I beg to move, "That the Bill be recommitted to the former Committee."

This Bill is alleged to be the fruits of the labours of the Samuel Commission, but in our judgment it does not in the least carry out the recommendations of that Commission. I could, if necessity required, go through a number of points in which I allege, and I think with real force, that this Bill is but a faint reflection of what is required as laid down by the Government's own Commission. In view of the fact that it is really so ineffective, I move that it be recommitted to the former Committee, in order to see what they can do with it.

I take it that the hon. and gallant Gentleman does not expect the Government to accept his Motion, for he did not take the trouble to support it by any argument. These little manœuvres are not unknown in this House. Their object is extremely well known indeed. It has nothing to do with this Bill, or any other Bill; it has much more to do with the clock. The argument is the argument of the clock. Of course, the hon. and gallant Gentleman has still a party. There are some Members of it who are still in this House, and there were some Members of it on the Committee on the Bill upstairs. Why did they not represent the views of the party? Why did not they go to the place where they could have brought in Amendments, could have set down new Clauses, and have filled all the gaps that the hon. and gallant Gentleman at the very last moment has found in the Bill?

The truth is that there are no gaps in the Bill except on two matters which have been discussed again and again, and which I have no doubt will be raised, indeed, are raised, in the new Clauses which will subsequently have to be debated at this stage of the Bill. There are the gaps with regard to the nationalisation of mines, and there are the gaps with regard to municipal selling. The latter is dealt with in a new Clause that we shall have to consider presently. The hon. and gallant Gentleman did not call attention to a single gap of any sort, and actually, in the Clauses of the Bill, there is, with the exceptions I have mentioned, everything that the Royal Commission recommended as far as legislation is necessary. There are many recommendations in the very long Report of the Royal Commission which do not require legislation at all. They require further investigation, and steps are being taken to secure that further investigation. Only this morning the appointment of a very important Committee has been announced, to deal with one of the recommendations of the Royal Commission which does not require inclusion in the legislative Measure. Was that the objection which the hon. and gallant Gentleman had to make to this Bill? It is quite likely, because he very obviously had not read the Bill, and did not know what was necessary and what was not necessary.

There is in the Bill a power the necessity for which is emphasised by the Royal Commission, and which is a great departure in practice from anything in any Bill that has ever been introduced into the House of Commons. It has always been recognised by all parties that there is a power in any Government to take or to interfere with private property upon proper compensation, but never has a Bill been brought into this House with such wide powers as this Bill gives—powers to take going concerns, and to amalgamate them compulsorily with others for the better and more efficient working of the industry. That is the main object of the Bill; that is the main recommendation of the Royal Commission; and yet the hon. and gallant Gentleman comes here, and asks for the postponement of this beneficent work, not having taken the trouble to read the Bill and see what it really does contain. I say that there is no substance in this Motion. It is a mere attempt to delay and harass the Government, who are carrying out in the very best sense the recommendations of the Report of the Royal Commission. I could, of course, go through each one of the various provisions of the Bill, and show by a process of exhaustion that there is little or nothing left to which the hon. and gallant Gentleman could fairly and properly call attention. Then the House would then see how hollow is the pretence of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, for by such a process we should see that Clause after Clause of the Royal Commission's Report is brought into this Bill in the only practical way.

It is quite true that the hon. and gallant Gentleman's Leader, who has graced the House with his presence to-day, at the very last moment—last night, indeed—put down five new Clauses, which I have not even been able to read, because they have never appeared upon the Paper until just now, and the most important of which, by the way, is not a product of the Liberal party at all, but is I understand, a slavish copy of a new Clause that was moved by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Exchange division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott). At the last moment, the right hon. Gentleman seems to have gathered up all the Amendments and new Clauses which were rejected in Committee upstairs, although only one Member of his Party ever appeared there, and then contented himself with leaving batches of his own new Clauses unmoved, I was thankful for it, but it ill becomes that party to endeavour to waste the all too short

Friday which is to be devoted to the consideration of the Bill. I hope I have been able to show that there is no ground whatever for the Motion except the clock, which has fortunately moved on, and I ask the House to reject it.

On a point of Order. Will it be in order, having regard to the extreme importance of the Motion, to move that it should take the form of a Motion to commit the Bill to a Committee of the whole House, because, if so, I should like to address you upon it.

Standing Order 40A instructs me to put the Question after a brief statement from the Mover and a brief statement from the Member who opposes the Motion.

Is it, in order for a Minister to charge another Member with malicious motives?

I did not hear anything disorderly.

He kept referring to the clock—

You cannot libel a clock.

Question put, "That the Bill be recommitted to the former Committee."

The House divided: Ayes, 81; Noes, 155.

Bill, as amended, considered.

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

This Clause gives the right to county boroughs and other municipalities to be able to sell coal. I hope the Committee will not follow the spirit of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War and impart bitterness into the discussion. I have been very much surprised this morning that we should have such a spirit from the Government benches. We stand for peace and goodwill generally, and we want that spirit to be shown in the discussion. The fact that a municipality cannot sell coal is one of the outstanding anomalies in our municipal life. It may not be known to the bulk of the Committee, that in a mining area or outside a mining area any Tom, Dick or Harry can come along and begin to sell coal. He may have nothing behind him, but he can begin at once to supply people with coal and very often to rob the average person who buys the coal. On the other hand, a municipality has not the same right to sell as the average individual, however insignificant the individual may be. It is high time that this right should be given by law to the municipalities to supply coal to the persons who need it. In mining areas we have municipalities engaged in all kinds of municipal activities, and doing the work very efficiently, and cheaper than the ordinary private trader, but when it comes to the question of selling coal, they have to stand by and see private persons making profits, and sometimes not doing the work very well. In district after district combinations of citizens have been formed in order to be able to buy coal by co-operative action, because they could not be supplied by the municipality and they had often been the victims of the methods of private distribution by ordinary private persons.

I suppose the right hon. Gentleman will say, what was said upstairs, that the new Committee which is being set up for the purpose of considering and investigating co-operative selling is the right body to deal with this matter. We are not sure that they would investigate this matter, and therefore we would like an understanding that they will give close consideration to the question of municipal selling. Even if they do give such consideration to the subject, we think it is time to give a definite legal right for local authorities to sell coal. Later, we shall discuss fundamental questions at greater length, and we do not wish to discuss this Clause at great length, although we feel very strongly upon it.

I beg to second the motion.

This, I think, is one of the recommendations of the Royal Commission. The Government, I understand, accepted the Royal Commission's Report, but I think there is very little in the Report which they are prepared to carry out, even since they made the promise. The supply of coal by municipalities is a principle which most of us on this side have supported long before the last Royal Commission investigated the question of coal. Many of us who have taken part in local government and in local elections for many years, believe that this principle would be to the advantage of the ratepayers, that it would be no disadvantage to those who are working the coal, and that it would certainly be a great advantage to those who have their money invested in the production of coal. The high price of coal has for many years prevented hundreds of thousands of people from purchasing the coal which they needed for their comfort and warmth in domestic use. I am satisfied that had we had this principle established many years ago instead of allowing a large number of people—there are 27,000 people en- gaged in selling coal—to build up fortunes out of the industry — larger fortunes, perhaps, than those who have had their money invested in the production of coal—and had we given these powers to municipalities, they could have distributed the coal cheaply to the people within their areas.

Had this power been in the hands of municipalities, domestic users might have purchased coal, even at a modest estimate, at 25 per cent. less price than has been the position in purchasing from merchants. There are municipalities who this year have brought coal at less than 15s. a ton, while the domestic users in those municipalities are paying more than £2 a ton for coal. For a great number of years I have taken part in municipal elections in Leeds, a municipality which has storage room and all the appurtenances near to the pits, and they could have purchased coal at a very low price, and have supplied their ratepayers with the coal, at no disadvantage to the colliers, at 25 per cent. less price than has been paid in that city. Yet we see coal merchants who have become tremendously rich out of the industry. I hope the Government will accept the recommendation on this point. We see in this House municipalities coming forward with Bills, or asking with Provisional Orders, for purposes of securing extended powers for dealing with various matters of trading, and one is the power to sell coal.

I have no doubt hon. and learned Members opposite will oppose this proposal because it may prevent them benefitting financially if it is passed. Thousands of pounds are spent upstairs in legal fees which might be saved to the ratepayers if this Amendment were accepted as municipalities who wished to use this power would be able to do so without the tremendous cost of having to get a Provisional Order or a public Bill. In the interests of the ratepayers, as well as in the interests of the mining industry, I hope the Government will accept this new Clause and give municipalities the power to purchase and distribute coal within their areas.

I desire to say a few words only on this Amendment. In my view, the proposal that municipalities should be entrusted with the selling of coal has nothing whatever to do with the welfare of the mining industry. I recognise that in some other great towns it is difficult sometimes for the poorer classes to get their coal retail at reasonable prices. I do not want hon. Members opposite to think that I do not appreciate the gravity of that situation. I do. But I suggest that this evil must be dealt with as a question of social reform, and that it does not fall within the general category of questions affecting the prosperity of the mining industry, to which this Bill is devoted. I read with some surprise the passage in the Report of the Coal Commission advocating this policy as a lever for the purpose of reducing coal distributors' profits. It does not seem to me to have anything to do with the real object of this Bill, or the Report of the Royal Commission—namely, how to make the mining industry pay better. The whole object of the Report was to ascertain how the industry could be made to pay better so that it could pay better wages to the miners. That is the whole thing. This proposal does not touch the subject.

If this Amendment be what it looks like, an Amendment to get in the thin end of the wedge of municipal trading, as the thin end of the wedge of nationalisation, then I can understand that there is an additional reason why hon. Members opposite are anxious to support it. That is my reason for opposing it. I am perfectly frank. My view is that no municipality ought to be given powers by Statute to indulge in trading unless there are exceptional grounds for providing the facility. In the case of electricity and tramways I recognise that there are certain aspects of monopoly, the use of the streets, which makes a special case. I know many undertakings, tramways and electricity, which have been extremely well run, and many which have not been well run, but the experience to which this side in the House attaches so much importance to these matters, and to which the Liberal Party opposite attach so much importance, is fundamental—namely, that you do not get efficiency in trading unless you have the trading motive of private profit. I have recognised the evil that exists, but I submit that this proposal does not touch the industry itself, and does not promote the efficiency of the industry. That is, shortly, an unsupenable objection to the proposal.

For the first time we have heard that this is a Bill to secure the welfare of the miners. We on this side of the House have understood that, apart from that, it is a Bill to secure the reorganisation of the industry and put it upon a basis which will make it more economic and able to render more service to the country as a whole. This new Clause will help to put this industry on an economic basis as much as anything else. Everytime we bring this question forward the Government say it is such a small matter that it will have no material affect, but if all these small matters are added together we are confident that by a real re-organisation there can be brought into this industry such an atmosphere that will enable the worker to have a better standard of life and better social conditions. From the experience through which we have passed, we are confident that it can be saved by a proposal of this kind, which will reduce the cost of production of coal in this country. I live within a mile of 11 collieries, and have to pay 27s. a ton more for my coal than the pithead price. We want to know where this 27s. is going. I have no objection to paying 27s. a ton more than the pithead price if I know that the miner who is getting the coal is getting a decent standard of life and that the consumer is not being bled for someone else's special advantage.

With a proper re-organisation in the distribution of domestic coal there can be saved a sufficient amount to give the miner a higher standard of life, the consumer cheaper coal, and still leave a sufficient margin to reduce the cost of production by 3s., 4s. or 5s. a ton. That is at least worth trying. It is no good hon. Members opposite saying that these things are of no use unless you give them a trial; at least, they are not entitled to say they are not worth consideration until they have been proved to be failures. The Government should give proper consideration to this subject, particularly as this Bill is supposed to be for the purpose of the re-organisation of the industry and getting it back to an economic basis. We are not putting this forward as a kind of side line in order to get in the thin end of the wedge of nationalisation. When we were in office we made no bones about our proposals. We brought in a Nationalisation of Mines Bill. That is where we stand, and we say that if you want to secure these advantages, small or great, and put this industry on a true economic basis, this is one of the proposals that should be adopted.

This is one of the recommendations of the Royal Commission, and as I have been in favour of the adoption of the whole Report of the Commission, I shall certainly vote for the new Clause. The question is not as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott) put it, whether municipal trading in coal is good or bad, or whether it would be better to leave it in the hands of private enterprise. That is not the point. The question is, whether you ought not to have this power in reserve to check private enterprise when it has the effect of putting up the price of coal extravagantly. This is one of the recommendations of the Commission upon which, according to the Commissioners themselves, there was general agreement. They say so in their Report. They certainly are not nationalisers, not one of them. They turned down quite unanimously the demand of the Labour party for the nationalisation of mines. Nevertheless, they recommend this municipal trading as men who were opposed to nationalisation, and who think it is essential that there should be a power of this kind in reserve in order that it may be used where there is an extravagant and unfair charge put upon the coal consumer. I do not agree with my hon. and learned Friend that this proposal would have no effect upon wages. What the miner sees is that at the pit mouth the coal is sold at a certain figure, and he hears from London and from other places that double, and even more, are charged for it. He finds that his wages are cut down, and he says that it is not the consumer who is cutting down his wages but someone else. According to the Report of the Commission, there is someone who is charging too much for the service rendered, and in certain cases that is the middleman.

Would the right hon. Gentleman refer to the passage in which the Commission says that the charge is too much?

I have here only the recommendations of the Commission. I have not the full Report. What I am referring to is on page 93.

Read what the Commission say at the bottom of page 92.

I am obliged to the hon. Member. At the bottom of Page 92 there is this statement: It ought to be possible, either to reduce the price of coal to the consumer, or to raise it to the colliery. That is prefaced by this statement: The information collected by us as to costs of distribution and summarised above, though less complete than we should have desired to make it, is sufficient to show that there do exist between producer and consumer substantial margins of profit or expenses, which might be narrowed to the advantage of one or other or both of them. That is a very conclusive declaration. It shows that in the opinion of these four gentlemen, who are not nationalisers, there is too much being charged in the interval between the pit mouth and the consumer. That has the effect of both raising the charge to the consumer and of narrowing the profit out of which the miner can be paid. All those who have gone into the question, such as the right hon. Member for Carmarthen (Sir A. Mond) are of opinion that one of the solutions of the problem is in the selling of the coal. There is a margin there which is available to pay profits to the coal owner—the actual coalowner, not the one who indulges in agencies and things of that kind, but the coalowner who is a bona fide worker of his mine—and at the same time to increase the pay of the miner. That is the conclusion to which practical men have come, and undoubtedly it is the conclusion of the Commission. They have unanimously recommended it, and most of the members of the 1919 Commission came to the same conclusion.

Even those who do not agree with the nationalisation of mines were in favour of this particular proposal. The question is not whether it is desirable that County Councils or Town Councils should enter into the business of selling coal within their areas. The question is whether the knowledge that that power is there cannot be utilised where there is a combination of merchants in an area to put up the price beyond the figure at which it ought to be put. Mr. Rickett, one of the greatest of the coal merchants, is not in the least afraid of this proposal. He thinks that they would be able to compete with the municipalities. I have no doubt that they would. But they would cut their prices. Every excellent business man would be able to compete with any municipality or county council, but the knowledge that it was necessary to compete, that there was this rival, this possible resort, would in itself force them to consider the question either of reducing prices or of leaving a margin which would be available in order to raise the wages of the miners.

I ventured to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman just now because I thought that he was making a case on the footing that the Royal Commission had found that there were excessive profits being made out of the distribution of coal. It is the general belief, because it is extremely difficult otherwise to account for the differences between the pithead prices and the prices that all of us as retail consumers have to pay. It is because of that general belief that a little less than fairness may be done if we are not extremely careful. What the Royal Commission actually said was: The information collected by us as to costs of distribution and summarised above, though less complete than we should have desired to make it, is sufficient to show that there do exist between producer and consumer substantial margins of profit or expenses, which might be narrowed to the advantage of one or other or both of them. The Commission did inquire closely into all the processes between the raising of the coal and the actual receipt of it by the consumer. If they could have found evidence and reached a finding that at any one point excessive profits were being made, their recommendation would be infinitely more convincing. The hon. Member for Rothwell (Mr. Lunn) said that the Government did agree to accept the Royal Commission's Report, and he asked why we were not accepting this new Clause. I want to make the position of the Government quite clear, though I thought it was well known. The Government did agree to accept the whole of the Commission's Report or offered to do so, provided that the owners on the one hand and the miners' representatives on the other hand would also accept the Report, so that we all three might co-operate in getting a lasting settlement on the basis of the Report. But there was no acceptance on the part of the other parties. So the Government naturally reserved its liberty. No one supposes that the Government, being what it is—[ Interruption, ]—being what I am proud to say it is, a Conservative Government, a supporter of individual rights and liberties, is likely to welcome a proposal for municipal trading. It was prepared, in the interests of peace, if its offer had been accepted, to bring in a Measure which would have authorised that, but the offer was not accepted.

Did I not hear the right hon. Gentleman on a previous Motion say that this Bill was the carrying out of the Report?

The The hon. and learned Gentleman has not been sufficiently often at the Standing Committee meetings to have heard what took place.

I am speaking of your statement in this House a few moments ago.

The hon. and learned Gentleman had better refresh his memory, because I will undertake to state I used the words "With some exceptions." I am within the recollection of the House. There was, the Commission says, no sufficient evidence before them, and there is no sufficient evidence before us to make it quite certain that municipal trading is a necessary check upon private trading. If it were really proved to be a necessary check it would have to be accepted, but it has not been proved to be a necessary check. I do not see any evidence in the Commission's Report, or in anything they have said, or even in the arguments brought forward by hon. Members opposite, to show that it has been so proved. The hon. Member for Rothwell said he had been in politics in Leeds for many years, and that he knew that in Leeds 25 per cent, on the price of coal might be saved to the consumer, if the sale were undertaken by the municipality. A profit of 25 per cent, on the turnover seems to be the sort of profit which would make any retail trader jump into the coal-distributing trade, especially if the 25 per cent. can be obtained in addition to profits which are already said to be too high. I cannot myself believe that the trade is so profitable as that, and that we do not find other people immediately joining it. If it is found to be necessary to do something more the Government will not shirk doing something more. [HON. MEMBERS: "Do it now."] There is no evidence now upon which we can go. What we are doing is to set up an extremely strong Committee under Sir Frederick Lewis to consider the desirability and practicability of the cooperative selling of coal, and we shall await their report before we ask the House to come to any conclusion as to the ultimate development of the retail selling of coal.

Is the point contained in this proposed New Clause, within the terms of reference which have been submitted to this Committee?

I do not say it is within the terms of reference. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] There is nothing extraordinary about it. We intend to await the Report of that Committee which is considering, as I say, the desirability and practicability of the co-operative selling of coal before we take any further steps. It may well be that they will be able to find some method of co-operative selling, even from the source—from the collieries themselves—which may cut out a good many middlemen's and distributing profits. If they can do that, there is no necessity for reversing our ordinary policy and authorising municipalities to sell coal. It may well be that they will solve the question; and when we have their report we shall be in an infinitely better position to dsa1 with this matter.

I gather that the Government's answer is that they cannot accept this proposed new Clause because the consideration of the whole question is to be determined by this Committee. If the terms of reference to the Committee do not include this question, how can the Committee consider it?

12 N.

I hope the right hon. Gentlemen will listen while I repeat what I said. The original Commission's Report, as shown by the passage which I have read, is to the effect that there is a large difference between the pit-head price and the consumers charge, which may be due either to profits or expenses. The Commission made a considerable investigation on its own account and came to no further conclusion than that, except that it recommended the municipal selling of coal. [Hon. Members. "Hear, hear!"]. I am only stating the facts, and I hope I am summarising the report fairly in this respect. As I have said, the Government have set up a Committee to consider the very wide question of how best to get the coal from the pit to the consumer. That is a very wide reference, and deals with all the processes, between the getting of the coal and the consumption of the coal. We intend to await that report before we decide whether municipal selling ought to be authorised or not. The Committee, as I have pointed out, is a very strong one, and it may advise checks on existing methods of retail sale. They may even cut out the present methods of distribution from pit to consumer, and may suggest a co-operative method which will reduce the price, but, until we know what they do recommend, I do not propose to go further.

Would it be competent for that Committee to consider the advisability of municipal selling, among other methods of dealing with the question, or would that point be excluded?

No, it is not excluded. The wording of the terms of reference is of the very widest character. I do not want, on the other hand, to say that I am specially referring to them the question of whether municipalities are, or are not, to be allowed to sell coal. I do not want to be understood as saying so.

But it is competent for them to consider this matter?

I think the terms are wide enough to enable them to make inquiries into the subject, if they wish to do so.

One is surprised to learn this morning that the Government are turning their backs upon the recommendations of the Royal Commission. Some of us have been endeavouring for some time past to turn the mind of our own organisation to the Royal Commission, as the way out of the difficulties which we are facing. Yet, just at the moment when there seems to be an indication in our own organisation that our efforts in this direction, backed up by a great body of public opinion, are succeeding, we find the Government turning their backs upon their own statement that they were prepared to give effect to the recommendations of the Commission. Among those recommendations is this one on the question of the right of municipalities to sell coal, and it is one to which the mining community attach great importance. If the Government are going to adhere to the attitude which they have taken up this morning, what faith can any of us have in any statement which the Government have made? We can attach no importance to their statements. All we can say now is that those who have been endeavouring to secure the adoption of the Royal Commission's Report, as a basis of settlement, have been misled by the pretensions of the Government. We shall be told from our own side that all the statements which have been made by the Government are but hollow shams, and that the Government are running away from their promises.

I should have liked the Government this morning to have shown that they were sincere in their promises and were prepared to give effect to the recommendations of the Commission. The right hon. Gentleman himself has said that there is going to be a delay in dealing with this matter, because it has been submitted to an impartial committee who are going to investigate the whole question of selling agencies and the retail trade. As a matter of fact, nothing of the kind is going to be done. The right hon. Gentleman says he is going to await the report of that Committee, but the Committee is not going to deal with this question at all. What is the use of trying to palm off a statement of that character on the House? It has no reference whatever to the subject under discussion, and, so far as we are concerned, we cannot accept it as conclusive or satisfactory. When the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) was speaking, the Secretary for State for War seemed to cast some doubt upon his argument and upon his statement with regard to the possibility of a saving in the retail trade which would augment the wages of the miners.

All along the line we have held the opinion that there have been large profits somewhere which ought to have come into the coffers of the industry, to have augmented the wages of the miners, and if the right hon. Gentleman opposite will let his mind rest on the evidence submitted, not only to this Commission, but to the last previous Commission, he will find that there is substantial evidence to justify all that we have been thinking and saying this morning. The Commission of 1919 said: The evidence shows that considerable saving is possible in the distribution of household coal. That was the conclusion of Mr. (now Sir) Arthur Balfour, Mr. R. W. Cooper, Sir Adam Nimmo, Sir Allan Smith, and Mr. Evan Williams, not members of the Miners' Federation, but men who were competent to speak with authority for the industry, and that evidence has been again endorsed by the further evidence submitted to the recent Commission. I would like to draw attention to the passage which the right hon. Gentleman read out a minute or two ago. In the first place, they say: The information collected by us as to costs of distribution ….. though less complete than we should have desired to make it"— It is those last words to which I wish to draw attention. I am quite sure that if we had to-morrow a Commission which was going to examine not merely accounts which were incomplete, but accounts which were complete, and whose investigations were not confined merely to the statements put in by the merchants themselves, but were going to follow them up and examine the colliery books and see how far they could be verified, there would be a revelation to this country with regard to the price that the merchants were paying at the pits for their coal. It is said here that the price paid by private enterprise is 35s. per ton at the depot, and 33s. by the co-operative societies. Is there any man here who believes for a single moment that private enterprise is paying 2s. a ton more for its coal than are the co-operative societies, whose experience and knowledge of the industry are limited, whereas you have had merchants in the industry for from 50 to 100 years? Every coal owner on the other side knows perfectly well that that statement is not entirely a statement of fact.

Would the hon. Member tell the House the quality of that coal?

I could take the hon. and gallant Member into little places in London where the top price is charged for little more than rubbish. The ignorance of the London population with regard to coal has been exploited by the people opposite, and on this side, so far as the coal merchants are concerned, in the quality of the coal put into the cellars of the people. I have witnessed coal that has been brought in at top price which has been little more than the very refuse of the coalfield, because the people knew little or nothing about the quality, and when they tell us that what they are receiving is Derby Brights it is very often not true. Coal owners get up and state that there is not more than 10 per cent. of the coal seams containing the best coal, and yet we are asked to believe that what is coming into London and every other city is the best coal, that they have to pay top price for it, and that, consequently, they have to charge top price for it retail. That is not a fact, and, therefore, I come back to the point I have already made, that if you could have a complete investigation into the charges to the consumer and the prices at the pits you would find there was certainly room for the establishment of municipal selling agencies. If the right hon. Gentleman will turn to page 89 of the Report of the last Commission, he will find this: If all the retail trade in London could in these respects be conducted as economically as that of the Co-operative Society whose accounts have been examined, a very substantial margin would be available, either for reducing prices to the consumer or for increasing prices to the colliery, and increasing wages to the miner. I would like to commend that passage to the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott), to whom I would like to pay my respects for the very valuable service he rendered in the Committee. His legal knowledge has been made available for the Committee on many points, and to that extent I pay my respects to him, but on this point I beg leave to differ from him. I think he is wrong when he says that this has no relevancy whatever to the question of the miners' wages and the general financial position of the industry.

I did not suggest, nor do I think, that the disparity between the pithead price and the price paid by the ultimate consumer of domestic coal has no relevance to the questions considered in the Commission's Report or to this Bill. I agree that it has. That aspect of the matter, as I understand it, is going to be considered by the Committee that has just been appointed. It is of vital importance that we should know how it is that there is so large a gap between the pithead price and the price paid by the consumer of domestic coal, and to the extent of the 30,000,000 tons or so consumed as domestic coal it is very important. All that I said was that the question of municipal trading seemed to me to be an essentially different kind of proposal altogether from the general proposals that are being considered for the purpose of improving the industry as a whole, and that they had no place in this Bill. I think strongly that that is a matter that will have to he looked at by the Committee that has been appointed to consider the whole question of selling.

That seems to be begging the question altogether, if it be true, as the Commissioners say, that there are substantial margins of profit and expenses that might lead to the advantage either of the consumers or of the miners. If you establish a medium such as has been described by the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs, which is going to stand as a rival to check the exorbitant prices charged by private enterprise, it stands to reason that the consumers or the people engaged in the industry will derive a financial advantage from the establishment of that agency. Therefore, if that be so, the remarks of the hon. and learned Gentleman are not really strictly accurate. That is the least that I can say about them. I think a case is made out here for the right of municipalities to engage in the selling of coal. I submit to the House that the worst thing you can do now, in face of the alarming stoppage which is going on, is to break faith with the British public, whom you have led to believe that you are standing by the Report. If you are now finally departing from the Report; if it has got to be a fight to a finish, do not think for one moment that that is going to have a bearing upon the stoppage. It is rather going to rally the forces on this side to continue as long as we can the struggle. It is making us rather more bitter and hostile to the other side of the House, and the Government and the owners as a whole, because we are beginning to realise that we have been misled, and for the Government to turn round on its best friends on this side, who have been endeavouring to get an end to this stoppage, is one of the most disastrous things they can do. Instead of bringing the more moderate men to their side, they are driving even the moderate men into the ranks of the extremists, because we realise that the battle we are fighting now is a battle against the Government and the owners combined.

It has been a great surprise to me to see the sudden hostility which this proposal has aroused among Members of the party opposite. One of the first things I did when I first came into this House was to introduce a Bill under the Ten Minutes' Rule, in order to try to bring this scheme before the notice of the House. At that time, I remember, a considerable amount of sympathy was expressed by Members on the other side. A certain number went further than to express sympathy, and supported me in the Division Lobby, I cannot believe that opinion has so desidedly altered among the less class conscious Members opposite that they should be solidly behind the very casuistical arguments brought forward by the Minister, and the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division (Sir L. Scott). It seems to me not only away from the point, but very dangerous at the present moment to argue that any of these things which bear on the amount available for the miners and the mineowners, have nothing whatever to do with the position of the mining industry. The actual fact is—and we have heard it from many Members on the opposite of the House that as far as accountants are able to discover, with their limited access at the present moment, there is not enough money being made out of the coal industry to pay miners an adequate wage, or to pay mineowners an adequate return on their capital, and all the other charges. I submit to the House, that the normal thing to do when you find that the total amount of income from an industry is not sufficient to meet its legitimate charges, is to go through that industry, and prune very carefully every excrescence of expenditure, every person who is drawing anything from the industry to which, perhaps, his services do not entitle him to draw, in an effort to see, that whatever is raised from the industry, whether it be adequate or inadequate, shall be shared principally between those people who are rendering the main service to the industry.

I have seen it stated in Press organs representing the views of hon. Members opposite, that the position which gives rise to this continual unrest in the coalfields is not only an economic position, but a psychological position as well. The miner believes, that while the Government hasten to accept that part of the Report which says he must make a sacrifice, he finds every kind of casual argument that they can possibly discover, in order to avoid accepting, and to discredit, any part of the Commission's report which involves the making of sacrifices by people who are more likely to be congenial to them than the miners. I have here a copy of the "London Coal Market Report," a paper which anybody can buy in the ordinary way, published by the retail coal merchants themselves. One paragraph gives an interesting insight into the method by which they distribute coal in London. They say there is little or nothing to report in the retail section of the market. When, however, the volume of orders has increased to appreciable dimensions, a revision of prices to the public will at once be brought forward. In another part of the report they say that coal, which was actually sold at the London Coal Exchange at 29s. a ton, was going into the cellar of the consumer in London at 51s., and in places, such as the East End of London, where coal is sold in very small quantities—and it is, as the hon. Member pointed out, courteous to call it coal— it is sold at prices which work out, in the aggregate, to much more, perhaps, than the prices which those who buy larger quantities have to pay for very good coal.

The miner does not get that money. According to the figures given, the miner gets something around 3s. a ton for the coal he hews. Yet he sees coal being sold in the streets of our great cities at these prices, and none of the arguments of the Secretary of State for War or the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite are going to persuade the miner that when coal, for which he gets 3s. a ton, in sold in London at 60s. there is not some leakage somewhere.

May I ask at what colliery the wage cost of coal is 3s. a ton?

The average price, as supplied by the Miners' Federation Executive, which the miner gets over the country, is 3s. a ton. That is what the coal hewer gets for the coal he hews. If the hon. and gallant Gentleman wishes to give an authoritative correction, I shall be glad to have it.

If the hon. Member will refer to the figures issued by the Mines Department, he will find that the wage cost per ton of coal is anything between 10s. and 12s., out of which the hewer gets his proportion.

That is just the kind of argument about which some of us complain. I was dealing with the average wage of the man who hews the coal, and I said he got an average of 3s. a ton. The hon. and gallant Member contradicts that statement. He says the Mines Department states—and I am quite aware of it—that the average wage cost is something in the neighbourhood of 9s. or 10s. a ton. I did not say that 3s. a ton was the average wage cost, taking all the people engaged in the industry into account. What I said was that the coal hewer, the miner, looks at the position, and sees the coal for which he himself gets 3s. a ton, sold in the streets of London at from 55s. to 65s., and he wants to know where the leakage is, why it is he is the only person called upon by the Government to make sacrifices, while everybody else, who, apparently draws the rest of the 55s. to 65s., is not to be called upon to make any sacrifice at all. It is all the more surprising that this suggestion, which was supported last year by many Members opposite in the Division Lobby, which we have continually urged forward, which is a purely permissive measure, we do not want force, or to interfere with the liberty of the subject, it is treated in this way. When the right hon. gentleman waxes so eloquent about this purely permissive Measure, why is it that he offers such constant opposition? The miners are suffering. Consumers are suffering. If any hon. Member will take the trouble at the present time to go down into the poorer districts of London, he will find that the present coal shortage is being exploited by someone. He will realise that not only the miner, but the consumer needs protection not from the unrestricted play of competition, but because there is no competition, but from the London coal dealer. The miner believes that a very considerable proportion of this matter is largely interwoven and largely tied up with the interests of the coalowners themselves. A paper case has been made out on the other side for a reduction of wages of the miners, but when the Government refuse such a simple permissive measure as we are putting forward, then there can be very little wonder that many of us on these benches should begin to despair even of getting the smallest measure of justice for anybody else but the trader himself from the Tory Government.

I do not propose to follow the hon. Member who has just sat down, into many of the arguments that he has used because I think he knows very little about the coal trade. His arguments are intended for propaganda throughout the country with a view to showing that the coal miner only gets 3s. per ton.

I said that the difference in the price paid to the miner and the high price at which this coal was sold brought the inevitable suggestion as to what became of the difference?

I accept that suggested alteration on the part of the hon. Member but may I say that I know from long experience and everyone engaged in the coal industry knows that apart from the managers, directors and so on, those who earn wages receive over 10s. a ton and in some districts such as South Wales considerably more than 12s. Therefore, I submit that it is unfair to throw out the suggestion that the miner is only paid 3s. a ton, whereas the miner, which term includes the hewer, the filler, the men engaged underground and the men engaged on the surface screening the coal—they are all technically miners —gets from 10s. to 15s. a ton according to the different areas of the country.

I think it is wrong to convey the impression that the miner gets 12s. per ton. The miners collectively get 12s. per ton—that is, spread over the whole body of workers.

According to the district the wage cost is more or less per ton of coal. That is perfectly clear from the Mines Department figures.

What is included?

I said before that you do not include in wage cost the higher officials such as the directors and the managers. I said that the figures 10s. to 15s. per ton excluded these. Hon. Members opposite look at this matter, I think, from an exaggerated point of view, as to what they think would be likely to happen with a municipal supply of coal. But hon. Members ought to know that house coal or domestic coal in this country is only 12 per cent. of the total coal which is used.

Will the hon. Gentleman give us some figures to prove that?

On Page 4 of the Report of the Royal Commission the hon. Members will find that for the year 1924 there were 267,000,000 tons of coal raised, while if they turn to page 11 of the Report they will see that of that total domestic use has accounted for only 33,000,000 tons which shows a proportion of just over 12 per cent. I cannot go into extraneous matters, but what I can say to the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Mr. Lee) is that if he refers to the Report of the Commission on page 4, he will see that in 1924 there were 267,000,000 tons of coal raised, of which as I have said 33,000,000 went in home consumption.

But I see on page 11 of the Report that in 1923 the percentage was 33.50 and in 1924, 33.75.

Those are not percentages, those are million tons.

I have gone carefully into these figures and, they are as I have stated, 267,000,000 and 33,000,000 respectively. With household coal only 12 per cent. of the total produced. If you eliminate the merchant trading in house coal about whom so much has been said and allow the colliery the shilling per ton on 12 per cent. which the merchant may be getting you get something like 1 per cent. added to the proceeds of the collieries, of which 87 per cent. goes to the men and 13 per cent. to the owners. It is absolutely ridiculous therefore to make such a point of what can be saved in the distribution of household coal.

May I say—[ Interruption ].

I know how anxious hon. Members are to raise many different subjects in the course of this debate, but I would suggest that it is not necessary to go into these detailed figures on this Amendment.

I apologise to the hon. Member for not giving way, but I have already given way half-a-dozen times. The point I was trying to make was that the profits of the coal merchant over the whole of the proceeds would make very little difference. I notice on page 87 of the Report that the profit of the merchant in London worked out at 6½d. per ton. The Commission say that the profit was 6½d. a ton, and the profit on coal dealt with in a wholesale way, which may not go to household consumers, was 6d. a ton. If we add those two profits together the resulting Is. a ton on household coal will not make all the difference to the situation seeing that household coal is only 12 per cent. of the total production of coal in this country. It is always a surprise to me that hon. Members opposite, many of whom represent co-operative societies, cannot find a solution to this question themselves. I believe the co-operative societies own coal mines—they may own one or two—and it is well known that they have their own organisation for the distribution of coal, and yet we find that they do not sell coal to consumers any cheaper than do the coal merchants. A solution is in their own hands—to distribute the coal themselves and give the consumer the benefit of the large profits which they say are being made by coal merchants.

In a way I rather regret that the Government will not accept this new Clause. It would be a sort of gesture to hon. Members opposite, and to the coal-miners of the country who have exaggerated ideas on this question of profits. But I quite agree with the Government in not accepting it, seeing that the miners will not accept the Report on the Coal Commission, seeing that they have held the country up for 12 weeks—[ Interruption ] — the coalowners may be to blame to same extent, but I put the blame mostly on the miners for holding up the country for 12 weeks. My own view is that if all three parties would agree to carry out the whole of the Coal Commission's Report we might have a solution of this problem on those lines. But to lay undue importance on a proposal of this sort, and to try to make out that the municipalities can sell coal much cheaper, seems to me rather ridiculous. Of course, they might be able to sell it cheaper if they had a free hand to dip into the pockets of the ratepayers, but that is expressly prohibited in the Report. I do not propose to detain the House any longer, but I shall support the Government, having regard to all the circumstances.

The speeches we have heard from the Government side are typical of the kind of thinking which has brought the country to its present difficult situation. I was astonished to hear the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott) putting forward the point of view he has submitted. With all respect to him, the arguments he used would have been applicable to the industry 50 years ago; but the attitude of the supporters of the Government generally towards this particular question seems to ignore the point that economic factors are continually changing, and that the conditions to which their arguments might have been applied are disappearing for ever under modern forms of industry. The right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill threw cold water on the suggestion that 25 per cent. profit was made on the retail side of the industry. I might agree that it is an exaggerated statement to say that is the profit of an individual retailer of coal, but the figure is a fair one if it is spread over all those who handle the coal in between the transporter and the coal consumer. In the last few years there has grown up in the coal industry, as in many other industries, a parasitic element which renders no useful service whatever. The Government may say this point has nothing to do with the Bill, or that it will not effect the ultimate solution of the coal problem, but it is no use their trying to blink the fact that more than 1,000,000 people in this country believe that in some form or another, though they may not be able to put their finger on the spot where the robbery takes place, they are exploited and robbed of the fruits of the labour they perform.

The hon. Member for Belper (Mr. Wragg) speaks of a wage cost of 12s. a ton. That is the figure of the Department for Mines; it includes high salaries as well as low wages, and also the cost of administration. Surely there must be something radically wrong when coal costing 12s. a ton at the pithead is sold at £3 5s. a ton to the consumer here in London. In the very districts where coal is produced the collier himself, who is receiving 3s. a ton as an individual for hewing coal—and there is another 9s. a ton to be added to cover the other costs of production—is compelled to pay as much as £2 10s. a ton for the coal he buys for consumption in his own fire grate.

I am much obliged to the hon. Member for giving way to me. The prices given are, of course, average prices, and they include slack, small stuff and house coal. At my own pit we sell coal at the pit mouth as high as 35s. a ton, and we also sell coal as low as 4s. a ton. I hope the hon. Member will bear in mind that house coal for London is not bought at the pit mouth at 12s. a ton, but more probably at 25s. or 27s. a ton.

May I say to the hon. Member for Belper (Mr. Wragg) that in the area where I am we have two prices for household coal. For the best screened coal we pay 25s. and for unscreened coal 24s.—just as it comes out of the pit.

The hon. Gentleman might tell us what is the actual percentage of best coal produced in this country. My hon. Friend the Member for the Broxtowe Division (Mr. Spencer) has quoted 10 per cent. as the actual quantity of best coal that can be obtained in the country, and it is interesting to know how these prices for best coal arise. Everybody sells best coal. There are millions of tons of "best coal" sold, and millions of tons for which the price of best coal is received. The actual quantity of best coal is strictly limited by natural factors, which even the most ingenious of coalowners cannot overcome. These are some of the factors which contribute to that sense of exploitation existing in the minds of the miners. What I would suggest to the Government is that if they think the retailers of coal can hold their own with the municipalities, if the owners think the municipalities cannot make the business a success, why not give the municipalities a chance to exhibit their incompetence and to prove that private enterprise is best in retailing.

At any rate, if the Government had accepted a Clause such as this it would have been an indication to the miners,

who are now bitterly struggling in the country for what they believe to be their elementary rights, that the Government were attempting to secure fair play. This would have sweetened the rapidly souring tempers of the men.

I think the Government would be wise to accept this small permissive Clause under which any public authority could buy coal at pithead prices and distribute it if they thought it was a reasonable venture. At the present time, the municipalities do buy coal directly and sell the products of coal, and it seems an anomaly that they cannot sell the coal they buy at a retail price. They buy coal for all kinds of municipal undertakings. They can sell coke, and they can sell gas and its by-products, sulphur and ammonia. Why cannot they sell coal? That would have been a sensible proposal quite in line with the findings of the Royal Commission, and it would have been an indication that the Government are bolding out some evidence of their goodwill.

Question put, "That the Clause be read a Second time."

The House divided: Ayes, 110; Noes, 257.

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

This Clause deals with the question of industrial disputes and on this matter I speak only for myself and for no one else. I do not think there is any apology needed for bringing this matter before the House. It appears to me that this is a very serious omission from any Bill which sets out to deal with what is called the reorganisation of the mining industry. One of the most vital parts of any reorganisation is the setting up of some kind of machinery, not necessarily the machinery described in this Clause, to deal with the disputes which are constantly cropping up and which injure the prosperity, not only of the industry itself, but of the country as a whole. As I understand it, this reoganisation Bill is intended to produce certain economies in the production of coal, which will assist the wages of the industry and generally promote its prosperity. Less than a week's stoppage, even a day's stoppage, would, however, entirely wipe out any economy which this Bill is intended to bring about and would land the industry in a considerable loss so that none of the economies that are going to be produced by the proposals in this Bill are going to be available to the industry unless we have some definite means of endeavouring to prevent the disastrous stoppages which come about from time to time.

There is no question at all as to the need for this provision. In the last five years, since 1920, there has been three national stoppages, which have cost the miners in wages alone £31,500,000. In addition 86,000,000 working days were lost. Since 1918 £41,500,000 in wages alone have been lost. If we are to believe the figures which the right hon. Member for West Swansea (Mr. Runciman) produced this week, the present stoppage has already cost us £25,000,000 in wages and in addition at least £119,000,000 to the industries and to the country as a whole. These are eollossal figures, and I do not intend to dwell upon them, but it appears to me that the results obtained from these stoppages have been absolutely barren and have condemened absolutely the appeal to force. We have got to go back to the appeal to reason, and we cannot do that until the Government have set up some procedure for dealing with these disputes which constantly arise in the mining industry, and until we learn some lessons from our past experience. These settlements have been reached either through sheer necessity on the part of one side or the other or from political pressure, which was especially brought to bear at the end of 1924 to force one side or the other to accept conditions which they regarded as unjust and which were not within the bounds of the economic conditions at the time. These settlements which are reached in this way are bound to be futile, because they have no moral sanction behind them, and they have no element of permanency. They give no security whatever for the future and, without the proper machinery and without the system of arbitration for the settlement of these disputes, we shall always be going on in the same old way from one disaster to another, from one stoppage to another, and we shall never get any settlement, based upon the moral sanction of the community as a whole, based also upon some element of permanency, which will also redound to the prosperity of the country and of the industry itself.

Under the present system, a dispute is always bound to drift into the political arena. Under the Royal Commission the question of wages, the most important of all, was left entirely in the air, and there was no tribunal which could meet before May 1st and decide what the industry could pay in the way of wages and so settle the question of wages and hours. There was no machinery that could be brought into existence at that time in order to prevent the stoppage. The consequence was, as it always is, that the dispute drifted automatically into a political atmosphere. The Prime Minister was called upon to try and settle the dispute. Immediately a dispute comes into this House it at once assumes a political character and becomes the subject of dispute between all the political parties. With the best will in the world, whatever any political party does, it cannot escape from the charge that it is endeavouring to make political capital or gain political advantage out of the dispute itself. The only way we can get the venue changed is to set up some machinery. Surely the Government can set up some kind of arbitration machinery so that the mining industry can be put upon the same footing as so many other industries in the country, which do not bring their disputes to this House and so make the issue a political one, but are able, through the machinery they have already set up, to arrive at a peaceful solution.

We are told that public opinion is to be the final arbiter. I submit that under present conditions public opinion has very little chance of asserting itself properly. Public opinion wants to know who is to blame and who is the aggressor. It is precisely the same problem that they are trying to solve at Geneva. Who is the aggressor? Who is to blame? Who is bringing this suffering on the country? Is it the coal owners or is it the Miners' Federation? Which is the party that is to blame? I submit that there ought to be some arbitration tribunal—whether this is the right one or not is open, no doubt, to various opinions—to test in the first place the willingness of both sides to come to the tribunal at all. If one side says that it is prepared to come to the tribunal, and the other says that it is not, obviously the side that is not prepared to come to the tribunal is the one that is in the wrong. The second test is, the award having been given, which side is not prepared to accept the award; and whichever side is not prepared to accept the award is obviously in the wrong. That would give a sure guide to public opinion as to which side is really in the right and ought to be supported.

It may be said, and I think it has been said, that both sides have refused to accept any solution of this kind, and that, therefore, we are not in a position to set up any such tribunal as this. It is quite true that you can take a horse to water but you cannot make him drink. I venture to submit, however, that at the present moment there is no water at all to which to take him. There is no tribunal, there is no machinery to which these hostile parties can be taken. In the second place, you want not only to get the horse to drink, but you have to get him to go even as far as the water, and neither side has yet reached that stage. It is true that one side has, in response to the appeal from the Bishops, expressed its willingness to arbitrate at the end of a defined period. They have said: If disagreements should then exist, a joint board consisting of representatives of both sides shall appoint an independent chairman whose award in settlement of these disagreements shall be accepted by both sides. Obviously, that horse has his face turned towards the water. It is not necessary that both sides should proceed simultaneously to the river. I think the first duty of the Government is to provide the machinery. Once the machinery is there, it may be possible for both sides, if not to advance simultaneously, at any rate to go step by step, with one or other in front, until they reach that point, and, once they have got there, it may be possible to persuade them to accept the decision which is given by an impartial court of this kind.

The next point that I should like to put is as to what is the proper machinery. We all have our views as to what particular kind of arbitration court should be set up. For my part, I think there ought to be some provision for what is called the principle of conciliation, and also some provision for the principle of arbitration. This Clause proposes to set up conciliation committees in each of the mining districts, with an appeal to a central body, or national arbitration tribunal, consisting of three persons nominated by the Government. I think, that, whatever the machinery is, it ought to be statutory. We had a voluntary sort of agreement at the end of the 1921 dispute, but I believe there were 23 representatives of either side, with an independent chairman—a most unwieldy body for coming to any real settlement.

The other point is as to whether it should be compulsory. Some of my hon. Friends on the Labour benches raised the objection in Committee that there were no sanctions or penalties attached in case one party or the other did not accept the findings of this tribunal, but I understood that it was considered that at this stage of the proceedings it would be unwise to put any penalties or sanctions into a scheme of this kind. Personally, I should welcome them, but the real test whether this scheme is compulsory or not is whether sanctions or penalties are to be imposed in case either party does not submit its case to the tribunal, or, having submitted its case, will not accept the award.

I would appeal once more to the Government to reconsider this matter. It is very easy to say that neither side has accepted the proposal, and that for that reason it cannot be put into the Bill; but I seriously submit that no Reorganisation Bill will be successful or will carry out what the country, and, I have no doubt, the Government, want to see carried out, namely the peaceful solution of all these difficulties in the coal trade. After all, the Government have to regard themselves as the custodian of the interests of the country as a whole, and to-day it is not the belligerents who are suffering so much as the neutrals. It is the poor people who are suffering who cannot get any coal. In my constituency, which is a purely agricultural constituency there are hundreds—I venture to say even thousands—of families without an ounce of coal in their cellars. The Government have not to consider the interests of any one section or class in the community, but to try to provide means whereby these matters are not automatically pushed into the political atmosphere, but are settled by means of some judicial tribunal whose decisions will be absolutely impartial, and will carry the confidence, not only of the parties themselves, but of the country as a whole.

I beg to second the Motion.

I need not dwell upon the advisability of having disputes settled by arbitration. We have already arbitration machinery in connection with the railways, and there have been for a long time arbitration tribunals in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. I can say myself that in Australia, although this machinery does not work perfectly, it nevertheless is the means of minimising a great number of strikes. One or two observations have been made which I should like to stress. This Clause proposes to set up two bodies, one a conciliation Committee in the district, and the other a national arbitration tribunal. Nobody is bound to go either to the conciliation Committee or to the arbitration tribunal, but, if these bodies are set up, their presence is an invitation to disputants to go before them. Therefore, when a difficulty arises such as we now have, if one of the parties say that they will not go before these bodies, public opinion will bear very strongly upon the party which stands out. That is really the only effective sanction that can be applied in matters of this kind. It has been found perfectly impossible in Australia to say that a large sum of money should be deposited. What is a large sum of money to thousands of men?

If, these two bodies being set up, the parties go to them, and supposing that they go to the conciliation committee first, then there is an appeal from that body to the national arbitration tribunal, which really is the final body. They can go direct, as I read the Clause, to the arbitration tribunal, but, once they have gone there, they are bound by the decision. It may be asked, "How are you to bind persons without any penalties?" You do not always need a penalty. I will tell you a very simple way. If a tribunal has a legal right to give a decision, anyone who acts contrary to that decision acts illegally and cannot enforce any rights. Suppose a National Arbitration Board said, "Under all the circumstances, we believe the rate of wages ought to be so and so," and the owners said, "We will not give that rate of wages," the men would strike, and then they would be entitled to their Unemployment Benefit. Some hon. Members above the Gangway took the objection before the Committee that without sanctions it was practically useless, That is not so. The sanction of public opinion is all you can ever get. Having gone to this body the decision makes it legal, and the person who acts against it cannot enforce any rights. That is all you can hope to get out of it. In this coal industry it is a pity when a dispute arises that either you have to set up an ad hoc tribunal at the last moment, or, as usually happens, it drifts into the political arena and passions are heated.

No one can complain of the importance of the subject which is brought before us in this new Clause. The present condition in which the country finds itself quite naturally raises the problem as to whether it would, be possible to protect ourselves against disputes. It is to be recognised, however, that the workers up to now have held compulsory arbitration in supreme suspicion. We must have some security that when a labour case, whether it be brought forward by the employers or by the employed, comes before a Tribunal, that Tribunal is such as in its nature and composition will secure the confidence of both sides. Up to now that has been an insoluble problem, and, until that problem is solved, I feel certain trade unionists will not accept compulsory arbitration. The arguments which have been brought forward by the Mover and Seconder ought to be very carefully considered, but on the Report stage of this Bill the opportunity does not arise. If we are going to have arbitration in industrial disputes, we must not have it as an adjunct to this Bill. Compulsory arbitration, or a scheme of arbitration which will be operative whether compulsory or not, must be the subject of special legislation, when the whole matter can be adequately discussed. The question of machinery must be gone into. If you survey the world from China to Peru you will get half-a-dozen very interesting ways of applying the views we have heard. Which is the best? I am not prepared to say, certainly not this afternoon. Moreover, why should the miners alone have this course imposed upon them? [HON. MEMBERS: "The railways!"] It is not imposed upon the railways. If the railwaymen take a case before their Wages Board and refuse to accept the decision of the Board, they simply hand in their notices, work out their notices, and a dispute takes place. If I were going to put an arbitration Clause into an Act of Parliament, I should only do it if I were more certain of the results than that. It is not worth the trouble if that is all you get. I should like to see the whole question more carefully considered than is possible to-day. If this dispute is going to end in any sort of arbitration tribunal, it must be done as the result of the voluntary agreement of the miners themselves. The Miners' Executive have passed a resolution which indicates that they are willing to consider this question. That is the best way to do it now, and, if the House wishes to pass legislation on the subject, it had better be the subject of a separate Bill and not a Clause included in this Bill, which is very miscellaneous as it is and as inadeqate as it is miscellaneous. Without in any way pronouncing on the merits of the principle, so far as this Clause in relation to this Bill is concerned, we cannot possibly support it.

I think the Mover of this new Clause will realise, especially after the speech we have just heard, that there are serious difficulties which make it quite impossible for the Government to accept it. The hon. Member for Montgomery (Mr. D. Davies) really only brought it forward in order to initiate a discussion on the general principle of arbitration in the settlement of industrial disputes, and of course, everyone will sympathise with his desire to see disputes more easily settled. I am certain that as the right hon. Gentleman opposite has said, arbitration cannot be successful in mining disputes unless it is accepted and asked for by both sides. There is no answer to that point. The mere fact of putting machinery into an Act of Parliament will not bring about a settlement. You can arrive at a settlement only by this means when the two parties get together and say, "This is the form of arbitration we are prepared to accept, and, if it be set up, we will accept the verdict." That, of course, would not be the result of this Clause. It is particularly unfortunate that the principle of compulsory arbitration should be applied to the mining industry, because the system of voluntary conciliation has gone very far. The Conciliation Boards have been working admirably for a considerable time. It was set up by agreement and the parties were willing to abide by the decisions to which it came. But that would not be the result of putting in this Clause. The Railway Board was also a matter of agreement between the parties. I am sure the House in every quarter is in agreement as to the desirability, at some future stage, that some machinery shall be set up which will be accepted by both parties in the mining industry, but you will not do it by putting this Clause in the Bill, and we cannot accept the suggestion.

I think my hon. Friends have rendered a real service in raising this issue in a definite and concrete form. Surely, it is desirable after all our experience, notably during the last 20 or 30 years, that we should devise some judicial method of settling disputes without causing such devastation to our trade and industry. About a week ago, I obtained information from the Ministry of Labour in regard to the days that have been lost to industry through industrial strikes and lock-outs during three comparative periods of eight years—eight years since the War, eight years before the War, and eight years preceding that period. The figures are very startling. My recollection is, that in the first period of eight years the average number of days lost through strikes and lockouts, through industrial disputes, was 3,000,000. In the second period, the eight years immediately preceding the War, the total had gone up to an average of 11,000,000 days per annum, and in eight years since the war it has gone up to an average of 33,000,000 days per annum, lost through industrial disputes. Obviously, it is essential to a great industrial community like ours that we should think out the problem of how that is to be arrested.

Experience shows that strikes and lockouts do not really settle the question in dispute. We have had three in the mining industry. What we have done is that we have postponed the struggle until a more convenient opportunity for one side or the other. I remember taking part in many settlements of dock disputes. I remember that on one occasion the dock labourers won a great victory. The owners lay in wait until they got their chance, and they then inflicted a very severe defeat upon the dock labourers. Then there came a third struggle, where the dock labourers got one back on the owners. The same thing is happening in connection with the coal mines. I have no doubt that if the miners are beaten this time, due to the stress of starvation and pressure upon them, we shall have exactly the same struggle again when they have recovered. That is always what happens in these cases. Surely, it is not beyond the wit of a nation like this, a great business community, to find some means by which we can have an arbitral decision upon these cases.

I agree with the right hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. MacDonald) that perhaps this is not the occasion when we can interject into a Bill of this kind, dealing with one particular dispute in one particular industry, a principle which ought to be of general application, but we certainly ought to consider whether it can be done. The real objection that I can see to imposing it at this moment is that, before we can decide that the dispute in the mining industry is a pure matter of wages, there are two or three big issues which Parliament has to decide to put that industry on a proper basis. We cannot, for instance, have an arbitration tribunal set up to settle the question of reconstruction, the question of amalgamation, unification, royalties, purchase. These are not questions of hours, but they are essential questions to the amount of wage which is to be paid to the men, and the wage that the industry can pay.

If we set up an arbitration tribunal now, and put it upon the basis of this Bill, it will alter nothing. On the whole, it will simply create disappointment. It does not go far enough, thoroughly to reconstruct the industry. [An HON. MEMBER: "It does not do anything!"] I agree. It is disappointing. Therefore, Parliament has to deal with this question and decide these fundamental principles before the arbitral tribunal comes in. If the arbitration Court came in now, they would simply decide upon the wages which could be paid under present conditions. The, miners are not saying: "Under present conditions you could pay more," but they do say: "You have to alter these conditions, and when you have altered them the industry can pay." These are questions which Parliament must decide first. The reason I like the suggestion of the Churches is that it does not begin with arbitration, but it ends with arbitration. The Churches begin by saying, "You must, first of all, carry out the Report, and reconstruct the industry. Having done that, any dispute that remains can be referred to arbitration."

I do not believe that we can build arbitration upon this shifting foundation of mere sand. That is why, although I am strongly in favour of the proposal put forward by my hon. Friend—I am not committing myself to details; it may not be the best tribunal, and I am strongly in favour of the general principle of arbitration—I do not think we can have arbitration in this particular case until, first of all, we have reconstructed the industry and put it upon a proper basis. I think that not merely the House of Commons, but the community are under a debt of gratitude to my hon. Friends for having called attention to this question and for giving us an opportunity of reviewing this matter.

It is most unfortunate that this principle should have been associated at the present time with the mining industry. In the abstract, there is a great deal to be said for it, but there are one or two things than can be said against it. With regard to the general principle of arbitration, I should like to state my view. My first objection to the question of compulsory arbitration is that up to now no provision has been made for making it compulsory on the owners to table the whole of their case. There can be no compulsory arbitration which is satisfactory unless by Statute the employer is to be compelled to place before the arbitrator the whole of the case from the financial point of view. The employer is in a fortunate position. He possesses both packs of cards. He possesses the pack of cards in regard to the workman's wages and general conditions, more so than the workman himself, because he has complete oversight over the whole of the wages. He knows, before he starts, what is the workman's case. The workman does not know the employer's case; that is secret.

Unless there is some compulsory arbitration to make the employer provide the arbitrator with the whole of the facts, no arbitrator can give a fair judgment. If we are to have arbitration we must make that compulsory. I am not against arbitration. I had the possibility of a dispute just before the present stoppage took place, and I wanted to submit the matter to arbitration, but the employer would not have it. I consider that that was a most unfortunate thing. In the whole of my career I never have refused to submit any case to arbitration. Under the present circumstances, if conditions were ideal as far as arbitration is concerned, and if I could be certain that the whole of the case would be submitted to a judicial tribunal, I should be well satisfied.

I should like to say to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) that it has always been a matter of regret to me that in the agreement arrived at in the 1920 dispute there was an absence of the personal element. The decisions were arrived at automatically, based on figures. Whether they were in favour of the workman or against him, a decision was given. There is a wide difference between this and the old Conciliation Board in the federated area with which the right hon. Member for Ince (Mr. Walsh) and I have been closely associated. That Conciliation Board dealt with a very wide coalfield, it lasted for many years, and we never had a single dispute. There were four principles on which all decisions rested. First, there was the selling price of coal, which was perhaps the most important; secondly, the volume of trade; thirdly, past prosperity, and, fourthly, future prosperity. Every one of these principles at some time or other was the deciding factor. Suppose a long period of prosperity, was followed by a fall in price, the owners submitted their figures to us for examination contending that a fall of 6d. per ton justified a 5 per cent. reduction. We might say, "Yes, you are justified in asking for a reduction, but you have had such a long period of prosperity that you ought not to ask for it at this moment," and if we could not agree, the question went before the independent chairman.

It was not automatic. The human element was brought to bear upon it, and the arbitrator repeatedly said, "you are justified asking for a 5 per cent. reduction based on the selling price of coal, but you have had such a period of prosperity, surely you can defer it." On the other hand, he could say "the future prospects justify you in asking for this 5 per cent. reduction," and the reduction was given. I am all for arbitration of that character, but not for arbitration on the lines suggested by this new Clause. If the Miners' Federation failed to choose their men, or the owners failed to choose their men, somebody else have to choose them. That is absolutely useless. If you are going to have effective arbitration, the element of consent must come in; the two parties must be agreed that they will set up this method of settling their disputes. As far as the general principle is concerned, I would give my voice and vote in favour at any time of arbitration on the lines I suggest, and I hope the day is not far distant when this brutal method of fighting out our industrial differences will come to an end and we shall set up a new, more sensible and judicial, tribunal for settling disputes which arise from time to time.

I ask leave to withdraw the Clause.

Motion and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

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

In our opinion this proposal is of great importance to the future of the industry. During the discussion of the proposed new Clause for the establishment of municipal selling of coal, the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott) said it had no connection with the Bill. He pointed out that the whole idea of this Measure is to bring more money into the industry so that higher wages can be paid to the miners. That objection cannot be taken to the proposal I am now moving, which provides for the establishment on co-operative lines of agencies for the distribution and the selling of coal and coal products, set up by the Board of Trade. Its object is to secure that the profits shall go into a common pool from week to week from which both profits and wages can be paid. The leakage that takes place in the selling of coal represents a large part of the trouble which the mining industry is facing to-day. It is facing great difficulties, and in my opinion, and also in the opinion of most of my colleagues, it is very foolish for the industry to continue to produce coal and then part company with it at the pithead, leaving the coal factor, the coal merchant, and the coal exporter to make whatever profit is made in the distribution of the coal. There is no doubt that considerable sums have been made in the distribution of coal by these parties. On a previous new Clause we heard a lot of talk about the money made by the coal merchants of London. Some time ago the London Coal Merchants' Association circularised Members of this House, and pointed out that the profits earned by their members did not amount to more than 1s. 7d. per ton, or less than 1d. a bag; and they said, "Surely the citizens of London or anybody else cannot complain of such a small profit as that being made in the transaction." In making that statement they seemed to forget that coal is not sold by the pound, but by the ton, and that a profit of 1s. 7d. per ton represents a large profit. There are many on these benches who have had experience in coal mining, and have produced many thousands of tons of coal at less than 1s. 7d. a ton. We were paid less than 1s. 7d. per ton for producing an article on which the London coal merchants admit they were making a profit of 1s. 7d. per ton in the distribution.

There are a number of distinguished members of the Tory party to whom I look for support. I expect to get the support of the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott), and that of the right hon. Member for Carmarthen (Sir A. Mond). The latter has already publicly declared himself in favour of the setting up of these non-profit-making agencies. He believes that the setting up of such agencies will lead to more amalgamations and that amalgamations will inevitably produce more of these selling agencies. In an article which he wrote some weeks ago he said that one of the things needed in the industry to-day was greater vision, that we required not only to set up selling agencies, but to have schemes of unification which would reduce the cost of production and keep inside the industry the money made in the industry. Moreover, in this matter we have the example of the German coal industry. In Germany there are at work non-profit-making selling agencies, which have been of benefit to the industry. In this country we have the example provided by the rubber industry, the tin-plate industry, the soda and sulphate of ammonia industry. There is a further example, from the constituency of the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Kidd), of the Scottish shale industry. There the shale companies are amalgamated in one company, and they have set up a non-profit-making selling agency with great benefit to the industry.

There is no doubt in our minds that if this principle were adopted it would be of great benefit to the coal industry of this country. From that source would come the money necessary to keep the wages of the men up to a reasonable standard. The great difficulty in the industry for years past has been that the standard of life provided for the men is too low. All our struggles for the last 20 years have centred round that fact. I noticed that the Minister in charge of the Bill, speaking the other day to a very dis- tinguished deputation from the Churches which was received by the Prime Minister and himself, said that this Bill put into operation every one of the recommendations of the Coal Commission with the exception of nationalisation and the setting up of selling agencies. We do not agree that the Bill does as much as that. In this new Clause there is an opportunity of bringing in one very important omission from the Bill, and I hope that even at this last stage of the Bill the Minister will be prepared to accept the principle of the Clause. There was a similar Clause moved in Committee, and the Minister in charge then promised that before the Report stage he would give careful consideration to the principle involved. I hope that to-day he will say that he is prepared to give effect to the Clause.

2.0 P.M.

I am sure everyone will agree that this is a very important Clause. There is no part of the Commission inquiry which has caused greater trouble than the question of selling agencies. The new Clause provides that The Board of Trade shall….promote the establishment of co-operative non-profit-making selling agencies, and every amalgamaton scheme shall provide for the distribution and sale of coal and coal products, wholesale or retail, through the medium of a selling agency promoted by the Board of Trade. We feel that would relieve the situation very considerably. It might not have the far-reaching effects which we expect, but we believe it would at least remove one of the great obstacles which is in the way of securing confidence between the employers and the workmen. It would remove what has been described by the Commissioners as the cut-throat competition, which is detrimental to the industry as a whole, The Commissioners, dealing with retail distribution, say: The figures as they stand show that while the cost at the depot has not quite doubled, the gross profit has a good deal more than doubled, and that net profits are many times greater. That brings under review the difficulty which we are so anxious to remove, namely, the duplication of sellers and the great profits which are made and retained by a section of the community which ought to go back into the ascertainment figures of the industry. We feel that a proper method of selling would improve the industry in many ways. The reply of the coalowners, on this point, though it does not go quite so far as one would desire, indicates that they agree there is something in it. They say in their reply: The owners agree that any means which are practicable for obtaining the best prices possible for coal in the general interest should be adopted, and they will recommend that the district shall give careful and immediate consideration to the measures which can best be taken for the promotion of this object. The coalowners themselves are to some extent, in agreement with what we are asking for in this proposed new Clause, in that they recognise that there are shortcomings in the present method. It would be much better if we could get the Government to adopt a provision on the lines of this proposal. In our opinion, it would bring about a proper scheme of selling and give us an organised selling price. It would remove much of the unfair competition which has existed up to now, and would meet, to some extent, the views expressed by the Commissioners in their Report. They say: For the rest we are strongly of opinion that the collieries would be well advised to establish co-operative selling associations. The creation in the future of the larger undertakings which we envisage should make this easier. The selling schemes under the new Clause could be carried on under conditions similar to those of the Workmen's Compensation Indemnity Associations in connection with the mining industry. These are conducted on what is known as the cost-price method, and the profits are returned to the coalowners in proportion, I suppose, to the premium they have paid. What we want is not that profits shall be returned to coalowners—this is a non-profit-making scheme — but that any benefit arising shall be returned to the industry generally and incorporated in the ascertainment figures. In that way any such benefit will not accrue merely to the coalowners but will be extended to the whole industry, We believe such a system will give a better return to the industry, and, while we cannot definitely say what will be the saving or the amount of money derived under such a scheme, we are quite satisfied that it would relieve present depression and remove much of the friction which has existed in the past. The Commission's Report also says: The associations are not likely to become so comprehensive as to stop any competition within the Industry and so, to prejudice the interest of the consumer by establishing a monopoly. But the present system of selling appears to carry competition to excess. I do not know that it will be suggested that competition ought to run wild, or ought to be allowed to do things which are not in the interests of the industry with which it is associated. Competition carried to excess brings with it evils which are difficult to remove once they are established. We ask the Board of Trade to set up a scheme in connection with each amalgamation for the distribution and selling of the commodity. Not only does that proposal apply to the internal trade, but also to the export trade. It cannot apply to the export trade in the same degree as to the sale of coal within our own shores, but I believe the present method in both is such as ought not to be encouraged by any section of the community. The Commissioners in their Report say: In the exporting districts the associations are especially needed. Their function would be to maintain prices at a remunerative level. On many occasions during these Debates it has been pointed out that the reorganisation and the new methods of selling adopted by the German coalowners might be copied by their competitors in Great Britain. The Germans have instituted a method of selling by which they can secure the full value out of the commodity after it has been produced. We believe such a method is possible in this country, and that it would lead to better relations, and enhance the profits of the owners as well as the wages of the miners. We ask that the Board of Trade should take this matter up and establish schemes with some element of authority in them. The coalowners and the Commissioners are agreed that something ought to be done, but I do not think anything will be done, unless some scheme of authority or compulsion is laid down by this House. I hope the right hon. Gentleman in charge of the Bill will give careful consideration to this question, which is of wide import, and is vital in connection with the present dispute.

I have been trying to discover from the speeches of the right hon. Gentleman the Mover of this proposed new Clause and the last speaker, who is to benefit by these selling agencies which are to be set up under compulsion by the Board of Trade. If it is suggested that the mineowner is to benefit I, in my innocence, would suggest that it is presumption for us to instruct the mineowner in how he is to increase his profit or discover new profit. Hon. Members opposite will surely agree that the test of the legitimacy of any trading is whether or not it is run on a system which has the interest of the consumer in view. We have heard a great deal as to the disparity between the cost of production of coal and the selling price, but immediately one comes to analyse the position one realises that a great deal of misapprehension arises because many factors have been omitted from consideration by the critic in this matter. I submit that you could not have a better system than you have at present. It is a system which secures the consumer's interest as perhaps no other system could. For in whose hands is this trade at the present time? On the one side you have the co-operative societies, and on the other, the private traders. People talk as though you had only the private traders, but the perfect balance of any commercial system is where the private trader on the one hand is countered by the mutual society or the co-operative organisation on the other, while the co-operative movement in turn is checked by the private trader.

In the co-operative movement you do not have profits, and obviously, if the private trader were bleeding the consumer white, as is suggested, the whole of the coal distribution of this country would be in the hands of the co-operative movement. There are times when the private trader is cultivated and times when the co-operative society can serve. If my wife wants a dress distinctive from all other dresses, or a new hat, she will not go to a co-operative society for it, she goes to the private trader. We hear a good deal of talk on the one hand about the co-operative system being bad and on the other hand of private trading being bad, but my submission is that the perfect system is to have both, the one competing against the other. If you had the whole trade of the country run by co-operative societies, you would have no comparison, no contrast, in order to check the prices, while on the other hand, so long as you have the two, the private trader cannot bleed the consumer, because the co-operative society is there to protect him. I only raised the point about the new dress or the new hat to distinguish between the two kinds of trading. Where personal taste plays a very big part, the question is very different from such a thing as coal, which is all black, whether you buy it from a store or from a private trader. I am assuming that the private trader and the co-operative society are honest in supplying the same quality. There is no question of taste in purchasing coal. I come back, therefore, to this, that in any country where you have mutual trading societies or co-operative societies along-side private traders, the consumers can never be fleeced in the matter of price. In buying anything like coal, if the private trader were attempting to fleece the consumer, all the sales of coal would go into the hands of the co-operative societies.

I cannot, as I say, discover the meaning of this Clause from the standpoint of the mineowner or from the stand-point of the consumer. Whose purpose, therefore, is to be served? Is it the workers? I am astonished to hear hon. Members preaching the German cartel system. That system is not now paying, and never has paid, a bigger wage to the miners in Germany than the miners are paid in this country. The German cartel has never secured to the German miner better conditions than the British miner has. Indeed, the German cartel is simply one of those devices where a certain type of capitalist protects his profit while pretending to protect the worker's wage, but secures both the profit and the wage by a simple exploitation of the consumer. That is the German cartel, and I say to the mining representatives opposite, that when you come to examine the working of the German cartel, you find some explanation of the great rise in the sale of German lignite or brown coal. Black coal under the cartel is being sold at such a figure that the brown coal is attractive for its cheaper price. In that fact you have the explanation why brown coal is mounting up in sales. For all these reasons, because I cannot discover any justification for this Clause, from the standpoint of the consumer, of the wage-earner, or of the coalowner, with the utmost desire to be fair in my criticism of a Clause submitted by one for whom I have so much respect as I have for the right hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Adamson), I must say that I have come to the conclusion that not one particle of case has been made out in support of the Clause. That being so, I think I shall be wholly justified in opposing it.

In rising to support this Clause, I want to say that I believe it will have a large bearing in helping to give effect to some of the savings contemplated by the Coal Commission. The hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Kidd) said he could not understand the Clause, but I suggest that if he had lent his mind more fully to it than he has apparently done, he would have been able thoroughly to understand it. He wanted to know if this would be of any assistance to mine-owners or to consumers, and he laboured those two factors all through his speech until nearly the last sentence or two, when he brought in the wage-earners. I think he wanted to inquire whether there would be any interest accruing to any of the persons concerned in the matter of the distribution and consumption of coal. We are quite satisfied in our minds that the four gentlemen who composed the Coal Commission are men of extraordinary capabilities, and it was on their practical knowledge and the evidence submitted to them that they came to the conclusion that selling agencies should be set up. Earlier in the Debate we discussed a Clause in regard to the municipalisation of coal, and it was pointed out by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War, in his usual plausible style, that it would not bring much benefit to the mining industry. I want to suggest that any one of these proposals, taken alone, would probably not be of much benefit to the coal industry, but it is by the aggregation of all these different proposals that we believe sonic salvation can be brought into the industry.

I want to suggest also that there is a wide difference between the municipal selling of coal and the setting up of these co-operative selling agencies. This scheme lies at the very root of the real distribution of the coal mined in this country. The present method of distribution has been condemned by every Commission that has sat to inquire into the mining industry. First, you had the Sankey Commission condemning it wholesale, then you had the Buckmaster Committee, you had the MacMillan Committee, and, finally, the Samuel Commission, all of which have given a strong leading in regard to the foolish way in which coal is distributed in this country. The selling agencies, as we understand them, and as we believe the Commission meant them to be understood, are to be large coal factors, who really get hold of the coal at the pit heads and are responsible for the distribution of coal, not only to the internal markets, but to the foreign markets as well. One hears some startling stories told of coal being sold at a definite round figure for so many thousand tons, passing into the hands of coal factors, being shipped abroad, and there being sold at fabulous prices, as well as stories of similar increases in the home prices. Therefore, we say that the real people who ought to benefit from the mining industry are not receiving the benefit at all at the present time. These huge profits that have been obtained from coal—and it cannot be denied—are going back neither to the coalowners nor to the miners themselves, but, generally speaking, somebody in between them and the consumers, either nationally or abroad, is receiving immense benefit. We have only to read in the papers of the vast sums that are being left behind by certain merchants and others through profits made out of the sale of coal.

We believe that this being a national asset, if it cannot pass directly into the hands of the nation, the Government ought at least to see that the coal is distributed to the best advantage of everyone concerned. We believe that if this scheme were put into effect, it would not only produce a profit, and be of advantage to the miners and coalowners, but would benefit the public generally. I want to give the right hon. Gentleman opposite my measure of praise. He has met all our arguments very fairly and kindly. He has given us a tremendous amount of sympathy, and has distributed his sympathy fairly between his own followers and ours. We cannot complain about our not getting our share. He has promised us Committees, to take part in all of which would be beyond our numbers, and I see by the Press this morning a Committee has been set up to inquire into selling agencies. In his reply, I hope he will tell us all about that Committee. I am not going to say one word against the nominated members, but if he accepts our Clause, it gives that Committee bigger powers. It will give them more confidence, and enable them to go more fully into this question. They have got to consider whether selling agencies will be of any advantage or not. The Commission have already decided that they would be of immense advantage. If this new Clause were accepted, it would give the Committee the right to see how effect could be given to the setting up of these selling agencies, and enable them to devise ways and means so as to be able to recommend to the Board of Trade how this thing should be carried out. I would not like to go as far as to say that the right hon. Gentleman gave us a definite promise in Committee but he did say something about giving consideration to this matter between the Committee and Report stages, and I hope in the interval he has considered this matter fairly, and will be able to say that he is prepared to accept this new Clause.

Let me, first, clear up the point as to what I said in Committee. The hon. Member is mistaken in thinking that I said this was going to be further considered, or that I gave any sort of undertaking to review it on Report. What I did say, was that the Government were in favour of co-operative selling agencies, and if the acceptance of this new Clause would really put into operation a practical scheme of selling agencies, which could be adhered to, then, indeed, we might be able to accept it. What we have done is to set up a really strong Committee, upon which two hon. Gentlemen who sit on those benches have kindly agreed to serve.

No one nominated to the Committee represents transport, which is bound up with selling.

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will allow me, for a moment, to deal with the particular proposal before the House. We have set up a Committee on which two hon. Gentlemen on those benches have kindly con- sented to serve along with men who are extremely experienced in business matters. They will be able to take evidence which can be brought, for instance, by co-operative societies, wholesale or retail. I am quite certain that any suggestion which may be made to them, will be fairly and properly considered. The reason for setting up that Committee has been made plain by the speeches to which we have been listening. The right hon. Gentleman who moved this Clause referred to selling agencies having been successful in other industries. He referred to the tinplate industry, among others. But how have they been set up? By some compulsion? By some Act of Parliament? By some scheme devised for them by the Board of Trade, as is proposed in this new Clause? Not at all, but by voluntary co-operation between the men carrying on and responsible for this business. If this Clause were merely to ask for voluntary co-operation, then, indeed, it would be on all fours with the tinplate trade. But it is not, and to say the scheme has been successful when voluntarily concurred in, when the whole of the details have been worked out by men cognisant of the industry, and then to compare such a scheme with the proposal in this new Clause, is to compare things which are totally different. We are, by this Committee, going to try to find schemes which are suitable to the coal trade, and when those schemes have been examined and are proposed by that Committee, this House will be able to judge whether any further legislation be necessary on the subject.

The right hon. Gentleman also referred to the shale industry, and he pointed out that those owning shale mines had amalgamated, or, at any rate, pooled their operations. That is what the Bill enables. When we come to Clause 1, I shall point out that there are compulsory powers of amalgamation, and if the instance of the shale trade be good for the coal trade, then, under Clause 1, power is given for the actual amalgamation of the undertakings, and, once you have got the amalgamation of the undertakings, of course you have the amalgamated control of the selling of the output from those undertakings. But selling agencies are not very easy to enforce. This Clause suggests that they should be made compulsory. I wonder whether the Mover realises that the selling agency would necessarily mean that someone or other was to determine the quota which each mine was allowed as an output. The hon. Member for Rotherhithe (Mr. B. Smith) says that it does not follow. Let me examine it, because this is at the root of the difficulty. I am anxious that real progress should be made towards selling agencies, and I do not want to have that progress marred by what is thought upon the subject.

There is only a certain amount of coal of a particular class to be sold in a particular market at a particular time. The flooding of the market with coal reduces the price, and there is the danger of what has been called cutthroat competition. You cannot go on for long, in a time of glut, with the full production of which the mines in the selling agencies are capable. That means that their production has got to be rationed in some sort of way by the selling agency. The hon. Member still shakes his head, but other hon. Members who, perhaps, know more about the coal-mining industry than he does, must realise that if you are going to have a quota, you must have some sort of control of output. Control of output under compulsion is extremely difficult. Between one mine and another there would be all sorts of complaints. One mine would complain that it was not allowed full output, while other mines were. You would have difficulties between district and district, and mine and mine. I only say this because I want it to be realised that it is not an easy question. Hon. Members opposite say that they want a selling agency. They do not state the form of that selling agency. Let us see what this proposal is: The Board of Trade shall….promote the establishment of co-operative non-profit-making selling agencies. That is to say, a sort of agency which will be co-operative and non-competitive, but it does not say whether it is to deal with the selling of coal wholesale or retail. Then in the second part it goes on to say: Every amalgamation scheme shall provide for the distribution and sale of coal and coal products. After all, what we are trying to do is to get an amalgamation scheme through, not because of the difficulty of sale at all, but because the mines can be more efficiently worked if they are worked as one unit. The proposal of the Government is to promote efficient working rather than injure the industry by putting upon it a selling agency which no one wants. Hon. Members, by supporting this new Clause, are losing the substance while grasping at the shadow. They had far better wait and see—it will not be long—what is the result of the definite action of the Government in setting up the strong Committee with which, I am glad to think, hon. Members are going to co-operate. When the Committee has reported the House will then be in a position to make up its mind whether any further legislation is required. I hope the House will now come to a decision, for, as hon. Members know, there is a great deal to be done. There are still many Amendments from all quarters of the House which hon. Members doubtless desire to discuss, and it is very difficult to do so unless we get on.

It is very much to be regretted that those in the country who have a wide knowledge of these matters, and are accustomed to deal with them on a large basis, are excluded from the Committee which is to be set up. I hope it is not too late, in view of co-operative development in this country, to see that those who know

about co-operative matters should participate. It is interesting at this juncture to remember that we have long since pointed out that sooner or later the State must come to co-operation for a solution of its difficulties. Those for whom I speak are responsible for a business of nearly £300,000,000 a year. As a movement we are now assisting in marketing the Russian wheat crop. We are financing the Australian co-operative wheat crop. We are in direct touch with the Canadian producers, and the same applies to New Zealand. Surely any Government really desiring an adequate solution of these commercial and economic questions would turn to those in the country who have the greatest amount of experience of co-operative buying and selling on such a large scale, and invite them to be on a body of this character. The Government can hardly say that they have not been given the opportunity to consider the matter, as the Prime Minister himself was aware of it. I make a strong protest, and would yet express the hope that it is not too late that some business representative of co-operation in this country should be included in this Committee in view of the importance of its expected Report, and to make its recommendations as fruitful as possible.

Question put, "That the Clause be read a Second time."

The House divided: Ayes, 111: Noes, 256.

I beg to move, in page 1. line 9, to leave out the word "Where."

I am moving this Amendment in the absence of my hon. Friend to enable a general discussion to take place on the question whether the definite responsibility of taking the initiative in the preparation of schemes of amalgamation or absorption ought not to be placed on the Board of Trade. We had a long discussion on this point in Committee upstairs, and I do not propose to detain the House more than two or three minutes in restating the arguments. The Royal Commission, in their Report, spoke of a growing reluctance on the part of owners of large colliery undertakings to amalgamate. It was stated that there had been large amalgamations in the past, but that the number of them was becoming fewer, that there was a distinct disinclination to amalgamate. We believe that if amalgamation is left to the initiative of the owners of the undertakings, amalgamation on any decent scale will not be brought about for a very long time to come. I am not going to say a word as to the inefficiency or the efficiency of the mining industry at the present time. I believe everyone possessing direct knowledge of the industry will admit that there are very many cases in which nothing but the best results could ensue from amalgamation, but a thousand and one interests which animate humanity prevent these amalgamations from taking place. To use a common phrase, what is everybody's business is nobody's business. While the Bill provides that compulsion can be exercised by the Board of Trade at a later stage, we do not believe that that will be sufficient.

Already the Board of Trade has a tremendous amount of information in its possession. While that is true of almost every Department of the Board's activities, it is particularly true of the Mines Department. In Committee upstairs I described the information in possession of that Department as encyclopædic. There is no information in connection with the mining industry, either on the commercial, the industrial, the legal or the social side, that is not already in the possession of the Department. I believe myself that a definite responsibility ought to be placed upon the Mines Department of the Board of Trade to promote these amalgamations and utilise the information already to hand, and after satisfying themselves with the information in their possession that amalgamation could be effected and was desirable, they ought to proceed to take the responsibility of preparing schemes themselves. There is no class of information which they lack. They have inspectors, and they are in possession of the very kind of information which it is necessary the Department should possess to make their action effective. We think if the initiative is left to the responsibility of the owners of the undertakings amalgamation on any effective scale will not be affected for a long time. We believe that very little good can result on the lines of the present Bill, but we do believe that the initiative should be placed on a State Department, and if that is done the benefit would be very much greater than it can possibly be on the lines laid down in the Bill.

The subject raised by the right hon. Member for Ince (Mr. Walsh) was discussed very fully in Committee. I rise to say a few words because there is an Amendment standing in my name, and in the names of three other right hon. Gentlemen, which we pressed very strongly indeed upstairs, and which we believe would have improved the Bill, and made the voluntary working of the system initiated by the Bill more successful on the whole—in page 2, line 9, at the end, to insert a new Sub-section: (3) ( a ) In default of initiative by any owner of such an undertaking the Board of Trade shall at any time after this Act has been in operation for twelve months have power itself to prepare and refer to the Railway and Canal Commission a scheme for the amalgamation of any two or more such undertakings for any one or more of the above-mentioned purposes, and such scheme may be either total or partial; ( b ) Upon such scheme being referred to it, the Railway and Canal Commission shall give such directions for notification by the Board of Trade to all owners of such undertakings likely to be affected thereby, and such opportunity for objection as it thinks expedient and fair, and if any one or more of the said owners is willing to enter into the said scheme the provisions of Section seven of this Act shall thereupon become applicable. Provided that— (i) the Commission shall endeavour to bring together the owners so notified in order if possible to secure their voluntary assent to the said scheme as proposed by the Board of Trade, or subject to such modifications as may be agreed or as may be directed by the Commission; (ii) if the said owners all refuse or fail voluntarily to enter into the said scheme the Commission may, if they think fit, direct the Board of Trade to publish the same together with the reasons of the Commission for thinking that the same is in the national interest, and the Board of Trade shall thereupon publish the same by laying the said scheme and reasons before Parliament or in such other manner as the Commission may direct; (iii) if, after a period of not less than six months from the date of such publication, no one of the said owners intimates that he is willing to be treated as an owner applying for an Absorption Order within the meaning of this Section it shall, for a further period of six months, be open to the Commission to receive through the Board of Trade and to consider an application from any other person to be treated as if he were an absorbing company within the meaning of this Section, but the Commission shall not grant an order in favour of any such other person until they have given the owners of the undertakings in question such further opportunity of themselves applying for an order as to the Commission may seem fit. And provided also that an order under paragraph (iii) hereof shall not become operative until a Resolution has been passed by both Houses of Parliament confirming the same. It is quite clear that the operation of the voluntary side of the Bill will take some little time to get into working order, but the Mines Department conceded upstairs an obligation to make a report at the end of two years instead of the original proposal of three years in order that the country may know earlier than three years how the system provided by the Bill operates during the first two years. The Mines Department are satisfied that the working of the Bill voluntarily under Clause 1, with the addition of some compulsion under Sub-section (2) of Clause 1, will be successful, and they are also satisfied that there will not be the inactivity which the right hon. Gentleman suggests, and to guard against that the Amendment I have referred to was devised. I am prepared to act upon that view, and let the Bill have a clear run on the lines upon which it now stands. For these reasons, I shall not press the Amendment which stands in my name. To-day is Friday, and we are very near the end of the Session. An arrangement has been made to get the Report stage of this Bill by seven o'clock on Tuesday, and therefore I do not feel justified a present, in view of the very definite decision of the Government that the Amendment standing in my name is not needed, in pressing it at this stage. I would like to remind those who were not on the Committee that during the Committee stage upstairs the Secretary for War said: If it is then found that the compulsory powers of the Bill have not been sufficiently made use of, or that the procedure is in any way defective, or that some further assistance is required, it will be easy for Parliament at that time, having regard to the experience that will have been gained of the three years' working of this Clause, to pass any legislation that may be necessary."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee D, 29th June, 1926; col. 43.] That period is now two years, and in view of that definite indication on the part of the Government that at the end of two years they will be prepared to take action on the lines of the Amendment which stands in my name, and the necessity of a considerable period elapsing before any action could be taken under the provisions of the Bill, I do not propose to move it, and I ask the House to get on with the Bill in order that what is a valuable reform of the mining industry may become law at the earliest possible date.

I do not quite go so far as the hon. and learned Gentleman who has just sat down in accommodating myself to expedite this Bill. Although I cannot say that I am willing to withdraw the Amendment standing in the name of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) and myself, I am quite willing to make the remarks on this Amendment which were intended for my own proposal, and when my own Amendment is reached I shall move it formally. In that way I go halfway in the same direction as the hon. and learned Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool (Sir L. Scott). Of course, it is common ground that further grouping of mines is advisable and that has been recognised by the Government, the Sankey Commission, and the Samuel Commission. The Labour party would go the whole hog, but the Members of my party have made up their minds to nail their colours to the Report mast. There is a difference between what I propose in my particular Amendment and what the Bill proposes, and what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for the Exchange Division of Liverpool proposes. The Bill proposes amalgamation, but confines it entirely to the initiative of the owners.

I propose amalgamation extending the initiative to the State. My proposal would permit amalgamation on the initiative of the owners, the State, or even the men themselves. I do not really think that at this stage in our coal industry development we can consistently exclude the men, not only from having a say but a very strong say, in all matters for the carrying on of the industry. Under the National Agreements of 1921 and 1924, they now occupy the position of partners. They are as much interested as the owners in seeing that only profitable mines are worked, and are made to give the best results, since they share in the proportion of 87 to 13 in the profits. Anyone who has mixed among miners, as I have had the advantage of doing, since I represent a mining constituency, must be struck with the acumen and the shrewd knowledge displayed by the miners themselves of the geographical, geological and commercial considerations that enter into the working of a mine. Provision is made, in a Clause introduced by the Government, whereby their views can be representatively expressed by the Pit Committee. It would be a very great pity if the Bill goes through Parliament providing for amalgamations—especially if extended to amalgamations at the instance of the State—but excluding the possibility of the men themselves initiating amalgamations. That is the reason, therefore, why I put forward my Amendment.

One of the great grievances that has caused the men in this present crisis to adopt such a stubborn and unfriendly attitude is not so much the material loss that they may have to suffer, as the fact that they are satisfied that they are being excluded from any say in the carrying on of an industry, the success of which is what they have to rely upon for their own living. They ask why they should not get now what all agree they are entitled to on the basis of even of subsistence. They say they do not get it because the mines do not pay, but that they have nothing to do with the question whether they pay or not. They have no word in regulating their combinations, in saying where the pits shall he sunk in seeing that the distance the men have to walk is shortened. They say that they are excluded from all those things, but that they believe that, by removing some of those handicaps to profits, they could get higher wages. Their grievance to-day, therefore, is that, because the mines do not pay through the lack of knowledge or skill on the part of somebody else they have to bear the burden of that inefficiency. Quite apart from its other uses, this Amendment would be of great advantage as—to use an expression which I hate—a psychological gesture, by saying to those men that we are giving them an equal say with the owners in initiating these groups.

3.0 P.M

It is no use the right hon. Gentleman telling the House that his Bill carries out broadly the views of the Commission. It really does not on this very point. How far does this Bill go towards the Report of the Commission? The Bill says, in effect, "If the owner moves, but only if the owner moves, can anything be done." If the owner moves, it is true he can move against another owner, and he can bring that other owner ultimately before the Railway and Canal Commis- sion, where a decision can be given that will be binding on the other owner; but the owner must first move. What do the Commission say? The Report says: Can we rely that those amalgamations which are desirable will come about by the action of the industry itself? Here the experience of more recent years has not been encouraging. The process of fusion appears to have come almost to a standstill…. But this process of natural absorption can also not be relied upon to effect, of itself, all that is needed. If nothing more were done than to leave economic forces to work themselves out, it would probably he found 20 years from now that over a large proportion of the area the same conditions as those of to-day would still be prevailing. My reading of this Bill is that, if it becomes an Act of Parliament, the owner is not bound by a single force that does not exist at this moment to set about amalgamation, and, therefore—if my Amendment be not carried I would be very glad to support the Amendment that the State should now step in—I do press upon the Government to make this system of amalgamation harmonious. There are three parties equally interested in seeing that mines are properly worked. There are the owners, whom the Bill allows to move. There is the State, on behalf of the whole community. Let it move. There are the unfortunate miners themselves—why should not they be allowed to move? If a mine is unprofitable, it means at most the loss of money to the shareholders, but it means the loss of livelihood to the miners. Instead of being put last in the list of those who may initiate, they ought to be put first in the list. I therefore press the Government, when my Amendment is formally moved, to accept it.

I shall not follow the hon. and learned Gentleman who has just spoken on the general question as to how far compulsion is included in this Bill, but I would like to bring the House back to the question which is under discussion. We had a considerable discussion on this Amendment in Committee, and I do not propose to speak at any great length, but I should like to remind the House that the Amendment suggests that the system to be adopted should be that the Board of Trade should provide a scheme for unifying under single ownership and control. That, as the hon. and learned gentleman who has just spoken says, means unification. Although he was ready enough to quote the Royal Commission's Report, he will admit that that was a system definitely and completely turned down by the Royal Commission. I do not think that any scheme of that sort would be accepted. It would entirely revolutionise the Bill. The object of the Bill is to give a chance of voluntary amalgamation by removing the obstacles that at present exist. We are doing that. When that has been done, if it be found after a certain period of time that amalgamations are not going ahead, and the Government consider that an expediting process is required, then a duty rests upon them to take action. In any case, this House would never accept this suggestion of unifying under single ownership and control. It is another form of our old friend nationalisation, which we have always rejectel.

I support this Amendment because I do not agree for a moment that the owners intend to amalgamate, nor do I believe that anyone else who knows anything about the situation thinks for a moment that they intend any amalgamation on any scale at all. If one took the statements by the Government, and particularly by the coal-owners' spokesmen in the Committee, one could demonstrate that these people have made it quite clear to the country that they are not intending for a moment to improve the organisation or to rely upon the improvement of organisation for the lessening of costs and the gaining of markets. The whole of the circumstances in which we are discussing this Bill are the best proof of that. We are discussing it quite calmly here, in an atmosphere which seems to be terrifically unreal, while this ghastly conflict is going on, and when the owners have made up their minds, and the Government have made up their minds, that they are going, as they say, to fight to a finish. Let them understand this, that those among us who have sometimes been counted rather moderate will say to them that, if it is a finish that the owners desire, it is for us only the beginning and the continuation of the conflict.

The owners say that what they are going to do is to get down to the economic basis. "The economic basis" is a very nice term for taking it out of the standard of life of the great mass of the workers. Having got the reductions of wages they contemplate, having got, as they think they will get, the increase of hours that they want, having got district arrangements, and all the other things for which there is a common desire among the owners and among Members of the Government also—having got all these things, they are not intending to rely upon increased organisation, but they are going, if I may use an ordinary word that the man in-the-street uses, to get it out of the very vitals and guts of the workers, and they are going to rely rather upon that than upon any reorganisation. The right hon. Gentleman quoted what the Report says, but the Commission only arrived at that conclusion very reluctantly. They asked: Is the initiative of the industry itself sufficient? And they said that it is not. They added: The experience of more recent years has not been encouraging. The process of fusion seems to have come almost to a standstill. They go on to say why— There are undoubtedly serious obstacles, which in individual cases hinder fusion"— and they ask: Which of the old concerns is to be predominant in the new combination? Which of the directors and managers are to be displaced? What is the valuation to be put upon each of the properties? How much above its market value at the moment are the promoters of the new scheme ready to pay to the owners of an adjacent colliery, rather than surrender the completeness of their project? All these are vital matters for consideration by the people who own the individual collieries. The truth is that, as has been stated in this Debate, it is not a question for discussing whether amalgamation is necessary or not. If it were, we could bring forward a fund of material. Every man, whether miner or independent citizen, who has considered this project, as well as the Commission itself, agrees that there is very great need for amalgamation and for improving the organisation for economic purposes, but the Commissioners themselves say that there is not the initiative in the industry itself to-day. What is the answer? Anyone who is in the industry knows it is quite true that there are so many obvious things that coalowners ought to do, but will not do because they affect their particular interests, because there are family interests, because of the things mentioned in the, Report, which I say are obvious but which they absolutely refuse to do.

I have known men from a colliery that was closed go elsewhere and try to discover a beautiful seam of coal of very high quality. They failed and then I have known the same men go to the next door colliery, belonging to another company, working round about the boundaries of that same coal which they had discovered from the other side, the coal being in a position to be got at the shafts, while they dared not touch that coal because it belonged to another company, and really was geographically part of the colliery that was working. Instance after instance of that description can be given, and the Commissioners themselves were satisfied. We do know that there are these prejudices, that there is this lack of business foresight, this concern to fall back upon reduced wages or increased hours or a lower standard of life—anything sooner than get down to the drastic reorganisation of the industry.

We know the owners have set out for a definite policy in this terrible conflict, and we know the Government is behind the owners. We know exactly where they are going. They are going to take it out of the bodies and lives of the worker himself, and they do not intend for a moment to fall back upon the reorganisation of the industry along the lines of amalgamation. It is true they say they are reconsidering the matter in two years. We ask the House to say whether or not they are going not merely to compel the owners to amalgamate, in fact we are asking the House to say whether they are going to allow the owners to fall back upon the weapon of continued starvation even when the workers get back to work. I am very pleased to have had an opportunity of saying this, and of giving a warning that there is no doubt whatever amongst the workers' representatives on this side that when this is finished the most moderate among us will take steps to fan the sparks that are left until there is another flame. That is the logic of the line the owners are taking. That is the logic of the refusal of Amendments of this kind.

On a point of Order. If this Amendment is defeated, would it be competent for my hon. Friend and myself to move the Amendment in our name that comes later?—in page 1, line 10, to leave out from the word "coal," to the word "may," in line 13, and to insert thereof the words the Minister of Mines, on the application of the owner of any undertaking consisting of or comprising coal mines, or on the representation of two-thirds of the miners working in any such undertaking, or on his own initiative.

When the right hon. Gentleman was not in the House we arrived at an understanding to take a. general Debate on the first Amendment, followed by a Division only on the second one.

If we are not going to debate the other Amendments we ought to be given greater privilege with regard to this Amendment. If the arrangement is that we shall have a Debate and then take the Amendment I am prepared to submit to your ruling, but if that is your point of view, the Debate ought to be extended.

I am sorry I was not in the House at the time, but do I understand you suggested that the speeches on the next Amendment should be made now and the Amendment should be moved without any discussion? If that he so, I shall be prepared to speak now.

Yes, I think that was the understanding.

I support the Amendment, because the scheme of the Bill not merely falls far short of the Report of the Commission, but is absolutely different in kind. The Report of the Commission would effect amalgamation within something like a reasonable time. There is not guarantee under the provisions of this Bill that you will ever have any amalgamation at all. I should like to ask the Secretary for Mines whether he thinks that in the course of the next two years we shall have any substantial amalgamation in the coalfields under this Bill. If not, it is a perfectly futile Bill and it comes to nothing. It is something that misleads the public into the belief that something is being done, where as a matter of fact nothing at all is being done. If the Government stood by their original declaration, the declaration of the Prime Minister that he was prepared to carry through the whole scheme of the Report, whether of selling agencies or of this particular scheme, we should be in a position to know exactly where we were. We should have had amalgamations, and we should have known things by now. It means that, first of all, we have to get two owners to agree upon a scheme. Then, there is a most elaborate process to go through, which may take any length of time. The owners will be fighting not merely against amalgamation, but they will each be fighting for terms. We who have had experience of Committees upstairs know what happens when a number of rival companies and rival counsel are fighting, not only to prevent a thing going through, but in order to get terms for themselves.

What will happen? In the end, terms will be given of such a character as to make the amalgamated concern a much bigger burden than the individual concern before, and the condition of the mining industry will be worse than it ever was. You will have capital watered, and you will have capital that represents no value, and you will have what simply represents, I do not want to use the word "blackmail," but a kind of pressure, which will be brought to bear upon those who are in favour of the amalgamation to induce them to pay terms which they would not have paid merely upon the value of the scheme, but merely in order to get rid of difficult and troublesome people, and in order to save time. Time here is the essence of the whole transaction. It is not merely that you have a great industrial strike or stoppage going on which has cost, according to some authorities, over £150,000,000. I am inclined to agree with my hon. Friend opposite that it has cost very much more. I have gone into the figures very carefully, and I am certain that the other is an estimate which is on the conservative side. I remember very well that when we had the stoppage in 1921 it was estimated that it cost £350,000,000. Of course, everything was exaggerated at that time, because it happened during the Coalition Government. Probably the cost was somewhere in between. The cost of the present stoppage is under-estimated. Every loss under a Conservative Government is under-estimated, whereas every loss under the Coalition Government is over-estimated. We can strike a happy or an unhappy mean between the figures, and I am certain that the loss will be very considerably more than the present conservative estimate.

Time is the very essence of the transaction, and it is not merely that you should get an earlier settlement of a very desolating struggle, but that you must begin to put this basic industry upon a footing that will give confidence to trade, that it can go on in the future without any danger of more trouble. The restoration of confidence in industry means a good deal more than your £150,000,000. I would have expected the Government to take what remnant of courage they have still left in both hands, and undertake to bring in a real compulsory amalgamation scheme. I frankly confess that I prefer unification throughout the whole Kingdom, but if we cannot get unification, the right hon. Member for Ince (Mr. Walsh) would, I am sure, prefer a scheme like that, if he could not get his own, as the next best. Nobody that I have ever heard of wants the scheme of the Government, not even their own supporters. They are only supporting this scheme because it will do nothing. That is the kind of consolation they are giving each other: "This does not matter, it does not mean anything. Nor does it. They are perfectly right. There is no real compulsion here. I hope the Government will put in some measure of real compulsion within a reasonable time. This basic industry is on a totally different footing to all other industries except railways, and now is their opportunity. In the Amendment we have put down, we propose that initiation shall not be confined merely to the owners. Why should the miners be ruled out of an industry which to them is a matter of life and death? It is their living; they have committed the whole of their careers to it. They live there. That is more than you can say of a good many of the owners. The miners have committed their destinies to it; their own and their families. Is it too much to say that they have a direct interest in amalgamation? You have had three great strikes, in which the miners have suffered considerably, and they are suffering now. They have a direct interest in. seeing that this industry is put on a sound footing, and I suggest to the Government not merely that they should introduce the principle of compulsion, and see that it operates in something like reasonable time, but that they should give to the 1,200,000 miners whose living depends on it, the same interest as the few hundreds and thousands of owners and shareholders, who also have their interest in the industry. It is not a question of ruling them out; it is a question of excluding the whole of the miners, and for that reason we propose to move an Amendment giving to two-thirds of the miners in a district the right to initiate a scheme.

In a short speech the right hon. Gentleman has managed to cram in a good many inaccuracies. Let me take some of them. He has spoken of the Amendment which is before the Committee, and also of the Amendment he is going to vote for presently. He has complained of the procedure, and he made one of his illustrative speeches. He says the owners will be fighting each other in order to save time; they will offer each other a great deal more than they are worth, the capital will be watered, indeed, that there will be blackmailing of each other in order to get the thing through. That he says, is the procedure provided by the Bill. But it is curious that his Amendment does not make any suggestion for altering the procedure. It is precisely the same, if his Amendment is accepted, as it is now in the Bill, there is not the slightest difference at all, except that two-thirds of the miners in a district can put the procedure into operation. There is exactly the same blackmail, the same kind of threat, the same amount of watering of capital, the same kind of action before the tribunal, all that clumsy procedure which is going to take so much time; all will be exactly the same, even if we pass the Amendment suggested by the right hon. Gentleman. He made another statement, that there is no real compulsion in this Bill, that it is going to do nothing, that no owner need amalgamate unless he likes.

The miners will be there.

Yes, that is the statement, and apparently the right hon. Gentleman has a follower not on his own benches but on the benches opposite.

Can the right hon. Gentleman show any single line in this Bill where there is a suggestion of a real reorganisation?

That is precisely what I am going to show. I am going to show that there is very real compulsion in the Bill. Clause 1, Subsection (1), deals with voluntary amalgamation. Sub-section (2) deals with compulsory amalgamation.

Under what powers?

I will explain to the hon. Member if he will listen to me. I should have thought it was very well known by now, but as the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) said that there is no real compulsion let me remind him of what the compulsion is. Any one corner or more owners of collieries may—

Yes, "may." Where is your compulsion then?

Is it "shall" in the Amendment?

What my right hon. Friend the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) said was that there was as no real compulsion in the Bill, because the only person to do anything was the owner, and if he did not move there was not a line in the Bill to compel him to do so.

That was not the statement of the right hon. Gentleman, who as a rule has no difficulty in defending himself.

May I repeat my statement, which has been explained with great lucidity by my hon. and learned Friend? The case which I did make was that the miners' interests were certainly no less than, if not much greater than, those of the owners, and that unless the owners agreed you could not amalgamate. Therefore, I urged that the miner should have the same right -of initiation.

That is a part of the right hon. Gentleman's own Amendment. I withdraw what I said if I misrepresented him. What he led me to suppose was that no owner would be forced to amalgamate. The proposal is very simple. The right hon. Gentleman has only to look at the top of page 2 where he will see that owners who are unwilling to agree to amalgamate or to the proposed terms of amalgamation can be absorbed compulsorily.

By other owners.

By what machinery?

By other owners.

Yes, that is it.

By other owners who produce a scheme. The case that the right hon. Gentleman was stating was that there was no compulsion in the Bill. Wherever it can be shown to be an economic thing to amalgamate, the only people who can originate a scheme are the owners. Wherever it can be shown that it is an uneconomic thing to do, that it is for the more efficient working of the mines to arrange an amalgamation, an amalgamation can be forced upon unwilling owners under a scheme.

If an owner does not seek amalgmation, what power is there in the Bill to push him?

The owners have generally been accused of being money makers, who are always trying to make profits and who disregard everyone else. If an amalgamation is economic, if there is a profit to be made out of it, cannot you trust the owners to bring in a scheme in order that the economic amalgamation may be carried out? [ Interruption. ] Of course, I understand the object of those who moved the original Amendment. They want unification, whether there is a profit in it or not. They do not care about profit, because unification for them is a step towards nationalisation. They know that if you had all the mines of the country unified in one single holding the public would control it, and their Amendment upstairs said so, though the present Amendment does not. The Amendment upstairs asked for a unification scheme under public control, and they know if there was an amalgamation of that sort of all the mines in the country, no one could finance that business except the Government, and as soon as you got the Government financing it, you would have Government ownership and nationalisation, which is the real objective of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite.

Our Amendment upstairs did not ask for unification under public control, but for unification under single ownership—not public control at all.

I think the exact words were "under single ownership and control," and if you had all the mines of the country amalgamated under single ownership and control, there would be no case whatever against the Government coming into control, because, they alone could finance an undertaking of that sort. If the national finance was to be used in this way, it is quite obvious that the right hon. Gentleman would immediately say that there ought to be national control. This is a subterfuge. It is an Amendment for nationalisation. It is contrary, in effect, to the Report of the Royal Commission. That Report was distinctly against nationalisation, and this Amendment is seven-eighths of the way towards nationalisation. I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) should support it.

I quite understand that there is a separate case in regard to giving the miners a power of initiating, but you must consider how it is going to operate. It sounds like a reasonable proposition that you should allow miners to initiate schemes of amalgamation. Then you ask, "Amalgamation of what?" and the answer is, "Of the property of shareholders and private individuals." The proposition of the right hon. Gentleman is that miners should be allowed to bring in schemes for the compulsory amalgamation of other people's property. It is a reasonable proposition that on an amalgamation scheme the miners should be entitled to be heard or, at any rate, that the Railway and Canal Commission should have the right to call them as witnesses and take evidence from them. That right is inserted in the Bill. In Committee I accepted a proposal made by hon. Members opposite, and it will be found in Clause 8 of the Bill as it stands now. That is right, but to ask that the miners should be allowed to bring in schemes of amalgamation is to ask for the impossible. Contemplate how it would work out. They would know nothing about the capitalisation or the liabilities of the companies to be amalgamated. They would know nothing about the financial arrangements which exist in any single company. How on earth could they bring in schemes of amalgamation? This is a very complicated matter, and I do not want to add to the difficulties; but if the miners themselves owned the collieries under their unions, if they took the risk of coal mining —[ Interruption. ]

Who takes the risk now?

I am talking of financial risks, and the hon. Gentleman need not attempt to misunderstand me. My meaning is perfectly apparent. If they take the financial risk and put their money into the collieries and become directors and shareholders, then they can bring in absorption schemes. If that scheme is a good one, the unwilling owners of adjoining collieries can be compelled to amalgamate under it. Hon. Members opposite have there the answer in their own hands to the question they ask. I hope the House will come to a decision on this Amendment now. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] It is indifferent to me whether we discuss one Amendment or another, but there are many Amendments down that really deserve discussion, and I hope the House will come to a decision now.

Nothing could be more preposterous than the last point made by the right hon. Gentleman. When he talks about trade unions investing their money in collieries, he knows very well, or he ought to know before he makes such a statement, that they have no right whatever to invest their money in that direction.

Does the hon. Member suggest that a trade union must not invest its money in public securities like any other investor? [ Interruption. ]

They are not able to buy a coal mine.

And you know it!

Noise is not argument.

The Registrar would call the trustees to account if they lost their money in an undertaking of that kind. Therefore, I think it is far beside the mark to argue in that way. In regard to the question of compulsion, the right hon. Gentleman has tried to make out the case that there is a measure of compulsion in this Bill. I am not going to deny it, to a point. What you really get is this: You get an undertaking A, an undertaking B, and an undertaking C in a locality. If A desires amalgamation, it can take certain steps, and if the Board of Trade and other authorities that have to examine the schemes submitted are satisfied that it would be economically sound, they can compel the others either to amalgamate or to be absorbed, but the argument from this side is that if A, B, or C do not take any steps whatever, there is no power to bring about an amalgamation. Therefore, in view of what has been taking place during the last 9 or 10 years, I think it is a fair inference that the owners themselves will not take any steps whatever to bring about the amalgamation of mines. I would like to call attention to the serious position in regard to the mines and to recall some of the evidence given by Sir Richard Redmayne himself as far back as 1919. At that time he made this very remarkable statement: Even under capitalist ownership, there is great possibility of improvement. It will be admitted on all sides that there is room for improvement from the points of view of the mechanical and of the administrative sides of the industry, and little or nothing has been done since 1919. What, then, is there to suggest that between now and 1929 there is anything going to be done? The right hon. Gentleman knows very well, from the evidence before the Commission, that they contemplated very serious obstacles being placed in the way of amalgamation. My hon. Friend the Member for Chester-le-Street (Mr. Lawson) has read out a lot of minor things which will prevent fusion taking place. The directors will want to know who is going to be the ruling body, what directors are going to be shunted, which general manager will remain, and who is to go, and a thousand and one little details of that sort will intervene to prevent amalgamations. Meanwhile, the industry is carrying on in many respects ill-equipped and inefficient, so far as working is concerned. Sir Richard Redmayne himself definitely stated that many improvements could be effected in the working of the industry, and if you have evidence of that unimpeachable character, how is it there is no disposition on the part of those who are financially interested to take steps to bring the industry up to a state of efficiency?

May I read another authority which I read in Committee? I think this is a striking indictment against the inefficiency and lack of initiative within the industry as far as ownership is concerned. I quoted this before the Committee, and if I am not wearying the House, I would like to quote it again. This is what was said by a mining engineer, who delivered a lecture before the Metallurgical Congress, in London, in 1924: In the majority of our collieries, the processes of getting the coal are very like those of 50 years ago, and the output per man has substantially declined. In no other important industry is the cost of labour so high a proportion of the total cost of production, nor is there any in which so little advance has been made in the methods of actual production, or in which so little advantage has been taken of mechanical aids to labour. Yet in no other important industry are the possibilities and opportunities of increased efficiency and improved economy in the methods of production so large as those presented at this time in coal-mining. What an indictment, that many of our methods are 50 years old! I venture to put to manufacturers here, and men associated with other forms of industry, that if they had carried on their industry like some sections of the mining industry have been carried on, taking out as large dividends as they could, and building up no reserve for re-equipment, they would not have been able to compete with foreign countries at the present time, and many of them would have had to go out of industry. It is simply because, in many respects there has not been paid that due regard to re-equipment of the mines which there ought to have been, that we are in the sorry plight we are in at the present time. The sooner that is recognised and realised, the better it is going to be for all of us. If it be possible along lines which have been indicated to take steps to put the industry upon a firm financial basis, they, surely, ought to be taken. The Commissioners contemplate, at best, that if you have got willing owners, it will take two or three years to do it, and if you have unwilling owners how long is it going to take? From the disposition of coal owners at the present time, we are led to the conclusion that there is little willingness to make drastic changes in the situation. If that be so, there ought to be a greater measure of compulsion in the Bill, so as to carry out what is admitted on all sides of the House, and in all quarters of the country, where you have men who speak with authority, that there is need for re-equip-

ment, and reorganisation of the industry. Unless the Government do it, it is not going to be done. The Commissioners point out that it is the duty of those in control of the legislative machinery to see that it is carried out. I suggest, even at this late hour, that the Government ought to bring in a far greater measure of compulsion to carry out the object which is so desirable and so essential to the success of the industry

Question put, "That the word 'Where' stand part of the Bill."

The House divided: Ayes, 263; Noes, 108.

I beg to move, in page 1, line 10, to leave out from the word "coal," to the word "may," in line 13, and to insert instead thereof the words the Minister of Mines, on the application of the owner of any undertaking consisting of or comprising coal mines, or on the representation of two-thirds of the miners working in any such undertaking, or on his own initiative. This Amendment has already been referred to and I only wish to move it formally. I do not propose to make a speech, except that I want again to make it clear that it is an attempt to introduce the proposals of the Samuel Report into this Bill, with special emphasis on the fact that two-thirds of the miners in a

particular district should have a right to initiate a scheme. Of course, the initiation of the scheme is not the final stage, and the information is subject to revision by all sorts of authorities and the final say would be on the part of the authority.

Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Bill."

The House divided: Ayes, 280; Noes, 109

It being after Four of the Clock, further consideration of the Bill ( as amended in the Standing Committee ) stood adjourned.

Bill, as amended ( in the Standing Committee ), to be further considered upon Tuesday next, 27th July.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order N o. 3.

Adjourned at Seven Minutes after Four o'Clock until Monday next (26th July).