The first Amendment on the Paper, in the name of the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Willison)—in page 1, line 14, after the word" repealed," to insert the words

"where at the time when such order, or orders, is made the married woman is residing with her husband the order, or orders, shall not be enforceable whilst she so continues to reside with him"—

I have been unable to read into Clause 1.

I beg to move, in page 1, line 19, to leave out from the word "accordingly" to the end of the Sub-section.

This Sub-section introduces a change in the law of a very important character, because it provides that, where the husband of a married woman has compelled his wife to submit herself to prostitution, she should be entitled to apply under the Bill for an Order which has the same effect as a judicial separation. That is rather a striking change in the law, and I presume that the intention is that the applicant at the time she makes the application should have abandoned that course of life to which she was unfortunately compelled by her husband. I cannot suppose it is intended that a married woman who is living in a state of prostitution should be entitled to go to the Court, and obtain a decree of separation from her husband. Persons who come for these decrees should come, as they sometimes say, with clean hands, if not with clean hearts, and it is not right that a woman living in prostitution should go to Court, and get such an Order. That being the intention of the Bill, I presume, the first part of the Sub-section has a good deal to be said in its favour. The use of the word "compel" is right in this connection, because the word "compel" necessarily involves that the wife has been driven into this evil course against her will—that she has been forced by the treatment she received at the hands of her husband to go into a life of prostitution.

But when we come to the second part of the Sub-section the provision is made that certain conduct on the part of her husband should be deemed to have compelled her to submit herself to prostitution. It ought to be pointed out that, when an Act of Parliament says that something is to be deemed to be something else, it means that that is not something else, and it requires the force of an Act of Parliament to say that it is to be so deemed. Therefore, in this second case, which is provided for in the latter part of the Sub-section, you have in fact got rid of the use of the word "compel" and of all that it implies, and you are really dealing with a case, not where an unfortunate woman has been forced against her will into prostitution, but where, as it sometimes unfortunately happens, she herself is not wholly unwilling to adopt that course. If that is the true meaning of these words, in such cases the woman ought not to be allowed to go and get a Separation Order against her husband. There is a very grave objection to the words in that they are so vague and indeterminate. This procedure is a procedure before Courts of Summary Jurisdiction; it is before any Court of Magistrates throughout the land. It is of vital importance that the words of an Act of Parliament should be plain and clear, but when you are dealing with Courts which consist, not of trained and skilled lawyers, but of laymen, it is all the more important that the words should be clear and unambiguous, so that those who are administering, the law may know what it is that they are entitled to do.

Sometimes politicians criticise judges, and some people think it is unfortunate. Sometimes judges criticise politicians, and complain that Parliament passes laws which are unintelligible, or very obscure. I am sure the House will agree that it is very desirable that we should, if possible, make our meaning plain and express it by clear words. I invite the House to consider what are the words here used. We are dealing with the case of a married woman who has submitted herself to prostitution. It has been provided that she is to be deemed to have been compelled to take that course in the following circumstances: where her husband has, in the opinion of the Court, been guilty of such conduct as was likely to result, and has resulted, in her so submitting herself. If you take the case of a woman who has submitted herself to prostitution, I think it may fairly be presumed that her married life has not been a very happy one, and in such cases the general opinion, I think, is that both sides are to blame. It is very seldom that you would get an unhappy married life where one of the parties was absolutely blameless in the sight of God and man.

Therefore, I am entitled to assume that in the case which is being supposed of a married woman who has submitted herself to prostitution, the husband has not been all that a, husband should be. He may have had a bad temper. He may possibly have, from time to time, indulged in intemperance, he may have wandered after other loves, he may not have dressed himself or behaved himself to her liking. He may have been guilty of all sorts of small or large things which may cause friction between husband and wife; and if he has done that, surely it may fairly be said that his conduct helped to bring about the result of the woman submitting herself to prostitution. Indeed, I think I may carry the argument further, because I was assuming that the husband had been guilty of some misconduct. But let us take the classic case of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere. There are some people who hold that it was the perfection of King Arthur that, I will not say compelled, but did something to impel that unhappy lady to the tragedy of her life. Therefore, even in the case of a perfect husband, it might be said that he had been guilty of such conduct as to lead to this result.

Would the hon. and learned Member say that it is a relevant case?

It is quite true that the lady in that case did not take to a course of prostitution, but she was guilty of misconduct, and there are people who hold that her misconduct was due to the immaculate perfection of her husband. Most of us, however, are frail mortal men, who cannot hope to attain the perfection of King Arthur, and in the case of most people it would be fair to say that the man's conduct was such as, in the particular circumstances, and dealing with the particular woman, would be likely to result and in fact resulted in her submitting herself to prostitution If that be so, are not these words too vague? They really might apply and will apply to practically every case where a married woman has submitted herself to prostitution. I respectfully submit they are too wide, and should not be allowed to stand in the Bill.

I beg to second the Amendment.

This Sub-section first of all defines an offence, and I think all hon. Members will agree there can be no greater moral offence than the offence with which it deals. Having defined the offence, you then go on to say in effect, "We have not made our net sufficiently large" and then you proceed to enlarge the scope of your net, not, by making the net itself bigger, but by looking at the results and by saying that any action, or any failure to take action resulting in the offence, shall receive the same punishment. I do not think it can be contended that you could apply that principle to any of the great offences such as murder. Murder undoubtedly results in the death of another person, but would any hon. Member bring forward an amendment to say that any action taken by a man which results in the death of another person should have the same punishment as murder?

That is the law at the present time.

The hon. Member will have an opportunity presently of showing us that a man who has taken action or who has refused to take action is guilty of murder if his action or his refusal leads to the death of another person. It seems to me a most pernicious form of legislation. We have defined the offence perfectly clearly and have said that where a man compels his wife to submit to prostitution, she is to have the benefit of the Clause; out the Sub-section then seems to me to try to pre-judge the decision of the Court in the use of the word "guilty" We say. "where the husband is guilty" and surely that pre-judges the question. To say "where he has conducted himself in such a way" would be sufficient and the whole or the second part seems, on both grounds, to be a most pernicious form of legislation which I hope the House will not support.

If this Amendment be carried, we might as well strike out the whole of Sub-section (2) but I trust the House will not accede to the plea put forward by the Mover and Seconder of the Amendment. The object of the Clause is to give an additional cause whereby a woman can obtain a separation order. The first words of the Clause are

"Where the husband of a married woman has compelled her to submit herself to prostitution,"

and if we do not add the amplifying words at the end, it will mean practically that actual physical compulsion will have to be proved. That is not what the Clause is intended to mean. The Clause is intended to meet those cases where the husband by his conduct makes it almost inevitable that the wife should submit herself to prostitution, and if these words be cut out, the whole object of the Clause is defeated. I ask the House to leave the Clause as it is. This Bill was originally brought up by the National Union for Equal Citizenship. Then it was a much larger Bill, but the Bill before us to-day is one which had the approval of the Conservative Government and the previous Coalition Government, which has been carefully scrutinised by the Home Office, and embodies a more or less agreed view as to the proper steps to be taken for the protection of women in these cases.

I venture to disagree entirely with the observations of the Chancellor of the Duchy who has just spoken. In my opinion the division of the Sub-section into two separate parts causes it to be contradictory. If hon. Members look at the first part of the Subsection they will see these words:

"Where the husband of a married woman has compelled her to submit herself to prostitution, the married woman shall be entitled to apply for an order or orders under the principal Act, and that Act shall have effect accordingly."

That provides a new ground whereby a married woman may go to a Court of Summary Jurisdiction, and obtain the benefit of a maintenance order against her husband. It is correct that that should be so, but where you are going to add a Sub-section, to say that the word "compelled" means that the husband has, in the opinion of the Court, been guilty of such conduct as was likely to result and has resulted in her so submitting herself, then you are putting on to a Court of Summary Jurisdiction the task of deciding whether the conduct, not the compulsion, of the husband has been such as would be likely to cause the wife to lead a life of prostitution. If that be so, the Courts of Summary Jurisdiction are going to listen to a variety of evidence, such as that, at an early stage of their married life, the husband and the -wife ceased to occupy the same room, evidence that the husband was continually devoting himself to a life of pleasure, and neglecting his wife, evidence that the wife was left to go about her own ways, and lead her life as she thought fit, and that there was no control over her movements, such as one anticipates does exist in the relationship of husband and wife. Then you would have this Court of Summary Jurisdiction, perhaps represented by a large number of Justices of the Peace, who, after they had listened to the evidence, would retire into their room to consider whether the evidence which they had heard was evidence of conduct likely to cause a wife to go on to the streets, and to lead a life of prostitution.

That is not the position of affairs which is desired, either by the group which supports this Bill or by the policy that underlies the Bill. The position is that, if a husband has compelled his wife to go on to the streets to lead an immoral life—that is to say, if he is a man who dislikes work, who does not desire to maintain his wife and family, who, perhaps as the result of a drunken life, says to his wife that the only means whereby money can be provided for the maintenance of the home is that she herself should go on to the streets and become a prostitute—then that woman is entitled to go to the Court, and say "My husband has thrust me on to the streets, and I apply for the protection of the Court. "This is an offence well known to the law, such as living upon the immoral earnings of a woman, that would cause the husband to be brought before the Court. In a case of that sort, you have husband and wife coming before the Court, where the charge against the husband is that of living upon the immoral earnings of his wife, and the natural result of the conviction of the husband for such an offence as that would be that the wife would be entitled, under this Clause, to go to the Court and say: "He has been convicted of living upon my immoral earnings; he compelled me to go on to the streets, and lead a life of prostitution, and I ask for an order of maintenance against him under this Act."

If you are going to stretch that, and to say that the Justices, in deciding a matter of this sort, shall go into all sorts of side issues, as to whether the conduct of the husband was "likely to result," what on earth does that mean? In the infinite variety of circumstances that make up married life, you can discover all sorts of conditions which may well be worthy of the consideration of a Court of Summary Jurisdiction as to whether or not the conduct was "likely to result" in a woman going on the streets. Then the Clause goes on—

"and in fact has resulted in her so submitting herself."

I do not suppose there is any married woman who goes on the streets who would not find some reason or other whereby she could blame her husband for the life she was leading. Married women usually blame their husbands for most things, and the natural result is that married men blame their wives for most things. At any rate, if you are going to be serious with this Bill, in the desire to provide for married women a new ground whereby to make a claim for maintenance, let it be definite, and not in the vague words of the second part of this Clause. Let it be definite that the Justices have to decide whether there is evidence before them that the wife has been compelled to go on to the streets by the husband. If they are satisfied of that, let them make the order, but if they have only to decide whether the conduct was such as to be likely to cause the wife to go on to the streets, and in fact has caused her to go on the streets, in my opinion, this second part of the Clause destroys the effect of the Bill, and is unnecessary if you consider the principle of the Bill.

I have heard with great interest the speeches delivered from the other side of the House in favour of the Amendment. I am opposed to the Amendment, because I read the Clause in two parts, one of which is certainly dependent upon the other. Courts of Summary Jurisdiction are benches composed, not of legally trained men, although there are sometimes a few of them who go there, but at least they are practical men and women who have had some experience of sitting with legal gentlemen, and I have always known them to give at least careful consideration to matters that come before them. Then they are guided by the Clerk of the Court, who undoubtedly is a highly trained legal gentleman, and on points of law no Court of Summary Jurisdiction would attempt to settle the question without careful consideration and consultation with the Clerk, who on legal points would guide them. So that I have no fear, from my knowledge and experience, of matters of this kind coming before a Court of Summary Jurisdiction. I read the Clause as meaning, in the first place, where there is no doubt or question about it. It may be that there are convictions known to the police and the people concerned, and the compulsion is clear and definite. But in the second part of the Clause, it says that the husband has, "in the opinion of the Court," and that is the key-note of the whole Clause. The case is thoroughly investigated, the statements are made, and the Bench themselves have to decide on the evidence received whether there has been some compelling cause or some act of which the husband has been guilty that has driven the wife into this unfortunate position.

It is easy to exaggerate these things, and to draw pictures of what might or might not happen. It is easy to magnify the possibilities that are involved, but I am going to come down to the practical, matter of fact position which would be occupied by a Court of Summary Jurisdiction. They would have to take the evidence submitted to them, and if they were satisfied that, in their judgment, the case had been proved, the woman would and should get the benefit, I will not say of the doubt, but of the evidence submitted to the Court. Therefore, if the second part of the Clause be omitted, the Clause loses its value, and the whole thing becomes distorted. I oppose the Amendment, and hope the House will accept the Clause as it stands, because the best legal minds of the country have considered the Clause. The people who have devoted their lives to what I will describe as the emancipation of woman and the defence of womanhood—the best minds of the country—have been devoted to it, have considered it, and agreed to it. Therefore, I hope and trust that this House will accept the Clause as it stands and reject the Amendment.

I cordially agree with the hon. Member for the Forest of Dean (Mr. Wignall) in this matter. I hope the House will reject this Amendment. There is one thing which I cannot quite follow, though, in what he said. He seems to think that this Clause as drafted is almost ideal in its language, but my reason for wishing that this Amendment should be rejected is that I regret that an Amendment preceding this on the Paper, to alter the word "compelled" to "caused," was not moved. The word" compel" is a word of high import, and a word which may lead to an extremely narrow construction of the Clause. The magistrates would have to ask themselves whether the woman had been compelled, in a strictly legal sense, to go out upon the streets and offer herself in prostitution. That would be an extremely narrow construction, and yet anyone who has had any acquaintance at all with the administration of law in the police courts knows perfectly well that there are a thousand and one ways absolutely short of legal compulsion where there would be such a strong moral compulsion as only the very strongest-minded woman in the world could resist. In those circumstances, the word "compelled" standing by itself would, in my opinion, defeat entirely the object of those who are supporting this Measure.

Therefore, it is absolutely necessary that there should be some words which will mitigate the hardship of the strict interpretation of the word" compelled." I do not say that the words which have been selected are ideal, but I do say, quite definitely, that this Clause is far better with the words that are now in than it would be if those words were left out. After all, these matters are very largely interpreted in the light of the ordinary practice which is carried out today in the divorce court, and one realises that if you want to get a legal interpretation of this, if there should be at any time an appeal against the decision of the magistrates, that appeal will go to two judges well qualified to deal with this matter, namely, two judges who deal with matters of this kind in the Divisional Court. I have no doubt they will be able to give a perfectly clear and common-sense interpretation of these words. They will give an interpretation to them which will make this Clause of real value to the community, of real value to the wife, while she cannot say she has been physically compelled, can prove quite clearly that the course of conduct and treatment has been such that she has had no alternative except to take the unfortunate course she has taken. My hon. and learned Friend seems to be a little troubled about what might be done in the case of the immaculate husband. I do not think the police courts of this country are very often troubled with the case of the immaculate husband. Are we to distort and destroy this Clause, merely for the off-chance that there may, at some time or another, appear in the police courts that immaculate person, who should be preserved in the museum when he does appear? We should destroy entirely the real dignity of Parliament, if, for an odd chance of that kind, we were to destroy what will be, if the Bill be passed in these terms—although the drafting may not be ideal—at any rate, a real safety valve, and a real means of protection to women who undoubtedly need some protection of this kind.

I also invite the House to reject this Amendment. It seems to me that the word "compelled" is somewhat vague. Personally, in many respects, I should very much prefer the word "caused," as it would make this Clause somewhat similar to Sections in the principal Act, where the word is used, and, for a period of time, there have been judicial decisions which have helped as to the definition and meaning of that word. Therefore, I think in many respects it would be highly desirable to substitute the word "mused" for "compelled." I understand the previous Amendment standing in the names of the hon. Members who are promoting this particular Amendment has been passed over, and therefore I may take it that the word compelled" now stands part of the Bill. It is absolutely essential there should be some definition of what that word means in this sense, and that is where the advantage of the latter part of this Clause comes in, because, in effect, it is a definition of a reason which the Justices must take into account before they uphold that a wife has been, in fact, compelled to submit herself to prostitution.

I do not agree with the hon. and learned Member for West Leyton (Mr. Cassels) in his judgment as to the ability of the Justices to consider all the multifarious facts that will have to be considered by them in discussing any claim under this particular Clause. I would remind the House that Magistrates' Courts all over the country, every day of the year, are considering equally important and equally difficult matters of fact, especially in dealing with matrimonial questions. There is no more difficult question ever put before Justices than in these matrimonial disputes. I think I may speak with some little knowledge of the matter, because for the last 20 years I have had the privilege of advising a Bench of Magistrates on these particular matters, and I can assure the House that the attention, the care and consideration given by these Magistrates in all these cases is immense, and in no circumstances do they ever leave their knowledge of human nature behind them when they enter the Court It would be, to my mind, disastrous to leave out the latter part of this Clause, and I hope, therefore, that it will not be pressed to a Division.

I venture to appeal to my hon. Friends to withdraw this Amendment, and, as one who has had some little experience in cases of this kind, I very heartily endorse the remarks of the hon. Gentleman who has just sat down. I suppose there are no more distressing and difficult cases than those that are, contemplated in this particular Sub-section, and I much regret that my hon. and learned Friend did not move his Amendment on line 16, because, undoubtedly, the word "caused" would be much more appropriate, and I hope those who are supporting this Bill, when it goes to another place, will, at any rate, endeavour to get that word inserted, because I am sure it would be much more satisfactory to the magistrates who have to determine the interpretation of this Clause. There is no doubt about it, in certain Courts, if you use the word "compelled," they will think some measure of physical compulsion is involved in that particular word, and it is very necessary, in my judgment, that the House should realise that in the majority of cases, I should say, it is not physical compulsion that brings about these cases, but it is conduct of another character altogether Therefore, I think that is the real reason why the second part of the Sub-section which it is proposed to delete, ought to be included. There is no doubt that in a very large number of cases the conduct which brings about this distressing state of affairs is not the conduct of a man going to strike his wife, or any thing of that kind, but a very much more deliberate, and, in many respects, devilish kind of conduct, which many of us who have had experience of these cases know about.

I do put to my hon. Friends this point also: There is no doubt about it, if this Bill gets on to the Statute Book—as I hope it will very speedily—some of these cases will be taken to the Divisional Court or the Divorce Court itself. There you have one of the most experienced Presidents sitting, whom we knew in this House as Sir Henry Duke, and with him sits another Divorce Court Judge. They will, if the necessity arises, very speedily lay down rules which would guide the magistrates up and down the country. Anyone who thinks that the vagueness of these terms may in some way be detrimental to the administration of justice may rely upon it that if there is anything of the kind the Divorce Court, which I feel, after all, is in very many respects one of the most careful courts in the country, will speedily put that side of the matter right, and there will soon be laid down a number of rulings and decisions to guide the Courts of Summary Jurisdiction.

Some reference has been made to the point as to whether this Clause is most against the husband or most against the wife. One can say this: that the position is very largely changed, because on a large number of benches of magistrates up and down the country—and I for one am glad to know it—there are many women magistrates who are sitting, and therefore you are getting—if there is any question of sex in this matter—a more balanced view in this particular connection. I hope on all these grounds that my hon. Friends will allow this Clause to remain. They certainly have, if I may say so, made very effective speeches in the suggestions that have been made, and it is a perfectly proper criticism to say that this Sub- section is of rather an indefinite character. But the difficulty is that directly you begin to define matters of this sort you get into very deep waters. The more you attempt to define these things the more likely you are to limit them, and make the administration of justice difficult. On all these grounds I hope my hon. and learned Friend, who has quite properly put forward this matter, because it ought to be very carefully sifted in this House, will see his way not to further press this Amendment.

I think my hon. and learned Friends have really rendered a service by the Amendment which they have moved, for they have called attention to what I consider is the very awkward language used in this Subsection. Subject to that, I wholly and entirely agree with what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. I think that if we left this Bill merely with the word "compelled" in it, it would be a waste of time and a waste of paper. My own opinion is that if we stop at the word "compel" the whole intentions of the promoters of the Bill would be defeated; therefore, I cannot possibly support the Amendment. I think, however, that this Sub-section is very unfortunately worded. The second part, as I read it, really comes as a definition of the first. We have words in the second part of this Sub-section where something is deemed to be compulsion which, in fact, is not. I want to help the promoters of the Bill. If they will look at the earlier part of the Sub-section, they will see that a married woman is entitled to apply for an order; they will also note there is no power to apply for an order under the second part of the Sub-section. The order is applied for on the ground that the married woman has been compelled to do something, and this may be supposed to be something which it is not. I think it is very unfortunate, and I would urge upon the promoters in the second part of this Sub-section to define the ground of application. I would suggest that you should take out the word "and" which connects the two parts and make it read:

"or where the husband has, in the opinion of the Court, been guilty of such conduct as was likely to result, or has resulted"—

I should like to have another "or" there—

"in her so submitting herself, the married woman shall be entitled to apply for an order…."

The result of that would be that you would give the Court a clear definition of women's rights, and it would not be necessary to give us something which is deemed to be compulsion which is not compulsion. She would go to the Court and say this or that has been the conduct of my husband, and I ask you to infer other conduct—refusing food, driving me out, and in insisting, it may be, in living with some low woman in the house, and so on. I think we would possibly get a clearer definition and the Court would not be asked to deem something to be that which it is not. There would be ample and just ground for an application. I attach the very greatest importance to this subject and the need for a substantial ground of application. I think it is the duty of the legislature to anticipate the possibility of a woman being compelled to lead an immoral life. We do in this way take these substantial grounds to anticipate, and we say to a woman: "If your husband's conduct has been such, as in the opinion of the Court, is likely to end in, or is likely to induce immorality, you can get your order right away." I would suggest to the promoters of the Bill that if they did this, if not here, in another place, they would properly amend this Sub-section.

I would also suggest to my hon. Friends that the order of the Sub-section should be transposed; in other words, I would put the latter part first, because we know, as I have said, how difficult it is to prove compulsion. If you put this latter part of this Sub-section first, then the woman may be entitled to go and apply for an order as against her husband on the ground that his conduct has been, quite obviously, such as, in the opinion of the court, was calculated to drive her to prostitution. That is what we want to put in. Therefore, I would prefer the wording to be on substantial grounds, leaving in "compulsion"—nobody can object to that. Therefore, I do urge an Amendment, either here or in another place, to make the ground of action clear and substantial to get away from saying a thing is deemed to be what it is not. I think the drafting is most unfortunate. I do not read it in the way it has been read, but I do not say I am right—but we want to make it quite clear.

I think the point raised by the hon. Member for Gillingham (Sir G. Hohler) deserves an answer from the Government. His point is that the conduct is almost as bad whether the woman takes to a life of prostitution or whether she does not, and it seems to me that there is a good deal in the suggestion which he has put forward. In fact I should say that the woman who has the greatest provocation to take to prostitution and does not do so deserves our protection just as much as the one who does. I think the Government ought to inform the House whether they are willing to provide something to provide for this case.

May I point out that the Amendment, if carried, would involve a re-drafting of the whole Clause, because if it be passed the first part becomes unnecessary. I do not think the suggestion made by the hon. and learned Member for Gillingham is relevant to this particular Amendment, because we should have to give a larger definition to the words, and it would make the second half meaningless and useless.

The words are "deemed to have compelled."

I must not be drawn into an argument as to whether the husband has in the opinion of the Court "been guilty of such conduct as was likely to result and has resulted in her so submitting herself."

It is the word "compelled" that is important. I think the proposal made by the hon. and learned Member for Gillingham is well worthy of consideration in another place, but in the meantime we are bound to persist with this Amendment.

I ask leave to withdraw my Amendment, and I do so in order to facilitate the improvement of the Clause in another place.

I think the point which has been raised by the hon. and learned Member for Gillingham would be out of Order on this Amendment. It is a point as to whether there should not be an additional ground given to a woman in respect of a Separation Order. The ground is not that she has been forced to prostitution, but that she might be forced to it. I do not think a discussion on this point is in order on this particular Sub-section. We are now discussing whether we shall leave out the last part of Sub-section (2). If we can get rid of that Amendment, then we should have a clear field to discuss something which may not be in Order at this point, but it may be in Order subsequently.

The question put from the Chair is, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill." If the word "and" stand part, my hon. Friend's suggestion will be impossible of achievement, because the proposal is to leave out the word "and" and to insert the word "or". I am afraid this cannot be done on this Amendment even if it is negatived. I do not think there is anything left to do except for the right hon. Gentleman and the promoters of this Bill to consider, before the Measure reaches another place, whether anything can be suggested to meet this point.

It must not be understood that we accept the new condition, because it will have to be gone into very carefully.

Will the Chancellor of the Duchy consider this point between now and the time this Measure goes to another place?

Certainly.

I beg to move, in page 1, line 23, at the end, to insert

"(3) Where any Orders are made they shall not be enforceable whilst the married woman continues to reside with her husband."

I do not want to hamper the administration of this Bill or go against the desires of the promoters, but in my view, unless some words of this description, are added, this Measure will only render the position of Justices a more difficult one because, as the law at present stands, a woman cannot obtain a separation order on either of the grounds referred to in this section unless by such conduct as neglect or persistent cruelty, which has led her to reside in separate apartments. This often inflicts the greatest possible hardship because, owing to the house shortage, the woman cannot obtain another house or room to which to take her children. I quite agree that the Clause itself as it stands would enable a woman, without necessarily leaving her husband, to be able to go to the Justices and obtain an order, but I do think it is absolutely necessary that we should add words to this effect, because otherwise it seems to me the position will become impossible, for this reason, that, as it stands at present, I am certain you will get different decisions all over the country.

Justices are extremely anxious—the hon. Member for Darwen (Mr. Hindle) spoke as a Clerk of the Peace, and I speak after twenty-five years' continuous practice before them—to administer the law correctly, and I want to feel sure that when they do get this Bill it will be clearly stated what is exactly their position. If it, stood without this proposed addition, the position apparently would be that the married woman, having obtained her separation order, could then enforce the order against the husband, although she was continuing to reside with him, and I do not think that would be either fair or right. May I call the attention of the House to the fact that the words as they stand are almost identical with the words that have been adopted and that were thought to be necessary in the Guardianship of Infants Bill now before the House of Lords. I therefore desire, in the interests of the Bill itself, that this Sub-section be added so that it may be made perfectly clear what is the opinion of this House with regard to it. If the members of the House think it is not necessary, I do not want to persist in it, but myself I do honestly feel that it is absolutely necessary for the purpose of Justices clearly understanding their position.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I do so because I think it is necessary in order that the Bill shall not cause a perfectly impossible situation. The Clause, for the purpose for which it is introduced, is an extremely good Clause. There is no doubt that the position under which a woman cannot bring proceedings without leaving her husband causes an enormous amount of injustice. A woman is subjected to cruelty. If she leaves her husband she is left absolutely destitute and has to maintain herself during the time that is necessary in order to get the case before the magistrates. Undoubtedly, that prevents many women who are fully entitled to orders of this description from obtaining that justice to which they are entitled. But from the moment she has got to the Court and the Court has heard the matter and made the Order which provides for her maintenance, all reason is against her continuing to live with her husband. Quite apart from that, all reason and common-sense is against two people living in the same house and one enforcing an order for maintenance against the other. I think this is absolutely necessary for the purpose of clarifying the Bill. One remembers when the Guardianship of Infants Bill was before the House (that that view was taken by the Government with regard to a similar Section, and I hope the promoters will accept the Amendment as making the Clause better in its terms and more reasonably enforceable.

I think these words ought to be added to the Bill. The House will remember that the Guardianship of Infants Bill was the subject of an agreement. The promoters of the Bill, the Government, and the opponents came together and drew up an agreed Measure. In that Measure, after considerable discussion, this form of words was embodied, and, if it was necessary in that Bill, it is certainly as necessary in this. The, broad facts are these. So long as people live together you must trust to the natural play of affection to settle these matters. It is only when people cease to live together that you can bring in the Court to decide the knotty problem between them. By this Bill we give to injured wives the enormous advantage of being able to get an order and know where they are. But it would be intolerable and impossible that a woman should continue to live with her husband and to go to him at the week-end and say, "You have only given me 15s.; I will summon you for the balance." Under such circumstances, married life could not continue. Therefore we consider that this form of words ought to be added to the Bill in order to make it a workable Measure and at the same time to give the injured wives the real protection which they need at present.

I wish the right hon. Gentleman would consider exactly how this Clause would work. As I understand Sub-section (1) of Clause 1, the object is to repeal the words in the principal Act—

"and shall be such cruelty or neglect have caused her to leave and live separately and apart from him."

If this Amendment run as part of the same Clause—

"Where at the time when such order, or orders, is made the married woman is residing with her husband the order, or orders, shall not be enforceable whilst she so continues to reside with him"—

I am not sure about it, but would not those words read as a limitation, and would you not be limiting the repeal of the objectionable words now to be found in the principal Act? Ought it not to come in as a separate Clause?

That is the reason I did not take the Amendment as it stood originally on the Paper. It is now proposed as a new Sub-section.

I think that answers my criticism.

I think it is all right. It is now being taken as a manuscript Amendment, and we have not been able to consider how it works in with the rest of the Bill. I think it might be preferable to have it as a proviso to the first Sub-section, but we cannot possibly decide these matters on the spur of the moment in this way. I can only assure my hon. and learned Friend that between now and when the matter is taken in another place we will look into it carefully.

I felt your difficulty, and I did not quite follow how you had put it. It does require great care, and the right hon. Gentleman says that he will give it.

I am all in favour of this new Sub-section. Under the principal Act, if a married woman on whose application an Order has been made shall voluntarily resume cohabitation with her husband, then the Order shall be discharged; and the position, as I understand it, is that a wife—

My recollection is that there was a case in the Divisional Court in which it was decided that under that Act you could not get a discharge except by order of the Court.

It means that the wife is to have power to go backwards and forwards, and do just whatever she likes. Although this is an admirable suggestion one must not forget that the Title of the Bill means Separation, and if we are going to allow a wife to obtain an order while in fact she is living with her husband, then of course it will be in the nature of an Order which is held in suspense. She will be entitled to refer to it frequently in the course of their married life. She will hold the separation order over her husband's head. Of course, one does not object to making additions to the weapons of a married woman, but before we put those weapons into the hands of married women, we must make sure that the Bill is properly drawn. If it were suggested in this House that another weapon should be put into the hands of a married man—

He has them all already.

I have no doubt that such a suggestion would have the cordial support of the noble lady who sits for Plymouth, but here you have the wife entitled to trot to the police court and make application for an Order, at the time when she is not living apart from her husband. She gets the Order, and is going back. No doubt she will mention in well selected terms to her husband the fact that she has got this Order, but still she is going to continue to cohabit with him. The difficulty arising under the proposed new Sub-section is that one cannot enforce that Order while the wife continues to live with her husband. That is a very proper thing, but it will have to be considered in relation to the terms of the principal Act. This is one of the difficulties arising from not having the Solicitor-General or a Law Officer of the Crown to take charge of the Bill and to explain to hon. Members exactly what the effect of the proposal may be on the principal Act. We are going to have a large number of Acts on this subject, and this will make it very difficult for the Court of Summary Jurisdiction to administer them. The usual thing is that, when a wife makes an application for an Order of this sort, she is living separately from her husband, but in this case she is living in the same house. She is probably going up to the Court with him in the same tram, in order to thresh out their differences, and, having got the Order she will come home with it in her pocket. It is not to be enforced, but doubtless it will be spoken of. It may be framed, and hung over the mantlepiece for the edification of the husband. I do not know what the noble lady the Member for Plymouth desires, but I see she is shaking her fist at me. At any rate, she cannot get an order like this against me.

Is it right to say I was shaking my fist at the hon. and learned Member? You know how badly this looks in print, and I protest, not for my own sake but for the sake of women generally, against such a statement being made. I hardly raised my finger.

I think the Noble Lady failed to appreciate the humour of the remark.

It is exactly the lack of appreciation of a little humour that sometimes leads to these applications to police courts. I can only express the hope that, when this Bill comes to be considered in another place, great care will be exercised to see that, as a result of putting on the Statute Book a new piece of legislation like this, confusion is not caused in the minds of the Court which has to administer the Bill by reason of the fact that you have so many contradictory principles expressed in it.

I should like to assure the hon. and learned Member who has just spoken that there is really no difficulty of the description he has mentioned, because the position at present is—after the decision in "Matthew v. Matthew," in which it was held that cohabitation did not bring to an end any order that might be in existence—the procedure is perfectly simple before the justices. The husband can at any time he likes, after the cohabitation has taken place, apply to the Court to discharge the Order, which is forthwith discharged. If the husband wants to put an end to such a state of affairs as the hon. and learned Gentleman has mentioned, all he has to do is to apply to the Court for a summons, which is granted. There is no difficulty on that score, whereas the addition of the Sub-section gives the wronged woman the right to obtain her Order. If the husband will not take the trouble to get it annulled, surely he is not worth consideration.

In reference to the possible conduct of a wife mentioned by the hon. and learned Member for West Leyton (Mr. Cassels), I beg to assure the House that that sort of thing is not only possible, but that it has occurred. I can give an instance which happened this year in my own experience. A lady got an order against her husband. I gather the conduct complained of was not very bad, but she contrived to persuade the magistrates that she had been deserted by her husband, because, in a temper, when she said she wondered how he managed to live with her if she were so bad-tempered as he suggested, he replied, "Get out, then." She took him at his word and got out, and she thereupon got her order from a sympathetic beach of magistrates. Benches of magistrates are rightly sympathetic to the claims of women. That is my experience. They gave this lady her order. She went away to live in a distant part of the country, and the husband faithfully paid the amounts due under the order. After a while, at his urgent solicitation, she returned to him and lived with him for about a week, and then, without any other quarrel having taken place, she again left him. He did not apply for the order to be annulled, and he continued to pay her the allowance. After another three or four months she returned again and lived with him for 10 days—one week and two week-ends. Then she went away again, and the husband adopted the course which my hon. and learned Friend has spoken of, and applied for the order to be discharged. The lady as a consequence was very much aggrieved. There is no doubt that on the first occasion he wanted to get his wife back to him, and he therefore did not apply for the annulment of the order, thinking that probably if he took further proceedings in the police court she would refuse to return to him. He was genuinely fond of his wife. His letters in the case were couched in the most affectionate terms, but when she played this trick on him a second time he took the proceedings I have mentioned. I am only mentioning this to prove that the point made by my hon. and learned Friend is not a mare's nest, but is a thing which has actually happened.

What we want the Government and the promoters of the Bill to do is to take care, when a proposal is made to insert the new Clause in another place, to see that the legislation on this subject is properly co-ordinated. We do not want to take away or to injure any right which women have, but on the other hand we do not desire to put into the hands of any woman who might be capricious the power to act in the manner I have explained. I apologise to the Noble Lady the Member for Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) for venturing to suggest that a woman can be capricious, but I do beg the Government and the promoters of the Bill to take care that this new Clause shall be inserted in such a form as to do no injustice to anyone.

It occurs to me that the view of the marriage tie, held by those who oppose this Amendment, is the view which has been held throughout the centuries, and those of us who sit on these benches have often been accused of being in favour of free love because at times we have suggested that the economic dependence—[A laugh]—I do not know that there is anything to laugh at. I did not laugh at the hon. Gentleman. Our view is that it is the economic dependence of the woman upon the man that so often leads to these domestic tragedies. The hon. Gentleman who has just spoken quite unwittingly gave away the whole case. I myself and others of those who sit on these benches, long before we came here, have had to offer advice in hundreds of these cases where married couples were in trouble—cases that never went into Court—and in 99 cases out of 100 the wife has been absolutely dependent upon what the husband cared to bring home, and if she complained she was told to get out. I suggest that this problem, after all, is a 50–50 arrangement, based on ordinary common sense, and that when people go to the Court after there has been an explosion of bad temper, very often, on the way home, the fact that the proceedings have actually been taken in Court, and that the woman or the man has secured a temporary advantage or protection, leads to a better understanding. It does not follow, because a wife goes back with her husband with an order in her possession, that they are going to live in a spirit of continued antagonism. It may lead to a better understanding, and for the life of me I cannot see why the opposition should be maintained.

I beg to move, in page 2, line 6, to leave out paragraph (a).

The Bill proposes to modify in a very important respect the provisions of the principal Act of 1895. Under that Act, where a married woman has obtained a separation order and subsequently has been guilty of adultery, the almost universal rule has been adopted, that that act of adultery should have the effect of wiping out the separation order. Now it is proposed that the Court should have a discretion, and should be able to say that, although the separated wife has committed an act of adultery, nevertheless the Court may be able to absolve her from the consequences of that act and allow the separation order to be maintained. I think all Members of the House will agree that this is a very serious question, and one which affects the life of people in a very important respect. The sanctity of the marriage tie, having regard to the moral considerations which are involved, is of the greatest importance. I cannot help thinking that this paragraph has been put in without sufficient consideration, and that if my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster will give it his attention, he will see that it really is not in conformity with the rest of the Bill. There is something to be said for the view that, if a woman has been separated from her husband by his fault, and has obtained a separation order, and if, after that, there is adultery, it is really her husband who is to blame in the matter, because he, having failed in his duties as a husband, is really the responsible person. If the House were to adopt that view, and if the promoters of the Bill were to adopt that view, then they would have provided—and I am not sure that I should not have been prepared to accept it—that in every case where an application was made by the husband to discharge the separation order on the ground of subsequent adultery, it should be within the discretion of the Court to say whether the order should be discharged or not.

If it were proposed to give the court a discretion in every case—a discretion which, of course, they have not got under the Act of 1895, because under that Act, on proof of adultery, the separation order has to be discharged—if it had been proposed to give the magistrates discretion in every case, there would have been much to be said for it, and I think I should have supported it; but that is not what this Bill proposes. It proposes to give the magistrates a discretion in cases where the adultery has been conduced to by the failure of the husband to make the payments that he was directed to make. I appeal to the House as to whether this proposal is not one that is grossly insulting to the whole sex. A woman may commit an act of adultery for love, or she may commit it for money. If she does it for money, then the promoters of the Bill suggest that the magistrates should have this discretion; but if she commits it from what I suppose everyone would agree is a higher motive, or at any rate not from a mere pecuniary motive, then the court is not to have any discretion, but only in cases where the adultery has been conduced to by the failure of the husband to make the payments. That must mean that the woman, not having got the payments from her husband, has had to commit an act of adultery for the purpose of obtaining the money which her husband ought to have paid. I appeal to the House not to pass the Bill with this insulting provision in it. I will support it if you will make it a discretion in every case, but do not only give the magistrates a discretion where the woman has sold herself for money.

I second the Amendment, for very much the same reasons as my hon. and learned Friend has Moved it. I am very strongly of opinion that, except in cases where there is very exceptional ground for it, it is quite a wrong thing that a woman should be living in adultery with one man and supported by another, and therefore the prima facie principle is right that when a Separation Order has been made and the wife has subsequently committed adultery, that should be a ground for discharging the Order. But that is very far from saying that should be the case in every case where a woman has subsequently committed adultery. One can quite understand that there may be circumstances where a woman who is living apart from her husband by reason of a Separation Order which she has obtained on account of his misconduct may be led by the conduct of her husband into committing adultery, but this proviso presupposes that the most effective way to give relief to a woman under those circumstances is that that relief shall be given solely where the husband has failed to make payment under the Maintenance Order. I assume, and everyone I think assumes, that the Bill is intended to give real relief to women, but I cannot understand that, except in a very extreme case, would the failure to make payment under a Maintenance Order conduce to adultery. After all, a woman who has obtained a Maintenance Order is usually a woman of respectability and one to whom character is extremely dear and whose honour is something that she prizes, and is it going to be supposed that you are giving any real relief to that woman by saying that in circumstances which would be the very last in the world in which she would ever commit adultery the Court shall not have power to discharge the Order, but that in other circumstances which she may be led into, really without any very great moral sin on her part, the Order is not to continue?

Let me give one small illustration which I think can very well be imagined. A woman has got a Maintenance Order, her husband being a man of evil character and evil disposition. He knows that adultery by the wife will be a ground for discharging that Order. He wilfully suggests to other men that they might attempt to make that wife their friend. He wilfully puts other men in the way of meeting her, which he may very well do although living apart from her, and he may put other men in her way, and the circumstances may be almost irresistible, although all the time he is keeping up his payments under the Maintenance Order. Even if this Clause passes, directly that woman has committed adultery under those circumstances, the Order could and would be discharged by the magistrate, and this Sub-section gives him no power to refuse to discharge the Order. The only case in which a magistrate here can give a discharge is where it conduced by the failure of the husband to make any payment.

Would not that be met by Sub-section (2) of Clause 1? This would be a case in which the husband conduced or connived at the adultery.

No. Subsection (2) of Clause 1 deals merely with prostitution. We are dealing here not with prostitution at all, but with something which is very far removed from it. We are dealing here with the fact of adultery, a single Act being quite sufficient, and under these circumstances we are pretending that we are giving a real protection and relief to women when we are providing that in one instance only the Court may refuse to discharge it, and that instance is one which, practically speaking, to many respectable women will never happen. The whole thing is an absolute pretence, and unless you are going to give a full discretion to the magistrates to discharge, or not to discharge, an Order which has been made for maintenance you are not giving any relief to those to whom you are purporting to give relief. If it is to be made dependent upon the conduct of the husband, there is some ground for saying that then surely the words should be wider and should show that the husband had conduced to the adultery, and not that it had been conduced to merely by one species of conduct on the part of the husband, namely, failure to make the payments.

I hope, in spite of the very eloquent speeches which have been made, that the House will not accept this Amendment. It is really a question which is almost vital to the Bill because it is not a Bill of morals but a Bill seeking to establish the economic position of the woman. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Londonderry (Sir M. Macnaghten) drew an affecting picture of the different way in which a woman who commits adultery is to be treated. If she commits adultery for love she is not to have any rights. If she commits it for money she is to have rights. That is not the right way of look- ing at this Bill. We want to see that the woman is supported. The children of a wife who has obtained a Separation Order are probably dependent upon the money got week by week from the defaulting husband. If those means are cut off she may be able to get work, but if the children are young she may find it very difficult, and she may be driven into the position of having to sell herself. It is against cases of that sort that we want to protect those women. If, as the result of cutting off the weekly payments, she is driven on to the streets then you say that man henceforth shall be exempt from having to pay these weekly contributions any more We want to stop that. (Interruption.) Undoubtedly as it is at present an act of adultery discharges the Order and relieves that blackguard from any further need of having to pay the contribution. We want to stop that and we do it by paragraph (a). We say that if the adultery has been caused by withholding of the contributions by the man against whom the Order has been obtained then that shall not be regarded in itself as sufficient to cancel the Order. The hon. and learned Member opposite says that if the woman commits adultery for love she gets no rights. Let us remember that where the woman lives with a man and they love each other, the man supports her. That is a question of economic support. It would be unjust that where a separated wife goes to live with another man, the original husband should be forced to contribute to her. She has transferred her affections and herself and her care to another man. Therefore, I do not think we have a right to prevent the original husband getting a discharge of the Order. It is a question of the hard facts of daily life and not the sentimental picture of the virtuous or the non-virtuous woman. Under these circumstances, I hope the House will pass the Bill as it stands, subject to a further Amendment which we propose to accept.

It struck me, and it struck the promoters of the Bill, that there might be many cases where a husband against whom an order has been obtained is absolutely incapable of making the payment. He may have become a cripple, or may have lost his work. There may be dozens of reasons why the man is not able to make the payments. Cases such as that should not be charged with having wilfully withheld the money which would keep the woman off the streets. Therefore, we propose to accept an alteration which will leave out words "any payments which he was required", in lines 9 and 10, and substitute after the word "make", the words

"such payments as, in the opinion of the Court, he was able."

I think that gets over the snag as I see it. Otherwise, I hope the House will pass the Clause as it stands, in order to give this real economic protection to these women.

I support the Amendment. Apparently the idea of the Bill is that you are, for the first time, taking into consideration when this system of consideration is being carried out the question of conducing to adultery. The law in England is that if a wife is charged with adultery by her husband it is a defence for her to say that her adultery has been conduced to by her husband. It is not a very easy defence to establish. It starts by the admission that adultery has taken place. Then the wife seeks to excuse it by saying that the husband has conduced to it by his cruelty or by his desertion or by half-a-dozen other things which might be mentioned. If you are going to apply the divorce court law under this Bill, you should do it in its entirety. If you are going to relieve the woman from the consequences of her adultery, assuming that she can prove that this consequence flows from her husband's conduct, I do not see why you should confine it to the fact that he has not paid certain sums of money.

There are several other reasons that have to be taken into account. If she succeeds in establishing the fact that in one of half-a-dozen ways her husband has conduced to her offence, then she is relieved from the consequences of that offence, and I cannot help saying that it is not a very wise thing to specify one reason only which is to constitute the fact that the husband has conduced. Why confine it to one thing only when there are in law at least half-a-dozen? If you are going to relieve her at all, why not rely upon the well-known and established rules which have been considered in the Courts for years? It is a very difficult subject. Love has nothing to do with it. It is not, as was suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Norwood (Mr. Greaves-Lord) a question of the affection of the wife for the adulterer. It makes no difference to the Court whether she has an affection for the man with whom she committed the adultery or not. You are not considering the question of the wife in that respect, but the question of the conduct of the husband. The fact that the wife has committed adultery apart from the conduct of the husband has nothing to do with it.

I do not want it to be thought that I put it entirely upon the conduct of the wife. I said that we ought to make the provision in regard to the conduct of the husband very much wider, in order to cover very much wider cases.

I understood my hon. and learned Friend, in very moving terms, to point out that there might be an excuse for the woman if she had a real affection for the adulterer. In the class of life with which these orders chiefly deal we have certain material facts to consider. Take the case of the miners, or other people who go out to work in shifts. There you must have some woman in the house. The man goes down the mine, and generally he has lodgers living in the house with him. Someone has to cook the meals and look after the household duties. I have had some experience of miners and of the working classes and I know that you cannot have men living in a house and doing their work in shifts, either in the same shift or in separate shifts, unless there is some woman who lives in the house and looks after it and cooks the meals. She may be the wife of one of the men, or she may be a woman separated from her husband. There is a great temptation for a woman living under a separation order in a case of that sort, because there is so much demand upon her, more particularly if she is experienced in household work.

You have to deal, not simply leniently and generously, but very justly with women who, in circumstances of that kind, and being separated from their husbands are living in what may be adultery, or, at any rate, keeping house for some other man. You have to treat them on a different principle altogether from that which you would apply to a woman living in adultery with a man for her own carnal pleasures, purely and simply, or, in a worse case, where a woman is living in adultery with a rich man in order that she may live a life of luxury. These circumstances do not apply in the class of life dealt with under this paragraph. Therefore, I appeal to the Chancellor of the Duchy to see whether he cannot simplify this Clause by saying that such act of adultery was conduced to by the husband, instead of specifying the one condition about nonpayment. If that be done it will leave it open to the magistrates to consider, not merely what is the present law, but that there are other acts of the husband which may have conduced to the adultery of the wife and which will also be in her favour.

The discussion upon this Amendment has moved considerably from the merely negative attitude adopted by the mover and seconder in the first instance. One gathers from certain perambulations around the House that efforts are on foot to further amend this Clause. I do not know that I should intervene in this Debate except to answer the statement which was made by the mover of the Amendment that this Clause as it stood was insulting to the woman. It seems to be agreed that the Clause as it stands is insufficient, but I hardly think that that criticism of it is enough, unless we have something to substitute for it, and I hope the House will adhere to the Clause as it now stands in order that we may get something in place of it, possibly before the Bill leaves this House, or when it comes from another place. It does go in the right direction in the way of giving facilities to the woman which she has not had in the past. The present position is that, though the man himself who is separated from his wife may be living in adultery, yet if the woman makes one slip she is debarred for all time from obtaining benefit under an order previously obtained. The Amendment is purely negative, and I hope we shall not sacrifice what is given in this Clause. One feels that the negative attitude adopted by the mover of the Amendment should be resisted strenuously on behalf of justice towards the woman. Though it may not be complete justice, it is at any rate a move in the right direction, and I hope that the House will adhere to the Clause as it stands.

This Clause as drafted is put about as badly as it could be, and I am anxious to see that there shall be this protection for women if they have got the order. The hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw (Sir E. Hume-Williams) said that the position is that, when an application is made for an order, the adultery of the wife can be answered by showing that it has been brought about by the conduct of the husband. It is the defect in the principle of the Act which it is sought to remedy by this new Clause. That is a defect no one can deny, because, having got the order, a married woman may have it taken away from her by the husband upon his showing that the wife, since the making of the order, has committed an act of adultery, and it is no answer for her to say, "He has not paid me." It is no answer for her to say, "If I have committed an act of adultery, so have you." It is no answer for her to say, "You are living in adultery and now you come to this Court and complain of my one act of adultery." Therefore something ought to be done in this new Bill for the purpose of providing the woman with an answer to the husband who seeks to get out of his liability by merely proving that an act of adultery has been committed by the wife who has been separated from him by an order of the Court.

1.0 P.M.

Therefore I suggest that there should be something said by way of introducing misconduct, and conduct conducive, in order to provide that protection. The use of the word "failure" alone, unsupported by any other word, is wrong, because a wife may come along and say "The act of adultery was committed by me because my husband did not pay." Under this Clause, as drawn, it is no answer for the husband then to say, "I could not," as it must be a wilful failure on the part of the husband to carry out the terms of the Order. The word "withholding" is not exactly the same as "failure." That would mean a wilful failure to pay. "Failure" simply may mean that he was unable to pay. Yet if a wife said that she had committed an act of adultery because she had no money to support herself surely the position would be a very serious one under the Clause as it exists now. Therefore I appeal to those in charge of the Bill so to amend this Clause as to provide, (1) for the wilful failure to pay, and (2) for the misconduct in bringing about the adultery of the wife.

I am sorry to intervene in this debate, but I want to apologise to the hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw (Sir E. Hume-Williams) for not being able to listen to the whole of his speech. I did hear the major portion of it, and I am fully seized of the point which he wished to raise. It was suggested that the specific reason for releasing the woman from the bar which adultery puts upon her is not enough, and that the terms should be general terms so that the adulterous wife may be protected on grounds other than the stoppage of her allowance. What we want to do is to secure the due payment of her weekly allowance. It would be infinitely preferable that that should be specified as the determining factor as to whether the order should be rescinded or not. If the wife can say: "Owing to non-payment of my allowance, I have been forced on to the streets," that will really make her position much stronger than if the matter were left in general terms as to the misconduct of the man. If the Clause specifically pays attention to that one point, the payment or non-payment of the allowance, it is likely to give a much better chance for the women than if the Court be directed to take every consideration into account.

Then it would exclude all others.

There is some maxim in law that if you state a particular point you are much more likely to get attention for it than if your wording is so general as to take in other points. Therefore I would beg the promoters of the Bill to stick to that which is in the Bill. I have consulted the specialists at the Home Office on this question, and they are in favour of the words proposed by the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Willison), and the words in the Bill as against the suggestion of the hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw. For that reason I would urge the people who really have the interests of these women at heart, and want to see the separation money paid, to support the Bill as it stands, and then subsequently to support the hon. Member for Nuneaton. I hope that we may soon come to a decision, for there is a great deal still to be done in connection with the Bill.

I hope, too, that we shall progress with the Bill, but I was very sorry to hear the speech of the right hon. Gentleman who has just spoken. I quite recognise that here again we have got rather into a tangle on the question of procedure, and that, owing to the form in which the question has been put, it is impossible now to amend the Clause in the way suggested by the hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw (Sir E. Hume-Williams), because we have now passed the words which he would wish to omit. The Clause as he would wish, and I would wish, to see it would read like this—

"…if the Court thinks fit,

(a) refuse to discharge the order if, in the opinion of the Court, such act of adultery as aforesaid was conduced to by the husband and

(b) "

I should not have risen at all but for the speech of the Chancellor of the Duchy, which appeared to me rather to discourage the suggestion that at some future time in another place the Clause might be amended as we desire. Before the Bill reaches another place I hope that the right hon. Gentleman and the promoters of the Bill will seriously consider the point which has been raised. The right hon. Gentleman quoted a legal maxim. The only legal maxim which really applies in this case is,

"Inclusio unius exclusio alterius est."

If you specify this single cause, which the right hon. Gentleman has called the economic cause, you thereby exclude every other cause. You remove from the woman those pleas which are open to her now in the Divorce Courts; you remove from her the chance of putting forward those pleas. I do not believe that the right hon. Gentleman wishes that to happen, and I doubt very much whether the promoters of the Bill wish it to happen. I am afraid that, owing to technical considerations, we cannot well deal with the matter now, but I hope that the speech to which we have just listened is not to be taken to mean that the right hon. Gentleman and the promoters of the Bill have finally closed their minds on the subject, but that they will reconsider the matter.

I want to join in the appeal which has just been made. I am all in favour of this Bill, and I do not support this particular Amendment, but if the Amendment were carried, other words might be introduced in another place. The hon. and learned Member for Bassetlaw made a speech which contained very valuable suggestions. After all, one must give very serious consideration to suggestions made by an hon. and learned Gentleman of such vast experience in the Divorce Courts. We have heard from all sections of the House that this is a Bill for the protection of women. I want to give the women who will be protected by this Measure full protection, and I would be very glad if the right hon. Gentleman would take such steps in another place as would make sure that the restrictions now imposed by this Clause are removed.

The matter will be considered between now and the next stage.

I have listened attentively to the Debate on this Amendment, and I am satisfied that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Duchy is right. I do not wish it to be thought that on this side of the House we are necessarily all of one opinion. I hope that the promoters of the Bill will stick to their words and take a Division on them, if necessary.

The House has shown a general disposition to widen this Clause, but, on the other hand, the hon. and learned Gentleman who has just spoken and the speech of the Chancellor of the Duchy are very convincing. As to the procedure, there would be nothing to prevent our adding at the end the words "or for misconduct on the part of the husband." The House ought to accept what the Chancellor of the Duchy has said, namely, that he will consider the widening of the Clause before it gets to another place. I agree that it would be a good thing to include these wider reasons on behalf of the women, but, on the other hand, I think it essential to retain the words in regard to non-payment of the allowance, and I hope that that will be the course taken.

I appreciate that the hon. Member wants to include these wider considerations, but if he specifies one and then wishes to add general grounds he will have to specify each and every one of those wider considerations.

I do not think that that is necessary. I think it would be most unwise to accept the Amendment suggested, and insert the words "conduced to by the husband," without specifically mentioning the non-payment of maintenance allowance. I hope that the Government will be perfectly firm, while consulting their advisers to see if they cannot find words to meet the object in view. I do not think it follows that because the inclusion of the one means the exclusion of the other, the inclusion of one, plus general words, could be held to exclude the others.

I was greatly impressed by the speech of the Chancellor of the Duchy, and I believe he is right. One fact and a very important fact which the House seems to have forgotten is that this Sub-section is dealing with people who are living under a separation order, and really the only connection between the man and the woman is the payment of money. Therefore, if you want to help the woman it is undoubtedly true that you can best help her by addressing your mind towards the actual payment of the sum by the husband to the woman. Although I had drafted a form of words in order to widen the scope of the proposals, I believe the Bill as it now stands is in the right form, and I hope it will not be widened when it goes to another place.

I would not detain the House at all but for one thing, and it is that hon. Members opposite do not appear to be in possession of the exact law as it stands so far as the summary courts are concerned. The present position is that if a woman applies for an order, although the husband might set up adultery as a defence, she is entitled to her order if she can prove that he conduced to it. Under the proposal which has been made, the position would be if she got the order and if, afterwards, by his conduct the husband conduced to adultery she would have no protection. He would only have to prove her adultery, and the order would go. I say that is wrong, and I urge the promoters to stick to the Clause as it stands, subject to the condition which the Chancellor of the Duchy said he would accept. That brings the position of the woman into line with what her position would be before an order was made, if the husband conduced to adultery.

Question, "That the words proposed to be left out to the word 'any' in line 9, stand part of the Bill," put, and agreed to.

I beg to move, in page 2, lines 9 and 10, to leave out the words, "any payments which he was required," and to insert instead thereof the words

"such payments as, in the opinion of the Court, he was able."

I do not think I can take up any time in connection with this Amendment, as the Chancellor of the Duchy has said that these words would be accepted, and I think the reason for their insertion is evident to the House.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I beg to move, in page 2, line 14, after the first word "wife," to insert the words

"or shall be committed to some other person."

On a point of Order. I submit that this Amendment and the two subsequent Amendments are out of Order. This is one of a series of Bills dealing with separation and maintenance orders, and the words which these Amendments propose to embody deal with the guardianship of infants. I submit such Amendments would be more appropriate under the Guardianship of Infants Bill which is before Parliament at the present time. They introduce an entirely fresh element which does not come within the scope or the title of the Bill, and, in any case, I think it would be undesirable in this Bill to mix up two different subjects.

I say nothing about the desirability or otherwise of including these words, but surely this Amendment is in order. The Bill, in terms, provides for the custody of the children and the court may make an order as to the custody of the children.

May I draw attention to the fact that Clause 6 of this Bill deals with the custody of children and the enforcement of orders as to custody and with nothing else?

I have considered the point of Order, and I cannot see that the Amendment goes beyond the scope of the Bill.

The reason for this Amendment is quite obvious. One has to consider the position which arises when a case of this kind comes before the Court. In the first place, take the case of a wife who obtains a maintenance order against her husband on the ground that he has been guilty of persistent cruelty or desertion, or something which makes him an undesirable person to have the custody of the children. A ground for discharging that order would be misconduct by the wife, and circumstances under which the magistrates might refuse to discharge the order, would be that the wife possibly without any conduct on the husband's part conducing to it, had committed adultery and was herself an undesirable person to have the custody of the child. In such circumstances the position is that to discharge the order prima facie would send the children back to the husband, who is admittedly, by reason of the order having been made, an undesirable person to have custody. The only alternative would be to give the children to the wife, who is also prima facie an undesirable person. Surely there ought to be power for the magistrates to commit the children to the custody of some other person who would be desirable. It has been said that this Bill was originally promoted by the Six Point Group. I understand one of the societies behind it is the National Union for the Promotion of Equal Citizenship. I do not think there is very much chance of a child being brought up to citizenship of any kind in a case where the only alternative is between committing that child, on the one hand, to an undesirable father, or, on the other hand, to a woman who has also shown herself to be an undesirable guardian.

I beg to second the Amendment.

The only difficulty which I see in regard to it was indicated by the objection to the Amendment taken by the Chancellor of the Duchy, but I do not think, though I have not all these Bills before me, that this proposal in any way interferes with the other Bills. It is quite true that the other Bills deal with very similar matters, and seek to raise the position of the wife and give her, not only economic independence, but equal rights with regard to the children. It seems to me that, as a magistrate, if I were dealing with this question, I should say that the only power that I had under this Clause was to make an order that they should continue to be committed to the wife. If the woman had committed adultery, and it had not been due to the non-payment by the husband, I might think it would be most undesirable to continue to commit the charge of the children to the wife, and yet I should have no other power, and I am assuming in this case that the wife already had the custody of the children. In these circumstances, the Amendment proposes to give the magistrate discretion, not only to continue to commit the charge of the children to the wife, but to commit them to the charge of any other person whom he might think fit. Surely that is right, and I cannot think that any other legislation will conflict with what, in my judgment, is so fair and reasonable. It may be that the magistrate may take the view that, notwithstanding what the wife has done, it is in the best interests of the children, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, that he should continue the custody of the wife in regard to them.

On the other hand, he might very properly take the view that it is not desirable at all. We know that there are many people and many philanthropic societies who will take charge of these children and look after them, and he might be very desirous of committing the children to such a body. I think this power should be given to the Court by the Amendment, and I cannot see that any other Bill which is in progress, such as the Guardianship of Infants Bill, could conflict with such a power. On the last Amendment I took the view of those who moved the Amendment, but when I heard the Chancellor of the Duchy against it, he convinced me that he was right, and it may be that he will convince me again now, but, subject to that, and having thought it out, it seems to me that this is a right Amendment, and I shall listen with very great interest to what the Chancellor has to say.

I do hope that in this case also I shall convince my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Gillingham (Sir G. Kohler). I will not deal with the point that I raised before, although I still think that it is more important that questions regarding the custody of children of this nature should be dealt with in the Bill which deals with the guardianship of infants, and not in the series of Bills dealing with separation and maintenance orders. Apart from that, however, I must say that I am surprised to hear hon. Members, pillars of the Conservative party urging what, in fact, is the nationalisation of children.

The hon. and gallant Member will surely never do me such an injustice as that!

The hon. and learned Member knows as well as I do myself that really, even though a parent may be immoral, he or she is probably the best guardian for the children and the best person to bring them up, and, apart from the interests of the children, the children themselves are the most reforming influence on the parent who has gone wrong. Whether, therefore, we are to consider solely the interests of the children or those of the parents as well, I hope we shall leave the children with their parents who have gone wrong, and not enable the State to take them away from the parents and hand them over to some philanthropic institution, which may mean well, but which really is a sort of dead and dreary affair for the children. I think I would rather be brought up in a slum than handed over to "parents" of this description. With that in view, I would ask hon. Members, although the Government do not take an official view of this matter, to stick to the Clause as it is.

I think the Chancellor of the Duchy said something which he did not quite mean when he talked about dead and dreary institutions, because really, as he knows, there are institutions in the country which are splendid for children, and where really the children are splendidly looked after and taken care of. We all know of such institutions.

Oh, yes; I think there are excellent institutions.

I am sure the right hon. Gentleman did not mean to make any reflection on institutions where children are brought up really sometimes far better than they would be at home by undesirable parents.

I think the Chancellor of the Duchy does not appreciate what this proposal is when he talks about nationalising children by sending them to institutions, because that is not at all the proposal of this Amendment. The case that we are contemplating is the case of children whose father has so misconducted himself that the wife has obtained a separation order. The wife, having obtained a separation order, has anyhow been guilty of one act of adultery, and the question is what is to be done with the children. I hope the Chancellor, when we come to an Amendment at a later stage, will agree that in these circumstances the Court is to be guided mainly by the consideration of what is the interest of the children. I hope we can appeal to his stony heart on on that point. Here is a case where a man and a woman have brought children into the world, and have both made a mess of their own lives. Here are these young children, and surely the Court ought, in considering what is to be done with them, not merely to have regard to the interests of the father or the mother, but principally and primarily to the interests of the children, and that is all that we are asking by this Amendment. All that we are asking is that the Court should have power, in a proper case, to commit the care of the children to some person other than the father or the mother. There may be a grandmother, a maiden aunt, or some other near relative—I am not thinking of the institutions to which reference has been made—who may be in a position to take the children in, who may have children of their own, and they may all form a very suitable and convenient family. We have all, I suppose, had experience of cases where such arrangements have been made for children to live with some other member of the family.

Why does the Chancellor of the Duchy refuse to allow the Court to have discretion—that is all we ask—to allow this really excellent arrangemement to be made for children to be put under the care of some relative or other? It does not compel the Court to send the children away. If the Court thinks it best for the children to live with the father who has misconducted himself, or the mother who has misconducted herself, I agree, It may be better for the children to live with the mother who, so far as her children are concerned, may be the best person to look after them. But there are cases where it is much better that the children should be with somebody else. The best thing for the children is that they should live with people who really care for them, and it may be that the mother, although she has misconducted herself, is that person. It may be that she is one of those people who really do not care for her children. On the other hand, there may be others who would give to the children all the mother's love they have lost, and yet the Chancellor refuses to accept this Amendment. I do appeal to the House to support it.

I rise to support with all earnestness the appeal of my hon. and learned Friend. If this were a proposal to compel children to be handed over to institutions, I should go all the way with the right hon. Gentleman, because I think it is better for the child to live with a loving parent, however disreputable, however slummy the surroundings in which the home may be, than to be taken to an institution where it has none of that which is the sunshine of the child's life, namely, parental affection. There are, unfortunately, cases where this parental affection does not exist. My hon. and learned Friend, and those of us who have done social work in all classes of society—I am not limiting it to one class—have, unfortunately, come across cases, and I am sorry to say not a few cases, where the parents are so intent upon doing that which is anti-social and anti-Christian, that, is, living their own lives, that they are entirely forgetful of the lives, the prospects and welfare of others, and entirely forgetful of the lives, the prospects and welfare even of their own children, and you can see almost any time, not only in this class of society, but in other classes, cases where the husband is off with another woman, the wife is off with another man, and the children are totally neglected and are suffering from an entire lack of care. In the upper classes—I say "upper," but I do not use the word in any sense invidious to any other class; I mean the wealthier class—they are left to servants, very often with no particular benefit to the children, unless they happen to be left in the charge, as is sometimes the case, of a really good nurse, some careful, good woman who will look after them.

In the class with which this sort of Bill deals, how are they left? Very often, except for the casual charity and casual benevolence and good-will of some kind woman in the neighbourhood, they are thrown into the gutter, and I say that when you come across these cases, and when they come before the Court, in any case where there is nobody who cares enough for the child, very often, to bring an action, which would be speedily brought in the case of a wealthier child in the Court of Chancery, you ought to have some power in the hands of magistrates to say, "We will commit this child to the care either of a relative or of some good woman", and the magistrates and missionaries of the Court are likely to know people of that kind who will take this child and will give it not, it is true, the exact equivalent of a mother's love and a father's affection, but, at any rate, will give it the best substitute that can be obtained.

This is a thing very near my heart. I have long been working in the cause of children. This matter is one in which, I hope, I have not talked what is called "sob-stuff." What I say is, that although it will be more logical, possibly, to have a separate Bill, or to put a Clause of this sort into another Bill, yet when we have the chance to do something for these children, for Heaven's sake let us do it. I feel so strong about this that I am going, if I can get anyone to tell with me, to divide, in favour of this Amendment. Hitherto I have refrained, because I am anxious to see this Bill go through, Upon the whole, this is a good Bill, and it is a well-intentioned Bill, but let us make the Bill as good as possible. Do not let us say that we will put in a Clause which is not as good as possible, because we want the Bill to go through. If the Chancellor of the Duchy will promise that, if it takes too long now to insert the Amendment and the consequential Amendments, he will get it done in another place, I am willing to accept that, because I feel quite certain that in another place an Amendment of this kind would be assented to without the slightest discussion. I do appeal to him, and to all Members of this House, to make the Bill as good as possible, and I am sure it will not be as good as possible if the only alternatives you leave to the magistrates are that they shall continue the guardianship of children in the woman who is so unworthy that they have cancelled her separation order, or, on the other hand, pass them over to a father who is a brute and a blackguard, unfit to have the charge of children.

I desire to say one word in support of this Amendment.

We have listened with some interest to what I can only call the aboriginal, atavistic outburst of individualism on the part of the Chancellor of the Duchy. Rather than these children should be committed to an institution—it may be a State institution—the right hon. Gentleman is willing to have them committed to the custody of one or other parents, both of whom are ex hypothesi disreputable. As has been pointed out, there is no reason at all why the institution should come in at all. Very often there is an aunt, or some other person who is the natural person to take them. I say you will put the law in a wretched position if you only give discretion to commit the child to one or other disreputable parent. This Amendment should be read in conjunction with a subsequent Amendment to provide that the Court shall have primary regard to the interests of the children, and if the Court has to choose between two disreputable parents, it cannot have that regard. I trust my hon. Friends will press this to a Division.

I hope the House will not be misled in regard to this Amendment, and it is most important that it should not be. The hon. and learned Member opposite talked about it being a woman's question, but there is no proof at all that the women to whom we are referring do not love their children. If the hon. and learned Gentleman knew anything about it he would realise that the love of their children is often one of the strongest motives in influencing their lives.

I said nothing of the kind. I contended nothing of the kind. I am well aware that many women in the class of life with which this Bill deals have as much affection for their children as any other class, and very often more.

If I misrepresented the hon. and learned Gentleman I withdraw at once; but I wish the House to realise, in dealing with the children of the women where an order has been discharged, that the suggestion that that class of people do not care is wrong. They care very much. I really think that the love of the mother for the children makes up for a great many other things.

There is another point. I do not think it is well to widen this Bill by bringing in a number of matters which do not immediately touch the point at issue. The case of the child, or children, of the woman who has got an order from the Court, and that order is subsequently discharged, is only one amongst many cases where the children are in the position where somebody has to look after them. If you want to deal with all these cases together we need a

I beg to move in page 2, line 17, at the end, to insert the words

"Section seven of the principal Act shall have effect as though the words 'or any court in whose jurisdiction the married woman or husband shall reside' had been inserted."

At the present time if an order is made, and the husband is in arrear with his payments, the wife may enforce it in any Court in whose jurisdiction she may reside. But although the parties may be living in an entirely different jurisdiction—they may originally have lived in the North of England and for some reason may now be living in the South—at the present time the applicant, in order to issue the summons, has to go to the Court where the original order was made. That affects both parties, but frequently the unfortunate woman is placed at a very great disadvantage, because if she wants an increased amount it may cost pounds to obtain it. Therefore I ask the House to agree to these words which only mean that the parties can go to any Court in whose jurisdiction the married woman or the husband shall reside, and I think that is a very necessary provision to make.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I beg to move in page 2, line 17, after the words last inserted, to add the words

"In making such an order the court shall have regard primarily to the interests of the children."

This Amendment loses some of its importance because of the acceptance of the last Amendment. The interests of the children may easily be forgotten, and no harm can be done by the insertion of these words. I think it is just as well to remind the magistrates that they should have in view primarily the interests of the children.

I beg to second the Amendment.

2.0 P.M.

Upon questions which affect the welfare of the children there ought to be one and one only guide to the Court, and that ought to be the interest of the children. That principle has been laid down for a very long time in the superior Courts and the Court of Chancery, and that has always been the principle upon which they have acted. Many hon. Members know quite well that the Judges in the Court of Chancery take any amount of trouble not only in those cases which come in open Court, but also in the case of private inquiries.

I see no reason why we should not accept this Amendment.

Mr. Godfrey Locker-Lampson—

I have an Amendment in page 2, line 17, to insert the words "so long as she continues to maintain such child in a manner satisfactory to the Court."

That Amendment cannot now be moved.

I suggest that the words I have read have nothing to do with the previous Amendment. The intention and the purport of those words is that, although in the general interests—

It is not a question of whether it is the same thing. We have now inserted certain words, and the words suggested by the hon. and learned Member are not possible, after the words which have been inserted. Therefore, the Amendment cannot be in order.

There seems to have been some fault in putting the Amendments down. It is not due to the way they are printed, but to some act of an official of the House, and not of any hon. Member. Under the circumstances might I ask whether there is any remedy, as, for example, the recommittal of the Clause? It is not the fault of the hon. and learned Member that his Amendment is different. The fault lies in the way the Amendments were put.

I am not making any comment on that point, but the hon. and learned Member had his remedy before the Amendment was put or called, and it is now too late to deal with it.

I beg to move, in page 2, line 23, after the word "using" to insert the words "except upon medical advice."

I beg to second the Amendment.

I should like to make a few observations which bear on other Amendments and on the whole Clause—

I am accepting both this and the following Amendment.

I beg to move, in page 2, line 24, to leave out the words

"any sedative, narcotic, or stimulant drug or preparation"

and to insert instead thereof the words

"opium or other dangerous drug, within the meaning of the Dangerous Drugs Act, 1920."

I think the House will agree that the Clause has been drafted in a very loose fashion. Indeed, I am very surprised that it has come down to this House from the Committee upstairs in its present state. If hon. Members will look at the Clause and I invite them to do so very carefully, they will see that it makes a man who takes any sedative, any narcotic, any stimulant drug or preparation into an habitual drunkard under the old Act of 1879. I cannot believe that the Committee upstairs or the House really have that intention at all. Surely tea is a sedative. Yet, under this Clause as drafted, if a man be an habitual drinker of tea and it acts as a sedative upon him, he becomes an habitual drunkard under that old Act. In the same way with regard to a stimulant. You may call coffee a stimulant.

I beg to second the Amendment.

We accept this Amendment.

I beg to move to leave out the Clause.

There are various reasons in support of this proposal. One and perhaps a sufficient reason is that the Clause as it appears in the Bill seems to me to be unintelligible. I hope that the Chancellor of the Duchy, who is so much enamoured of this Bill that he will not have any alteration made in it at all, will do me the honour of giving me his attention and do his best to lighten the darkness in which I find myself over this Clause. I do not think that I can be alone in regard to this matter. I think most hon. Members who have read this Clause must find themselves equally in the dark as to what it means. It provides for a case where a summons has been granted under the principal Act as amended by this Act. Let us therefore suppose that the wife has obtained a summons calling upon her husband to show cause why a separation and maintenance order should not be made against him. It goes on

"and the person against whom the summons is granted cannot be found."

Of course, one can imagine such a state of affairs. Very often people who are wanted cannot be found. Then it proceeds to say that in those cases

"The Court may upon a sworn information by the applicant grant a warrant for the arrest of that person."

That does seem silly on the face of it. The person cannot be found, and that is the reason for issuing a warrant for his arrest. If you cannot find him, what is the use of issuing a warrant for his arrest?

That is just the point.

I am glad of the interruption of the Noble Lady, because it explains the reason she does not see how silly is this Clause. Who are the persons to whom the service of a summons issued by a Court of Summary Jurisdiction is entrusted? Am I not right in saying the police? It is the police who have to serve the summons. May I put another question? Who are the people who, when a warrant for the arrest of a person has been issued, have to execute the warrant? Surely the Chancellor of the Duchy will agree with me that it is the police who have to execute the warrant. That is to say, it is the same person who has to execute the warrant as has to serve the summons. If the policeman cannot find the defendant, respondent, or husband, whatever you like to call him, when he is provided with a summons, why should he be able to find him when he is provided with a warrant? That is the conundrum which I present to the Chancellor of the Duchy. Let him tell the House why the policeman, having got a warrant in his pocket instead of a summons, should be better able to find the man he wants. I hope that I have made the question clear. I have not been very fortunate to-day, but on this occasion I do hope that I am making myself perfectly clear. I want to know why a policeman who cannot find a man when he has a summons should be able to find him if he has a warrant. If either the Chancellor of the Duchy or the Noble Lady can answer that question I shall be satisfied. If I am right in thinking that the giving of a warrant to a policeman will not enable him any better to find the person against whom it has been issued, then am I not also right in declaring that this Clause, as it appears on the Paper, is unintelligible and useless?

May I answer that question? If a, wife take out a summons against her husband, she gives a specific address. If the man is not there, the summons is marked "Not found" and returned. Then a warrant is issued, and the whole police force go in search of the man.

That is to say it will be the duty of the police to search through the area covered by the address, for the purpose of finding the man.

They have to do more than that; the whole force is practically in search of the man, wherever he may be.

Are we to take it then that the policeman can find the man when he has got a warrant for his arrest, although he may not be able to find him when he has merely got a summons? Is it merely a question of giving instructions to the police to go to the proper place to execute the warrant? Are there not great dangers in a Clause framed in this way? I hope I shall not be guilty of any offence if I suggest it is possible that a wife may not be right in this matter. You have really to suppose the possibility of a case where an applicant makes an application which is not justified. Are you going to assume that every application made under this Bill will be well founded? If so, why trouble about fresh legislation or about the Courts at all? Anybody who wants a separation order under such circumstances would be able to get it. But it must be admitted there may be cases where an applicant asks for an order to which she is really not entitled. Take the case of a wife who is maliciously-minded towards her husband. Can the right hon. Gentleman not conceive the case of a woman who has got into such a frame of mind that she is really malicious against her husband? She takes out a summons against him; she purposely gives a wrong address; the police, acting on the instructions of the Home Office, go to that address, and, being unable to find the man, return and report that they cannot serve the summons. Thereupon a warrant is issued.

On her sworn information.

I am assuming a case in which the wife is maliciously-minded. Perjury is not altogether an unknown offence even in Courts of Summary Jurisdiction. The summons having been issued and attempted to be served at a wrong address, the wife then makes an application for a warrant which is issued. The man may be in some distant part of the country. It may be that his wife is a drunken, worthless person from whom he has fled, yet this poor man is going to be arrested and dragged back in custody to London because of the malicious feeling of this woman. Is that not an entirely unnecessary provision? Surely some method of substituted service might be adopted where it is found impossible to serve the summons. I venture to assert that this provision may be a cause of great injustice, and that it could be worked very improperly in the hands of a malicious wife.

I beg to second the Amendment.

I do so because I think that this Clause is one of the most serious attacks upon liberty which has yet been made. We have not yet arrived at quite the stage when, there being no allegation of crime, but merely a civil dispute between the two parties, one of those parties can cause an infraction of the liberty of the other merely in order that that other party may be before the Court when the suit is heard. That is an extremely dangerous principle to admit into our public life, and it is one which I hope the House will hesitate a long time before it sanctions. There is, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Londonderry (Sir M. Macnaghten) has shown practically no reason for this infraction of liberty, and it is, of course, a very serious infraction. May I point out exactly what the position is in which we are asked to give the Court the right to arrest a man? A summons is granted upon an unsworn information, and usually the particulars supplied are by no means full. An information is lodged and a summons is granted. Then this farcical process is gone through—because, after all, it might very well be a farcical process. There is no safeguard as to what is the meaning of "cannot be found." Does it mean cannot be found in the particular town? Does it mean cannot be found in the country? If it means cannot be found in the country, then, of course, the warrant will not matter very much, because, if the man is not in the country, there is no great advantage in getting a warrant, and it will not hurt him, except, perhaps, that it may prevent him from coming back to his native shores. It is not going to help in getting hold of the man when he is out of the country.

The summons is issued, and then there is a sworn information. What will that sworn information be? I suppose it will be a sworn verification of the complaint upon which the summons was issued, together with a sworn statement that the man cannot be found. That is not a very difficult oath for a great many people to take, and certainly it would not be a very difficult oath for a woman or a man who wanted to vent very serious spite against his or her partner in life. It has been assumed throughout the discussion, so far, that this merely affects the liberty of the man, and, therefore, there are chivalrous people in this House who think that, because it is only a man who may be arrested, it really does not matter. They have not really realised that a woman can be arrested under this Clause as well, and the circumstances in which a woman may be arrested are very serious. As we know, a man may get a Separation Order on the ground that his wife is an habitual drunkard, and, when this Bill is passed, he will be able to get an Order on the ground that she is addicted to drugs. When this Bill is passed, he will be entitled, if he proves his case before the magistrates, to get a Separation Order on those grounds. Suppose that a man has been a brutal husband, and, by reason of his brutality, has driven his wife to leave him. She has left him, and she has taken care to put herself in such a position that she cannot easily be found. What does the man do? One can quite imagine that, in these circumstances, some men would stick at nothing in order to put that wife to all the indignity that is possible. There are men of that description. What would happen? As this Bill stands, the man, in those circumstances, has merely to go before the magistrate and make a complaint that his wife is an habitual drunkard or a drug-taker. Then an effort is made to find the wife, but, by reason of the fact that she fears the brutality of her husband, she cannot easily be found.

The return will very quickly be made that she cannot be found, and the next step in the proceedings is that he goes before the magistrate and makes a sworn information—which a man of that character will not shrink from making—that, first of all, his wife is an habitual drunkard, and, secondly, that she cannot be found; and there and then a warrant will be issued for the arrest of the wife, and, as my hon. and learned Friend has pointed out, all the police forces of the country will be set looking for this woman, whose only desire is to keep away from the brutality of the man who is seeking to put indignity upon her. The warrant must be executed; the police must do all that they can to drag the woman from some place where, probably, she has gone for shelter from his brutality, where she is living with her children, where she is keeping her children as best she can, and where she asks nothing better than to be left in peace, sheltered from brutality. By reason of this Clause the man will be able to drag her from her haven and bring her into the full light of a Police Court, in order that there he may vent his spite upon her. It may be said that this is equal citizenship. I suppose it is, for it is an equal deprivation of liberty for women as well as men; but it is an equality that none of us wants. What we want is equal protection before the law, and not equal assaults upon liberty.

Take another matter—the case of the wife against the husband. Take the ground of desertion. It is an answer to a complaint on the ground of desertion that the woman has made the man's life intolerable. That has always been, and still is, an answer to a complaint on the ground of desertion. If a woman brings proceedings against her husband and claims that he has deserted her, that he has gone to live apart from her, the husband may say, "That woman made my life absolutely intolerable. It was impossible to live with her." Quite short of misconduct on her part, she may have behaved in such a way as to make his life absolutely intolerable and miserable, and that is a complete answer to a complaint of desertion. But that is a position which can only be arrived at by having the matter tried out before the police magistrates. Assume an instance of that kind, where a man's life has been made absolutely intolerable. He leaves his wife. She may be a woman with plenty of money to support herself. He goes away, and he asks nothing better than to be as far from her as he possibly can be. Under this Clause she can—and that is exactly the class of woman who would do it—go to the magistrates and lay a complaint that her husband has deserted her. There is no question of perjury involved; she lays a complaint saying that her husband has left her, that he went away on such-and-such a date, that she has heard nothing from him since, and does not know where he is or anything else.

She gets a summons, and the summons is returned "Not found." She then goes and swears an information. It is not a question of fact in these circumstances; it becomes a real question of law, and she can make that information without the slightest danger of being charged with perjury. It is a matter, very largely, of opinion whether it is desertion or not. Whether it is desertion depends upon the magistrates being convinced ultimately that the circumstances were such that the man was driven to leave his wife. In these circumstances all that she swears is, "This man left me on such-and-such a date, he has never returned to me, and I have never heard anything from him since." That is primâ facie evidence of desertion. She swears that, and also that she had a summons against him and that he cannot be found. Under this Clause, simply on that information, that man may be arrested and brought in custody before the Police Court. I venture to think that is a very serious inroad upon the liberties of the people of this country, and something which they will not sanction. I could understand it if there were any real advantage to be obtained from it, but let us see what the position is. Suppose that the summons is served. Then, if the man fails to obey, the case can be gone on with, and it would be properly conducted. The magistrates would inquire carefully into the matter and sift it as completely as possible in the man's absence, and they may then issue a warrant or an enforcement order. But, quite apart from that, if you want to deal with such a case and get the case heard in order that you may get a warrant to enforce it, then let some provision be framed for substituted service, which will, at any rate, give a real chance of getting the man before the tribunal first of all before the case is heard. Then if, in those circumstances, you fail, you will not have merely a sworn information, upon which there is no cross-examination. That is taken before a magistrate. He has no right to disbelieve the person who has made a sworn information. The sworn information is as to facts, and it may also be, in the case of desertion, something which is very much a question of opinion.

But he has no opportunity of cross-examining upon that sworn information. There is none of the material upon which there may be cross-examination or anything of that kind. But if the case comes before a magistrate and is going to be fully heard in the absence of a party, one's experience of magistrates is that under those circumstances, when they are dealing with a case in the absence of a defendant, they are extremely careful to cross-examine themselves, and the clerk to the magistrates will ask questions which will find out whether the woman or the man is speaking the truth, they will have a full opportunity of considering the demeanour of the witnesses, and what is more, before they can make an order, in many cases they will demand corroboration by witnesses, and therefore the matter, as far as it possibly can be in the absence of a defendant, may be practically and thoroughly sifted in a Court of Justice. When they have done that and have made the order you can get your warrant for the enforcement of it, and tinder those circumstances there is justification for getting the warrant. But the position that would result under this Clause is merely that you bring the defendant before the Court in order to have the case heard in his presence. You have no power to keep him in custody after the order has been made. Directly the order is made he walks out of the Court a free man. In fact I do not know exactly how long you are going to keep him in custody or what you are going to do. It says he may grant a warrant for the arrest of that person. What is going to happen then? You may arrest him. Have you to bring him before the Court under arrest? If so, having brought him before the Court are you to keep him under arrest while he is before the Court? It is a rather extraordinary thing that you should keep in custody a man against whom there is no charge of crime and who has committed no crime. It is a new principle in our law that you should bring a man who is merely a party to a civil dispute and keep him in custody while the case is heard. When is the custody to cease? It is perfectly clear that it must cease, if not before, the moment the order is made, because the magistrate has no power at all to keep him in custody after the order is made.

But take something else. Suppose he is brought in custody to the Court and the applicant is not present, because after all if you issue a warrant for a person who cannot be found you do not know exactly on what day he is going to be found, and therefore it may be that on the day he is brought before the Court the applicant is somewhere else altogether and cannot be found on that day. She may not be available next day or for a week.

The hon. and learned Gentleman is repeating what was said by the mover of the Amendment.

I am merely asking what is going to happen. Is the man going to be remanded in custody or to be admitted to bail? But take a further case Take the case from the moment the order is made. There is no power then to keep him in custody. If he is the kind of man who is not going to obey an Order of the Court and who has been keeping out of the way solely because he does not want to support his wife, directly that order is made he can get out of the country, and the wife will have got no advantage at all by the procedure of bringing him up on warrant. That is exactly the class of man for whom a warrant of this kind will be necessary. The very fact that the woman has issued a warrant against him and has arrested him before proving the charge against him is all the more likely to make him stubborn and to make him come to the conclusion that under no circumstances will be obey the order. The result is that the moment an order is made in circumstances of this kind the man will clear out of the country, and then there will not be the slightest chance of enforcing the order. This Clause is stupid in its drafting and is entirely silly in any idea that it can ever be made practicable. It is hopelessly impracticable and the only purpose it can really serve is to enable spiteful people to use the machinery of the courts for the purpose of depriving people of liberties which they are entitled to enjoy, and under these circumstances I hope the House, which has always been the guardian of the liberties of the British people, will take a stand against a Clause of this kind and see that it is not put on the Statute Book.

The mover of the Amendment has accused me repeatedly of being hard-hearted and refusing to make any variation of the Bill. I hope he will set it down to my credit that, having listened with the greatest attention to his arguments and that of his seconder, they have convinced me that a strong case has been made out. I hope they will realise that we are giving something away in accepting this, and will facilitate the remaining Clauses of the Bill being passed. We could spend a long time and make a strong case against the arguments put forward, but I do not want to waste the time of the House but to get on with the Bill. Therefore I accept the Amendment.

I beg to move to leave out the Clause.

I want to respond to what the right hon. Gentleman has said as to getting on with the Bill.

Did you, Sir, on Clause 4, not put the words down to a certain point, so as to save the next Amendment on the Paper?

The Amendment having been accepted, the rest of the words go out automatically.

Under this Clause the husband has to give notice of his change of address. I understand these payments are not made into Court, but to the person mentioned in the Order at that person's particular address. My point is that if the husband has to give notice of change of address, it is also incumbent on the person to whom the payments are to be made to give notice of change of address. It will be very hard on the husband if he is penalised through not knowing where his wife lives. I do not know how the Amendment is going to be framed at the moment, but I shall be very glad if the right hon. Gentleman can give us an assurance that this point will be considered in another place, and, if possible, an Amendment will be framed to meet it.

I do not think that in actual practice there would be much fear of the woman not notifying her change of address. The real danger is that the person who has to pay the money will not notify change of address. I will, however, consider between now and the time when the Bill reaches another place whether it is necessary to add certain words to the second line of the Clause that would make it equally necessary for the recipient to notify her change of address.

As the Clause stands, a man is liable to a fine of £2 if he does not give notice of his change of address to the person to whom he has to make the payment, although he may not have ceased to make the payment. I should have thought that the intention was that the man should be fined if he has failed to notify and has also ceased to pay. The man may be away, and may not know what his address may be in a few days' time. I should have thought that it would be quite sufficient to make him liable to a fine if he had not given notice of his change of address, and had also ceased to make the payments.

The words are

"without reasonable excuse shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £2."

It is not conceivable that the fine would be imposed where a man who had not notified his change of address was still continuing to make his payments.

It is not a question of excuse. The fact that he had made the payments would not be any excuse if he had failed to notify his change of address. He has to excuse himself for not having given his address. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will consider the insertion of the words "and is in arrear with his payments."

Yes.

When the right hon. Gentleman considers the alteration that he proposes to make, will he consider the advisability of instructing the clerks to the magistrates to notify to the person against whom the order is made the fact that if he fails to notify his change change of address he is incurring the risk of penalty? Having had some experience as a magistrate in these matters I suggest that that intimation should be given in the order served upon the man, because the man as a rule lives in a class who take very little interest in Acts of Parliament, and he may be ignorant of this provision.

There is an Amendment standing in the name of the hon. Member for West Woolwich (Sir K. Wood) which I think would meet this particular point. The Clause provides that the change of address must be notified to the person to whom the payments are to be made. The Amendment of my hon. Friend provides for notification being given to that person or to the Court. That is to say, if the husband who has to make these payments instead of notifying the person to whom the payment has to be made intimates to the Court, which in practice means the magisrates' clerk, his change of address, that would be sufficient, because it indicates an intention not to avoid his liability and not to conceal himself from the person to whom he has to make the payment.

I hope the Chancellor of the Duchy will accept the suggestion that has just been made. Where orders are made for payment of money by husbands to separated wives the money, as a rule, in practice, is paid into Court, and the wives have the pleasure of going to the Court every few days in order to collect the money. When a change of address is made, if notice is given to the Court, that should be sufficient. Very often husbands in that condition are not concerned to know where their wives are. The man may not have the address of the wife to whom he is required to notify his change of address.

I will deal with these points when the next Amendment is moved.

In view of what the right hon. Gentleman has said I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.

On behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for West Woolwich (Sir K. Wood), I beg to move, in page 2, line 33, after the word "to," to insert the words "the Court or to."

I beg to second the Amendment.

The right hon. Member for Central Sheffield (Mr. Hope) accused me earlier of being an anarchist.

I am afraid that I was not clear enough. What I said was that there was on the right hon. Gentleman's part an oboriginal, atavistic outburst of individualism.

I cannot recollect the exact formula. At any rate, I will read the official reply to this Amendment:

"This Amendment should be opposed. It is not the function of the Court to keep a list of defendants with their addresses. When the Court has made an order, the payments are made to the person named in the order and not to the Court. The Court is functus officio"

—which means out of a job—

"until a complaint is made that the order is not being complied with. Notice of change of address should, therefore, be sent to the person to whom the payment should be made, as proposed in the Clause. This person will frequently be the collecting officer of the Court. Such person is distinct from the Court."

The lawyers in this Assembly will appreciate the exact point.

Has the right hon. Gentleman any information in his possession as to the percentage of cases in which maintenance money is, in fact, paid to the Court?

I wish to emphasise the point put by the hon. and gallant Member for Barnstaple (Captain Rees). If you are going to make this Clause of any value you must give specific notice to the person against whom the order is made that if he changes his address he must intimate the change either to the Court or to the person to whom the payment is to be made. Otherwise, he will know nothing about it, and he may find himself fined £2 for having done something of which he had not the remotest idea.

There is no reason why the practice in this matter should be altered. I do not think that it would be any great burden on the Court to keep a record of these addresses It would be a most useful thing if they would do so. I do not think that the translation of the words "functus officio"have been correctly given. I do not think that these Courts are ever out of

I beg to move, in page 2, line 36, after the word "shall," to insert the words "if such payments are in arrear".

I understood the Chancellor of the Duchy to agree that it would be excessive to impose so much as a fine of £2 on a man who is making payment, merely because he has not given his change of address. The Amendment will make the infliction of such a fine impossible unless the payment is in arrear.

I am very much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for having drafted the Amendment.

There are no further Amendments that I select.

Is it the intention of the Government to take charge of the Bill from this stage onwards? The Government have undertaken to make what, I hope, will be considerable improvements in the Bill, and I trust that they will now also make themselves responsible for it.

That is so. The Government will take charge of the Bill, and see it through.

I, as a humble Member on this side of the House, am very glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman's statement. This is another Bill with several unnecessary Clauses. We have the instance of Clause 4 in this Bill. I shall certainly vote for the Third Reading of the Bill, and I hope that all Members on this side will do so.