too late now for him to give any particulars, but if any such cases arose it would be the wish of the War Office to bring instant relief. The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for South East Leeds (Major Milner) was also generous in his tribute and I am grateful to him. I hope I have disposed of all the questions. I would have referred to each Member by name, but they were so numerous that I am afraid the questions would have got out of control.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill is designed to confer upon the Board of Trade the power to regulate imports and exports. It is necessary also, as hon. Members will appreciate, to extend this control to coastwise shipping, because there are possibilities that shipments intended to be coastwise in character might develop into overseas shipments; and also to ships' stores, because excessive shipments of ships' stores might result in an evasion of the exports control. No one, I think, can question the great necessity in war-time for the most rigid control of both exports and imports, of exports from the point of view of conserving our own resources, and imports from the point of view of seeing that only those goods which are vitally necessary for the national emergency should either occupy our shipping space or be a call upon our foreign exchange. I already have certain powers, under the Orders in Council of last week, to deal with the licensing of exports, but they are rather clumsy in character. Alterations in the list can only be made by other Proclamations, and the effect of this Bill is to enable me to exercise the same powers and to make any variations of the list by order of the Board of Trade. Similar powers under Clause 1 will also be given to license or prohibit imports.

I think I ought to call the attention of the House to Clause 2, which is a provision of some importance. Clearly during the course of the war rigid control will be instituted in many cases of manufacture, and price limits will be fixed for the sale of particular commodities in this country, and, of course, there will be no such limitation of price in the case of sales abroad. The consequence is that there will be extreme inequities between the man who is made to produce goods for this market and the man who is allowed to export similar goods to other markets and gain a substantially higher price. Under Clause 2 it will be possible for the Treasury to impose charges for the granting of such licences, which will equalise the position as between the man who is making those goods for the home market and the man who is exporting.

The remaining Clauses are merely machinery Clauses for the purpose of enforcing this system of prohibition or licensing, and I think it is only to Clause 7 that I need call the attention of the House. It is essential that the exporter or shipper of goods from this country should not only make what he believes to be a true declaration as to the destination of the goods for which he is asking a licence but that he should, before he makes a declaration, make every effort to find out that the destination is the correct one, and that these goods are not in fact going to find their way into enemy hands. Under Clause 7 if it is found that goods which have been licensed for export on a declaration that they are due for some destination to which no exception can be taken do, in fact, find their way into enemy hands, then under this Clause the onus will be put upon the shipper to show that he took all reasonable steps to secure that the ultimate destination of the goods was not a prohibited destination. The transfer of the onus from the Customs to the shipper should bring home to the shipper the necessity to exercise the utmost care in examing the destination of these goods.

I think the House will agree that the general powers sought in this Bill must be regarded as necessary in the conditions which arise, but there are one or two short points which I should like to make. First of all the power which the President of the Board of Trade proposes to take to impose licence charges will, in fact, amount to a power to levy a tax on exports which may be of very considerable volume. We are anxious that, in cases where specific firms are required by the Government, in the national interest, to enter into the production for the home market of something which is of essential importance, other firms should not be allowed to gain an advantage by exporting similar goods; but this provision as to licensing charges puts a very wide authority of a taxing nature into the hands of the Government and we ought to be quite sure that such power is going to be properly used. It is a fact that under Clause 2 the Order must be passed by an affirmative resolu- tion, but I should have liked to have been rather more certain as to the direction in which this power is to be used and to have heard more than it has been possible to explain to us in these hasty circumstances.

The other point I want to raise, which is a very small one, is as to the very general wording of the provision as to penalties. There is a specific reference to the forfeiture of goods and the imposition of a fine, but the general application of penalties under the Customs Act may mean anything or nothing. At present there is no reference to imprisonment, although an offender may be doing something which is very detrimental to the State—unless the President of the Board of Trade proposes to invoke the imprisonment Sections of the Customs Act. I think he will agree that we ought to be quite sure about that. Lots of people made money in this way during the last War. I am anxious about the generality, as it were, of the wording of this Clause.

The only other point is in regard to the registration of the shipping. I beg the right hon. Gentleman to look into the position of Government agents because you must have not only an adequate Admiralty list controlling the regulations for shipping but men who are likely to be experienced in the class of work to be undertaken during the War. This matter has not been dealt with specifically, but I hope the right hon. Gentleman will look into it and see whether he can do anything about it.

I desire quite briefly to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether in regard to Clause 2 the difference between the cost price of goods manufactured for home consumption and that of goods manufactured for export is roughly going to be the cost of the licences. Another aspect of the matter which I hope the right hon. Gentleman has borne in mind is that a large part of our trade deals with export and that the exercise of these powers will have to be carried out with discretion; otherwise it will not only be that one man may get a slightly better price but he will be building up a very substantial goodwill which might be of very considerable use to him after hostilities have ceased. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman is cognisant of this point. If the right hon. Gentleman, without taking complete control of industry, is to get the co-operation and the smooth running of industry, he must see that no suspicion is left in the minds of manufacturers that one section, or indeed one manufacturer even, is not granted something of which at some distant date he may reap the benefit at the expense of manufacturers who, in peace time, may have been manufacturing for export.

As was said by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hills-borough (Mr. Alexander), we are all readily granting now to the Government powers which we should never have dreamed of granting in any ordinary time. The right hon. Gentleman referred in particular to Clause 7 (Provisions as to ultimate destination of goods). By this Clause we provide that if the Commissioners for Customs and Excise

" have reason to suspect that the declaration is untrue in any material particular, the goods may be detained until the Commissioners are satisfied as to the truth of the declaration, and, if the Commissioners are not so satisfied, the goods shall be forfeited."

There, of course, the burden of proof is put on the man whose goods may be forfeited. As I read the Clause, the decision rests entirely with the Commissioners of Customs and Excise, but surely there ought to be some possibility of appeal in a case like that. I suggest that we ought to have some further explanation why this considerable power is left in the sole hands of the Commissioners and why there is no right of appeal of any kind under Sub-sections (1) or (2) of Clause 7.

Perhaps I might briefly reply to the points which have been made. Both the right hon. Gentleman opposite and the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) called attention to what I agree are the very wide powers contained in Clause 2. The right hon. Gentleman also went on to point out that they are dependent finally upon the passage of an affirmative Resolution by this House, which will, of course, give the House a measure of control. I do not think it is possible at this stage, with so many conditions unknown and so many possibilities unforeseen, to give a picture of how this Clause will, in fact, be used. But it is quite clear that, as the hon. Member for Bassetlaw has pointed out, we must have equity, as far as we can, between the man who has to produce for the home market and the man who has to produce for the export market. Those are the general principles upon which the Clause will be worked. I am afraid it is impossible to be more specific. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Hills-borough (Mr. Alexander) raised the question of the position of Government agents. I can only say that I shall be very happy indeed to have a talk with him on this very important point, and that I shall be very grateful to him for any advice he may be able to offer.

With regard to the point raised by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dundee (Mr. Foot), it is quite true that there is under this Clause no appeal from the forfeiture of the goods. It is essential that when we suspect that a declaration which has been made as to the destination of the goods is untrue the man should be prepared to back up the declaration he has made by the production of satisfactory documents. If he fails to do so there is no appeal for him so far as the forfeiture of the goods is concerned; but, of course, if we take subsequent steps and prosecute him for having made a false declaration, he has the usual protection of the law.

Suppose the man was subsequently prosecuted, and the courts decided that the declaration was not false and judgment was given in his favour. Under the operation of the Clause, the goods would still be forfeited.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill, again, is one with which the House will agree in principle. It has for its object the restriction of the transfer and mortgage of ships and aircraft without the licence of the President of the Board of Trade or the Secretary of State for Air. It is clear that we cannot allow the transfer of ships on the British Register except under circumstances which are believed by those responsible to be in the national interest. With regard to ships, we have, under the Emergency Powers Act, powers in regard to this matter, and we are now exercising them. As far as ships are concerned, therefore, this will only put in a slightly wider and better drafted form the powers that we already exercise under the Emergency Powers Act. But under this Bill similar powers are extended to the Secretary of State for Air in respect of aircraft or parts of aircraft.

I think that the only provision to which I need call attention is that here again we give to the Treasury the power to impose a charge. It was found once or twice in the last War that it was in the national interest for some reason or other to allow the transfer of a ship from a British register to another register. The powers included in this Bill will permit the Board of Trade to license such a transfer, but, at the same time, it will give the Board of Trade powers to attach conditions. They will be able to attach the condition of the payment of a sum of money to the Treasury, and they can attach sucha condition, as they naturally would, that the owner who transfers his ship should build another one in its place. These are powers which the experience of the last War showed that the Board of Trade should possess. I do not think that in this Bill there is any other point to which I need call specific attention. I shall be glad to answer any questions with regard to that part that deals with the transfer of ships, and the Undersecretary of State for Air will reply to any hon. Member who asks questions in regard to aircraft.

The months of June and July now seem a very long distance away, but the right hon. Gentleman will remember that during those months he was continually being pressed by this side of the House to take powers similar to those conferred upon him now by this Bill, and he will readily understand that we heartily welcome that part of the Bill, and especially its extensions to cover aircraft. There is only one point upon which I want to ask the right hon. Gentleman a question. It is with regard to Clause 6, sub-section (1, a). If a person is guilty of an offence and has been found so guilty on indictment, it will be seen that he is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or a fine of an unspecified amount.

I understand that there are precedents in the particular kind of legislation in which the Department of the right hon. Gentleman specialises for a provision of that kind, but I am very anxious to ensure that some guidance should be given to the courts, especially in view of the extension of the power of treating cases on indictment, so that they should have some idea of the amount of the fine that ought to be inflicted. I understand that precedent would seem to point to the fact that the maximum fine might be regarded as the value of the ship, and there is another Act dealing with the Department of the right hon. Gentleman where the fine in similar cases is fixed at £5,000. It is important that some guidance should be given to the courts, because it will be seen that the imprisonment of six months is put in the same Sub-section as a fine not exceeding £100. I suggest that there might be cases where four times the addition of £100 might still be a very inadequate monetary penalty to impose, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be able to give the House some guidance on that point. Apart from that, we on this side of the House heartily welcome the Bill, and regret that it has not been put on the Statute Book before.

The Bill now before us is no doubt very essential, but I think that we ought to have a little more explanation of Clause 1. What is the particular thing that is in the mind of the Government in their special objection to the transference from one port in the United Kingdom to another port, and to the sale of a vessel or part of a vessel, or the transfer of a mortgage? It seems to me that none of these acts could in any way be detrimental to the public interest, but it would be contrary to the interests of the country if such ships were transferred to foreign owners. During the last War there were many notable changes in the ownership of vessels and indeed in the ownership of whole lines of vessels. Lines were transferred from one firm to another which was more competent to handle them than the original owners, by virtue of the fact that they could supplement the lines by having at call a larger fleet than those who originally owned the vessels. I have no objection to the Treasury or the Board of Trade making profit out of such transactions if it can be shown to be reasonable, but I think we are entitled to some explanation as to what evil might ensue from the transfer of such property from one Englishman to another or from one port to another.

I gladly avail myself of the opportunity of explaining the matter raised by the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. David Adams). I can assure him that there is no intention to use Clause 1 in order to put any obstacles in the way of ordinary, legitimate transactions between one British owner and another, such as he referred to. The whole object is to prevent the weakening of the national effort by the transference of ships from the British register.

You do not say so in the Bill.

Why we seek to make it necessary for a transfer even between one British owner and another to receive the licence of the Board of Trade is that it is essential that we should be in complete control of these transfers and that they should not without our knowledge take place from an individual or a company whose good reputation we know, to someone whom we might suspect of being in a position or having a desire to evade the provisions of the law and in some way or another to get a ship off the British register. It is only for that reason that we ask for this power in regard to changes between British owners. I can give the assurance that there is no intention to use the power to prevent ordinary legitimate transactions beween bona-fide owners.

In regard to the case which the hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) raised as to the penalty, he is right in saying that there is a precedent to this Clause in the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894. That precedent has been on the Statute Book for 45 years and during that time no complaint, I understand, has been made against it. I do not think the inference the hon. Member drew that because it is two years in one case and six months in another, a £100 fine becomes £400 in another, has any validity. It will be a matter for the discretion of the court. A person who is fined always has the protection of the common law in regard to what might be regarded as an excessive fine.

I beg to move "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill continues under control houses at present under control and provides that there shall be no decontrol of such houses by the landlord obtaining vacant possession. In addition the Bill extends the same form of control to all houses except those which in April, 1939. had a rateable value exceeding £100 in the Metropolitan Police District and £75 elsewhere in England and Wales and £90 in Scotland. The limits of rateable values are so high as to ensure that only a small minority of houses will be out of control. In fact the Bill will cover 98 per cent. of the housing accommodation of the country.

The House will heartily welcome the Bill because it continues legislation which was put into operation in the first few months after the outbreak of war in 1914 and which has had such beneficial results in protecting the homes and safeguarding the interests of the great masses of the tenants of the country. Since 1914 the limit of control has been to some extent reduced, but I understand that there are about 400,000 houses still under control, and the Bill proposes to continue that control and in addition to bring under control houses which but for this Bill would be uncontrolled. A great number of houses have been built between 1918 and 1939. Indeed, we have surprised ourselves by the extent of building operations in this country, but there is still the risk that certain abuses might occur unless legislation such as this were brought immediately into operation. The tenants of the country will be happy that there is to be no delay in making this provision, and we feel sure that large numbers of tenants, people with small incomes, who will be forced to undergo trials which war always brings, will be gratified by this contribution to the satisfaction of public needs and the appeasement of the people. Speaking for the party to which I belong and for the great mass of the workers I am glad that the Minister has not delayed in bringing forward this Bill.

I am sorry that the other members of my party have not been able to get here, but we had not very much notice and it was difficult, if we were not near the railway station, to get here at the time that I arrived. While we welcome the Bill, it does not go nearly far enough. It is true that it extends control to all ordinary working-class occupiers, but there are many people who will not be able to pay the controlled rent in the new circumstances into which they are going. The man is called to the Army, if in the Reserve, and so many children have been evacuated and the homes are in a complete state of disorganisation economically as the result of what has happened in the last few days. I think it is necessary for the Government to extend their powers to prevent the eviction of people from their homes. If a man is serving with his regiment is it not going to be an absolute disgrace if the family are evicted because of inability to pay the rent, or are taken to court, with all the ensuing hardships? It is not a very simple position in which we find ourselves. It is straining many of these people to pay the rent with the wages or salaries that they are earning, but now the wage has been reduced ever so such by the fact that the man has gone into the Army, and the pay and allowances are much less than he was getting in civil life. When the rent gets behind and the owner or factor takes the person into court, many tenants will not know what to do. The House ought to see to it that no family is evicted in this period on the ground of poverty.

I think hon. Members will agree that the point raised by the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen) is a most important one, but I suggest that probably it is covered by Clause 1 of the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill, which the House passed a short while ago. That Clause seems to me to be devised precisely for that purpose. I wish to say that hon. Members on these benches welcome this Bill, and we think that there would be a good deal to be said for it even if we were not passing through an emergency.

I think that possibly the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Foot) has answered the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen), but it might be better if the right hon. Gentleman could see his way to provide that at least for some transitional period no action could be taken. There are two points I want to raise. I understand that the Bill re-imposes control in the case of houses that have passed out of control. To that extent, it is satisfactory. The first point I want to raise concerns the provision dealing with houses that are let with part of the furniture or services. As far as I gather, houses of that sort are to be exempted. In Glasgow, a large number of houses are sub-let to tenants; that is to say, a person takes over a big house and sub-lets portions of it to occupiers. I gather that this provision of the Bill exempts those people from rent control. In Glasgow, people cannot get houses and are driven into furnished lodgings, and these people are not to be covered by any form of control. In the right hon. Gentleman's Division and in my own Division, the position will be dreadful if men are to be called to the Colours and those they leave behind are not to have even the protection of the courts. I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he cannot bring furnished apartments within the scope of the Bill. The people living in these furnished lodgings are the poorest of the poor, the people with least to defend, and they are given little protection under the Bill. I ask the Minister to give two forms of protection to these people, the first being rent control, and the second, a provision to prevent them from being evicted from their homes without at least an appeal to the courts. I ask him seriously to consider the matter.

The second point I want to raise has reference to shops. I think the Bill does not cover this point, but a number of shops are used by working-class people as dwelling-houses. Unfortunately, they cannot get houses, and frequently they take a shop and occupy it as a dwelling-house. I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether these people will be covered by the Bill, both as regards rent and the power of eviction, as there is a provision in the Bill regarding the exclusion of shops. Shops which are occupied as residences ought to be covered, and the local authority should have right of interfering for the purpose of giving advice and guidance to the courts. With all due respect to the courts this will be necessary. What will happen in an emergency? In many cases the man will have gone away and a woman will have been left behind. Unless you arrange for that woman to have some advice the courts may unwittingly do her an injustice. Before the court makes an order, the local authority should have power to intervene and the right hon. Gentleman ought to enforce on the judge the necessity of consulting with the local authority before making an order. In other words I want the courts not merely to consider the evidence which is led but to have the advantage of some further investigation such as the local authority can make. With the best will in the world, we may leave certain people defenceless in this matter. The services of lawyers will not be easily obtained. They, like other sections of the community, will be doing other work, and the courts will have to rely more and more, on their own judgment. Before an order is made there should be a responsibility on the judge to consult the local authority.

As the right hon. Gentleman who spoke earlier said, we agree with this legislation and we welcome it, but I ask the Minister to take a rather bigger view of the question of getting this matter conveyed properly to the ordinary citizen, who is terribly worried about the present position. We are passing this legislation here. We have to take these two Bills together; we can refer to the terms of the Measures and we know what the position is, but there are thousands of people who are being worried into neurosis about what is going to happen with regard to these rents. I know the case of a woman whose twin sons are responsible for meeting her household expenses. Their wages were £3 a week. Now both have been called to the Colours together and the total amount which they can get is 17s. a week, and that woman has to pay a large rent.

We realise that there is also the question of the small landlord. There is the small owner who has just two or three houses and who may actually be in the position that people who can afford to pay him the rent are not doing so, on account of this legislation. Of course, we do not want that kind of thing to happen, but we do want to see that the woman whose only support is someone who has been called to the Colours should know that if she requires this protection she can have it. It is very simple to put in such words as "except with the leave of the appropriate court." We know that a woman in such a case as I have mentioned, can go to the county court, but I ask the Minister to remember that we are dealing here with the large mass of wives and mothers who will be left behind, who have had no experience of the law and to whom the mere idea of a law court is postively frightening. I would like to ask the Minister whether it would not be wise if he went to the British Broadcasting Corporation and spent a quarter of an hour in explaining to the ordinary woman what her rights are under these two Acts, and at the same time make an appeal that those who can afford to pay their rent ought to do so.

I think I can do better than that. It is difficult for us to see how each Bill which we are passing reacts on the other, but the two very important Bills which my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has been steering through the House, and particularly the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill, go a very long way to meet the difficulty brought forward by the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen). It is impossible to go back on each detail, but the House may remember Sub-section (4) of that Bill, where it says:

" (4) If, on any application for such leave as is required under this Section for the exercise of any of the rights and remedies mentioned in Sub-sections (1), (2) and (3) of this Section, the appropriate court is of opinion that the person liable to satisfy the judgment or order, or to pay the rent or other debt, or to perform the obligation, in question is unable immediately to do so by reason of circumstances directly or indirectly attributable to any war in which His Majesty may be engaged, the court may refuse leave for the exercise of that right or remedy, or give leave there for subject to such restrictions and conditions as the court thinks proper."

That is a very wide Clause and goes a very long way to meet the point of the hon. Members for Camlachie and Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan). The latter pointed out, quite rightly, that the Bill does not apply in terms to furnished rooms, but at this stage it is obviously most undesirable to try and amend the well understood and established rent control, and we might get into tremendous confusion if we started amending it in emergency legislation of this kind. We merely extend it, but a very long way, and, of course, along familiar lines. It covers the shop which is partially a dwelling-house, but that wide set of circumstances and possible queries raised by the hon. Members for Camlachie, Gorbals, and Jarrow (Miss Wilkinson) as to hardships arising in some way or other, where the rent previously contracted for could no longer be paid, where furnished rooms were being occupied by a tenant who feared eviction—all these things are dealt with in much better form by the more general powers conferred on the courts to examine hard cases of all kinds, by reason as the Act says in the widest possible terms, of

" circumstances directly or indirectly attributable to any war in which His Majesty may be engaged."

That is a very wide power, covering a very wide set of circumstances. There is one further point made by the hon. Lady. She suggested a 15-minutes' talk on the B.B.C., but I can go further than that. The local authorities have powers, as is known, to publicise matters connected with rent restriction and housing, and I intend, if the House give me the Bill to-night, to send out, as soon as possible, a circular to the housing authorities in England and Wales, and a similar circular will be sent out by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, calling attention to the great extension of rent control which is now to be passed into law, and saying—I quote from the draft of a circular which I intend to send out:

" Section 10 of the Rent Restriction Act of 1933, which gives local authorities power to publish information relating to rent restriction legislation, extends to other provisions of a like nature in the new Act, and I am to request that the local authorities will forthwith take such steps as they consider necessary to give due publicity to the new provisions in their area."

I think that will meet the point made by the hon. Lady better perhaps than a short discussion on the wireless.

Surely a friendly talk from the B.B.C. would be more effective —a homely talk?

I think that that is a good form of publicity, but one of the things I fear is that the court will not have the machinery. I suggest that the Minister should not only ask the local authority to give this publicity but should have one of their officials named as a person to whom people could go and state their difficulties.

That is a valuable suggestion, and it shows the desirability of having the name and habitation of the person who is to be consulted in this matter, which the ether does not fully provide. A talk on the ether is all very well, but when it has gone it has gone, whereas a circular to the local authority and publicity by them mean that there is a door at which persons can knock and ask for the provisions of the Act to be explained to them.

The last Rent Restrictions Act passed about two years ago de-controlled thousands of houses and the rents went up. This Bill will control them again. Now that they are to be controlled again will the rents go back to what they were before they were decontrolled, or will they remain where they are?

If we were to attempt to fix a new set of rents and go back to the old set of rents we should be in a great difficulty with a great mass of houses which have been built since the War. We cannot go back and begin to fix a new set of rents. The houses will be controlled at current rents, and that applies to the new houses which have been built. This Bill extends to millions of houses which were not under any form of control and it will be difficult to go back and fix different rents.

If I may speak again by the leave of the House, there is no difficulty whatever in the matter, because it was only about two years ago that the rents were raised, and the old rents could easily be ascertained from the rent book. Let the Minister do the job fully and then everybody in the country will be pleased.

In view of the very helpful assurance which the right hon. Gentleman has given as to publicity, I should like to ask whether he will consider having a very simple announcement put up in post offices. There it would be read by practically everybody. The notice would come to the attention of people who would not see formal circulars and might not be able to understand the language which would be used by the local authorities. It would allay a great deal of anxiety in the near future if some simple announcement could be displayed in post offices. I also ask the Minister to consider introducing some Measure in future to deal with lodgings which were referred to by the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan). In the crowded cities of England the way in which poor people are exploited in so-called furnished lodgings by being made to pay enormous rents as compared with the value of the house amounts to a very real evil. At such a time it is important that this question should be borne in mind, as I am sure it will be by the Minister.

I can give the assurance that I will take both those matters into consideration.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

I think my exposition of this Measure can be brief, because it carries out in all essentials the recommendations of the Committee which was presided over by Mr. Andrews Uthwatt, and has been called the Uthwatt Committee. Their recommendations have been studied by those interested in this subject, and I think they have met with general approval. There are only one or two quite minor differences between the recommendations of the Committee and these proposals, and those differences were referred to the Uthwatt Committee and were approved. The problem dealt with by the Bill arises out of the fact that war damage being uncertain in its incidence and its extent is uninsurable in the insurance market. Under leases the obligation to repair war damage might, but for the provisions of this Bill, be imposed on the tenant or the landlord according to which party is liable to repair the structure. Clause 1, following out the main recommendations of the Uthwatt Committee, takes war damage out of the obligations under the lease, whether of lessor or lessee, imposing on the tenant, where he would be the person liable to repair the damage, an obligation to give notice to the landlord and to permit access. That is the main provision—to relieve either party under a lease who would otherwise be liable from the obligation to repair the war damage.

The Bill goes on to provide that if war damage renders premises unfit, certain notices may be given with consequences which I will briefly enumerate. The tenant may serve a notice of disclaimer or a notice of retention under Clause 4. If he does neither, the landlord may call upon him to elect as to which course he desires to pursue. If and when a notice of disclaimer is accepted by the landlord and is declared valid, it amounts to a surrender of the lease and the tenant will be no more concerned; but if the tenant serves a notice of retention, that means he undertakes the repair of the war damage to render the premises fit, and that he is relieved from the payment of rent wholly or in part during the period when the premises are unfit and only as long as they remain wholly unfit. The landlord upon whom a notice of disclaimer has been served may serve a notice to avoid a disclaimer. This means that he undertakes to shoulder the obligation to render the premises fit as soon as practicable. That keeps the lease alive, but means that the tenant is relieved of the liability to pay rent during the period when the premises are unfit and before the landlord has rendered them fit again.

Suppose that under the lease the tenant is not obliged to repair any damage at all and it is entirely the landlord's duty. Do we understand that in the case of war damage, if the tenant desires to continue to retain the premises, it is for the tenant to repair the damage even though the landlord would do so in normal circumstances?

No, that will not be so. These questions of disclaimer or retention arise when the tenant is prima facie liable. The point which the right hon. Gentleman is putting is that the tenant would not be forced, if the lease were to continue, to undertake the repair of the premises. Then there are provisions for taking to court the question whether the land has been rendered unfit by reason of war damage. That is obviously right. There are provisions for dealing with the obviously complicated case where there are sub-lessees. In some cases there may be a head lease and more than one sub-lease. Each sub-lessee will have the right to serve his notice on his landlord and the latter on his landlord again, finally the head lessee having the right to serve a notice himself. If all these notices coincide and all these tenants want to do the same thing, no difficulty will arise, but you may have the head lessee wanting to disclaim and a sub-lessee who wants to retain. If so, there are pro- visions under which that matter can be taken to the Court. If the court thinks it reasonable in the circumstances, the sub-lessee will be allowed to retain his interest. There are provisions also for protecting specific claims. If the specific claimant is a sub-lessee a disclaimer by a head lessee does not automatically affect his position. There are provisions for notice being given to assignees, mortgagees and so on.

Then there are certain minor consequential matters. Clause 3, for example, deals with the case of settled land; Clause 12 allows the matter to be reopened after further war damage occurs; Clause 13 excepts ground lessees from the operation of the Act, unless the court otherwise orders; Clause 15 deals with multiple leases—that is, leases which cover more than one tenement; Clause 18 enables restrictive covenants to be dealt with; Clauses 17 and 19 relate to agricultural and mining leases; Clause 23 applies to the jurisdiction of the county courts; and Clause 24 is the Interpretation Clause. As I said before, the Bill is based on the lucid findings of the Committee, whose recommendations met with very general approval.

It has been quite impossible for any really close examination of this Bill to be made by my hon. Friends, but one or two of those who have some acquaintance with the subject have gone into it, and we think we can safely allow it to pass, and, indeed, that we need not occupy a great deal of time in discussing it. But it appears to raise one important question. I gather that in the case of a lease which imposes liability to do repairs, this Bill now says that if the damage is war damage the liability will not be incurred. After all, this loss is going to be incurred by someone sooner or later. This Bill raises the question, what is the intention of the Government with regard to losses of this character? It would be desirable, that, before we leave this Bill, the Attorney-General should tell us whether he is in a position to let us know what steps the Government have in mind for dealing with this whole question of damage to property as a result of war.

I understood the Attorney-General to say that agricultural land is, prima facie, excluded under this Bill. Am I to understand that to mean that damage to farm buildings would be excluded too?

No, I went on to say," except in respect of buildings."

In that case, my point is met.

There is one point on which I would like the Attorney-General to give us more information. It relates to Clause 20. It is quite a small point, but the whole machinery of this Bill, as I understand, depends on the service of notices. It is provided here that it is a good notice if it is sent from the landlord himself, but it is also an equally good notice if it is left at his last known place of abode, or if it is sent to his last address. In the circumstances which we are envisaging that is liable to raise some difficulty. A vast number of people will leave their normal addresses. They may, in some cases, have to leave their homes for long periods. Their houses may be empty; they may have been completely evacuated. It seems rather strange in these circumstances that it should be sufficient simply to leave the notice at a house which may be completely empty. I do not see why the more normal procedure should not have been followed in this case of seeing, when you want to serve a writ, that you serve it on the man personally, or else get an order for substitution of service, the court itself deciding whether it is reasonable to leave it at the man's last address. Difficulties must arise in the circumstances which we are likely to encounter in the near future. Under the Bill the tenant serves the landlord with notice of distraint, and then the landlord has a month within which he can go to the court and say that, after all, the property has not been made unfit and therefore the tenant is not entitled to distraint. You may have a landlord who may be completely unaware, because he will not receive the notice, and we ought to have some explanation as to the reason why Clause 20 has been drafted in this form.

I would like the Attorney-General to give an answer on two points upon which I am not clear. He stated that only buildings relating to agricultural land will be covered by this Bill. There is the question of reservoirs, land drainage schemes, culverts and water. If these are damaged, I assume that they would be covered although they could not be put into the category of a building. If a reservoir was damaged it might have a very adverse effect on the management of property. This Bill is called "War Damage," but I do not see any explanation of what war damage is to be. I assume that, if an aero-plane of our own crashed and caused damage, such position would be covered?

I want to ask a question, for it is obvious that we cannot do more than ask questions on these Bills. It arises out of the point which was made by the right hon. Gentleman as to the intention of the Government with regard to compensation or methods of compensation for war damage. I happen to know of a case where a freeholder has already written to a leaseholder and asked him what provision he is making for insurance against damage arising out of war. I take it that that will be covered by the terms of the lease under which the leaseholder holds. As most leases provide only for fire insurance and not for war damage, I take it that the lessee is not under any obligation at the present moment, unless his lease specifies it, to insure the property against war damage. Perhaps the Attorney-General can elucidate that point.

The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Pethick-Lawrence) asked a question in the course of my exposition, and I think I gave him an incorrect answer. The provisions as to disclaimer and detention are general and do not depend upon the liability being upon one party or the other. If the landlord is under a liability to repair war damage, and the place is rendered unfit for habitation, then, if the tenant desires to reclaim, he can only reclaim on the basis of making himself liable. That only arises when the premises have been made completely unfit by war damage.

It seems to me to be grossly unfair that if the tenant is prepared to go on paying rent, even after the property has been damaged, the obligation should be put upon him of putting the property into repair again.

He would not be liable for the rent, in our view. The point is that under the Bill the tenant is given the right to disclaim, and therefore, to get out of the liability to pay any further rent. In many cases, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, the landlord is under no obligation to repair, neither is the tenant and the tenant cannot get out of his obligation to pay rent because of the failure of the landlord to do repairs. All that he can do is to sue for damages. If the premises are rendered completely unfit, then the tenant is given the opportunity to get out of his lease and any further liability to pay rent. There is, of course, nothing to prevent landlord and tenant coming to any agreement which they like. If, however, the tenant desires, although it would seem extremely unlikely, to retain the lease of an unfit house, under which he had no obligation to keep the property in repair, then he must take upon himself the liability to repair the war damage.

Let me put a case. Suppose there is a considerable block of premises and that in one small part of those premises war damage is done, not to any immense amount which renders the whole of the premises unsuitable but which renders only part of them unsuitable. The tenant in these circumstances might not wish to abandon the lease covering the whole of the premises, but he might be prepared to go on, even though one part may have been rendered unsuitable. Surely, it is grossly unfair in those circumstances to say that if the tenant is to go on with his lease, and nine-tenths of the premises which it covers are undamaged, he must bear the whole of the cost of repairing the war damage. It may be that he has only two more years of his lease to run. It seems to me grossly unfair to make him pay the additional burden.

I agree, but that might not be so. In the case which the right hon. Gentleman has put, where part only of the premises is damaged, there are two possible positions and whichever was the position the tenant would be protected. If the premises were single premises, used by a single tenant, then the premises would not be unfit because part only of them was destroyed. That is clear in the definition. If the premises could be properly regarded as covering more than one tenancy, then there is an expressed provision in Clause 15 for enabling the tenant to retain the lease in respect of the premises which have not been damaged.

The right hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Lees-Smith) asked me whether I was in a position to make a statement on the general question of war damage. I am not in a position to make any such statement. The question of war damage goes far wider than this Bill, which deals with landlord and tenant and houses subject to leases. We have houses of all kinds which are not subject to leases at all but which are equally liable to war damage. The hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Foot) dealt with Clause 20, which in fact follows the precedents of the Housing Acts which have been approved by this House and have been proved to work. He says, and I quite agree with him, that war might lead to more departures than take place in times of peace, and I will certainly look into the point. So far as notice is concerned, it is unlikely that a landlord will not be in touch with his tenant for the purpose of collecting rent and, therefore, the landlord is unlikely to disappear completely into the blue. It seems to me that notice served on the agent of a landlord would in ordinary circumstances be notice served on the landlord, but I will look into the point he made, and if it is right and reasonable to extend the provision as to notice on the lines suggested by the hon. Member, I will give an undertaking that the point will be considered.

My hon. Friend the Member for Abingdon (Sir R. Glyn) dealt with reservoirs. I do not know whether reservoirs are subjected to leases; it is a point which certainly had not occurred to me, but I will look into the matter and see whether the provisions of the Bill with regard to agricultural land in Clause 19 cover reservoirs where they are the subject of leases. My hon. Friend also said that war damage is not defined. That is so.

War damage is defined in the Interpretation Clause.

Yes, the hon. Member is correct. It defines war damage as meaning:

" damage caused by, or in repelling, enemy action, or by measures taken to avoid the spreading of the consequences of damage caused by, or in repelling, enemy action."

Those are rather general words, and if any detailed point arises I can at least safeguard myself by saying that the detailed point is not defined. I have not a note of the point raised by the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger).

My point was that, in the absence of any Government scheme for insurance, I have known an instance where a freeholder has asked the leaseholder to insure his property against war damage. My assumption was that, unless the lease specifies that the leaseholder is responsible for that, he is not bound to insure the property.

That is quite right. If you cannot insure, obviously you cannot carry out an obligation which purports to put on you a liability which cannot be carried out.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This is the second of the group of Bills to which I have referred. It has not only been the subject of a Circular which has been sent round to all the local authorities but has been published in the Press and, consequently, Members are well acquainted with the general lines of it. Roughly speaking, there is a general duty upon local authorities now to keep in review the supply of working-class houses and the Bill extends the duty not only to see that there are sufficient houses, but that they are kept habitable. This Bill therefore provides for emergency repairs and also provides for the financing of those emergency repairs, the financing of them being on the basis that the local authority may go ahead and carry out the work unless the owner is able to do so, that the local authority is advanced the money by the Ministry, that the local authority is not asked to pay any interest on the money or to repay any part of the capital until after the end of the war, and that no demand for repayment is made upon the person at whose expense, so to speak, the repair is being done. But that repair is a charge against the property and is to be repaid at the end of the emergency. Those are the general lines of the Bill, which have been explained by Circular to those responsible, and generally welcomed. I hope it will meet with the approval of the House.

The right hon. Gentleman has explained the Bill in a perfectly satisfactory way and everyone will have sympathy with its objects, but I would like to put one or two questions on points which are certainly not clear. For instance, the right hon. Gentleman, in dealing with the financial Clauses, explained that local authorities would be advanced money without interest for the purpose of carrying out their duties under the Bill and they would be under no obligation to repay the capital until after the war, but I fail to see that provided for anywhere in the Bill. If the right hon. Gentleman can give an assurance that that will be the case and that that is provided for, I am certain the local authorities will accept this as being satisfactory. However, if one looks at Clause 3 of the Bill, one finds that is not so, and that the Minister leaves himself power not only to demand interest but also to demand repayment of the capital during the period of war. I should like to have some further assurances from the right hon. Gentleman on that point.

I want also to raise a point which refers particularly to London. Under Clause 2, the position is that both the London County Council and the Metropolitan Boroughs are authorities for carrying out the provisions of the Bill. That is very confusing. It is unfortunate that in a period such as this there should be divided responsibility. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that he should make up his mind which is to be the authority for carrying out the provisions of the Bill in London and put the responsibility upon the particular authority. In normal times, it does not matter if prolonged negotiations go on between the London County Council and the 28 Metropolitan Boroughs as to which of them shall do the job, but in times such as these, when it may be urgently necessary to provide housing accommodation for people whose homes have been destroyed, it is really important that the duty should be perfectly clear and unequivocal, and that the body on whom the responsibility is placed should know exactly what are its duties. I hope the Minister will be able to give a satisfactory assurance on these points.

I think I can do as the hon. Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin) asks. If he will look at the proviso to Clause 2, he will see that it states:

" Provided that no demand for expenses incurred by a local authority under this Act shall be made under Sub-section (3) of the said Section ten until the end of the period of the present emergency."

That is also mentioned in the circular which was sent to the local authorities. In paragraph 5 of the Circular, it was stated that any works carried out by a local authority under these provisions would be registered as a charge on the premises, but there would be no right of recovery until the end of the emergency. The local authority would obtain the necessary money to pay for repairs by means of loans advanced by Ministers on terms and conditions approved by the Treasury, and there would normally be no repayment of interest charges in respect of these loans until the end of the emergency. As for the other point which the hon. Member raised, the fact is that both the London County Council and the boroughs have certain housing powers, and I think it is very desirable that we should not start a row between the boroughs and the county at the present time, because great as may be the struggle into which we are advancing, I do not wish to find it complicated by an even greater struggle between the local authorities of this country.

I was not intending to start a struggle at this time. I only want to make clear that the London County Council are not asking for these powers and would gladly surrender them, but I think it is important that at some later date the Minister should take powers for himself to make quite clear as to which are the authorities concerned. I do not ask him to settle the matter now.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The previous Bill dealt with the repair of war damage to housing accommodation. There are, of course, many other classes of buildings, the maintenance of which is essential to the welfare of the civil population, and this Bill deals on lines analagous to those of the previous Bill with essential buildings and plant other than housing. After the discussion on the previous Bill, I need not go into the details of this Measure.

The House will, I am sure, welcome this Bill, and I would only ask the Minister to explain whether the financial provisions in this Bill are similar to those in the previous Bill and whether it is the case that no call will be made on local authorities, in respect of any loans which they may be required to make, until after the emergency.

Yes, Sir. Any loans made by an authority or the cost of any expenses incurred by a local authority, in carrying out repairs will remain as registered charges on the property, and no demand for repayment will be made until after the emergency. A circular will be sent out to local authorities.

I beg to move "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This is a Bill of very great urgency. It deals with the subject of compensation for property taken for emergency purposes. The House will remember that, a few days ago, Defence Regulations were made under the Emergency Powers (Defence) Act which have been in force, I think, since last Friday, by which powers were conferred on the Government to take possession of land, to do essential work on land, to requisition or purchase ships as well as other goods compulsorily, and to take freight space or accommodation in ships and aircraft. These necessary powers are already being extensively used, but the Defence Regulations make no provision for assessing compensation in such cases. Indeed, apart from this Bill, there is no general code, as there ought to be, regulating the standard of payment or providing how the figures of compensation are to be arrived at. It will be seen, therefore, that this Bill is really an essential part of the scheme for re quisitioning in emergency. What the House will wish to be satisfied about—and I think I can do it very briefly—is to see that compensation is fair and to make effective provision to prevent an increase of compensation arising out of the cir cumstances in which we find ourselves— what may be called profiteering. It is not a Bill that has been hurriedly thrown together. It is the result of a long and very careful examination of the whole subject by a body that was created for the purpose and which included representatives of all the Departments that were likely to be concerned. I should, in one sentence, put the Bill in this way: It is a Bill which lays down the principles of compensation and secures that the claimants will not gain advantage from the emergency.

May I call attention to two or three Clauses? Clause 2 deals with compensation for taking possession of land, and it provides how the appropriate rent should be arrived at. If hon. Members will look at Sub-section (1, a), they will see that set out; but that Sub-section must be read with the proviso on page 3, and I call attention particularly to lines 14 to 16 on page 3. Shortly put, that provides that, in computing the amount of rent to be paid, no account shall be taken of any appreciation in value due to the emergency. On the other hand, if hon. Members look back to page 2, they will see that the rent is to be

" the rent which might reasonably be expected to be payable by a tenant in occupation of the land, during the period for which possession of the land is retained in the exercise of emergency powers."

There will be cases, no doubt, in which the rental value will be considerably diminished by the circumstances of the case. It may be in a vulnerable area, and we ought not to pay, therefore, the normal rent, but we ought to pay no more than the sort of rent which in the circumstances would rule in the emergency. If, on the other hand, the difficult times through which we have to pass are calculated to make the commercial rent rise, then this Bill provides, as already pointed out, that no account shall be taken of any appreciation, any increase of value, due to the emergency; and that principle, which I am sure the House generally will think right, goes right through this Bill. In the same way, Clause 3 deals with compensation for work on land, for entering on a man's land and, for example, building trenches there, and Clause 4, a very important Clause, deals with compensation in respect of the acquisition of ships, vehicles, and aircraft. Already, as the House can imagine, a large number of merchant ships have had to be taken up. Clause 6 deals with compensation for other goods.

Therefore, as I think the House now appreciates, the object is to secure that compensation payable under the Bill, while it is a fair measure of the value, shall not be increased by the circumstances of the emergency through which we have to suffer. I have called attention already to the passage from page 3. There is another on page 7, lines 7 to 12, and another at the bottom of page 9. In each case there is to be no increase paid on that account. It is hardly necessary to say that if experience shows that this Bill requires amendment there will be an opportunity of considering it, but as things are the matter about which the Government are concerned is to get this power at once, because if we do not have it special bargains will have to be made which may be very much to the disadvantage of the public interest and they may be unfair in the circumstances.

This Bill is clearly necessary and urgent and we have no intention of delaying it. Its object is to give compensation for property taken over by the Government and it gives reasonable protection to the subject. We have looked carefully at the provisions for the tribunals and I think that they are well constituted. The only point of detail which has occurred to me is that unless a claim for compensation is put in within six months the claim lapses. I am not Sure that that might not occasionally work out unjustly. The theory is that everybody knows the law. I am not of the legal profession and I have sympathy with those who find themselves left out because they are not skilled in these matters. I should like some assurance that when these cases arise a notice will be served on the person involved pointing out his right to claim compensation within the period laid down.

We, too, realise that this is a necessary and, I think, a very valuable Bill in the circumstances. There are two small points of detail to which I should like to draw attention. The first is in Clause 3, where there seems to me, on the face of it, a slight contradiction. Subsections (1) and (2) deal with the way in which compensation is to be assessed, and it appears that the criterion by which the compensation is to be arrived at is the diminution of the annual value of the land. Sub-section (7) says:

" For the purposes of this section no account shall be taken of any diminution or depreciation in value ascribable only to loss of pleasure or amenity."

I should have thought it was easy to visualise circumstances in which certain works would be done near a house or somebody's land which would result in a great loss of pleasure and amenity and would, therefore, result in considerable diminution in the annual value of the land. A part of the annual value consists in the amenity value. On the face of it there seems to be a slight contradiction between those Sub-sections.

I intended to refer to the matter raised by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Keighley (Mr. Lees-Smith), who drew attention to the question of time within which claims should be made. This is a matter of some importance because we may easily have people who are serving beyond the seas and who will not appreciate in time what their rights are. It is true that under Clause 7 power is given to the Treasury to extend the period of six months, either generally or for a category of cases, or in any particular case, but it seems to me that that power should not rest with the Treasury alone, because the Treasury is, in a sense, a party to the dispute. It is the Treasury that ultimately has to find the money in order to meet the claim. I have already put forward a suggestion to the Financial Secretary—I do not know whether he can accept it—that there should be a further provision inserted in this Clause by which the tribunal itself should also have power to extend the time. That is a very normal provision, which occurs in one or two of the Bills we have dealt with to-day. The suggestion I make is that at the end of the Clause these words should be added:

" Provided that the appropriate tribunal may extend any period mentioned in this Section on such terms as it thinks fit on the application of any person affected by the extension."

Under that, apart from the Treasury having power to extend the period any person who could give reasons for not having brought his claim within six months would be able to make application to the tribunal itself. The tribunal would be impartial between him and the Treasury. There would be no question of the person deciding the issue having some interest in it. That appears to be a very valuable and necessary protection. Delay is not likely to arise in a great many cases, but there are some cases in which there will be delay through persons not realising their rights and bringing their claims within six months. That is shown by the form in which the Clause is drafted, which gives the Treasury the right to extend the time. I hope that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, even if he cannot accept this particular form of words will be able to see his way to make an Amendment along those lines.

There is one point to which I wish to draw the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Bill provides for a standard of compensation in respect of any land or other property which is acquired by His Majesty for public purposes. Under the Emergency Powers Act passed last week local authorities and other bodies are also given powers to requisition land and other property for public purposes. As I read the Bill, admittedly I had to read it hurriedly, it looks as if the standard of compensation laid down for property acquired by the Government is not the standard laid down for local authorities and other bodies and that they are left very much in the air. I should like the Chancellor to say whether this Bill does provide for the same standard of compensation, and if it does not whether he is going so to amend it as to provide the same standard of compensation in the two cases, because obviously the same reasons which necessitate a standard of compensation being settled for property acquired by the Government apply to other property requisitioned for public purposes.

I should not have intervened, only it happened that there came to my notice quite fortuitously the other day two cases which, I think, deserve some attention. One was the case of a fanner whose land was being taken for a new aerodrome. I happened to be there by accident, and he did not know who I was, but he told me his story. He said the Air Ministry were taking 60 acres of his farm. It is a farm of about 300 acres, and he showed me the 60 acres, and it happened that they included the two essential paddocks of the whole farm. A farm is like a factory, a piece of delicate and well-balanced machinery, and if you take an important part away from it you may damage the whole working of the plant, and in fact make it impossible for the farmer to carry on. If you give him money, not as laid down in the Bill entirely on the actual value of the land required, though it seems rather vague whether the annual value is in any way held to be diminished or not by reason of the work which is being done on the land, the fact remains that the whole of that farm with an integral part of it removed may prove to have no value at all.

The farmer must move. He has to go, because he cannot work the land. With that essential 60 acres of good, home paddock, including his water supply, taken away, the farm is worth nothing. It appears to me that in assessing compensation you must take those facts into account and you must take into account the fact the effect upon the whole farm. You must either buy the whole farm or you must pay the farmer sufficient money adequately to compensate him. Otherwise I do not think the compensation will be of any use. You will simply have a number of acres made useless and a number of farmers put out of their occupation.

Another story he told me was about his next door neighbour, a certain farmer whom we may call Mr. Brown. The whole of that farm was made over to the Air Ministry, and the farmer was turned out lock, stock and barrel, in a great hurry. He has not had a penny of money paid to him. He was there, homeless. He has to find himself another home and he has to use his savings to pay interest on the loans which he borrowed from the bank at 5 per cent. before he gets a penny from the Government. I heard another story concerning a doctor who had land which was wanted for another aerodrome. He has been owed money for two years in respect of it. Surely these men ought to be paid for the land they have provided; otherwise it is the story of Naboth's vineyard all over again. This parable happened to come up for the first Lesson in church that very same Sunday, but it seems to be nothing like what the Air Ministry are doing at the present time. In the case of Naboth's vineyard there was an offer of a fair price for compensation, and it was only when that was refused that Ahab began finding accusations of blasphemy against King and Government on the part of the accused. If my right hon. Friend went round some of the public houses frequented by West Country farmers he would find quite a lot of blasphemy against the Defence Departments concerned relating to the actual amount paid in compensation for some of these farms. I am sure this delay is mainly due to clerical error and difficulty. In these times of emergency there may be good reason for delay, but I trust that the Government will give the matter some attention.

I want to raise a rather different point. What is happening to the statement made by the Government that in all these matters there was to be conscription of wealth and that those who already owned property and so on would have to pay their due share? When I look at paragraph (c) of Clause 2 (1) I see that where land is agricultural land,

"a sum equal to the amount (if any) which might reasonably have been expected to be payable,"

and so on, to the end of the paragraph, is to be the compensation payable. It seems to me that, although the Chancellor has represented the Bill as one which restricts the amount of compensation which the Government have to pay, in the sense of restricting profiteering, with which restriction, as my right hon. Friend has said, we on this side heartily agree, we can still find a great difference between the way in which the Government look at profits and the way it looks at the taking of men. The Government are to pay compensation not only for the actual value of the land, but even for the possible damage. On the other hand, it is taking men who may be earning £4, £5 a week, or even more, on which they are able to keep their families adequately, and they are paying them 17s. and allowances, reducing them practically to beggary. The Government should explain why they are going with most meticulous care to see that every possible and conceivable kind of compensation is being paid in respect of any conceivable loss to the owners of land and property, while they are treating the men whom they are calling up for Service and who have wives and families dependent upon them, in a very different way.

I do not feel that I can, at this stage, discuss the subject men- tioned by the hon. Lady. I believe it is the object of Members in all parts of the House to see that men are treated fairly, but I must be excused from dealing with that matter now. The hon. Gentleman opposite asked a question about the local authorities. I have made inquiries, and I am informed that, in so far as local authorities exercise the emergency powers for acquiring property of the kind to which the hon. Member referred, they do so really because those powers are delegated to them by the Crown. I have before me the regulations, which say that a competent authority may delegate its functions for this purpose. In that case, the local authority is really acquiring the property on behalf of His Majesty, and will, therefore, employ the same code as we employ. The right hon. Gentleman on the Front Bench asked whether we would consider providing that to prevent doubt arising, an individual who had a claim might be warned of it. I will consider that. I do not think I can go further now than to say that, but certainly it is no part of the intention of the Treasury that people should in matters of this sort be deprived of their opportunities because of pure ignorance. The same point was developed, in a more elaborate way, by the hon. Gentleman below the Gangway. In fact, he raised two points. He referred to Sub-section (7) of Clause 3, which provides that

" for the purposes of this section no account shall be taken of any diminution or depreciation in value ascribable only to loss of pleasure or amenity."

I think the matter will be clearly understood if I remind the Committee that Clause 3 relates to compensation when the Crown authority goes on to land and executes some work on it—it may be Defence work of some kind. If they do that—if they dig trenches in somebody's garden, for instance—no doubt it is right that there should be a proper measure of compensation by reference to the diminution of value; but should the tenant be allowed to say, "I used to have a beautiful prospect out of my window, and now the amenity is destroyed by this ugly structure," or should he be allowed to say, "The pleasure of my estate is diminished"? We think he should not. We think that he would be treated quite fairly if he were paid compensation only for the diminution of the annual value of the land. I think the House will probably agree that that is right. My hon. Friend thought that that was probably inconsistent in some way with the provisions of Clause 2—in particular, I think, with the provision in lines 13 to 15 of page 3, that:

" no account shall be taken of any appreciation of values due to the emergency."

That relates to a case where possession is taken of the land, temporarily at any rate. I think the House will agree with the view taken in the Bill that when you take possession of the land you ought to be careful to provide that, whatever the compensation paid, no account should be taken of any appreciation which is due to the emergency. There may be houses in some parts of England—the safer parts —which will actually have an increased rental value because of the times through which we are passing, but that seems to be no reason at all why the State should pay the owner of such houses increased rents. We want to deal with the matter with this maximum limit, so that in any case he will not get more than will be the amount properly calculated, and no increase of value due to the emergency. That is a perfectly justifiable provision and one that is not really inconsistent with the other provision quoted by the hon. Member.

The right hon. Gentleman opposite and the hon. Member below the Gangway raised a very important point on Clause 11. It is a difficult point, and it has been very carefully considered by the Committee which has been drawing up this scheme. It is really very necessary that claims that are put forward for compensation should be, as far as reasonably may be, promptly put forward and promptly dealt with. We therefore provide that:

" No claim for any compensation under this Act shall be entertained unless notice of the claim has, in such form and manner as may be prescribed, been given to the prescribed authority within the period of six months, or such longer period as the Treasury may, either generally or in relation to any particular claim or class of claims, allow, beginning in either case with the date on which the compensation accrues due or the date of the passing of this Act, whichever is the later."

I agree with the two speakers that you could imagine cases in which the period of six months might be too short. I have considered carefully the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman that there should be, in addition, a further power put into the hands of the tribunal—the shipping tribunal in the one case, and the general tribunal in the other—power to admit applications and claims of a more belated kind. I would urge the House not to put in a provision of that sort especially because I should like, here and now, to give an assurance. I have considered the matter carefully. There may be a class of case for which special provision ought to be made. There is the case—I think it was mentioned by the hon. Gentleman below the Gangway—where the claimant, who may well be serving abroad and attending to his duties, comes back and finds, in the meantime, that the six months have expired. Such a case is quite possible. That ought to be dealt with, as it can be dealt with, by suitable Treasury regulations. There may be other cases, and I shall be very glad to consider suggestions. But more than that, there may be individual cases which do not fall within a general category. I have been giving some preparatory directions in the Treasury about this, and it is my view that, if any bona fide case arises in which without any default on the part of the claimant a claim is not presented within the prescribed period then, I think, the Treasury, in the exercise of their powers under this Clause, should give favourable consideration to an application for an extension of time. I say that so that it may be on record.

I think that we all feel that, while it is very important not to have more claims than we can help, what is done in this matter should be done fairly. On the other hand, I would most strongly urge that we ought not really to amend the Bill and put in words which may even encourage prolonged delay. I certainly could not agree to put in references to tribunals for this reason. If the tribunals were a regular court like the County Court, it could perhaps be done, but the Shipping Tribunal and other tribunal would have their work to do during war but should then be wound up. We do not want to have them going on indefinitely. Therefore, I hope that my suggestion will be accepted, but, at the same time, the point made by the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Gentleman opposite is an important one. I think we can secure that no injustice is done.

I beg to move "That the Bill be now read a Second time." The purpose of the Bill can be explained in a few words. It does two things. It provides for the payment of salaries and allowances for expenses of regional commissioners and deputy regional commissioners appointed by His Majesty under the scheme of regional organisation for Civil Defence, also of any district commissioner or deputy district commissioner appointed by the Secretary of State for Scotland for similar duties there. In the second place, the Bill provides that in the event of an hon. Member of this House being appointed to one of these positions —as the House knows several hon. Members have indicated their readiness to undertake these important duties—the disqualification which normally attaches to a Member accepting an office of profit under the Crown shall not apply. That provision would be necessary, even if in an individual case the person appointed elected to serve without remuneration, the office being of a class to which payment of remuneration attaches.

The purpose of the Bill is to provide money and to make other arrangements in connection with affairs which have been before the House already and which have received general agreement. Therefore, we have no objection to make and we hope the Bill will receive a rapid passage.

May we be informed what is the amount of remuneration for a dis- trict commissioner in Scotland and a deputy district commissioner, and whether any provision is made that they shall not hold any other office, such as director of a company, or anything like that?

Although this Bill will permit the Minister to pay salaries to these regional commissioners and the other persons described in the Bill, I take it that the right hon. Gentleman will be prepared to say that a considerable number of the commissioners will be serving without any remuneration. We do not want the idea to go out that every one of these persons is going to be heavily paid. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will indicate what is the maximum salary. I think it is about £1,500 a year.

Before we pass this Bill I hope we shall have an indication that local opinion will be considered. I heard two hon. Members not long ago discussing whether certain Commissioners were carrying out their duties in the lines laid down by this House and in conformity with local opinion. I hope the Minister will see that the Commissioners give consideration to municipal opinion and to trade union opinion, and that where the local authority cannot obtain satisfaction they will have the right to lay their complaint before the Minister. It is well that these matters should give no cause for grievance. The less grievances arise the better will be the spirit of our people.

We shall be glad to hear from the right hon. Gentleman what salary the Commissioner for Scotland is to be paid. I welcome the Bill on general grounds because I think that latterly the House has been getting into the position of saying that no Member of the House shall ever be appointed to an administrative office of any sort of kind. A more preposterous suggestion I have never heard. I think this is a good precedent and I hope that His Majesty's Government will not allow any archaic prejudices dating from the reign of Queen Elizabeth to stand in the way of an hon. Member of this House being appointed to any office which the Government think he can efficiently discharge.

I should like to know who is going to decide whether a commissioner is to be paid or not. In the Bill I think it is a matter for the individual concerned as to whether he will give voluntary service or not. Who is to determine whether the service is to be paid or not?

I cannot see why a Member of Parliament drawing £600 a year who is appointed to one of these posts should not be allowed to have any remuneration while another person who is already getting £4,000 a year is going to have remuneration for this work. The Member of Parliament with his £600 may be quite as efficient as the man who is drawing £4,000 somewhere else, but he is not going to get any remuneration. Men who are getting big salaries now, have so much work that they do not know how to manage it, but they can manage this job and, if they are appointed, some of their other work has to be given to someone else and they are retaining the salaries that they were getting previously.

The terms in which the Clause dealing with remuneration has been drawn are, I think, common form. The Clause is permissive. It gives authority to the Government to pay remuneration out of moneys provided by Parliament at such rates as the Treasury may approve. The Treasury authority extends to the payment of a salary up to £2,500 to a regional commissioner and £1,000 to a deputy regional commissioner. In the case of district commissioners and deputy district commissioners the corresponding figures are £1,000 and £750. It is a fact that certain gentlemen who have been designated to hold these appointments have indicated that they would prefer to receive no remuneration. The view taken by the Government is that such a wish should be respected, but certainly without implying any reflection upon others who are not in a position to make such an offer. As regards the point put by the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen), the Bill does not deal with such matters as that which he raised. In regard to the points put by the hon. Members for Stoke (Mr. E. Smith) and Ince (Mr. G. Macdonald), the position is that regional commissioners, deputy regional commissioners, district commissioners and deputy district commissioners will hold public office under His Majesty's Gov- erment, to whose direction they will at all times be subject, and it will be for His Majesty's Government to satisfy themselves continuously that these gentlemen are carrying out satisfactorily the functions assigned to them. In that respect they will be in exactly the same position as other public officials.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

In time of war, it will probably be necessary to create new Government departments with Ministers in charge of them. Of course, the Crown, under the Prerogative, can appoint a further Minister or Ministers at any time without statutory authority, but if that were the way in which it was done, very grave inconveniences would arise, the first and most obvious of which is that such a Minister could not sit in the House of Commons, nor could his Parliamentary Undersecretary. Therefore, it is necessary to have legislation. There are other reasons of machinery which are illustrated by Clauses 2, 3, 4 and 5 of the Bill. The Act of 1919, which is referred to in subsection (3) of Clause 1, the House may remember, was the Act which provided that not more than three Ministers without portfolio might sit in the House of Commons; but we are not here contemplating Ministers without portfolio so much as Ministers holding an office and discharging a defined set of duties. Moreover, we want to make provision for an Under-Secretary as well as the Minister himself. The House will see that this is a necessary emergency Bill. Of course. it is expressed in the form that there is power to appoint such Ministers. I invite the House to give the Bill its Second Reading, and to pass it among the emergency legislation.

I rise only to say that we have no objection in principle to this Bill, although, of course, as to the persons appointed and as to how they perform their duties, the House will retain its right of criticism.

I wish to raise one question concerning Clause 1, sub-section (2). in this Sub-section, there is a reference to

" not more than one secretary in each Ministry shall sit as a member of that House at the same time."

The word "secretary" is used rather loosely, but I presume that it means an Under-Secretary of State. I should like to know whether that is so. Does it mean a Parliamentary Secretary? I do not understand the wording of the first and second lines of the sub-section, where it is stated:

" The office of a Minister to whom this Act applies or of a secretary appointed by such a Minister."

Surely this must mean that the reference to secretary is to the Parliamentary Secretary, because surely the Minister does not appoint his Under-Secretary. Surely the Prime Minister makes that appointment. It seems to me that there is something wrong with the wording of the subsection, and I should be obliged if the Chancellor would give an explanation.

I wish to raise a point with regard to a matter which seems to be left a little bit vague. There does not seem to be anything in the Bill with regard to the remuneration which the Minister will receive in carrying on the office that is contemplated. I also wonder whether, if the Minister concerned becomes a Member of the Cabinet, the Act relating to Cabinet Ministers' salaries will apply. I think it would be as well if there were some clarification of the position with regard to the status of the Ministers who may be appointed under this Bill.

I will deal with the points that have been raised as well as I can. With regard to the question put by the hon. Member for East Wolverhampton (Mr.), I think the language of Sub-section (2) is quite correct. As hesurmised, the reference in line 15 to

" not more than one secretary "

refers really to what comes before, where the reference is to

" The office of a Minister to whom this Act applies or of a secretary appointed by such a Minister ";

that is, what we usually call a Parliamentary Secretary. The hon. Member thought there was in the drafting or phraseology, something ambiguous. Of course it is true that it is the Prime Minister who really takes the responsibility of selecting his colleagues, whether in the Cabinet or in the Ministry, but Under-Secretaries are always described in our Statute law as "Secretaries appointed by the Minister" and in fact they are so appointed in the sense that the formal document is executed by the Minister. That does not mean, however, that anybody other than the Prime Minister of the day makes the choice. The hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. Stephen) asked whether, if one of these Ministers was in the Cabinet, the Act of Parliament providing for a common standard salary for all Members of the Cabinet would apply to him. Certainly if the Minister was a Member of the Cabinet that would be the result. If he is not in the Cabinet Clause 3 of the Bill provides that he shall be paid a salary out of moneys provided by Parliament, and that salary would be settled by the Treasury and would come before the House in the course of the Estimates.

I would like to remind the House that this Bill deals with a supremely important subject, namely, the executive instrument in the event of war. I hope my right hon. Friend will not lose sight of the fact that a great many people notably the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Sparkbrook (Mr. Amery), are firmly convinced that before long it will be necesary to set up something in the nature of a War Cabinet, consisting of a limited number of individuals, certain of whom will hold very high executive offices, and perhaps one or two Ministers without Portfolio. In addition there may have to be a Council of Ministers, or something of that kind, to meet from time to time to confirm decisions reached by the Executive Cabinet. I do not think the House would like to pass this Measure without an expression of the view that some kind of executive instrument may have to be devised by the Government in order to carry through the decisions which will be necessary from day to day, and even from hour to hour, in the next few weeks. I am sure the Government do not mean the House to take from this Measure that exactly the same executive instrument as that which we have at present, is going to be used or that anything which we pass to-night will preclude the setting up, if the Prime Minister thinks it desirable, of some kind of War Cabinet such as we had during the last War.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill corresponds to the Bill which we passed earlier this evening, the English Landlord and Tenant (War Damage) Bill. It was necessary to have a separate Bill for Scotland owing to the difference in the form of land tenure, but the principle is exactly the same, and it was explained by my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General. The main provisions of the Bill are for relief from the obligation to repair damage to land, which includes buildings in the case of war damage. Power is given to the sheriff court, on the application of any party interested in the land, to suspend or modify the terms of the title deed relating to the land and to terminate the contract under which it is held.

The Bill seems to be a counterpart of the English Bill, and I see no objection to it.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill passed through all its stages in another place at a time when we were not so pressed as we are at present. It is a Bill to enable the administration of justice to be carried on during the period of any war. Obviously obligations will be incurred between men and men, and men and women, and women and women, and, of course, lunatics' affairs will have to be managed. All these matters will have to be disposed of, and our care is that the machinery of justice is kept rustless, so that it may be restored in more prosperous times. That is what this Bill seeks to do. It must not be forgotten that there are, in London, over 1,000 people attending the Royal Courts of Justice every day, many of them in quite humble walks of life, and that those numbers are swollen by jurors, litigants, and various other people, and it is obvious that decentralisation into some areas which may be more salubrious and less dangerous is essential if justice is to be administered.

The Bill proceeds on that principle of decentralising, and the scheme is to find places where there shall be courts and libraries and safe repositories for registers, wills, and other documents in different parts of the country. Therefore, Clause 1 provides as a preliminary that the Lord Chancellor should be enabled to declare a vacation on the outbreak of any emergency. It would appear that it will not be necessary to operate that Clause, because the vacation is with us at this moment. The rest of the Clause enables the Lord Chancellor to effect decentrali- sation of the Supreme Court. The second Clause deals with the decentralisation of inferior courts and enables the Lord Chancellor to move such courts as, for example, the County Courts, the Liverpool Court of Passage, and so on, to places where they can function without danger and inconvenience to litigants. Clause 3 substitutes the Lord Chancellor for an Order in Council as the method of bringing commissioners of assize into being. Clause 4 deals with the Court of Criminal Appeal and Clause 5 with the Central Criminal Court. Sub-section (2) gives the Home Secretary similar powers to those accorded the Lord Chancellor in relation to quarter sessions and summary jurisdiction courts.

Clause 6 enables the Lord Chancellor to delegate some of his functions to Lords of Appeal in Ordinary or Judges of the Supreme Court, including in that category the Lord Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls. An important check is contained in Sub-section (5) whereby the powers which the Bill vests in the Lord Chancellor are subject, as regards the exercise of most of these powers, to the concurrence of two other Judges, unless in exceptional circumstances they are not available. The necessity for having 12 jurymen is dispensed with by Clause 7, and the minimum number of seven will be sufficient for the trial of any inquiry in civil or criminal matters. In civil matters there is to be no right to trial by jury except in cases where the court thinks that trial by jury is absolutely essential. Clause 9 extends the remand period for accused persons to 21 days and enables the period of remand to be extended in the same way as at present the time can be extended in the case of illness or incapacity. By Clause 10 vacancies in the Bench cannot be filled if in the opinion of the Lord Chancellor it be unnecessary. Clause 11 enables the Bill to be brought to an end summarily if the emergency disappears.

In the course of the mass production with which we are endeavouring to cope in the present sitting this Bill appears to be unexceptional, and we do not propose to delay its passage.

I notice that this power is given to the Lord Chancellor with a check upon him that he has to have the con- currence of two other Judges. Why is this power given to him instead of the procedure by Order in Council?

The whole object is speed. The Lord Chancellor will be in touch with the administration of justice and courts will be distributed in different parts of England. In many cases they will be the assize towns and in other cases safer places than assize towns. The Lord Chancellor will maintain contact and be able to direct changes of sitting much more quickly than the machinery of Order in Council.

I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

This Bill contains provision regarding the sittings of the Scottish courts which are similar to those proposed for the English courts in the Bill we have just passed. Power is taken to vary the time and place of sitting of the Court of Session, the High Court of Justiciary and the Sheriff Courts. The number of jurors in criminal and other cases is reduced to seven, five being required for a majority verdict. No civil case shall be tried by a jury unless the court thinks it ought to be so tried. No vacancy in the Court of Session will be filled unless the Lord President certifies that the state of business makes it necessary. The Measure is really a counterpart of the English Bill we have already passed.