Everyone who heard or has read the Gracious Speech must have been affected by at least three things connected with it. The first thing to attract attention is the very frank and very grave statement with regard to the general depression in which we find the affairs of a great many people of this country, and one must also be astonished at the extraordinary veil which is drawn over the policy, if they have any policy, of His Majesty's Government to deal with that state of depression. We find, so far as we can find anything that suggests something in the nature of remedial measures, merely a general statement of the worst possible character. If the events that have already happened are any criterion of what. the Government intend to do, their chief occupation seems to have been to try to stabilise the conditions which have largely contributed to this economic depression by enabling the chief markets of the world to be closed against us, and to leave us without the smallest opportunity of retaliating upon those who refuse to deal with us in an ordinary way.

When one passes from this general and vague statement and comes to the programme of legislation we find, again, something which is astonishing, having regard to the grave statement which is made as to the depression. Exactly and in what way legislation which has for its object to:

"secure for the community its share in the site value of land,"

is going to reduce in the smallest degree the depression from which the country is suffering, I cannot understand. My recollection is that. on the last occasion when we had any legislation which had the object suggested in that sentence it caused such depression in the building trade that that trade was not able to recover in the smallest degree until with the assistance of the State after 1918 houses were built. Therefore, it seems to me to be rather a futile proceeding to try to repeat legislation some of which has already been repealed because it was an absolute and complete failure. The Gracious Speech also says that:

"Measures will be submitted for raising the age of compulsory school attendance."

I suppose there is an extent to which if you keep people out of the industrial market you may keep some others in slightly more constant employment, but I am very doubtful how far it is true that that is the effect of dealing with a matter in that way. I am quite certain that if in order to keen these people out of the industrial market you do two things (1) take over the natural obligations of the parent to support his own child and (2) place that burden upon the children of the rest of the community, so far from alleviating depression you will tend to increase the depression which already exists. We find a much more curious suggestion in the Gracious Speech, because it is said that:

"Measures for amending the law relating to trade disputes and trade unions will be submitted to Parliament."

I wonder whether it is thought that any Measure of that kind can be put forward as a serious contribution to the relief of our present depression. I should have thought that the less acute controversy that was raised the more likely you were to get those settled conditions which alone can be the fit surroundings in which to build up a prosperous industry. I should have thought that industrial peace was an extremely important factor. Everybody knows that whereas up to the date of the passing of the Trade Disputes Act of 1927 we had from year to year a large and increasing number of industrial days wasted in trades disputes, from the date of the passing of the Act—for some reason or other, and I think mainly because of the definite statement of the law and the obvious determination that the law should be enforced, tended to make people seek rather the lines of conciliation than of strife—we have had less time wasted in industrial disputes than in any similar period in the last 50 years. I should have thought that it was a very ill-advised proposition to interfere with that state of affairs, but one realises that there are people who from time to time remind the Front Bench opposite of some of their election statements and pledges, and I suppose that some semblance must be made of an attempt on the part of the Government to fulfil some of their pledges.

Last year this was done in a very peculiar way. If I remember rightly, instead of mentioning legislation in the Gracious Speech from the Throne the Government precluded discussion of trade disputes by introducing a. skeleton Bill before the Debate on the Address began. Vainly did this House wait the whole of last Session to see whether any flesh could be put upon the bones of the skeleton, but no attempt was made to do that. If it be the fact that to amend, or to alter as I would prefer to call it, the law as now existing in regard to trade disputes and trade unions was something vital to the industrial classes of this country. I cannot understand why during the whole of the last Session there was not a seething mass of discontent on the benches opposite. I cannot but think that most of the hon. Members opposite were very much relieved when the Government did not move the Second Reading of the Bill. [An HON. MEMBER: "Pure guesswork."] One hon. Member says that it is pure guesswork. Certainly, the House were kept guessing as to the reasons why the Government could not make an attempt to fulfil their pledges. If it was guesswork it was something for which they were responsible. There was one thing for which they were not responsible and that was that wherever one went amongst the working men or this country you found something which was a little intense, and that was an intense fear that the present Government might do something to interfere with the liberties which the working men of this country now possess.

When the Socialist party meets for its annual conference the conference serves exactly the purpose that most party con- ferences serve, in that you get an enormous amount of steam let off. The Llandudno conference was no exception to the rule. That leads me to this question, to which no satisfactory answer has yet been given: when is the Bill dealing with trade disputes and trade unions going to be introduced? I seem to have read that the right hon. Gentleman the Foreign Secretary promised the conference at Llandudno that the Bill would not only be introduced but would pass its Second Reading before Christmas. I wondered at the time whether that was a real promise or merely a method of overcoming a temporary difficulty, and I am driven rather to the second conclusion when I heard what the Prime Minister said on Tuesday last. The Prime Minister was asked very definitely as to the business which was to be done before Christmas, and he said:

"I should like the business between now and Christmas to he to as great an extent as possible in the nature of unemployment emergency measures, and there will be two Measures taken, not wholly exclusively to that end—the Education Bill, and the Bill relating to agriculture, the big one." [OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th October, 1930; Col 23, Vol. 244.]

I cannot find the Trade Disputes Bill anywhere in those two suggestions, and, therefore, it would seem that the Prime Minister either has not been informed of the pledge of one of his chief lieutenants or prefers to ignore that pledge altogether and put forward some sort of suggestion that the Government really does intend business with regard to unemployment. Perhaps we shall be informed in the course of this afternoon whether the pledge given by the Foreign Secretary was really a pledge or merely a passing statement to calm an otherwise rather inconvenient conference. If it is introduced, what is to be its nature? I read a statement the other day, which I adopt, that the man who tries to interfere or alter or subtract from any of the propositions which are laid down in the Trade Disputes Act of 1927 is treading on very dangerous and very delicate ground.

Not a bit of it.

People's ideas of delicacy differ and while of course one does not know what the promised Bill is going to contain, I should have thought that it was extremely delicate ground to interfere with a law which lays it down that a workman shall not be interfered with in his own house and in his own home—[Interruption]. At any rate, I possess that right and I want to preserve it for the working men. I am free in my own house from annoyance, and I see no reason why a working man should be subject to annoyance. But what are we going to have in the Bill? Not long ago the idea of some hon. Members opposite was that anything short of complete repeal would be so inconsistent with their election pledges that they would throw out their own Government if they did not bring in a full repeal of the Act. One has heard many statements as to what will bring the Government to the ground, and, while one did not pay much attention to some of them, yet at the same time complete repeal of the Act was one of the most important planks in the programme of the party opposite.

We have dropped repeal and now it is a Bill to amend. To amend what? Sometimes it is suggested that it is to be a Bill to amend all the sections of the Act and sometimes it is to be a Bill to amend the obnoxious sections. We have never been told what are the obnoxious sections, and one is entitled to assume that the Government have not yet been able to find out which are the obnoxious sections. It may well be because there are varying opinions on the other side of the House, that there are some people to whom one section is obnoxious and some to whom another section is obnoxious. I leave it to the Government to satisfy themselves as to what is the line of least resistance, and I have no doubt they will do so before they draw up their Bill. But let us consider the propositions of the Act of 1927. They were laid down very carefully and fully by the Attorney-General in introducing the Bill into the House of Commons. He said that the propositions were these—and no one will contradict the statement that the Act carries them out. First that—

"a general strike is illegal, and no man shall be penalised for refusing to take part in it. The second proposition is this, that intimidation is illegal, and no man shall be compelled by threats to abstain from work against his will"—

I shall be very much surprised if any hon. Member controverts that proposition.

"The third proposition is this, that no man shall be compelled to subscribe to the funds of any political party unless he so desires. The fourth and last proposition is this, that any person entering the established Civil Service must give his undivided allegiance to the State."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd May, 1027; col. 1306, Vol. 205.]

Those are the four propositions, and it seems to me that the man who tries to subtract from any one of them is indeed treading upon very delicate ground. Is he going to say that a general strike should be made legal? Is he going to say that a general strike is illegal and that a man shall be punished for refusing to do that which is illegal? Is he going to say that it is right to intimidate one's fellow men, and that a man should be compelled by intimidation to do that which he does not want to do? Is he going to say that a man should be compelled to subscribe to a political party when he does not desire so to do? Is he going to say that a man who joins the service of the public and becomes a civil servant of this country should at the same time bind himself in allegiance to those who may in fact work contrary to the employment in which he is?

That is not in the Bill.

We do not know what is in the proposed Bill. The contrary proposition is in the Act, and, if you interfere with it, you are doing something which whittles down the general proposition which says that a man in the public service shall not own allegiance to something which is contrary to the public service. So far as the earlier propositions are concerned I do not intend to waste any time upon them. I would merely point out that, apart from everything else, we are here in a very serious state of unemployment. Nobody disputes it, and everybody is thinking and thinking very seriously as to what can be done to alleviate it. I care not whether the intention of those who bring in the Bill is to legalise a general strike, or whether it is to render strikes more possible, I care not which of the two propositions it is, because I appreciate this, that there are some hon. Members opposite who, quite wrongly, have the opinion that some parts of this Act stop and prevent a strike in a legitimate trade dispute. If they have not that idea there is no necessity to intervene. I take it that some hon. Members opposite have that idea.

It does not matter which is the proposition. All that one can say is that one of the greatest authorities on strikes in this country has definitely said, with regard to such a thing as a general strike—I think he extended his language almost to every large strike—that in the end those suffer most on whose behalf it is suggested that the strike is entered into. It is quite true that in the old days you did not often hear the right hon. Gentleman who is now Secretary of State for the Dominions say that before a strike, but you always heard him say either that or something to the like effect immediately the strike was over, particularly if it was unsuccessful. In those circumstances one may realise that the truth does come out under adverse conditions. Everyone realises that any extension of trade disputes and strikes or lock-outs not only causes misery, but does interfere with the ordinary course of employment for very long periods, sometimes far longer than anyone imagined to be possible.

Then I come to the question of intimidation. Do I really understand that there is any hon. Member opposite who wants to have the right to intimidate? I notice that there is complete silence. If he does not want the right to intimidate there is not the slightest necessity to interfere with any of the Sections of the Act which prevent intimidation. Next I come to the political levy Section. I do not minimise in any way the effect of that Section. Hon. Members opposite are always in the habit of saying that they do not want to compel men to subscribe. I suppose they all say that. At least I have always noticed that there is a sharp denial if one says that they did compel men in the past. What one cannot get away from is this: I have always understood that to the magnificent management of the present Foreign Secretary was due the very strong financial position of the Socialist party.

It never was strong.

Let me put it in another way. I have always understood that it was not more lacking in strength because of the organising powers of the right hon. Gentleman who is now Foreign Secretary. That may explain, of course, why he gave that pledge and was so anxious that the Bill should be taken before Christmas, because, as I understand it, a part of the case of hon. Members opposite for altering the Section which deals with the political levy is that their funds have decreased by a very large proportion since the Act of 1927 was passed. There is only one conclusion that can be drawn from that fact. The funds have certainly decreased out of all proportion to the decrease in trade union membership, and the only inference to be drawn is that there are many people who do not want to subscribe, and therefore the funds of the Socialist party are a great deal less.

Let us ask ourselves for a moment what the law is at present. As I understand the law it is that any man who chooses to do so can subscribe to any political party to which he wishes to subscribe, but, as far as I know, no man in this country is put under the smallest compulsion to do so—[Interruption.] Art hon. Gentleman whose voice is apparently outside the House but extends into it, interrupts with the remark that it is only the lawyer who is compelled. I have been in the legal profession some 30 years and I have never found the smallest evidence of compulsion. When it does come I shall reconsider whether I can remain in the profession any longer. One thing is perfectly clear: At the present time anybody who wants to subscribe to a political party can do so. What is the necessity for the alteration of the law Those who seek to alter it can have only one desire, and that is to compel people who do not want to do so to subscribe.

There is another way of dealing with this matter. That way means that you are putting a compulsion upon the working man of this country that you would not dare to put upon any other class. One hears a great deal of "one law for the rich and another for the poor." There will be that if hon. Members alter the Trade Disputes Act. Apart from that, let us consider the one alteration which has ever been sug- gested—contracting-out instead of contracting-in. What is the effect of it? It is this: Inasmuch as a man who does not want to subscribe has to contract out, it follows, as it did follow from the law which existed before the Act of 1927, that a man who joined a trade union which had passed at some time or other a resolution in favour of a political levy, by the fact of joining the trade union became liable to pay money to one political party. It is true that he could contract out if he chose. But let us follow this out for a moment. I have noticed lately a recrudescence of suggestions of strikes to compel what is called 100 per cent. trade union membership in particular industries. I am not going to discuss the merits of that type of strike now. Hon. Members opposite apparently think that it is quite a proper form of compulsion. But this thing, I think, is clear, that almost every hon. Member opposite would support that kind of strike and compulsion. What is the effect of it? If you alter the law for contracting-in to contracting-out, directly a man goes into an industry where by reason of 100 per cent. membership he has to be a. trade union member, a condition of his earning his livelihood is that he shall, unless he contracts out and until he contracts out, be liable to subscribe to one political party.

This country has always prided itself upon the liberty of the individual either to express, or, if he chooses, not to express his political convictions in a way which is made public. The theory behind our Ballot Acts is that a man's politics are a matter for his innermost conscience, and that nobody has the right to compel him to make a declaration of his political views. Quite apart from any question of money, contracting-out, to my mind, makes a serious inroad upon the political liberty of the working classes. [HON. MEMBERS: "Non sense!"] Hon. Members say "Nonsense," but here is the position. Where there is, as there is at present, contracting-in, a man who occupies his life in industry is not under the smallest compulsion to tell anybody his opinions. I always sympathise with the man who, when he is canvassed, says, "That is my business; you get on about yours." That surely is the position now. A trade unionist to-day is under no obligation to declare himself. If he chooses to subscribe he can do so, but that is a matter for his own conscience and his own volition.

But if hon. Members opposite pass a Bill which substitutes contracting-out for contracting-in—and everybody knows that is the reason for this—and if at the same time they are able to enforce, in industry, 100 per cent. trade unionism they are then making it a condition of industry that a man should make a declaration of political faith. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Well, there is one way and one way only in which a man can avoid it if he does not happen to be a Socialist, and that is by paying money to something in which he does not believe. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] That is an inroad upon political liberty which not only in my view, but I believe in the view of the vast majority of the working men of this country is one not to be tolerated. I look forward to the time when me may have the opportunity of discussing some such Bill upon the Floor of the House. We on this side could wish for no stronger ground on which to criticise hon. Members opposite; and if they make that the gage of battle, then the majority by which we shall be returned at the next Election will not be a small one but an overwhelming one.

We from Lancashire, especially those who represent the miners of Lancashire, are not at all surprised to hear a speech like that which we have heard from the hon. and learned Member for Norwood (Sir W. Greaves-Lord). The miners of Lancashire have had trouble of various kinds from time to time and they know the hon. and learned Member as a protagonist of the employers. He has tried to tell us that there is no laudable desire for a change in the law regarding trade disputes, but I submit that the desire for a change now is just as laudable as was the desire for a change in 1927. We must remember what is supposed to have brought the Trade Disputes Act on to the Statute Book. The miners of this country were locked out. Their fellow trade unionists felt that an unfair and inhuman onslaught was being made on the miners' standard of life. They considered various ways and means in which they could help the miners. They wisely decided that, rather than see the miners' standard of life reduced any lower than it was, they would cease work in support of the miners. A few months later it was thought wise by the party then in power to take advantage of that position to introduce a Bill for the purpose of handicapping the Labour movement both industrially and politically. They said, "As it stands at present the Trade Unions Act is a help to the Labour movement. How can we so change it as to make it a handicap to that movement?" That was not very laudable.

The hon. and learned Member for Norwood says that contracting-out, as against contracting-in, cannot be justified. He knows, perhaps better than I do, because he fought my Division before the War that in 1913 the Labour movement made a bargain. They thought that a majority decision by a trade union on a ballot vote ought to decide the disposal of the union's funds, but they agreed to accept contracting-out so as to allow people, who had been defeated in the ballot vote, to take advantage of contracting-out. That understanding was reached in an endeavour to meet to some extent both extreme points of view. The hon. and learned Member says that since the Trade Disputes Act has been on the Statute Book there have been no stoppages. We have not had any wars either. But, surely it is not suggested that we have had no strikes because of the Trade Disputes Act. It is in spite of that Act, and not because of it, that there have been no strikes. The miners have never been in a position, but it is quite likely that, before long, you may find one, because there is an attempt to reduce miners' wages every month. I see no reason, however, for arguing that because of these facts no attempt ought to be made to change the Act. Our contention in the trade union movement is that. that Act was class legislation of the lowest kind, that its actuating motives were despicable and that it is most unfair to suggest that we are actuated by lower and baser motives in seeking to change the law now, than were those who brought about that change in 1927.

As regards the King's Speech in general, it has met with the fate of all King's Speeches; it has been severely criticised inside and outside the House. Portions of it please certain people and displease others. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) was very pleased with the mention of electoral reform and was very anxious to know what was meant by it and whether it would benefit his party or not. His colleague the right hon Gentleman the Member for Northern Cornwall (Sir D. Maclean) was very pleased with the Speech, provided that, alongside it, he could find a policy of economy. But when my hon. Friend the Member for West Wolverhampton (Mr. W. J. Brown) put a few pertinent questions to him as to the Departments in which the suggested economies should take place, the right hon. Gentleman was very chary about answering. When he was asked if he would exercise economy in dealing with the interest paid to the people who loaned money during the War—not the people who loaned their lives—he readily said "No." When he was asked would he suggest economies in the Ministry of Health there was no answer. When he was asked would he economise in reference to expenditure on unemployment there was no answer. There was no suggestion as to where these economies were to take place except at the expense of the Civil Service or at the expense of the unemployed people. The Leader of the Opposition could not accept anything in the Speech—not even the prayer at the end.

There is one aspect of the Speech which has been very much emphasised and yet not too much emphasised. That is the aspect relating to the Unemployment Insurance Fund. I was very interested in the point of view put forward by the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton) that it is doubtful whether it is necessary at all to have a Royal Commission. At the same time, one must be quite frank. I heard in my Division, during the Recess, complaints of what appear to be abuses, but I must, at the same time, say that, for every single complaint of people doing something which they ought not to do, I heard hundreds of complaints of others not getting what they ought to do. The answer of the right hon. Lady the Minister of Labour yesterday was very pleasing, and it was that this Commission would look into both questions—not only with regard to those who have received benefit and ought not, but those who have not received benefit and should have done so.

We are told by the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs that the Fund should be made solvent. We have no objection to that, but how is he going to do it? Does he suggest reducing the amount of relief to the unemployed, or that they should take the unemployed off the Fund altogether, or does he suggest increased contributions to the Fund? If he says that those who have run through their insurance must go off the Fund, where are they going to? Surely he will not suggest that they should then get less than those on the Fund and that they ought to get it from the local rates and not from taxation. Make the Fund solvent if you can, but whatever else you may do, provide fairly adequately for those who need help and are unemployed.

My hon. Friends below the Gangway on this side take a different point of view and criticise the King's Speech because they feel that it is not full-blooded Socialism. They think the measures outlined, if enacted, will not be real, full-blooded Socialistic measures—[An HON. MEMBER: "Full-blooded Liberalism!"] What I cannot understand about my hon. Friends below the Gangway is this: Suppose a full-blooded Socialist measure was brought forward. We know that in this House both parties opposite are opposed to full-blooded Socialism. For what purpose are we going to bring in such a measure? In order to have it rejected? I do not see that that would serve a useful purpose. Is it to show to the country that the right hon. Member for Edgbaston (Mr. Chamberlain) is not yet a Socialist, or that the right hon. Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill) may soon be a Socialist, or that my hon. Friend the member for Bridgeton still is a loyal Socialist?

Does anyone suggest that this Government can get placed on the Statute Book a real full-blooded Socialist measure now, and, if they cannot, why should they bring it forward? I have never doubted the Socialism of the Prime Minister because he has not yet brought forward a full-blooded Socialist measure. I suggest that this Government will get all the Socialism possible on the Statute Book in this Parliament, but it is a limited amount. I agree that in the King's Speech there is not much sign of Socialism, but how do we know? It is purely a matter of opinion as to whether or not there is any hope of Socialism in the Speech, because we have not yet seen any of the measures. We do not yet know what will be in the Bills, and it is unfair to charge the Government, because they feel their position as a minority Government and realise that this House has a majority opposed to Socialism, with lack of faith because they do not bring forth measures which they know will be rejected.

12 n.

I will say more. Those who sent us here do not want us to do that. I dare not go back to my division and say, "We have brought in a measure of full-blooded Socialism; we knew it would be rejected, but we brought it in to get it rejected." We have to realise that, after all, this Government is not a Government elected to put Socialism on the Statute Book. We, as individual Members, believe as earnestly as does the hon. Member for Bridgeton that the only hope for the workers is Socialism, but we think it most unfair, and we do not think it helps the Socialist movement, for my hon. Friends below the Gangway constantly to suggest that some of us have ceased to be as faithful Socialists as they are. We feel that the King's Speech is an earnest effort to improve the standard of life of the poorer classes of this country, and if the measures outlined here ever get on the Statute Book in a fairly substantial form, it will mean an improvement for the working classes of the country. Therefore, our job is to bring more happiness to the unhappy and sunshine to those who live sunless lives, and I suggest to the hon. Member for Bridgeton that, with his mighty power outside and inside, he would do far more good to those whose interests he has so much at heart if he would give his full backing to this Government, so that they might get a majority, and then he could claim that full-blooded Socialist legislation which he so much desires.

I find it very difficult to follow the last speaker, the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. G. Macdonald), because I am so much in the dark as to what his policy could be which is to bring happiness and light into the dark places. I heard him constantly and with vain repetition talking about full-blooded Socialism, and I wondered if he was not transposing the words, because I think the transposed words represent the view most people take of the matter of Socialism. I wonder what this extraordinary measure is that they could have introduced and that was going to lead to greater happiness and sunlight in sunless homes, and so on. I never expected that the people opposite would do anything but aggravate the problem of unemployment, because for a very large proportion of them it is their life's work to aggravate unemployment. None of them ever gave a working-man a job in his life, and they have often turned a working-man out of his job by a senseless and futile strike. That is pursuing their activities. They are men diligent in their business. That is part. of the occupation of quite a number of hon. Members opposite, and they do it very well. If I were at their occupation, I have no doubt that I would do it with equal zeal, but they have no knowledge of what constitutes trade or activity in getting workmen occupations.

We look at this King's Speech, and we see no remedial measures in it that are likely to affect unemployment at all. There are only two matters before this country that are of any importance at the present moment. The two sides have the same difficulty, the same problem. Taxation is one side of unemployment, and the other is unemployment itself. These hang together. You can only get employment and people busy if there is confidence, and there is very little confidence in the world just now. I think a great part of this want of confidence is due to the fact that in the centre of the world's commerce and finance there exists so large a party as that of hon. Members opposite with so little knowledge of commerce and industrial affairs except from the wage-earners' side, and whose Chancellor has definitely announced that he believes taxation is a stimulus to industry. You can get an overdose of it. You can get to the time when the camel lies down and will not rise.

How can you expect any man who has got any money to engage in any new enterprise if when it is successful the profits are taken by a Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether he be Socialist or Conservative, for the burdens that were laid on the back of the taxpayer by the last Government were extraordinarily heavy; in fact, many people think there is not so much difference between modern Governments, and there is not really, because it is the machinery of the State which has got hold of the people and exhausted them with these burdens. We politicians here are mere corks on the water for Government officials. The world-wide depression is largely due to the uneasiness and want of confidence in Britain. A man I know spoke to me of his investments which he had in all quarters of the world, hoping they would be safe here and there. But he said that in the end it all came back to Throgmorton Street, and that if there was want of confidence there the whole world smarted. The captains of industry or the men capable of developing industry are very scarce. There are very few men who are capable of starting an. enterprise and making it a success. There is always plenty of money and business, but it is almost impossible to find the men to employ the money profitably. If you discourage them so much, as modern tax-collecting Governments do, they just sit back.

There is an eminent lady who derives, nominally, an enormous income from her efforts upon the stage. She said to a. friend of mine—I have not the honour of knowing the lady myself—that she did two performances a day on the stage, and sometimes three, and that one performance and a quarter of the next was for the benefit of the Chancellor of the Exchequer; that is to say, she. worked for about seven months in the year for the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The same fate must befall an eminent Scotsman in the same occupation. Now if there is one thing you would think belonged to a person more than to anybody else it is their own voice, their capacity for singing, their own personality, and yet along comes the tax-gatherer, the super-Zaccheus, who never repents as he did, in the form of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the man who has compelled so many people to hand over part of their fortune to their family so as to escape Death Duties that he may well be described as the champion creator of Prodigal Sons. How long can this last? Imagine the preposterous result the other day of a man with a very large fortune, who, after he had paid his Income Tax, Surtax and premium to preserve his estate in the event of Death Duties, instead of having an income, having a minus quantity. I really think it is time we got a Chancellor of the Exchequer and a Treasury tax-collecting body with a sense of humour, because if they had, they would have seen the absurdity of thinking that could last very long. I know a very wealthy man who tells me that he has got a very large income on paper, but by the time he has paid all his bills and premium his deficit is £30,000 a year. [Laughter.] Hon. Members laugh, and no doubt to all but the victim it is very funny, but, of course, this is the capital that gives employment, and it is being absorbed by the tax-collector and dissipated, but not in paying the debts of the country. What else can be expected but unemployment? It is drying up the whole source of employment. You are not only taking away the psychological impulse to develop the country, but taking away the actual cash.

Who laid down the canons of taxation?

All Governments are practically becoming the enemies of the people, and, instead of, like the sheep dog, guarding the fold, they are worrying the sheep. They are taking the best fleeces and diminishing the value of the whole flock. It can last only a comparatively short time. Shortly after the present Government came into office I predicted that the figure of unemployment would be 2,000,000, and I was told that I was talking nonsense. Nobody is going to sit down and toil if the tax-collector is to come along and appropriate the lot. What is suggested in the King's Speech? Nothing in the way of relieving the burden of taxation. The Government are under the delusion that by spending money, preferably that of other people, on more social services, they will solve the present difficulty. They have not got beyond the mental atmosphere of that celebrated character in the "Heart of Midlothian" who, whenever any question arose said, "Will siller dae it?" You cannot go on increasing burdens without bringing employment to a conclusion. You see it to some extent in the Antipodes, where now the lesson is coming home, but not quite enough, judging by the elections in New South Wales, where the workingmen have got the wages up to such a high figure that they are like the Irishman who got them up so high that he could never get them paid. There is no one to employ them.

It is said that we are going to have proposals to promote increased settlement and employment on the land and large-scale farming operations. How can you do that unless you do something to protect the farmer from the dumping of the products of slave labour, and from the dear friends of hon. Gentlemen opposite, those pleasant democrats who reside in Russia? Then there is the proposal to deal with the site value of land. The hon. Member for Burslem (Mr. MacLaren) is always speaking of his single tax, but it is as futile as a tax on bachelors. It has already been tried and found wanting, for it is a piece of absurdity that you can find the valuation of a particular property which varies from day to day and from hour to hour. Then the Government are going to appoint a Royal Commission to inquire into the question of unemployment insurance, and particularly into the allegations of abuse of its provisions. I am no believer in any of the social services, and I do not believe in extending them. The National Health Insurance, which ought to be inquired into, is one of the most manifest impostures that was ever put upon a respectable population. It is based upon compulsion and the idea that, if you have less than £5 a week, you are such a fool that you cannot look after yourself, that you have not the sense to employ your own doctor, and that. you are such a knave that you cannot be trusted to pay him.

That is the principle of National Health Insurance. If you have 10s. a week more than that, however, you are a gentleman and a wise man, whereas we know perfectly well from practical experience that there are some splendid wise men and gentlemen in receipt of 30s. and £2 a week, and some terrible fools and non-gentlemen in receipt of 30s. an hour. The cash basis has nothing to do with it, but that is the class basis of this legislation. The result is that the working-man is treated, as he is always treated by the Legislature, as being something on which to experiment, and he is forced into it. I saw in the "Daily Telegraph" not long ago a letter from a doctor who bought a country panel practice. He had 12 patients in one village. One of them applied to him for a line to enable him to draw on the Fund, but, on examining him, he did not think he was ill enough, and the referee was sent for. Within a week that doctor lost 10 of the panel patients; that is to say, he was fined £5 10s. for doing his duty. If you do not give the patients liberty to choose their doctors they will get very scant attention from the medical men. I am a lawyer, and my hon. and learned Friend for South Derby (Major Pole) is also a lawyer; supposing he and I were to have two or three thousand people paying us 10s. a year for giving them legal advice when they ask for it—well, they would get it, but it would be of very little value. We would be both busy looking for the clients who would pay us 6s. 8d.

indicated dissent.

My hon. and learned Friend would not, perhaps, but I was not born in the angelic mould. I am only speaking for common human nature. I am one of those who are a little lower than the angels, but he is apparently above them. I am not so sure, if we got him in real practice, that we would not find that on examination that his wings are made of asbestos and bat shaped. The same objection applies to unemployment benefit. Many men who contribute to that do not get any benefit and resent compulsion. A friend in the shipping world told me of seafaring men coming home who, having accumulated funds on their voyages abroad, say, "We are going to get our own money out of this, for it has been deducted from us," and take a long holiday on their own funds aided by the dole. Naturally; every one bitterly resents compulsion; when you get compulsion, you destroy the moral basis of any scheme. When the trade unions ran their own unemployment funds, they were well and faithfully administered, and the system was the pride of every member. When National Insurance was introduced, it was resisted by the trade unions. If it had been linked up with the trade union movement, and trade union men had been given the administration of it, it would have been a much more humane system. It is, however, worked by Government officials, and what can you expect from them but the usual red tape and the usual formalities?

I have often had cases of men complaining to me, not of victimisation, but of the scurvy treatment they get from the Employment Exchanges. All of us who have been employers, and those who run solicitors' offices and large businesses, know how difficult it is to get a staff of clerks who will be reasonably civil to your clients. It is very difficult unless you are there; they do not care; they draw their pay, and it is only now and again that you get a man who will keep discipline. The men in the Employment Exchange offices are case-hardened and tend to look upon the people who go there as trying to get what is not theirs.

I do not propose to deal with the question of the site value of land; the community gets its share all right. It is far too technical a subject; very few Members would understand it, and it would take me much too long to go into it. The Government propose to introduce a Measure for compulsorily raising the age of school children. That is an extra-ordinarily foolish proposal, and it is perfectly well known that it is not popular, especially in the country districts, and the mere suggestion of the pauperisation of the children by giving them money is disliked. The question is put across to this side of the House: "How long do you keep your children at school?" I have no hesitation in saying that the well-to-do classes in this country are extraordinarily foolish in the way they bring up their families. They keep their sons far too long at school. There is nothing more disastrous than the fate of a young man, the son of a wealthy parent. He is sent to a public school and then to a university, and when he comes out, sometimes indeed often after his majority, he is completely unemployable. If some wealthy relatives happen to be connected with a first-class business or a big combine company, or something of that kind, they can put him in near the top, and he never has to learn the business from the foundation. He will manage to make a show, but he will always have some poor, hard-working chap, generally a Scotsman, who does the real hard work for him. That is one of the dangers of our big combinations at the present time; there is so much nepotism. It sickens the hearts of the young fellows who do the work in these businesses, those who bear and have borne the heat and burden of the day. A great deal of the failure of our big businesses and cause of their getting into financial trouble is to some extent due to these abuses. It is not done in America. There, if a man has a son or a son-in-law he makes him begin at the bottom, and if he is not good at his job he soon pensions him off. It is cheaper for the business. The Government are proposing, against the wishes of the people—[NON. MEMBERS: "No!"]—to raise the school age compulsorily. It is an entirely wrong proposal.

I remember an old Socialist who had been a teacher for very nearly half-a-century telling me that he could count on the fingers of his hands all the boys he had known to whom it was not a waste of time to give what is miscalled "higher education." It is a sheer waste of time! Mind you, that is the case in all classes—practically all classes. The number of young men I have seen in the so-called better classes—better off classes, I would say—whose lives have been absolutely wasted by keeping them at school for too long in the hope that, by some mysterious process, they would in their association with those more intelligent than themselves absorb something! It is absolutely absurd! What we really want is to get the best for the service of the community. We need the best possible intelligence and talent from every class of the community, I do not care how poor. Talent is fairly well distributed among all classes, and we want to get the best, but we shall not get it by treating all in bulk. As an old gentleman once put it to me, "What would you think of a man who sent the whole of his sheep to the show in the hope that they would get a prize?" The owner makes a selection and sends the best, and we shall be wasting the money of the ratepayers and the taxpayers in compelling all the boys and girls to stay longer at school. And why this compulsion? Why conscription? Why not make it voluntary and say, "We will reward every boy who of his own free will goes to school and engages in secondary education"? Then we should get the best, and there would be far more money available to help them to get on, because there would be funds which otherwise will be wasted.

Compulsion is a terribly bad thing. It may be all right in the case of small children, but in the main it is a very bad thing. I remember an eminent geologist in Johannesburg telling me that when there was an attempt to get all the young mining apprentices to study geology he refused to have anything to do with the proposal unless they came voluntarily. He said that one or two men in a class of 50 who were there under compulsion and against their will could destroy the morale of the whole class, just as one or two men can disturb the placidity of a meeting. [HON. MEMBERS: "Paddington!"] If we put compulsion on the children without the consent of their parents we shall render this whole business nugatory. The mass of mankind can express themselves best through the work of their hands, and not in words, but practically all our education, especially our secondary education, is mere word-spinning. That may fit a man to be a lawyer—if he is very good—or it may fit him to be a labour leader, because they do not do any really hard work, and to some extent they can fix their own remuneration, but we cannot all be lawyers or labour leaders, though there seems to be great competition in those vocations.

These proposals of the Government will add very materially to the burden of taxation and that, in turn, will bear on the question of unemployment. Then there is the proposal to pay poor little innocent boys and girls so much of the taxpayers' money weekly for going to school. It is like giving a child the reward of a spoonful of jam when he is taking some disagreeable medicine. It will set children against education. They will think that it must be something wrong and disagreeable. The real cause of education is promoted by enthusiasm and by children gladly taking to it, as they do take to it when they get the right kind of teacher, of whom there are not too many about. This is demoralising—keeping these children at home dependent on their parents at an age when it is very difficult to get anything like obedience. [Interruption.] Most of you do not know that. You would not approve of these proposals if you knew anything about the difficulty of rearing a family. Many people who take so keen an interest in education have not themselves had the education which is acquired by rearing a family, which is one of the most educative processes. They are just like childless relatives who come to stay with you and spend the week-end in advising you how to bring up your children! All the time they are very busy laying down rules—because all children are alike to them, like so many rabbits.

All this enthusiasm about education is indulged in by these cranks, and also to some extent by the teachers. I remember a young man asking me my advice about staying longer at school. I said to him, "What do you think?" He said, "I do not want to stay longer. It is just an excuse for the teachers to screw more fees out of us." That is at the bottom of all this scheme. At a meeting of teachers in Edinburgh it was stated that there were far too many unemployed teachers and that the only way to absorb them was to raise the school age, and to keep on raising it. Children are being merely used as cannon fodder for that particular profession. It is a case of the teachers first and the children second. I do not blame them for it; it is only the law of self-preservation. That was the origin of free education, so-called, or, rather, miscalled. The teacher did not like the idea of some poor, ragged little boy coming up to his desk every Monday and laying his 6d. on it. He did not think it was good enough. It made the teacher feel that he was dependent on the boy. So the teachers said, "We must get free education, we must pauperise you all, and we will thereby become Government officials." They call it free education, but it is not free education. Every time a working man goes into the grocers or the bakers he is contributing to the cost of that education, through the rates and taxes, and paying for it far more than he would do if he paid direct. We have made every shopkeeper join the brotherhood of Zaccheus—because they are all tax collectors. These proposals of the Government will only add to rates and taxes, and thus create further unemployment.

I see that the next item says something about the preservation of rural amenities. I hope that will be undertaken but at the same time I am a little uncertain about the taste that will be displayed because one generally finds that the views of the members of public bodies as to what are amenities and the ideas of those who really know what they are do not always run together. I do not know what the Measure of electoral reform will do, but I hope it will at least reduce the expenses of election. The more that item is reduced the better—and probably that will not make hon. Members opposite so keen about the political levy Bill.

Finally, there has been an alteration in the Prayer, but I am sure that it would require a prayer of very high horse-power to avail the Government in its present parlous position. I am very sorry for them, because some of them have been preaching all sorts of economic fallacies for the past 30 years. Now that they have got into office and power, because they are in power, they are finding out what a very difficult thing it is to carry on the Government. I have great sympathy with them, and it must be horrible to have their past and their promises brought up against them time after time. I sympathise with those hon. Members opposite who say, "For goodness sake do not remind us of our promises." It will be a very healthy thing for the country, and a very healthy state of mind if, as a result of the present Government having been in power, the people really come to understand that what the Member for Ince called full-blooded Socialism—which hon. Members opposite have been preaching for the last 30 years—should have the first two words modified slightly and transposed and that they should realise it is an impracticable policy. No country in the world can rely for its prosperity upon the Government doles but each country must rely upon itself, the industry and efforts of its own inhabitants. If we can get the psychology imposed on them that each man must stand up by himself, that it is not by Government multiplying officials and miscalled social services that either prosperity or happiness can be achieved—if as a result of the Socialist party being found out the nation can again find itself—then this Government will not have existed in vain.

.: I only intervene on this occasion in order to say how surprised I was that no reference has been made to the Trade Disputes Act by the hon. and learned Member who has just spoken.

To be quite frank, I had forgotten all about it.

I have always understood that there was a sort of friendly rivalry between the hon. and learned Member for Norwood (Sir W. Greaves-Lord) and the hon. Member for Argyllshire (Mr. Macquisten) as to who was the father of the Trade Disputes Act of 1927. Having regard to the fact that the hon. and learned Member for Norwood introduced the subject, I fully expected to hear the views of the hon. and learned Member for Argyllshire on the question. Complaint has been made that the King's Speech does not make it clear whether the Government intend to amend the Trade Disputes Act or whether they intend to repeal the Act in toto. I do not know what the Bill to be introduced will contain, or whether it is drafted at the present time, but I am sure that all hon. Members on this side of the House hope that the Government will go the whole hog, and seek to reestablish the position that existed prior to the passing of the Act of 1927. Three or four legal principles have been quoted which were enunciated by the Attorney-General at the time, and as it was stated that no member of the legal profession disputed their legal soundness, I would like to make one or two references to the statement which has been made that the general strike was illegal.

I 'am surprised that any lawyer who has made a study of this particular subject should come to this House and make that statement, because, if there is one subject upon which lawyers have differed to a greater extent than upon this particular question, I should very much like to know what it is. There has been very prolonged discussion on the question, and some of the most prominent lawyers in the country, men who are members and supporters of the Conservative party and the Liberal party, have stated that in their opinion the general strike, or a right to embark upon a general strike, was lawful at Common Law, and was not made unlawful until the Act of 1927 was passed. Perhaps hon. Members will allow me to remind them of what was the position prior to the general strike. Lord Moulton, one of the greatest jurists we have had in this country, said more than 20 years ago that a right to strike per se was lawful, and that the right of workmen to withhold their labour, if it is not exercised in a manner which is accompanied by breaches of contract or violence, is perfectly lawful. That does not mean that the right was restricted to a dispute between a workman and his own particular employer, because nearly 100 years ago it was laid down by Mr. Justice Erskine, in a famous State trial, that so long as the object of the strikers was lawful there is nothing in law to prevent working-men exercising their right to strike. In other words, even if the strikers objected to the policy of a particular Government, so long as there was no actual sedition or violence, the workmen were perfectly entitled to withhold their labour. That was the position 100 years ago, and the position in 1926.

Then we had the so-called general strike. I have never yet met a lawyer who has been prepared to define the term "general strike." The strike that took place in 1926 was on a large scale; it involved, I think, just over 2,000,000 men out of a total of 16,000,000 workers throughout the country. In so far as there is any authority on the legality of a general strike, we are again entitled to dispute the charge that a general strike is illegal at common law. A case was heard some years ago in which a judgment was delivered by a Liberal Lord Chancellor, Lord Loreburn, in which he said that a trade dispute was not necessarily restricted to the parties, for, he said, some are parties but many are interested; and he went on to point out that you might have a trade dispute in a colliery between the men working in that colliery and the colliery proprietor, but that, if the rest of the mining community, who might have no direct interest or concern in that particular dispute, but who as miners were interested in the welfare of their fellow miners, were called out in sympathetic strike action in support of the miners in that colliery, they were doing a perfectly legal act. Therefore, I think we are entitled to say that at any rate there is a large volume of legal opinion in this country which does not accept the statement of the law given by the learned Attorney-General of that time. On the contrary, some of the most famous lawyers in this country have gone a step further, and have definitely stated—I have the authority here in case anyone wishes to dispute my statement—their view that the general strike in this country prior to 1927 was perfectly lawful.

I may be asked, was there not an illegal act accompanying the general strike of 1926? Were not the men called out in breach of contract, and is not a breach of contract an illegal act? If the Trade Disputes Act of 1906 were not on the Statute Book, there might be something to be said in favour of that point of view, but we are entitled to rely upon the law as it was, and as it is so far as that particular Act is concerned. In Section 3 of the Act of 1906 will be found a provision that any action procuring a breach of contract is perfectly lawful so long as it is in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute. Therefore, it is a question of fact, and, in so far as it could be shown by any of the men who were on strike in 1926 that the breaches of contract with which they were charged were procured in contemplation or furtherance of the trade dispute that existed at that time between the miners and the mineowners, then any such action was given legal protection by virtue of that provision of the Act of 1906. If, then, I am asked, Why should we object to making illegal something which may have been legal prior to the general strike of 1926, but which held up the whole community, I think the answer is that it is not consistent with good government for any party to make illegal something which may have been perfectly legal before, but which has resulted in unpleasantness or hardship to the community, without seeking to deal with it by removing the causes which compel men in our community to exercise their right to strike. I should like to quote, on that point, something that was written by a very well known constitutional lawyer in this country, in which he says:

"An act which is peculiarly harmful or dangerous to the State is not ipso facto unlawful. The only legal remedy, of course, is for Parliament to alter the law. Because the general strike was exceptionally dangerous to the life of the community, it does not follow that it was illegal."

I suggest that the course which should have been adopted by the Conservative Government of that day, if they had been prepared to face up to their responsibilities as the Government, was, not to penalise the men who were exercising a legal right by making it impossible for them to exercise that right in the future, but to tackle the conditions that undoubtedly existed at that time in the mining industry, and so prevent the necessity for men going on strike.

The second point made by the hon. and learned Member for Argyllshire was with regard to intimidation. He asked those who sit on this side of the House whether we were in favour of intimidation, whether we were in favour of allowing a workman to interfere with another workman in his house or home. The hon. and learned Member knows as well as I do that the law with regard to intimidation as it existed under the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, 1875, as amended by the Trade Disputes Act, 1906, was sufficiently adequate to make it a punishable offence for any man to engage in picketing which resulted in his invading the home of a workman.

Have you ever seen a big picket peacefully picketing?

I have seen, perhaps, more pickets at work than the hon. and learned Member himself has, but I am dealing at the moment with the law. The hon. and learned Gentleman makes his living, as I do, in the law courts of this country, and any person who was affected as he insinuates would have no difficulty in procuring his services for an adequate fee. [Interruption.] Under the law as it existed prior to the passing of this Act, there was every protection for the man who was refusing to take part in a strike. Intimidation had been the subject of many cases in the courts. I have looked through the cases on this question with some care, and there are remarkably few concrete instances where it could be shown that a blackleg had been interfered with by his fellow workmen who were on strike without the facts justifying punishment by a court of law if the law had been broken.

Does not the hon. Gentleman know that in the cases where prosecutions took place, particularly in South Wales, the defence relied on in almost every case was that the man did not know that violence was in fact intimidation?

I am not going to discuss whether a particular workman knew what the law was, because I am afraid that the maxim that operates in such a case is far too old to be altered to-day, and that is that ignorance of the law is no excuse. I f a man does not know his rights under the law, that does not make the law bad. What I am arguing at the moment, however, is that the law was there—

Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that it does make it necessary to make the law clear? That is what we have done.

I should have had no objection, and I do not think that anyone on these benches would have had any objection, to making the law clear. What we object to is a change in the law, which is quite a different proposition. It is very interesting to come to this House and hear the charges hurled across the Floor by hon. Members opposite—charges of gross intimidation on the part of the working men of this country—when some of us, including the hon. and learned Members opposite, have been associated with cases, and have knowledge of cases, where a much more insidious form of intimidation has been and is to-day being practised by employers. There were, for instance, the cases of Ware ?. De Freville and Trollope v. London Building Trades Federation. We know what happened in those cases. You have rules passed by the association, and a member, if he breaks those rules, is sent a letter intimating that he has broken the rules, and that, if he does not make amends, no member of the association is allowed to trade with him; he is boycotted, intimidated, and in some cases actually ruined.

Amend that law, then?

I am sure that, if the hon. and learned Member will assist us to amend the law with regard to trade unions, we will assist him to amend the law with regard to employers.

Does not the hon. Gentleman know that in just that type of case the Court of Criminal Appeal has held that threats of the type he suggests are blackmail?

I am afraid that the hon. and learned Gentleman is not meeting my point. It had been decided that the associations were not responsible in any court of law for what they had done. There was a subsequent case which turned on an entirely different branch of the law and in which the association's representative was held guilty of blackmail, not because the association had penalised or boycotted a member of it, but because he had written on behalf of the association demanding a sum of money as a fine, an entirely different point and an entirely different form of intimidation.

indicated dissent.

The law books are in the Library and the hon. Gentleman will be able to get them. The third point he made was with reference to the political levy, and he waxed very eloquent about the hardships imposed upon the working man who did not desire to contribute to the political fund of his union, and the impression he gave me, and I imagine others, was that a member who did not desire to contribute had to make a public declaration in front of a mass meeting of his workmen and was thereby held up to public ridicule, hatred and contempt.

Will the hon. and learned Gentleman tell me one single word I said that suggested anything of the kind?

The hon. and learned Gentleman proceeded then to extol the advantages of the secret ballot, and I assume that it is a very fair interpretation of the position that he took up that the converse must have been that there was some publicity attending it. I have no desire to misrepresent his position. The OFFICIAL REPORT will be a sufficient check. The effect of what he said was that it was desirable to protect the workman against pressure on the part of his fellow workmen, and that the best method to adopt would be some form of secret ballot.

The hon. Gentleman completely mis-apprehends what I said. I said the principle behind the secret ballot was that a man's political faith was a matter for his innermost conscience and one which he need disclose to no one and, acting on the principle that has been accepted by this country, I said it was quite wrong to make it a condition of a man's employment, if he happened not to be a Socialist, that he should, unless he wanted to subscribe to a political faith that he did not believe in, make a declaration of political faith, namely a document which he signs for the purpose of contracting-out, which is open to every union official and, not only that, but is sometimes posted in clubs in order that other people may see it.

I do not know whether such documents are posted up in clubs. The hon. and learned Gentleman may have greater knowledge of clubs than I have but I know something about the machinery that operates under the 1913 Act, and I should be very surprised if he could adduce any substantial evidence showing that there is anything in the nature of a practice on the part of trade union officials of publishing the declarations made by such persons. In addition, such workmen did not make any declaration of their political faith. They merely signed a document stating that they did not desire to contribute. That is as far as it went. The hon. and learned Gentleman can hardly interpret that as a declaration of political faith. Further, if any workman was penalised, machinery is contained in the Act for putting the matter right and during the years 1913–1927, according to the return of the Registrar-General, only 40 or 50 complaints were received by him, of which number 15 were found to be substantiated, making an average of one case of hardship per year in a body of men averaging perhaps 3,000,000 to 4,000,000. There is not very much evidence yet adduced in support of any grievance so far as the political fund is concerned. We on this side are not at all perturbed at the prospect of defending the Government policy. The hon. and learned Gentleman was rather satirical at the expense of the Government when he asked why they did not introduce this all important Measure 12 months ago. Why have they waited till now? I do not imagine that that is very much of a grievance. It is never too late to mend. We have had other things to do. The hon. and learned Gentleman takes a paternal interest in the Trade Disputes Act of 1927 and it will not be very long before he will be able to maintain his position on that question. We believe the Bill is a measure of justice to the workers of the country. We believe the restrictions contained in the 1927 Act may have been very applicable and very desirable a hundred years ago when the attitude of the ruling classes was one of open hostility to the trade union movement but to-day, after the trade union movement has proved itself to be a responsible section of opinion which performed invaluable service during the Great War—and to those opposite who pride themselves on their patriotism surely that ought to make some appeal—and when it is doing the work it is doing to protect and safeguard the interest of the working classes, the least we can do is to assist it by restoring the position that existed prior to the passing of the Act.

My hon. Friend has brought back the Debate to the point at which it started, but he has addressed himself in the main to the legal aspects of the subject. I conclude that there are many other Members who would like to address the House, not merely on this but other topics, and I rise to offer only a sentence or two on questions of right and questions of equity apart from questions of law as they relate to this theme. There was an understanding and an arrangement which might be termed a settlement reached by all parties in the House in 1913, and that settlement and understanding, embodied in a Bill which passed this House without opposition and without a Division on its Third Reading, worked well until we came to the year 1926. The understanding included what we imagined was a very substantial concession to our political opponents, because we agreed that even alter a body of men had collectively settled by ballot what they should do individuals who claimed on grounds of conscience that they were disinclined to make a contribution to a political fund should be able, by formally signing a form to that effect, not to pay any contribution which had been settled by the collective action of their fellow workmen. Therefore the dissentient minorities who had a right to take part in the ballot had the right, when they found themselves outvoted, to step aside from any obligation or contribution and, as is known, many thousands of workmen exercised that right without a great deal of complaint.

Then we come to the year 1926. There was what is termed a general strike. The present Leader of the Opposition who was then the Prime Minister immediately after that strike said that those men went on strike because of their sympathy with the miners who had been locked out. It is, I think, as clear as day that if there had not been what was in the nature of a general lock-out of the miners there would not have been a general strike at all. It was not a premeditated, organised or desired industrial act on the part of the men who took part in it. I have more than once, in this House and elsewhere, put this question, that if it was right for the mineowner to lock out a million comrades, how could it be wrong for two or three million men to down tools in sympathy? Happily that strike was conducted with uniform orderliness and good temper. There were lapses, there were offences and breaches of the law, in some instances rather serious breaches of the law, for which men were severely punished and some were sent to prison, but in the main people in other countries who conduct their quarrels differently from us stood amazed at the peaceful manner in which the two sides conducted that quarrel. That, I think, was a tribute to our general national good sense in these times of very real ordeal.

Following that act, clearly the party opposite made that general strike an excuse for wounding their political opponents and inflicting upon them what they thought would be a blow almost completely disabling them from gathering the necessary political funds to fight their Parliamentary battles. But let the House remember that before there was a general strike—years before there was a general strike—repeated efforts were made by the Conservative party in this House, by speech and by other organised action, to induce their leaders to pass a law which would have inflicted that disability upon their political opponents. If the general strike required legislation to restrict the industrial action of the few, why was not the Act limited to industrial acts? Why did they want to prevent organised bodies of workmen collectively using money in that way if they desired to do so. What we said then and what we have said in other places is, that the trade unions are entitled to the same condition of collective freedom and majority right and majority rule as is enjoyed by every other organisation, and by every other body in this country. Whether it be church or chapel, whether it be Tory club or Radical institute, no matter what body it may be, all these matters are settled by the majority rule of the membership, and the trade unions ask for no more than the method and practice by which this House itself settles whatever is to be the action or law of the vast majority, indeed the whole of the people in this country.

I do not know what hon. Members may think might be the condition in our country if ever again there were a general lock-out of miners or any very large body of workmen in any one of our big national industries. My own feeling is, law or no law, that if a step of that kind be taken to inflict say reductions of wages upon great bodies of men it would be immensely difficult to prevent the sympathetic action of even larger bodies of men taking sides with those of their fellow workmen who they might conceive were the victims of the unfair action either of the State or of the employers, as the ease might be.

I can only inform the Home, without touching upon any question of detail or upon how far the Bill will go, or upon what precisely might be the best phrases and the best Clauses, that we are determined to go ahead with this task on grounds of right and equity for those whom we imagine we represent, and we do so plainly for the reason that we want to establish order and to restore within the trade unions no more than the right enjoyed by every other collection of persons in this country, the right of enforcing majority rule.

I would begin by asking the Home Secretary whether I am to understand by the concluding words of his speech that the only point with which this Bill is going to deal is the enforcement of majority rule in the trade unions in the matter of the political levy.

Certainly not. I did not imply that the Bill was to be limited to that one point alone.

The whole of the right lion. Gentleman's history and story and the whole of his arguments were addressed to that one point alone. Perhaps I should not be fair if I did not say that I knew that he was anxious not to take up too much time, but after all he was asked to say what were the points with which this Bill was going to deal? He was asked with which of the four points mentioned by my hon. and learned Friend were they going to deal, and the Home Secretary did not answer and dealt only with one particular. Perhaps I should not be far off the truth if I were to assume that the Majesty's Government have now decided to deal with the political levy point, which, obviously, is the one in which the trade unions are most directly and immediately interested from the point of view of politics, and that they have not yet made up their minds whether they will tackle any of the other difficult and more delicate problems involved in the Act of 1927. That, I think, would be a fair assumption to which to come. His Majesty's Government have wobbled for a year and a half over this question and they are wobbling still. As the Home Secretary was not explicit on this point, perhaps I may deal with the arguments of the hon. Gentleman the Member for South Cardiff (Mr. A. Henderson, junr.) who, I am sorry to say, has left the House. The hon. Member for South Cardiff—I do not know whether, owing to family connections, he knows more than most hon. Members about the probable policy of His Majesty's Government—left no doubt that the Bill is going to deal with three points—the general strike, the political levy and intimidation. He did try, and he is the only hon. Member opposite who has tried, to deal with the Act on its merits and to say why he objected to certain parts of it or to the Act as a whole. In the first place, his objection to the way in which the Act of 1927 deals with the general strike was that the workmen had previously had a lawful right to strike not only against their employers but against other parts of the community, that they had the right to strike in sympathy with other unions, that they had that legal right before the general strike and, therefore, ought not to have their legal right infringed. They have that legal right today. The hon. Member has forgotten that in order to make a general strike illegal under the Act it has not only to be actuated by purposes other than mere coercion of the employers but has also to be a strike:

"designed or calculated to coerce the Government either directly or by inflicting hardship upon the community."

I say to hon. Members opposite if you want to repeal this general strike provision of the Act of 1927, you do it solely in order to enable a combination of trade unions to strike in a manner "designed or calculated to coerce the Government." That is the only reason why you could wish to do that Therefore, the whole of the hon. Member's argument on the past law on the subject falls to the ground. When lie turned to the question of intimidation, he said that intimidation always was illegal and that there was no need for the provision of the Act of 1927. In what respect do the provisions of the Act of 1927 go beyond the Act of 1875? That, the hon. Member did not tell us. Do they go beyond the Act of 1875 or do they not? If they do go beyond that Act, is there anything in the provisions of the Act of 1927 which any hon. Member opposite does not agree ought to be prohibited? If so, which of these things which are prohibited in Section 3 of the Act do hon. Members opposite think should be prohibited in the future:

…. to attend at or near a house or place where a person resides or works or carries on business or happens to be, for the purpose of obtaining or communicating information or of persuading or inducing any person to work, or to abstain from working, if they so attend in such numbers or otherwise in such manlier as to be calculated to intimidate any person in that house or place, or to obstruct the approach thereto or egress there from, or to lead to a breach of the peace;" ….

Which of these things do hon. Members think ought to be legal? The hon. Member, replying to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Norwood (Sir W. Greaves-Lord) said that it was rather absurd to talk about the principle of the secret ballot, because a workman contracting out had only to sign a declaration which was sent to the trade union officials and was not necessarily published. Does the hon. Member think that it would be a satisfactory secret ballot for the election of Members to this House of every elector was forced to sign his voting paper at the polling station? Surely, if there is a principle behind the secret ballot it is that no man, even though he be a responsible Government official in the polling station, even though he be a responsible person employed to count the votes, should know how his neighbour has voted.

Nobody does.

Nobody does, but I do not think the hon. Member was here at the time when the hon. Member for South Cardiff was arguing that it was no infringement of the principle of secrecy about one's political convictions that one should sign a declaration and send it on to the trade union, because it was only the trade union official who saw it.

Surely, that is not the point. Whether you will have a political levy or not is one thing. Having agreed that the union should take part in a political levy, an individual wishing to contract out signs a paper. Those are two very different things.

Had the hon. Member listened to the argument of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Norwood he would have seen that the point was quite simple, namely, that if you force a man, under any conditions, to sign a declaration of his political conviction, or something implying what his political convictions, at any stage or in any way, you are bound by that act to infringe the general principle which is behind the secret ballot.

Is it the suggestion of the Noble Lord that the paper signed contains a declaration of political principle?

Of course, the hon. Member may say that the declaration which is signed simply says: "I do not want to contribute to the levy."

That is all that it does say.

The hon. Member's point is, that that is all that it does say and that, of course, no trade union official and no one else would presume that such a declaration was a declaration that the trade union member in question belonged to the Liberal party or the Conservative party; nobody would draw that conclusion. That is the hon. Member's assumption. I will leave him with that happy conviction, and pass on. The upshot of the speech of the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. G. Macdonald) and the upshot of the speech of the Home Secretary and of the speech of the hon. Member for South Cardiff was this: "Do not let us trouble; it is not worth while. We are not dealing with this thing on the merits of the Act of 1927 but because of the circumstances in which the Act of 1927 was passed. We feel sore about it. We think, apart from its actual provisions, that the motive of the Act was an attempt to get back at the trades unions or the Labour party. [HON. MEMBERS: "Quite right."] For that reason, because we feel sore, now that we have power over the government of this country we are going to reverse that Act, quite apart from the merits of it." That is the driving force behind the demand for the repeal of this Act, or the modification of it. That is a very natural and very human feeling, but is it the way in which His Majesty's Government ought to approach any measure of public policy? Should they say: "Let us put the clock back and let us wipe out the thing that makes us feel sore. Do not let us trouble about the merits of the Act itself."

I should like to go rather over the head of the debate, as it were, and to ask hon. Members to consider this question from a rather different point of view. We have had two or three remarkable appeals from the back benches during the last few days in speeches by the hon. Member for Smethwick (Sir O. Mosley), the hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. O. Stanley) and the hon. Member for Central Nottingham (Mr. O'Connor), appeals to think of policies which may cut across party lines, appeals that we should deal with the situation of appalling industrial depression and national danger which faces us, wipe out of our minds party prejudices and sit down irrespective of party to consider measures for national salvation; and have the courage to enforce those measures. Might I reinforce those appeals from the Front Bench. There is very little facing up to the realities of the present and the dangers of the future about a policy which merely wants to pay the other fellow out for something he may have done in the past, and, after all, the whole question of trade union policy and organisation which is involved is a problem which especially needs to be considered at the present moment in relation to the national danger without prejudice, with fresh eyes and with a determination to do what the State and the nation requires.

It is very difficult for anyone on these benches to speak about trade union organisation and policies. Hon. Members opposite always feel that we on these benches have vested interests of various kinds in land or capital which make it quite impossible for us to consider with an open mind the difficult problems of national policy which might affect some vested interest. We on these benches feel that it is sometimes difficult for hon. Members opposite to speak about trade union policy because so large a proportion of hon. Members opposite have grown up in the trade union movement, have risen as officials of these unions and have become tied up in the administrative system which they have evolved that they are unable to realise the defects and the anachronisms of the organisation to which they belong. I hope hon. Members opposite will forgive me, and will listen to me, if I suggest to them some points about trade union organisation which really have to be faced and which can never be dealt with by fiddling away at this old question of the Trade Disputes Act and the political levy. What has been the history of the trade union movement? It grew up in a period of this nation when the birth rate was steeply increasing, when there were continuous waves of new labour coming upon industry, and when, consequently, it was of supreme importance to protect the body of workers from new competition coming in from generation after generation outside. Whilst trade unionists in their origin recognised as their primary interest the duty of keeping wages up as high as possible this continuous competition of each new generation in the labour market forced them increasingly to look away a little from the problem of high wages and turn their attention to the problem of security of employment.

Hence there arose two well-marked trade union policies. One was the great old policy of "Keep the boys back," a policy which was largely responsible for successive improvements in educational administration in this country, and which in those days was a perfectly sound policy. The other great policy was to build up all that system of demarcation, the object of which was so far as possible to keep men who were in a. particular line of work and protect them from the competition of new workers from outside. Around these efforts have been built up a whole elaborate system of trade union rules, so elaborate that in a good many the trade union officials themselves do not for a moment defend the rules as economic or efficient at the present day. Just as the administrator in pre-revolutionary France, Turgot, was so tied up in his bureaucratic entanglements that he dare not pull any thread for fear that everything would come away in his hands, so in some trade unions, notably the building industry, the trade union officials would be only too glad to sweep away a great deal of this hampering tackle if they could feel that the employers would meet them and would not take an improper advantage of any concession which the workers might make.

Can the right hon. Member cite a rule to which he refers?

I do not think the hon. and learned Member should ask me to prolong my speech at this hour by going into details on a question with which everyone is familiar. If the hon. and learned Member is living under the comfortable delusion that there is no rule enforced by any trade union in any industry which injures efficient production, let him go to the building industry and ask any trade union official, let him compare the English building industry with the American building industry, and answer his own question.

On account of the allegations of the Noble Lord I made exact inquiries of the building trade and I find no such rules in existence.

The hon. and learned Member must really not make sweeping statements of that kind. No trade unionist will agree with him. If this be the position, and I do not think anyone will deny that there is a good deal of truth in it, what is the position at the present moment? You no longer have the increasing competition from the rising generation. You have a falling birth rate. The unemployment you have at the present time is not the unemployment of too much competition for the same job but unemployment due to the restrictive effect on industry of a lot of old customs, many of them customs of the management and many of them customs of the trade unions in the organisation of labour. In these days you must speed up if you are to have cheaper and more efficient production.

Surely the question that we ought to be considering is this: There has been a- kind of concordat between American employers and American trade unionists, and that concordat has broadly followed this principle—that there should be no restriction by management or trade unions on the most efficient possible employment of labour, except restrictions based upon considerations of health. The effect of that policy has certainly been that wages in the American industries concerned have risen much further and more quickly' than would have been possible if the old restrictive rules of management and trade union had remained. Does anyone doubt that if trade unions in this country generally were to meet employers in that spirit, and were to make a bargain for higher wages in return for a reconsideration of the whole nexus and system of trade union rules and administration, there is hardly an intelligent employer in the country who would not be prepared greatly to raise wages in order to get rid of hampering rules which now interfere with production? I know many employers who would be prepared to pay almost anything to get a bargain of that kind.

I quite recognise that hon. Members opposite who have passed their lives in the trade union movement know a great deal more about the question than I do, and I appreciate that their inclination would be to make a sweeping denial of everything that I have said. They would say that there is nothing like this in the trade union movement, just as some hon. Members on this side are accustomed to dismiss with the most cheerful sneer anything that any hon. Member opposite may say about agriculture or the land, on the assumption that he cannot possibly know anything about it. I would appeal to hon. Members opposite not to treat what I have said as in any sense hostile to the trade union movement or any of the rules that I have criticised. But it is true, it must be true, if all trade unions were managed by archangels it would be true, that where you get such a profound change in the whole industrial economy of the country as has taken place in the past few years, when the whole nature of the population, when the birth rate and the death rate are so fundamentally changed, it is inevitable that great and cumbrous and highly organised administrative bodies like the trade unions must in a measure lag behind the necessities and realities of the situation, just as every Government Department and the whole system of our law tends to lag behind.

I appeal to hon. Members of all parties. Why at this moment of national emergency should we waste our time over the recriminations to which all that this proposal about the Trade Disputes Act will lead? No one is prepared to discuss the thing on its merits; it is all historical grievance. The whole debate on the subject, strong as I believe our case is and glad as I should be for party reasons to fight the thing out on the Floor of the House—the whole effect of the debate would be to divert employer and trade union from the real issues of the moment and to direct them back to the happenings of four years ago which, in spite of anything that hon. Members opposite may say for debating purposes, were events which all of them believe to be put irrevocably in the past. Then why go back? The really grave and urgent problems which face you are of a truly different character, and their solution can only be hindered by fighting over again in a childish way those old battles.

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

"But humbly regret that the Speech from the Throne contains no proposals making for Socialist reorganisation of industry, agriculture, banking, and the import and export trades, and for the fairer distribution of the national income."

Every hon. Member will feel that, having regard to the fact that the trade disputes question is to come up later in the shape of a legislative proposal, the discussion of the subject to-day has been exhaustive enough, and that it is time for a change. In the belief of those of us who are associated with the Amendment the position of the country to-day is not in any way met by the proposals foreshadowed in the King's Speech. There are no fewer than 2,250,000 unemployed persons in this country. I can recall the time when the million figure was reached and the situation was considered to be very serious. The situation to-day resembles that in the latter part of the eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth century. A great industrial revolution is taking place similar in character to that which took place in the period mentioned. In those circumstances, it appears to be essential that the House should consider measures of far-reaching importance specially designed not only to deal with the industrial situation in the remote future and to deal with unemployment in the immediate present, but during the transition to another industrial and social order to do away with the hardships and relieve the miseries of the people.

I repeat, that we do not feel that the Measures which are foreshadowed in the King's Speech are calculated to meet the situation. The leading feature in the King's Speech, if I read it aright, is the affirmation of intention of the Government to go forward with the rationalisation of industry. I am not going to argue that the rationalisation of industry can he prevented or ought to be prevented. When there are new methods of organisation, and new scientific appliances which can be employed in the production of the necessaries and the luxuries of life, those new methods and appliances, of course, will inevitably be brought into play. But I most respectfully submit to the Government that it is not the special business of a Labour Government to carry through rationalisation under capitalism, except on such terms and within such lines as make it perfectly certain that, whatever assistance may be given in one shape or another to capitalist concerns and to branches of industry, shall be of a nature which will, in the words of the Amendment, "make for Socialist reorganisation of industry"

The inevitable result of rationalisation in any event must be saving of labour. If rationalisation were taking place under the social order in which we believe, the problem of course would be easy because all we would need to do would be to share out the work and give more leisure and a better standard of living hi order that everybody might share the advantage. But if, under capitalism, capitalists carry out this reorganisation which we have called rationalisation, they are under no obligation to do any such thing. The reorganisation which they carry out is for the cheapening of production, for the saving of labour costs, and, in many instances, for securing the control of the market in order to get the utmost possible price for their goods. No consideration for the workers enters into that reorganisation, and what we are now facing is the most pathetic spectacle that any hon. Member could possibly contemplate. Men and women who have worked in the same establishment, in skilled employment, for 20 and 30, aye and 40 years, are thrown on the unemployment scrap heap with no hope or expectation of ever being employed again at the only craft or job they have ever worked at in their lives. We have a right to expect the Labour Government, in so far as it assists industry under capitalism to reorganise itself, in so far as it assists what is now described as rationalisation, to do so not only on plans that will ultimately help towards the Socialist State, but on plans that will give the nation a share in return for whatever is invested and whatever costs there may be. One would expect after the years of consideration given to the programme for the last Election that such proposals as the control and direction of raw materials might have formed part of the Government's policy.

We are not asking in this Amendment as the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. G. Macdonald) seemed to indicate that a minority Government should propose measures of full-blooded Socialism. We are asking, and we have a right to expect, that those proposals which took such a prominent place in the election controversies should be put forward here in the House of Commons. If the Government created the necessary machinery for doing so, these proposals might be put forward in circumstances which would enable Members of every party to contribute to the discussion of them, to make their own propositions for what they are worth, and to have those propositions considered. I believe in the sharing of responsibility which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) advocated in his speech. I think it would be a good thing but if it should be that what he meant was merely consultations behind the Speaker's Chair, then those consultations may be called Councils of State or by any other fancy or imaginative name, but they are not consultations in which the rank and file of all parties can put in their suggestions as they should be able to do.

My point is that irrespective of whether a majority could be got in the House of Commons or not, proposals advocated at the Election such as the proposal for the control of finance and banking, and others should have been placed before the House for consideration. In my opinion and in my judgment those proposals ought to have been placed before the House in order to seek approval for them, if possible. I feel that it is almost unnecessary to say—but for the purpose of making my case clear I must do so—that the rationalisation that is now- in progress inevitably means more unemployment, and more unemployment means in its turn greater difficulty in keeping up wage standards. We have had tragic proof of that fact within the last few years. The miners carried through for seven months a tragic struggle to maintain the very inadequate and miserable standard of life which they had previously secured, and if there is a section of industrial workers in this country who are entitled to good wages, short hours, and good conditions, it is the miners. We, on these benches, owe a very great debt of gratitude to the miners for their political consciousness, for their industrial solidarity, for their courage in carrying through industrial conflicts, but with all their power, with all their loyalty to each other, they were beaten. However readily young men in plus fours will mount tramway platforms and punch tramway tickets, young men in plus fours "don't go down the mine, daddy."

2.0 p.m.

The reservoir of unemployed labour inevitably has the effect of weakening the power of the workers to maintain their standard of life. Capitalism has no hesitation in taking advantage of that fact, and with every increase in the unemployment figures and the consequent impoverishment of those who are unemployed, whether they are in receipt of unemployment benefit or not, and with every reduction in the incomes of the working class, there is a decrease in purchasing power, which in itself again further depresses trade and industry and increases unemployment. Since 1920 wages have fallen £700,000,000 a year. That means £700,000,000 a year less purchasing power for that section of the population which, above all others, spends the bulk of its money, and must inevitably do so, on necessary things; and that either directly or indirectly concerns the staple industries of the country. Four-fifths of the income of the working class household is spent on necessary things. It is useless to expect that, unless there is some very material and substantial change in the world situation, our export trade will ever be what it was. There are districts in the particular part of the country from which I come, and other districts too, as for instance, Lancashire, which for a generation and more have been exporting machinery to different foreign lands that we used to supply with our textile goods. That machinery was not bought for ornament, but for use, and in India, China, and Japan machinery that was sent from this country is now in use. I have no com- plaint of that, hut it is a practical difficulty. Then we have to consider this perfectly evident fact, concerning countries where raw materials are produced in great profusion, Members of any party may say what they like about reciprocity, about trading with the Colonies, and so on, but the Australian population, for example, will not consent permanently to send over the ocean its raw wool, to be spun and woven and sent back again with all the profits on it. They are intending to make their own.

It is therefore the home market that is above all important for us in our present situation. That home market depends chiefly on the well-being of the working class population, on the workers having money to spend, on the workers being able to use the commodities that we can produce in such profusion. These factors are vital, and any measures that we can take to distribute the national income, we should take. We are sometimes told by our "intelligentsia" that in planning for the redistribution of income we are only carrying out a policy of charity, which is not Socialism. Socialism, they say, is nationalisation of the means of production and exchange. That is only a part. It is an essential part of Socialism that in the end—and it is bound to take time—there should be nationalised industries organised under national control and national ownership, to increase the amount produced, as it is possible under such a system vastly to increase the national product. But it is equally an important part of Socialism that the product already in existence and future increases in the product should be equally distributed among the population. This part of Socialism finds no real expression in the King's Speech.

Of course, it may be said that there is mention of taxation of land values, beginning with a Valuation Bill, a very important proposal; but a Valuation Bill will be fought very keenly, and, when passed, there will be the delay of assessing and all the rest of it before bringing it into operation. While it is all very well to find out the value of land and how much unearned increment is going into the pockets of landlords who have never created it, there is no uncertainty whatever about the forms of unearned increment not difinitely associated with land. The Government know full well that there are 98,000 per- sons in this country who pay Super-tax whose combined income amounts to £536,000,000 a year. The Government know full well that eight members of one family died within a comparatively short period of years possessing at the time of their death £19,000,000, and in another case six persons died possessing £28,000,000. The Government know perfectly well that in France there has been something in the nature of a capital levy, the nation having said to its debtors, both individual and national, "What is it you owe? Do you owe 10d.? Write down 2d. Do you owe £10,000,000? Write down £2,000,000." In this country, under the guidance of bankers, we have gone exactly in the opposite direction. Money was lent at the time when the sovereign was worth from 8s. 6d. to 15s. and, under the direction and advice of bankers and financiers, those pounds have been converted into the equivalent of gold sovereigns, and huge sums of unearned income have passed into the possession of these people. Now that we have decreed that gold shall be our measure, and that whatever the lenders of money possess in bank balances or elsewhere shall be converted into the equivalent of gold, France and America hoard up gold, which again increases the value to the rentier class.

The Government know all that, and yet in the King's Speech the only substantial indication of an intention to extend the spending power of the working class is the suggestion of land valuation leading to taxation of land. At the General Election proposals were made for the purpose of approaching the unemployment problem by increasing the spending power of the working class. We promised increased pensions to the aged workers. We promised work or maintenance of at least 20s. per man., 10s. for a dependant wife and 5s. for each dependant child. We promised the restoration of the Wheatley subsidy in order to give further support to house building. The effect of equalisation and re-distribution of income is well known to members of the Government. The economic effect of taxing the rich for the benefit of the poor is well known to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In 1922 and 1923 reductions of Income Tax were proposed, and in the Budget of 1925 a further reduc- tion was proposed. All those reductions were opposed officially by the Labour party on the Front Bench, and the theories that I have been endeavouring to advocate this afternoon of increasing the spending power of the working class, tapping the superabundant wealth of the rich in order to create more spending power for the poor, were well expressed in a speech, an extract from which I venture to read, by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 14th May, 1923. He said:

"A vast amount of employment we have to-day is of no special trade or commercial advantage whatever. It is parasitic on the community. It is a drain on the industry of the country, and where you have, as you have in this country, a large class of people with an enormous spending power, you thereby give encouragement to the development of pernicious employment which withdraws labour from useful work. Perhaps the strongest argument that can ho advanced, apart, of course, from the necessity of raising revenue to meet unavoidable expenditure, in favour of using taxation as an instrument of social reform, is that by it you can lessen the spending power of the rich and transfer it to those whose reasonable needs are unsatisfied, and it is only in that way that you can really encourage trade and industry, and thereby increase the volume of employment."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 14th May, 1923; col. 85, Vol. 164.]

That is our case. To put the matter by means of a homely simile, an increase of wealth in a country is like manure. If it is all heaped up in the wrong place, it is a pernicious nuisance, but, if it is spread and distributed, it is a fruitful source of new and better life. We did look for some definite attempt to indicate large measures of far-reaching effect to deal with the tremendous problem of unemployment. We did expect that that form of taxation which the Chancellor has shown could be used to increase employment by increasing spending power, would have been proposed and used to its fullest effect in the present situation. A sum of £135,000,000 a year has been given by three Budgets in the relief of taxation to the Income Tax and Super-tax payers, and on top of that there is de-rating. Surely it is time to get some of it back. It is not sufficient merely to say that you will prepare a valuation in order that, when the roll is prepared and all the necessary assessments are made, you can get something back from the land. Landlords are not the only parasites. Socialism is against them all, and it is time that the Government ceased to let this party engage its attention in merely ploughing the sands, and enabled the party to put its hand to really serious far-reaching changes in our present social and industrial system.

I beg to second the Amendment.

During the Debate on the Address, a large number of speeches have been devoted to unemployment, and on Monday and Tuesday we revert to that subject. This Amendment contains no specific reference to unemployment, but it embodies the policy which we claim can alone substantially contribute to the solution of that problem. In our view the problem of unemployment cannot be separated from the general problem of poverty. You may have your schemes of public works, you may seek to extend your export trade, but the causes of unemployment and poverty are the same. They lie in the capitalist system, and any effective treatment of unemployment must be by a policy which seeks to substitute the new system of Socialism for that of capitalism. That system of Socialism embodies both the principles which are expressed in this Amendment. The first is that it requires a. reorganisation of industry, finance and of trade so that public ownership and public control are embodied in it. The second and equally important principle is that the wealth in the community should be fairly distributed among the community. With that second principle I want to begin.

There can only be any substantial absorption of the unemployed if there is a raising of the purchasing power of the masses of the people. There are raw materials enough for industry; the industrial equipment is adequate; there is labour sufficient. The reason why the wheels are not turning and why goods are not being produced, is the fact that there is not purchasing power among the mass of the people to make a demand upon that labour, upon that industry and upon those raw materials. Unless Government policy succeeds in raising the purchasing power of our people, it may endeavour to secure unemployment policies in this direction and that, but it will make no substantial impression upon the number of the unemployed. At the present time, the effect of the policy of the Government is not to increase the purchasing power of our people, and its failure to pursue policies in that direction is enabling the employing class actually to reduce purchasing power, During the last few months there has been reduction in wages in the textile industry in Lancashire, in the woollen industry in Yorkshire, among the jute workers and among the building operatives, and now the miners and railwaymen are faced with a struggle against reductions of wages. Even the Government has imposed a reduction of wages upon the Civil Service.

Therefore, the whole tendency of economic policy to-day is by reductions of the purchasing power of the people actually to increase unemployment at greater rapidity than the policies of the Government are able to absorb the unemployed. We had a speech from the President of the Board of Trade the other day in which he stated that during the last 10 years national income of this country had remained stable at £4,000,000,000, but that during the same period 10,000,000 workers had suffered a reduction of £700,000,000. If that economic tendency is to continue the number of the unemployed is bound to increase, because the essential factor in absorbing the unemployed, an increase of massed purchasing power, will be missing. In addition to that general tendency, there is, as has been pointed out by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Bradford (Mr. Jowett), the aggravation of the process of rationalisation. I will put it in a sentence. Rationalisation means mass production. If you have massed production without massed consumption you are bound to have massed unemployment. Therefore, the additional fact of rationalisation makes it absolutely necessary that the House should follow a policy which is seeking to increase massed purchasing power, so that the power to consume may keep abreast of the power to produce. That, and a policy of shorter working hours, is the only method by which that aggravation of unemployment can be met.

We suggest in this Amendment that it should be the aim of the Government to lay down a minimum standard of civilised existence below which it should be impossible for our people to fall, and we think that our Government should take the initiative by seeing that the victims of our capitalist system, the unemployed, the aged left in penury, the widows and the sick, should have their undeserved destitution wiped out. The nation should recognise its duty to them by seeing that they have a decent standard of existence. In addition to that, it is the duty of the community, if it is to regard itself as civilised, to say, "The workers who are rendering a service to the community shall be guaranteed at least a living wage in return for their service." It is a principle of elementary decency that the man who is providing us with coal for our firesides and our industries, providing our clothes and providing our food, should be paid a living wage before we should be prepared to accept the things he is providing for us. No nation can regard itself as civilised unless it has laid down such a standard.

I would like to see this nation leading the nations of the world in applying that civilised standard. We have led the nations of the world in political democracy. Why cannot we lead them in a minimum standard of civilised existence? I admit that if we are to pursue such a policy we must meet the difficulty of foreign competition, and I endorse what was said from these benches by the hon. Member for Smethwick (Sir O. Mosley), that we must begin to treat these problems according to the needs of this time and not according to the philosophies of the pre-War period or the middle of the last century. We do not believe that either Tariffs or Free Trade are adequate to deal with the problem of foreign competition. If it be true that an increase of purchasing power is the essential thing, we say that tariffs, so far from securing that, are likely to decrease purchasing power. They have the effect of building a wall around this nation, and the employers of another country, in order to get their goods over the wall, reduce the wages of their workers, and in our own country our own employers retort by reducing wages here in order to meet that foreign competition. In addition to that, the increased prices which result have the effect of lowering purchasing power. But if Tariffs are no solution of the problem we take the view also that Free Trade is no solution. In our view, the only difference between Free Trade and Tariffs is that one represents a free fight and the other represents an organised fight. We do not desire a fight between nations at all. We desire the co-ordination of international trade through an international authority, so that world supplies are distributed according to world needs.

While that policy is being pursued we must be organising our foreign trade, and therefore we make the proposal of export boards and import boards, which shall have the power to protect the standard of civilised existence we set up, which shall have the power to buy in bulk, to watch an industry and to see that the standards we lay down as our minimum here are not interfered with by sweated and unfair competition from abroad. That is our answer both to Tariffs and Free Trade.

Lastly, we urge that if there is to be any solution of the problem of unemployment there must be a frontal attack upon our capitalist system. I want to repeat the question which was put yesterday by the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton). Have the Government decided to place Socialism upon the shelf for three years? Is it the policy of the Government to introduce such legislation that, with the promise also of electoral reform, they can count upon the support of the Liberal party? If that is to be the policy of the Government, though they may plan upon those lines events will disturb their strategy. That timid, that cautious, that ineffective policy will be utterly unable to deal with the increasingly grave economic situation which is developing in this country. My Friend the hon. Member for Ince (Mr. G. Macdonald) asked earlier to-day whether we expect the Government to introduce a programme of full-blooded Socialism. We ask the Government to do this—to introduce proposals which in a full-blooded way express Socialist principles. We ask them to have the sincerity and the courage to stand by such proposals.

We have to think not only of this House but of opinion in the country, and opinion in the country is quite clearly demanding bold policies, on one side as well as the other. The result of the Paddington election shows from the point of view of the Conservatives that electors are demanding a full-blooded Conservative policy, and, similarly, the supporters of the Labour party demand a full-blooded Socialist policy from our Gov- ernment. It would be infinitely better for our Government to introduce a full-blooded policy, equal to the needs of the situation, and then, if defeated by the Conservative and Liberal parties, go to the electorate and ask for a majority to carry out that policy, than to pursue a timid policy for three years. Our people will become disillusioned and disappointed, there will be an absence of hope, and the condition of apathy when the General Election takes place will render the position of the Government worse.

I would conclude by saying that it is not only the Labour party and the Labour Government which have to face this issue. It is the whole of our democratic and Parliamentary system. It is my view that if disappointment is intensified then, at the next General Election, thousands of the working-class electors will not vote for the Conservative party, because they have been disillusioned with regard to them: will not vote for the Liberal party, because they see no hope there; and, equally, will not vote for the Labour party. They will be in a state of apathy, and will say, "Politics, parties, Parliaments, are of no value." You may have that state of apathy for a time, but it will not remain. What has recently happened in Germany ought to be a warning to us that when that condition of apathy begins it is likely to turn in other directions, whether in the direction of Fascism on the one hand or Communism on the other hand. We say that if the Government are to be equal to the economic situation; if they are going to bring sincerity into politics and give a challenging lead to our people then they must express Socialist policies and principles in their programme and then I am sure that that challenging lead will be responded to in the country.

I listened with great pleasure to the speech of the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton). May I say, in regard to that speech, that there is nothing easier than to make a general attack on the capitalist system, but I do wish that· the hon. Member would explain a little more clearly what he means.

If the hon. Member will cross the road to 14, George Street, he will find a series of penny pamphlets which explain the whole thing.

None of those pamphlets really explains what you are aiming at. I would like the hon. Member for Bridgeton to sit down and write out what he is aiming at and then we should be able to get on. Let him bring in a Bill. I think 100 Bills mill be necessary. Let me remind the last speaker who spoke about the foreign capitalist that out of a world population of 2,000,000,000 there are countries with at least 1,000,000,000 where there are civil commotions, revolutions, and revolts, all due to people who are trying to overthrow the capitalist system. It is no use woolly gentlemen talking theoretical stuff of that kind and getting no further. What is the good of talking about the distribution of wealth and purchasing power and public ownership unless you explain exactly what is meant.

I am going to Norwich on Sunday.

I hope the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade will be on the same platform, because I am sure that he would be more inclined to agree with the hon. Member for Bridgeton than I am. Can any hon. Gentleman opposite mention any country which has adopted Socialist principles where the purchasing power of the people has been increased. It is only in those countries where the capitalist system has been well developed that a higher standard of life has obtained. Am I to understand that in the new Socialist State we are to have the old machinery? If so, let us have a chapter upon it in a book. The only concrete proposal which has been put forward is that of bulk purchase. That is a proposal which we can discuss. That is something tangible, and, as an old journalist, I desire to say that the most interesting part of this debate has been the rise of the new party. This is the day of new parties and the party I am alluding to will be called the bulk purchase party, or the B.P.P. At present, that party consists of the hon. Member for East Leicester (Mr. Wise), the hon. Baronet the Member for Smethwick (Sir O. Mosley) and the hon. Member for East Leyton (Mr. Brockway). I presume that their ministry will be in Hyde Park where they will store all the good and raw materials that they buy.

I do not dismiss this theory of import boards lightly. What the Government want are ideas, and, if hon. Gentlemen opposite will take the trouble to produce a number of ideas, perhaps the Government may get one idea that will be useful. A man who can produce an idea, even if it is a bad one, has made at least some contribution, and a man who produces a bad idea may sooner or later produce a good one. This is what happens in business, because very often one idea is adopted which makes a success of the business. A policy of that kind would be much better than these woolly and nebulous talks about the capitalist system. I have here the figures published by the Wheat Commission, of which the hon. Member for East Leicester was a distinguished member, and they afford a splendid example of the system of bulk purchase. They employ paid labour to the extent of 4 per cent. and all the rest is voluntary labour.

The hon. Member is quite wrong in his facts.

I understand that four per cent. was paid labour and that the rest was more or less voluntary. Another fact I would like the House to remember is that the purchases were made on a rising market, and it is not difficult to make a profit on a rising market. What happened? I have here the figures from the years 1916 to 1921. In 1916, the price was 13s. 7d. per cwt., in 1917, 17s. 8d., in 1918, 17s., in 1919 17s., and in 1920, 18s. 10d. Those figures show a steady rise. When the Wheat Commission wound up, they showed that they had made a profit on their transactions, including the purchase of all cereals, of £28,000,000; but they forgot to say that the bread subsidy, which was coupled with that profit, cost the country £162,000,000. That was left out of the picture altogether. The net loss to the country in respect of the Wheat Commission was £134,000,000. That is a very different story.

Does the hon. Member suggest that it is a loss to the country to keep the price of bread down in time of war?

No, but the point I am making is that, if you operate on a large scale, either the tax- payer must pay or the consumer must pay; you cannot have it both ways. If you are trying to help the producer, you cannot help the consumer or the taxpayer; and if you consider the interests of the consumer and the taxpayer, you do not consider the interests of the producer. Surely, buying in bulk during four years of steadily rising prices is very different from buying at a time when, as has recently been the case, prices have been falling in a chaotic way.

Just look at the difference. Even in September, the price of wheat fell by 17 per cent., and in the course of the year it fell by 44 per cent. Cotton in September fell by 12 per cent., and in the course of the year by 44, per cent., wool fell by 8 per cent. in September, and by 28 per cent. in the year; rubber fell by 23 per cent. in September, and 62 per cent. in the year; and so on. Will anyone suggest that buying on this vast scale, when the market is in the chaotic condition in which it has been in the last month or the last year, is the same thing as buying on a rising market such as existed during the War? There are other difficulties. There is the difficulty that buying on a large scale in itself sends up the price of all produce. One is told, on the authority of the Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, that when the late Lord Privy Seal arrived in Canada, on putting down his right foot the price of wheat went up by 30 cents., and on his putting down his left foot it went up by 25 cents., because they thought that he had a little import board in his pocket. The late Lord Privy Seal sent up the price of wheat on the Winnipeg market by 55 cents., and that is just one of the difficulties.

It is a good job he was not a centipede!

One Should not, however, dismiss this idea lightly. It is a concrete idea, and one would very much like to hear the hon. Member for East Leicester on some of the points that it raises. Ideas are explosive things. All reforms come about through people in garrets and university rooms thinking out things, until an idea explodes round the world and makes a great change. I agree with the hon. Baronet the Member for Smethwick that, owing to the present chaotic condition of the world and the recent fall in prices, Protection would be absolutely useless. How can either Free Trade or Protection or import boards be operated in the confused state of markets which we have seen lately? The real trouble in the world is that producers are producing their raw materials at almost pre-War prices, while manufacturers are offering them back in exchange, in the form of manufactured goods, at something like 50 to 100 per cent. above pre-War prices; and, until the world adjusts itself to that fact, and the one set of prices falls or the other rises, the economic disturbance must go on.

May I, in conclusion, say a word about the King's Speech? As far as I can see, the only people who will rejoice at it will be the Ethiopians, who have got a very honourable mention in the early part of the Speech. In the homes of the working classes, in the homes of the unemployed, there will be no rejoicing. What troubled one most was the complacency of the speakers from the Front. Government Bench. I listened to them all. If the Prime Minister's speech meant anything, it meant that, as long as the unemployed were carefully registered on a better system than that obtaining in America, all would be well. The Lord Privy Seal was almost worse. He left me in absolute despair. He explained in the first half of his speech how we had permanently lost our export trade in many big industries, and he imagined that we could find a stimulus by extending sales in the home market. All I can say is that, if our export trade has gone, there is no earthly justification for this country keeping a population of more than 30,000,000, and, instead of having 2,000,000 out of work, we shall have 10,000,000.

3.0 p.m.

The right hon. Gentleman then went on to say that the record of the Labour Government as regards relief works challenged comparison with that of any other Government.. It is not difficult to take up that challenge. He said that 150,000 men had been found work under various schemes that the Government. had introduced. As a matter of interest I was looking at the figures to see what happened under the Coalition Govern- ment, when a similar slump came at the end of 1920 and the beginning of 1921; and I found that in the last week of January, 1922, there were 125,000 men employed on relief works the principles of which were initiated by the Leader of my party. I think it is a fair claim to make that a man who initiates schemes of relief of unemployment on an experimental scale when unemployment on a large scale is a new feature of industrial life, as it was in 1921, has made a bigger contribution than a Government which, after eight years of experience by Government Departments, leading economists and so on, and after 16 months of office, can only find work for 150,000 men. After all, every one of their ideas is borrowed from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George). I think I am right, in saying that there is no single idea that has been undertaken over the last eight or nine years, whether it be Trade Facilities, Export Credits, home development, or the St. Davids Committee, that was not initiated by my right hon. Friend and his Government in 1920–21. I do not think, therefore, that the Lord Privy Seal is right in claiming that the Labour record is as wonderful as he claims it, to be.

The Government cannot say that they have not had good will. I am full of good will; we are all prepared to help them in every possible way. They had a very good chance even from hon. Gentlemen above the Gangway on this side; I do not think they have ever hindered the Government on any definite unemployment scheme. The big triumvirate that started to cure, or to mitigate, unemployment—where are they now? The late Lord Privy Seal is in the safe haven of the Dominions Office. The hon. Baronet the Member for Smethwick has gone, not in triumph, but in disgust because he cannot get things done. One man alone is left—the First Commissioner of Works; and his contribution has been mixed bathing in the Serpentine. While people have been bathing in the Serpentine, the unemployment figures have gone up to over 2,000,000.

Hon. Gentlemen will say, "What is your idea?" I am entitled to reply, in the words of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that it is not the duty of the Members of His Majesty's Opposition to suggest ideas to the Government; but I will say this, that my idea is not the idea of the King's Speech. The hon. Member for Bridgeton regretted that there was no Socialism in the King's Speech, and he called it Liberalism. The King's Speech is not my idea, because, whatever Liberalism does or does not do, it does move with the times and adjust itself to the needs of the day. We do not utter platitudes, but we present our solutions in the greatest detail so that the whole country can understand them, and, if the hon. Member will buy the book next Wednesday, he will see "We can conquer unemployment" brought right up to date. In my judgment, instead of spending £100,000,000 in keeping men hanging about in idleness round the Exchanges, I would rather spend that amount, or more, in finding them work of useful development. I believe there is a very wide field of national development into which nationally controlled investments can be conducted. I do not mean nationally controlled. The hon. Member knows what I mean. I do not mean under public ownership. I mean investments directed into more profitable channels through the agency of some central association, and along those lines I think very much can be done. That is the opinion of all the leading economists of the country. One can only say that very little can be done along the lines of the King's Speech. I agree with the peroration of the last speaker. If the Government had come forward even with a full blooded Socialist policy, there is not one of us, in fighting against it, who would not render them a tribute of admiration and, if they fell, they would fall fighting like men. If they fall now—and they may do—they will fall without even the respect of their friends and will pass away unwept, unhonoured and unsung.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton) a few days ago threatened, in a jocular manner, to publish some of my left wing speeches. I plead guilty to my youthful indiscretions and I am not ashamed of them. It is true that at one time I was a vigorous left winger, but the left winger of my time has at least a virtue that the left winger of to-day does not possess. The feathers of the left winger in my time did at least flock together. The difference between my time left winger and the present day left winger is that everyone of the present day left winger's feathers wants to flutter en its own. That is my difficulty. I have not departed one iota from the principles of my early days of the Labour movement. The sooner Socialism comes, the better I shall be pleased, because I believe the present system is getting so top heavy that sooner or later, by the sheer force of circumstances, Socialism will establish itself, whether it is to-day or to-morrow.

The mover of the Amendment complains of the King's Speech and says the items in it are of such a character that they could not possibly be carried in this House. If they cannot be carried, how can my hon. Friend expect that Socialism in our time will be carried in this House? An hon. Member opposite says he would he glad to see a full-blooded Socialist scheme brought in and in the next few words, following his illustrious leader, he threatened to put us on the dissecting table. I do not believe this Amendment is going to help the situation a bit. If I did, I should have no hesitation in voting for it. On the one hand, we have the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) and on the other we have the official Opposition. One day the right hon. Gentleman will be falling on our necks professing the greatest friendship possible, the next day we find him going in the opposite direction. He is a master of the art of political coquetry. Sometimes he impresses me with the application of the old couplet:

"How happy I could he with either,

Were t'other dear charmer away."

At the very moment when we intend to introduce anything of the character proposed in this Amendment, we have both sections of the Opposition against us. I appeal to my hon. Friend. How is it possible in the circumstances, just new at least, to entertain an Amendment of this character? I regret to find myself even in temporary opposition to him. Socialism is all right. It is the Socialists who are wrong.

I listened carefully to the speech of the hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. Shakespeare) to see whether I could discover those ideas that he was so anxious to have brought before the House which were going to deal substantially with our problem of unemployment. I found that, like all good Liberals, he was full of good will and that he agreed with speeches made on all sides of the House but that he disapproved of the King's Speech, he disapproved of the idea of bulk purchase, and he disapproved of tariffs. That was a good clearing of the deck and left plenty of room for the things with which he did agree and which could be applied to the situation. But when I come to the positive side of his remarks, I find, first, that £100,000,000 is to be spent on development loans. I am willing, when I am given an opportunity, to vote for a policy such as that. For instance, I am keen in my desire to get a substantial share of any such schemes in Scotland. We can spend it all upon ourselves; on a big mid-Scotland canal or upon a road across the Forth Bridge and other projects. I am willing to support any such policy, and I very much wish that the Government would give us an opportunity of supporting such a policy. But I can assure the hon. Member for Norwich that that is merely a tiny drop and will deal with a few thousand unemployed men only. Although £100,000,000 may be spent upon such schemes, rationalisation is developing, and new machinery is deplacing men, so that the unemployment problem remains substantially as big as it was before. I noticed that even the hon. Member for Norwich was slightly uncomfortable about the solution he put before the House and that something more ought to be added. He went on to produce another idea, which, again, I should immediately welcome. He said that he felt that we should have to control the investment of capital. I very much hope that the hon. Member for Norwich will crystallise that idea.

I said "direct investments." I made a slip, and I altered it.

I do not. want to give a false impression. The hon. Member corrected himself and said "direct investments." I want to point out the implications of such a proposal; he would ultimately be giving us the advantage of his great ability in making that tangible contribution to Socialist ideas. I am sure that the hon. Member for Norwich, if he desired immediately to deal with unemployment and wanted to see whether we could not use our in- vestment surpluses in a way more beneficial to the country as a whole he would find himself led on inevitably to interfering with, or intervening—that is the word, which, perhaps, the Liberal party finds more acceptable—more and more in the control of finance. I think he would discover that it would not be nationally controlled investment, that, you are only playing with the idea, and that you are being dishonest in thinking that you are going to do anything along those lines until you get to the inner citadel of Socialism and thus control the finances of this country.

May I call the attention of the House to a most interesting supplement given by Sir Henry Strakosch, whose authority will be acceptable on all sides, to the "Economist" a few months ago. In that supplement he analyses the percentage of the national income which was held by what are called the rentier classes of our community or, if you like, people who are in possession of fixed interest bearing securities. The percentage held by those people in 1924 he gives as 26.4 per cent., roughly a quarter of our national income. Then he analyses the changes in gold values. The result is that Sir Henry Strakosch claims that this section of our community holding fixed interest bearing stock, national loans and such kinds of stock, are now getting, not a quarter, but a third of our national income—34 per cent. Here is something which every Member of the House must seriously answer when we are blamed for saying that we want a bigger share of our national income to go into working-class houses, and that is that during the very same year when wages have been cut and when a smaller proportion of national income has been going into working-class homes, and when that smaller proportion has resulted in a decreasing of our home markets and in the aggravation of unemployment, another section of the community, a section that is neither worker nor employer, a section that is not taking any of the risks of industry but which is playing safety first, a section which says: "Our demands must be satisfied first. We are going to do nothing: we are not going to contribute skill or labour but we must have our tribute from the community as the first call upon everything that is produced," that is a section whose tribute from the com- munity has increased from one-fourth to one-third of our national income. Will the hon. Member for Norwich accept that as, at least, one indication of the need for controlling the finance in this country in the interests of the whole country and as one concrete point which illustrates that it is not an impossible argument to expect more to be spent on pensions for the aged and on social services for the children, seeing that we are spending more or allowing more to go to one section of the community who take more than they formerly did, and who are giving nothing.

The Liberals talk about the need for people getting high dividends because they are taking risks. I was astounded when the hon. Member for Norwich talked about the Liberal party adjusting itself to the needs of the changing times, because, if I may respectfully suggest it, one of the chief reasons for the decline of the Liberal party and one of the chief reasons which makes it safe to prophesy the continued decline of the Liberal party is that it is not adjusting itself to the changing times. We find that in their policy of laissez faire and even in the policy of Free Trade. Their idea is that the men who take the greatest risks and may make immense fortunes one year and lose it another year require the stimulus of these high profits, and that in doing the best for themselves they are also doing the best for the community and raising up the general level. I put it to my hon. Friend and his party that times have changed and that those ideas are completely exploded because we are dealing to-day with big trusts and cartels. Either these vast groupings of private individuals, over which this House has no control, must be allowed to play about as they like with our monetary problems or with our trade, or we have to face up to the alternative of the State controlling these things. That is the conception which is at the back of the scheme which the hon. Member for Leicester has so ably brought before the public attention for the establishment of import boards and for bulk purchases.

If there is to be a monopoly group in the community, let the monopoly group be the biggest power of all, and let it be the State. Let it use the power that it possesses not in order that any small fraction may profit at the expense of the rest, but let the State be the watchdog of the economic interests of the whole community and use its position in a world of falling prices. There is no argument that it is easier to make profits in the highest than in the lowest market, and I think the hon. Member for Norwich was unjust to himself and to the House on that account. In a falling market it is all the more essential that the State should intervene and minimise the effects of collapse and chaos. We should make use of the fact that this country is about the best market in the whole world; that the internal market of this country is most desirable from the point of view of any exporting country, especially a country exporting industrial goods and agricultural produce. We are not taking advantage of our position. If we were organising the demand we should make a good bargain with the Colonies and with Russia, with any part of the world, and say "we will buy from you." We should make big deals for a reasonable period of time. We should say "we want your goods at the cheapest possible price," and then, instead of being afraid of dumping, we should gladly welcome big deals in wool or meat or any of the major commodities which would allow us to buy all that we require in order to supplement home production.

None of us on these benches is so foolish as to want to see agriculture or any of our industries completely crushed out, but we want to insure that we are not going to protect an industry at home, which perhaps supplies one-fifth or one-quarter of the home market., by a tariff device which is simply going to make the consumers at home pay more for what is imported from abroad and for what is produced at home. We want to give the home producer a feeling of security in which he can organise and develop, a guaranteed price, a guaranteed market free from profiteering, and then the State can step in and supplement what the home producer brings to the home market by additional supplies bought at the cheapest possible rate. We are moving this Amendment not because we do not recognise that some of the Measures suggested in the King's Speech are very good. I am particularly glad to see that the raising of the school age is not going to be shelved, but is to be brought before the House at a very early date. We are still a little doubtful about maintenance allowances, but if that difficulty can be overcome there should, I think, be a ready welcome to the Bill from everyone in this House who cares for an enlightened and cultured democracy fit to rule this country.

The Amendment now before the House does not deal with the question of raising the school age. Speeches must be confined to the subject of the Amendment.

I must content myself then with that passing reference. The Amendment is not moved because we do not realise that the individual Measures mentioned in the King's Speech are admirable, but because we think that they are totally unequal to the situation. If we sum up the entire contents of the King's Speech it is still entirely inadequate. I believe, indeed, that it can he judged not only by those who radically disagree with the tactics of His Majesty's Government, but that a case can be made out for it by those who believe that it is the best possible policy to stay in office as long as the Government can do so and do all that is possible within those terms. I do not believe that even on those lines the maximum is being done.

I have already referred to import boards. I am very much disappointed that import boards are not being pushed more from our Front Bench. At the Imperial Conference I would have liked the Government to have used a magnificent opportunity for putting forward this which, after all, is the Labour party's policy, in such a way that it would be known and understood by this country and by the whole world. There is another matter which, I believe, would be a more definite individual contribution to the solution of unemployment than anything outlined in the King's Speech. In answer to a question yesterday or the day before we were told that the Government are now guaranteeing less than £3,000,000 of credits for export trade to Russia. I beg the Government to keep in mind that in Lanarkshire, my constituency, in any industrial area, especially where there is a great deal of iron and steel, thousands and thousands of men could be put into employment if only the Government adopted a more courageous policy regarding export credits, if only they would go as far even as Germany is going in that direction.

I visited Russia during the summer and I found Russian workers amazed that we curtailed our export credits to 18 months. Germany gives them two years and even up to four or five years. Individaul capitalists in America give up to five years guarantee. But this country, which could benefit most by having big orders from Russia, finds it is impossible for these orders to be placed because of the limitations around export credits. I believe that we could get from £10,000,000 to £15,000,000 of orders from Russia without a great deal of difficulty if only we were making full use of the powers that we have already. I understand that the Government have £23,000,000 which can be used to finance export credits schemes, and that only about £6,000,000 of that amount is being used at present. It would require a very strong case indeed to convince us that the rest of that money should not be used, that the period of credits should not be extended to make its use possible, when we see that in this way a definite and concrete contribution might be made for the reduction of unemployment.

But when I deal with individual matters in which I am interested, I am not touching the real centre of the criticism from this Bench. We believe that by a more vigorous and a more courageous policy, even within its own brief our Government might do a little more. But with all the courage and all the vigour and all the enterprise in the world we do not believe that in the composition of the present House of Commons we can radically hasten the solution of unemployment. Those of us who were critical in the past must be very careful that in our criticism we do not convey to the out-side public the idea that we could solve unemployment inside the present House of Commons. I do not see why a party like ours, which has grown up by propagating the idea that the present system could not give a proper standard of life to our people, should at this moment turn round in panic when it finds its own forecast being justified. We have said all along that the breaking point would come and that as time went on and cartels and trusts developed, and machines displaced labour, the position of the working masses would become worse rather than better. But what we expect at this moment, when our own philosophy and our own economics are being justified by the event, is that our Government should still stand by our own analysis and our own philosophy, and should not give the idea that any compromise scheme to deal with the situation could be worked out.

I hope there will not be the idea that we on these back benches can clutch the hands of the people on the other side who have rather nice dispositions and who are earnestly wanting to help—that we can make a sort of political cocktail containing elements from all sides of the House, and apply it to our national needs, and thereby improve the situation to any extent. I do not think we can do so. I think that every time we must come back to the question of the control of our national finances. We must come hack to the need for reorganising our industries on Socialist lines. I stress that point, but what I stress still more is the immediate need for increasing the purchasing power of our people by pensions, by better social services, by protecting wages.

This is my final remark. Rather than continue on a compromise policy which is doing nothing, which all the whole is accompanied by outside events drifting more and more to disaster, we should support this Amendment. We want a challenging line of action. We want at least an attempt made to protect and improve the position of the working masses in this country. We want it for their sakes. We want it because we believe it would be the biggest single contribution to the solution of the unemployment problem. It would be far better for us to be defeated in this House of Commons, even if that defeat meant that for a temporary period we were out of office, provided that we clearly carried on our distinctive Socialist education, and built up, for the time that is coming, that knowledge and support which will be necessary to put through the radical Socialist reorganisation which is the only means, the means which ultimately must be resorted to, in order to bring prosperity to our country and rid our people of poverty and unemployment.

Everyone in the House, I am sure, has admired the courage of the hon. Lady the Member for Northern Lanark (Miss Lee) and the way in which she has put forward the full-blooded Socialist programme, though many of us do not agree with the picture painted by her of the results which would follow from Socialism, and some of us would point out that her knowledge of business is not very profound. She has told us that a falling market is of no interest whatever to holders of stock, and that it would be of great advantage to the State, even in a falling market, to be dealing in stocks or whatever the commodity might be. May I point out to her, that holders of stocks in a falling market must on every occasion make a loss, and the difference between Socialism and private enterprise is that, whereas under State enterpise, the loss would be incurred by the taxpayer, under private enterprise, the loss is incurred by the private individual.

Like the hon. Lady I have been tempted to intervene in this debate by the speech of the hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. Shakespeare). He has told us that the policy of import boards, though he is not in favour of it, is worthy of consideration. May I remind him that a necessary accompaniment of import boards is that there shall be no longer any free import of the goods with which the boards are dealing. Import boards inevitably mean the end of free imports, and I am surprised that one whom I have always regarded as a worshipper at the shrine of Richard Cobden should even give consideration to a policy which means the end of the free import system. When we examine in close detail the whole idea of the import purchasing board we find innumerable difficulties in the way. First of all, we find that the State must be the one buyer and then that it must be the one seller. It follows that the State can fix its own price at which it shall sell. If, after the State has made a purchase, the price falls, it follows that the State must either make a loss or that your food must cost you more than it ought to do. If you have a position in which the State fixes its own price, any fool in the world could make a profit under circumstances like that. Even the Post Office, inefficiently managed as it is, being able to fix its own prices, can make a profit under such circumstances.

I ask the House seriously to consider what kind of a muddle there would exist in this House and on every political platform in the country if, under such circumstances as have been outlined in this Amendment to-day, we had questions put as to what the price of bread should be or ought to be or would be. Would it not be perfectly obvious that questions would be raised in Parliament to the Minister responsible as to why the price of bread had been reduced or increased?

When we examine the past history of this question, and its trial in the case of the Ministry of Food during the War, when Mr. G. H. Roberts was Minister of Food, we find that the Government controlled bacon in this country, and huge purchases were made, which were brought into Liverpool. The Ministry of Food made a stipulation that none of the new bacon was to be sold until the old bacon had been distributed to their customers, and so much of it was bought that there were not sufficient warehouses in Liverpool and the other great ports to accommodate it. Most of the new stuff was put into warehouses where there was no cold storage, and the result was that before the old bacon had been distributed, the new bacon was rancid and utterly unfit for human food, and literally thousands of boxes of that bacon were taken, under State control, and dropped to the bottom of the River Mersey, because it was then unfit for human consumption. Also, if I may outline something further that happened, a great deal of it was sold at very much below cost price for making soap and other materials of that kind.

I heard the hon. Member for Smethwick (Sir O. Mosley) speaking in this House the other day, and he seemed to-visualise the idea that either some kind of public corporate company or the State should make all the purchases required for this country. Imagine what kind of superman would be necessary who would, in the case of wheat, say, have to calculate what was required, to almost the exact bushel, by this country, and to calculate what the harvest would be while that harvest was still growing. I believe there are more people in this country and in other countries walking barefoot through trying to calculate the harvests of the world than from any other cause in business life. They are bound, however capable they are, to make mistakes, and if those mistakes are made which every business man makes sometimes in his business career, they will be made to the loss of the State instead of, as now, to the loss of the private individual.

If, for those reasons, I am opposed to import boards, I am as strongly opposed to the principle of a quota, which has been put forward, I believe, by hon. Members on both sides of the House. I say that this policy, though it may have some attractions as far as home-grown wheat is concerned, is utterly impossible in regard to Dominion wheat. The principle, as I understand it, would be to increase the use of Dominion wheat, and to decrease the use of foreign wheat. Leaving Russian, German and French wheat out of the question, I would ask the House to think of it in the terms of Argentine and Canadian wheat, which are the two big countries concerned. What would he the result of the quota system in actual practice? It would mean that, as far as Argentine wheat is concerned, there would be a less demand, and that as far as Canadian wheat is concerned, there would be more demand. The effect would be that Argentine wheat would fall in price, and Canadian wheat would naturally rise in price, and I can imagine the hon. Member for Norwich rising in his place with the familiar Cobdenite argument, and pointing out that the price of Argentine wheat was lower than the price of Canadian wheat, and that our food was really in such circumstances costing more.

I believe that all these fantastic ideas of dealing with the food supplies of this country either by quota or import board are all doomed to failure. [An HON. MEMBER: "What about tariffs?"] I do not know whether it would be in order to put forward an alternative which would raise revenue and would not interfere with the supply more, at any rate, than the amount of the duty. believe that the ideas which have been put forward would be of no advantage to this country, but would be a serious disadvantage in the form of hordes of officials. They would not have the practical experience that we have in our food supplies at the present moment, and it would result in considerable loss to the people of our country.

Perhaps it may be opportune if I say a word or two with regard to the Amendment before the House. should like to say at the beginning, that although I believe the Amendment would carry very little support if taken to a Division, yet I do not think any Member of the House can offer any reasonable complaint of the manner in which it was introduced, or the way in which it was supported by those who are in agreement with it. In fact, all their observations were confined to an examination of the problem as we see it to-day. When they speak of the need of something being done to deal with the awful results of the system under which we are living at the moment, then few of us on this side can find anything with which to disagree. In fact, it is true to say that the party on this side of the House has been able to build itself up to the position it occupies at the present moment very largely by advocacy on similar lines and in similar terms to those which have been given by the mover and seconder of the Amendment.

At the same time, the problem arises as to what is exactly the purpose for which this Amendment has been moved. As I say, it may get little support in the Lobby. The only support it has, apparently, received in the discussion has come from the hon. Gentleman who shares with me the representation of the City of Norwich. He seemed to have some sympathy with the Amendment, judging by his last remarks. I rather think that he was speaking very much with his tongue in his cheek when he made that observation, because if there is one Member who sits on those benches who is an out and out admirer and a blind follower of his leader, it is he. One is reminded of the fact that very early in the life of this Parliament, almost within a week after the General Election, his leader declared in the most emphatic terms that, as soon as we became a Socialist administration and in any way attempted to put into operation our Socialist beliefs, we would cease to be a Government; and the hon. Gentleman would have been one of the most ready to follow his leader into the Lobby should a situation of that kind have arisen. Therefore, when he makes a de- claration that he had sympathy with an Amendment in favour of a more full-blooded policy, I suggest that he must have been speaking very much with his tongue in his cheek.

The point arises, what is the purpose of this Amendment? Do my hon. Friends who put it forward submit it with the idea that it is furthering the policy of dealing with the problem of poverty? Is that the purpose they have in mind, because they are contradictory in the position they take up. The hon. Lady the Member for North Lanark (Miss Lee) explicitly stated that she, did not believe that these things could be accomplished in this House. She did not believe that proposals which were largely within the meaning of this Amendment could be carried in this House.

I do believe that a portion of them could be carried, and that at least the attempt ought to be made.

That resolves itself entirely into a matter of opinion and judgment as to what is the right course to pursue, but it is hardly logical or consistent to get up here and make a statement that it is impossible to do certain things in this House, constituted as it is, and then blame the Government for not attempting to do it. [Interruption.] I submit that that is a fair interpretation of what was contained in the statement to which I have referred. The hon. Gentleman the Member for East Leyton (Mr. Brockway), as far as I could gather the meaning and purpose be had in seconding the Amendment, demonstrated the fact that, if any attempt were made to produce legislation on the lines of which he is in favour, the net result would be that we should have an election; and the only part of the House from which any approval of that came was the benches opposite. Therefore,, I fail to see what purpose is being achieved in regard to alleviating the problem of poverty, to furthering the interests of the unemployed, to furthering social legislation or to any one of the proposals that might be put forward; and in what way by the moving or carrying of this Amendment would we in any way further these proposals in the slightest degree.

It is obvious that in the minds of those who have submitted the Amendment they know clearly and unmistakably that, if such attempt were made, the result must mean the defeat of the Government, a General Election, and possibly a change of Government, which, I am sure, would not be of the character that would further the proposals for which they stand. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the position which they are taking up in this matter. Before that can happen we must have a larger number of the voters of the country behind us. I have spent, I suppose, as many years in the Socialist movement as most of my hon. Friends. It is 38 years since I joined the movement, and I have never regretted my association with it, nor have I gone back in a single degree on my belief that ultimately Socialism must be adopted if we are to remove this problem of poverty as we see it and understand it; but if we are to do so, we must have a larger proportion of Members holding our convictions sitting on these benches than we have at the present time.

My hon. Friends who are responsible for this Amendment and take up this attitude towards the Government would be rendering a greater service to the cause in which they believe were they to go and tell the electors not that the Government are failing in their policy, not that the Government are a failure, but point out the limitations under which the Government are suffering and labouring, and ask the country to give us better support when the time comes. That would be a better and sounder policy to pursue.

After all, we have been able to accomplish something. We have dealt with phases of the problem. In the legislation which was passed last Session there were one or two manifestations of a desire and determination to act in that direction. We have undertaken some reorganisation of industry, moderate as it may be and inadequate to meet the realities of the situation. The legislation in regard to the coal industry was an attempt to reorganise that industry and to bring in the principle of public and organised control. And so it is the intention of the Government to take up those items in their programme and in their policy which they believe they can carry in this House. That is the intention foreshadowed in the King's Speech this year. That may fall short of what some of us had hoped for years ago, it may fall short of what we would like to see being done at the present time, but I submit with every confidence that it does represent all that is reasonably possible within this Chamber, constituted as it is. Before we can hope to get those wider and more drastic reforms at which my hon. Friends are aiming we must get more support from the country and a larger representation in the House. I hope my hon. Friends will now be content to let us go to a Division on this Amendment.

rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put," but Mr. SPEAKER withheld his assent, and declined then to put that Question.

I do not propose to delay the House very long. I merely want to state the reasons that have brought me to my feet. The Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade has spoken of the attempts that are being made and what might happen if we were to attempt to make bolder demands. The point I want to make clear is this—that if we go to the country on legislation such as is adumbrated in the Speech from the Throne there will be much less hope of getting the majority which we are all anxious to obtain. My complaint against the Speech is, as the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton) said yesterday, that· it is a generation too late. There is in the Speech a reference to the present Dominions Conference. In the speech from the Throne in 1906, in the days of a Liberal Government, there was also a reference to a Colonial Conference. In the present Speech there is a reference to the need for consideration of the distress in the rural areas. In the Speech in 1906 there was also a reference to the need for securing an improvement in rural conditions. In the present Speech there is a reference to education and a Bill is promised. In 1906 a Bill dealing with education was also promised. In the present Address there is also a Bill to deal with trade disputes and singularly enough in the Speech from the Throne in 1906 there was also a Bill to deal with trade disputes. In 1906 there was a proposal to deal with electoral reform drawn from the Government because of the demands of the rising new party, the Labour party. In this Speech there is the promise of a Bill to deal with electoral reform drawn from the Government by the old, decadent Liberal party. The result of the last election shows that there is a multiplicity of parties, and everywhere there is a demand for some definite programme that will bring relief to the community. The United Empire party, the Empire Free Trade party, the Conservative party, the Liberal party and the Labour party have each got their own programme.

There is no item in the King's Speech which, in my opinion, will effect any reduction in the number of people who are becoming unemployed. The outstanding facts can be summarised in a few words. The last Conservative Government failed to deal with the unemployment problem effectively, and so did the Coalition Government. The present Government is proceeding on the same lines, and it is bound to fail in the same way because we are adopting precisely the same methods. The Lord Privy Seal declared the other day that he hoped we should hear no more of the short-term policy and that road making and bridge building have done no good whatever in the direction of relieving unemployment. In my view the long-term policy will have the same effect, because that policy is built upon the principle of the rationalisation of industry and is bound to increase unemployment.

It is claimed that by rationalising industry we shall get some extension of trade, but in my view that policy will also fail. The result is that we come back to this proposition which I hope those on the Treasury Bench will note. Firstly that all sweated goods, whether made in this country or abroad, are goods that no Socialist should actually purchase, because it is immoral, from a Socialist point of view, to purchase sweated goods made in this country or imported from abroad. There is nothing in the King's Speech which makes the slightest effort to deal with this problem. The second principle, which is a corollary to the first, is the Socialist principle that, wherever a man or a woman is doing the work of the world or the work of the country, that man or woman should have a living wage. There is nothing in the King's Speech that deals in the slightest way with that. There is a third principle, and that is the Socialist principle that it is the divorcement of the people from the sources of wealth that is the primary cause of unemployment and poverty. The King's Speech in no way touches that. These are the fundamental problems that are creating burdens for a, multitude of parties; these are the problems that to-day are discussed by men and women everywhere; and of these problems the King's Speech gives not the slightest hope of solution. It is because of that that I, very much against my own feelings, shall go into the Lobby against the Government.

I would finish by saying this: We have come here, after all, not merely to succumb more or less to the pleasant atmosphere of this House. We have come to this place, sent here by men and women who are in poverty and who have worked to get us here, who have sacrificed a great deal to get us here; and there are many here who have sacrificed positions in order that they might come here to do something for their own folk at home. We have not come here to