I beg to move, That the Regulations made by His Majesty in Council under The Emergency Powers Act, 1920, by Order dated the 26th day of July 1926, shall continue in force, subject however to the provisiois of Section 2 (4) of the said Act. I rise once more for the purpose of making the speech I made a month ago, and the month previous to that, and the month previous to that, and the hon. and learned Member for South-East Leeds (Sir H. Slesser) will probably rise after me to make the same speech that he made a month ago and the month before that, and the month before that. Perhaps, however he will be more able than I am to make a different speech. There is very little fresh that one can say. I do not think it is necessary at this time to justify the Emergency Regulations as a whole. I see that the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition is in his place, and I am reminded that he found, when there was trouble anticipated during his term of office, that it was necessary to issue a Proclamation, though the trouble did not actually occur at that time. We found at the beginning of May that a very serious difficulty arose, and an Emergency Proclamation was issued.

Perhaps I might digress for one moment to explain, as I did on the last occasion, that the Message from the Crown which was read here by Mr. Speaker two days ago is not the personal act of the Sovereign, but he being a Constitutional Sovereign, it is the act of His Majesty's Ministers, and we take full responsibility for that action. We are to-day following the precedent of 4th May, 1921, when there was a second Message from the Crown continuing an Emergency Regulation, and it was found unnecessary to move an Address to the Crown.

The precedent set on the 4th May, 1921, is not being followed.

The hon. and gallant Member, I presume, would not be in order in moving an Address, because we have not put it down. We did not think it necessary at this time, this being the third renewal of the Proclamation, to put down an Address in reply to His Majesty. I, therefore, have simply to move this Motion that the Regulations shall be continued, and, as the Member of the Government who is responsible for the maintenance of law and order throughout the country, I am bound to come to the House and to say that, in my view, in the view of those who are advising me, and in the view of the police authorities throughout the country, it is desirable that these Emergency Regulations should be continued. I can only say, and I am delighted to be able to say, that since the conclusion of the general strike the coal stoppage has, not resulted in any very great trouble, but there have been minor troubles in different parts of the coalfield, and under these Regulations I am doing, in conjunction with the police authorities of the districts, all we possibly can to preserve fairness between the parties, consistently with the right, which I lay down-and I think the House will agree with me-that every man who desires to work shall have the fullest possible protection of the law to enable him to do so.

I was asked, on the last occasion, to give details as to the way in which these Regulations had been utilised during the previous month, and I was able to tell the House that in June there were 28 prosecutions under Regulation 20, and, 40 prosecutions under Regulation 21. I have got further details to-day for the current month, and I think it is only right that the House should have them. Under Regulation 14 there have been three cases and three convictions; under Regulation 16 there have been one case and one conviction; under Regulation 20 there have been 24 cases, nine convictions, and 12 cases pending; and under Regulation 21 there have been 49 cases, 36 convictions, and 7 pending.

Could the right hon. Gentleman differentiate the cases under Regulation 21 between acts alleged to cause disaffection among the police and armed forces' or fire brigades, and acts alleged to cause disaffection among the civilian population?

I cannot at the moment, but I could telephone through. These cases come from all over the country, and it is very difficult to get absolutely full details, but when the matter is over, if the hon. and gallant Member desires it, I will submit a very full Return to the House of all the cases, differentiating between the different parts of the Regulations. There have been no fewer than 59 cases under the Emergency Regulations where people used sky lights and signs of various kinds, 41 convictions and 15 cases now pending. Though it is true that, taking England as a whole, the number of prosecutions has, I am glad to say, been remarkably small, at the same time there have been prosecutions, and I must say to the House that I think it is essential that we should keep these Regulations until the coal trouble is over. I have had notice from an hon. Member opposite who proposes to call in question the action of the police in Warwickshire, and I believe there is another district also where the police action is called in question. I do not complain for a moment. It is quite proper at this stage that any hon. Member who desires to raise a complaint against the police should do so, and the Floor of the House of Commons is the place where it ought to be done, and where the responsible Minister can be arraigned and make such defence as he is able to do.

I should like to explain what the action of the police is in conjunction with the Home Office. We do not desire to interfere unnecessarily. Where everything is quiet, where, however many thousands of men may be out on strike, there is no rioting and no intimidation of any kind, the police do not interfere. On the other hand, where there have been, in certain districts, intimidation and occasionally minor rioting—I am glad to say that since the conclusion of the general strike there has been no rioting on any large scale—we offer or supply to the chief constable of the district, if he so desires, reinforcements of police from different parts of the country. It has not been necessary, and I hope it will not be necessary, for us to use any military in this dispute. I do not think it is a case where it will he necessary, however long the stoppage may last, and however bitter feelings may become, and I appeal to hon. Members opposite who have influence in the mining areas, to help to continue the present spirit of fairly good temper, which has has made it unnecessary up to the present to call in the military.

Here is a ease which I can give to the House of the kind of thing which is going on. 'Of course, hon. Members may say that in a stoppage of this kind, men who are going to work are enemies to their trade unions, and that they must put up with opprobrium and minor threats. I do not take that view, and I am going to ask hon. Members opposite to agree with me, and to say quite definitely with the responsibility attaching to them in their own districts, "You men may stay out as long as ever you like, but you must not act harshly and unfairly to the men or the wives of the men who are working. I do not think it would be fair to mention names in a case of which I will give details, as there is a prosecution pending, but it is the kind of thing which, in my view, it is not right should go on. Here is the statement of a miner working in the Warwickshire district—

"I live with my wife and five children—

Is this case being tried?

Yes.

Then may I draw your attention, Mr. Speaker, to the fact that the Home Secretary is reading from a document relevant to a ease before the Court, and I submit that it is an abuse of his power in this House to make a statement which might prejudice the decision of the Court.

On that point of Order, may I say that I am not stating what the ease is, and I am not creating prejudice.

That is what you always do—create prejudice. [HON. MEmnEris: "Withdraw."]

It was done before. He did it with Saklatvala.

I used to expect courtesy from the hon. and gallant Gentleman, but I am bound to say that I am forced not to expect what I used to get.

May I raise another point? Although the right hon. Gentleman may give no names or locality, will not the case be identified, and will not the magistrates who have this case before them, if they read the right hon. Gentleman's speech, understand precisely the case to which he refers? Is he not, therefore, prejudicing that case, even by keeping it anonymous and as impersonal as he possibly can?

The right hon. Gentleman puts the matter in a different way from the somewhat offensive way of the hon. and gallant Gentleman. I do not want to prejudice the case at all, and I say at once, that if the right hon. Gentleman makes an appeal to me not to mention the case, I will not mention it. It is not necessary for the purpose of my argument, but I do want the House to realise—and I am making this really in the form of an appeal to hon. Members opposite who are interested in the mining parts of the country—that the kind of unfair personal intimidation to make men abstain from work, and to make the lives of their wives and families unhappy, is not quite fair. An hon. Member opposite has referred to attempts to make men go to work. If he will produce to me any cases of intimidation to make men work, I will at once communicate with the local police, and suggest to them that they should take exactly the same steps to deal with this sort of intimidation as with intimidation against those who want to work. I want to hold, the balance fairly. But I do say it is a great pity that this great stoppage in the coal trade, which has been very largely an example to all countries in the world so far, should be spoilt, when we are getting towards what, I hope, is the end of the dispute, by unfair attempts of quasi-intimidation against those who are desirous of working.

I do not desire to take up the time of the House, because I know many hon. Members opposite wish to adduce arguments against the continuance of these Regulations, but I do submit that, on the whole, coupled with the spirit of the men—and I desire to make the fullest acknowledgement of that—and coupled with the very reasonable way in which all the chief constables in the mining areas throughout the country have done their best to carry out their duties, and, as it were, to preserve fair play between the competing interests in the coal industry, I think the House will do well to continue these Regulations for another month. Although, as stated by the Prime Minister yesterday, it may be the case that we may have to come back at the end of August to renew the Regulations for a further month, I sincerely trust that this will not be necessary, and that this will be the last occasion on which I will stand at this Box to ask for the continuance of the Regulations.

Do the figures given by the right hon. Gentleman relate to offences actually committed in the present month, or were they offences committed in the previous month, the trials of which have taken place this month?

I think some of them probably were in the previous month. To get, I think, a fair conspectus, we should have to take two months.

I think the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary has made an excellent speech for the abolition of the Regulations. There was not a single note of substance in that speech justifying the continuance of these Regulations. Since the right hon. Gentleman made his last speech on this subject, however, new uses have been found for the Emergency Powers Act Proclamation. It has been a decoration on Conservative candidates' platforms and a prelude to Conservative .Candidates speeches. The subsequent disapproval of audiences whose votes were being solicited were then described as an "interference with free speech." That kind of use, while it may be convenient to candidates who have difficulty in justifying Government policy, does nevertheless seem an extraordinary use of the Emergency Powers Act. The point I would like to make, quite seriously, is that the country is noting the fact that this is the first time such powers have been applied for in connection with a single trade dispute, a trade dispute that is a clearly defined one, in which there is a proved body of men who are following a most dangerous calling. A distinguished Member of the Conservative Part, then Lord Ashley when deal- ing with certain phrases of the coal mining industry nearly 100 years ago said: It is right the country should know at what cost its pre-eminence is purchased. When Lord Ashley was piloting through this House the Mines Act, 1842, he made a speech revealing the conditions in the mines which was so powerful as to change the temper of the Prime Minister of that day, and secure from the House a unanimous passage for that Measure. Mine-owners were not then in this House, they were in the House of Lords, and when the Bill went to the House of Lords the mineowners in the persons of Lord Lonsdale and Lord Londonderry, proceeded to make hay of the Bill as far as they could. To-day the mine-owners do not need to bother about the House of Lords, because they have the Government of this House to give them the conditions they desire to obtain. In 1842 the workers in the mining industry were brutalised, were uneducated, were disfranchised, were inarticulate. To-day they are able to read balance-sheets and to study the history of their occupation both at home and abroad. They are responsible citizens, and they are capable not merely of a critical examination of the conditions of their industry but are capable of a self-control which requires from this House that they should be treated as responsible citizens and not merely as some indeterminate group described as "the workers or the persons in the dispute." They are as responsible citizens as any who are sitting in this House to-day and they ought to be treated as such. The Northumberland situation, if I may be permitted to take a local illustration of a general point, is such that the men there are being asked to go back to conditions, as to which I will quote the actual words used by Mr. Straker: They are being asked to go back to a condition of things worse beyond what has been worked in Northumberland for between 60 and 70 years, and the proposals seem to be annulling all the progress which has been made during that period. That statement of the fact has not created riot and disorder. The men have, on the contrary, with the utmost self-control, with a unanimity which is really startling and with an unshakeable resolve, decided simply not to operate the Eight-hours Act. They have taken the most constitu- tional way of expressing to this House their determination not to operate that Act. There is no case for applying the Emergency Powers Act to a situation like that. Then there is the question of the general depression of conditions—another provocative action by the mineowners. I would like to tell the House what these men have to face, these responsible citizens engaged in an essential industry—one of the most dangerous industries of the country. They are asked to face conditions which, worked out in terms of purchasing power, come to a reduction of something equal to 2s. 2d. to 2s. 6d. a day. That is what the owners' terms mean in the abolition of certain privileges peculiar to Northumberland added to the proposed 10 per cent. reduction of wages. Again on this point I quote Mr. Straker: If this is the expectation of the coal owners in making an offer, that expectation"— that is, the expectation of starving them into submission— may be realised, but the condition of the workmen will be such that instead of its being a gain they will find that it will be an economic loss owing to the inefficiency created amongst the workmen generally by reason of low wages and hard conditions. That is the attitude and that is the kind of speech being made by the leader of the miners in that district under great provocation. There is nothing inciting to riot in that speech, and it has been received with self-control but at the same time with a determination to resist the conditions offered which should at least make it as clear to this House as it is clear to the average citizen what is the feeling in that district. I am grateful to Bishop Gore for having reminded me of a fine rhetorical phrase in Carlyle's "Past and Present," which sums up the attitude of the Government in dealing with this tremendous situation. The Government appear to be trying to apply 19th century methods to a 20th century population, and it will not work any more now than at the time when Carlyle wrote these words: How is it to be cured? Brothers, I am sorry I have got no Morrison's Pill for curing the maladies of society..… There will be no 'thing' be done that will cure you. There will a radical universal alteration of your regimen and way of life take place; there will a most agonising divorce between you and your chimeras, luxuries and falsities take place; a most toilsome, all but impossible ' return to nature, and her veracity, take place; that so the inner fountains of life may again begin, like eternal light fountains, to irradiate and purify your bloated, swollen, foul existence, drawing nigh, as at present, to nameless death! Either death, or else all this will take place. Judge if, with such diagnosis any Morrison's Pill is like to be discoverable. Morrison's Pill of the E.P.A.! The Morrison Pill of the Eight Hours Act, the Morrison Pill of the Mining Industry Bill. How is that going to meet a situation in which the whole prosperity of the nation is endangered? This is the. Government view—instead of meeting the upwards rise of civilisation, instead of welcoming the undoubted growth of responsibility of which we ought to he proud and which is the most signal mark of the worth of all the work that has been put in by generations to uplift the people. They do not touch the root problem at all, arid it is from that point of view again that I desire to emphasise our objection to the renewal of the Emergency Powers Act.

I would like to say a word about the women's share in this dispute. They do, in a very real way, share the occupational hazards of their husbands. In the mining industry they lead a very isolated existence—both an isolated and a unified existence. When an ambulance goes through a village, in every house there is a quiver of apprehension, "Is it going to stop at my house?" There is no other industry where that peculiar atmosphere exists day by day, week by week, year in and year out; so among the women also there has been this protest against the inaction of the Government in not dealing with the root problem but, instead, attempting to deal with the surface of the matter by the Emergency Powers Regulations and the Eight Hours Act. When I was in the colliery villages recently this statement was made to me, not on one occasion, but on many occasions by women; "At any rate there is this to be said, my man is still alive and he can still walk about. It is just possible, if he had been in the pit, that by this time he would have been dead or have met with an accident which would have crippled him for life." Cannot bon. Members realise the intensity of the problem in a district where that can be one of the first thoughts that comes to a woman in connection with a stoppage in the industry, overshadowing the fact of the weekly wage not coming in? Do hon. Members realise that? I am sure many of them do. I think they can widen their imagination to that extent, even those who are living in towns and cities and are accustomed to other forms of occupation. It is very difficult for them to realise just exactly what the feeling is in the mining industry. There are Members in this House in touch with the mining industry who can verify what I say about the extraordinary feeling and passion there is in these districts against any attempt to still further reduce the low standard of life. The remark is often made that if we have to starve we will starve above ground. In all these matters I submit that in spite of this tremendous provocation the Prime Minister himself has borne testimony to the perfect discipline and self-control, which is the admiration of the whole world, which has been exercised by the working classes of this country during this stoppage, and as a recognition of that fact I think the wiping out of this Order would be an appropriate gesture which would meet with an immediate response from the people of this country.

One other point I wish to mention is in relation to the intense disappointment at the provocative act on the part of the Prime Minister in regard to recent negotiations. There was an attempt made by the bishops to deal with this problem, but it was turned down and flouted in a way which has amazed and disgusted the country. The offence of the Church apparently was that it was trying to carry Christianity out into the common ways of life. Nearly 2,000 years ago Our Lord was crucified for carrying His gospel out into the common ways of life, but the common people heard him gladly and I venture to say that the action of the Church to-day has created again a tremendous impulse—a movement on the part of the people of good will towards that greater unity of purpose in the utilisation of all our great material resources —of coal and other things not for the selfish purposes of the nineteenth century, but for the great communal purposes of the twentieth century, for which we are now ripe.

We have been informed by the Press that the Prime Minister is suffering under a mental strain. I am not surprised because I think any Prime Minister with the present Government must suffer a mental strain, but is not the moral strain even greater? A man who has a sensitive conscience and who either deliberately or by mere inertia, disregards that conscience—a man who knows what is the right thing to do, and according to his earlier speeches the Prime Minister did know, but does not do it, is bound in the long run to get broken by the state of discord within himself. I wish the Home Secretary would decide to end his Emergency Powers Act to-day because I do not think he has given any justification whatever for its continuance.

Every hon. Member who has listened to the speech made by the last speaker will welcome her back again to her place in this House. I do not wish to speak about these Regulations from the point of view of the Prime Minister's speeches, but from the point of view of the liberties to which we are accustomed in this country. First let me say that I deeply regret the alteration of the procedure in relation to these Regulations. It is the custom when we pass an Act of Parliament to require a Royal Proclamation, as was done in the case of the calling out of the Reserves, and it is done in the case of these emergency powers.

The invariable practice has been for these Proclamations to be communicated by a Royal Message under Sign Manual, and the practice has been for the Government to move that the Royal Message should be taken into consideration. Recently, for the first time, a Royal Message delivered under the Sign Manual by the Home Secretary, has been received by this House and no Minister has seen fit to move even that the Message be taken into consideration. Furthermore, for the first time we have abandoned the practice of moving the humble Address in reply to this Proclamation. I raised the point myself at the time, but just let us see where we are in consequence. These Regulations require a Resolution to be passed confirming them, but previously they required a humble Address to His Majesty. In the past that used to go upon the Order Paper, and it was debated in the daylight, but the Chief Whip knows that this Resolution which we are discussing might perfectly well be moved at 12.30 or 1 o'clock in the morning, and I deeply regret that no support was forthcoming for my plea that the old procedure should be retained.

This has now become the practice and practically the Home Secretary says "I need not say anything now because we are used to the abandonment of the old procedure and we have abandoned the humble Address; we have reached the stage when the Chief Whip pressed with much business can put this Motion down and it can be discussed in the middle of the night." By abandoning the ancient procedure of moving an humble Address we have foregone a vital opportunity of discussing procedure of this kind, and I deeply regret it. The Government are now asking for very strong powers. They are asking for power to arrest without a warrant, and there are charges of an utterly undefined kind in these special Regulations. One of the charges is "If a person attempts or does anything calculated or likely to cause sedition or disaffection amongst the civilian population." What is disaffection amongst the civilian population? Is there a single Conservative Member in this House who does not consider that when we on this side advocated the curtailing of the powers of the House of Lords we were not doing a thing calculated to cause disaffection. As a matter of fact they said we were proposing revolution. Take for example Regulation No. 33. It says: Any police constable may arrest without warrant any person who so acts as to endanger the public safety, or who is guilty or is suspected of being guilty of an offence against these regulations. A person can be arrested for being suspected of acting in a manner likely to cause disaffection amongst the civilian population. In order that there should be no loopholes Regulation 34 deals with attempts to commit offences and it provides that Any person who attempts to commit, or solicits or incites or endeavours to persuade another person to commit. These are great and vague powers, and before whom are these alleged culprits to be brought for judgment? They are to be brought before the minor Courts and Justices of the Peace. Who are they? In the old days I remember that "Truth" newspaper used to give a comparison of sentences passed in different cases. I remember one comparison where it was stated that if a man stole a hare he got six months, but if he walloped his wife he would be let off with a fine. It it said that the Lord Chancellor has con- trol over the magistrates, but who is the Lord Chancellor? He is a political officer, and what does he do? If he finds a Justice of the Peace is acting in a way of which he does not approve he writes to him a letter, and tells him that if he continues to misbehave he will have to be taken oft the Bench.

Is that a suitable tribunal to try people who are unpopular because the Squire will be prepared to contend that a man who promotes a trade union in a country village is a man who causes disaffection amongst the civilian population? We are giving power to these Courts to arrest people in this way. Previously, serious charges of this kind have been brought before professional Judges. We can say of the Judicature of this country that it has always shown an entire disregard of the Executive. There is therefore a safeguard for the culprit who goes before a professional Judge, but there is no safeguard for the culprit who on a charge in these vague terms goes before a local Bench. The Home Secretary himself has under these powers immense judicial re-responsibility. The separation 'between the Judicature and the Executive disappears, and, under these Regulations, the two functions are merged in the present Home Secretary. He himself says so, Making a speech at a political demonstration he said: I am able to do my best work "— There is a tone of modesty about that which stamps it as a remark of the right hon. Gentleman— when it is utterly unknown to the people of this country." It is done under the authority of the powers of the Home Office. That is to say, such powers as these. The right hon. Gentleman accused me of discourtesy. I certainly made an interjection, and I made it with conviction. It was emphatic, but it was not discourteous. I say the nature of the right hon. Gentleman is foreign to the conception of the judicial powers which he exercises under this Act. Let us see—I will try and put it in moderate language—if there is any substance in the charge that I make. Let us take, first, the old case when he prosecuted under the Incitement to Mutiny Act. I think they were actually arrested in November. He himself in a speech in October named Mr. McManus and Mr. Gallaher and said that they directly or indirectly received their orders from Moscow. That was the charge on which they were going to be tried.

indicated dissent.

Certainly it was. The thesis of the Third International, this precious document which few read and no one understands, was the main burden of the Public Prosecutor's speech on that occasion. I will pass over statements made by other Members of the House. During the course of the trial there was one made in the presence of the Secretary of State for War. An hon. Member said that this was the sole Government who had had the courage to bring into Court men who preached sedition. That was the charge on which the men were being tried, and there was no correction by the Secretary of State far War who was present at the meeting. The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary goes to a meeting the night that the men are arrested. What does he say? He says "You will be pleased to hear that I have arrested them." Why pleased? Shall we be pleased that they are arrested if they are acquitted? Is it not prejudging the very issue from the mouth of the Judge himself? Then he goes on to say: "Before this ease is over"—the jury and Judge are considering it, but he, the supreme Judge, says—"you Communists will be ashamed of yourselves." Why? That was the first and major offence, but there are many others.

I will pass over his jocular references to hon. Members opposite, which I consider offensive, such as, "I have my eye on you," as he constantly says. It is not the conduct of a Judge, though it, may be that of a party politician. Then, on 22nd April, in this House, he confessed that the hon. Member for North Battersea (Mr. Saklatvala) had for a long time been a great temptation to him, and that more than once his fingers had itched. They did not itch long, because three weeks afterwards the hon. Member was arrested. That may have been the proper thing to do—I am not complaining about that as an act—but I say that for a Judge, before a man has come before the Court and been convicted, to say that his fingers have itched to get hold of him is a monstrous perversion of justice. I will take, another case, and then have nothing more to say. The right hon. Gentleman, in the course of the last debate on these Regulations, when asked "Why do you want these Regulations?" said "Look at the case of Mr. Cook," and he went on to say that Mr. Cook had said so and so. Far be it from me to defend or to examine what Mr. Cook has said. That has nothing to do with the case. The right hon. Gentleman said "Look at. Mr. Cook. That is why I want the Regulations." Yes, but he is the judge, and he goes about pleading like a hired barrister.

Then we get the final case to which I have called attention to-day. Here is a trial proceeding and men are to be brought, I do not know upon what charge, before the Court. The right hon. Gentleman comes to this House, the great sounding board of the country, and, with all the authority of his position, and all the notice which will be taken of his statement, proposes to read out some partial document dealing with the case. I say that the right hon. Gentleman has got to choose, if he wants to be the leader of the Tory Diehards and shine at Primrose League demonstrations let him do it. It is not a very comprehensible, though it is a permissible ambition. But, if he wishes to come to this House and to ask us to put him in a position to supersede the Judicature of this country, then, I say, he has to show a different spirit.

I have come into the House the last few minutes to enjoy further the attacks made by the hon. and gallant Member for Leith (Captain Benn), who seems to represent for the time being the rump of the Liberal Party. He talks as though he were really a dictator, but, when he speaks sneeringly about hired barristers going about the place, I hope he will remember that he is making an undeserved sneer against one of the most honourable professions. Barris'ers do not as a rule select their political opinions from one party only; they are to be found in the ranks of all parties.

A barrister's position is to win his case. That is not the position of a judge, and that is the whole point of my argument. I have not the least intention of throwing any discredit upon a profession of which the right hon. and learned Genleman is so distinguished a member.

It is most unfortunate that the hon. and gallant Member should have used the word "hired," for he knows perfectly well that the basis of the professional employment of a barrister is a token. At the back of the garment which barristers wear is a small bag, the origin of which is the idea that clients might slip the fee into it without the susceptibility of the barrister being shocked. The word "hired" was unfortunate, and it is unfortunate to say that the barrister's one object is to win his case. The, barrister's object, of course, is to justify his client, even though that client is a fool; but, on the other hand, he works within limits, and he never forgets the honour and standard of his profession, whatever he may be called upon or asked to do.

Now I turn to these Regulations, which the hon. and gallant Gentleman has been attacking. I have been amazed during the last few months at the manner in which that remnant of a party talks in this House. Apparently its talking in the country is no good at all, because it goes from bad to worse; it is positively going to vanishing point.—[An HON. MEMBER: "What about your party?"] I do not think that hon. Members above the Gangway opposite have anything to jeer about. If the election in North timberland could not have been won in that particular district, it could not have been won in any district. [HON. MEMBERS: "North Hammersmith."] The less said about North Hammersmith, about which I know something, the better. It never pays to jeer before the sentence is completed, because, if hon. Members knew the methods to which the Socialist party sank in North Hammersmith—[ Interruption ]—they would see that it was as black a page in the history of electoral proceedings in this country as any. Therefore, let them not he too sure that North Hammersmith is the feather which shows the way the wind blows. [An HON. MEMBER "What about Ladywood?"] I am at a loss to know why hon. Members are so anxious—

May I ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman whether he is imputing anything in the nature of discreditable practices to the hon. Member for North Hammersmith?

A candidate in an election cannot always be held responsible for the actions of his supporters.

Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman answer my question? I was intimately concerned in the North Hammersmith election, and I ask for an answer.

I do not know what the hon. Lady wants an answer to, but, with a longer knowledge of electoral proceedings than she can possibly have, I say that I made no reflection upon the personal character of the candidate, but I say that the methods resorted to at that election were most discreditable.

rose —

I am at a loss to see the relevance of by-elections to the matter in hand.

I am afraid it is something of the nature of a red herring. It was the interruptions with reference to electoral experiences that caused my remarks. Of course, it is one of the characteristics of my profession that we are always ready to meet any point that may be raised by the other side. I now go back to the Regulations. These Regulations which are denounced as though—

May I intervene? There was not only a Socialist candidate at North Hammersmith, but a very distinguished member of the Liberal party. I put it to you, Sir, that when the right hon. and learned Gentleman who has given long service in this House, who is greatly respected in all parts of the House, and who occupies a judicial position outside, makes a statement of this kind as to there having been gross corruption, or whatever it was that was alleged, it is not quite fair that he should be allowed to ride off by changing the subject without giving some explanation.

Does the hon. and gallant Member propose that we should proceed to discuss by-elections?

No, Sir.

I suggest that he should continue the conversation in the Tea Room.

I should like to ask whether it is in order for an hon. Member to throw out an insinuation against the conduct of an election, without any proof. These things are very painful, and they may be repeated.

I am afraid that is not confined to one section of the House. It is my duty to check these matters as soon as I can. Perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman will proceed to the Regulations.

12.N.

I promptly obey your directions, Mr. Speaker, and to put myself in order, I agree, as a matter of order, that I ought not to have transgressed— [Interruption] I leave it at that, notwithstanding the cries of hon. Members opposite. These Regulations are said by the last speaker to be absolutely unnecessary. One knows that the country at the present moment is honeycombed with illegal societies having illegal aims, and it is for the defence of the Realm at a moment of supreme necessity that this House is asked to reaffirm these Regulations. I say that no Judge seeking to determine in regard to offences under these Regulations is likely to extend them or to strain them, but, as experience has proved, they have been administered with the greatest consideration for the person charged. There is not a case that can be brought forward, I venture to think, in which the Regulations have been administered otherwise than with the greatest consideration for the person charged. Quotations have been given from speeches. No doubt there have been many peaceful speeches, but it does not follow that there have not been mischievous ones, though it may be that it has not been found desirable to allude to these mischievous ones. After all is said and done, however, the safety of the Realm is what we have to look after at this moment, and I say with emphasis that without these Regulations the Realm is not safe against those who—sometimes citizens of this country, to their shame, but more often foreign, alien agitators—are doing their best to undermine society. We think it is necessary that we should have these Regulations in full force in order to combat that kind of mischief, which otherwise may mean destruction to our country which would be beyond repair.

Before we go to the details of these Regulations, I think the House ought to direct its attention for a short time to the need for the Regulations themselves. Is it necessary that special legislation and special administrative orders should be enforced? That is really the question. When we come to the various Regulations, we shall have a good deal to say on how they have been administered during the last three or four months, but I think there is a confusion in the right hon. Gentleman's mind between politics and law. He talked to-day, for instance, in justifying these Regulations, as though there were no common law and no Statute law in existence. He never attempted to justify, in relation to the experience of the last three or four months, why the common law shoul0 be complicated by these Regulations. The right hon. and learned Member for Ealing (Sir H. Nield) has told us that in his opinion the whole country is honeycombed with seditious conspiracy, conducted very largely by foreigners who ought not to be here at all. If that nightmare conception of the state of England at the present moment be true what is the use of these Regulations? We did not hear the right hon. Gentleman piously expressing the hope that before the end of next month the lock-out would be finished and the Regulations would lapse. We really must apply means to an end with something like common sense. What is the Home Secretary's own case? He gave us a list of figures, which I took down. Was there ever a more miserable justification of special legislation than those figures? Three convictions under one Regulation, one under another, 31 under another, 49 under another and 59 under a very special one. That is the sum total in a month, and a confession that he in not quite sure how many cases last month have been carried over to this month and included. Again, what is the position? There arc a million and a quarter men out all over the coalfield. They have been provoked almost beyond words. Their distress is getting more and more severe. This is the beginning of the fourth month of the dispute. The figures relate to the third month of the dispute, and with a million men out one Clause has been used three times, another once, another 34 times, and Clause 20, the seditious Clause, 49 times. The right hon. Gentleman knows quite as well as I do that those figures are absolutely no justification for the continuance of these Regulations. What I want to know is this. I wonder if he can tell us from how many districts those figures have been drawn?

They are roughly drawn from all the coal districts, because an hon. Member opposite put a question yesterday—Durham, Warwickshire, South Wales, Lancashire.

Do they include Scotland?

indicated assent.

The right hon. Gentleman will find in analysing the figures that the greater number come from districts where probably the police administration is more responsible than the state of unsettlement. These Regulations, given police conditions such as are alleged in Warwickshire—and there will he more said about that later by hon. Members who have been there and seen it from personal experience—you can produce all those figures and instead of them proving a state of national emergency, they only prove bad handling on the part of the police. I am certain that at least half those figures prove that rather than a state of unsettlement on the part of the miners themselves. We have had coal lock-outs and strikes before. We have had riots before and we have had picketing before which was not peaceful. we have had disturbance and unsettlement before in connection with industrial disputes, and the safety valve was to put the ordinary law and the ordinary police administration into operation. The least said the soonest mended, and the right hon. Gentleman has no occasion whatever to compare his experience, with these Regulations, and the experience of his predecessors without them, and to congratulate himself that he has maintained law and order. That is the test of special Regulations. The whole political and legal genius of the country is a deep-seated suspicion and enmity against the police State. The right hon. Gentleman is establishing a police State. There are two ways of doing it. Of course, you are going to have risks. The man who is a statesman takes risks. Take your risks, because by taking risks you save your State far more certainly than by putting on police Regulations. You give your people a sense of fair play and justice, and there is nothing that is more conducive to an instinct for obedience to the law and the keeping of order than that. In this case you tell your people, as the right hon. Gentleman has told the million and a quarter who are out today, " I do not trust you. I suspect you. The Government is afraid of you. We cannot leave your conduct to the ordinary operation of the law. In order to meet the fear and the suspicion that are in our hearts we have to produce a new 39 Articles." You have thrown over the Church. The right hon. Gentleman's mentality may be of that kind that he is never safe unless he has a policeman about him, and not only a policeman, but a policeman specially armed. I say with great respect that it is not in that that lies the foundation of British liberties. It is exactly the mentality that has created your Junker State, your Prussian State.

Russian.

Your Russian State, too, as the inheritance of Czardom. These Regulations now are merely an insult to our people. They are a violation of the spirit of the British Constitution and they are an open confession to the miners now locked out that the Government is mortally afraid of them.

There is another general observation I want to make. The right hon. Gentleman has talked about blacklegs. The blackleg is disloyal to his society. When hon. Members opposite find their children leaving the old Tory principles of reaction and joining the Labour party they frown on them, boycott them and turn them out of society. The class consciousness of hon. Members opposite is one of the most supremely apparent things. Everyone who has anything like an objective mind and can see things not merely as they appear but see them as objective truth outside understands the position of hon. Members opposite. They ought also to understand the position of the trade unionists and the workmen who combine together in order to advance their interests. You will find men who are always willing to take the advantages when advantages come and yet always willing to be blacklegs when there is any labour dispute on. Workmen and trade unionists have a perfect right to say to these gentlemen, " You are disloyal to your trade, you arc disloyal to your society, you are disloyal to all the great forces that are lifting human beings in society. That does not justify them in adopting any attitude towards those people except the attitude that private individuals adopt to others in choosing their associates and their friends. There must be no breach of the law, no personal violence. Anything that relates to the liberty of the subject must be preserved in that relationship. Outside that, the individual trade unionist has a perfect right to boycott and blackball and leave out of his society anyone who is blacklegging society. It is in the same way that hon. Members opposite have a perfect right to exercise the function which they do towards ors of keeping us outside their society.

The effect of these Regulations on the administration of justice is of the worst possible character. Reference has been made to the peculiar position of the magisterial bench. I am one of those people who prefer never to raise these awkward questions, because we have to trust not merely to the letter of the law but to the spirit of it. But the moment you challenge, as you are now doing, the status of the justices of the peace, you have to take the consequences. The very first consequence of putting the responsibility of administering Regulations like these upon Justices of the Peace is that people begin to reflect upon the nature of the bench. The Home Secretary has invited that, and he knows as well as know that the magistracy is a political appointment. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Leith (Captain W. Bonn) referred to the very obvious fact—one prefers to overlook it and just to allow the machine to work—that if a man who is a Justice of the Peace takes up a political attitude at a time when feeling is heated and social opinion is divided very sharply, that man, acting conscientiously and in accordance with his political lights, is censured by the Lord Chancellor.

What to me is remarkable, is the most absurd conception of loyalty and disloyalty held by the Home Secretary, and the right hon. Gentleman's conceptions of loyalty and disloyalty undoubtedly are part of the conceptions and ideas held by his Lord Chancellor. His Lord Chancellor in pursuance of those conceptions, regards the actions of Justices of the Peace and, as he is entitled to do, as he is morally bound to do—I am sure the Lord Chancellor would say so—he has to apply his conceptions of loyalty to the conduct of Justices of the Peace. Consequently, applying his conceptions of loyalty he says to one body of Justices, " You, being conservatively-minded have done right." To another body of Justices he says, " You, being Labour-minded have done wrong, and you must come off the bench."

The right hon. Gentleman is making very serious charges against the Lord Chancellor. He has not one iota of proof that the Lord Chancellor has acted for political reasons, or that he has complained of any particular Justice of the Peace became he has Labour views. That is not the case. Undoubtedly, there have been a few cases in which Justices of the Peace have taken part in action against the State, and on those grounds those men have been removed from the Bench. To make a statement that the Lord Chancellor has said to one set of Conservative magistrates that they have done well, and to Labour magistrates that they have done wrong, is not the case. Labour magistrates have, on the whole, done quite as well as other magistrates.

I must intervene at this point, and remind the House that any question regarding the action of the Lord Chancellor cannot be discussed in the ordinary Debates of this House. It is only permissible on a Motion properly tabled.

Does that Rule apply to the Lord Chancellor as a member of the Cabinet and a politician, or is confined to Judges of the High Court who are members of the Judiciary?

It certainly applies to the Lord Chancellor, and always has done.

I. bow at once to your ruling, Mr. Speaker. The discussion that has taken place has rather been pushed across borders over which I had no intention of pushing it. [HON. MEMBERS: " Withdraw I "] Perhaps you will allow me to say, without pursuing the matter further, that the statement which the Home Secretary has just made is one which I would be perfectly willing to make, but it is not at all in accordance with the point that I was making. We will leave the Lord Chancellor out of account and deal with the principle of the Bench. The point that I was making was this, that under conditions such as we are in to-day, the question of what is loyalty and what is disloyalty is not capable of a definition which will satisfy the Home Secretary and myself, as representatives of two very separate and fundamentally different points of view regarding society. I say that the representative of the Home Office, whether the Home Secretary or anybody else, is bound to apply his views of loyalty to the actions of people for whom he is directly or indirectly responsible, and in applying those views he cannot possibly dissociate the administration of justice from political opinion. That is my point.

I hope that you, Mr. Speaker, and the House will clearly understand that what I have been saying is not in the nature of a censure but in the nature of a definition of the particular part of our machinery which when worked under the conditions of to-day is bound to produce political results. That is all I mean. By the passing of these Regulations the Home Secretary is only emphasising that unfortunate aspect of that part of our machinery. Therefore I appeal to him from that point of view, and as he does not wish all these things to be raised, and as I do not wish all these things to be raised, and as he and I occupy this common ground that when we have a machine working, which works, on the whole, well, it is far better not to overload the machine and compel people to consider its nature when it begins to work badly.

The right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well, and this was the point which 1 was making when he interrupted me, that he himself censured certain magistrates, following certain observations which- I made. He said he was perfectly well aware of the fact that certain magistrates in the administration of justice had made observations which were improper, and had said things that they ought not to have said as magistrates. Has any representation been made for the removal of those magistrates? No. That shows the delicacy of the position in which he is placing the Bench by constantly repeating these Regulations. He knows that in special needs, when the circumstances are such that we are faced with a grave crisis, in order to protect the national interests, he can bring in the Regulations and carry them through. That is not the position now. This is a prolonged affair, a continuation of exceptional legislative and administrative rules, when the figures do not prove the necessity. Any hon. Member from any part of the House, who goes about the country and through the coalfields, knows that however high passions may be, however angry the men are, there is no chance of any serious situation arising unless it is provoked, and if it is, these Regulations are not necessary. If, for instance, a coal embargo had been going on there might have been some justification for special legislation. But that is off. This is an ordinary dispute between capital and labour in the coalfields, and there is no justification on earth for continuing these special Regulations.

Let me touch upon a far more fundamental point before we get to a consideration of the details of administration. I beg this House, every Member in this House, to carefully consider all the implications of this extraordinary drift of the State towards the type and mentality of a police state. I believe in liberty. I believe, moreover, that when you have a people like ours, who are accustomed to have these Regulations in their own hearts, the more you trust to that internal power the more you will strengthen your position and the more good you will do for the State. Instead of doing that, the Government, as soon as any dispute takes place, rush to these Regulations. After the crisis of the dispute has passed, so far as we can see, then the duty of a statesman is to take his risks, say " I believe in my people, but if anything compels me to do so, I will call the House of Commons together immediately and do it." In the meantime very little damage will be done. Even if the right hon. Gentleman scraps all these Regulations he has the common law behind him, which certainly can tide him over a week. Surely we are not in that distressful condition at the moment. We are in a minority in this House, but I beg hon. Members to consider that this is not merely a Government business; it is not merely a party business. It is an indication of a great change in political psychology, which the right hon. Gentleman is pursuing not only in this instance but in half-a-dozen other ways, and one day the citizens of this country, and the Government, will wake up and find that the old English political mentality, the old British legalistic mentality, has gone, and that we are in the position of those unfortunate States which have gone to wrack and ruin as they followed this method towards the latter part of the nineteenth century.

I agree with many of the general statements made by the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition. I am a passionate believer in personal liberty, but when it comes to the application of this principle, I find great difficulty not only in the statement made by the right hon. Gentleman opposite but also in the statements of the hon. and gallant Member for Leith (Captain W. Benn). One would think to hear them there had been no revolutionary strike recently, no attempt to subvert the State itself. I may point out that it was then that the reverence and instincts of the people of this country for law and order, which the Leader of the Opposition eulogised, were manifested. The Government may be entitled to some little credit for the defeat of that outrage upon the British community, but it was the people themselves, the great mass of the people., who defeated it. That general strike came as a very severe shock to the masses of the people of this country, and the Government was very severely blamed for its laxity in allowing a certain class of people to get such a vast amount of rope by which so serious an attempt could be made upon constitutional Government in this country.

These Regulations are the fruit of weak legislation in the past. I am a believer in liberty. Hon. Members opposite say they are believers in liberty, but the liberty they believe in is a liberty to tyrannise over their fellow workmen. They do not believe in industrial liberty in any shape or form. They will not allow the working man to have any freedom. They were deprived of their freedom by the weak legislation passed by the party of which the hon. and gallant Member for Leith is a member, which was not in my opinion sufficiently strenuously resisted by the party to which I belong. The working man has been deprived of his personal and industrial liberty; and what is the result? It is only the other day that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) was flapping his wings pretending he was a dove of peace. But what happened in Glasgow during one week in 1920 when a large body of men came into conflict with the police in St. George's Square? I was a witness of that conflict—from afar off. I knew the law that you should never he part of a crowd. The Minister for Mines in the Labour Government (Mr. Shinwell), he knew the law too, and I have never seen a man, any Marathon runner, run so fast down a side street as he did up Hanover Street that day. The lion. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. Kirkwood) did not know the law, and stopped to argue the matter with a policeman in much the same way as if he was disputing with the Chair in the House of Commons. Unfortunately for him he was rendered unconscious, as he said, for 25 minutes. I have often thought when I have heard him address this House that he had made an error in the time, and had not yet completely recovered consciousness.

The next day the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs had three tanks and 10,000 troops in Glasgow, and a lot of aeroplanes. He was ready to make a shambles of the citizens of Glasgow, this man of peace, whom the hon. and gallant Member for Leith supports. It was not a case of genial special constables going to have a little bit of a rattle here and there with some of their fellow-citizens. There was to be shedding of blood if they dared interfere with the dictator who won the War; and yet that right hon. Member comes here and talks of peace, and calls on the Christian churches. The trouble we are experiencing to-clay is a most unfortunate and serious business, but I say this, that in the main it has been conducted on both sides with a great amount of good humour and good temper and the minimum of violence. I do not like these Regulations. I do not like the idea of a man being arrested without a warrant, and I do not like giving to the police the power to say whether it is a crowd or not. We all know what was said by a certain policeman to a man. The man was expostulating that he was not " a crowd," to which the policeman replied, " One man is a crowd if I say so." But the number of cases in which there have been convictions is no indication of what the Regulations have done.

Is it not a thousand times better, at a time like this, when the country has passed through such a crisis, that we should have emergency powers, so that this state of peace may continue until the parties in the dispute have come to a reasonable settlement, rather than that we should have a repetition of what took place in Glasgow when the right hon. Member for Carnarvon as Angel of Peace was ready to make peace with guns and tanks. Hon. Members opposite should be grateful that law and order are well kept. There is always in any community a substratum of the population, who do not belong to the working class but belong to the class who do not work, who are prepared to take advantage of industrial or other disputes and to bring about social and economic chaos and disorder. It is against these people that the Regulations are directed. The Regulations are not directed against the steady working man, the miner. Everybody who knows the miner knows that he is not only among the boldest and the bravest, but that he belongs to the most law-abiding class that we have. I know the miners intimately. I have been very sorry time and again to see the result of the foolish legislation that his brought great numbers of quiet and decent young working men, who were acting as pickets, into collision with the police. If hon. Gentlemen of the Labour party would assist those cal the Government side of the House who are strong believers in strengthening the powers of trade unions so as to put them in their proper legal position like other large institutions, and would see that the supporters of the moderate party amongst them will have the right to veto foolish and illegal expenditure, then I say that there will be no need for these Regulations.

On a point of Order. I would like your ruling, Mr. Speaker, as to whether the diversion of the hon. and learned Member to the question of trade unions has anything to do with the question before us.

The hon. and learned Member is not entitled to deal with the question of legislation affecting trade unions.

If supporters of trade unions would give us help to put the unions on a sound basis, these Regulations would never be needed, because you would not have the circumstances out of which disorder and sedition arise. The inevitable result of the present state of the law is to lead to disorder, trouble and sedition; with the further consequence that in times of crisis the governing power of the country has to be armed with forms of legislation which, I agree, everyone of us who is a supporter of liberty and freedom feels is in normal times contrary to the spirit of the British people.

I want the Home Secretary to note that his coming back to, the House for the fourth time for these special Regulations is an epoch-making event. Here is a strong Government, or one presumably strong, with a large majority in this House, armed with laws which are quite sufficient for carrying on the administration of the country, but it conies to the House for the fourth time when as a Government it is only two years old, and says that it is incapable of carrying on the administration of the country unless it is armed with most extraordinary and despotic powers. That is the position to-day. We are told that the Regulations are for the defence of the Realm. They are not for defence, not even of the whole Tory party, but only as a means of making a dramatic and spectacular exhibition by the particular wing of the Tory party which wants to establish its hold on the Prime Minister, and to assume the leadership of the Tory party. The whole purpose is a political purpose. I challenge the Home Secretary to produce his figures of prosecution and to give to the House an instance in which a prosecution could not have been carried out in the ordinary way. We know that these extraordinary prosecutions arc taking place. They are not taking place against men of all political parties who deliver provocative speeches; they are taking place all over the country against individuals, men and women, who have been marked by local Conservative agents as standing in the way of Conservative progress in a particular locality.

I agree with the last speaker that the Liberal party are now making a splash. I am quite delighted at some of their recent speeches, because they are delivered, not in the spirit of the Liberal party, but as an attempt at approach to the Labour party. I am convinced that the most excellent speeches delivered from the Liberal benches nowadays are excellent because they are a direct setting of the cap to the Labour party. I would go further than the last speaker and quote, not only the example of the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George), but that of another leader of the Liberal party—there are several—and would remind the House of Tonypandy and Featherstone. If a real outbreak takes place it is not these Regulations which will be invoked to deal with it. Then the Home Secretary will hand over the maintenance of law and order to the Secretary for War, who will send down his battalions. It is certain that at the present moment these Regulations are not helping towards a settlement of the miners' dispute and are not operating so as to give work to the locked-out miners, but are being operated directly and purposely as a means of taking proceedings against those marked men whom Conservative agents privately report as being a thorn in their sides. If there is in this House the true spirit of democracy, if we are to have regard to the traditions of the House and of the British constitution, we must realise that this so-called strong Government is incapable of administering the country without extraordinary laws and regulations, and I say that the only honest course for the Government to take is to throw up the sponge, to admit that it is incapable of finding a solution of the present industrial problem, and to tell the country to find persons capable of administering the country with ordinary law.

I beg to move, in line 2, after " 1926 " to insert the words " other than Regulations 21 and 22."

I find some difficulty in reconciling certain of the remarks of the hon. Member who has just sat down, with that desire for the preservation of individual liberty which I believe to move Members of the Labour party. In another country which has been referred to during these Debates, it is considered that the value of efficiency and order and governmental coercion is so great that it is justifiable to have Regulations of this kind, and if I were to draw a comparison, I should imagine that there is a considerable bond of sympathy between the right hon. Gentleman opposite and the hon. Member for North Battersea (Mr. Saklatvala) because, as I understand their theories, they do not believe much in that liberty which we think keeps the community sweet.

In substance these two Regulations contain the objection to the Regulations as a whole. Sonic of those which deal with the price of coal and such matters may be very material, very natural and very useful at the present time, but the real interference with the operation of the common law is to be found in Regulations 21 and 22. Not many Members of this House have been at pains to examine the Statute under which these Regulations are made. The Regulations have only power and force, in so far as they are justified by the Statute under which they arc made. Therefore, in order to test the real intention of the legislature one has to look at the Statute itself. One finds that the Statute—the Emergency Powers Act, 1920 —is concerned almost entirely with the production, and distribution of food supplies and other commodities. It was passed primarily to ensure that in times of emergency and industrial stoppage, people should not lack the necessities of life.

The Act provides that where action has been taken or is threatened which will interfere with the supply and distribution of food and other essentials of life, a Proclamation may be made, first, for securing the essentials of life for the community and, secondly, to give such powers as His Majesty may deem necessary for the preservation of the peace. Parliament, when it passed that Act, had never seen the Regulations because they did not come into being until after the Act was passed; and my first point is that the Legislature contemplated that in times of emergency the Government should have the power to commandeer materials, to control prices, and secondly, to take the necessary steps to preserve the peace. I very much doubt if the steps which were to be taken to preserve the peace were ever intended to include the creation of a vast mass of new offences such as we find here catalogued. As so often happens with this kind of sub-legislation, there is great danger that, with every good intention, the persons making the sub-legislation—which never actually comes before the Legislature—imperceptibly extend and enlarge the powers which the Legislature intended to confer. Here we have an excellent illustration. There are new principles of law, there are new offences and there are all kinds of machinery in these Regulations which go very far beyond the words of the Statute " the preservation of the peace." I am not saying that they are illegal or ultra vire:3. I will be frank with the House—I do not think they are, but I think they go much further than was ever intended.

My next point is that the amount of regulation which is made under this Statute ought not to he a hard and fast amount. It ought to vary with the necessities of the case. Instead of repeating month after month the same stereotyped Regulations, the amount of coercive legislation required ought to be varied and modified from month to month according to the necessities of the time. It may be that during a general stoppage far more stringent Regulations are needed than during a partial stoppage. Certain incidents may occur, certain possibilities may be apprehended, which, at a particular time, would justify stringent Regulations. Those incidents and those apprehensions might pass away, and, then, I submit, the Regulations ought to be modified because they are only for the preservation of the peace at the particular time when they are made. The necessity for special legislation to preserve the peace is, I think, less to-day than it was a month ago and infinitely less than it was two months ago. We are all prone to repeat our arguments to some extent, but why should we go through this somewhat idle form month by month. It arises from the fact that the Government take the view that they ought to go on repeating these Regulations without modification or consideration. I believe the intention of the Legislature in asking Parliament to review and renew these Regulations from month to month was that intelligence should be brought to bear upon them each month in accordance with the conditions which had arisen during that month. If we are to be presented every month with the same Regulations, quite regardless of how the situation has changed or how serious the cessation of labour may be, then the procedure becomes something not much better than a farce. That is because the Government by refusing in any way to modify the Regulations have defeated the intentions of the Statute.

The Legislature, I submit, looked upon these Regulations with disfavour and thought they were undesirable and that the ordinary law was quite sufficient, but in effect they said, " Circumstances may arise where special Regulations are necessary, but it is always reluctantly that we should employ those Regulations." The arguments adduced by the hon. and learned Member for Ealing (Sir H. Nield) and by the bon, and earned and humorous Member for Argyll (Mr. Macquisten) seemed to proceed on a fallacy. These Regulations are only in force for so long as this particular stoppage continues. If the hon. and learned Member for Ealing is right that this country is honeycombed with seditious organisations, they can go on just the same after the settlement of the coal stoppage. In fact they are likely to grow worse, because, according to the Freudian psychology, if they are not able to let themselves out, they will burrow underground and re-appear elsewhere. Therefore, in order to satisfy the views of the hon. and learned Members these Regulations ought to be a permanent part of our law. The hon. and learned Member for Argyll thinks it is necessary to protect the trade unions from what he believes to be tyranny. I think myself that the present law is sufficient to deal with that situation. The Act of 1875 in its terms prohibits any forms of molestation or victimisation by trade unions. The Act of 1906 is little more than declaratory, that where you have peaceful persuasion it is lawful. Be that as it may, if the right hon. Gentleman is right and legislation is needed, what is the use of legislation which is going to come to an end directly this coal dispute is settled? There will be more disputes and more victimisation, and because the coal dispute is not on, he will cry in vain for these Regulations.

According to the Stoic philosophers, humanity will repeat in 15,000 years, I think—I forget the exact cycle—the same experiences. When I heard the right hon. Gentleman say that exactly the same speeches would be made to-day as were made a month ago, it did seem Jo me that the Stoic cycle was at work, and 1 have no doubt that the wheel will turn round again in a month's time. But the right hon. Gentleman has had a month to consider these particular Regulations 21 and 22, whether they are any longer necessary. It has never been disputed that they are an invasion of the common law. I tried last month to analyse in what way this Regulation 21 differed from the common law. I pointed out that, while it was quite true that the common law of sedition and incitement to mutiny was -covered in the first part of the Regulation, in so far as it went on to deal with the publishing of reports and statements, it laid the onus on the person liable to be prosecuted to show that he had no intention of transmitting or circulating the document or distributing copies thereof to or amongst other persons. In all those matters the common law of sedition has always required that the act of sedition should be proved by the accused. I pointed out the situation that arose by providing that a person shall not be guilty of an offence under the Regulation by reason only of his taking part in a strike or peacefully persuading any other person to take part in a strike. While that is permissible, it really leaves you nothing except something in the nature of malicious damage to property, which is already dealt with under the Malicious Damage to Property Acts. It does introduce a vicious principle of putting the onus of proving innocence in certain cases on the accused. According to the common law, these persons are entitled to trial by jury. What is there in the present situation to entitle the right hon. Gentleman to deprive people of their right to trial by jury? I submit there is nothing. There is no class of case in which it is more important that you should have a jury than in sedition cases. What necessity is there to abolish trial by jury? Supposing a historian 10 years' hence writes, " A great coal stoppage broke out in England, and the Government thought it necessary to abolish trial by jury." Anyone would ask what was the connection between a coal stoppage and trial by jury. If these things can be dealt with by the processes of law, what need is there for the abolition for trial by jury? When we hear that 29 persons have been prosecuted, we may take it that 10 or 15 of them may have been concerned in one offence combined together, so that many of those offences are probably offences of persons acting in combination. The total number of separate persons charged with disorder must be greatly less than 29, and I do not think we have reached a state in which we should alter the law.

As I am moving the omission of Regulation 22, as well as Regulation 21, I may refer to the other Regulation. It provides, first of all, that if the assembly of any persons for the purpose of the holding of any meeting or procession will conduce to a breach of the peace and will thereby cause undue demands to be made upon the police, or will promote disaffection— 1.0.P.M.

]it shall be lawful to make an order prohibiting the holding of the meeting or procession. I believe that this Regulation has scarcely been used at all. It may be said in reply that that is a reason why it should be left there, but the same argument applies as in the case of Regulation 21. The common law has devised a carefully balanced principle to deal with this question relating to all meetings which are apt to irritate other people and promote disorder. There is the famous case of the Salvation Army against the Skeleton Army, as it was called, in which it was settled, not that they were not lawful, but that they might cause other people to be unlawful. Good sound principles were then laid down as to which assemblies were lawful and which were not. Is it quite satisfactory that any magistrate should have before him the material in advance to judge whether a meeting will conduce to a breach of the peace? Very often it does not depend upon the people who are at the meeting but on people who are not actually there. How can you tell beforehand whether a meeting is going to cause disaffection? There may be banners, but you cannot tell beforehand whether those banners arc going to be carried in the procession or not? It is also provided that any magistrate shall decide, and not even a quorum. That is really too much of a burden to put on them to perform judicially. There is no suggestion that there have been any meetings of this sort, and I think the present law is quite adequate. Why are these meetings likely to take place now any more than before? The right hon. Gentleman knows, in connection with another Measure in which both he and I are interested, that the question of processions has been considered there. Those are processions that are likely in certain cases to promote animosity, but it is not suggested that these Regulations should be applied to them. let they are quite as likely to promote animosity as the meetings to which the Regulation applies.

There is one final point to which I would like to refer, that is that while this House should be only too pleased to assemble if public business demanded it, I think I can speak for hon. Members in all parties when I say that we do feel that a reassembly which might happen in consequence of these Regulations and which we consider would not be necessary, would in fact be as unpopular on the opposite side of the House as it would be on this.

I beg to second the Amendment.

With the Leader of the Opposition and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for South-East Leeds (Sir H. Slesser), who has just spoken, I cannot help thinking that the very existence of these Regulations has had such a bearing upon certain sentences that, have been inflicted that the sentences have been much more severe than would have been the case for similar offences under the common law. The Home. Secretary will be aware of the very large number of people in the Don Valley Division who were apprehended during the general strike for certain offences committed on the highway. I do not suggest that these men were totally justified in doing some of the things that they did, and possibly many indiscretions were committed, but, on the opposite side of the balance-sheet, there is the fact that large numbers of police from other districts were there who knew nothing at all about the mentality of the local miners and who took such action as would not have been taken in other circumstances, with very disastrous results so far as the miners were concerned. The right hon. Gentleman will know that over 80 miners in the course of a few days were sentenced to three months' hard labour each, and in one or two cases fines reaching £50 were imposed. Therefore, when the right hon. Gentleman told us this morning that only minor troubles here and there had been experienced during the past two months, I think that is a clear indication that when no exceptional force, either of police or other people., is imposed upon a district, there is little or no likelihood of untoward incidents taking place.

I suggest that the quasi -intimidation which is supposed to have taken place in various districts has not been seen to the same extent perhaps as the quasi intimidation which we know to be a fact by one or two boards of guardians in this country. The cases of Lichfield and Bolton are, I think, tantamount to infinitely greater intimidation than any that may have taken place with regard to the miners in any part of Warwickshire. and if we, as a nation, would concentrate on attempting to maintain and develop the best that is in men, we should be better employed than in passing Regulations of this description. Arising out of the Hatfield case, I received a letter to-day from one of our local people, and I think I ought to read it for the benefit of the Home- Secretary, so that he will see that in these local disturbances, where large numbers of strange policemen are brought in, the police may very well be more responsible for the disturbance than the local men. This is one of the consequences of a happening of this description. I received this letter from the secretary of a branch of railwaymen, who states: Dear Sir, On the 12th May during the melee between the police and miners at Hatfield, the police ran amok, and one of our members was struck by the police while on private property, standing on his front doorstep. He is still under the medical care of Dr.— I should like to state that on this occasion the police showed no mercy to man, woman; or child. I have reported the matter to the local superintendent of police at Doncaster, who has acknowledged the letter and states that he is giving the matter attention. The attention apparently that he is giving to it is that nothing further has been heard about it, and I suggest that in this particular case, while the miners, in an extraordinary atmosphere, did congregate in fairly large numbers, the action of the police tended more towards creating unpleasant scenes than would have been the case had the ordinary methods of keeping the peace been used. I should like to ask the Homo Secretary if he does not think that the very existence of these Regulations for dispersing crowds in an extraordinary manner and all that kind of thing is not likely to create more disturbances than the disturbances they can dispel. As the Leader of the Opposition truly said, not only have we 1,250,000 miners out of work, but there are also another 1,500,000 of people who are unemployed, and it is scarcely possible to avoid large demonstrations, although meetings may not be taking place, and as, during the existence of these Regulations, all men, even down to one man, cart be moved on, a good deal of ill will and bitterness may be created. Therefore, I think Regulation 22 may very well he dispensed with. I would like the right hon. Gentleman to tell us how many meetings or processions have been prevented during the existence of Regulation 22. I have in mind one instance where the President of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain was due to address a meeting, and the local people who were organising the meeting had to do all manner of things before they could secure the final permission of the superintendent of police for that meeting to take place. Mr. Smith must have addressed thousands of meetings in Yorkshire and in no previous case that I can remember had it been necessary for the organisers of the meetings either to interview the local police or to go to a police superintendent to secure permission for the president of a large society to address his own members. That happened because Regulation 22 was in existence, and I do not think this Regulation ought to be continued if the local superintendents of police are going to insist upon permission being sought in this way.

I want to refer to one other case, which is that of an individual who was prosecuted under Regulation 21. This person addressed a large meeting of mine workers, and during the course of that address he would be telling these men what he conceived to be their duty to their trade union during the run of the general strike, Because he made that speech, he was hailed before the Bench, and a sentence of three months' hard labour and a fine of £50 were imposed. I do not know whether the term of imprisonment or the fine of £50 can be regarded as a normal sentence for an analogous case of that kind, but I do suggest to the Home Secretary that, knowing this person, I cannot conceive that he would make any statement or statements deliberately calculated to incite the public to any sort of act which would be directed against the State. His words might have that ultimate effect, and it might very well be that his statements might have two or three interpretations, but the interpretation placed upon them by the Court brought him three months' hard labour and a fine of £50. I suggest to the Home Secretary that this person could not have been prosecuted, had it not been for the existence of Regulation 21, and it is because certain unfortunate cases of this description have arisen, and will be included in the 39 or 40 cases referred to by the Home Secretary, that I desire to see Regulation 21 dispensed with altogether.

I would like to ask the Home Secretary a question, which, perhaps, can better be dealt with later in private. There have been certain cases in certain parts of the country dealt with by the Magistrates and certain punishments inflicted, and then appeals lodged against the original sentence. These cases are taken to the Quarter Session, and I would like to ask the Home Secretary whether it is a usual thing, in a case of this description, for the presiding Magistrate who, at the original hearing inflicted the sentence, to attend the Quarter Sessions to give evidence, either in the ordinary sense against the defendant, or to quote from evidence submitted to the local Bench of which he happened to be the presiding Magistrate.My knowledge of law is very small indeed, but I would like to know from the Home Secretary, either publicly or privately—possibly, privately would be better—whether that is a normal proceeding in the Courts of Great Britain.

I am rather astonished at the hon. Member's statement. Does he say that a Magistrate who is Chairman of a Bench which tried a case subsequently gave evidence in Quarter Sessions against the man whom he tried?

I want to be strictly correct, and not open to two interpretations in the statement I am making. I said the presiding Magistrate at the original hearing goes to the Quarter Sessions, enters the witness box and gives certain evidence as a witness. But I would not carry the statement further, and declare that the presiding Magistrate gave evidence against the defendant in the ordinary sense, as a witness for the prosecution would be expected to give evidence. Perhaps the Home Secretary will tell us later whether or not this is the normal procedure in the Courts of Great Britain.

I think I can tell the hon. Gentleman at once. It is a most extraordinary statement. I have never heard of it before. I am quite sure the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for South-East Leeds (Sir H. Slesscr) will agree with me. The hon. Gentleman has made a very serious charge—[HOX. MEMBERS: " Not a charge!"]—that a man who is chairman of a Bench, and in that capacity convicted and sentenced a prisoner to three months' hard labour, when the prisoner appealed to Quarter Sessions, the original teresiding magistrate went to give evidence there with regard to the case over which he had presided. Perhaps the hon. Member will furnish me with full particulars?

I would certainly prefer to do that, for fear one's words might be misinterpreted in the form of a charge, which they are not intended to be. At all events, thi6 has arisen in case after case under these Regulations, and it is because one fears the extension—even beyond the point to which the Home Secretary himself would go—of certain things which are happening, which would not happen were it not for the existence of these Regulations. In the ordinary sense, I think, the Home Secretary would be the first to admit that the miners all over the country have behaved during the past 13 weeks in a most wonderful manner, and have been an example to the whole world. I do not think that in any other country on earth could we have had from 2,000,000 to 2,750,000 people out of work for such a long period with so few incidents having happened. Because of that fact, I think, with the Leader of the Opposition, we ought to have a great deal more confidence in our own people, and not atempt to restrict their normal liberty when they are living in abnormal times, and inspire them to do things of which, otherwise, they would never have dreamed.

The Leader of the Opposition made reference to various magistrates who hold certain political views. I think it is, possibly, unfair to these gentlemen, who are called upon to perform a most delicate duty, to place them in a position where they even may be suspected of interpreting their political conception of a, given case, instead of administering in the most impartial manner the law in any case which may be brought before them. While one would like to see the administration of British law remain untainted, it is fair to say that in many districts, because of these Regulations, and the prosecutions which have been undertaken as a result of them, a good deal of suspicion has been aroused, and is still in the minds of tens of thousands of people, with regard to the action or attitude of certain members of the bench. I would prefer, notwithstanding one's opposition to some other person's political view, at least to believe that he carries on his duties with the utmost belief that he is doing the right thing, and it is because I. fear the suspicion, ill will and bitterness which have been created already will be in future increased and because of the extraordinary difficulty in which magistrates on the bench are placed while these Regulations are in existence, that I second the deletion of Regulations 21 and 22.

I find myself in an unpleasant difficulty this morning, because perverse fate compels me to give a qualified support to the point of view of the Opposition, which, to me, is very distasteful. Although one hesitates to agree with any view of the official Opposition, I rather doubt whether some of the Regu lations are any longer needed. Of course, it must be clear that those Regulations which deal with sale of coal, and such things, are required. Everybody in the House will agree as to that, but I think it is necessary, if I may respectfully say so to the Home Secretary, to show us how the ordinary law of the country fails to deal with the situation as it is at present, although, quite obviously, it has been necessary for the last few months to have the whole of these Regulations. It was necessary during the general strike, and necessary since then, but it seems to me that the situation now is somewhat different. The Government have shown, and a tribute is due to the Home Secretary in this connection, that they really mean business, mean to preserve law and order, to carry out the law, and prevent the violence and brutality which have taken place during former strikes; and by showing this clearly to the country at large, they have very largely, if not entirely, made the continuance of these Regulations unnecessary.

The real cause of the trouble in previous strikes—it was apprehended in the present strike, and undoubtedly would have occurred but for the enactment of these Regulations earlier—has been that past Governments have failed to carry out the law, not that the law itself was weak. Everybody admits that any workman or body of workmen have a perfect right, subject to proper notice, to withhold their labour; but the converse must be admitted by every right-minded and fair-minded man or woman, namely, that every workman or body of workmen have an equal right to work if they choose, and that no other workman or body of workmen have any right whatever to prevent a willing workman from doing his ordinary work. In the past the Government, whose duty it was to give protection to those able and willing to work, have failed to carry out that duty.

The course of the present strike has witnessed a new departure in that the Government, through the Home Secretary, have definitely shown that they realise that one of the primary functions of Government is to preserve law and order and to give protection if and when necessary. Therefore I feel that unless the Home Secretary can clearly show that under the circumstances now existing the Regulations are still absolutely neces- sary they ought not to be re-enacted. I do not for one moment mean they were not necessary earlier in the strike, but it seems to me the necessity for them has now lapsed, and that the ordinary law of the country suffices, without this extra assistance. The psychological effect, if one may use that expression, of not re-enacting them must be good, it seems to me. It would tend to show that the Government and the country are prepared to trust those working, or formerly working, in the mining industry, whether employers or men, not to abuse their position and not to engage in violence-and disorder. I do not think it would have been safe to do earlier what I am now suggesting, but the firm action taken by the Government recently has made it possible, and therefore advisable, not to re-enact these Regulations other than those, as I have said, dealing with the sale of coal. I realise that nothing which I can say to-day will have any effect on the decision of the Home Secretary or the Government to re-enact these Regulations for the month of August, nor should I oppose their doing so; but I would very seriously appeal to the Home Secretary to consider, supposing the strike lasts for another month, whether it would not be wise to abstain from reenacting these Regulations at the end of August, thus showing those engaged in the coal industry that the country feels they can be trusted to behave themselves like gentlemen.

I am sure the House must have been pleased to hear the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for West Dorset (Major Colfox). It is true he said the Regulations dealing with the fixing of coal prices ought to be retained, but our chief objection to these Regulations is that those dealing with the fixing of coal prices have not been used, while the Regulations giving power to magistrates to proceed against innocent citizens, sometimes men of irreproachable character, have been put into operation in a way which even the Home Secretary would scarcely credit. I was told by my hon. Friend the Member for Hillsborough (Mr. Alexander) that only this week half-a-crown has been charged for half a cwt. of coal and the same price for half a cwt. of coke, that is, a rate of £5 a ton In the face of instances of that kind, and that is a common state of things, it is high time these Regulations for limiting or fixing prices of coal were used, but those are just the Regulations which have not been used, whereas Regulations 21 and 22 are used in an extraordinary way.

I gave the Home Secretary notice that 1 intended to deal chiefly with the operation of these Regulations in the mining area of Warwickshire. The effect of the Regulations in that area has been that the police and the magistrates seem to think they are quite absolute, that they can do almost anything they wish. The relationship of the 150,000 miners in my district and the police has been exceedingly good, and I know from my own experience the extremely difficult and delicate task which the police have sometimes to perform. With regard to intimidation I agree with what the Home Secretary has stated, and all through the strikes with which I have been connected as a responsible official I certainly have not countenanced any attempt to defend intimidation on the part of the men. We have demonstrated clearly that that is the point of view of the official, and we have always endeavoured to carry out the law properly.

I went down to Warwickshire last week where I was told the coalowners in cooperation with Fleet Street had arranged a big posh, and were trying to get the men back to work. I was rather sorry that the Home Secretary was not able to see the point of intimidation in this case, because intimidation in the Warwickshire coalfields has been the normal day to day procedure on the part of the coalowners. In that county the men have received letters to the effect that if they do not go back to work the work would not be there for them. Moreover, the police in Warwickshire have got to such a state of mind that evidently they think it is not their duty to see that the citizens carry out the law, and they consider it is their chief duty to help the coalowners to bully the men back to work. The Home Secretary seems to think that that is a very strong statement, but I think shall be able to give him some evidence on that point.

During my visit I addressed a meeting at Tamworth, which is in Staffordshire. On that side things seem to be all right, the situation was quiet and the usual relationships existed. I heard of certain incidents but I did not take much notice of them because I observed that the relations between the men and the police were perfectly normal in Staffordshire. The same day I addressed a meeting on the Warwickshire side in a small village, and hon. Members would scarcely believe the difference I found there in the relationship between the people and the police, and this was only two miles out of Staffordshire. I addressed in this small Warwickshire village a comparatively small number of men, but the inspector of police and two plain clothes men were present, and I found that that was the regular course of things, and had been for weeks past from day to day.

I do not know what the figures of police charges in connection with the stoppage are for Warwickshire, but the Home Secretary promised yesterday that he would furnish them to-day. I know that there are a large number of men who have been put into prison in Warwickshire. I met a lady whose father and her two sons were serving two months imprisonment, and there are a large number of such cases. In view of these facts I said definitely to the meeting which I addressed that I had seen such things during my visit that I was satisfied that the police inn Warwickshire were simply the pimps and tools of the coalowners of the county. I also said that I was careless as to whether I was going over the bounds or not, but I confess from what I have seen of the harassing of humble and obscure men in this county that it would be a good thing if something would happen to turn the searchlight of the Home Secretary's activities in that direction. Let me give the Home Secretary evidence that that is the opinion of other people as well as my own. The "Manchester Guardian " has a correspondent in that district, and he writes: The miners live in a hostile atmosphere. The local governing authorities, political influences, and the county are against them, and there can be no doubting the strong pressure than is being exercised against them; the police in some districts have gone exceedingly close to active participation in the work of strike breaking. If that is true how can the right hon. Gentleman say that the police are impartially carrying out the law? In yesterday's "Manchester Guardian" there appeared the following passage: Feeling is now running pretty high here, and a police official whose instructions to his men on the control of picketing are over-strict and provocative may stir up trouble. The Warwickshire miner is a mild-mannered. man in comparison with his fellows in some counties, and will not complain without good grounds. Here is an example of what I saw. The offices of the Warwickshire Miners' Association are in Tamworth, and they published about a fortnight ago a typewritten statement saying that there were so many men out on strike and so many working, and that all the statements, which had been made about a number of the men having gone back to work were not true, and the men were urged to-stand fast and so on. A highly placed police official arrived at the Warwickshire Miners' offices at Tamworth, and asked the agent if they were responsible for publishing that statement, and he said " Yes." Then the police official told the agent that it was intimidation, and against the law, but fortunately the offices were in the County of Staffordshire, and as it had been published there he could not take this necessary step to deal with it. Here is another example which has occurred this week, and this is a circular which has been issued:

May I ask whether it was true?

I shall be very pleased to tell the hon. Gentleman whether it is true or not. In the Press, which has been so very jubilant—

I do not quite see how this is relevant to the Amendment.

All 1 would say is that there is nothing in the Press about Warwickshire to-day It does not affect the legal position, Here is a circular making a simple statement, and in village after village I had absolute confirmation of the statement that the police were actually hindering its distribution on the Warwickshire side. I addressed a meeting at Nuneaton, and I saw there this leaflet distributed on every hand. The police were there, and this is the circular which they allowed to be distributed:

" MINERS OF WARWICKSHIRE!

Do you realize

That your loss is Cook's gain

that you are being used as cannon fodder

for the Red Push and to save your

Leaders' Faces?

Save your jobs instead.

Mr. Cook is an avowed Communist

Whose admitted intention is to smash British power, and create chaos in Industry.

Don't be victims.

What have you gained during the years which Cook has been misleading you?

Nothing.

What have you lost?—Everything Your Savings, Your Wages, Your Domestic Happiness.

Let Reason guide you."

That is printed by the " Chronicle " Press, Church Street, Nuneaton, and is paid for by the coalowners.

What is the objection?

The right hon. Gentleman is very quick in seeing how right that kind of thing is when it is done by the coalowners, but he will be very slow in seeing how wrong it is to suppress an infinitely more simple circular issued on the, men's side. The right hon. Gentleman is courteous as a rule, but it is very difficult to make him see the need for administering the law properly and enabling people to carry out their ordinary duties.

Does the hon. Member suggest that either of these circulars has been prohibited by the law?

Yes, I have stated so. The police in village after village in the mining area of Warwickshire have hindered the circulation of this leaflet, and have intimidated men because they have been circulated. If the right hon. Gentleman is not quite sure about that, let me give him a typical case of what has actually happened. The Warwickshire Miners' Association are asking for an inquiry into this business, and they will certainly give him abundance of detail. The police are interfering with men standing in the streets. They are, in fact, the agents of the coalowners purely and simply. A man is standing by himself—not in a group—and the policeman asks him why. I myself saw groups of policemen at every turn, and there is something wrong in that itself. The policeman asks the man standing by himself, " Are you going to work? " The man replies, " No," and the policeman asks him " Why." The man says, " That is my business," and the policeman then says, " Well, get away out of this."

There were half-a-dozen men sitting on their doorsteps. The police evidently thought they were intimidating other men, so they took them to Court under these Regulations. They could not get them under the Regulations, though certainly the Regulations cover almost everything. There is an Army Regulation which makes what is called " dumb insolence " an offence. They could not get them under the Regulations, so they went back to an early Eighteenth Century- Regulation. I can give the right hon. Gentleman the names of these men if he likes. There were three brothers and three others. One- of the men's agents say that they did not speak a word to the blacklegs as they were passing. They were sitting on their doorsteps. and one was playing a mouth-organ. They could not get them the Regulations, so they went hack to an early Eighteenth Century Regulation and they fined all six of them.

What for?

Because they were on strike.

Yes, it will be interesting to the right hon. Gentleman to hear what for. They went back to an old Act, and got them for " sitting and besetting." The right hon. Gentleman may himself understand what that means, but it is a kind of offence which the men had not heard of before. I should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman how many men there really are in prison in the Warwickshire area, and if he can tell us what proportion they are of the total number of men who have been imprisoned since the general strike. I am certain from what I have heard that there are in prison more of the few thousands of Warwickshire miners than there have been men imprisoned among the whole 150,000 miners in my own county since the general strike stopped. I would almost venture to say that since the general strike there have been as many men put into prison in Warwickshire as there have been in almost all the other mining counties put together.

That is not the worst of it. The worst is the spirit that is prevailing. Here are men, as the " Manchester Guardian " says, in a hostile area, with everything against them. When I saw them I understood something of what my owl people went through in the early part of the nineteenth century. It is common knowledge that in the County of Durham then there were strikes, there were conflicts with the police and with the military, that men went to the scaffold and were sent overseas, that the prisons were filled, and sometimes the Bishops' stables, too; but out of all that emerged leaders and men whose names are to-day revered in the County of Durham. _I began to understand something of the spirit that prevailed in Durham and other industrial districts in this country in the early 19th century. I want to say frankly that I told the people that if I were on the job where there was intimidation, I would certainly get our own people to deal with anyone guilty of it. But because of that, and knowing the type and character of the people, I do ask the right hon. Gentleman, if there has been actual individual conflict, to investigate the whole of the conditions out of which this present spirit has sprung, a spirit of retaliation, and a very bitter spirit which is bad enough in any industrial district, and certainly ought not to prevail in an old-time county like Warwickshire, where the people have had different conditions and different upbringing. I ask the right hon. Gentleman not only to take back these Regulations, which give these people absolute power, as they seem to think, but which places a few thousand miners who are in a hostile country absolutely in their hands.

I want also to ask this question. It is said in Warwickshire that coalowners are sitting upon the benches of magistrates. If that be the case, it ought not to be so. Of course, I know that there may be a Labour man or two, but they are very few. I not only ask the right hon. Gentleman to waive these Regulations, but I ask him, further, Can he not go into the whole of these cases personally? Can he not make investigation into the activities of the police in Warwickshire as compared with other parts of the country? Can he not come to the rescue, of these people, who are a minority in this area, and who are certainly a very fine type of people, and not the ordinary criminal type at all? If the right hoh. Gentleman cannot take steps to protect and succour these people, who, in the minds of all observers who have been there, have been the victims of a very bad situation as the result of these Regulations and of the social pressure—if he cannot take steps to succour and defend them, then I will tell him this: Our people are there now. We have done what we could to keep things right, and will do so. Our people will pour in there day after day and week after week, and we, with any public standing that we may have, will certainly consider it our duty to look after people of this description in order to protect them from the kind of thing which has been going on during the past fortnight.

2.0.P.M

I trust that the right hon. Gentleman will not overlook the appeal which has been made by the hon. and gallant Member for West Dorset (Major Colfox), who expressed in very clear and precise language his opinion that the time had arrived when the conditions prevailing did not justify the continuance of these Regulations; and the evidence submitted by my hon. Friend the Member for Chester-le-Street (Mr. Lawson) indicates the extent to which abuses can arise in connection with the administration of the Regulations. My hon. and learned Friend who moved this Amendment dealt-with the legal aspect of the matter, and quoted well-known cases to justify the arguments he advanced and the policy he enunciated. I will not traverse such dry, legal courses, but will call attention, if I may, to the human aspect of the dispute which gives rise to the proposals of the right. hon. Gentleman. For 13 weeks now we have seen over 1,000,000 men, who work in and about the pits, locked out. divorced from their daily occupation, and I have no doubt that, if we include their families, some 4,000,000 to 4,500,000 people are thereby affected. It is an unprecedented and unexampled period, for at the time when they were locked out, we had over 1,000,000 unemployed, and that figure has now been increased to 1,600,000. The miners are not seeking to improve their economic position; they arc—

These two Regulations refer to matters likely to cause disaffection, and what the hon. Member is now saying cannot be in order upon them.

I do not intend to proceed on that basis, of course. My idea, in making these preliminary remarks, was to indicate the nature of the dispute. It has continued for some 13 weeks, aggravated by extensive and increasing unemployment, the strangulation of our trade, and so forth, and yet the right hon. Gentleman had the greatest possible difficulty in producing any evidence to justify the action he is taking this afternoon. He comes along every month with his parrot-like cry for these Emergency Regulations, including No. 21 and No. 22, which concern the right of public meeting and the holding of processions. These powers, and especially the interference with the right of public meeting and the expression of free speech, import a new psychology into our industrial disputes. They are a measure of coercion and intimidation. They put a limit upon the recognised rights of those involved in the dispute to express their opinions. For instance, the right hon. Gentleman has made some very flagrant statements, involving serious misrepresentations, if may say so, of the position of the miners. He said that miners' leaders said " They would prefer a reduction of wages rather than a lengthening of hours, and why? Because, if the miners got less wages, they would have a better cry for raising further trouble." I cannot think of a statement more calculated to generate heat and passion.It is a direct misrepresentation of the attitude of these men. I suppose that, if one of these men who has only had an ordinary elementary school education, moved by great human impulses, seriously criticises the right hon. Gentleman and indulges in some loose kind of language, the right hon. Gentleman will himself start the machinery to work, and that man will be accused of uttering seditious statements calculated to create a state of riot, disruption and disturbance. The right hon. Gentleman seems to enjoy the advantages of a liberty which, apparently, he is unwilling to extend to other people. On the other hand, the policy of the Government in the importation of coal raises another important question which can give rise to serious criticism, and on which those involved can seriously challenge the political attitude of the Government. It is all a question of free speech and the right of public meeting. The questions I have raised are contingent matters and they arise from the political policy of the Government. They give rise to a great deal of feeling and if those involved, who are not struggling to improve their economic condition, who are simply seeking by passive resistance to maintain that which they enjoyed on 30th April, indulge in severe criticism the right hon. Gentleman invests himself with what I term a legal bludgeon to force them to shut up and maintain a silence which he at any rate has failed to observe. Though the dispute has lasted all this time, involving over a million miners and putting a growing number out of employment., it has been peaceful.

That is not seriously challenged by the right hon. Gentleman, and the figures he produced do not enable him to justify his case. There has been no indication that these people rely upon force to attain their end They are relying upon passive resistance and peaceful persuasion. There has been no attempt at the drilling of a volunteer force. There has been no question of the importation of arms, which the right hon. Gentleman knows something about. There has been little or no disorder throughout the country. It is just an ordinary normal dispute between the employers on the one hand and the coalminers on the other. If the right hon. Gentleman had followed the line that influenced him when he was Financial Secretary to the Treasury, when he was more charming and more courteous than he is now, and when he was lacking in the spirit of antagonism which he seems to generate to-day, we should secure far greater results. I trust he will accept the Amendment, and restore to us the rights and privileges of free speech, and will free the Government from the accusation that it is taking sides in this dispute. It will put the country in a better position, and enable the miners to fight a better battle, and ultimately, I hope, secure a settlement compatible with humanitarian principles and consistent with public honour.

I am sorry the hon. Member accused me of being less courteous than I used to be when I occupied the position of Financial Secretary. It may be that the position of Financial Secretary brings one less in conflict with the hon. Member and his friends than is the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary has to-day the most unpopular work of any Minister, to administer law and order, and though I have always received very great courtesy from hon. Members opposite, perhaps it is not possible for them to be quite as friendly as they were when I occupied a position which brought me less in contact with them. I endeavour to carry out my duties with as little friction as possible. It really seems to me that a great deal of the complaint against these Regulations and against my conduct, from the Leader of the Opposition down to the last speaker, is not that I have done too much but that I have done too little. He told us everything was quiet. The Leader of the Opposition quoted the figures I have given as to the very small number of cases where these Regulations have been used. If, on the other hand, the police had been provocative, if they had used these powers harshly and gone up and down the country haling men before the Benches and sending them to prison, I should have been able to give a large number of cases and to have said: " There are hundreds of cases under the Regulations and therefore I ask the House to continue them." The Leader of the Opposition himself says there is no need for them because everything is going on so well under them. Prevention is better than cure. If on the other hand I had had a large number of cases under the Regulations the accusation against me would have been that I was a, bloodthirsty person putting people into prison. The attack would have been equally great but of a different character and on different lines. I see the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Leith has come in and I hope he will support me in these refutations, because they are in accord with the views of the great Liberal party.

Does the right hon. Gentleman really intend to repeat that time-worn inaccuracy that the Coalition Government of 1918 to 1922 was a Liberal Government? It is ridiculous.

It was in essence a Liberal Government. The hon. and gallant Gentleman knows perfectly well that there was a Liberal Prime Minister, one of his numerous leaders. I think I am justified in saying not only what I have done about the Regulations from the Liberal point of view, but it is well known that the Labour party, when quite a different state of affairs existed, told the House quite definitely, when there was a trumpery little strike in the tramway world, that they would issue Regulations. [HON. MEMBERS: " They were never put into operation."] Because the strike collapsed. Here we are dealing with a strike where a million and a quarter men are involved and it has been said 4,000,000 people throughout the country are affected. This is not a small strike in a particular works. It affects the greatest industries throughout the country. The powers which were given to me two months ago I. am not using to any great extent. There has been no necessity to use them because of the excellent spirit between those who are out of work and the police authorities throughout the country. A very little difference, a very little spark may set things alight, and a different feeling may arise.The hon.Member for Chester-le-Street. (Mr. Lawson) has shown us how very quickly there may arise a difference of opinion in regard to the administration of the Regulations, and how very much more trouble may arise than has arisen. I put, it quite definitely to the House, that it is largely because of the spirit in which the Regulations have been acted upon and the known fact that they are there, that there has been so little disturbance in the coal areas throughout the country.

The hon. and learned Member for South-East Leeds (Sir H. Slesser) led the main attack upon the Regulations. He admitted that they were not ultra vires. He said at first that he thought they were outside the purview of the Act, but he admitted later that he thought they were legal. He quoted various philosophers, with whose works I am not so well acquainted as he is. He spoke of the Froudian psychology and Stoic philosophers, but I do not know what that argument had to do with his attack upon these Regulations. If he will forgive me—I am sorry that he is not here—I should like to say that there was very little in his speech. There were reasonable complaints in the speeches of the hon. Member for the Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) and the hon. Member for Chester-le-Street. The hon. Member for the Don Valley told us that there were large numbers of miners in his own county with an electric spirit in their minds, and that the police must keep the peace. It is the object of the police to keep the peace between the electric-minded miner and other sections of the community.

I think I said that in the peculiar circumstances obtaining at the moment the atmosphere would be more or less electric, and that unless the police force were local men, who understand the mentality of the people, things were likely to happen that would not happen in other circumstances.

I am dealing with the hon. Member's speech, and quoting it as an argument in favour of the action I am taking. He says that there are electric feelings about. The hon. Member for Chester-le-Street said that there was a very strong feeling among the miners in Warwickshire. I am very anxious that those strong feelings should not burst into flame at any time and create disturbances and serious effects throughout the country, and I think the very existence of these Regulations is a safeguard against that. Any man who desires not to work is entitled to adopt that attitude. He is perfectly entitled to sit with his hands folded and say that he will not work. I want to prevent that feeling, which may get more bitter as weeks go along, bursting out into any kind of attack upon, or intimidation against, those who desire to work, and who are equally entitled to do so if they desire. That is a principle and a. theory recognised by trade- unions. It is my duty to protect the man who does not want to work, who prefers to sit on his own doorstep and not work until he gets the wages to which he thinks he is entitled. He is entitled to take that course, and no attempt will be made by the Government to force a man to work. Equally, I want to be prepared, in case there may be any electric outbreak of any kind which may make difficulties between those who want to exercise their undoubted right not to work, and those who want to exercise their equally undoubted right to work.

The hon. Member for the Don Valley went on to deal with a case where a man was sentenced to three months' imprisonment for a seditious speech, under the provisions of one of these Regulations. I did not gather from the hon. Member's speech that the man was wrongly convicted. What the hon. Member complained of was that I have been enabled under these Regulations to get a man convicted of making a seditious speech, and sentenced to three months' hard labour.

What I suggested was that the speech which this person made would, under ordinary circumstances, and apart from these Regulations, not have been interpreted in the manner it has been, which has resulted in the sentence. I feel that a similar speech made in the absence of these Regulations would not even have come under the ordinary common law.

The difficulty is in attempting to say what would or would not have happened under a different set of circumstances. The hon. Member knows that speeches are made obviously of a character which may light the flame. Here is one case where. from my point of view, the Regulations were useful.

indicated dissent.

The hon. Member does not agree with me. At any rate, the Regulation enabled the police to prosecute successfully a man who was making a seditious speech. I cannot expect the hon. Member to agree with me entirely. I want to deal with a remark made by the hon. Member regarding certain magistrates. Whilst the hon. Member was speaking, the Attorney-General came in and sat beside me, and I spoke to him on the subject, I cannot believe that in any number of cases or, even in any case a man who was chairman of a bench which has convicted a certain person, would go and give evidence against the man on his appeal. I have never heard of such a thing before. The hon. Member has been good enough and courteous enough to give me a newspaper report which does seem to imply that that has taken place. I say at once that I will instantly cause inquiries to be made. I will find out what the facts are. I do not want to condemn any man unheard, nor would the hon. Member desire me to do so. I will at once take steps, as I am always prepared to do in cases where, as in this case, names and dates have been given, to inquire into the circumstances, and I will communicate with the hon. Member, as he asked me to do, in regard to what I find out.

The hon. and gallant Member for West Dorset (Major Colfox) made an appeal to me to drop these Regulations. I should always like to please my hon. and gallant Friend, but if he has listened to the tenure of my speech he will probably agree with me that it would be unwise to do so. I do not know what is going to take place in the mining areas or in one or some of them during the next month. The House of Commons will not be in Session, and I think it would be a very grave responsibility upon my shoulders if I were to say to the House that they could safely abrogate these Regulations —such as Regulations 20, 21 and 22— during the coming months. I am not so advised by my advisers that I can do so. I am not so advised by the principal Chief Constables in the districts where there are possibilities of mining troubles, and it would be a responsibility which frankly I confess I am not prepared to take. If I took that responsibility, and if in the course of the next fortnight or three weeks in some district or another grave disturbances were to take place, and if the troops had to be called in, I should never forgive myself, and I do not think the House would forgive me. Names have been mentioned during this Debate, names of ill-omen in the history of trade disputes—Tonypandy, Featherstone and other places where troops were called in. I do not wish to boast—I would rather not boast, at any rate, until all the trouble is over—but I can say as Home Secretary during all these troubles since the 1st May, during the general strike and since, it has not been necessary to call in the military, and I hope sincerely that it will not be necessary.

The hon. Member for Chester-le-Street made several charges against the police in Warwickshire. He said that the miners in that county were intimidated by the police and by the other people in that district. He said they are in a hostile area. That charge cannot be made against me. I think the miners are very unpopular. It has been assumed too much during the last few months that the miners in some of these districts are popular. I do not think the stoppage is popular with the general public at all, at any rate the hon. Member said the miners in Warwickshire were living in a hostile area. I think that is quite true. The non-miners in a community—

The right hon. Gentleman must not misinterpret what I said. I said that the Warwickshire area is composed of people of various types, and that between them the county families, the farmers and the coalowners have practically control of the police and the Bench.

I beg the hon. Member's pardon. He will see the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow. He spoke of the miners living in a hostile area, in a hostile environment.

I quoted the " Manchester Guardian."

I do not care about the "Manchester Guardian," but I do care for the hon. Member. He said he had been there, that he went down there last Saturday, and that he proposed to tell the House what he had seen with his own eyes. I am prepared to take the hon. Member's statement rather than that of an anonymous con- tributor to the "Manchester Guardian." He made a complaint that the police in this area were helping the coalowners to bully the miners into forcing them back to work, and that at the village meeting which be addressed there was one inspector and two plain clothes constables listening to his remarks. I am not at all surprised that the people of Warwickshire who are not concerned in the mining trouble were angry and annoyed that the hon. Member should go down there in order to stir up trouble. The hon. Member went down to Warwickshire in order to prevent these men going back to work, men who desired to work, and who had gone back of their own accord. He is quite entitled to make speeches in order to keep them out, but he cannot expect to be popular in Warwickshire if he does so. It does not add to his popularity in a neighbourhood like this, where the people want to see the coal stoppage settled and work resumed. The hon. Member must not complain when he makes a hostile speech if he finds .a hostile atmosphere. Quite courteously he wrote to me last night,and gave me notice that he was going to raise this question to-day. He said: I am far from satisfied with the methods of the police in the Warwickshire area and their operation under the Emergency Powers Act. As soon as I was able I got on the telephone this morning to Warwickshire, and I found that there has been no single prosecution under these Regulations in that area. There have been one or two prosecutions under the. old law.

How many?

The figures I have are three or four. I must tell the hon. Member that I think his statement is a grave exaggeration. I will get the facts. The notice he gave to me was in reference to the Emergency Regulations, and as I say there has been no single prosecution under them, no meeting has been stopped, no procession prohibited, and no conflicts with the crowds or pickets.

There have been no meetings. But half-a-dozen men could not stand about in any village.

Oh, no. That is not the case. The hon. Member wrote me a formal letter to say: I am far from satisfied with the methods of the police in Warwickshire, and their operations under the Emergency Powers Act. And we are discussing those to-day. We are not discussing the old Act of Parliament, or the ordinary acts of the police. We are discussing whether the police have done wrong, and the inference is that they are likely to do wrong if these powers are continued. So far as this particular county is concerned, where the hon. Member has been himself and given the House all those lurid details, no one has been prosecuted, no meeting stopped, and no collisions with the police.

How many people are in prison?

If the hon. Member will put down a question on that point I will endeavour to get him the information. I will send at once to Warwickshire, and get a full return of the large numbers which he has told the House to-day are in prison. It is not pleasant for me to have to press these Regulations on the House, but I have a grave responsibility to maintain law and order in such a way as to prevent conflict and bloodshed. I stand on the horns of a dilemma. If I do too little, there may be trouble: if I do too much, I am equally liable to be shot at by hon. Members opposite.

May I ask what reply the right hon. Gentleman has to the complaint that the superintendent of police stopped the distribution of a certain leaflet which was sent out on behalf of the. Warwickshire miners. He was quick enough to say that the leaflet against the Miners' Federation was quite lawful, but he did not give us any answer as to whether the other leaflet was equally lawful and why it has been suppressed. [s he going to allow the police to bully these people as they have been during the last few weeks?

No, certainly not. I believe the hon. Members' charges against the police are gravely exaggerated; I do not want to use a more forcible term than that. It is quite impossible for me at. half-past two to reply to a speech made by the hon. Member at half-past one as to what action the police took in regard to a certain leaflet. If he had given me notice of this particular point, I would have made inquiries, and if he will put down a question, I will try to get him all the) information I can before the House adjourns. I do not shirk any answer. He can put down any number of questions, and I will do my utmost to get full answers to all of them.

rose —

The hon. Gentleman warns me that there might be trouble in Warwickshire. It is the whole essence of my policy to prevent trouble. I will inquire most fully into the statements that he has made. I have already promised that I will inquire into the charges made by the hon. Member for Don Valley. The hon. Member for Chester-le-Street has made very grave charges. I do not complain that he has made them here. This is the proper place in which to make them; it is far better to make them here than at a public meeting, for here they can be dealt with. I will make the fullest inquiries into all the charges, and I will endeavour to give him a full answer on Tuesday, or on Wednesday on the Motion for the Adjournment. I ask the House to come to the conclusion that in all the circumstances of the case these Regulations during the past three months have worked well in preventing trouble. They have worked well in so much as they have not been used in many cases. The essence of a preventive Regulation is not the number of cases sent to prison, but the number of cases not sent to prison under it. As long as I have these Regulations I shall continue to administer them in—I think I may say—the friendly way in which they have been administered, subject to the complaints made by the hon. Members, into which I will inquire. If the House gives me the Regulations, the House may be satisfied that they will be used in the way in which they have been used in the past three months, namely, with the utmost endeavour to prevent trouble, and, above all, to prevent serious conflicts in the mining areas.

I wish to make a few remarks on the Home Secretary's speech. I pass over at once the smaller debating points about what other parties have done or are alleged to have done. It is not my place to defend the late Labour Government, though they never issued any such Regulations as these. There was a Proclamation made, but no Regulations were issued, and the Home Secretary cannot now say what Regulations the Labour Government would have issued. As to the Liberal Government, the allegation is so flimsy that I shall not he expected to deal with it. The particular charge against me is of no importance. The Home Secretary has a very heavy duty placed on him. He must keep public order; it is his special duty to do that. What he has to convince us of is that the introduction of these special and very objectionable powers is really necessary. There have been many trade disputes in the past in connection with coal and transport, and before the War there was a great surge of industrial trouble. Those troubles were settled without Regulations of this kind. Let us turn to Warwickshire, which the Home Secretary singled out as a place where there was an atmosphere of hostility. He says that there he has not instituted, or found it necessary to institute, a single prosecution under these Regulations. Does not that prove that the ordinary law is quite sufficient and that these emergency powers are unnecessary? The whole of his dialectical success in that matter is based on the fact that he has been able to operate under the ordinary law. I would ask the Home Secretary a question. Will he tell us exactly what is his position in regard to the institution of these prosecutions? I am not a lawyer. Is the Home Secretary responsible for instituting prosecutions under the Emergency Powers Act?

The prosecutions are, of course, in the local police court, but I have to admit responsibility in this House for the action taken under the Regulations.

I do not understand. The Home Secretary said that if he instituted many prosecutions he would be charged with acting in a violent way. Is he the person responsible for directing the police?

The police, of course, are in close touch with the Home Secretary and the Home Office. The police have to carry out their duties, and if, for instance, they want more reinforcements they have to come to me for them. The prosecutions are instituted by the police. Although, as a matter of fact, I have not issued a single prosecution, I am responsible for the action taken under these Regulations, or, perhaps, it would be more correct to say that if a great number of prosecutions had been issued I should be responsible, although they had not been issued by me. I should be taunted by the hon. and gallant Gentleman. Because a few prosecutions had taken place, it would not be the police who would suffer, but my unfortunate self.

The Home Secretary makes a boast that the fact that many prosecutions have not been instituted is a credit to himself.

I do not want to interrupt the hon. and gallant Gentleman again. I was not putting a feather in my own cap. I repeatedly stated the method by which these Regulations have been carried out. That, I think, is a satisfactory thing. All through the country, from the Home Office down to the smallest police administration, these Regulations have been administered in a friendly way, and there have been few prosecutions.

The answer seems to me to be very unsatisfactory. In effect the Home Secretary says, " Look how I have administered the Regulations! I have instituted few prosecutions. If many had been instituted I should have been blamed. My fingers itched to get the hon. Member for North Battersea."

The hon. Member for North Battersea (Mr. Saklatvala) was not prosecuted under these Regulations at all.

That is perfectly immaterial. The right hon. Gentleman does not seem to me to clear up the point as to how far the institution of these prosecutions is a judicial act on the part of someone, and how far the prosecutions are due directly or indirectly to the supervision or influence of the Home Secretary. That is the point I want to make clear. There was a great Debate in 1924, in which it was alleged that the Government had interfered with a political prosecution, and all the right hon. Gentlemen opposite rose in their places and declared that this was corrupting the fount of public justice. The Home Secretary comes here and boasts that not many prosecutions have been instituted owing to his own benevolent attitude. My own feeling is that one of the worst features of these Regulations is that they do introduce political influence into judicial proceedings [HON. MEMBERS:" No "] Certainly they do. I leave hon. Gentlemen who take the opposite view to explain it. That is how it appears to me. Let me put one further question. The right hon. Gentleman has abolished juries. In the absence of a jury to protect the interest of the accused, this House, as the great inquest of the nation, may be considered a jury. Would the right hon. Gentleman consider this request? Will he make a return, giving the words for which people have been convicted for causing sedition or disaffection? I do not think that is an unreasonable request. In such cases the newspapers merely state that a man was prosecuted for an offence under the Emergency Powers Act. I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, for the benefit of Members of the House, he would consider issuing at some suitable time a return showing in each of these prosecutions or convictions the precise words for which a conviction was obtained.

A month ago when we were discussing the continuation of the Emergency Powers Regulations, I made a statement as to the manner in which the police had deliberately provoked a disturbance in the division which I have the honour to represent. I then stated that the police had made a baton charge on a number of innocent people, injuring many, and that they had made an attack on a club and batoned a number of men inside the club. The Home Secretary then charged me with omitting to mention that the Town Clerk of Poplar and I had interviewed him in regard to this matter and that we had declined to leave with him a number of statements which had been taken from people in the district regarding the occurrence. The right hon. Gentleman then asked how it was possible for him to deal with the matter if he did not get these statements. Since then, we have prevailed upon the local authority to send in those statements. They have been sent in now for over a fortnight and are still under consideration and, in the meantime, the police are very busy interrogating people.

One of those injured by the police in the baton charge is the Rev. John Groser, who was asking the police to refrain from interfering with the people when they knocked him down. Two or three days after my previous statement in this House, two persons in a car, who were supposed to have come from Whitehall, arrived at this gentleman's house at one o'clock in the morning. They knocked him up and told him he was wanted at once at Whitehall by the Commissioner of Police and when he asked what for, they said, " We understand you have made a statement that you were injured by the police in the baton charge." He refused to go with them at that hour and they then told him that lie must be at Whitehall by 10 o'clock that morning. Luckily for him the door of his house was on a chain which he did not undo, thus preventing these men from pushing the door wide open. Instead of going to Whitehall he telephoned, and the people at Whitehall said that they knew nothing at all about the matter. [Laughter.] Hon. Members opposite who are such great upholders of the constitution and of law and order may laugh, but there is not much to laugh at in this sort of thing. Probably this was a hoax by some of the super-patriotic people who believe in law and order, so long as it suits themselves.

I want to know if the Home Secretary, having received the statements to which I have referred, will either receive a deputation upon this matter or hold an inquiry into the conduct of the police in driving through an assembly of 400 people in a lorry at the rate of 10 to 12 miles an hour and then proceeding to baton the people. That meeting had been in progress for at least three-quarters of an hour when the occurrence took place, and no complaint had been made by the inspector in charge or by any of the police. We have heard from the hon. and learned Member for Argyllshire (Mr. Macquisten) about " angels of peace," but supporters of this Government need make no references of that kind to other people. This Government have used the Army and the Navy and have also shown themselves to be " angels of peace." We have had " angels of peace " in our district, and I was surprised to hear the Home Secretary's statement as to the use of the military. We saw battalions of them being paraded in the East India Dock Road and all round the wharves, and when the convoys went up the road there were armoured cars and tanks and Lewis guns. [HON. MEMBERS: " Hear, hear! "] Hon. Members applaud that statement, but the Home Secretary would try to make them believe and make the public believe that such things did not happen. We were also blessed with a large importation of foreign police. [HON. MEMBERS: " Oh! "] They were foreign to Poplar at all events. We had foot police and horse police, and they were not satisfied with parading up and down the streets and roads, but they went across the pavements and chased people from the doors of the houses. [Laughter.] Hon. Members opposite seem to like this kind of thing, but we do not like it and we do not like paying for it.

It would be interesting to know how the police who were imported into that district got the amount of refreshments which seems to have been available. It. would be interesting to know what was the bill in our district and in Limehouse. We claim that our people were so quiet during that fortnight that the police had no eases at all. There was no disturbance; the police had not even a job or two to do, and on that particular day when the strike was declared off by the Trades Union Council, they had plenty of refreshments in at the back of Poplar Police Station, and they were well livened up to go out and charge the people. We are not prepared to submit to that kind of thing without protest, and we ask for an inquiry into the conduct of the police on that occasion.

I understand the Home Secretary has promised to make inquiry into a statement by the hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams). At the time that statement was made the evidence relating to it was not here, but I have since been at the trouble of finding the newspaper in which the report of the case appears, and I propose to read a short extract from it. This is in relation to 15 men from Armthorpe whose appeal was heard last Tuesday. I quote from the report in the " Sheffield Daily Independent " of Wednesday, 28th July: The chairman of the Bench when the men were convicted quoted from his notes of Martin's evidence"— Martin was one of the appellants. In this evidence Martin told witness and the other magistrates that they had received instructions from their council of action to stop all traffic except C.W.S. Martin said that 200 or 300 of them set out, and it was their idea to do it in a quiet manner. Ma. NEAL (Counsel for Appellants): Rather unusual for a magistrate to come and give evidence in a case in which he was chairman, is it not? WITNESS: It is the first time I have been asked to do it. I suggest that even that was not quite enough for the chairman of the magistrates because, in face of that and having his attention called to what was certainly a strange procedure, on the next day another appellant, who had also been charged in the same court at Doncaster, was given two or three months or fined £50, I am not sure which. The chairman gave evidence against this man.

Did this chairman of the bench who gave evidence, besides giving evidence, adjudicate upon the case?

No. On the appeal being heard at the Leeds Quarter Sessions he was there giving evidence against these people. He had adjudicated first, of course, but not at the Quarter Sessions. There is another question with regard to this into which I would like the Home Secretary to make inquiries. At the same Quarter Sessions Mr. Waugh, opening the case for the Crown, said he had seen a letter from the Lord Chancellor—I am reading from the " Sheffield Daily Independent ": In which lie said that any magistrate who had any pecuniary interest in the case and who sat upon the Appeal was doing an illegal act. Any magistrate who adjudicated at the Doncaster hearing was disqualified. He was instructed that magistrates who were members of the miners' branches who had contributed funds for the appeal and who were therefore interested in the case should not adjudicate in this ease. The CHAIRMAN I am sure the magistrates will appreciate what has been said. A few of the magistrates thereupon took no part in the case beyond that of spectators. It appears to me that this was directed almost entirely at members of the miners' branches. Section 103, paragraph (2) of the Coal Mines Act, 1911, reads as follows: Where proceedings are taken before a a Court of Summary Jurisdiction in respect of an offence against this Act alleged to have been committed in, or with reference to a mine, a person who is the owner, agent, or manger of any mine, or a person employed in a mine, or the father, son, or brother, or father-in-law, son-in-law, or brother-in-law, of such owner, agent, manager, or person, or who is an officer of any Association of persons so employed, or who is a check-weigher appointed under the Coal Mines Regulations Act, 1887 to 1905, or who is a director of a company which is the owner of a mine, shall not, except with the consent of both parties to the case, act as a member of the court. 3.0 P.M

I would like to ask the Home Secretary, as I am suspicious that this was directed against the members of the miners' branches, whether he could make inquiry into this case and see whether all the other persons mentioned, either mineowners, royalty owners, or other people interested in mines were asked to withdraw from the case also? Surely this Regulation relates to persons who are either directly or indirectly concerned with the management and ownership of mines, whether as shareholders or in any other capacity. If the Home Secretary can assure us on that point he will be able to dispel some of the doubts in our minds. I would like to ask him, further, who is responsible for giving the evidence or making allegations or giving information to the Lord Chancellor about Justices of the Peace who have been connected with this strike business, especially with the general strike? I had a case brought to my own notice in which a magistrate was accused of being a member of the Council of Action. It was not true and he wrote back to the Lord Chancellor to say so and apparently his answer satisfied the Lord Chancellor. I would like to ask the Home Secretary if any instructions have been given, either from the Lord Chancellor or from himself or from anyone else, that inquiries should be made as to what these Labour magistrates have been doing during the strike or during the lock-out and who the people are who have been giving evidence against them. I ask him whether he can assure us on this side of the House that the dice are not loaded against us.

Question put, "That those words be there inserted."

The House divided: Ayes, 87: Noes, 222.

I beg to move, in line 2, after "1926," to insert the words, "other than Regulation 33."

We have heard from the Horne Secretary to-day that he rather flatters himself that the quietness in the country, as he termed the good order of the community, has been brought about because he has these Regulations upon which to act, and that the people of the country have troubled themselves to read through the various Regulations. I want to ask the Home Secretary, especially seeing the hour at which we have arrived, what is the justification for keeping in operation this Regulation 33, under which any police constable may, without warrant, arrest any person who is suspected of being guilty of an offence against these Regulations. Why is it that they are placing on the shoulders of the constables throughout the country the responsibility for arresting people who are suspected, when no indication is given to them as to how they are to arrive at a conclusion? If they happen to suspect an individual, then, no matter who that individual is, they may without warrant, arrest that person. It is a sorry day for this country when a Home Secretary and a Government are prepared to make such Regulations.

Not only may the police arrest a person, but power is given to a constable to break into, by force, premises in which it is suspected that a breach of the Regulations may be committed. I remember one ease in the early days of May, when an informer—and we all know that informers have to report matters, whether true or not, in order to justify their position and retain their job—reported to Scotland Yard that a particular trade union office was being used for the purpose of drilling a reserve force. One of the higher officials of Scotland Yard attended at that, office, and was surprised when he saw the premises, and realised that there was not accommodation even for the typewriting machines which were required for the work of that trade union. This Regulation encourages the worst type there is in any country—the secret service and the informer. [An HON. MEMBER: "Like Russia!"] Yes, exactly like Russia. The secret service man and the informer are the worst type that can be found in any country.

We had an example of it during the War, when we found all types of people sending to the War Office information respecting various individuals, which afterwards proved to be untrue, though before they could prove their innocence many of the people had suffered as a result of the work of these informers. Regulation 33 enables these informers to engage still in their despicable work. For some reason the Home Office has decided that if it suspects any newspaper, or any journal of a trade union, of being about to issue some statement in connection with the miners' dispute which would be a breach of the Regulations, then if it is not a registered newspaper the police may enter by force and remove not only the paper but the machinery or parts of the machinery. In the case of a registered newspaper, the newspaper proprietors of this country, who are able to dictate too much to the Government, have a protection in the sense that a police constable may not enter its offices unless he has the permission of the Secretary of State. The friends of the Government on the newspapers have that amount of protection; but trade union journals and other papers have not the same protection.

Then we find that any machine which may be used for the purpose of communicating information may be taken, and under this Regulation the Government have allowed officials not only to seize and detain typewriting machines, but to dispose of them as they think fit. We know that in one raid typewriting machines were moved from place to place. I am sure this is the first time in the history of this country that anyone has suggested that a typewriting machine is an instrument which we need be afraid of and must seize for fear it should be responsible for a breach of the Regulations. Not only that, but a constable may search any person whom he suspects, and he may search any vehicle which be suspects is engaged upon anything which he thinks is prejudicial to public safety. Even with all the fears which we know animate the members of the Government, I think it is absurd to ask for a continuance of these Regulations. The members of the Government seem to me to go about in fear and trembling, and every night suspect that there is somebody in their bedroom of whom they seem to be afraid. [HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw!"] I am informed that there are certain members of the Government who are afraid of Communists or Bolshevists, and they are afraid at night that their homes might be invaded by these people. I ask that these Regulations should not be persisted in.

I beg to second the Amendment.

The Regulation we are discussing is one of the least defensible of the whole of these Regulations. I think we have come to a bad pass when the liberties of the people have to be placed in the keeping of police constables who have the right of arrest simply on suspicion. We have come to a bad pass when the police of Warwickshire have the right under these Regulations to search every miner to see if he has got any Russian gold in his possession. As a Member of this House I wish to protest against the right of a police constable to arrest any person if he merely suspects him, because that is opposed to the whole of the traditions connected with the British judicial system. I think it is quite wrong to give a police constable the right to arrest a person merely on suspicion.

But there is something worse so far as this particular Regulation is concerned. This Regulation was originally passed in this House because we were in the midst of a general strike. That strike ceased many weeks ago, and therefore the need for these Regulations has long since passed away. These Regulations are so antiquated that those responsible for printing them and preparing them seem to have forgotten that we have now got a Secretary of State for Scotland because they contain a provision that "The Secretary for Scotland " shall be substituted for "a Secretary of State." These Regulations were prepared 12 weeks ago. We have now a Secretary of State for Scotland, and this paragraph 5 of Regulation 33 is to-day altogether unnecessary. The whole of the Regulations are unnecessary, but this particular Regulation, if possible, is more unnecessary than any of the others, and, in the interests of British liberty and believing that no police constable ought to have the right to arrest anyone merely on suspicion, I have much pleasure in seconding the Amendment.

I did not intend to speak, but I cannot imagine that there is to be no reply.

As no new points have been made at all during the Debate, and as the only speech I could deliver has been delivered on many occasions, I thought that hon. Members, especially on a Friday afternoon, would much prefer to be busy on other occupations than listen- ing to me; but, seeing that hon. Members desire to have a speech, I will do my best to answer the one real material point which has been made by the hon. Member for Rochdale (Mr. Kelly). I think he said that there was a proviso in Regulation 33 in connection with registered newspapers. I will read that part of the proviso to him: Provided that where the alleged offence is an offence in connection with a registered newspaper, the powers conferred by this paragraph of this Regulation shall not be exercised except with the consent of a Secretary of State. I think he took exception to that paragraph, because he inferred that it was an indication, if not more than an indication, that we took these powers to protect ourselves. This is the first time that I have been given to understand that the Labour party have no registered newspapers. I thought, for example, that the "Daily Herald" was a registered newspaper. [HON. MEMBERS: "It is."] We deal with these Regulations absolutely impartially, and not only one side but both sides of the House have registered newspapers. Yet, this is a proviso which, in the hon. Member's opinion, is welcomed from our point of view. He ought to consider it equally welcome from their point of view.

You ought to have operated it against the "British Gazette."

I should be out of order if I discussed the "British Gazette," and in any case that subject has been fairly well thrashed out in previous Debates. The only reason it is necessary to retain this particular Regulation is that there may be certain ill-disposed people, not necessarily miners or people interested in this dispute, who may be inclined to stir up trouble. This is one of the most indispensable Regulations to deal with an emergency, and, although I admit that it is a great power to possess, the Government feel that they would be sacrificing too much if they had in any way to relax the powers which are given them in Regulation 33.

Has anyone ever heard British rights disposed of in such a way? [ Interruption. ] Anybody—I am not sure that he need be a constable— who considers that some person is going to do something that is not defined, can arrest him, and the hon. and gallant Gentleman says it is a Friday afternoon, and explains that this has nothing to do with the miners—

also said that, as this case has been answered so frequently before, I did not think it desirable to waste the time of the House by repeating the arguments.

The hon. and gallant Gentleman says he does not think it desirable to waste the time of the House in explaining why they should filch away one of the most valuable—

I said I did not think it desirable to waste the time of the House by repeating arguments which had been put forward before.

What argument has ever been put forward before? The Home Secretary never mentioned the matter to-day. I certainly have no desire to take up time, and our ease requires no putting, but I say that this indicates that this thing is becoming perpetual. The hon. and gallant Gentleman says that it has nothing to do with the miners' strike, but that it is because certain ill-disposed people may be inclined to do something. Then why not take the power permanently? Why not have done with all this humbug, and say that you intend to invade the privileges which people have—[ Interruption. ]

The hon. and gallant Member is misquoting me. I said during this emergency.

Ill-disposed people will be there after the emergency.

Yes, but they have not the same opportunity.

That is how the hon. and gallant Gentleman defends the putting in of these powers. Perhaps, in my sincerity and conviction, I may speak with too much excitement—[ Interruption ]—but I can assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that many people in this country, not members of the Labour party, regard with very grave concern the taking away of fundamental rights of the citizen, and especially the flippant way in which that is defended in a sentence by an underling from the Home Office. [HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw!"]

Question put, "That those words be there inserted."

The House divided: Ayes, 87; Noes, 233.

With respect to the next Amendment, which stands in the name of the hon. Member for Spennymoor (Mr. Batey)—in line 3, at the end, to add the words and to the substitution in Regulation 14, lines 1 and 16, of the word 'shall' for the word may '"— I feel rather doubtful whether it is in Order. I do not quite understand how it would read in the present Regulations. I propose to give the hon. Member the benefit of the doubt and to allow him to move the Amendment, and then to hear what the Government have to say.

I beg to move, in line 3, at the end, to add the words and to the substitution in Regulation 14, lines 1 and 16, of the word 'shall' for the word 'may,' Hon. Members on the Government benches have been complaining that they have had to deliver the same speeches to-day as on other occasions. I want to supply them with new ground for delivering a different kind of speech. Regulation 14 is a different Regulation from the other Regulations we have been discuss- I propose that the Government shall takeing. By the deletion of the word "may" and the substitution of the word "shall," possession of the coal mines. I do so for two reasons (1) in the interests of the mining community, and (2) in the interests of the country. I believe that the time is coming when the Government ought to be prepared to take possession of the coal mines, open them and work them in the interests of the miners and in the interests of the country. This dispute has been in existence for 13 weeks, and as far as the coalowners are concerned it seems that the dispute can continue for another 13 weeks. I want the Government to put an end to that, and to say to the coalowners, "If you are not going to work the coal mines, we will work them."

I beg, formally, to second the Amendment, in order to hear the reply of the Secretary for Mines.

The hon. Member for Spennymoor (Mr. Batey) asks that this Regulation which is in permissive form shall he made compulsory. The answer is a simple one. If what he wants to do were carried out, it would mean that the Government would at once and for the remainder of the period of the stoppage have to take over the whole of the mines and the working of the mines, as well as the stocks of coal. In other words, the hon. Member has found a short cut to his old friend, nationalisation. I do not complain of that. The hon. Member is thoroughly consistent. That is the one idea which he has had all the time. In the interests of the community, it is far better that certain of these Regulations should be permissive. It is advisable to impose as little hardship as possible upon the public. There are, no doubt, some instances, and it has been proved that there are some instances, in which it has been to the benefit of the country that certain stocks of coal should he taken over, that certain stocks should be held up, and that certain Regulations should be enforced, but to say that it is therefore necessary to apply compulsion and at once to act in the way suggested by the hon. Member, is to exaggerate the need.

The form in which the Regulation now stands gives the Government an appropriate way, if they think it is necessary in the interests of the country, to exercise the powers given in the Regulation, but to say that we should exercise them in every conceivable case covered by this Regulation, would be to make it very much more difficult for us to exercise efficiently the parts of the Regulations which we think are necessary in the interests of the country. It would make it much more difficult for the Government to make effective use of this Regulation and it would impose hardship where hardship need not be imposed. If the object which the hon. Member has in view, apart from the question of nationalisation, is that he wishes to help the general community, they would certainly not be assisted by this Amendment, but they would be very largely impeded.

I entirely disagree with the Secretary for Mines. Let it be remembered that this country is labouring under the great difficulty of this stoppage. We have heard over and over again that the great need of this country is to export coal, but instead of exporting we are importing it, and in the Amendment we ask that the Government shall take over the production of coal for home consumption as well as for export. I demur to the statement that this policy would result in greater hardship than is being suffered at present, because the hardship could not be greater than it is now. I trust the House will accept the Amendment and will not give any assistance to the coalowners, who desire to drive the miners into the condition they were more than 100 years ago.

The Secretary for Mines only dealt with one aspect of the Amendment, the question of the Government taking over the mines, and omitted to deal with the second point, namely, that the Board of Trade "shall" not "may," give directions as to the fixing of the price of coal. If there is one thing that the Board of Trade ought to have done, it is to fix the price of the coal. Under the old conditions the labourer at the face got 3s. a ton, and the community had to pay as much as £3 10s. and even £4 per ton. This Amendment is intended to save the general community being exploited by the coalowners in the sale of coal, and I should like to know from the right hon. Gentleman what objection there can be to the Board having definite powers to fix the price of coal and so save the community from the sharks which are exploiting them at the moment.

I am only entitled to speak again by leave of the House. The answer I gave is simple. The hon. Member talks about coal being sold at £4 and £5 per ton. If he will give me particulars I will go into every case, as I have done so far, but I cannot deal with mere vague assertions, especially as some of the cases which have been brought to my notice have not proved to be accurate. As regards the price of foreign coal, you cannot prove profiteering unless you prove the price originally paid for it and all the circumstances under which it is distributed. If the hon. Member can give me the particulars of the case in which coal has been sold at £4 I will deal with it, but the mere fact that hon. Members say it is being sold at these prices—I respect every word they say—is not of much use unless they are prepared to give me the details of the transaction from the moment the coal is purchased to its distribution. Until they have given me these particulars it is absurd for me to give any definite decision or announcement.

The right hon. Gentleman will know from the evidence I submited to the Royal Commission that I have some knowledge of the cost of coal. The Royal Commission on Coal referred to that evidence. It is strange that the Secretary for Mines should make such a reply, for I can tell him that yesterday at Twickenham, at my residence in the constituency of the Home Secretary, we had to pay for rationed coal 2s. 6d. for half a cwt. and for coke 2s. 6d. for half a cwt. In other words, that was an average of £5 a ton for a mixture of coal and coke. I make a present of that information to the right hon. Gentleman, and suggest that he might now take up the question of the control of prices.

I hold no brief for the distributors of coal, but I think it only fair that the House should take into account that until a few days ago merchants were limited to a delivery of one quarter cwt. per house per week. It is obvious that no merchant can go a considerable distance with a motor lorry or horse-drawn vehicle and deliver coal in those small quantities at the same margin of gross profit as for the delivery of a ton or larger quantity.

Question put, "That those words be there added."

The House divided: Ayes, 84; Noes, 238.

Main Question again proposed.

It being after Four of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER rose to interrupt the Business.

rose in his place, and claimed to more " That. the Question be now put."

On a point of Order. I submit that it being after four of the clock it is impossible to put the Motion.

If the hon. and gallant Member will read the Standing Order, he will see that the Closure may be moved on the interruption of Business at four o'clock.

May I submit, on a point of Order, that the words "interruption of Business" are a term of art in the Standing Order meaning eleven o'clock on four days of the week and four o'clock, as the case may be, on Friday.

"Interruption of Business" means the moment at which I say, "Order, Order!"

Does the interruption of Business not refer really to the Committee being in Committee, and coming from Committee into the House?

The interruption of Business was at the completion of the Division proceeding at four o'clock.

When in the case of interruption of Business there is only one Amendment left and time is not given to take it before the interruption, can the Main Question then be taken?

Certainly. The Question is, "That the Question be now put."

Question put, "That the Question be now put."

The House divided: Ayes, 233; Noes, 87.

Question put accordingly, That the Regulations made by His Majesty in Council under the Emergency Powers Act, 1920, by Order dated the 26th day of July, 1926, shall continue in force,

subject, however, to the provisions of Section 2 (4) of the said Act."

The House divided: Ayes, 230; Noes, 84.

Resolved, That the Regulations made by His Majesty in Council under the Emergency Powers Act, 1920, by Order dated the 26th day of July, 1926, shall continue in force, subject, however, to the provisions of Section 2 (4) of the said Act.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. S.

Adjourned at Twenty Minutes after Four o'Clock until Monday next (2nd August).