I imagine that no old Member returning to the House after an absence of several years can fail to be impressed by the new atmosphere of responsibility which permeates our proceedings as compared with the state of things in pre-war days. I suppose it is that the old system of make-believe and party intrigue, which His Majesty in his Gracious Speech calls "disunion," has come to an end and that we are plumbing the depths of the world's verities. I shall endeavour not to be unmindful of the awful, the majestic burden which rests upon the shoulders of His Majesty's Government, which, as I take it, it is the duty of every Member of the House, wherever he sits, to whatever group he belongs, to do his best to lighten. But it does not follow from that that we are bound to give a blind, unquestioning acquiescence to anything and everything that the Government proposes, and I feel that upon the shoulders of some of us who stand aloof and outside Government circles there is an equally grave responsibility, especially those of us who in some form or other have taken an active part in various phases of the tragedy of the past five years, and, above all things in the case of those who, like myself, in the early days of the War, sent scores of thousands of men to the Colours and, unhappily in too many cases, to their death. If I have come back to this House with one determination more fixed than another, it is that I will do everything in my power to fulfil and honour the sacred covenant which in the name of the State I entered into with those gallant fellows, which was that if they went out to the trenches and did their part, as God knows they have done, we at home would do ours; and that meant that we would first of all requite their services in the field, that if misfortune overtook them in the way either of wounds or death, neither they nor their dependants should ever have cause to regret the fact that those men answered their country's call; and, over and above all that, that when the day of peace arrived, we would insist upon securing such a new order of things as to make all the bloodshed and sacrifice of the War well worth while. That being my view, I approach the consideration of His Majesty's Gracious Speech in that spirit, but I want to make it clear that I do not think any of us is called upon to regard the Treasury Bench or the Government as so sacrosanct or as armed with such an unquestioned mandate and authority that we need be over-fastidious and scrupulous in criticism or placing our views before them. After all, the Government with this overwhelming majority—some 300 I believe—has been elected, as this House has been elected, by less than half the voters, and on any equitable system of gauging the voice of the country by the votes recorded at the poll, allowing for split votes and other considerations, instead of the Government having a majority of 300, their correct arithmetical majority is nearer forty, and my hon. Friends on the right ought to have at least another 100. Apart from that there is another consideration. Above all things we wanted to ascertain the views of the fighting men, and we entered into special arrangements to give them the franchise. It is no exaggeration to say that, despite the official estimate which was given from the Treasury Bench, that under this arrangement 70 or 80 per cent. of soldiers would vote, not more than 25 per cent. at the most recorded their votes. I am going to give illustrations from perhaps the most enlightened constituency in the Kingdom, that of South Hackney. In South Hackney the absent voters' lists contained 7,100 names; but so utterly, hopelessly useless was it, that when the attention of the authorities was called to the matter they consulted the Records, and other sources were consulted and the Town Hall authorities of Hackney agreed that not more than 5,900 of the 7,100 names could possibly be addressed with any hope of reaching their destination. Therefore, we reduced the 7,100 votes—and the same thing has happened in the constituency of almost every Member if he only took the trouble to check it—to 5,900. Out of that 5,900 I had 1,700 returned through the dead letter office. That is typical of what was going on all over the country.

How many votes were recorded?

In South Hackney the percentage was larger than in any other constituency. I did not mention it because I did not want to base a false argument on false premises. In South Hackney about 3,000 voted, and I am sorry to say that of these 3,000 my opponent got three.

Did you see them?

Yes, I saw them all counted. I was my own election agent. In these circumstances the Government must not put itself on too high a pedestal as representing a solid community. Incidentally I observed with some disappointment a day or two ago that a notice of Motion had been given of a Bill to relieve certain Members of the House of re-election on their appointment to office. I should have thought the Government would be glad to avail itself of the opportunity of really testing the opinion of the country, especially when one of these offices concerned no less important a post than the Minister of Labour. I do not know how far that appointment meets with the approbation of the Labour Members. I have the utmost admiration for the learned Gentleman who is proposed to be appointed. But he is a lawyer. I thought lawyer politicians had had their day. Heaven knows I have no cause to quarrel with lawyers. They have been my best friends in days gone by. So long as we have in this country a system of education under which, although every citizen of the realm is supposed to know the law, it is kept a profound secret from him, I suppose the lawyers are a necessary evil; but I should have thought that the Government might have afforded that lion-hearted leader of labour, Sir Leo Chiozza Money, the opportunity he seeks of measuring swords with the proposed new Minister of Labour. However that may be, I only mention these things as indicating that the Government's claim to a mandate in spite of the overwhelming majority which it has in this House, will not bear investigation. I have seen indications already in the last few days that lead me to think the Prime Minister cannot rely, in view of some possible developments in the near future in connection with the Peace Treaty, upon quite such a docile majority and following as he anticipated.

I now come to the King's Speech. The King's Speech is a mere phrase—a conven- tion. We all know that His Majesty, as a constitutional monarch, always adopts the declaration which his Ministers place before him. I should be indeed guilty of disrespect to His Majesty if I thought he was responsible for the stilted English, the clumsy construction, and the grammatical crudity of this particular document. As a rule it is drafted by the Prime Minister, but I know the Prime Minister has been very busy. I am wondering whether he delegated it toa small committee of his Ministry and officials, consisting, say, of Lord Milner, the Colonial Secretary, the First Commissioner of Works, and Sir Eyre Crowe, the Permanent Under-Secretary to the Foreign Office. However, we have it, and having it before ns we have to take it with respect and thankfulness. I had the privilege once again on Tuesday last of standing behind you, Mr. Speaker, in the House of Lords whilst His Majesty read the Speech. His Majesty did not read many lines before I had something in the nature of a shock. I found his Ministers, through him, assuring us that, having regard to the strategical positions we have now obtained on the Rhine, we have no cause for alarm in the event of the Germans deciding to renew the War. It was three months ago yesterday since the Armistice was signed. I happened to be with the President of the Board of Trade at his office on a matter of some State importance, at any rate to me, when the maroons sounded out the glorious tidings, and the right hon. Gentleman said "Now we shall be able to get on with the business of the nation." We have had the Armistice, we have had these Conferences and conversations, and the rest of it, and yet we solemnly put words into the mouth of His Majesty as to the possibility of Germany deciding to renew the war. That is a profound reflection upon the diplomacy and the statesmanship which, from the very outset, has muddled the whole matter of this Armistice. When the enemy sued for the Armistice it was because the enemy knew that he was hopelessly beaten; because he knew, in the words of Field-Marshal Haig, that a great offensive was coming within the next two days, and that he was unable to give or to receive battle. When he appealed for an armistice the terms of that armistice ought to have been left entirely and absolutely in the hands of Marshal Foch and Field-Marshal Haig, and no politician had any right whatever to be at the table at which those terms were discussed. An armistice is a military matter, and the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House know very well that if these Generals had been left to determine the terms of the Armistice they would have been the unconditional surrender of arms and the immediate march of the Allied forces into Berlin. That is the only way in which you are going to stop all these rumours and fears of further outbreak of hostilities. And it is the only way to impress the Teutonic mind. If the Prime Minister does not know that fact, he has facilities at hand for being enlightened on the subject without putting himself to much inconvenience. I say that those words should not have been put into the mouth of His Majesty unless the Government had felt that the contingency of a fresh outbreak of hostilities is not so remote as it would have us think.

I venture to call the attention of the House to two statements made within the last few days. The first is by Marshal Foch himself:

"We have the best reason to believe that Germany is not continuing to demobilise. She has now concentrated more than eighteen divisions under Hindenburg on the Eastern Front. We have also the best reason for believing that Germany is keeping other troops under arms under a pretext of economic necessity. Some of the military authorities think that Germany has enough war material to give the necessary armament to 3,000,000 men."

Those words were spoken by Marshal Foch within the last three days. Then we have M. Clemenceau—who with great respect, I think knows as much about the War and the circumstances of the War as even the Prime Minister himself—saying,

"It is said the War is won, It would perhaps be more accurate to say that there is a full in the storm. At the very least it is necessary to provide for all eventualities. With the British Army demobilised, and the American Army returned home, and France isolated, there might be danger of Germany reopening the debate of arms."

Those are solemn utterances by perhaps the two greatest authorities who can speak on this matter. I ask the House whether it is not a serious thing that, after three months of armistice and after having had the enemy absolutely in our hands and at our mercy, we should have to contemplate even the remotest possibility of a fresh outbreak of hostilities?

Leaving that matter for the moment, I want to say one word on two omissions in the King's Speech, which, so far, have not been commented on in this Debate. First of all, the mind of the country, as far as I have been able to gather—and I have many opportunities of doing so—has been very seriously disturbed during recent months by this American ideal of "freedom of the seas." The King's Speech is absolutely silent on this subject. I was hoping that the Prime Minister, when he addressed us yesterday, might have told us whether he had yet succeeded in obtaining from President Wilson something like an understandable definition of those words. We are told that there is "complete accord." I venture to suggest that it is a most curious phrase to put into the King's mouth. I would like the Leader of the House, before the Debate closes, to tell us whether the freedom of the seas is still a matter under discussion, and, if so, what it means. When we know what it means we can grapple with its possibilities. Then there was no reference to a relaxation of the restrictions under the Defence of the Realm Act, One half of them, at least, are no longer necessary. Much of the unrest about which we have heard so much can be traced to unnecessary interference with the rights, liberties and habits of the people. I mention those two things in passing, simply in the hope of eliciting from the Leader of the House some assurance that they will not be lost sight of.

A great deal of this discussion has turned on the subject of labour unrest, and as there is an official Amendment of the Labour party on the subject it would be impertinent on my part to attempt to even make a suggestion to the right hon. Gentleman on my right (Mr. Adamson). Yet I may point out that while the Leader of the Labour party formulated five or six points which he thought accounted for labour unrest, I could not help being struck by one wonderful omission. He said nothing about the wicked, shamelss profiteering which has been goiing on with the foods and necessaries of the people, and nothing about the way in which at this moment the Government is holding up food supplies which could be furnished to the people at infinitely less cost than is the case to-day. This question of profiteering has a deep meaning which, if I may say so, even the Leader of the Labour party has not mastered. Many people are under the impression that because the Government is imposing a tax of 80 per cent. on the excess profits of such contracts, therefore we are getting four-fifths of our own back again. This is the greatest illusion in the world. The Excess Profits Tax is a tax on the workers of the country. You allow the contractor to supply his goods at an inflated price, which is obviously a great deal more than he ought to charge, and you say. "We will say nothing about it so long as we stand in with you and share the swag." That is the attitude of the Government who allow this profiteering to go on. I am not going to weary the House with illustrations, but I was struck with one case the other day. Take the case of the firm, which I believe is not unrepresented in this House, which controls the great cotton industry of Coates. A reel of cotton which before the War cost about 2d. now costs 7½d., and the profits of Coates's last year, after providing for Excess Profits Duty, were £3,500,000!

The Government which has allowed that cannot complain and cannot be surprised if there is restlessness among the people. It cannot be surprised if, when you have all the great multiple tea shops willing to sell tea at 2s. or 2s. 2d. a pound, and it insists on their charging 2s. 8d., there is unrest. It cannot be surprised when you have millions of tons of meat held up by an American meat trust—which is a very practical side of American idealism—that there are all these signs of unrest. The Prime Minister yesterday surpassed himself when he tried to explain the reasons for this unrest. He said that the workers were war weary and nerve wracked, and did not quite realise all they were asking. He condemned, as one would have expected him to do, the recklessness and extravagant dishonesty of many of the unofficial demands made in the name of Labour; but I would remind the Prime Minister—and I wish he were here—of what he himself said about eighteen months ago, when, perhaps, his judgment was less mature than it is to-day on these social problems. Addressing a great Labour gathering, he said:

"My advice to you after the War is to make your policy audacity, audacity, audacity."

4.0 P.M.

He cannot complain, therefore, if he is taken at his word. But unrest is not confined only to industrial classes. It shows itself to be as great, or even greater perhaps, among the fighting and ex-fighting forces as among the workers. Can you wonder? The way the pensions are being muddled, the way the allowances are being muddled, the way this Armistice was so shaped that it led the average fighting man—and he is a civilian first and a soldier afterwards—to think it was a peace treaty and not an Armistice, led him to think the War was over, especially when he was invited to vote "for the man who won the War," and for "early demobilisation."

The soldier and the ex-soldier are great elements in the unrest. I receive every week in some other of my activities evidence to the justification these men have for their discontent. Can you wonder? I wish the Secretary for War had not gone out of the House. When some poor devil, wounded, broken in the War, dies in a hospital, a wire is sent to his widow informing her of the death, saying that they are "prepared to forward the body on to you and pay the carriage to the station, but you must pay all other charges of fetching and burying him." One case came before me the other day where the body of a gallant soldier who had been four years in Mesopotamia without one day's leave was sent in a case of sawdust with a shroud only half covering it, with the back eaten by rats and mice, and the poor woman had to fetch it from the station and to pawn some of her humble articles of furniture to pay for the expense of a firing party to perform the last honours to her dead. That is no exaggerated case. I know cases where men arriving home from the front are immediately arrested by the Poor Law authorities and put into prison for non-payment of rates. I know of cases where little dead children have been awaiting burial because a woman could not got her allowances and pension. I say that all this adds to the unrest. The Prime Minister threw out the intimation recently that he recognised that all was not well, and he said, "We will welcome suggestions." I am going with the utmost respect to throw out to the Labour party what I conceive to be a practical and practicable suggestion. You have sitting in Paris a Conference to settle the Peace and the War. Surely, while that is going on, you might now appoint a home conference here to settle industrial peace, and have the representatives of capital and of labour—even the most extreme amongst them—round a table, and see if you cannot set up some Department of the State and some machinery which will prevent unofficial agitators from destroying the greatest charter labour possesses—see if you cannot devise some machinery for settling labour disputes. If the con- ference, well attended as it would be, arrived at conclusions simultaneously with that of the Paris Conference, it would be of no less interest and value to the nation than that which will terminate the unhappy War. I submit this to the Labour party for its consideration.

I want to say a word about another item in the Speech. It is an item which I assure the Leader of the House no amount of Parliamentary skill, no depth of eloquence, or appeal to the loyalty of his followers, will ever enable him and his Government, should they desire it, to evade. That is the payment by Germany of the cost of this War. For some time the Prime Minister did not include that in his programme. President Wilson forgot it altogether. Some of us did our best to "ginger up" the Prime Minister on the subject, and before the election took place the Prime Minister—I have his speech here—announced that although originally the Government Departments had advised him that Germany could not pay the cost of the War, in the end he said that he had had a Committee of great experience, appointed, and they thought that the assets of Germany, the wealth of Germany, have been under-estimated in the past, and that she is wealthier and has greater capacities than we had given her credit for. He added there is no doubt that Germany herself thinks so, and can pay a very substantial sum towards the cost of the War. The Prime Minister said in that same speech that he was going to appoint another Allied Conference to go further into the matter. These Conferences bewilder me. All that we have done is to appoint another Commission to inquire into Germany's financial capacity. I was told yesterday by the Prime Minister that some very eminent gentlemen sit on that Commission. Three names were mentioned; they left me quite cold. Mr. Hughes, a splendid patriot and a lover of mankind and of his country, so far as I know, possesses no special qualification to investigate the financial capacity of Germany. Lord Cunliffe—the name suggests to me the Bank of England. Well, there are business gentlemen in this House, and they do not want me to tell them that there are governors of the Bank of England who are very much interested in Germany not being called upon to pay much indemnity. I could mention the name of a man who has at least £5,000,000 of German bills unpaid, and he is very solicitous of the solvency of the enemy country. Then there is the name of Lord Sumner. I seem to remember him as a Chancery judge who, on more than one occasion in the course of his professional career, said that he understood nothing about figures. All Chancery judges do say that. No, he was a King's Bench judge. But why this solicitude about Germany's capacity to pay? In the course of a somewhat active career I have once or twice found myself in the Law Courts, and by those occasional miscarriages of justice which will occur, I have now and then lost a case—usually, by the way, when I had an eminent counsel to represent me, instead of doing it myself. But on not one of those occasions do I remember the judge saying: "Will it be quite convenient for him to pay the money?"

Putting the lowest view of it you like we hope Germany has lost the War. We believe she has, and judgment should be entered against her for the full amount. The German Reichstag, when Germany thought she was winning the War, proposed an indemnity of £9,000,000,000 against Britain alone. I have made our Bill out. It comes to £10,000,000,000. I say that we ought to register judgment for that amount, issue execution, and if she cannot pay, seize the country. Give every German a living wage according to his own low standard of comfort and run the country. That is the way it should be done. I am given to understand—I suppose the Leader of the House would give me a negative shake of the head if I asked if it is so, but it is so—that there is no idea at all on the part of the Allied Conference to-day of pressing Germany for the whole cost of the War. What we talk about now—I say we, but I mean the Allies plenipotentiaries—is reparation for damage done, and then only for wilful damage—broken windows and that sort of thing. If the enemy shot at an aeroplane and brought down a church steeple you do not pay for it because you did not mean to do it. It reminds me of the story of two men fighting a duel, a thin man and a fat man. The fat man complained that his opponent had the advantage of a target three times larger than he had. The seconds solved the difficulty by chalking out a portion of the fat man's body to equal that of his opponent. When he said "What happens if he hits me outside the chalk line?" They said, "That will not count." We are bringing the indemnities down to this level, to the level of wilful damage of non-military description.

I elicited by interpolation yesterday that the Peace Treaty will be submitted for ratification. I asked whether the House had the power to alter it. With seven years' experience of this House, I recall at least one occasion when we had a somewhat useful object lesson. It was the Bill for setting up the South African Union. When it was here for ratification the Minister in charge said, "Understand you must take it or leave it; you cannot alter a single comma or cross a 't.' "That is exactly what is going to happen about this Peace Treaty. There is not a member of the Treasury Bench who will contradict me when I say he will not put that Treaty on the Table and invite the House to revise any one of the provisions. Why should we be fooled in this way? There is not an hon. Gentleman supporting the Coalition who is not pledged to the teeth to get these indemnities, and when I find His Majesty saying in his Speech that he hopes that in a short time a preliminary Treaty will besigned, I want to say: Let it be initialled by the delegates; let the Peace Conference do that, in order that the Peace Treaty may be submitted to all the responsible Parliaments of the people, that you may have a peoples' peace on a peoples' war. I will be no party, as far as I have a voice in this House, to smuggling through a Treaty in the terms of which not one of us has the slightest voice. I say that unless that Treaty is put here for confirmation of the House of Commons—and I find it weak on this question of indemnities—I will do my utmost to get other Members to support me in holding it up at the lasts moment. I warn the right hon. Gentleman, and do it deliberately, that he may shed a very large portion of his majority if he takes that course. Let the Peace Treaty be initialled provisionally. I am not so sure that Mr. Wilson would find that he speaks with absolute authority as the voice of America on this question. I think America might like to consider the Treaty. I do urge the Government to give some consideration to the views of this House on this subject and to enable us to at least justify the main plank of the platform on which we were elected. So far as the Treaty is concerned, that is what I have to say; but I should like just to add one word about the question of the Colonies. There again we have come to this House bound hand and foot by the pledges of the Government. When the policy of the First Lord of the Admiralty, as he then was, was announced, we were told that it expressed the view of the Government and that in no circumstances whatever would we disregard the views of our Dominions in regard to the late German colonies. Just as in the case of indemnities so in the case of the colonies this House has no choice. It has come here with a mandate. We will not have another Ireland on the borders of our Empire. As far as Ireland is concerned, His Majesty expresses himself as deeply grieved with the condition of affairs there. The Prime Minister did not mention Ireland, but he said that never again will the Government countenance anything in the nature of forcible resistance to law and order, and therefore I may assume now we shall take a short cut of some kind or other towards a solution of this long-standing problem, and that we shall make a stand on this matter on the basis of the principles which the Prime Minister has enunciated.

There is one other matter I want to say a word about. We are told that this Peace Conference consists of representatives of no fewer than thirty countries, twenty of which at least have had no more to do with the War than Timbuctoo, countries like Nicaragua, Liberia, Uruguay, Hiati, and Guatemala. But what have they to do at this stage with the settling of accounts between Great Britain and Germany? All this vague nonsense about the League of Nations at this stage is a menace to the Empire. While you have thirty nations sitting round the Peace Table, including all those eminent States which I have just mentioned, there is one little State which was the first to come to our rescue in the Balkans, which almost committed suicide in the cause of the Allies, and which has been forgotten. Little Montenegro has done everything she could, and I wonder whether the Leader of the House will tell us whether it is part of a bargain that Montenegro is to be handed over to her traditional enemy, Serbia. I say that the Peace Conference at this stage ought to be confined to the Great Powers concerned in the War to get a settlement with Germany, and then they can discuss the League of Nations to their heart's content. I understand that President Wilson is about to pay a visit to the United States. I dare say, when he gets there, he will find that the idealism of which he has spoken so much is taking a very practical and definite form. While we are indulging in all this nonsensical and Utopian talk, America is securing the food contracts for the world, is going in for the rebuilding of Belgium and other parts of the Continent, and, us America always does, is "scooping the pool." There is no idealism in the American merchant or contractor, and I say we ought to leave the League of Nations, over until we have got the terms of peace settled and have made our victory absolutely assured.

We are assured in the King's Speech—and this is a statement which requires very great consideration—that the progress of the Conference is going on interruptedly with perfect success, and then there is a phrase put into the mouth of His Majesty to the effect that "there is no disagreement." That is either true or false, so far as those who put the words into His Majesty's mouth are concerned. If there is no disagreement, then we must assume that the "freedom of the seas" has gone; we must assume that our Dominions are to be supreme with regard to the ex-German colonies; we must assume that tie Prime Minister's pledge about indemnities is to be carried out; we must assume that all that we stood for at the last election has been conceded. With the utmost respect to the Government, I think that is an unfortunate phrase to have put in. No disagreement about indemnities! No disagreement about the colonies! No disagreement about the freedom of the seas? When one of two things has happened; either the Prime Minister—and if so all honour and credit to him—has succeeded in carrying through the pledges which brought him and us here, or somebody has sold the pass. We shall soon know. But there may be troublous days ahead if it is found outside—and here in this House we are only the reflex of the outside public—if it is found outside that all our protestations of fighting for the men who won the War, all our protestations about demobilisation, about fair and generous treatment for the dependants of those who haw fallen in the War, about social reconstruction, about better chances of life, happiness, and comfort are merely lip-service of conventional political expediency—and then I will not answer for safety and good order in this Empire. It is because I believe, as a result of my, it may be, unorthodox and unconventional meetings with the soldiers at the front, but, knowing so much of their aspirations, and, incidentally, mixing a good deal with the class for which my right hon. Friend near me speaks, that I say I am certain they are looking to us at this hour to prove that we can do something for them which is better than the anarchism and Bolshevism which is being offered them in some quarters. I have spoken critically of the Government, but at the same time with a desire, which I am sure is shared by every other Member of this House, to help in any way I can to round off any corners either in this House or out of it by means of good home propaganda, by telling the people the truth, in every way in my power. I am here to do my bit I am, as is every hon. Member, actuated by only one ideal, and that is that the fruits of this victory shall not be lost, that the seas of blood and of tears, which have saturated the earth for nearly five years, shall not have been run in vain, and that we may grasp from this ghastly tragedy something well worth winning and well worth keeping. Then every Briton will be able to walk with head erect, and Civis Britannicus sum shall still be the proudest motto in all the world.

There were two points in the eloquent and very interesting speech to which the House has just listened which particularly impressed me. Let me, at the outset of my observations, state how thoroughly I am in agreement first of all with what the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Bottomley) said with regard to making Germany pay. I am certain that everyone on this side of the House will agree that there was no point upon which feeling and opinion in this country was more decided than its determination that, when peace was signed, Germany should pay the whole cost of the war. I entirely agree also with the hon. Gentleman who expressed the view in a very entertaining way that it is entirely a wrong method to set about establishing committees to examine what Germany can or cannot pay. I agree with him, and I am certain that the country intends to insist as far as it can that the claim against Germany shall be made out, and that after it has been made out Germany shall be made to pay, and if there is any suggestion of her inability to pay, that can only come up for consideration when every effort has been made to collar her resources. People speak as if the pay- ment by Germany was to be a mere book-keeping operation—as if a mere balance-sheet is to be drawn up, the balance on one side to be debited against Germany, who is then to be asked to be kind enough to make an early settlement. The sort of payment which I think we ought to insist upon Germany making is a payment to the Allies, not in gold or in manufactured articles, which would merely stimulate her commerce against ours, but we should require her to deliver to our account her raw materials and other resources, out of which we may pay our own costs and the costs of the Allies, and at the same time get materials for our industries. In that connection I would like to say that there is one payment Germany should be forced to make in kind. Germany has deliberately, in the course of this War, destroyed much property belonging to other countries which no money and no commercial transaction could ever restore. Let me take a single example.

Germany, in the early part of the War, destroyed one of the most splendid libraries in the world. No money can restore to us the Louvain Library. But there is a splendid library at Leipzic, and why should not that be taken to make good the loss of Louvain? In the same way many beautiful churches have been, destroyed in France and Belgium, and, among others, I am afraid to say, to a great extent the most glorious cathedral in the world. Priceless stained glass work has been lost and cannot be replaced. There is nothing like it in Germany, but if there is to be found in any German public building any tolerably good stained glass, I would prefer that, in restoring the cathedral at Rheims; we should take even the inferior stained glass at Cologne rather than that new glass should be put into the windows. Thus the reparation we call upon Germany to make will not be confined to mere commercial transactions, but we shall endeavour as far as possible to make Germany pay in kind where no other form is possible. The second point in which I was in thorough agreement with the hon. Member was when he spoke of the very serious situation which has been brought about by the apparent revival of the military strength of Germany. It is quite true when discussing these matters the Prime Minister rather deprecated the House debating them at all, and certainly no one is less desirous than I am of introducing topics into the Debate which the Government seriously think it would be a public disadvantage to discuss. I think Lord Curzon in another place gave a much fuller reply with regard to the Paris transactions than did the Prime Minister here. Lord Bryce, and other persons competent to deal with them, discussed detailed matters in connection with the settlement of Europe. I do not think, therefore, that any serious complaint can be made if we in this House also take the liberty of referring, at all events in a guarded manner, to the transactions which have been going on in Paris. The Prime Minister has told us that the Treaty of Paris will be laid on the Table of this House before it is ratified. If that is so, I think the Prime Minister really ought to feel thankful to any of us, who have, been necessarily more in touch with the opinion of the country than has been possible for him during recent weeks, if we give him some indication of what is in the minds of the Members of this House and also of the country outside.

The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken referred, naturally in rather guarded terms, to the great influence which has been exerted and is being exerted in the Peace Conference by the representatives of America. I do not think there is anyone in this country who does not follow with the greatest admiration and respect the work that President Wilson has done, both before he came to Europe and since, and he has spoken of ideals and principles to which we in this country give very ready allegiance. But it also seems to me that President Wilson, from the very nature of the case, cannot be thoroughly conversant with the needs either of Europe or of the British Empire. It is quite possible that the needs of European races and European nations and of a very peculiar organisation are not matters which from his point of view he has kept entirely before him. I think it is quite right that the Peace Conference should have been largely inspired by President Wilson's ideals, but if I were to give an indication to the Prime Minister of what is causing a good deal of misgiving in this country, I think it is the fear lest he, in his very proper anxiety to act in co-operation with President Wilson, has given loss support than might have been expected first of all to our other Allies, who, of course, have made infinitely greater sacrifices in the War than America has been called upon to do; and, secondly, whether he has given all the support that might be expected to the legiti- mate aspirations, of our own Dominions. Because, while we join, I think, in wholehearted deference to President Wilson, we look upon our own Prime Minister as our leader and our spokesman, and we do not expect our leader and our spokesman to play a part secondary to that of any other statesman in the world. The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken, in the concluding part of his speech, said that if there had been no disagreement in the Conference, as mentioned in the Gracious Speech, that the absence of disagreement must be due to the fact that the Prime Minister has obtained all those matters for which he has naturally been standing out. I do not; feel quite confident that that is the case. I do not know whether hon. Members have been following the series of articles written by a distinguished American journalist in the American Press, and copies of which have been appearing in this "Times" in this country. He wrote an article the other day upon the British Delegation, and an article which was intended to be, and was, highly laudatory of our proceedings and our representatives. But in the course of that article he writes this sentence, intended, of course, to be read in America as a tribute to British policy:

"British policy has ceded everything which the President chooses to make an issue….They have gone a long way to persuade their own Overseas Dominions to abandon even reasonable claims to German soil."

I must say that that seems to me to be a rather disquieting announcement with regard to what his been going on in Paris. Does that mean that the Prime Minister has given way on certain issues to the representatives of America? I hope it is not the case that the Prime Minister, unlike the Lord Chancellor in that respect, is affected by a morbid self-distrust. It is not a failing I have ever attributed to my right hon. Friend. [An HON. Member: "Which Lord Chancellor?"] The present Lord Chancellor, who reassured us by telling us that he is not subject to that complaint. What I want to point out is this: If it is true, as this American writer says, that our Overseas Dominions have been persuaded to abandon "reasonable claims" what, may I ask, are those "reasonable claims"? Of course I am not asking for any breach of confidence, but I am simply indicating matters which are causing a certain amount of disquietude. My first question is, What are the reasonable claims, and, secondly, by what methods were the representatives of the Overseas Dominions persuaded to abandon those claims? Was it because they found that if they persisted in them they would not get the necessary support in the Conference, where they had the best right to expect it.

This point as between the American representatives and those of our Dominions appears to have been mainly concerned as to the mandatory arrangement as regards the German colonies. We have never been told what that mandatory arrangement means. The fact is, so far as we can follow the proceedings in Paris, that it looks as if the world statesmen there gathered have been beginning with the coping stone instead of the foundation stone. They have been dividing their responsibility and attributing responsibilities to the League of Nations before they have made up their own minds probably, and certainly before they have told anybody else what the League of Nations is, what it means, and what it is to do. Let me say in passing that the ideal of a League of Nations is one to which I entirely adhere. But the League of Nations is rather taking the place as a blessed word that used to be occupied by Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia has become so familiar that it has become useless as a blessed word. Using blessed words in that sense and making them often factors in a great world settlement with the necessary vagueness which is attached to blessed words, becomes a very serious and practical danger, On this question of mandatory States, that is States that are to receive a mandate from the League of Nations, the essential preliminary questions are what sort of control is the League of Nations to exercise and how is it going to enforce its authority? Those questions cannot be answered unless you first know what is the constitution of the League of Nations and who are going to be its members. I do not know whether these various matters have been decided upon, but it appears to me that they ought to be definitely and clearly decided before it is possible to persuade our Overseas Dominions that they ought to abandon reasonable claims in order to accept a mandate from a body of that sort whose constitution and powers are so very vague. I asked just now who is to be in the League of Nations. I want to know is Germany to be a member of the League of Nations or not? Two views are taken of this matter. I am afraid that there is a good deal of reason to fear that the idea that Germany is either immediately or in the near future will be admitted to be a member of the League of Nations is accepted. Supposing that is so, what will then be the position of a mandatory State required to administer a quondam German colony under the supervision or as trustee for an organisation of which Germany herself is a part. That appears to me to be an arrangement which will produce almost certain and perhaps fatal friction. What would be the position for instance in an African colony or in a Pacific island, under those circumstances, of the native races? Is the code by which they are to be governed to be decided by a League of Nations in which Germany is to occupy a position of, at all events, some influence and power.

There is another point as to which I cannot help feeling a certain amount of uneasiness, because I read the other day in an article in "Le Petit Journal," that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary was reported there to have said that in the colonies taken from the enemy the principle of the open door ought to be adopted. If that is the principle upon which these States are to be governed by mandatories from the League of Nations, it means that from the first moment Germany is to be given facilities for peaceful penetration into those parts of the world from which she has just been ejected by British blood and sacrifice. Not only that, but you are to have the open door in these States, and presumably the Hun himself will be allowed to walk through that open door—the Hun himself, of whom the Foreign Secretary himself has said that he was a brute and is still a brute—and yet he is prepared to allow this brute through the open door to walk back as soon as he likes. What will the result of that be to the native races of those States? Take the case of South Africa. How is the Government of the Union of South Africa, acting as mandatory for the League of Nations, to protect the natives in South-West Africa if the open door allows Germans to go back, so that the former knout-wallopers are to go back as spectacled explorers or commercial travellers; and how are the natives to be protected against the vengeance which will certainly overtake them through that policy? In our own Dominions they do not keep the open door into their States. The Union of South Africa has a Customs tariff. Is the Union of South Africa to be compelled to erect Customs barriers between her own territory and the ad joining territory which she is to administer as a mandatory of the League of Nations; and if that is to be the future policy, does not that also indicate an arrangement as unhopeful as it is possible to imagine for the peace and prosperity of those future Colonies? It therefore appears to me that if these matters have been decided in that manner—there is only too much reason to fear they may lave been decided—it is no wonder that the American writer to whom I have referred calls these claims reasonable and that he is a good deal astonished to find that our own people in Paris have been persuaded to abandon, them. While the Conference has been engaged upon these matteis—I will not go so far as the hon. Gentleman opposite, who used very drastic language and said, I think, that they had been at least three months engaged in muddling the whole affair—I do think it is very extraordinary that while they have been discussing matters of the sort to which I have alluded, only in an indirect way connected with the real vital question of the making of peace and of making the Germans pay—

On the point of Order, Sir. May I inquire whether it is proper that the King's Speech should be discussed without a single Minister being present on the Treasury Bench?

The Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, whose business it is to listen to this matter, is present.

I agree with the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Bottomley) that, while the Conference has been engaged upon these matters, it is very much to be regretted that apparently Germany herself has bean so far recovering, both internally and from the military point of view, as to raise doubts whether she is not in a position to renew the War. The hon. Gentleman opposite quoted the opinion of Marshal Foch and of M. Clemenceau, and when I saw the language of the French Premier I thought it would not be an exaggeration to describe it as alarming; and it is interesting to observe that that alarming language indicates exactly what the German Foreign Minister himself threatens will be the result if the peace terms turn out not to be to the liking of the German Government. It is quite true that President Wilson has expressed the opinion that the German Army is incapable of further fighting. I hope it may be so, but I confess that, with all possible respect to President Wilson, I should very much have preferred to have that same assurance from Marshal Foch. What is particularly significant is the language in the same speech by M. Clemenceau in which he pointed out that Germany will be able very largely to draw upon Russian resources, resources in regard to which he used this significant phrase, "They are still fruitful but in a state of chaos." I wish I could feel completely assured that we have done nothing to prolong that chaos or to encourage its authors. Allusion has already been made in this Debate to the proposal, which again, I think, originated with the American representatives, for a meeting at Prinkipo between the Bolshevists and the other Russian sections, a conference which can only be likened to a conference between the boa constrictor and the rabbits. It is not at all surprising to find that the rabbits object to meet on equal terms those whom I have so described, and that the proposal has been rejected by, I believe, every sane, moderate section of Russian opinion, while the mere making of the proposal seems to have brought despair to all those sections from Russia which is our bounden duty to encourage and to support, morally and otherwise, to the best of our ability. The Russian Consulate in Paris learned of the invitation with consternation, and rejected it and denounced it with indignation. The Archangel Government went so far as to prohibit the publication of the text of President Wilson's invitation, and when they replied to it they said that no sane and honest Russian could take part in pourparlers with representatives of the Bolshevists. A very significant phrase was used by Mr. Vladimir Bourtseff, who is a revolutionary himself, and who says that it is the equivalent to pourparlers between. Cain and Abel. That shows the harm that has been done by the making of the proposal, which, I think, must have been done without sufficient thought and without taking into consultation those authorities upon Russian opinion which might easily have been consulted in Paris.

Hon. Members who have read the letter published only the other day from the hon. and gallant Member for Stoke (Colonel John Ward), in which he shows what he thinks of those elements, can, I think, form some opinion of the language which he would hold if he were here to-day in regard to this particular proposal. Nowhere was this proposal more strongly objected to than in America itself, and the "New York Herald," which other correspondents say expresses very fairly the general view in America, wrote of it, "Nothing has so shocked the moral sense of right-thinking men as this suggested compromise with crime." We must remember that the opposition in America to proposals made by their representatives in Paris is an important matter, and is a factor which will enter very largely into the success or failure of the work that is being done there. And when we find indications of possible divergence of views between the President of the United States and our own Prime Minister, let us remember that while the recent elections in this country have shown an overwhelming sense of public confidence in the Prime Minister, the elections in America have shown that the President has not got the overwhelming confidence of the American nation, while we must also remember that in a few weeks' time the President of the United States will have to carry on the government of that country with a hostile majority in both Houses of Congress. It is, therefore, a very important thing, in view of the opposition in America to his proceedings in Paris, when we remember that without the concurrence of the Senate there can be no American signature to any treaty of peace; and when we know that all the other statesmen are very rightly attaching immense importance to it, and are willing to make great sacrifices in order that the American signature may be beside theirs on the final Treaty of Peace we shall see that we must look not merely to the doings or the words of the President, but also to the opinion in America which may express itself through the Senate. In that connection there is one point which I must say has been difficult for some of us to understand. The hon. Gentleman opposite spoke about the very disquieting subject of the freedom of the seas. It is difficult to understand, though I have no doubt there is very good reason for it, that while in Paris the President of the United States was leading the Conference very skilfully and very nobly, as I think, along the path leading to a League of Nations, involving as that, we all hope, will do general disarmament all round, at the same time, having a very proper regard for the American interests which he is bound to protect, he was sending messages to America pressing Congress and the Government there to agree to a large programme of naval building. Those are matters which it is rather difficult for us to understand without much fuller knowledge of American domestic politics than we possess, and I mention it for this reason, that I have no doubt that the President is reconciling his duty as a member of the Congress carrying out a great world scheme with his duty as the head of the American Executive charged with the safeguarding of American interests, and all I want to do is to make quite certain that our own Prime Minister is doing the same thing, and that when he is acting as a member of the Congress he is sufficiently keeping in mind the domestic and national interests of this country which it is his duty to safeguard.

5.0 P.M.

I have mentioned these points for one reason only. It would be no benefit to the Government, no help to the Prime Minister in his arduous task in Paris, if he were left in ignorance of the matters which are disquieting some minds here. No Member of this House would be more delighted to act up to the pledges he gave—and I gave plenty of them to come here and support, as far as I could, the Prime Minister in carrying out the peace, as he helped to carry on the War—and to give him the opportunity, so far as I can, of dispelling these matters of doubt which are troubling minds here. We have been told by the Gracious Speech that much progress has been made in these matters. What we want, if we could have it without damage to the interests of the Conference and nation, is to know not only about the amount of progress but of the direction in which that progress has been made. Somewhere or other, Carlyle, speaking of the question of progress, says:

"Progress—yes; but see that it is not to the bottomless pit and blackness of Gehenna."

We hope progress has not been in that direction at the Paris Conference, and I have no reason to suppose it has. I am not speaking in any spirit of apprehension or of censure, but merely of doubt and of hope. I do hope very much, notwithstanding these matters—on which, I fully admit, I am not completely informed—that the Prime Minister, on his own re- sponsibility, not too much influenced by others, will guide us to much safer and more healthy waters.

The hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley), whom many of us are glad to see back again in this House, opened his speech with a very optimistic note. He said that he hoped to see the labour of this Parliament fruitful in great and mighty results. Everyone not only listens to, but is profoundly interested in, anything the hon. Gentleman has to say, and I followed with deep and increasing interest the reception in all parts of the House of the varied sentiments he uttered. I noticed that his sentiments were received with prolonged cheers when they were reactionary, and that the House was dumb when he spoke for the causes of humanity. Therefore, I think when he has been in this House a little longer he will come to the conclusion to which I have come already, that this House of Commons, which has sprung into existence in a moment of public panic, is not a democratic assembly, that it represents reaction in its best form, and that even the programme which was adumbrated by the Prime Minister, and which was given forth in the King's Speech, is a programme which will be dissected, analysed and tested, not with a view to the uplifting of the masses of the people or improving their conditions, but to suit the idiosyncracies, tastes and interests of those vested classes which are largely represented in this House.

I have risen for the purpose of asking the Prime Minister, if he were here, or the Leader of the House, if he were here, or the Chief Secretary for Ireland, if he were here, or any responsible Minister, high or low, great or small, this question: What is the meaning of this passage in the King's Speech:

"The position in Ireland causes Me great anxiety, but I earnestly hope that conditions may soon sufficiently improve to make it possible to provide a durable settlement of this difficult problem."

That is a very enigmatical sentence. It is characteristically Lloyd-Georgian. Why was that paragraph put in the Speech of the King, unless we had some explanation of it from the Prime Minister? I waited here and listened to his reply to the two rather meek and humble speeches from the two leaders of the Opposition. I waited here and listened with interest to get some explanation as to what that passage meant. I wanted to know from him what is the position in Ireland, what is the Government in. Ireland, who are the Government in Ireland, what is going on in Ireland, and what you propose to do with Ireland. Do not imagine by your pledge-breaking, by your false promises, by your criminal treatment of Ireland, that you have rid yourselves of your responsibility when you engage in a conspiracy, which is successful, of driving the constitutional representatives of Ireland out of public life. For nearly forty years this party, of which there are only a few of us left, laboured by constitutional means to win the great constitutional end of a great constitutional party, namely, the right of our people to govern themselves on their own soil. We won that great reform by the constitutional judgment of the electorate, of this country. We won it because it was a just cause, and because it was sanctioned by public opinion. We won it because it had the moral sanction of the Colonies. We won it because mankind in every English-speaking country in the world was in its favour. Yet the Gentlemen who from these benches are now lecturing labour upon their extreme courses, are the very Gentlemen who destroyed the possibility of that solution, and have cast Ireland again into the melting-pot of agitation and discontent.

I know that my colleagues and myself will be like voices in the wilderness in this House. As long as we were a strong and powerful party here we made, some impression, although some men may have grown helpless in the task to which we set ourselves, and to which some devoted the whole of their lives. For my part, representing nobody here but my Constituents, not speaking for Ireland, but speaking for justice for my country, as I have pleaded it for every country in the world since I came here, I am here to demand from this Government what they are going to do about Ireland, and I ask that an answer be given to that question. You cannot allow things to remain as they are. Martial law, trial by jury abolished, men not charged with any offence cast in prison and deported without trial, continuous irritation of the masses of the people, constant pin-pricks, no government but the government of a military junta, and no peace or progress, or enterprise or development, because of the discontent and agitation that exist there. Yet the Government sit helpless and hopeless, giving no guidance to the House of Commons—this new, fresh, magnificent democratic assembly, that has come here without principles, but merely to cross the "t's" and dot the "i's" of the Prime Minister. These men know nothing about Ireland. They have heard nothing of our Debates. They have not followed these controversies. They are entitled to get guidance from the Government, and the first thing the Government ought to have done before they go to Paris to discuss the people of Uruguay, Liberia and Bolivia, the Czecho-Slovaks and the Jugo-Slavs—before they go to a Peace Conference to determine the destinies of those people, we have a right to ask them what they propose to do for the little nation to which we belong, sacred to us by every tie of birthright and devotion, sacred to us as a nation with its cherished Christian civilisation and its splendid traditions—we want to know, are you going to change your policy? Are you going to do justice to Ireland? Are you going to end this discontent? Are you going to carry out your promises and keep your pledges, and carry out the purpose for which you said you went into this War? I want an answer to that question.

There have been many attempts to solve this problem. It seems to me it cannot be settled by the constitutional will of the English people, because when the English people have declared their will a section of the Members of this House have decided against the authority of this Parliament. You cannot settle it by a Convention which you nominate yourselves, because your Convention held its meetings and prolonged its session for twelve months, and the results of that Convention were fruitless. The only thing I know about the Convention is that the gentleman who was greatly responsible for smashing it has been now placed in the high position of a member of the Government charged with the carrying out of the administration of the Department of Irish Agriculture. That has been the single fruit of this Convention. Since Parliament cannot decide, and since a Convention which you nominate cannot decide, there is only one thing that can decide, and that is to give the Irish people self-determination. Why is that expression which is so sacrosanct when you are dealing with little nations in Europe, an anathema when you are dealing with Ireland? Why is the great democratic principle of the right of a people to determine its own destinies, which is unanimously accepted by all thinking and enlightened men in every part of the world, not to be applied to Ireland? You, no doubt, will say that there is a large minority who will not accept national self-government for Ireland, but you are going to force minorities in other countries in Europe. [An Hon. Member: "Every one of them!"] There are minorities as large in Bohemia and in Alsace-Lorraine and other countries, but they are other people's minorities—not yours. You are so busy taking the motes out of other people's eyes that you cannot see any in your own. What are these minorities in Bohemia, in Poland, and in Alsace-Lorraine to say as to the honour and the honesty of your protestations and your professions if you deny the application of that principle to the one country in all Europe which you control? If those Gentlemen who have got up on these benches had said that the solution of the Irish question is to keep the Irish people down with a military heel, to allow no constitutional principles to operate, to continue to make the rifle of the soldier the determining factor in the adjustment of great public concerns, that could be understood, but you have never taken up that position. The Prime Minister has declared, not once but twenty times, that it is absolutely essential to the safety of the Empire, as well as to the peace and happiness of Ireland, that you should settle this Irish question, and that you should settle it upon lines that will be satisfactory to the Irish people themselves. Why is that not done?

There are only two courses for this Government to adopt. The first is either to give Ireland representation at the Peace Conference or to give her the right of self-determination. Are you afraid to allow Ireland to state her case at the Peace Conference? Is that the reason why she is denied a hearing there? If she has not a good case to present to that of the Czecho-Slovaks, the Jugo-Slavs, Liberians, or the men of other races, well, you need not be afraid! Do you not want the story of Ireland to be told? Of what are you ashamed? Give Ireland representation at the Peace Conference so that she may be heard, because it seems to me perfectly clear that you have not the slightest idea of settling this question yourselves. But supposing you are afraid and shamed by the Liberians and by all the other races! Supposing you are afraid that your treatment of Ireland brought the blush of shame to Bolivia and Uruguay and all the other little nations gathered around the Peace Conference table, then give Ireland the other right—that of self-determination! President Wilson, who, in my judgment, has not received over-generous treatment at the hands of this House to-day. President Wilson not once, I think, but twenty times has stated that the purposes for which this War was won was to secure freedom for small nationalities, and the right for every people to determine its own destiny. That is not the American doctrine only. The hon Member below me (Mr. Bottomley) and the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. E. McNeill) are followers of the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister accepted every declaration of President Wilson. He iterated and reiterated that he was in full sympathy and accord with all that President Wilson said on the inspiring purpose of the War. It was for this that countless men went out from Ireland.

Nationalists as sound as I am fought with superb courage and in the early parts of the Warcast lustre and glory upon Irish chivalry and upon Irish fighting power. You think only now of the worse side of Ireland. Public memories and the memories of politicians are short. You remember someone who has said something nasty about a Minister and has been cast into gaol. You forget. the heroic death of Willie Redmond, of Tom Kettle, and the many men who sat on these benches, and who spoke with pleading voices for a solution of this problem which they thought they were solving when they went out to fight for the freedom of small nationalities. We are here to see that that blood has not been shed in vain. I have stated that these are two simple proposals—two sample alternatives, either of which it is in your power to grant. Give Ireland her fair representation at the Peace Conference or give her the right of self-determination. You yourselves have proposed no solution. Therefore we are; entitled to demand that either one or other of the two solutions which we have presented should be accepted by the House, or, if they are rejected, we should be told the reason why.

My position here is an exceedingly difficult and delicate one. As I have said, I have no authority to speak for Ireland; neither have my colleagues. The Prime Minister, the Leader of the House, and their friends have seen to that by their treatment of those of us who through the early and critical stages of the War were faithful to the Allied cause, some of us giving far better and far more genuine material assistance than some of those in this House who prate most about their loyalty. Therefore, I say, the only fruit of your policy, you who are a constitutional party, is to disentitle my colleagues and myself to speak for Ireland. I am, however, representative of a great working-class constituency. I think—if I may strike a personal note without being charged with egotism—I am more interested in great social reforms than in political controversies. One of the ambitions of my life in fighting for the solution of the terrific conflict between these two nations was that I might take some part in my own native land, in a free democratic Parliament, in doing some of these things for the good of the masses, which the Labour party are endeavouring to do in this country. So long, however, as we are denied that right; so long as we are refused the power to apply our capacity, our civic zeal, and our devotion to the people to the interests of our own country, I must, while I am here, not because I want to be here, but because my constituents press upon me to come here, take that interest which an individual Member may in all these burning social questions which have been discussed in the House of Commons for the last two days.

I am not a Bolshevist. Indeed on these questions I am not even an extremist. I confess that I do not like the tone and character of the discussion that has taken place in this House in regard to those most important and vital problems touching the lives of the people which have engaged us yesterday and to-day. I represent a great city which has passed through a great industrial conflict. I deny that the strike in Belfast was ever inspired, engineered, or carried on by Bolshevists. Is that to be the new policy? When we demand justice for Ireland are you to shout "Rebel"? When we ask for freedom are you to cry "Pro-German"? When we advance our case for concession in a great and irresistible demand for a great reform are you to call us "Impossiblists"? Do not try the same game on Labour. It does not solve anything to shout "Bolshevist." All men who know anything of the strike of Belfast know that it was conducted with a dignity, a capacity, and a freedom from crimes of violence unexcelled in the history of any conflict in any part of the world. There was not a single Bolshevist associated with it. I know nothing about the troubles on the Clyde, or in London. I am an Irishman, and I do not interfere in the affairs of Scotland and England. I have learned too much to look other than at my own country, or to try to govern yours. I leave that for British Members to do in Ireland. But I am surprised that the Leader of the Labour party, in yesterday's speech, was so sweeping in his declaration as to the menacing and powerful character of the Bolshevist spirit. I know it exists. These people have agents everywhere. For my part I would not stand on a platform with one of them. But does not the House think that the treatment of our aspirations in a Bolshevist spirit may unwittingly become the instrument of Bolshevist agents, though the development of the matter may be assigned to other causes? When the Home Rule Bill was before Parliament, how was it defeated? Not by reason. Not by argument. Not by votes. Not by common-sense. The justice of the cause had passed out of the arena of discussion. Everywhere it was an accepted fact. What killed it? It was killed by your Bolshevists, clad in black cloth and wearing tall silk hats. I heard the Prime Minister yesterday say—and I would like to quote his words—

"I am prepared to say with full knowledge that no section of the community, however powerful it may be, can or will be allowed to hold up the whole nation."—[Official Report, 11th February, 1919, cols. 80–81.

Is that Cabinet policy? Has the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House subscribed to that? I want to know from him now did he subscribe to that doctrine? Did he believe that the minority in Ireland should hold up the whole nation? Did he not offer to put on a uniform and go over there to fight? Yes, Sir, Bolshevism was born on those benches. It was christened on those benches. It was fostered in every reactionary club and Conservative Association in this country. I remember Mr. Asquith, when in the House, uttering words that now may be regarded, I think, as a true prophecy. He said:—

"Has the right hon. Gentleman—"

I think he was replying to the Leader of the House—

"ever considered what might happen if in the whirligig of political fortunes he and his friends should become responsible for the Government of the country. Has he considered what might be the attitude of the people of Ireland in view of the advice he has given—the attitude not of the minority, but of a very large and overwhelming majority….I say to the right hon. Gentleman and to the friends who are associating themselves with him, that if the contingency, which I have described should arise—and mind you it would arise if you succeed in defeating this Bill—what answer are you to make to the vast majority of the Irish people when they resist the considered determination of Parliament, and appeal to the language of the right hon. Gentleman to justify their action?"

I am not aware that the right hon. Gentleman, the Leader of the House, denounced anarchy when anarchy was preached from the Tory benches.

The Lord Chancellor.

Was it anarchy? Perhaps new Members think I am exaggerating?

No, no!

Let me quote something for them, assuming for the moment they never heard or read of it before. Here is a speech delivered by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Trinity College in Glasgow—of all places in the world, Glasgow! on the Clyde! where Maclean was in gaol and Kirkwood in exile. Here is what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said, and I ask the House carefully to consider these words:—

"The Attorney-General has been reading me a lecture upon what is a serious matter, because I myself once or twice had the honour of being a, law officer of the Crown. He says that my doctrines, and the course I am taking, lead to anarchy. Does he not think I know that? Does he think that after coming to my time of life and passing through the various offices and responsibilities I have accepted I did this like a baby without knowing the consequences?"

What happened? No consequence followed him because he had on his side the great, the powerful, and the wealthiest party in the State. Anarchy is a crime when it is committed by the man who works before the furnace, when he is fighting for fair conditions and a decent living. Anarchy is a virtue when it is inscribed on the banner of a reactionary party fingering for power and place in this country. That is the only gospel which these gentlemen understand. These matters will be remembered when we come to this question.

I know there were forces at work to bring into Belfast the soldiers of the Army to put down the strike. You did it in Glasgow, and I venture to say that it is only the fear of political consequences which prevented you doing it in Belfast. What did the same right hon. Gentlemen say to those working men who we are now told are Bolsheviks? They were asking that the law of this Parliament, sanctioned at three elections and backed up by the sympathy of the whole world, should be observed, and he said:

"Had the operations started by the constabulary seizing the old town hall, the Unionist headquarters, it is certain that many thousands of volunteers engaged in work at the Queen's Island shipyards, half a mile away, would have left work and, reinforced by other men, some in the Volunteer Force and others who are not, would have attempted to regain possession of the building. The central office of the Belfast Police is in the same block of buildings, and as a high percentage of Belfast's male population carry revolvers it is doubtful whether the police could have held either the old town hall or their office."

That means to shoot their own countrymen, and this determination to defend their homes was called anarchy and Bolshevism. The right hon. Gentleman proceeded:

"Long before this troops could have arrived the streets would have been running in blood, and by the time General Macready could have reached the city from Hollywood to take over the duties of military governor under martial Jaw, a terrible situation would have arisen."

These are the people who now lecture the working classes, and who tell them when they make an attempt to improve their conditions they are Bolsheviks and must be put down by the heavy hand of the State. The hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. Bottomley) was loudly cheered in this House when he stated that those who were responsible for the War would have to be brought to justice, and I think that was the only sentiment which he uttered that received universal applause in this new Parliament. The hon. Member says he has been busily engaged in the pursuit of other activities, but I would remind him that it is not so long ago that the German Emperor was invited to take charge of Ireland, not by the so-called pro-Germans, but by the very hon. Gentlemen who cheered that sentiment loudest on these benches.

There is not a word of truth in it!

Of course I do not expect the hon. Member who interrupts me to accept anything I say, and consequently I always come prepared with my facts and my figures. Speaking upon the gospel of anarchy at Ladybank on 5th October, 1912, Mr. Asquith said:

"The possession of a conscience and a repugnance to obey inconvenient or objectionable laws are not the monopoly of the Protestants of the North-East of Ireland. This new dogma, countersigned as it is now by all the leading men of the Tory party, will be, invoked, and rightly invoked, cited, and rightly cited, called in aid, and rightly called in aid, whenever the spirit of lawlessness, fed and fostered by a sense whether of real or imaginary injustice, take body and shape and claims to stop the ordered machinery of a self-governing society."

Of course he signed it but they did not dethrone the King. They merely threatened him with the German Emperor, and they threatened us with, him also, although our only relationship with the Germans was that our soldiers fought them on the plains of Belgium and France. [An Hon. Member: "What about Roger Casement?"] Do not bother me about him. I know he was in the English Public Service for forty years. In Ireland we may hate your rule but we are never disloyal to the Flag, and when fighting is to be done we are never traitors to one cause or another, and we believe in standing or falling or fighting for it, and the hon. Member opposite never made a more unhappy interruption. [An Hon. Member: "What about Austen Chamberlain?"]

It would be just as well to remind the House that the rule here is that speeches must be addressed to me in the Chair and not to hon. Members across the floor of the House.

I thought you were enjoying it so much, and I thought I might be allowed to give them some quotations. We were told not only that we were to be delivered from our bondage by the German Emperor, but when Home Rule was going through all its vicissitudes and trials we were told that we should not only have to face the prospective incursion of Kaiser William, but also the military power of the British Army. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belfast (Sir E. Carson) said they had made pledges and promises; when the time comes, and if necessary, they would come over to help to keep the flag flying. Again Mr. Asquith called attention to the serious nature of these declarations. He said in the same speech at Ladybank:

"A more deadly blow—I say it with the utmost deliberation and with the fullest conviction—a more deadly blow has never been dealt in our time by any body of responsible politicians at the very foundations on which democratic government rests."

How, under these circumstances, can the Government lecture these working men upon the extreme attitude that the working classes have adopted in this country I What is it that has aroused the ire of all those forces I It is a modest demand in the city of Belfast for a working week of forty-four hours. And what is there revolutionary in that? There was a meeting called in Belfast during the General Election to which every candidate was invited, and every one of them attended but myself.

No, I did not go, although I was in favour of it.

Then they all went except the hon. Gentleman who did not go although he was in favour of it, and they all pledged themselves to vote for a forty-four hours week

Yes, if uniformly applied.

I was the only Member who did not attend.

You had no convictions at all.

My convictions are well known to the working classes in Belfast, and they understand them perfectly. When the hon. Member opposite comes forward and takes a similar stand to that which I have taken for the last fifteen years, even for the men who have voted against me at every election, I shall not be envious, but I shall be delighted to find him a colleague of mine in the cause of industrial progress. It was a modest request, but there were the same cries of Bolshevism hurled at these men both on the platform and in the newspapers. I say that the only way in which you can kill unrest and Bolshevism is not by pursuing the attitude adopted by Ministers and others who try to find settled reasons for not giving increased wages or shorter hours, but by recognising that democracy is determined to make the world safe for itself. Are we to understand, now that the War is over, that the same old weary cycle is to be continued of crushing the poor, of sweating, low wages, long hours, lack of leisure, after forcing the people from the simpler pleasures and delights of life in order that the great industrial machine may grow greater and more powerful? That is not what the people went into the War for, though it may be the purpose for which jingoes in every part of the world went into the War. Men went out to fight that they might enjoy some of the fruits of their sacrifices, and that they might be enriched in better and higher lives and in nobler conditions by the blood and tears that were shed in that conflict. So far as I am concerned, whether I speak for Ireland or for myself, I shall fight that cause as long as I am in this House, and to any party that pleads that cause and devotes itself to its promotion I and my colleagues will be delighted to give our constant support and our continued co-operation.

I come again to repeat what I said at the beginning. I want to know what is your policy in regard to Ireland? I want an answer from the right hon. Gentleman as to whether he is going to release these political prisoners. I have no doubt that the political prisoners would resent my interference. I do it not because they want me to do it, or desire that I should not do it, but I do it as a lover of human liberty. These men were imprisoned without trial and they were deported without charge made, apart from a fabricated story about a German plot that was invented by someone and given publicity by the Chief Secretary at that time. Never for one moment has any hon. Member of this House been enlightened as to what that German plot was, or who was in it. We were merely told that it was a German plot. All the Government had to do was to fake up some charge, arrest the semen, deport them to some other country without trial, and keep them in prison. I want to know when that is to end. If there, ever was any German plot, they can be no longer in any German plot. They can be no longer of any trouble. Their continued imprisonment is a source of anger, irritation and bitterness. Do you want to continue that? You know, everyone of you, that there was no German plot. The man who told us the story was only Chief Secretary for about a fortnight, and the man who was Lord Lieutenant for five years said that he never heard of a German plot until he read about it in the newspapers. That was the charge on which these men were imprisoned, deported, and kept there without charge. A more grave scandal against public justice I do not think was ever recorded in the history of any country. You had better let out the prisoners. They for the moment represent Ireland; we do not. You must make your arrange- ments with them as to the solution of this problem. If you do not, then the only thing for you to do is to fall back upon those principles which have gone from every platform in these islands and every Allied platform in Europe. You had better put the principle of self-determination into operation as the democratic and inspiring cry which roused your soldiers as they went to battle in the cause of liberty, or you had better give Ireland her right to plead her cause before another and more impartial tribunal.

For my part, like nearly everyone interested either in Ireland or in the welfare of these islands, I am profoundly and passionately anxious that some solution of this problem should be found. I have never been and never will be a party to sweeping attacks upon the English people, knowing as I do how splendidly they have gone out in this War, how uncomplainingly they have suffered and fought, and how uncomplainingly their relatives have borne the terrific sacrifices which have darkened their domestic hearths. I know, too, for I have come into contact with them at various great demonstrations throughout England during the last ten years, how deep-rooted is their devotion to the cause of freedom, and how anxious they are that Ireland should come into her own. It is, therefore, because I believe in the interests of humanity. You talk about a League of Nations. You had better first create a League of Nations here around your own doors, a league between Ireland and England not brought about by the coercive method of the sword or the destruction of constitutional liberty and every form of justice, but a league based upon mutual trust, goodwill, and common understanding. [An Hon. Member: "Is it possible?"] There have been more impossible things than that done. It is thirty years since we heard that cry, and we have seen what has occurred as the result of the "Impossibles" being here in this House and in these islands. We know what has happened during the last thirty years. If Mr. Gladstone's policy had been carried out, you would have Ireland to-day not with a dagger drawn to meet you, but with a warm handshake, a friendly spirit of comradeship, working with you just as we worked with you at the beginning of the War. Listen to the "Impossibles" and you may bring ruin to Ireland, but you will also bring destruction to your Empire.

I do not intend to say very much on the points raised by the two hon. Members who have just addressed the House, but I cannot approach the main body of the remarks which I intend to offer without saying, on behalf of those with whom I act in this House, how much we are in agreement with the appeal once more uttered by an Irish representative who so eloquently pleats their cause. I must conclude that many hon. Gentlemen opposite cannot hear without certain pangs of regret the language of the quotation which my hon. Friend has used, and, if they, have no painful memories in respect of these speeches delivered in this country and in their own in the years 1913 and1914, I may remind them that these quotations adorn the walls of many of the most extreme and revolutionary clubs in this country. They are to be found in almost every Bolshevik newspaper. They provide very largely the literature and the pamphlets that are circulated, I will not say in any very large numbers, but that, at any rate, are very industriously circulated for propaganda purposes. Accordingly, the members of the Labour party read with very great regret the little phrase embodied in the Gracious Speech from the Throne on this all-important subject of Ireland. "The position in Ireland," says the Speech, "causes the greatest anxiety," and the hope is expressed that things may soon sufficiently improve to make it possible to provide a durable settlement of this difficult problem. That is most unsatisfying. It is a mere pious opinion, not worthy of the statemanship which should have accumulated in this House as the result of the recent election.

Either the Government will finally have to yield to an accumulation of disorder which is rising in Ireland, or they will have to assemble there a sufficient military force to mock the plea which the Government are making at the Peace Conference in Paris for the settlement of the claims being put forward or the ground of self-determination by various peoples in Europe. Finally, the Government will have to yield to the very disorder which its past policy has created. I have no doubt that from the material standpoint, the standpoint of pounds, shillings and pence, or of ordinary prosperity, that Ireland is as well situated to-day as she has ever been in recent years. That only proves that no kind of government of Ireland from this country will be or can be accepted by the Irish people as a good enough government for them. I think it was Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman who said one of the wisest things that has been uttered upon this subject. "Good government," he said, "is no substitute for self-government." And in these days when the claim for self-government is being universally admitted, the Government of this country ought, to have more to say to us on this difficult Irish problem than the mere expression of this hope to which I draw attention. I agree with my hon. Friend that in face of the divided opinion in Ireland, and the improbability of that divided opinion being reconciled, it becomes all the more the duty of the Government to face with unusual courage the situation which has so long continued and to apply the provisions of such an Act of Parliament as this House has so repeatedly sanctioned in order to bring this interminable Irish conflict to an end.

6.0 P.M.

I have risen mainly to bring the House back to some of the questions which formed the greater part of our discussion yesterday. I listened with the greatest sense of disappointment to what in the main the Prime Minister expressed to the House yesterday, for it is true, as my hon. Friend has reminded the House, that the Prime Minister, perhaps more than any other man, especially on occasions when he has had to face labour conferences or labour deputations, has given every encouragement to organised labour to expect great things from our Government, not to rely merely upon themselves or their organisations, but to turn to Parliament for the great social changes to which they aspire. Audacity was preached by the Prime Minister as quite, the proper line for organised labour to follow. The Government cannot indulge in such language as we find in the middle of the main paragraph of the King's Speech without following this language up by some substantial action. The speech speaks of "stamping out unmerited poverty, of an intention to diminish unemployment, to mitigate its sufferings, to provide decent homes for the people, to improve the nation's health, and to raise the standard of well-being throughout the community." A Government cannot trade in this language and continue it upon platforms, unless it suits its Parliamentary action to the word. The Labour party for months have looked in vain to the Government for some effective action to deal with housing and with many of the other industrial and social evils which abound. Therefore, I make no apology for asking the House to return to what the Prime Minister himself regarded as the all-important and pressing problem for this House to take in hand. I agree, however—I say this knowing it to be the genuine feeling of my colleagues in this House—that great as our difficulties are and even though they might become greater in industrial England, the sense of relief which we all feel at the termination of the War should enable us, not in any party sense or in any class sense, collectively and unitedly better to handle these problems than has been the case up to the present moment. This abiding liberation from the pressure which the War imposed upon us gives us now the greatest of all opportunities to settle more effectively the great home problems that were placed before the country in so many speeches in the course of the Election. I want at this early stage to repeat a complaint which I have made elsewhere of the failure of the Government to keep faith with the assurance repeatedly and expressly given by the Prime Minister as to the place which Labour would have at the Peace, Conference in regard to the great questions between the nations. The Prime Minister during the course of the War perhaps over-praised labour for the part it had played in it, and thereby gave some stimulus and encouragement to the measure of the terms that Labour frequently demanded. When the Prime Minister undertook to form a Government more than two years ago, he invited the Parliamentary Labour party in this House and the executive of the Labour Organisation in the country, jointly to meet him to consider the conditions or terms on which, as organised labour, we might take some part in the Government which he was to form, and he expressly assured that joint meeting that Labour would have a place at the Peace Conference. If he meant anything, surely he meant Labour as represented by those whom he was addressing—Labour, as represented by the Parliamentary party in this House—twice as large now as it was then—and Labour as represented by the organisation to which his remarks were addressed at that moment. My complaint is that the pledge which was given has not been honoured. There is, therefore, in the country, in the ranks of the army of labour, very keen disappointment at their not having the place in the Peace negotiations which was assured to them. It may be said on behalf of the Government that no party, as a party, has a right to be represented in these negotiations. It may be said that the Government alone, as a Government, have the sole right to conduct these negotiations. Why, then, was the promise given to Labour. If Labour had no right as a Parliamentary body or as an organisation to have representatives at the Peace Conference, why was the assurance given? I can assure the Leader of the House that at the time that assurance went far to persuade many of us of the necessity of taking part in the Government. Those of us who were opposed to taking part in any Coalition Government were considerably influenced by that assurance, and I allege that faith has not been kept either with the Parliamentary party or with the Labour organisations in the country. [An Hon. Memrer: "What about Barnes?"] I have the greatest regard for my right hon. Friend the Member for the Gorbals Division of Glasgow (Mr. Barnes), but my right hon. Friend was not a Labour candidate at the recent election, he is not a member of the Parliamentary Labour party, and he has no connection with the organisation. He is in no way in association with those to whom the pledge was given at the time of which I speak. If that interjection means that Labour has a right to be represented as Labour, then I claim that the party to whom the pledge was given has a right to suggest who its representatives ought to be. While we may have the fullest trust and confidence in my right hon. Friend as one of the representatives of the Government, we are by no means represented as a party by him and the pledge is not fulfilled.

I have also to complain of the manner in which the Prime Minister yesterday responded to a question put by my right hon. Friend who leads the Labour party with regard to what was to happen to the peace terms when they are signed. It appears that what is to happen is that some four or five right hon. Gentlemen who are at the head of the Government, virtually in the position of dictators, never referring, so far as we know, any of these important and highly controversial questions to this House are to proceed month by month to the completion of their great task, even to the point of signing the terms as they may be arranged by them. Then the finished document is to be placed on the Table of this House. Hon. Members who even might be new to the conditions of Parliamentary work will be well aware that a document so laid is laid with the claim of requiring the ready sanction and obedient support of those who range behind the Government, and that any difference of view would be made a point of loyalty and support to the Government, and would undoubtedly be made a test question, as to whether any hon. Member was giving the support to the Government which he guaranteed he would give when he was before the electors. It is not sufficient that this great task should be completed by just a few representatives at the head of the Government without this House being taken periodically into account, and being given an opportunity of discussing those grave matters which form the subject of settlement between nation and nation. I understood that we had emerged from the days of secret diplomacy, but it does not appear to be so. We have not yet got to the point where these grave questions are to be discussed in the open, and when the Parliaments of the world shall be able to bring to bear their rightful influence in the different stages of the settlement of these all-important problems.

As the Prime Minister is here now, I think I am entitled to repeat, a complaint expressed in the country by some of us, that on the eve of the General Election he failed to do credit to his very high station and great influence in this country, by a most ungenerous and totally unwarranted attack upon the Labour party, when appealing for the support of the electors. I have not the exact language before me, but I recall statements to the effect that the party was dominated by a Bolshevik element, that its decisions in the main were influenced by a body of men who were to be regarded as enemies of their country, and that certain of our former colleagues were named and held up to the ridicule of the electors. I claim that the services of the Parliamentary party, in the main in connection with the War, the services of labour in the country in connection with the building up of an army, and with the supplying of our immense stores of munitions—I claim that all these things entitled labour to a more accurate descrip- tion of its position on the eve of the election than was used by the Prime Minister on that occasion. As a result of that line of conduct the Prime Minister has secured a far bigger personal following in this House; but he has, as every hon. Member now clearly sees, built up in the country a greater degree of discontent, a greater measure of unrest and dissatisfaction than existed even before that election took place. Hundreds of thousands of workmen who readily voted for the Coalition Government, and backed the Prime Minister on the election day, are ready to strike against this Government now and to take the most extreme steps. The reasons for this change are not far to seek. Faith was soon lost in a Government which secured so large a measure of its power by these very doubtful and, I think, unworthy means.

What action has the Government taken in the two or three months in which it has had power to suit its deeds to the words of the Speech from the Throne? Problems are to be handled, houses are to be built, unmerited poverty is to be lessened, suffering is to be relieved, and the standard of well-being is to be built up. I set aside what I think was a totally unjustifiable waste of time involved in the General Election itself, and I come to what has been attempted on administrative lines. Nothing has been attempted, nothing has been accomplished to deal with the labour situation more than could be covered by the word "doles." A very large number of people, in all I believe now some 700,000 persons, very largely women, are receiving State grants week by week for doing nothing. Some millions of pounds of State money are so being paid out. That is not a settlement; that is not a solution; that is not statesmanship. It is a mere device for delaying the task of facing these difficulties as they ought to be faced. Labour does not want unemployed benefit of this kind. It does not want idle pay. It wants wages for work. Surely, with all the preparation of the past year or two, and with all the resources at the command of the right hon. Gentleman, the Government ought to be equal to more effective administrative work than this organised paying out of millions of money for doing nothing whatever. It may be seen in what I understand is the decision of the Miners' Federation, sitting in conference to-day, how little the Prime Minister has so far contributed to a solution of this great industrial difficulty which confronts us. The tone and terms of his speech of yesterday are likely to be interpreted as a challenge to labour, and undoubtedly will provoke some retaliation from labour quarters. I agree whole-heartedly, and I think the whole of my hon. Friends are in agreement also, with the Prime Minister when he said that disorder must be put down, that such acts of crime as in a few instances have been committed, such excesses as I say without hesitation have now and then disgraced the record of Labour, must be resisted. With all that side of his case we are in the fullest agreement, but it leaves his case totally incomplete. The situation is not handled by strong language of that character, for indeed all that labour has to do, if it wishes to create the most serious trouble and nothing more, is not to commit offences, not to break the law, it merely has to stand by. Let labour remain idle on a very large scale for any considerable number of days and the Government is in a totally helpless position. So that more than doles, more than strong language, more than that part of the speech which we had yesterday calling for reverence for the law is required from the Government if this situation is to be faced. The administrative provisions, paying out donation benefit, and the provision under the head of the Wage Regulations Act cannot last very much longer. They both expire in May. What assurance can we have that even this relief in the shape of doles is to be replaced in order to meet the state of unemployment which will then exist? Unemployment is bound to grow unless this urgent work of reconstruction, of which the Prime Minister spoke on the eve of the Election, is to be taken in hand more effectively than it has been up to the moment. What yet has been done or attempted on any one of these matters of substance referred to in the Speech from the Throne? In May of this year you will have hundreds of thousands of women, and men as well, deprived of these doles which the Government is now paying them, and unless by that time this work is hastened and those steps of promptness of which the Prime Minister yesterday spoke are taken, the country will be involved in a long continued, though I will not say endless payment week by week of millions of money for absolutely no kind of service. Work then might be organised, and the changes that we look for from war employment to peace labour might be more effectively put into practice and superintended than they have been.

A few questions yesterday were definitely put to the Prime Minister from this side of the House, which he failed not only to answer, but even to notice. He was asked as to what was the position in Russia? This is a question which is being asked week by week at thousands of meetings. The Albert Hall has rung with it, and however much we might pass by these signs of unrest, they are undoubtedly extending. The public is in a state of mystification, and disgust even, with regard to the situation to which we are parties in Russia. For what purpose is our Army there? What is its object? Is it fair that men who have served throughout the four or five years of war in the Eastern and the Westerntheatres of battle should, as is the case I am told in many instances, be sent out to Russia for a totally unknown purpose? Surely my right hon. Friend who put the question yesterday was entitled to some notice and to some definite answer, if not for his satisfaction, at least in order that the labour mind in the country might be a little more reassured. Absolute silence was maintained by the Prime Minister on the question put to him with regard to Conscription. There is, in the King's Speech, a rather ambiguous reference to future military service, and to the kind of Army that for our present unknown purposes we require. On the eve of the election the Kingdom was assured that Coalition meant the abolition of Conscription. Can that statement be repeated in this House? Are conditions of military service covered by the word "Conscription" to be the means by which any future Army for this unknown purpose is to be created? The country is entitled at this stage to know what is in the mind of the Government with regard to the manner in which the Army shall be got together. for was any reference made in the Prime Minister's speech yesterday to another matter which properly agitates the labour mind During the war many millions of national money were expended in the acquirement of national properties for war purposes Ships, stores, buildings, factories, machinery, and implements of many kinds were required for many purposes. I understand that there is to be some consideration of this question by one of the Departments of State as to how these properties are to be disposed of. The public ought not to be left to the uncertainty of newspaper reports on an important matter of Government policy of this kind. Are all the ships to be sold to private shipowners? Are these properties, stores, buildings, materials, machines, tools and so on to be said on private capitalist terms to private capitalists? We are surely entitled to some answer to the question how these great national properties can now be used by the nation for productive, urgent and necessary work in order that unemployment shall not be receiving the weekly grants to which I have referred, but producing some wealth for the nation itself.

I concluded, after listening intently to the Prime Minister yesterday, that his view was that there are not now available in this country means whereby any considerable settlement of the position of the worker may be made. I would invite the Prime Minister to be a little more definite as to what the wage earners of the country may expect from the policy which he expounded yesterday. I may recall in his hearing what I understood to be the statements which he made. He warned the workers of claims which were deemed to be extravagant, of the impossibility of solving the problem of unemployment by restricting working hours, and of the impossibility of meeting foreign competition and of maintaining British industries if higher wages were paid. I can assure the Prime Minister, if the requires the assurance, that the working class mind works very simply but quite accurately upon these great economic questions, and unless you can give to the workmen material benefit in the shape of less labour and more pay you have not convinced them that you have made their position any better. So that, dross your purposes in what language you choose, you have to meet the material claims of the masses of the wage-earners by lessening the load of their labour where they are carrying too heavy a load and by making their spending power greater in order that they may enjoy more material means of existence. And in that direction my conclusion was that the working classes could not, according to the policy outlined by the Prime Minister, expect any considerable measure of betterment. I agree fully with the Prime Minister that working men can make extravagant claims. I have said that in many quarters during recent months, particularly where I have seen those claims growing. I have per- sonally resisted those claims, as I believe in their interest, and I say to organised Labour that it can make the great mistake of asking and pressing for too much at one time. But there are exceptions even to this general rule, and surely, in reference to those exceptions, the Prime Minister might turn his eye upon some of the balance sheets of trading companies and of great producing companies. Let him ascertain how big have been the fortunes made in the last two and a half years of the War, for instance, say, out of the sale of coal, out of the sale of food, even out of the sale of beer, a subject, by the way, which is one for more than merriment. Let the Prime Minister look up so simple a matter as supplying the people of the country with thread, and see the balance sheets, the size of the profits of so many of these big firms trading in all manner of things and he will at once find an explanation of two things. He will find an explanation of the high price of many articles the price of which ought to be lower, and he will find an explanation of the disgust and the discontent which exists in the minds of working men with regard to the alleged inability of the Government to meet any of these reasonable claims which are being presented. These great fortunes made during the course of the War and as incidental to the War, as almost a condition of trading conducted during the War, area matter rather for shame on the part of those who receive them than for credit. I agree with the Prime Minister in his argument as to the relationship between one trade and another, and to the difficulties of isolating any particular trade or group of trades, and that is why I have desired that no one great organised body of men should take advantage of their organised power to place themselves in any unduly favourable position as compared with their fellows.

But there is another side to this, to which the Prime Minister did not refer. It is the side which calls for exceptional treatment from the law because the men are now in an exceptional position as, for instance, the miner, who is in an exceptional position compared with the clerk or the shop assistant or the postal worker, a locomotive man, or a man making gas or working in a chemical yard. Many men employed in several of the more arduous and dangerous trades are now so excep- tionally circumstanced by their labouring conditions that they are entitled to some exceptional consideration. That, however, does not remove, I hope, the point which I tried to make, that even those who have a reasonable claim can press it too far and ask for too much at one time. But let me in the case of the miners recall to the House its recognition of their exceptional position. I was in this House when by almost a unanimous vote it recognised the dangerous and arduous nature of the miners' work, and the law years ago did for the miner what it would do for no other worker. It fixed his hours of labour by Statute. So that there are exceptions, and these exceptions the Government ought not wholly to set aside. When the Prime Minister or others have to consider the actions which trade unions in these days are obliged to take and the unfortunate manifestations of force in which certain trade unionists are indulging, let them not forget the history—though I am not going into it now—of the origin, development, and establishment of trade unions. They grew out of force. They had to overcome by force the forces ranged against them to get their very life. They had to fight against the law to be recognised by it. In the earlier days of our presence in this House, as the older Members will remember, we constantly had to fight for little things which the country might well have conceded as an act of simple justice. We had to reverse Osborne Judgments and Taff Vale decisions. We had to get the legal right to politically organise ourselves and to pay contributions in order to meet returning officers' expenses. So that in the very birth and history of these organisations there has been left some natural sense and consciousness of the virtues of force in the trade union mind. As this is a doctrine which has been preached in very high quarters, not without success, it is no wonder that in these days it is being imitated by simpler folks who now have the force of numbers behind them.

Against that doctrine of force I put the view for what it is worth to the trade union mind of the ultimate dangers and losses and the present futility of that method on the part of trade unions. I stand not only for respect for the law, because we make it, but because some day those of us who have now to play the part of critic and sometimes of opponent of the Government may for aught we know be called upon by the country to be responsible for the making and admistration of the law. We, or those who are to follow us, who may have that responsibility should be careful of the examples which in theses days of less responsibility and greater freedom we may now set. Therefore, we want not only law in the land and respect for it so long as it is the law, but law within the trade unions, law within these great organisations which sometimes can become so potent as to contest the law and even overcome it. I want to see discipline maintained in these great organisations. Some of these trade unions and their officers are now on their trial. I would ask these officers to show themselves worthy of the occasion and not to surrender their self-respect to any degree of pressure that may be used against them in connection with any one of these industrial disputes. So long as leaders are authorised to lead and are put in positions of responsibility to guide and advise they should insist, if only as a matter of their own self-respect, upon the rules, regulations and procedure of their organisations and their societies being followed just as we would insist upon the law of the land being applied if we were responsible for it.

In this regard I would like to level a complaint at the Government for its lack of alertness, if no more, in following the examples which it has asked private employers to set. I had the honour some time ago of sitting with many other men under the leadership of the Deputy-Speaker of this House, in whose absence I may say that that very useful document the Whitley Report was produced under his guidance, and that the skill, forbearance, resourcefulness and knowledge of men used in building up what is known as the Whitley Report entitle the Deputy-Speaker of this House to the thanks of the nation for the good that I am certain will eventually come from what was done by those of us who were called upon to carry out that task. As representing the men's interest and the masters' interest we found ourselves able to reconcile opposites because of a great sense of public duty and because of the convict ion that it behoved us to try to provide some better way of preventing these industrial differences and of settling them when they arise. The Whitley Report has been before the country for about a year or more. Scores und scores of industries are covered by its provisions. I am attached to a trade union representing more than 300,000 members and covering more than 100 different occupations in which already we have provided representatives for more than seventy different industrial councils sot up under the provisions of the Whitley Report. Hundreds of these industrial councils have been established, and I want to see them followed by corresponding councils in the districts and eventually to see in the workshop committees of men who will act with the management in a spirit of co-operation, who will act not in any frame of mind of revolt against the firm or the heads of it, but with a desire jointly to create harmony and produce the best fruits that can be brought from the joint efforts of those who may be concerned in the shop. In that way the individual workman will have the responsibility placed upon him of taking a personal part in what is called the control of industry in the interests of labour. In such a position I am hopeful that the plain, simple man will eventually feel some pride in taking a useful part in labour's share of the control of industry, of which now so much is said.

What has the Government as a great employer done to make good the provisions of the Whitley Report in their own Departments? Within the Government there is contained, I think, the greatest single employer of labour in the United Kingdom—the Postmaster-General, and in other State Departments employment is given to hundreds of thousands of workers. What example is the Government setting in tie matter of popularising and extending these industrial councils and workshop centres and district committees? I attended a meeting about a week ago of a considerable number of postal workers, and a resolution had to be passed protesting against the failure of the Postmaster-General to set up these industrial councils and to give his employés the facilities for participating in the settlement of industrial disputes which the Government calls upon private employers of labour to put into practice. In some Departments I know something has been done, but I do seriously say to the Prime Minister that the Government has failed to give a lead to employers or to be an example, and that it has lagged behind and waited for a lead from a considerable number of private employers in the country.

Despite these criticisms I can assure my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister that so far as we act in opposition it will be with a desire to co-operate with the Government in taking speedily any one of the good steps that have been referred to in the Speech from the Throne. But promptness is everything. This House, consisting in the main of men returned to support a Coalition Government, should begrudge none of its time in acting, when we have overcome the preliminaries of the week, and should tolerate no waste, even by length of speech, but should face as practical workers the conditions of expectance which have been raised by the assurances given to the country. I do not want legislation to be slurred over or scamped, but I would remind this new House that during the life of the late House, for at least three out of four years, war measures were speedily got through. The Government had only to ask for support to receive it. Those were the days of swift and prompt legislation, and by either one means or another in an hour there could be accomplished greater things than were possible by months of time in the ordinary days of party controversy.

Those were temporary laws.

I would say to the Noble Lord that we do not wish the conditions which the War period has created to become permanent, but, at any rate, they are with us for the moment. The conditions of mind and body which the War has created are with us for the moment, and they may require legislation which in certain of its aspects would be permanent in order adequately to deal with those conditions. The whole of this problem is not covered by unemployment, by low wages, or by any one of the things known to us as industrial conditions. The breadwinners have been lost. Fathers, brothers, and sons have gone, and there is a very natural cry rising from the hearts of hundreds of thousands of people whose homes have been robbed of their dear ones. This is a factor in the formation of the conditions of unrest which the Government must effectively handle, and as these men went out to fight to secure victory for their country they naturally look to the country's Government to look to them in a better way than they were ever supported by the Government before. That legislation which was so simple and easy to get during the War might be taken as our pattern for the peace-time legislation which is now so urgent because of the problems which the War has created. Finally, I agree with another statement made by the Prime Minister, but I wish him not merely to express in very general and moving terms his approval of certain definite things. The Prime Minister must move more than our emotions. He must move those real grievances which exist. It is not enough to say that individual liberty may be enlarged and that certain restrictions ought to taken from us. It is within his power speedily—I will even say at once—to do all these things. Individual freedom was very much curbed during the War. "Dora" is still very powerful. Men, if I may say so, feel its irksomeness. Hundreds of thousands of workmen feel the difficulty of either not being able to get into a tavern or being ejected from one long before the daylight has spent itself. There are many of these restraints which are now severe limitations upon individual freedom, which the Government at once could take away without the slightest risk so far as the War is concerned or the internal security of the country itself is concerned. Delay in this matter will not be readily pardoned in view of the great administrative resources at the disposal of the Government. I can assure the House that it is our honest and fervent desire to work in co-operation with all parties in this House to attain those great ends which constituted in the main the mandate of the Prime Minister when he appealed to the electors of this country, and in securing the attainment of those ends we claim for both hand and brain worker the release from the personal difficulties, from the individual restraints which war conditions impose. We claim for the workers simply fair and reasonable consideration for such reasonable claims as they may make. There is something reasonable in many of the claims for a shorter working day without any damage being done to the commercial and trading prospects of this country. There are ways and means still at the disposal of the commercial genius of the country to enable our firms to be re-adapted, and our businesses and tasks to be conducted on such lines as will give no advantage to the foreigner, but at the same time will give some advantage to the oppressed and overworked masses of the industrial population of this country. If we secure these things both for the hand and brain worker during this, our first Session, then I think the Prime Minister can look forward to the second with every hope of continued support from these benches.

I desire to raise the question of Conscription. I am very glad that the Prime Minister is here, as I want to ask him some questions. I and some of myhon. Friends had put down an Amendment on this question, but that Amendment cannot be moved, because the Government have this afternoon given notice of a Bill dealing with the armed forces. They have done this despite the fact that there was no notice relating to the matter upon the Order Paper, and I do ask why this indecent haste? Why could not notice have been given to-morrow? Then, perhaps, this Amendment would have been moved. I regard the whole proceeding as a very wrong one, and I am afraid it is too characteristic of many of the methods of the Government. I am afraid also that it points clearly to the fact that this Bill, when it is introduced, will be a Conscription Bill, and I want to ask the Government to state definitely in the course of this Debate whether the Bill will be a Conscription Bill or not. Two questions relating to this matter were asked of the Prime Minister yesterday—one by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Labour party (Mr. A damson) and one by my right hon. Friend theMember for Peebles (Sir D. Maclean). Yet the Prime Minister, in the course of a long speech, did not say a word about the matter. Now, speaking in Wales recently, the Prime Minister prayed, in the words of the Psalmist, that his tongue would cleave to the roof of his mouth if he proved false to Liberal principles. Apparently his tongue did cleave to the roof of his mouth yesterday. At any rate, he never said a syllable upon this vital question.

During the election there was a definite declaration of the Government policy. On several occasions it was stated that the Government stood for no Conscription. It is quite true that I did not believe their promises, because I do not believe the Government, and I do not trust them. In my opinion the election which has taken place was the most fraudulent election of modern times, and the Government have obtained power by methods which are a lasting disgrace to English political life. But although I did not believe the Government many people did, and I want to remind the House of some of the things which happened during the election. Now I will go to the Prime Minister. On 12th December, very near the eve of the polling, the Prime Minister, in reply to a correspondent, wrote as follows:

"Dear Sir,—You send me a cutting from to-day's 'Daily News' to the effect that a vote for the Coalition is a vote for Conscription, and you ask me if this is true. My reply is that it is not only not true, but that it is a calculated and characteristic falsehood."

Hear, hear!

Very well; wait and see. During the election for Carnarvon Boroughs, election posters appeared calling on the electorates to "Vote for the Prime Minister and no Conscription." Then again on 22nd and 23rd December, when the Government was angling for the soldier's vote—there was still time—there appeared in the Press what was called a Lloyd George programme, and the second item in that programme was "No more Conscription." These are perfectly definite pledges. There is no ambiguity about them, and I ask the Prime Minister, is he going to honour these pledges, and if not, why not? Is it because his Tory masters will not let him? Is that the reason? But whatever difficulties he may have to meet, and they are very great, and entirely of his own creation, I do submit that the Government cannot play fast and loose with this vital issue. The policy of the Government should be, first to announce that Conscription will terminate at the expiration of the Military Service Act, and, second, to urge at the Peace Conference, and to emphasise again and again, that Conscription must be abolished in all countries entering into the Leagues of Nations. If the Government will do that, they will be backed by President Wilson and they will get their way.

This policy which I urge upon the Government is not asking for any new departure nor is it asking for anything inconsistent with the Armistice terms or with the League of Nations. On the contrary, one of the most important of President Wilson's points—and it was these points which really were the basis of the Armistice terms—was No. 4, and it was endorsed by our own Government and the Allied Governments and enemy Powers when signing the Armistice terms—that adequate securities should be given and taken, that national armaments will be reduced down to the lowest point; consistent with domes- tic safety. By no possible interpretation can those words be made to involve Conscription or to leave the least loophole for it in future. Therefore it is idle and irrelevant to argue as some people do that our policy must depend upon what other countries do. If words mean anything at all this No. 4 of President Wilson's terms made an end of Conscription not only in this country, but in all countries entering into the League of Nations. Therefore I am merely asking the Government to reaffirm in effect one of the Armistice terms.

There is now a great opportunity which has never occurred before and may never occur again of getting rid of this accursed system which has brought such untold suffering upon Europe. So far as this House is concerned, it has a grave responsibility in this matter. Conscription was passed by the last Parliament and was accepted by the country, in so far as it was accepted by the country, on one clear, definite understanding that it was to be a war Bill, and a war Bill only. I do not think that there is any dispute as to that. Mr. Asquith, who was then Prime Minister, in reply to a deputation just before the Bill was introduced, said:

"This is a war Bill and a war Bill only."

The present Foreign Secretary, in the House on 6th January, 1916, spoke in the same sense, and later on Lord Lansdowne, who was then in the Cabinet, spoke in the House of Lords in a similar sense. If these pledges had not been given Conscription would not have been passed and could not have been passed; and I ask the Liberal Coalition Members in particular, What are they going to do if the Government refuse to pronounce against Conscription? The simple truth is that in view of the pledges which were given when Conscription was passed, and by means of which it was passed, it would be a distinct breach of faith if the Military Service Acts are continued in any form at all. Such being the case, what excuse can be offered for continuing Conscription?

For myself I have always been against Conscription. I voted against all the Military Service Acts in this House of Commons, and I have been returned by my Constituents resolutely to oppose Conscription in any form, and I will vote against it on any and every occasion. But apart from my own position, I ask again, What excuse can the Government give for continuing Conscription? It cannot be said that Conscription is necessary or will be necessary because of an inconclusive peace. No such situation has arisen. Germany has been crushingly defeated. That really means that the last hope of the conscriptionists is gone. Some people, for lack of a better reason, contend that Conscription will be necessary to ensure the peace. If it is the Government policy—and I think this is the case—to have an army of occupation, then sufficient men could be got for that purpose if they were paid better and treated better. Something has been done in this direction, but not enough. The War Office in their recent statement refer to a gap, which apparently, according to their argument, could only be bridged over by continuing Conscription. But their conclusion was most unconvincing. How can the War Office or the Government or anybody else say that there will be a gap until they have seen what better pay and still better treatment for our men will do? In particular I urge that a Committee should be set up at once to revise and scrap many of the King's Regulations. The men must be treated better and paid better.

7.0 P.M.

If we could afford to pay £7,000,000 a day to beat the Germans and pay interest at the rate of 5 per cent., which is a very high rate of interest, on £8,000,000,000 debt, then we can afford to offer very liberal terms to the comparatively small number of men who will be required to wind up the War. We can afford to offer such terms as will induce a sufficient number of men to volunteer for an army of occupation. But here I come to the Prime Minister again. When it was a matter of getting votes the Prime Minister said, "There must be no army of occupation." He said that in the Bristol speech on 11th December, and later on, in the same speech, he said, "It will not be necessary to have an army of occupation," and he continued to contend that pressure, if necessary, would be brought to bear upon them—that is, the Germans—by economic and international means, and that that would give the best results. For my part, I do not like the economic weapon, but as a temporary measure, to meet an emergency, I should certainly prefer it to Conscription. Further, it is virtually certain that it would never be actually necessary to use the economic weapon. The mere threat to Germany in her present desperate condition would be sufficient to secure compliance with the peace terms.

Over and above all these considerations there is, to my mind, one outstanding reason why the Government should announce the termination of Conscription, and announce it as quickly as possible. The country is faced with many grave problems, particularly with those connected with industrial unrest, and a serious situation will be greatly aggravated if Conscription, which can always be used to depress labour—and the workers know that—a serious situation will be greatly aggravated if this weapon against the workers is still placed by the Government at the disposal of the capitalists. [An HON. MEMBER: "It will not be tolerated!"] Military Conscription always carries with it a great deal of industrial conscription. The Government, when the Military Service Acts were introduced, denied this; at any rate, they gave pledges and promised Amendments. You may give pledges and pass Amendments until you are black in the face, but industrial conscription will still be there. Not only does military Conscription mean that unfair pressure can be brought to bear on individual workers, but also Conscription has been used acid would be used to break strikes. It broke the railway strike in France in October, 1910; this was done by M. Briand. Only last month, in France, the transport workers' strike was broken down by M. Clemenceau in the same way. Notices were posted in the Metropolitan Railway that any demobilised soldier who ceased work would be recalled to the Colours. In this country, last year, the engineers' strike was broken down in the same way, and the Government threatened that men who did not return to work would be taken into the Army. What is that but industrial conscription of the worst kind?

This question of Conscription is a key question. It not only affects industrial conditions, bat determines the character of national life and of policy in its broadest sense. Upon Conscription Prussian militarism and imperialism were built up. I do not propose to go into this matter historically in any detail, but I will just remind the House. It is perfectly true that Conscription came into being in Germany in 1862. Why? [A laugh.] Evidently my hon. Friend does not know. I will tell him why. It was carried through by William I. and by Bismarck because, according to Dr. Friedjung, the historian, William I. was fully aware that a great European policy could not be carried through with a standing army of 200,000 with 400,000 Landwehr, which was sufficient for the defence of the Fatherland, but not for the foundation of a Prusso-German Empire. So Conscription came into being, and having been enacted it had to be rendered palatable by success. Thus came about the Danish War of 1864, which added Schleswig-Holstein to Prussia; and the Austro-Prussian War of 1866. These two wars were used by Bismarck as object lessons to show that militarism pays. These and the Franco-Prussian War led to the establishment of the German Empire, and that war went far to convince the German people that the military system of Bismarck was the foundation of their power. I say, and I repeat, that the rise of Prussian militarism and imperialism can be traced directly to the beginning of Conscription in Germany, and I ask "Are we, under whatever specious pretext, going to set out on the same fatal road?" I know it will be said there is no such intention, and if the Military Service Acts are renewed it will only be for a short time, and so forth, I protest against running any risks at all in this matter. There are people who want Conscription, and if the Military Service Acts are continued under one specious pretext, then, in due course, another specious pretext will be forthcoming for continuing them again, and so there is a grave risk of the system being perpetuated. Let us run no risk, let us have done with it. We were told again and again during the War that this was to be the last war; it was a war to end war; a war to end militarism. Now the War is over and won, and won outright. [A laugh.] I say, won outright. Now Germany is down and out—[Hon. Members: "Oh, oh!"]—what are you going to do about Conscription? Quite apart from his electoral pledges, let me ask the Prime Minister this, in conclusion: Were all his speeches during the last four years, about a war to end war, about fighting for liberty and freedom, about the white beaks of sacrifice arising above the mists of the valley, were those all hollow professions? That really is the question, and I ask him to tell us what the policy of the Government is, and I can promise that if they are going to bring in another Conscription Bill it will meet with the stoutest opposition.

I beg to move, at the end, to add the words:

"But regrets the absence from, the Gracious Speech of fuller information as to the policy in relation to the interests of Great Britain and the Dominions which is being pressed by British representatives at the Peace Conference."

I quite appreciate the difficulty of the Prime Minister in dealing in any detail with the delicate questions which are now under consideration in Paris. I quite appreciate that it would be most undesirable, in view of the difficulty of these negotiations, for the House of Commons at the present stage to attempt to impose any binding conditions upon the British Delegates. I quite recognise how much we should be grateful for the unanimity which has so far characterised the discussions of this Conference, but I do feel that attention must be drawn at the very beginning of this new Parliament to the grave feeling of public disappointment which now exists at the dilatoriness which has been shown at the Paris Conference. The country has got the impression that we are looking on at a lot of professors catching butterflies on a field of buried mines. The capture and classification of butterflies is no doubt a very engrossing pastime, but we should look on it with less anxiety if our professors would first take the precaution of removing the detonators from the mines, which may blow up not only themselves, but us as well. So far although the Conference has been in existence for nearly a month, they have discussed pretty well everything but peace with Germany. They have discussed at very great length the question of the League of Nations; they have discussed the future of Turkey; they have discussed the control of the German colonies; they have discussed the future and the boundaries of all the smaller Powers, but they have failed entirely to get to grips with the question of peace with Germany and the question of German frontiers. I think it is very largely due to the unfortunate procedure. They tried for an impossible ideal of unanimity, not only among the big Powers, but among the small Powers as well. If the large Powers had been set up as an executive committee, and told to fix up peace and then report to the whole body of the Conference, we should have got on very much faster than we have done. After all, the big Powers have got to decide this question, and, as it is, the big five go on sitting day after day, hearing very interesting dissertations from the smaller Powers as to their own particular claims, not laying down any definite principles on these claims, but just referring the matter to a committee without any definite guidance as to what policy they ought to follow. It may be that America can afford the expense which is caused by this delay. America has not been in the War so very long. But the Allies, who have borne the burden and the heat of the day, both as regards manpower and resources and productive industries, are in a state of complete exhaustion, and every day's delay is adding to their burdens and financial embarrassments. They simply cannot afford indefinitely to keep up their armies on a war footing. Even more serious than this financial effect of delay is the very ugly spirit which the unbusinesslike procedure of the Peace Conference is arousing in Germany. This is urgent for the British Empire. We have had far too much of the particular panacea which America is supporting in the Peace Conference. Since the days of Mahomet, I do not think any prophet has been listened to with more superstitious respect than has President Wilson. If he were speaking for a united America I am quite certain the whole of Europe would be willing to accept with the very greatest respect what he put forward, but President Wilson appealed to America on the question of a League of Nations at the recent elections there, and he got a by no means favourable answer. The Prime Minister appealed to this country to finish the War and to have a conclusive peace with Germany, and he had an answer from the country which has no parallel in our previous political history.

Among matters which directly concern the interests of the British Empire on the question of Peace there are at least two where anxiety is felt lest the Prime Minister's election speeches are beginning to fade from his mind. The first of these questions is that of reparation. We see that, although the Armistice has been signed for three months, the committee which is considering that question only last Monday for the first time got to grips with deciding the principle which was to decide the admission of claims. That does not show any very great enthusiasm for making Germany pay. No doubt the Prime Minister, at the time of the Election, held very strong and very strict views on this question. Clearly, from his speeches, he intended that reparation should include the costs of the War, including, presumably, the outlay on men, munitions and pensions, quite apart from strict compensation for material damage. In his speech at Newcastle, on 29th November, he said that Germany must pay the costs of the War up to the limit of her capacity to do so. The whole context of that statement showed that he separated this war cost from the expense of repairing material damage. He went on to distinguish, and he said:

"Apart altogether from the cost of the conduct of the War there was the actual damage inflicted."

That is very satisfactory, so far as it goes, but you cannot open a newspaper with any message from Paris for the last few weeks without reading that the American view of reparation is now holding the field in Paris. The American view, of course, is that a very narrow basis for damage should be adopted, and that reparation should in no way include the cost of the War. Such a narrowing of the definition of compensation would not merely be a direct breach of faith with the electorate of this country, but would be entirely illogical, because there is no difference to the financial embarrassment which is caused to this country or any other country whether they have spent their money on repairs after aeroplane raids or compensation for lost shipping, or whether they have spent it in paying pensions to the relatives of the men killed in the War, or in providing munitions for carrying it on. The only fair system for arriving at reparation is to decide what Germany can pay, and out of that turn to meet in full, as a first charge, the claims for the material damage which has been inflicted on our sorely-tried Allies in France, Belgium, and Serbia. Make her pay right up to the hilt that Germany can possibly produce, and allocate the remainder among the Allies, so as to reduce their war expenditure as far as possible to the same level of sacrifice per head all round. If we limit our compensation to the actual damage done we admit that there should be one law for the Germans and another law for everyone else. When Germany crushed Rumania she imposed terms which in the aggregate amounted to about £800,000,000 from that small country, and if we en- Courage the ides, that Germany when she wins a war can exact not merely the cost but also a further sum in addition, whereas, when she loses she is not even to pay up to the total actual cost of the war, we are going very far in the direction of encouraging her to make another war and trust for better luck next time. The Prime Minister yesterday laid stress on the excellence of the personnel of this Reparation Commission. I agree with him. I think the whole of this House has looked with admiration on the splendid fight which the Australian Prime Minister, Mr. Hughes, has been making for British interests in Paris. But this Committee is a committee of referees, and not of Plenipotentiaries. Our Plenipotentiaries in Paris are, in the absence of the Prime Minister, Lord Milner, and I understand very shortly we may have the Loader of the Government in this House back there.

And the Foreign Secretary.

Of these Plenipotentiaries it is very generally believed that both the Leader of the House and Lord Milner are not in favour of reparation being claimed for other than war damages. I see the Leader of the House shakes his head. I am very glad.

I have never said anything of the kind.

I withdraw the statement. I simply quote the newspaper statement, and I am very glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman does not limit the claim to that. There is a great danger that our representatives in Paris, who have not been through the rough-and-tumble of election meetings, as we have done, do not quits realise the strength of feeling in this country on this question of reparation. There as a tremendous feeling in the country, and the feeling is also very strong in this House. You will not get that feeling in this Debate, because we do not want to embarrass the Government. But I may tell the Prime Minister that there was a meeting this afternoon of the Unionist War Committee, who are so keen on this subject, that they are going to send a deputation to him—

I do not know whether it will shorten debate, but it is quite unnecessary, and I can tell my right hon. Friend it will not embarrass the Government in the least, for they stand by the election pledges that they gave.

If the right hon. Gentleman will tell us that he is going to press to the utmost extent of his power not only for reparation for the actual damage done but to make Germany pay up to the full extent of her financial resources, it certainly will shorten discussion.

That is the election pledge I gave after very careful consideration by the Cabinet. The Government stand by every word of that pledge.

I am sure the House has heard with great relief that there is no foundation for all these newspaper statements. I now come to another subject in regard to which perhaps the Prime Minister will forgive me for saying that he appears to have fallen considerably short of the expectations which were formed from his election speeches. I refer to the subject of Russia. It is a matter of vital importance to this country that we should live on close terms of friendship with that great country. It is perfectly certain that Russia will revive. It is a young people full of great genius and provided with natural resources, probably unrivalled throughout the world. It would be disastrous if, owing to our present attitude towards the various governments in Russia, we should drive the Russian people into the hands of Germany. The Prime Minister in a speech on the 13th December, 1918, made various satisfactory references to Russia. He said that

"in Russia you have now got a scheme of government entirely in the hands of one class. They will not even allow other classes to vote, and the result is chaos, anarchy and confusion. There is starvation there. People are dying by scores of thousands for want of food. Credit has gone. There is no work. There are massacres all over the place."

After this speech it was with profound Astonishment and consternation that we found the Prime Minister taking the lead in inviting delegates from the Bolshevik Government in Russia to the Peace Conference. This step was only prevented by the French Government, who in the words of M. Pichon, "refused to dally with crime." Being unable to get the Bolshevik Government to Paris, the Prime Minister started a proposal to invite the Russian Governments to Prinkipo, and he has put in the wrong all the more respectable governments from Russia which refused an invitation to meet the assassins. Why should we have any dealings, of any kind whatever with the Bolshevik Government? It is, in its origin, a purely German enterprise. It was founded with German gold and carried on throughout in the interests of our enemies. They have murdered, because of their loyalty to us, from 30,000 to50,000 loyal Russian officers. The criminal responsibility of the Germans for their inhuman atrocities in the War absolutely pale beside the responsibility of the Bolsheviks who massacred not only individuals but whole classes.

Negotiations with such a Government are entirely out of place, and although we certainly cannot send an expedition there we ought not to acknowledge the Bolsheviks, we ought to remain in a state of war with them until we can dictate our terms to them in the same way as we are going to dictate our terms to Germany. Consider the feelings of those Russians who have been so loyal to France and to Great Britain. No country has suffered in the War like Russia, in man-power, in resources, or in the unspeakable horrors of fratricidal war. Yet the Paris Conference, regardless of those appalling sacrifices by the loyal governments in Russia have given representation—two members each—to such Allies as Siam, and Brazil, but have refused to allow representation to our Allies in Russia. I should like also to mention that the Czar and his family were murdered because of their loyalty to us and to those countries which are fighting with us. That statement is not made on the authority of General Ghourko alone, for I came across it over the signature of a well-known Russian revolutionary—Bourtzeff—who, in his own paper, writes that he is satisfied that within a month of the murder of the Czar and the whole of his family the German Emperor sent a German general to offer terms to the Czar—to offer him his life and his throne if he would desert the Allies and go over to Germany. The Russian Czar—all honour to him—refused even to receive that German general. That statement is made on the authority of Bourtzeff, who was put in prison by the Czar, and who perhaps more than anyone else brought about the downfall of Czardom. But we have far less concern with the internal politics of Russia than with our relations with that country, and from this point of view we owean enormous debt of gratitude and respect to the Czar and the loyal Russian officers who stood up for the Alliance and refused to bow the knee to the Bolsheviks.

I think the complete indifference with which the Government and the Press received the news of the murder of the Imperial family—our loyal friends in Russia—was an absolute disgrace to this country. But it is far worse to see our Government now wishing to go still further and make friends with the murderers, by inviting them to the Prinkipo Conference, a proposal which has done untold harm in Russia. Already the Bolsheviks have not been slow to explain our changed attitude by saying it is due to their promise to respect British loans and to give concessions to the capitalists of foreign countries. No gold, no loans, no forests, no concessions can compensate us for the loss of principle involved in associating ourselves with a government of criminals. Let us not attempt to revive this disastrous proposal to recognise the Bolshevik Government. The loyal people in Russia are waiting for the possibility of calling together the various governments there. They realise that none of the Allies are in a position to send a military expedition to them, but they do ask for moral support, and they ask for ammunition with which the Bolsheviks, owing to German help, are well supplied. Let us supply them with it to the utmost of our power and thus place our loyal friends on an equality in resources with the Bolsheviks. Let us remember there is more involved in this than the security of British loans, and that not only gratitude to our Allies, but the safety of civilisation itself demands that we should give every possible support to those who are trying to bring back ordered government and security to the most screly stricken country in the whole Alliance.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I should like to say at once that I do so in no controversial spirit, and that I do not wish to press the Prime Minister, or whoever may reply for the Government, with questions which it would be wiser in the national interest to leave unanswered. But having served during the greater part of the War in various parts of Europe I may be pardoned if I make a few observations in support of the Amendment. I, like my hon. Friend who moved, am very anxious as to the course that the Peace Conference is taking. It is three months since the Armistice, and during that time, an far as outsiders can judge, it does not seem to have arrived at any definite decision with reference to what I regard to be the two most important questions upon which it has to decide. After three months' session of the Conference and three months since the Armistice, one looks around Europe and one finds, particularly in the East, disputes cropping up on every side between various members of the Alliance, and one finds most of all the problem of Russia becoming more and more complicated and involved every day. I, like my hon. Friend, would have liked to have seen the Conference begun with, what I believe to be its principal duty, namely, the making of a provisional peace with Germany. I believe that is its first duty, and that it would have been better if it had started with its first duty rather than to have begun with a number of other projects, such, for instance, as the foundation of a League of Nations. I think I am supported in that view by the evidence which Germany provides at the present moment. It seems to me that every day that the Conference delays to impose upon Germany a provisional peace Germany becomes more truculent, and dangerous. The German General Staff is obviously becoming more truculent every day. Ebert, the new President of the German Federation, as fur as one can judge from reports of his speeches in the papers, is beginning to snap his fingers at the Paris Conference. Hindenburg is with eighteen divisions at Danzig and he is challenging the Allies be intervene in Poland, whilst proposals are being considered as to whether the German portion of Austria should not be absorbed into the old German Federation. All that seems to me to show that the longer the Conference puts off the problem of imposing a provisional peace on Germany the more difficult it will be to impose our terms upon Germany and the more dangerous will be the German attitude. I quite realise that it is impossible for the Conference to complete a permanent peace with Germany and to decide all the many problems at once, but short of that I do think it would be possible to make a provisional peace and in that provisional peace to insist, first of all, upon the indemnities to be paid, and, secondly, to insist upon the occupation of more strategic points in the German Empire than have yet been occupied by the Allies. Take one single instance. I am convinced, after some knowledge of Russia, that one of the first conditions for dealing with Russia would be the occupation of the Kiel Canal and by that means to ensure the control of the Baltic and thereby of the Baltic Provinces of Russia. Be that as it may, I am convinced that the first duty of the Conference is not to involve itself in all those many great problems in which recently it has involved itself, but to concentrate upon imposing upon Germany a provisional peace with, as I say, indemnities and the occupation of strategic points.

I pass from that to a subject of which I have more direct personal knowledge. I pass to the question of Russia. During the War I have had the opportunity of spending something like a year and a half in Russia, and, rightly or wrongly, I have come to certain definite conclusions as to the policy which our delegates ought to adopt at the Peace Conference. Looking back it seems to me that the fault of our policy with Russia has been that we have never made up our minds as to which side to back. For some time before the revolution we had certain well-informed persons stating that a revolution was inevitable in Russia, whilst we had other people, particularly in London, who held the opposite opinion. After that the situation became worse. I think any hon. Member who looks back on our policy in Russia since the revolution will agree with me when I say that we have gone on the principle of backing one horse one day and another horse another day. We sent people to deal with the Bolshevists and other people to deal with the anti-Bolshevists. I am certain, whether hon. Members' views favour one side or the other, they will agree with me that what is really required is one consistent policy the whole way through. I make that remark because it seems to me that the Prinkipo proposal is the embodiment of this policy of uncertainty and hesitation. We had the French Foreign Minister only a few weeks ago declaring that on no account must we have any relations with the Bolshevist Government at all, and within a few weeks we make a proposal not only to enter into some sort of relations with the Bolshevists, but to shuffle off the responsibility, which it seems to me is upon our shoulders, to decide which side in Russia we ought to take. We asked the Governments in Russia to go to Prinkipo, and we hoped that after their discussion something will emerge.

In my humble opinion that should not be the policy of the British delegates in Paris. I venture to suggest they have come to a point where they must decide between the Bolshevists and the anti-Bolshevists. On the side of the Bolshevists it may be said that they have been the de facto Government in certain provinces in Russia for a considerable time, and that no other Government has shown itself strong enough to drive them out. I quite acknowledge that that is true, but at the same time I cannot understand how the British delegates can in any way enter into relations with the Bolshevist Government which, apart from all questions of atrocities, was the Government which at the most critical moment in the War made the Brest-Litovsk Treaty and threw over the Allies. I cannot see also how the British delegates, if they have any hope whatever in the League of Nations, can enter into relations with a Government the policy of which is in every way contrary to every one of President Wilson s principles. Why, Sir, the militarism and Prussianism of the Bolshevist Government is ten thousand times worse than the militarism and Prussianism of Prussia. Moreover, even if I am wrong in those two contentions, it seems to me that the Bolshevist Government is economically so unsound that it is doomed to destruction in the near future. I am convinced on that account that it would be folly for the British Government to enter into relations with such a Government at such a moment. How can a Government of the kind hope to exist when during the first six months of last year the deficit on the Budget was 17 milliards of roubles, and during the second six months was 82 milliards of roubles? How can a Government continue to exist when the only national industry that is nourishing at the present moment in Russia is the industry of printing rouble notes? I was told by a Russian only last week that in a village in the North of Russia he was asked by a peasant to change a thousand rouble note. He was rather surprised at the peasant having the note, and he asked him how many of them he had got, and the peasant's answer was that he had fifteen lbs. (avoirdupois) of those thousand rouble notes. A Government so economically unsound, I venture to suggest, cannot possibly last.

I would therefore impress, with all the power that I possess, upon the Prime Minister to have no dealings whatever with a Government that entered into the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, and a Government which outrages every principle of the League of Nations, and a Government which is economically so unsound. That being so, I would ask him and the Peace delegates in Paris boldly to take sides, and to support the anti-Bolshevist Governments in Siberia and the South of Russia which represent the parties in Russia who, during the whole of the War, were loyal to the Allies, and who represent all that is best in Russian life. When I say that I do not mean all that is best in Conservative Russian life, because many of the members of those Governments are extremely Radical, and are as Socialist as any in the whole of Europe. I would ask him not only to back them in words, but to back them by definite assistance. I am aware that after four years of war it would be quite impossible to begin a new and great campaign in Russia. I see that as clearly as anybody, but, short of military operations, we could give them great and valuable moral support. If it is known that the British delegates in Paris are on the side of the Governments in Omsk and in South Russia, then I am certain it would be a great step forward in bringing back peace and order to Russia. I am quite certain not only could we assist them with munitions, but also with food and economic help of that kind. I believe if it were known that we would, for instance, send quantities of food into Petrograd provided that a representative democratic Government was set up there, the Bolshevist power would fall there to-morrow. That is not my own unsupported opinion. I have had many opportunities of discussing the question with representative Russians in the last few weeks, and I have, as I say, some knowledge of Russia myself. Those are my views, and I much hope that when the Prime Minister replies he will be able to give us some reassurance that the Peace delegates have come to a definite decision to discontinue the policy of first taking one side and then another and are definitely giving their support to the men who have been faithful to the Allies during the War, and the only men who can restore peace and order to Russia.

I must thank my hon. Friends first of all for having exercised a very wise and patriotic dis- cretion in the choice of topics upon which they have invited the Government to give explanations. I think I can give full and explicit explanations about all the questions that have been put without in the least imperilling any interests of the Peace Conference. My hon. Friend on the other side, in complaining of the time we have spent there, gave the impression that we were rather a frivolous crowd of about nine or ten young people who had met together there. He described us, I think, as "professorial butterflies." [An Hon. Member: "Chasing butterflies!"] I know the venerable President of that Conference, M. Clemenceau, and I have heard him compared to a very fierce specimen in the animal world, but never have I heard him compared either to a butterfly or to a chaser of butterflies, and I think those who know him will regard the first as a more appropriate description under certain conditions. I can assure my hon. Friend that we have been devoting our time to trying to speed up peace. There is not a man in that Conference who does not know how important it is to get peace at the earliest moment.

Both my hon. Friends suggested that we have not devoted our time at all to the very important question of making peace with Germany; but they are quite wrong. It may be that they have not read the procès terbal—I do not suppose they have—or it may be that those newspapers referred to by my hon. Friend have not given the information. I am afraid he confines his rending rather too exclusively to certain papers; he might if he had leisure broaden the sphere of his newspaper reading, and he might be able to get a little more information upon these topics. What are the questions we have to settle with Germany? They are first of all territorial, but they are not all territorial. There is the question of indemnities, and there is the question of colonies. My hon. Friend referred to the question of the German colonies as if it had nothing to do with peace with Germany. There is the question, of the responsibility for the War, and there are two or three other questions which for the moment have escaped me, but there is not one of them that we have not considered.

I will take them categorically. Take the question of territorial readjustment. Germany has a Western boundary and an Eastern boundary. With regard to the Western boundary, we have found that the best method of dealing with, that matter is to have confidential talks amongst ourselves lather than to have formal discussions even in the Council of Ten. These informal discussions have taken place, and I am very sanguine that a complete agreement will be arrived at amongst us with regard to the demands to be put forward against Germany in respect of her Western boundaries. When you come to the Eastern boundary it is a different matter. Dealing with the boundaries in the West of Germany, the facts are well known and well established, and we require no Commissions. There are questions of principle and questions of policy, but there are no questions of fact which are not very well established. Therefore no Commission is required to settle any question with regard to the Western boundary, and we have not proceeded by way of investigation there; but when you come to the Eastern boundary it is a very difficult matter. The populations are very mixed; it is a question of delimiting the boundary between the new Republic of Poland and the German Republic. You have got a very mixed population there of Poles and of Germans, and it is very difficult, without the closest investigation, to draw a line and say, "This is Poland, and that is Germany." If you make a big mistake and put a whole slice of what is really Germany into Poland, Alsace-Lorraine is a sufficient warning of doing things of that kind, and that is why we are proceeding carefully and investigating the circumstances. The Poles themselves admit there is a question for investigation there. We have already heard the Polish deputation on the subject, but we have done more than that. We have sent a very powerful Commission to Poland to examine the matter on the spot. We could not do anything more than that at the present moment, and until they have returned—and I do not suppose they will take very long—we shall not be in a position to make our demands upon Germany in respect of territorial readjustments in the East and West, and they are both important.

Now I will take the other question—that of the German colonies. The question of German colonies was the very first we dealt with, and we decided quite unanimously that whatever happened to them, whoever the mandatory should be, they should not be restored to Germany. We all agreed that Germany had forfeited her right to those colonies by the way in which she had treated the natives—we had accumulated a vast store of evidence with regard to her abuse of her powers in those territories—and also from the point of view of the security of the world. There was complete agreement that the German colonies should not be restored to Germany. That is an essential part of peace with Germany. Those are two fundamental questions you have got to consider in the German peace, which we have already dealt with. What is the third? Indemnities. And with regard to indemnities, I have already made an interruption in which I said that the Government stand absolutely by their pledges, in that matter, and not only that, but those are the instructions that they have given their delegates. My hon. Friend complained that it is only within the last week or fortnight that the Commission in Paris startedits investigations. It is no fault of ours. The Committee appointed by the British Government reported, I think, a couple of months ago. There has been no slackness so far as the British Government is concerned, and, as a matter of fact, the British Government was in advance of any Government in this respect. We were the first to appoint a Committee after the conversations we had in London some time before the Conference. We appointed a Committee, and they made their Report. The policy of the Government was founded on that Report, and two out of the three men who were upon that Committee represent us now in Paris. We have moved the Conference of the nations to appoint a similar Committee, but an international one. No single nation can move in a matter of this kind—you must carry all the nations with you. We took the initiative two or three months ago—in fact, within a few days, I think, of the signing of the Armistice. We circulated that Report to the principal nations concerned, and it was our delegation that in Paris moved for the appointment of this Committee, and made it quite clear, in moving it, that reparation included indemnities.

I was sorry to hear my hon. Friend talking in rather a slighting tone about the League of Nations. I think if he had been in Paris attending that Conference—not the Conference of the Great Powers but the Conference of the little nations that were present—he would have realised how much they are relying on the League of Nations. Here we are creating new nations—the Czecho-Slovaks, with a population of eight or nine millions, the Jugo-Slavs, Poland—I will not say it is a new nation, because it is an old nation—but there they are, with great and powerful nations around them, some of them prostrate at the present moment—Russia, Germany; Austria, of course, has disappeared. They are all depending for their lives upon the League of Nations, and at the Conference that was held where thirty nations were represented—thegreatest Conference ever held in the world—the little nations were not merely unanimous, but they were eager about it.

My hon. Friend seems to suggest that President Wilson represents only one party in respect of the League of Nations, but as a matter of fact Mr. Taft was the pioneer in respect of the League of Nations—a great leader of the Republican party. He has gone much further than President Wilson when you come to examine it, and he has gone much further than we can possibly follow on the mandatory question. I was talking to a very able Republican who I think was a member either of President Roosevelt's Cabinet or of President Taft's, and he told me that as far as the League of Nations was concerned the Republican working men of America were just as keen as the democratic working men. So that my hon. Friend is quire wrong in imagining that American public opinion is in the least divided about the League of Nations. There may be some difference of opinion with regard to its functions, and the extent to which it ought to have the power of committing the great nations to war; but all these are questions which we ourselves have got something to say about, and I quite agree that a, nation ought not to be committed to war by any means without having the responsibility considered by itself. But these are questions of detail.

8.0 P.M.

I think the third question that has been raised by both my hon. Friends is the question of Russia. Let me say at once that there has never been any proposal put forward to recognise the Bolsheviks. Never. There has never been a suggestion that they should attend the Peace Conference. That was not the proposal. For better or for worse, that was not the proposal. My hon. Friends do not like the scheme put forward, but that was not the proposal. It is very easy to dogmatise about Russia. It is very difficult indeed to deal with it. The horrors of Bolshevik rule are so great that there is a sense of disgust when you come to deal with its leaders. Do not let that blind us to the real facts of the case. What are they? The first fact I want to get into the mind of every Member and the British public is this, that unless there is peace in Russia, it is no good the Peace Conference separating and saying, "You have made the pence of the world," because you have not. Russia represents an area not far short of half the size of Europe, and it is also very nearly half of Asia, and if you do not make peace there you will have the whole of these immense territories surging with anarchy, with disorder, and with bloodshed. You may not be able to do it, but until it is done by some means or other there will be no peace in the world. That is the first fact to be recognised. How are you to do it?

There are two, and possibly three, methods of doing it. The first is intervention—honest, straight, downright intervention. You may say these men are assassins. So they are. They are guilty of all the crimes that can be laid to their charge by the two hon. Members, who I should say described them with restraint and moderation. That is all I can say about that. You can intervene. You can say, "It is a blot on civilisation, and you must crush it. It does not represent Russian public opinion. It simply governs by terror." Exactly the same was said about the French Revolution, and it was true. We intervened there, and there was a war of twenty-two years. Does anyone propose that? Before anything was ever done by the British Government, we asked our military advisers what it would mean. I could tell the House that, but perhaps on the whole it would not be wise to give the information. If I gave the figures of what intervention meant, there is no sane man in Britain who would advise us, after nearly five years of war, to undertake that enterprise. Supposing yon do intervene. Suppose you crush the Bolshevik military power, which is much greater than it was. It grew at the time when all our resources were devoted to fighting the Germans. They had their leisure. Neither the Germans could attack them, nor could we attack them; they were no strong. Supposing you do intervene, and you overthrow them, how long are you going to occupy Russia? Are you going to remain there until there is a Government you can depend upon? And are you quite sure when you withdraw you get exactly that Government? Are we going to restore order in that vast country? Nobody proposes to do it. I am arguing against the proposition that no one makes.

I come to the second proposition. My hon. Friend (Sir S. Hoare) has said that you ought to make up your mind whom you are going to back. "One day you back the anti-Bolshevist; the next day you back the Bolshevist." Have we ever backed the Bolshevist? What actual recognition of the Bolsheviks have we ever given? What help have we given them? What dealings have we had with them? I will tell my hon. Friend what dealings we have had with them. He evidently does not know, and therefore I am glad of the opportunity of informing him. He seems to think we have done nothing. He said, "Boldly take sides." I waited to see what he meant by "boldly take sides." He said, "By that I do not mean sending troops. I want you to give them moral support." We have given them far more than moral support. Take all those Governments that are trying to hold their own with difficulty in Siberia, and in the Don country, where the Cossacks clearly do not want the Bolsheviks. We have given them substantial support. They have had financial support. It may be right or it may be wrong, but the Allies have done it. They have had support in ammunition and in guns. Pretty much the whole of their equipment—at least a good deal of it—has been supplied by the Allies. My hon. Friend wants us to give moral support. That is the position at the present moment. So that what he asks we should do we have done, and more. We did it at the time, because we were anxious that the Germans should not occupy the rich grain-growing districts of Russia, and get copper and oil, and all those commodities of which they were so short, and the want of which helped towards their collapse. It was part of our campaign against the Germans to assist in equipping those great forces in order to keep Germans and German influences out of those territories. That has been the position up to the present moment. I do not want to go too far, because this is a question which will be under discussion, no doubt, in the next two or three days in Paris, and I do not wish to interfere in the least with the progress of those discussions. They have a serious responsibility before them. Everybody agrees that you cannot intervene. There is not a single Power that proposes it. That is, then, out of the way. The next proposal is "support of the other Powers." What does that support mean? Does it mean men? I should like to know whether there is anyone prepared to say that here. [An Hon. Member: "Yes."] I like my hon. Friend for his courage, because it is very easy to have a good deal of loose talk and say, "You must support these people." It is no use giving them support unless you give them real support. What does that mean? Are you to confine it to money? Are you to confine it to munitions? Or are you to send men? America will send neither men, money, nor material, and therefore it practically falls upon France and ourselves. Has anyone calculated the cost?

The third plan is that of letting the fire burn itself out. It is a brutal policy. My hon. Friend thinks we can send food to Petrograd. Who would distribute the food now? There is no machinery there except theBolsheviks. My hon. Friend says he knows Russia. When did he leave Russia?

More than a year ago.

Anyone who follows events knows there has been a vast difference in Russia since then. There is no doubt at all about this. The Bolshevist machinery in Russia is deadly, is brutal, is horrible, but there is no doubt about its efficiency for its purpose. It is the only machinery you have got there, and if you send tons of food to Russia, there is no one to distribute it except a Bolshevist government. I can assure the House of Commons that all these suggestions which have been put forward here have been considered by governments individually, and by the representatives of the governments together; and I do not mind saying there are two difficulties in Russia. The first is the intrinsic difficulty. That is bad enough. Everybody who has ever interfered with Russia has come to grief, whether the Swedish Monarch or the French Emperor. The second difficulty with regard to Russia is this: You must get agreement among six Powers. That takes a good bit of doing, and there I only say this. My hon. Friends condemned us for trying to do some- thing short of what is known as allowing the fire to burn itself out, which may take a long time and mean the death of millions of people. We thought we would try the experiment of summoning these people to see whether it was possible to have some accommodation with them which would enable order to be restored in Russia. It is by no means unknown. On the north-west frontier of India, with brigands and assassins to deal with, and when there is turbulence among tribes there, they are summoned very often by our Commissioners to see whether some sort of order can be restored when you want to avoid an expensive expedition.

There is no idea of recognising Bolshevism. It would have been quite impossible to do so unless they abolished their present methods and their present course of action; but we are anxious that when peace comes to the world, it shall be a real peace. All this about promise of repayment of loans, their promise of concessions to Britain and to France, their promise of concessions of territory—all that was for consumption in Russia, and we knew that. It might have been as a bribe. I agree with my hon. Friend these are insignificant compared with the realities, and I hope that my hon. Friend will realise the great difficulty or dealing with that problem. I have not met a man yet who has said confidently that he could do anything short of a big expeditionary force. Every man who came to the Conference said nothing else was of any use.

What about munitions?

I do not want to say too much about that if I can possibly avoid it. We have not denied anything in that respect, but I do not wish to give away military information to the Bolsheviks. I would rather not be pressed. But I do agree with my hon. Friend that a system like this cannot last for ever. Just before coming to the House I met an English workman who had been five years in Russia. He is just back, and what he said contains a warning to this country. His wages were extraordinarily high—£150 a month. He was a printer. That is a paradise, you say. He said a pound of butter cost him £12, and he could not always get it. A pound of sugar, he said, cost him £8. That was somewhat cheaper. For a whole week he could get no bread at all. Yet his pockets were bulging with wages. That in an economic condition that cannot last for ever. Unfortunately, it lasted for a long time in France. I would ask my hon. Friends to turn their minds occasionally from the newspapers—which sometimes are helpful and sometimes are not, which sometimes mean well and sometimes do not—just to read up the story of the French Revolution. All these things happened then. There was all this paper money, all this bankruptcy of France. That country was hopelessly bankrupt in all these years. The same thing happened in France as is happening, according to the military evidence we have got, in Russia. The threat of intervention in the affairs of Russia is driving even the moderate parties in Russia into the hands of the Bolshevists. That is part of the evidence we have got. Some of the officers of the old Armies are actually taking part now in reorganising the Red Army of Russia. Is experience to teach individuals, and never to teach nations? I agree with my hon. and gallant. Friend in a sense of horror at Bolshevism, in the refusal to take it by the hand. That, however, ought not to prevent us, in the interests not merely of Russia, but in the interests of Britain and of the world, from doing, at any rate, our best to restore order and good government to that distracted country.

I should like to offer a few remarks on the subject of Russia. [Interruption.]

May I ask new Members to remember the very important Rule of the House that they should not pass between the hon. Member speaking and the Chair.

Much has been said on the subject of Russia. The future of Russia is of vital importance to the whole of civilisation. The Russian Revolution was fomented by Germany and supported by German gold. If matters are allowed to proceed as they are at present, and the only salvation for Russia is reorganisation by German agents, then we are in danger of facing this position: that, although Germany has in fact been beaten in war, she will have won an economic victory by the absorption of the resources of Russia and the control of her population. This would compensate the German race for all that they have sacrificed in the struggle. The Allies cannot afford to look upon proceedings m Russia in any other light than that which I have ventured to indicate. It is not a matter of sentimentality. It is one of the safety of civilisation. It may mean the German race reorganising with vastly increased power. The Prime Minister's statement on the subject of indemnities was much more definite and much more satisfactory than those which had gone before. This subject is one which has caused the greatest anxiety and the strongest possible feeling amongst our people outside this House. Any deviation from what is believed to be the right attitude in this matter of indemnities and reparation will cause the downfall of any Government of this country, and a most lively expressed indignation amongst our people.

There is one subject, however, which has not been dealt with, and on which I desire information. I do not think it is realised inside this House how interested is the "man in the street," whatever be his station, in the question of the freedom of the seas. British people realise that this War has been won and the nation saved by sea power. The freedom of the seas is a very old story. It has been adopted amongst the Continental nations to avoid the pressure of sea-power. As interpreted by Germany, the doctrine of the freedom of the seas means the destruction of the sea power of this country, because, unless we are able to preserve the freedom of communications between the different parts of our Empire, the safety of the great trade routes to our race across the seas, would be cut, and the resources of the world prevented from being at our disposal. It is folly to rely upon other things for the safety of this great country. History shows that Leagues of Nations have been formed with great hopes and vast expectations. They did not last long. They crumbled away. To sacrifice the foundation of our great power and our safety to the expectations of an unformed League of Nations, in View of the experience of the past, would be the greatest folly. The freedom of the seas, as an American doctrine, is still not clearly formulated. The President of the United States did state very clearly in his fourteen points what he understood at that time by the doctrine. There was to be no armed force brought within three miles of the coast of any territory occupied by any Power. That was one of the doctrines set out in the fourteen points. We have some further enlightenment which is worth some consideration, and it was a pro- vision that no nation should have a fleet so large as to be able alone to keep all the seas. Is that a document which is going to be enforced by the League of Nations, because if it is it means that the power of England will be gone? Another declaration is that the sea rules for the period of belligerency laid down in times of peace shall not be challenged while war is in progress. We have had some experience of that kind of thing in the Declaration of London. The sound doctrine of belligerency at sea has been, proved over and over again. The Declaration of London set up by proclaimation had to be abandoned. The hard facts of war forced this country to return to the old laws of sea-warfare, which are the proved results of centuries of experience.

Another provision is that every nation, whether belligerent or neutral, shall be held to account for the observation of sea rules in time of war. The Prime Minister has given us an illustration of what that means. It has been said that certain action might be taken in the case of Russia, and evidently something of that kind has been discussed at the Peace Conference. No action has been taken, because the Great Powers at the Peace Conference are not agreed on this point. It is also suggested that no ships of a neutral shall attempt to run a blockade established by a belligerent, and the Government of the country to which such ships belong shall be held accountable for such attempts or other infringements of the new rules. That is a most dangerous doctrine to the whole peace of the world. Then there is the present rule as to contraband, which is that the nation waging war can declare what is contraband and publish it to the world. That is a necessary and an unavoidable condition. Goods and materials necessary or useful for carrying on war are constantly varying; they multiply with the progress of each war. The proposal to establish, before hostilities, a rigid list of contraband for all nations is impracticable. The new rules are a most dangerous departure, making for quarrels and broaches of the peace in every direction. The rule made in regard to the discontinuance of the use of submarines will be difficult to carry out. What does freedom of the seas mean to this country? It means that though this country may succeed in defeating in time of war—and we are told that wars will never cease, and the experience of mankind shows that they never will cease—although we may sufficed in battles outside neutral waters not within three miles of the coast-line of some other country, that will be a fruitless victory. The seas will be open to the enemy to send his merchandise across the ocean and to carry on just as if there was no war, and his ports will be open to receive stores.

Our wars have mostly been against Continental Powers which have had at their back their land frontiers connecting them with other countries, and under those circumstances they might make an indefinite war with a sea-power country. This country exists by the maintenance of its sea power. The doctrine of the freedom of the seas as urged by Germany means the absolute destruction of the power of this country. The history of dealing with this question is somewhat curious. When the fourteen points were subjects of correspondence between President Wilson and the German Government the whole fourteen points were accepted by Germany and forwarded to the belligerent Allies for their acceptance. So far as we can ascertain from what has appeared in the Press without contradiction, the British Government absolutely refused to discuss the question of the freedom of the seas in any shape or any of its bearings, and they insisted that that should be kept outside the fourteen points, and I think in that attitude they are supported by the whole of the European Allies.

It appears that at the Paris Conference the matter has been brought up again by the Government of the United States and it has become the subject of discussion. So far as we can learn, though the freedom of the seas has not been determined as an essential part of the League of Nations, and has nothing to do with the terms of peace made with Germany, yet it is still a subject reserved for the discussion of the League of Nations to be set up by the Peace Conference, and that seems to me to be a very disastrous attitude for the British Government to adopt. I think the British Government ought to have adhered to their attitude of refusing to discuss the question of the freedom of the seas, for I am sure that would have been a better course than submitting it to a heterogeneous League of Nations of Land Powers, because that is placing in a very unsatisfactory and dangerous position a question which is so vital to this country. We want more information about this question. I assume the Government that it is not only in this House but outside of it a great deal of interest is taken in this most important matter by a vast number of people, and it is a question in the solution of which they have determined that their voices shall be heard.

Then there are the German colonies. Apparently those colonies are, with certain regulations, placed at the disposal of the League of Nations. The question the world has now to decide is peace with Germany. The German colonies were all conquered and are now in the possession of the Allies, and most of them were conquered by British troops from the British Dominions and the Colonies. If those German colonies are to be handed over to a League of Nations, the best method would be to have a sound understanding as to how they are to be dealt with, and the terms should be made before they are handed over to anybody else. My remarks apply equally to Palestine and Mesopotamia, but to place these German colonies, many of which are of the most vital importance to our own Dominions, at the disposal of a League of Nations, is, to my mind, betraying our own kinsmen across the seas, and adopting a policy which would be disastrous to our Empire in the future.

There are one or two points which I wish to make with regard to reparation and indemnities. The Prime Minister stated that the word "reparation" included indemnities. If that is the true construction, I am afraid that we are liable to considerable difficulty before we get over the financial questions which will arise at the Conference. I have no doubt that the Germans take the view that the word "reparation" is a word of restrictive meaning and does not include indemnities, and, consequently, as the word "reparation" was used in the negotiations and in the instruments and not the word "indemnities" that we have foregone what right we had in negotiations to ask for indemnities. The view of the United States may naturally be very different from the British view. The President of the United States stated distinctly that in going into the War the United States were not looking after any selfish interests; they were not seeking any indemnities or any compensation. Neither the matter of indemnities nor the matter of annexations was at any time seriously considered as between the United States and the Germans. But these were only two of the parties in the great War. Outside them were all the other Allies. The Prime Minister stated that the word "reparation" included indemnities. It seems to me from what has been transpiring in Paris during the last month or so that that view has more or less prevailed there. I think it is a most dangerous view, and, in the light of the correspondence that took place and the relationships of the parties, a very unfounded view. When the President of the United States made some of his communications to the Allies on the part of the American Government, he pointed out that one of the things that must necessarily be done was the restoration of Belgium. Later he gave his explanation of what he meant by the restoration of Belgium. Again, in communications with the Allies they did not accept that limited signification of "restoration of Belgium," but they said that they understood that "compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and to their property by the aggression of Germany by land, by sea, and from the air." Here was an enlargement of the word "restoration," but only in respect of damages to the civilian population of all countries invaded by Germany. That view, which I contend is the contracted view, does not imply that the right to indemnities does not exist side by side. But if there could be any possible question about the right to indemnities existing, in addition to the right to reparation for damages, it is removed by the terms of the Armistice, because we have in Section 19 words of primal value to us in determining whether we should have indemnities in addition to reparation. I will read the words of Section 19 of the Armistice of 11th November:

"With reservation that any future claims and demands of the Allies and United States shall remain unaffected, the following financial conditions are required:—(1) Reparation for damages done."

I say, and I do not think anyone will differ from me, that here was a distinct differentiation between reparation for damages done and other claims or demands that either the Allies or the United States might have to make in the future. I say, therefore, that both rights are reserved, the right for reparation for damages where injury is done, and the right to claim indemnities. Both are recognised in the Armistice. Therefore, there should be no weakening whatever upon this matter. It was only after examining these clauses very carefully that daring the Election, as early as 19th November, in issuing my Address, I set forth that these were the grounds on which. I would insist and on which I now insist that we are entitled, not only to reparation in the form of damages, but also to indemnities for the cost of this War. I think the great majority of the Members of this House in fighting the recent campaign, whether on one side or the other, were of that view and announced that view. If it is to be limited to-day, and a much lesser meaning given to it, and if our representatives at Paris do not take that ground firmly and maintain it, what position shall we be in when we go back to the electorate? That may look selfish and I do not press that view, but I do say that we must not give away the advantages to which we are entitled. It is our duty to press for them, and, if we have any doubt whatever whether our repretatives at Paris are putting this matter as strongly forward as they should, it is our duty to say so in this House. It is for that reason that I made the remarks that I have made to-day.

The doctrine of the freedom of the seas that has been put forward very vaguely by President Wilson is one that is incomprehensible to the people of this country. It would destroy our supremacy in sea-power. We do not envy the power of other nations—they can build all the fleets they like—but we do say that ours is an Island Empire, and it is absolutely essential to us that the rights of the sea should be preserved for our peaceful commerce without which we could not subsist. That is the view we take, and these attempts at a limitation of that view will not, I am sure, be tolerated by the people of this country.

My hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Gretton) put forward a very strong case with regard to the freedom of the seas, and I do not intend to enlarge upon it, but I do wish to say a few words with regard to the position of our Dominions Overseas and how they might be compromised. The Prime Minister did not exhaust the whole position when he said that one of the first things they settled at the Peace Conference was that the colonies should not be restored to Germany. That is all very well, but that is only part of the business. What is to be done with them? What is to be done with them concerns us and concerns those great Dominions. The view of these Dominions Overseas—I have some reason for expressing the opinion—is that these colonies should be transferred to the respective Dominions which conquered them, to Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. That would be the natural thing to do, and it would be far more in the interests of those colonies themselves and our Dominions and of this country. It would safeguard them and us in the future against attacks from these colonies, which might be made the bases of attack by submarines and other warlike engines. Therefore, it is desirable, in the interests of all, that the colonies should be transferred to the Dominions or to the British Empire.

The proposal of a League of Nations is one with which I have a very great deal of sympathy, but it does not seem to me that we have had any development of what the League is to be, and until we see the machine and see it at work, how do we know that it will operate to the advantage of ourselves and of our great Dominions? It is all very well to talk about a thing in theory, but the great question is, how will it work in practice? Above all, why should we adopt it before we know that the scheme actually is? We have been told, and I suppose we shall be told again, that we are to hear of it before Peace is concluded. Assuming that we do hear of it before Peace is concluded, what is the necessity in the meantime of anticipating what the position will be then by saying that these colonies are to be handed over to certain mandatories? Surely there should be no disposition of the German ex-colonies until we know the conditions upon which they are to be handed over at the moment that they will be handed over. I see one great difficulty in placing these ex-German colonies in the hands of mandatories. Who is going to pay the expense of carrying on these colonies? Who is going to provide the means for developing them and for the education and enlightenment of the natives if the holding and tenancy of these colonies is to be subject to revision by a League of Nations of which we know nothing at all? Again, what is to happen if there are two systems of Customs prevailing, one for the mandatory colony and the other in this colony committed to the trust of the mandatory? I see the greatest opportunities for confusion, and also difference of opinion between the members of the subsequent League of Nations. Although President Wilson may be very enthusiastic for securing this League, it must be remembered that the American man is a very practical man and the American woman is a very practical woman, and when it comes to a question of entrusting a section of Asia or Africa or Europe to the custody of the United States of America and to their providing for its administration in dollars and cents, and when it comes to the United States of America being made part of a League of Nations which, if it is to amount to anything, must have the power to act, must have or be able to command an armed force and must provide the money to maintain that force, when the thorough-going thinking American comes to count up the cost of all that and the danger of European entanglements, against which the great President Washington warned his people, I do not think we shall see a great deal of alacrity in the United States of America in favour of the League of Nations. Let us not count too much on that. Nobody desires more than I do the closest possible unity between the Allies and the different branches of the English-speaking races, but we must not count upon the Americans so forgetting their own interests—they usually know what their own interests are—that they will link in with us to incur a liability of which the sense of their people cannot approve.

Have we not got burdens enough already all over the world without getting bound by fresh ties in connection with the League of Nations? We know how to govern ourselves, however much we differ. We know how to leave freedom to our Dominions. We know how to govern our Crown Colonies. We have an enormous Empire which we have succeeded in knowing how to govern and hold together, and the real virility of that Empire has been splendidly proved in the War. Why should we encumber ourselves with these fresh burdens? There is a League of Nations at present in operation, and if that League of Nations, with its trained and disciplined armies, now present on the Rhine, is not able to restore peace at this time to Europe, what little chance there is of this visionary League of Nations at some future time being able to stop a great war or a great revolution. With all respect to those who think differently, we are borrowing trouble. My wisdom no doubt may be very imperfect. In any event, I hope that our representatives at Paris will adopt sound views, and that the result will prove to be satisfactory.

in conclusion, I hope that for our own credit, for the credit of our Government and of our public men, out of respect for the promises that we gave to the people of this country, and out of respect for the confidence which the people of this country reposed in us during the recent election, that the voice of our representatives at the Paris Conference will be firm and strong, that the word of Britain is sacred, and that her word is not analogous to a scrap of paper. There has been a consensus of British, and I believe of Irish opinion too, upon this subject, and the word cannot be broken. I am equally confident that if the word is said firmly, strongly, and respectfully to the Conference at Paris it will receive due recognition. Let us not forget—Europe has not forgotten, and the United States has not forgotten, no part of the world is without knowledge of—the splendid services that our country and our Empire have given in this War, the men they contributed, the risks they took, the ships they ventured, the lives they lost. Shall it be said of us that at the conclusion, as the time approaches for peace, we shall be mealy-mouthed upon what our rights are? No, I trust not. I confidently hope there will be no backsliding, and that our representatives will be firm and strong upon the maintenance of those rights to which I believe we are justly entitled.

I believe the question of the future of the German colonies is one of the very gravest anxiety in the country, and of even greater anxiety in our great Dominions across the seas, it was not very greatly debated at the recent election, for the very good reason that the country at large based its confidence upon the supposed representations and statements of Ministers, that those colonies would remain under British rule. But I should have liked to see the fate of any candidate at that election who had put in his address that the German colonies, which were then conquered by our own fighting men and at present are occupied by our fighting men, would be handed over even to a mandatory of a League of Nations. I think his shrift with the electorate would have been very short indeed, I wish the Government could have been a little more communicative about it. I fully recognise the delicacy of the discussions which are going on at present in France, and no one in this House wishes to embarrass the Government in those discussions, but I think everyone in the House wants to impress upon the Government the fact that this matter is one of the gravest anxiety in the country. I know what the apologists of the mandatory principle say, and this question really has resolved itself into a sort of controversy ranging round the word "mandatory." The apologists of the attitude of the Government upon the mandatory system say that there was a strong movement in the Convention that these territories should be put altogether under the League of Nations and that the mandatory system was invented as a sort of compromise whereby at least certain British interests might be safeguarded in the conquered territory. It was supposed that any national appropriation, so to speak, of these territories, any British appropriation particularly, was a very bitter draught to certain important members of the Convention and that it would facilitate matters if the word "mandatory" was put in as a sort of sugar plum, to allow this draught to be swallowed more easily. They say, in effect, that the word "mandatory" is, after all, merely a word, and that these colonies will in fact be under the sole control of the British Crown and the British Dominions, that they will be in our occupation and will be completely under our dominion and under our control, and that after all it does not matter for the word if that is the reality. It does not matter whether you call the occupying Power a mandatory or a missionary or a cassowary or any sort of big word that is supposed really to please the high-browed fancy and soothe the high-toned conscience in these matters. That is the sort of attitude of the apologists of the mandatory system, that really it is only a word, and that the reality will be that fall British dominion will be possessed over all these territories. I am a very zealous advocate of the League of Nations, but in the interest of the League of Nations itself that is a very undesirable position. No one who wants the League of Nations to be strong, no one who wants it to have real power, to have real officers with real strength—no one wants it to have sham officers and to have sham powers, no one wants the whole thing to be really a matter of names. There is no more ignominious position for a Power that really stands to be a great Power in the world, or a super-Power, as the League of Nations must stand to be, than to have its officers, who are called its mandatories, mere shams and figments. That is tending to bring the whole idea of the League of Nations into contempt and to make the whole thing unreal. Accordingly, if the word "mandatory" is to be a mere word, I think every supporter of the League of Nations and of its place as a real Power in the world ought to be against the mandatory system.

Then there is what I might call a second school of thought on the question of the mandatory system, and that is the school of thought of the plain man who calls a spade a spade, and when he speaks about a mandatory really means a mandatory; and on the other hand, when he hears other people speaking about a mandatory, really imagines that they mean a mandatory. A mandatory, of course, is simply an agent, and his relation with the mandatory Power is simply that of principal and agent. There is no relation of life which is looked upon with more tender affection by lawyers than the relation of principal and agent. There is no relation that bristles more with opportunities of friction and opportunities of every kind of disagreement than the relation between principal and agent, and if there is anything in the relation of a mandate or an agency, it means that the principal has the right to call the agent to account, to interfere with his control, to say, "Give an account of your stewardship," and, if necessary, to revoke the mandate altogether and give it to someone else. If that is the position—and it is a position that could logically be taken up by any Power which had another subordinate Power calling itself a mandatory—certainly that would be looked upon by the British Empire as a very great betrayal of its interests indeed. Everybody knows, and it has been often said, that we did not go into this War to make profit, but as we have come out of the War now we have earned the right to look upon the profit and loss account of the War. The loss of the War is a matter that we can see with the naked eye. The profit of the War at present consists in the claim for indemnity, and we were glad to hear the Prime Minister say to-night that that claim will be urged and pressed forward. But it is in a somewhat uncertain position. Further than that, the profit of the War consists of those territories which have been conquered by our fighting men and are at present occupied under the British Crown. After all our sacrifices we have every right, by the moral right of the Power which has conquered, the right of the Power that can best govern and best administer these new dominions, to claim that these dominions ought to be permanently attached to the British Dominions, and attached not by the shadowy tie of mandatory. Why, for instance, should German South-West Africa be attached to the Union of South Africa? Because it is natural and because it is best for German South-West Africa, best for South Africa, and best for the British Empire. How can that be if South-West Africa, while it is attempting to be made part of the Union of South Africa, is at the same time tied by this illusive tie of the League of Nations, and held under it by the title of mandatory? The whole position would be most unsatisfactory, most illogical, and quite absurd.

We have come out of this War, in which we have made the very greatest sacrifices, and we see various rations putting in their reasonable claim for reasonable extension of territory, and for reasonable extension of power as a result of the War. The United States of America has come out of this War as a creditor of the whole world. She has made tremendous profit out of the War. Greece will get extension of territory. Serbia will get extension of territory. Italy will get extension of territory. France will get extension of territory. Is it to be said of Great Britain that she is to have nothing, or perhaps nothing, out of this War, and that no material asset is to remain to her except the great load of our debt and the graves of our dead, and beyond that, perhaps, the shadowy title of mandatory to the League of Nations? We trust to the Government to urge our case strongly at the Peace Conference. This is a matter of the very gravest importance to our Empire. If it is necessary to quarrel with any Power, do not let us quarrel with our own Dominions. Do not let us quarrel with our own children. Let our foes not be the people of our own household. The Government should go forward perfectly fearlessly in this matter. They have a perfect right and title to go forward, and behind them is the almost unanimous de- sire of the British Empire and the vital interest of our great Dominions across the seas.

The hon. Member has made an able and interesting speech, and if I do not follow him in his line of argument it is not because I do not sympathise with him, but because I doubt whether the method he has selected is the best means of carrying out what is desired. I think the House is indebted to the hon. and gallant Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Colonel W. Guinness) for raising this discussion. He has given the Government an opportunity of hearing a good deal of the opinion of their own countrymen in regard to the Peace Conference, and I dare say that what has been said will have some results in the deliberations of the Conference. The first question on which I should like to speak is in reference to Poland. I take that as my first subject, because in any attitude that the representatives of this country may take up at the Conference they ought to have leading principles, and the first is that every nation, small or great, should get the Government it wants.

I see no hope for the future of Europe unless the map is so reshaped and the principle of nationality is so thoroughly recognised that we shall have destroyed the temptations for Governments again to change the map of Europe. I am old enough to remember the last Franco-German war, and I am proud to think that I was one of the minority who at that time thought that Germany was committing not only a crime, but a blunder, in annexing Alsace-Lorraine against the will of its people. I thought then—and events have justified my anticipation—that the seizure of Alsace-Lorraine by Germany would so poison relations in Europe as to ultimately lead to another war. As I have mentioned Alsace-Lorraine, may I say that I hope the Government will refuse the impudent demand that there should be a so-called plebiscite in Alsace-Lorraine. Everybody knows what Alsace and Lorraine want. Through nearly half a century they have resisted every form of pressure put upon them—military pressure, Governmental pressure, bureaucratic pressure—and all the time France has been silent because France could not give Germany any excuse to renew the attack upon her. Alsace-Lorraine has resisted pressure for nearly half a century, and the verdict of Alsace- Lorraine was given in the enthusiastic welcome that her people extended to the French authorities and the French soldiers. There is no ground whatver for a plebiscite in Alsace-Lorraine. The question is settled, and settled for ever.

The first guiding principle of our representatives at the Peace Conference should be the recognition of the principle of nationality. I am not going to preach eternal warfare on Germany. I do not think that is business or morals, but I do think we are perfectly entitled, always subject to the recognition of the principle of nationality, to build up against Germany a series of States that will make a repetition of her crime impossible. I do not know any case in which it is more clear what the policy should be than the case of Poland. Bethmann-Hollweg said a year or two before the War, as a justification for the policy for which he made himself responsible, that there was a struggle in Europe between Deustchtum and Slavtum—between the Germans and the Slavs. That was part of his false philosophy, the falsity of which has cost the world so much blood to undo: the false philosophy that the world should be divided among those nations who govern and those nations who obey, whereas, of course, the true philosophy is that each nation should govern itself and live at peace with others. But, accepting the principle of Bethmann-Hollweg, I insist that it is our interest and our duty to see that the great Slav world shall be so strengthened as to be a buffer against Germany in either her Eastern or Western aggressions. That means a strong Poland.

I do not take a very optimistic view of the present situation of the Continent of Europe from the military and other points of view. Is it or is it not a fact that the Germans have concentrated in Eastern Prussia a large number of troops under the redoubtable Hindenburg? If Germany has collected a large number of troops under one of its greatest and most powerful generals, it must be with an object. What is the object? The Polish part of Prussia is as much part of the new Poland that will have to be created as the Austrian or Russian parts of Poland, and it would be disloyal to our own principles and to the people of Poland if we do not equally insist that all Polish land which has been in either Austrian or Prussian hands shall be secured for the Polish nation. If that be so, what is the meaning of these troops being there? It means that at the back of the German militarist mind, still possessing more power even in a republican Germany than we realise, there is still an idea that by Force, and owing to our unwillingness to enter into a new struggle, they may be able, so to speak, to jump the claim in East Prussia and keep that part of the land of Poland in the hands of Prussia. They must not be allowed to do so.

That leads me to another point in the relations between the new Poland and Prussia. Everybody who has studied the history of Germany will know that she had two methods of pressure. One was military and the other was commercial. Austria, the obedient slave and ally of Germany, bad exactly the same methods. When Austria wanted to squeeze Serbia she did not require to send military forces there. All she had to do was to raise the tariff against Serbian pigs, and as the pigs wore the greatest article of export from Serbia, Austria in this way was able to declare as effective a war against Serbia as if she had sent an army against her. What will be the position of Poland if, placed between Russia and Prussia, she is left at the mercy of the Prussian tariff pressure? Her political liberties will be destroyed by her commercial slavery, and the only safeguard against that oppression and strangling of Poland would be to give Poland an outlet to the sea. What is that outlet to be? Geography and history point to Danzig as the city which must be the port of Poland. Danzig is claimed as a Germancity. I do not think that the claim is historically strong. Danzig was for a long period in the hands of Poland, a great deal of its population is Polish, and many of the people in Danzig who speak German speak German after the Polish fashion, and if we do not secure Danzig as a port for Poland the liberty which we profess to give Poland will be a liberty which will leave her still at the mercy of Germany. If we leave Poland at the mercy of Germany, we will remove one of the greatest protections of the peace of Europe and against further aggression on the part of Prussia all over the East of Europe. If I were a member of the Peace Conference, representing this country, I would be guided by the principle of building up always, of course in accordance with the principle of nationality, the very strongest States I could establish, because every one of these States in my opinion will be a guardian of Europe against attempts in future on the part of Germany to establish domination by military and commercial force.

Coming to Greece, though we remember the trouble that Greek classes gave us in our schoolboy days, we must all have the keenest sympathy with the desire of the Greeks to establish, as far as possible, the ancient glories of their race. Greece has strong claims to the littoral of Asia Minor. For this reason, the littoral of Asia Minor goes back to the very foundations, not merely of historic, but almost of prehistoric times. I believe that Smyrna is regarded as having the best claim among the sever towns which dispute the honour of having been the birthplace of Homer. Smyrna was called all through the period of Turkish domination an infidel city, because it was known to be a Greek city, and I cannot understand any other nation in Europe, especially a nation which has suffered from disunion, standing in the way of the claims of Greece to the littoral of Asia Minor, nor can I understand any opposition to the claim of Greece to have under her control the large Greek population of Thrace. The Dodekanese are still under Turkish control. Everyone who has studied the subject knows that in every one of these islands 100 per cent. of the population is Greek. There is a small number of Mussulmen on some of these islands, but these are people of Greek race who speak the Greek tongue, but who, under the influence of Mahomedan tyranny, lapsed from their religion. I cannot understand how any nation, especially any representatives of this nation, can refrain from insisting that the Dodekanese shall all be restored. I do not want to say anything about the Epirus, because an hon. Friend of mine holds such strong views in regard to the claims of Albania, that I do not like to offend him, but I may say this, that everybody in Greece knows that some of the greatest Greek statesmen, including some of the present Ministry come from Epirus, and are Greek by tongue and by blood, and I think that the case will require a great deal of argument to have the claim refuted.

In regard to what the hon. Gentleman who has just spoken has said about the colonies and the management of the colonies, I have said, and I say it again, that I do not think that Germany should not get those colonies back on strategical grounds. I must say I have a fundamental suspicion of arguments that are founded on strategical grounds. I remember it used to be said that Bismarck was opposed to the annexation of Alsace and Lorraine. Bismarck was a man of brutal policy, but he was a man of genius, and if he had survived and remained in power I do not think we should have had the extraordinary folly of the gentleman who took his place, and who has never done anything to the detriment of Germany that Bismarck did not forecast. Because anyone knows, who read his views immediately after his dismissal and his memoirs, that Bismarck, although his policy was brutal, was a statesman, and I believe, in his heart of hearts, he had his doubts as to the wisdom of taking Alsace-Lorraine. But then came along the soldier Moltke who said, "Metz must be taken from France, because Metz is a great fortress and is worth a hundred thousand soldiers"; but they have spent the lives of millions of Germans unsuccessfully in order to defend a city equal to a hundred thousand men. That shows you with what distrust you must take these arguments from the point of view of strategy. That is not the reason why I object to Germany having the colonies. I put it on higher and more rational grounds, and I daresay the hon. Member and I will agree. I think the treatment tinder German rule of the natives of these colonies, the horrors, the slaughter, the spirit of oppression and militarism which existed in these colonies disentitles Germany to have one of them ever again. That being so, the question arises, to which the hon. Gentleman so emphatically referred. Who is to get them and how they are to be got? As we understand, from the somewhat sparse accounts of the Conference rather too sparse, I venture with all respect to think; it is no use talking of the evils of secret diplomacy if this great nation is not allowed to see something of what her Plenipotentiaries are doing in the Peace Conference in France—the colonies are to be given to mandatory Powers, and that is the point which the hon. Gentleman, so sharply criticised. But I do not think anybody has much doubt as to who the mandatory will be. I cannot imagine our great Dominions being refused the right to have those colonies, which are at their very doors, which are part of their natural sphere, and which, in enemy or in alien hands, might be a peril to their security. But here is the point I would make. In this wicked world everybody and every nation is suspected, this nation not the least of all. I am sure that the old tradition of Perfide Albron is dying out, except in a neighbouring Isle. We have gone into the War in defence of right, and we must be very careful that our claim is subject to no suspicion. If in utter disregard for the opinion of other nations, and of the recommendations of as powerful a friend as President Wilson we insisted on taking these, colonies, I am afraid we should subject ourselves to a great deal of suspicion. I think our position will be not weaker but stronger if we go into these colonies as the mandatory of the combined wisdom of all the nations that joined with us in fighting the battle of freedom. Therefore I do not take quite the same view with regard to the mandatory as does the hon. Gentleman.

I regret to have heard the tone of such acrid criticism as was made use of in some of the speeches with regard to the League of Nations. I regret the tone of some of the allusions to President Wilson. I regret still more the tone of some of the newspapers of the country with regard to President Wilson. I do not think they are good manners. I do not think they are good business. I do not think they are good policy. Whatever we may think as to certain pointy in President Wilson's proposals, I believe to-day that the masses of every nation in Europe, of England, of France and of Italy, look to him as the great leader of the plain people in their desire to have a just and peaceful world in the future. What I put to all these critics of the League of Nations is this: Ten millions of human beings, mostly in the flower of life, have died. France has lost a third of her manhood; we, in these Islands, have lost some of the best and bravest of our race. What I want to ask is, can any man contemplate all that precious blood being shed in vain? Will not that blood have been shed in vain unless we have some guarantee of security andorganisation to prevent the recurrence of such a hideous tragedy as that of the last four and a half years? Is there any method of producing that except by a League of Nations? I admit that before we get to the second stage we ought to have the first. I agree that the Powers who fought together for the liberty of the world ought to remain together as long as that liberty is threatened, and I believe the union in heart and in spirit, as well as in words, of England, France, Italy, and America, and of all the other Powers that have fought this War together against Germany and Austria, is the beat security for peace for some time to come. Nobody has a right to use a word that might menace the close co-operation between these Powers, and I cannot help feeling that the rather rancourous criticism I have seen, not only of the policy but of the personality and convictions of President Wilson is not helping towards keeping these Powers together. It is very easy to pick holes in the principle of the League of Nations. But I repeat, if we have not a League of Nations, what guarantee have we that in ten, fifteen, or in twenty years time we shall not have a recurrence of the hideous and terrible sacrifice of the best lives of is very nation in the world. Of course, I must qualify that statement. In the past few days I know there has been a great deal of anxiety in France, and I have profound sympathy with the anxiety of France. She has lost one-third of her manhood. Her losses have been greater than the losses of any other nation in this War. After all, America is remote from Germany. To a lesser degree, but to some degree we are remote from Germany, far more remote from Germany than France. France always has this tiger on her frontier, and she knows, by all her tragic experience in the past, that if the new Germany be anything like the old Germany, the tiger will spring on her back at the first moment she has an opportunity of doing so. Therefore I made great allowance for any criticism of a League of Nations or any other proposal at the peace Conference which does not seem to give France the most absolute guarantee for her future safety against aggression on the part of Germany. I want to make the best of the new Germany. I believe that a Republican Germany will be different from the Imperial Germany. Whatever may be the nature of the individual German, I have not the smallest doubt that democratic institutions in that country will produce a very differen spirit among the people from that servile spirit which obtained under the reign of the Kaiser. But we must take guarantees. There are signs that some of the German people are yet unconverted. The Hindenburg's, the Ludendorf's, the Bernhardi's, and that gang will remain till the end of their days, and we must take adequate precaution against their ever having an opportunity of again plunging Europe into war. But why attempt to disparage the policy of the League of Nations? I think President Wilson has made great sacrifices, in leaving his own country and taking all the risks to his great reputation (which is very high, among his countrymen) in coming into a Conference in which, after all, he is only one man and has to meet the best intellects of Europe. I have the honour of knowing him, and I am sure that only one thought could have brought him from Washington, and that is that he regarded it as in his power, and therefore as his duty, to open up a new and better chapter in the history of mankind.

To which nations can we confidently look as the best guarantors of that new world which is to be the outcome of the League of Nations—as the best guarantors of effective resistance to militarism? My own opinion is we can look most of all to the two great English-speaking nations, and unless we can keep the British Empire and the Republic of the United States well together, not merely now but in the future, the League of Nations will turn out to be an empty dream. I have visited the United States on six occasions. I want to speak quite candidly. I do not think the maintenance of permanent good relations and of a good understanding between America and the British Empire is an easy task. There is not an American of middle age to-day who was not taught in his school the history of the struggle between this coin try and his own at the time of the Revolution, and there will be many recollections of that struggle which excite resentment even to-day. The influences which bear fruit in youth often remain permanently through men's lives. There are certain temperamental differences also between the two nations. There are certain rivalries, and in my opinion the most tactful men in both America and England, the most farsighted, the most prudent, will have all their work cut out to maintain the good relations which ought to exist not merely for the good of Great Britain and America, but in the interests of the future peace of the world. I do not know whether our papers are wise in keeping from us information with regard to what goes on in America. For instance, I saw only the other day that in the American House of Representatives a resolution was carried calling upon the Peace Conference to con- sider the claim of Ireland for independence. Why do our newspapers keep this information from us? Is it wise or businesslike? Is it becoming to the good sense of a practical nation like the English? I could say a good deal about this, but perhaps it would not be unfair to do so in a discussion which is dealing with the larger question of the Peace Conference. I do pray every Member of this House to approach this question of the relations between England and America and of the future of Ireland as part of a great Imperial problem and to try and lift their minds above petty considerations which are calculated to keep Ireland and England apart and at the same time to keep Great Britain and the United States apart.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw my Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Main Question again proposed.

I rise to move, at the end of the Address, to add the words,

"But humbly regrets that no assurance is given that the merging of the Air Ministry and the War Office under one head is but a temporary measure of convenience, inasmuch as to disintegrate the Air Service or subordinate it to the other fighting services is detrimental to the Empire's aerial development."

This is an Amendment intended to protest the necessity for the unity and independence of the Royal Air Force. The Amendment, you may say, was not put down on the initiative of the Members who are supporting it, but was rather provoked by the action of the Government; because, despite the fact that this House has passed the Air Ministry Act setting up a Secretary of State for the Air who is to be co-equal with the Secretary of State for War and the First Lord of the Admiralty, in the construction of the Government the two offices—the War Office and Air Ministry—have been combined under one head, and in the judgment of those who are supporting this Amendment, which is put down in the names of Members all of whom have been actively engaged during the War in the Royal Air Force, the union of the two offices under one head threatens the unity and independence of the Royal Air Force. It is not necessary that I should explain that this is not an attack either upon the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Under-Secretary of State for War or upon the War Minister, and I can say, speaking for myself, that were he Minister for Air and nothing else there is no one I would rather see in office, nor is there anyone, in my judgment, who has contributed more by energy and imagination to the Service of the Air. What troubles us is that the right hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Churchill) combines the two offices in his person, and it is the very fact that he has such ability and such gigantic energy which makes us uneasy, because, in our judgment, the War Office will come first, and the fact that he will control it with his great ability and energy will necessarily subordinate the interests of the Air Ministry. It is too late in the day for it to be necessary for me to explain the necessity for an Air Ministry independent of the other Services. That has been decided by this House, and it is based upon the unity which exists among all the Air Services in material and on land and water and in the unity of training, because, except in the final stages, there is no difference in the training of a pilot whether he is to fly a seaplane, an observation machine, or a scout. It is not necessary for me to dwell on this point because it has been agreed upon by this House, and it was one of the points in which there was said to be inaction on the part of the first Coalition Government.

In our judgment unless the Air Force is independent it cannot remain united. We consider that on the independence of the Air Force depends entirely the basis on which alone its unity can be preserved. The right hon. Gentleman the Minister for War, who is also the Minister for the Air, will be faced with problems like this. About this time of the year Estimates are being prepared. We know what happens. The Departments ask for much more money than the Cabinet is willing to grant, and there is a general series of interviews and representations, and each Department has to cut the coat according to the cloth. We will suppose that a certain amount of money has been set aside for defence purposes, and that the question is whether that money is to be spent, say, on Cavalry or on aeroplanes. Which side will the right hon. Gentleman take if such a question comes before him? He represents both Services and his position is really impossible. Previously such a question would be settled by reference to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, but the right hon. Gentleman in his dual capacity will find himself at least an embarrassed, if not a partial, judge. There are other matters on which conflict is possible between the Air Ministry and the War Office. I was not present when it took place, but I believe that a year ago there was a dispute between the two Ministries on the question of the medical service. Anybody who has been in the Air Service knows perfectly well that there is a large field for air medical service, and that the problems of a medical service for the air are really quite different and quite specialised, and are not the same as problems of the War Office. The right hon. Gentleman probably agrees with me that there is a case for a separate air medical service. In any case a pledge was given on the subject, and why was it not done during the War? It was not done because the War Office would not agree, although very distinguished medical experts in this House pressed for it, and a compromise had to be arrived at in deference to the wishes of the War Office. If that problem arises again, and the conflict arises again, which side is the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War and Air going to take? But I do not base the case against War Office control of the air even on a matter like that, and on matters like that, which could be elaborated indefinitely. I say that the whole Army point of view on air subjects is unsound. It is not the air point of view. There is such a thing as an air sense, and persons regard the air in the same way as the sailors regard the sea. That air sense you will never get in people trained only on the land. I have observed matters in the Army and the Navy. I know the sort of thing the Army people want. They want spectacular points, such as "How many Huns have been destroyed to-day?" That is really not the fundamental fact in air warfare, and is really ancillary to the real service that the Air Force renders in observation and defence; but the Army point of view is what is in the newspaper, and they want the interesting thing, and they ask, "How many Huns have been destroyed in the course of the day?"

There is also their attitude towards the technical side. The progress of the air, I make so bold to say, depends entirely on mechanics. It is exactly in the same state as when the Navy changed from sail to engines. The Army point of view never gives proper weight to the mechanical side, and to constant improvement in mechanism, by which alone progress can be made. I have ventured to point out some of the conflicts that may come before the right hon. Gentleman, and some of the ways in which his heart may be torn in his dual capacity as Minister for War and Air. What about the naval side? It was only with the very greatest difficulty that the Air Ministry was formed to include the machines which were under the orders of the Navy. Now there is a very great suspicion in naval circles of the union even to-day. Many of the men on the naval side of the Royal Air Force have been in the Navy. Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that they would be a little suspicious when they found that their promotions or rewards had to be decided by the Secretary of State for War? It may be said that these matters of promotions and ribbons are small matters, but soldiers and sailors do not work for money. They work for honour, and they think a great deal of those things. I think the man in the Navy who renders service in the air would be rightly suspicious if he found that such matters have got to be decided by the War Office. In my judgment, when the union took place some mistakes were made. The naval flyers were put into the united Air Force and the titles selected for thorn were military. I do not think that was necessary, and I think it was a mistake, because I do not think the military titles, such as colonel, captain, and brigadier, are in the least applicable to the Flying Force. I think it would have been better to select naval titles if the question was one between the Army and Navy, but I do not see why you should not have special terms for the Air Service. The very existence of these titles fosters the separatist spirit which exists in the naval part of the Air Service to-day. Then there is the question of discipline. Discipline in the Air Force was based upon discipline in the Army, and in my judgment that was a mistake also. Of course, during the War Acts had to be adopted holus-bolus, because there was no time to go into details, but I do not think that the discipline which is suitable for the Army is necessarily the type of discipline suitable for the Air Service. Personally, I think the Army discipline and the whole penal code in the Army wants revision, and I think its punishments and its ideas are mediæval, archaic, and ineffective, and they are certainly not suited to the peculiar psych- ology of the airmen. What happens? A number of flying men are in a ship. Even when they were Royal Naval Air Service men there was never that knitting together between them and the ship's company as there was between the whole company itself, and when they became Royal Air Force men the feeling of division became more acute still. The captain of the ship, who exercised a very complete and rather paternal control over the whole ship's company, resented having on board a number of people in a uniform that he did not recognise and subject to a discipline that he did not understand and strongly suspected. That caused a desire for separation, and that desire, I think would be very greatly increased by the knowledge that those men were under the control of a Minister whose first charge he would suppose must necessarily be the War Office, and not the Air Ministry. Demobilisation is now taking place

10.0 P.M.

The Air officers consist of people, some of whom were soldiers and others sailors before joining the Air Force, while others still entered directly. It is among these that you have the best chance of fostering the real esprit de corps of the Air Force, but these are the very people who are being demobilised first, and you have as a result a tendency already setup to leave in the higher positions of the Service the very men whose desire to get away from one another and to get back again to their first love, either the Army or the Navy. You get the sort of thing which, in my opinion, is the worst possible thing for the Air Force, and that is men who do not know whether they are going to succeed in the air or whether they will not go back to the Artillery, or to their old ship; and if you have men whose interest is divided you never can get that wholehearted support and enthusiasm and real esprit de corps which must be the basis of success in aviation in the future. I dare say the right hon. Gentleman will explain either that this is a purely temporary arrangement—if it is we must accept it as such, but we should like to know how long it will last—or he may say that it is a step in the direction of the co-ordination of the three Services and of the creation of a Ministry of Defence. Perhaps his filial piety causes his mind to turn back thirty years to when Lord Randolph Churchill presented a memorandum suggesting a Minister of Defence, who should combine both the Navy and the Army under his control. But I would remind the right hon. Gentleman that one of the reasons why that very scheme was turned down by one of the strongest Committees that ever sat on Defence, of which Lord Sydenham was secretary, was because the Navy could not be convinced that under such a scheme it was not going to get the worst of it. If that was well founded then, how much more true would it be for the Air Force to be suspicious, being the youngest of all, that she was not going to get an equal position with the older Services under such a scheme? I suppose that what will really happen will be, not that there will be one Minister in charge of the three Services, but that our defences will be governed by some Committee partaking of the character of the Imperial Defence Committee or the War Cabinet. We are, therefore, entitled to ask what will be the exact functions of the Air Ministry under such a Committee, and whether this present plan of uniting the two under the control of one right hon. Gentleman is going to assist a successful arrangement of that, kind? During the War the smallest part of the work of the Air Force has been done by the Independent Air Force, which is the part which operates not under the orders of either the Army or the Navy. In my opinion, and I think my hon. and gallant Friends who support me in this Amendment will agree, that Force will have the greatest part of the work to do in the future. There will be a punitive expedition, perhaps, or there may be police work to be done in the way of a force to be put at the disposal of a League of Nations in order to enforce its decisions. This will be partaking of the character of the work of the Independent Air Force. In the particular part of the theatre of war in which I was employed some years ago a great deal could have been done if there had been an effective Independent Air Force. I mean against Turkey. The whole of the Turkish coast line was exposed, but there was absolutely no organisation of the Air Force to enable us to attack it. Hon. Gentlemen may remember that the Bagdad Railway passes the Gulf of Alexandretta at a point only 15 miles from the coast, perfectly flat land over which it is quite easy to fly, as we did repeatedly, but we had no organisation of machines to enable us to blow up the railway, which crosses two rivers by bridges 130 metres wide, I think, if I remember rightly—a single line. That railway could undoubtedly have been destroyed if we had had the material to do it, and that would have meant isolating the forces of the Turks in the East from their headquarters in Asia Minor. Then there is the case of the Hedjas. As hon. Membersremember, the Turks for a long time kept a garrison at Medina, from which a single line of railway runs through the desert to the north. If we had had a sufficient and properly organised Independent Air Force, there is not the least doubt that that line could have been cut repeatedly, the garrison of Medina forced to surrender, and the King of the Hedjas would have had his victory months, and perhaps a year, sooner than he had. As it was, the capture of Jeddah was a decisive military action by air. The place was bombed and the Turks surrendered without any land force being required at all, which is an instance of a decisive action by air. At Aden there was a man with a force some twenty-five miles inland and no one would attack him because it was too hot. It was simply the heat of the desert which protected him. If we had lad an effective Independent Air Force he would have been wiped out. That is the sort of thing which will happen in future. It is one of the things that the Air Force will have to undertake on the military side.

Then there is the civilian side, which is far more important. These are some of the commonplaces of their work—licensing aircraft, certifying pilots, regulating patrols, laying down international law, and so on, as well as a great deal of pioneer work. The aircraft industry is, of course, at a very critical point. It has lost, or is losing, its best customer. The War having ceased, the best customer is cutting down its orders, and it is not a time when the industry can afford to do the necessary pioneer work. And yet a great deal of pioneer work has got to be done. The sort of work that the Air Ministry will do, I suppose, is something of this kind: The air must be policed. You must, prevent smuggling—a big job. You may both find and signal distressed vessels. A great deal of the work done by coastguards could certainly be done by aircraft. The air patrols would see a vessel in distress and might bring it succour, and certainly bring back news so that assistance could be rendered. Then there are expeditions. An expedition already is fitting out in America and taking aircraft to explore the Northern regions. Undoubtedly there is the use of aircraft for the production of rain by a discharge of electric currents between aircraft in the clouds. There is the whole arrangement of codes and signals in the air. Nothing could be more grotesque than the present arrangements by which a signal is made in a naval code and made into the military code. I have known a message take eight hours, though the actual message was sent in as many seconds from one place to another. All that has to be arranged by the Air Ministry. Then there is the whole question of the navigation of the air. You must have charts showing the speed of winds at different heights. There is also the question of telling aircraft which are lost their position by means of wireless telegraphy. Then there is the provision of lighthouses, and all sorts of signals in fog.

All this sort of work has got to be done by the Air Ministry, and the question we have to ask is: Is a proper foundation for this sort of work being prepared by the association of the Air Ministry with the War Office? It is perfectly obvious from the enumerations I have given of the purposes of the Air Ministry that no good thing can possibly come by associating this great, live, progressive Service with the War Office. As a matter of fact, it is much more akin to Admiralty work. But I should have been the very last, having served in the Royal Naval Air Service when under Admiralty control, to recommend that the Service should be put under the command of the Admiralty. I am not speaking of the regimé of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Churchill) at the Admiralty. I only wish I had been serving when he was fit the Admiralty. Rather than the War Office or Admiralty, I would see a civilian element introduced in the Air Ministry so as to be in touch with all the genius of civilian energy that has done so much to give us the mastery of the air we enjoy at the present moment. The Royal Air Force can look back without shame on the records of the lass four years. It can look forward to an unparalleled opportunity of service in the cause of humanity. That, in my judgment, depends entirely on the preservation of its unity and its independence.

I rise, with a certain amount of nervousness, for the first time in this House to make my maiden speech, but I am reassured somewhat by Members who have told me that even those Gentlemen who speak on the Front Bench have not always distinguished themselves by their maiden speech. My own case, I think, is a little different from other Members of this House, because I stand for the Chatham Division of Rochester, where there is situated a very big manufactory of aircraft, so that the question of aeronautics and aviation played a more prominent part there than perhaps in other constituencies. Consequently, after they have placed their confidence in me and elected me, the first thing I find is that the Government have introduced a measure for an arrangement of offices which is so much against what we understood in the past that I have, even at this early time, and much against my will, to raise my voice in protest. I have been told that the House will lend its ear to a Member who knows his subject. Some fourteen years' intimacy with aeronautics having given me knowledge, I look round and hope that I may be accorded that ear. I divide that fourteen years into three periods. I am here now again as a civilian. There was a time when I was a civilian. There was a time when I was a soldier—or an airman—and there was a time when I was at the Air Ministry. I do not know under what class that occupation would come. Anyhow, the whole history of aviation in this country is so short that I have not to appear in this House with grey hair or a long beard to show that I have been associated with it from the start. I want, if I can, to convey to this House how in all that time the spirit of opposition from those great offices, like the War Office and the Admiralty, has been dominant.

In the very early days of aviation, in 1911, certain members of the Aero Club were so impressed with the possibilities of aircraft from a purely military point of view that they arranged a deputation to the War Office, and made an offer to the War Office to provide two aeroplanes, with the pilots and all the necessary paraphernalia, so that the aeroplanes might be tried during the Army manœuvres of that year. I formed one of that deputation. I approached, I must say, the building with some confidence. After being kept waiting three-quarters of an hour we were told that the aeroplanes were not wanted for war purposes, that no one could see any use for them. That was the sort of encouragement one got in those days. Lest, however, the Admiralty should think that they are less blameworthy, let me tell the House that the Aero Club again had to teach the first four naval pilots. These were taught by private members of the club because no action would be taken by the Navy in the matter.

I want to skip from that time to the War. When the War came on there was a Flying Corps, a small one, I admit, but already the right hon. Gentleman the Minister for War had, for the best purpose, I do admit—still he had done it—taken a part of the original Flying Corps and had turned it into the Royal Naval Air Service. I know his intentions were of the very best, but so many great mistakes are made under those circumstances. It is popularly supposed that the Flying Corps and the Air Services during the War were welcomed by everybody at the front. Such, I assure hon. Members, was not at all the case. First of all, the thing was not in the book. And recognisances, the most elementary, of course, of all the uses of aircraft, were not in any way believed in. Then we got a little further. When trench warfare began we went in for photography, and we produced all sorts of photographs. We tried to get the people to accept them. They said they were very pretty but they did not see any use for them. We had as a Flying Corps actually to start to make maps before the Army would make them. There was a lieutenant-colonel, now a famous general, who carried in his pocket a pocketful of photographs. After every interview he used—like a commercial traveller—to produce one and say, "You must have one of these; you will find them very useful." Then, again, I want to show hon. Members another instance of opposition from the Army mind—that is in regard to Artillery. It is well known that very gunner thinks he knows exactly where his shot goes. That is one of those popular fallacies one cannot dispel. The Royal Flying Corps did their very best to help them to correct their shots. Yet it was not until we actually showed the marks made by the shells, by photographs, that they were practically forced to use aeroplanes for firing heavy guns. On that matter I remember well an officer, who was killed, flying over Ypres salient and sending back by wireless a curious message that, if anyone is firing at the centre of the lake, whose name he gave, he is hitting it.

Do not let the Navy think that they are not to blame. We are told in the papers every day to remember the Dover patrol. I very much remember it in the early days of the War. It will be remembered that the Navy were in charge of that stretch of coast. They allowed to be built up there an enormous enemy artillery which never ought to have been allowed for one moment to exist. It never would have existed if aircraft had only been used as is should have been. Instead of that, the most antiquated methods were adopted by the Admiralty. They brought up huge constructions, dropped them in the sea, and put a man upon them; and he was asked to observe the fall of the shots behind a hill which he really could not see. While there were squadrons at Dunkirk dying to do the work. I bring forward these points to show the constant opposition there is to anything new, and we have never got, over that even to this day. After seeing what opposition there was to the R.N.A.S. there was naturally a feeling between the two Services to get together to be allowed to do their work. When the R.N.A.S. was formed that was a red-letter day in aviation, because it was the declaration of independence of a new Service. If one can make a simile, the egg of aviation was cracked and out came the chick. What plumage it was to take on we did not know, but the plumage turned out somewhat heterogeneous. A few of us here believe in the future of aviation, and we want to know whether the Government do. We want to know what the arrangement is and whether it is permanent or not. If it is simply to help demobilisation let us be told so. Perhaps the Government have taken it into their heads to start some aviation experiment on their own. Had the present arrangement been reversed, and had there been a Secretary of State for Air and an Under-Secretary of State for War, that would at least have shown that the Government saw what things were coming to, because although the Air Service is going to be very expensive it is in many ways going to save the State money.

The whole outlook in different parts of the Empire must change. For instance, a squadron will do all the work of several garrisons in India, but if you keep your two Ministries together, and if the Secre- tary of State for War is to take the advice of soldiers, is it not within the bounds of possibility that there will come up from the soldiers a recommendation to eliminate themselves in favour of another Service? This arrangement has already started almost an agitation for the old Royal Naval Air Service. I do not know very much about the organisation of the Admiralty, and it has always been somewhat of a mystery to me that they have been able to produce any thing more than a trireme, but the Navy have some grievances in the master of Royal Air Force officers on board their ships. The future of the Air Service can be rather likened to the Admiralty and the Navy in which a fundamental training is the same, but in which at the end the different officers choose the separate branch of the Service into which they would like to go, as, for instance, submarine, mining, navigating officer, or gunner. In the Air Service it would not be difficult to arrange some form of regiments or corps, one of which would be devoted, say, to the naval side, one to the military side, one to pure bombing, one to pure fighting, and one to the offensive against troops. That is a thing that can easily be done. It only requires a little organisation and a little imagination.

We now come to the commercial side of aviation. Of course, an enormous amount of nonsense has been written about this by people who know very little about it, but I am glad to think that the Indian rope trick has taken precedence in the literary field for the moment. I think we can compare the future of aviation a little with motoring. We find to-day in motoring that taxation is heavier and legislation is more oppressive in this country than in any other civilised country in the world, and we must remember that motoring never started only in the hands of the Government. The whole of the future of aeronautics now rests in the hands of the Government. That is an awful thought. The first thing that we want is to release all flying. We want flying permitted in this country apart from Government machines. Already there is a trend for designs to go different ways. The war machine and the commercial machine are very different things, and the designs are going in absolutely opposite directions. Up to quite recently no firm was allowed oven to build an aeroplane which was not approved by the technical side of the Air Ministry. I am going to touch a little on that last year of mine which I spent in the AirMinistry. I want to show the House the enormous rise of militarism therein. The Air Ministry was fuller of generals than any other building in England. Even to-day the civil direction of aviation is run by a general. There is scarcely a department which is not run by a general, and where we did expect a civilian politician at the head we find a major-general. There is at this moment a demobilisation going on in the Air Ministry which I regard with very great alarm. The Air Service, as it was at the end of the War, was composed of civilians who had come into that force and a few Regular officers. Those civilians, who were the blood of that Service, are going out every day, and there are being left there nothing but old Regular officers. You cannot change the spots of a leopard. Most of those at the head of Departments were generals, and were Staff officers in the War Office, and that is their spiritual home to-day. Never did the future of a great movement, a new age almost, depend upon careful organisation atone particular time more than aviation depends upon it now. Through this War, with the united efforts of all manufacturers, and with our wonderful flying officers, we have got to the top of the tree. We must keep there. We cannot, by lethargy and by trying to run the thing on a military line when it must be run on a civilian basis, jeopardise the position we have won. There is one bright spot, and that is the personality of the Secretary of State for Air. He does enjoy the confidence of most people interested in the air. He has imagination, and I believe he has the movement at heart. He has started by shaking a little of our confidence, but if he can in any way restore that, he will find in our little committee the greatest help, because we are out to show that not only is the sea His Majesty's ocean, but that the air is His Majesty's also.

We have listened to two very pleasant speeches, and I do not think we could wish for anything better than that speeches of that kind should be the characteristics of the new House of Commons, because they were both delivered by men who, with long study and considerable achievement, have made themselves masters of the subject with which they have dealt. They were characterised not only by knowledge but by earnestness. Everyone is delighted to see my hon. and gallant Friend (Captain Benn), fresh from his victories in the air and at the polls, speaking for the first time from the Front Opposition Bench, and those who are acquainted with the mystery of the birth and growth of our aviation Services know what a help the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Colonel Brabazon) has been. I believe his ticket as an air pilot is actually No. 1—and what a claim he has, not only from his service as a flying officer and a pioneer of that development, but as a pioneer in aerial photography! Every one would recognise and admit his claims to the attention of the House on such an occasion. I am, however, called upon not simply to pay compliments, but to define the policy of the Government on a Motion which, if it were successful, would entail a change of Government.

The Prime Minister is responsible for the decisions which have led to the present arrangement, and in ordinary circumstances he would have been here this evening to reply to the speeches which have been made, but he has already addressed the House yesterday and again, to-day, and I believe will speak on the Amendment to-morrow. Therefore it falls to me to defend my own qualifications for this double office in his absence and to do the best I can to repeat, to the House the arguments which I understand actuated him in arriving at that decision. My right hon. Friend, I know, had first of all in his mind a great wish not to multiply unduly the offices of the Government. In various directions it is necessary to create new offices, and as far as possible he wished to reduce the scale of the Parliamentary staff by which the Government is carried on. Although the Air Service is an arm which will acquire increasing importance as the years go by, there is no doubt that after the demobilisation is complete, the size of the Air Service compared with either the Army or the Navy will be very much smaller; and it was not considered by the Prime Minister at the present period in aviation development that a separate Secretaryship of State was required for the administration of the Air Service.

In the second place, we are confronted at present with the great operation of demobilisation, which affects the Army and the Air Service in very similar ways though not absolutely identical, and which affects them in ways different from those in which the Navy is affected. The Navy has only been expanded two and a half times; the Air Service has sprung into existence, and the Army has been multiplied by ten. This makes the shrinkages which have to be made in the Air Service and the Army involve decisions in regard to pay conditions, and Regulations governing the transition of men from military to civil life, which I say, without hesitation, can far better be taken in regard to those two kindred Services if they are taken from a common point of view, and if the two Departments can be made to march in step, and not overthrow the policy of the one by separate or independent action on the part of the other. Therefore it is specially in regard to the period of demobilisation that I make this point.

When demobilisation is complete, another important task will lie before us. We shall have to redistribute the garrisons of the British Empire in the light of the lessons we have learned in the War, and in view of the fact that a new element—a new arm—has come into the military category, and though we must not anticipate the decisions of the Peace Conference, that our military responsibilities, particularly in the East, may be somewhat enlarged. If you are to have the highest amount of military power developed with the least possible cost, you have to redistribute your garrisons, with the air and military forces harmoniously interspersed, and disposed about the Empire. There are good reasons why an effective arrangement of squadrons, all working from powerful well-established bases, could be held with a minimum of expense and difficulty and the greatest amount of security, whereas without that aerial development very large forces of Infantry, Cavalry, and Artillery would require to be maintained at the greatest possible expense. It is the harmonious interweaving of the Air Force with the Army in the redistribution of the military forces, and in the redistribution of our overseas garrisons that the hope of our discharging the great tasks which lie before us, without an undue burden upon the public Exchequer, mainly lies. That redistribution can far better be made if it be made from one point of view and if the two Services which are primarily concerned walk together in step, and are not competitive rivals in the field. Therefore, I say that, at any rate at present and in the future—the immediate future—there is special reason why the Air and the Military Secretaryships of State should be directed from a common standpoint.

But I should like to assure my hon. friends that in the meantime, without prejudice to anything that may or may not be done in the future, the integrity, the unity, the independence of the Royal Air Force will be sedulously and carefully maintained. There is not the slightest intention of merging them in the Army, of merging the administration of the Royal Air Force in the War Office, of subordinating it to the War Office, or of derogating from its separate, independent state as a Royal Air Force. I have done my best on every opportunity which has so far fallen in my way to make that perfectly plain, and if at any time another arrangement be thought preferable, and the needs which make this present arrangement appropriate are no longer in existence, the Air Force will be found to have been so conducted and so managed that it could immediately undertake an independent existence with my right hon. Friend (General Seely) as pilot under its own steam, or any other arrangement could be made which would enable the offices to be divided. There is no question whatever of rupturing the integrity of the Air Force. So far from the Air Force having been disintegrated by what has taken place since the present Government was formed, we have enlarged our scope. The manufacturing and production departments of the Ministry of Munitions have been handed over to the Air Force. Anyone acquainted with the importance of these departments will realise what an accession that has been to the substance and strength of the air organisation. Instead of civilian aviation being split up between all the different Departments—the Board of Trade, the Foreign Office, or whatever it may be—as some people had suggested, it will now be definitely placed in the sphere of the Air Ministry.

I am very glad indeed that General Sykes has been induced to take charge of this most important and growing branch of aviation. If you are to choose the head of a civil branch of aviation, your choice is limited to two classes of men. You must either choose a Service man or an aircraft manufacturer, and while I recognise to the full the services which the aircraft manufacturers have rendered there can be no doubt that a Service man of distinction is to be preferred, and for this reason: Whichever great head of an aircraft factory you choose to develop civil aviation for the Government you would certainly engender in the breasts of all his rivals and competitors in the trade a feeling of great insecurity and suspicion that would undoubtedly dog his steps. But General Sykes has most patriotically consented to retire from the military profession, and to take civilian garb, in order to emphasise the civilian character of this Department, and to devote his great abilities to developing to the utmost, as far as it lies in the province of the Government, to the progress of civil and commercial aviation. We have already taken preliminary steps to introduce a Bill to the House to enable us to get private flying started, at first under Regulations, which at a later date can be greatly relaxed, and I trust that, progress will be made in that sphere.

My hon. Friend opposite drew a picture of quarrels between the Air Office and the War Office, in which the Air Office would always be the sufferer. I am not quite sure that that is a picture which carried conviction to his own mind. At any rate, I can promise him that there will be very few quarrels between the heads of those two Departments. That, at any rate, is an assurance which I can give him. Whether that will completely reconcile him to the arrangement I cannot tell. But there is another step he recommended which I think it right and proper to take. In order to emphasise the distinction between the Air Force and the two parent Services, it is necessary that the titles and ranks of the officers should be different from those which are employed in the two parent Services. There is no topic which gives rise to more fertile and provoking discussion than the invention or titles and styles, and therefore I will not venture to submit to the House at present any of those which we have in mind, but I am glad to say that General Trenchard, who has resumed his post in the Royal Air Force, is confident that a good scheme of perfectly distinctive titles can be devised, from which it will be seen that so far from the Royal Air Force being merged in the War Office, it has, in fact, taken notable steps towards emphasising its own independent characteristics.

I should like to point out to those in this House who are very much interested in aviation that at the present stage much harm may easily be done by over-estimating its capacity and capability. The hon. Gentleman who spoke drew attention to the extravagant estimates which are set about in the newspapers as to the immediate possibilities of commercial aviation. Generally, we shall not help to forward this cause if we begin by teaching the public to expect from it all sorts of performances which, although they are now within view, are certainly not yet within reach. The Air Force must neglect nothing that can add to its body and its substance. We want everything that the technical departments and the production processes can give us. We want everything we can get from the Navy and from the Army. We want everything we can procure from our own unaided effort.

The officers of the Air Force must be drawn from three sources. There must be Air Force officers of permanent commission, but there must also be Army and Navy officers who are seconded—who will come in and do three or four years of flying, and then go back to the parent Services—teaching the parent forces what the air is worth and what it can do for them; and then, perhaps, some of them will come back at a later date as Staff officers or in command. Unless you have that process, you will not be able to make a fair proportion between the lower ranks of the Service and the higher ranks which are open to the legitimate aspirations of those embarking on the career. Unless you have a proper proportion between the higher posts at the top of the Service and the young men who enter at the bottom, you will find that you will not get that class which is absolutely necessary if the high tone of the Service is to be maintained—that class of efficient young men of enterprise and daring who are indispensable to the force. Every profession must have its proper proportion. I have been getting out statistics to see how many curates there are to every archbishop, how many sub-lieutenants to every admiral, how many lieutenants to every field-marshal, and so on. In the Air Force we have the same great disproportion of the young officers of the flying age, and unless you can derive from the two other parent forces something that will take this off, so that they will look to their own Services for their final advancement, you will find it very difficult to provide a reasonable share of advancement and promotion for those who have to enter on this profession. I have, I hope, done something if not to reassure my hon. Friend, at any rate to placate him.

There is only one more word which I can say before I sit down, mid I say it because the Prime Minister specially referred to it when instructing me on the subject. Reference has been made by both speakers to what is called the Ministry of Defence. There can be no Ministry of Defence, however good that may be in theory and as an ultimate ideal, actually there can be no Ministry of Defence until you have created a staff of extra-officers who have grown up year after year having studied the question of war and the defence of the Empire from the general point of view, and unless that staff have gradually gained the confidence of their respective branches and are familiar with all the branches. You have to build up a great body of combined war thought, capable of producing professional, expert leaders to advise the Government, not from an Army point of view or a Navy point of view, but generally over the whole field of war. Until you possess that body of officers, believe me, it is idle to speculate on the possibilities of a Ministry of Defence. That is a task which certainly cannot be a complished and achieved until not merely the officers have been trained, but have grown up and are in such a position, in their respective Services as will entitle them to the confidence of their comrades and their profession. It is a matter of a good many years work. However, nothing in what has been done in the association of the Air Force and the Army under the conditions I have specified, with entirely separate offices, is inconsistent in any way with that ideal, if it be thought to be possible. It may be said that two-thirds of the road has already been covered. I end as I began, by thanking both the Mover and the Seconder for the kindly terms in which they have expressed their differences, and I trust that in the few words which the House has allowed me to address to it on the subject I have done something to remove their objections, or, at any rate, to diminish their hostility.

While I am glad to recognise the very conciliatory tone of my right hon. Friend's speech, I must say I do not think he convinced me by any of his arguments—if arguments they can be called—that the arrangement suggested is a wise one. It appears that the Government are anxious to save the difference in the salary between an Under-Secretary of State and a Secretary of State. Does my right hon. Friend think it worth while to put forward an argument of that kind in the House of Commons at this time of day? Then we are told it is necessary that the Air Force and War Office should work together in respect of demobilisation and other matters. Is my right hon. Friend so indocile that unless he was a subordinate official he would find it impossible to work with him, and disagreement would be inevitable? These arguments only inspire distrust and create the impression that something is being attempted which the Government date not avow. They are protesting it is essential that the War Office should be over the Air Force which is the very thing we want to avoid. Surely my right hon. friend can see it is absolutely essential for the efficiency of the Air Service that it should be entirely detached from the control of the War Office. Experience has shown us that wherever the War Office has intruded its fingers there has followed inefficiency and disaster. As long as the War Office had anything to do with the Air Service it had a mischievous effect, and nothing could be more likely to imperil the future and efficiency of the Air Service than any return to the arrangement adopted in the past. I merely want to enter a protest in case my right hon. Friend thought his explanation was a satisfactory one.

In view of what the right hon. Gentleman has said, and after consultation with my hon. and gallant Friends, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Main Question again proposed.

Motion made, and Question, "That the Debate be now adjourned," put, and agreed to.—[Mr. Brace.]

Debate to be resumed To-morrow.