I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read the Third time."

It may be for the convenience of the House that I should give a short recapitulation of what this Bill does. One of its main objects is to assist by way of subsidy the owners of British ships making tramp voyages to meet the competition of foreign subsidised vessels. It also provides for assistance being given to British shipowners by means of loans on special terms, to improve their merchant fleets, whether by the building of new ships or by the modernising of existing ships. The third object is to give more employment to our Mercantile Marine officers and seamen and to the workers in the shipbuilding industry. The total amount of the subsidy proposed for ships on tramp voyages is £2,000,000 in respect of the year 1935.

The Government's scheme was first outlined by me in the House on the 3rd July last. It was subject to three important conditions—first, that the subsidy should not be dissipated by unreasonable competition between British shipowners; secondly, that it should be utilised to secure as far as possible greater employment for British vessels at the expense of foreign subsidised vessels; and, thirdly, that British shipowners should press foreign shipowners to co-operate with them in order to attain an adjustment of the supply of world shipping to the demand for shipping. The shipowners' scheme, which was set out in the White Paper of last Session explanatory of the Financial Resolution, made it clear that we should do what was within our power to work along business lines. As regards the International Conference, the work has already proceeded with some rapidity. A preparatory international meeting of shipowners in London has drawn up a scheme for further consideration with a view to an international shipping conference in a few months' time. This preparatory work was undertaken by the representatives of all the shipping countries in the world, and we are not without hope that, when the scheme drawn up by the preparatory committee comes before the Conference as a whole, steps will be taken to regulate the supply of tonnage to the demand for it. The machinery for operating Part I of the Bill will be set in motion as soon as the Bill becomes law.

There has been no appreciable change in the situation since the Government first outlined the proposals in July. Rates are still abnormally low, and the freight market is weak. There is no sign of the subsidies of foreign Governments diminishing at the present moment; international trade is still at or below pre-War level, and the world's tonnage is about 40 per cent. above the pre-War level. We hope that the steps which are being taken by shipowners internationally to adjust the supply to the demand may achieve their object, and that foreign Governments will be led to give up uneconomic subsidies. These are a burden to the countries that are concerned; they lead to a form of competition which is ultimately of no use to the merchant fleets of any country; and there is no doubt that the best step that could be taken by the shipping countries of the world as a whole would be to abandon this part of their shipping policy. If that is done by other countries, we should, of course, co-operate, but we wish to make it quite clear that, in so far as other countries give this artificial assistance to their merchant fleets we shall have to proceed with the proposals which are embodied in this Bill, and that we shall provide in this current year a subsidy of £2,000,000 on a basis which will give the greatest possible benefit to those whom we wish to serve.

I would like to add that, in speaking of those whom we wish to serve, we are thinking of all those who are connected with the shipping industry, whether afloat or ashore; and I would also like to add that, unless we take steps of this nature now, at the present time, more and more of our shipping concerns will find themselves in grave difficulty, and the employment of our people, both in the running of vessels and the staffing of our ports and in the construction of new vessels and the repair of those which are already afloat, will be detrimentally affected. It is in the interests of all these industries that I ask the House to give the Bill a Third Reading.

11.13 a.m.

I beg to move, to leave out "now" and at the end of the Question to add "upon this day six months."

I was glad to hear the President, in the course of his remarks, say that in his view the principle of subsidies was an unsound one. In that I can say that at all events the party which I represent heartily concur. But I do not think we shall ever get out of this difficulty, involving not only this but other industries, until we definitely decide to have a managed price system, so as to obviate this kind of tinkering with industry. However, so far as that is concerned we are confronted with the fact that here is a Bill which makes grants for subsidies, and, therefore I think it is proper, seeing that this subsidy is to be derived from the British taxpayer, that we should see that it is accompanied by conditions which will achieve the purposes which the President says he has in view. He said just now that two of the main purposes of the Bill were to afford more employment to those engaged in shipping offices and so on and to the officers and men of the Mercantile Marine, and to give greater employment to British ships. As we all know, in this industry, as in others, there are some people that do better than others, and nobody knows it better than the right hon. Gentleman himself; and it is a prejudice to every good owner and every well conducted line that those who do not manage their affairs on the same standard of excellence should be able to derive assistance from the British taxpayer.

I think it is to the interest of us all to secure that, when the British taxpayer provides £2,000,000, we should see that it is used for the benefit of those who conduct the industry on self-respecting lines. If that be generally accepted as a principle, it behoves us to see that it is sufficiently embodied in the Bill and that the conditions attaching to the grant of this money are sufficiently prescribed. What are the conditions in this Bill? First, there is the condition that the subsidy is payable for ships which were under the British flag on 1st January, 1934, and have been so since, or that they were built or were in process of being completed during the past year. Those are quite proper conditions. There is one other.

Let me recapitulate one or two of those circumstances which I say ought to compel us to put certain conditions into the Bill. In the first place, there are thousands of British officers and seamen who are out of work and have been for a long time. If we are going to spend £2,000,000 in helping this industry, we ought at all events to see that a fair measure of additional employment is secured to these men. That is not an unreasonable request to make. In the Committee stage it was moved that no subsidy under this part of the Act should be paid by the Board of Trade unless the Board were satisfied that during such tramp voyage a reasonable proportion of the crew were British domiciled seamen. What can the right hon. Gentleman object to in that? It is quite easy to make that an instruction to the Tramp Shipping Subsidy Committee and, if he promises that he will do so, it will make a great difference to our attitude. It is easy to give an instruction of that kind, because it is not open to doubt that on some, at all events, of these ships under the British flag there are no British seamen at all. That is a fact that is not questioned. A ship that employs an entirely foreign crew ought not to receive any of this subsidy. There is a considerable number of other ships in which the number of British seamen is below what is recognised in well-conducted shipping circles as a proper complement. That, again, is undesirable, and the taxpayers' money ought not to be given to ships manned under those conditions.

Again, there is no doubt that there is a practice prevailing more or less, in some places pretty considerably, of getting foreign seamen on to ships sailing under the British flag, and a case was brought forward during the discussion on the Bill where that very night 15 Chinamen had been shipped on to a British ship which was coming into Liverpool. I have nothing to say against Chinamen, but, if they want to subsidise Chinese ships, let the Chinese pay for it. If we are going to subsidise British ships, I want to see that British officers and men of the mercantile marine get a proper share of the assistance. These very undesirable practices, which do prevail, though I do not say widely, ought to be excluded from the benefits of the Bill.

It was pointed out during the debate that the case that the right hon. Gentleman is quoting had no foundation in fact, that this was not a British ship at all but that it had been sold, I think actually to Japan.

I was not aware that the ship had been sold. All I know is that it came into Liverpool under the British flag with a crew of 15 Chinamen on board. If it was sold that night to someone else who was a Japanese subject, that alters the case, but it was under the British flag when it came into Liverpool and there were 15 Chinamen aboard. That is a fact, and the hon. and gallant Gentleman will not deny it. All I say is that the British taxpayer should not be called upon to subsidise British ships in those circumstances, and it is a perfectly fair request. Why not make it a condition attaching to the subsidy? The Parliamentary Secretary made a considerable point that there is in existence a Maritime Board which prescribes certain rates of pay. It has no power to compel them, but, in fact, all decent shipowners fall in with the conditions prescribed by the Maritime Board. Why, in the cases which I have quoted—and I could give actual names of ships or even the names of the crew in some cases—are they employed by this section of the trade? They are employed, of course, because they are only paid about half the wages which are payable to British seamen according to the conditions of the Maritime Board. That is why they are employed. I suggest that that type of employment should not be subsidised by the British taxpayer. It is perfectly easy for the right hon. Gentleman to embody some conditions of that kind in the Bill.

There was another apparently reasonable request which we made and which makes us persist in our objection to the Bill in its present form. It is not denied that the conditions and accommodation and all the rest of it on some ships are undesirable and are not as good as they ought to be. We suggest that on the ships to be built under this subsidy, anyhow, the condition of the grant of assistance to building should be that the accommodation should be on a proper standard. What is the objection to that? I am well aware that with regard to ships now on the seas you cannot pull them to pieces very well, and you have to do the best you can, but with regard to new ships which are built by public assistance we can at all events come up to the standard upon which I remember that Lord Maclay insisted in regard to the ships for which he was responsible for getting built in the later stages of the War. It was practicable then and is practicable now and should be made a condition of this grant.

We also in this respect suggested that when these ships are being built the ordinary conditions relating to the employment of those who are building them should apply. It is a common thing that the Fair Wages Clause should be applied. Government Departments, local authorities and the Central Electricity Board use it, and why should it not be applied to the building of these ships? The Amendment that was put down was in the same terms as the usual Fair Wages Clause.

The right hon. Gentleman will realise that his speech is chiefly concerned with matters which are not in the Bill. It is a well-known rule in this House that on the Third reading of a Bill you can only discuss the provisions that are in the Bill.

I thank you for your instruction. I am trying to state my objection to the Bill because it is incomplete, and I was reciting a number of grounds for that objection. The position, however, is that we are now presented with a Bill under which £2,000,000 of British money is being provided, and the only conditions under which that money is to be payable are, first, that the ship should have been under the British flag or have been built since January, 1934, and that she is not trading between United Kingdom ports. A Bill with these very narrow conditions is not adequate, and we ought to secure that conditions designed to achieve the purpose which the right hon. Gentleman says he has in view are part of the proposals to which we are asked to agree. I confess that when I look down the record of subsidies I can find no case in which the grant of a large amount of public money is made so unconditional. This House is very particular in these matters and rightly so, and I think the President of the Board of Trade will find that it is impossible to discover a parallel to the proposal which he has presented to us. It is altogether, as it stands, inadequate and undesirable and, therefore, we are compelled to adhere to our resistence to the Bill. We say that it is unfair to the people who do the work in that industry. The right hon. Gentleman himself, many and many a time, has been full of admiration of the services of the officers and men of the Mercantile Marine, but we have no assurance, as the Bill stands, that it will assist them in any material degree, and until we have that assurance we must persist in our objection.

11.31 a.m.

I have not any particular affection for this Bill, but I dissociate myself from the extraordinary argument put forward by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Swindon (Dr. Addison), that if a subsidy is payable at all British ships should not be eligible for it because they are trading only between foreign ports. Surely the essence of this Bill, in so far as it has any merits at all, is that it should enable British shipping to compete on foreign terms. If a subsidy is only to be paid to ships trading to and from United Kingdom ports—

No.

May I get the point clear. I understand the right hon. Gentleman to say that ships trading between foreign ports and which, perhaps, never come back to this country, or do not come back for years, should not be eligible for the subsidy. If a am wrong, I shall be glad if the right hon. Gentleman will correct me.

I said British ports, not alone United Kingdom ports. You get British ports in many parts of the world. United Kingdom ports should also be included. The hon. Gentleman knows that several of these ships may never touch a British port in any part of the world.

That is exactly my case. The right hon. Gentleman is saying exactly what I say, that ships trading between foreign ports should not be eligible for the full subsidy. I do not know why he takes exception to my statement. All I protest against is that that is not a fair statement of British shipping. He must take a broad view and realise that British shipping is in competition throughout the world. A great part of the profits earned by shipowners in days gone by and the employment given to British officers and seamen and to British shipbuilders has been due to trade between foreign ports which were neither in the United Kingdom nor in the British Dominions. If we are to discourage that principle, then, indeed, the British shipping industry will be in a bad way. That is by the way.

With regard to a great deal of the rest of the statement of the right hon. Gentleman everybody in this House is in agreement. We all want to see better conditions and more employment for British officers and seamen. The only question is whether it is quite an appropriate method of dealing with it, and personally I am inclined to think that my right hon. Friend and the Parliamentary Secretary might have indicated better ways of dealing with this subject than they have in this Bill. I am prepared, at any rate, to waive any objection on that ground to this Bill, but it does not mean that I can bring myself entirely to approve of it, for further investigation does not increase one's confidence that it is really going to bring any speedy prosperity back to the shipping industry. Further investigation and experience will show something of the dangers that are to be expected from Government assistance,, because Government assistance we are learning by bitter experience means Government interference. In the case of a recent subsidy we had an indication that the Government were going to take control of the industry.

The subsidy for the Cunard-White Star Line was a mere subvention to that Line. To our surprise we find that the Treasury regard the fact that it has contributed towards the cost of building the new Cunard-White Star Liner as entitling them to establish a stranglehold on the whole North Atlantic passenger traffic. It is an illustration of the unexpected results which may follow an acceptance of Government assistance by the shipping trade, and I would warn my friends among tramp shipowners that they should watch carefully to see whether by accepting this subsidy they do not place themselves in the same condition as those engaged in the North Atlantic passenger trade, who do not know where they are. In the last few days there has been great uncertainty as to the attitude of the Government. It is, of course, vital to the success of the British shipping industry, when you have to make prompt decision, that you should know how much interference you will suffer from the Government. This makes one doubtful as to the benefits to the shipping world which will come from this Bill. The right hon. Gentleman gave an undertaking that there should be an international conference to put things on a better basis. I welcome the statement he has made as to the progress towards a solution of the difficulties, and I hope he will devote his attention to encouraging conferences of this kind. Subsidies can only be mere palliatives.

I should like to ask whether it is not possible to do something more in negotiation with our Dominions to assist the shipping trade. The Dominions owe us something in return for the benefits conferred under the Ottawa Convention, and they can do something to help general trade and particularly the shipping trade. Is it possible to encourage the amount of coal carried into Canada? I have had an opportunity of discussing that question with some friends of mine, and it seems to me that there are no insuperable difficulties, given good will and fair play. With the backing of the right hon. Gentlemen it might be possible to find an additional valuable trade, which would help the distressed coal industry as well as the shipping industry. There is also the difficulty that the Australian and New Zealand Governments have never come into line on the vexed question of coastwise shipping. There is the well known and grossly unfair case of the American steamers carrying passengers between New Zealand and Australia, whilst British steamers which are in competition are forbidden to carry passengers between San Francisco and Honolulu. This is a gross case of discrimination which could be put an end to if only His Majesty's Government and the Australian and New Zealand Governments could come to terms. Surely we may ask the Dominion Governments to come to our assistance to that small extent. That is a small illustration of the way in which indirect steps can be taken to help this sorely distressed industry.

Can the right hon. Gentleman tell us something of the composition of the Committee which is to administer this subsidy. Some anxiety was expressed in the Committee stage on this point. I have no anxiety because I have every confidence in the integrity of members of the shipping community, and particularly of those members who are to serve on the committee. But some anxiety was expressed in Committee as to whether it was right that those who are to receive the subsidy should be entirely responsible for its distribution. It was thought desirable that some other interests should be included. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will let us know whether he has come to any conclusion on this point, and if he can give us the composition of the committee I am sure it would allay any such anxiety as was expressed in Committee.

I do not know that there is very much more to be said on the Bill which, after all, is not very important in the mass of protective legislation which we have been passing during the last few years. But there are two warnings I desire to give. First to the taxpayer, that it is no use thinking that this is a mere matter of £2,000,000. When once this burden has been shouldered it is likely to prove nothing less than an old man of the sea. It will grow heavier as the years go by, and more and more difficult to get rid of it. The pressure of events will teach the Government and the country that the artificial restriction of trade is sheer folly. We shall never get back to prosperity until some of these restrictions are removed. The other warning is to my shipowner friends; that they must remember that for this attractive and illusory benefit they are surrendering their freedom of initiation, which has always been their pride and upon which they have built up their previous prosperity.

11.43 a.m.

Before we ring down the curtain on this Measure I desire to make one or two observations, not from the point of view of one who has any interest in shipping on either side, but as one who realises the enormous importance of British shipping in the economic life of the nation and desires to see it flourish. The Bill is concerned solely with tramp shipping, a point which during the Committee stage it was quite impossible for hon. Members opposite to grasp. Tramp shipping is the backbone of the British mercantile marine, and it is that section alone which the Bill is intended to assist. The provisions in the Measure are in my judgment rendered absolutely essential by the economic nationalism which has spread over the world, by the choking of the channels of international trade, the shrinkage in sea-borne traffic and the growth of the mercantile marines of other nations, who are determined by any means, economic or uneconomic, to obtain their share of the carrying trade of the world. While these are factors in the decline of the British mercantile marine it cannot be denied that the main factor is the subsidies which have been so freely given by other nations in their endeavour to secure their share of the carrying trade of the world. I dislike subsidies, and the President of the Board of Trade dislikes subsidies. The Government which has to find the money dislikes subsidies, but it cannot be denied by any impartial observer who has looked into the conditions of the mercantile marines of the world that we have been absolutely driven to resort to the same weapons as those taken up by our competitors in the sphere of mercantile activities.

One would have thought that hon. Members opposite, and particularly the right hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) would have learnt by their experience as a recent Government the truth of what has been said by the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mr. Rea). It affords a very valuable lesson. The Socialist Government was fortunate in having as President of the Board of Trade, the position now occupied by the right hon. Gentleman who is in charge of this Bill, one of the ablest Parliamentarians who ever sat in this House. He realised the very dangers to which reference has been made by the hon. Member for Dewsbury. He realised the harm that was being done to international trade by the continual raising of tariff walls. He was an able and skilful administrator; he was an astute negotiator; he spared neither himself nor his Department in an effort to get other countries to lower their tariffs and thus free the channels of trade. He attended conference after conference and spared neither himself nor his Department. But he failed utterly and absolutely. He failed because he had no weapon of any kind with which to fight.

The National Government changed the fiscal policy of the country and the moment it did so a totally different situation arose. The House knows the result. My hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury looks at me. I am sorry if the cold, hard facts of the world have made inroads into his theories; I am very sorry indeed. In spite of the tariff neither he nor his leaders can deny that all their dismal prophecies have failed to come true. Exports and imports have gone up and have had their effect on the carrying trade of the world. It is not the slightest use pointing out to other nations that subsidies are wasteful, or that they are uneconomic and constitute unfair competition. Other countries are perfectly entitled to formulate their own martime policy, and if they choose to put a heavy burden on their taxpayers in order to carry out that policy we are utterly powerles to prevent it. But that does not mean that we have to sit down and hold our hands on our laps and wait in the hope that this policy, with which we disagree, will work itself out.

I take the view that this Bill is not a Bill to assist the British shipowner alone. The provisions of the Bill are the things which it actually contains. It is a Bill to assist British shipping, and in doing that it will help not only shipowners, but the charterers and merchants and dockers and railway workers, the sailors and firemen, the officers and engineers, the iron and steel workers and the coal miners. It is a very good and useful Measure, and is going to be of very great assistance in those parts of the country in which that assistance is most badly needed. That is a point which I would like right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite to get into their heads. It will help shipyard workers too, and those in many other ancillary trades. One might be forgiven for thinking that a Measure of this kind would be accepted by the whole House almost unanimously, and particularly by those on the other side who are always, and quite rightly, deploring the lot of the unemployed, and yet by some extraordinary process of mental hypnotism seem to regard themselves as the sole guardians of the rights of the workers. This is a Bill to provide employment in the shipyards and on vessels at sea.

Hon. Gentlemen opposite do not seem to have grasped what the Bill is or what it intends to do. The simple facts of the case are that in Part II there is £10,000,000 to be spent in rebuilding vessels belonging to the Mercantile Marine. Does any right hon. or hon. Member opposite want to tell me that that is not going to benefit the Tyne and Wear and Clyde? [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Very well; I am afraid I have reached the position where I am unable to understand the meaning of the English language. That brings me to ask the House how these proposals are received. I am not an old Member of the House, but in my limited experience I have never known any Measure introduced into this House which has been received with such ill-informed and ill-considered criticism, some of it based on scurrilous letters the writers of which have not the courage to put their names to them—letters which are actually quoted on the Floor of this House.

Nor do I know of any Measure the opposition to which has been advanced by so many irrelevant, far-fetched and mutually contradictory statements. And the worst feature of all is that much of this criticism has come from people who know absolutely nothing about either shipping or shipbuilding, some of whom in point of fact do not know the difference between a tramp and a trooper, between a binnacle and a barnacle or between a crankshaft and a tail-end shaft. As far as irrelevancy is concerned this Bill deals with tramp steamers and tramp steamers only. The provisions relate to tramp steamers. Yet in speech after speech from the other side we have references to the passenger liners of the Cunard and P. & O. and other companies, although the President of the Board of Trade was meticulously careful to point out that the Bill related to tramp steamers alone.

I am not a shipowner, and I am not speaking for shipowners, but if I were a shipowner I think that one of the things I would do would be to reprint the whole of this Debate and circulate it amongst the crews of the mercantile marine. I would print in leaded type the speeches of the two serangs, the two old shellbacks who represent the seaport towns of Wakefield and Swindon. With regard to the validity of the arguments, I would congratulate the right hon. Member for Swindon on his completely changed attitude this morning. He talked about the President of the Board of Trade having shown a spirit of sweet reasonableness. He talked of exceptions and a few cases here and there. His right hon. Friend next to him, the right hon. Member for Wakefield, said that deplorable conditions existed in British ships—there were no distinctions or exceptions—and that these were a disgrace to our national life. Hon. Members sitting behind him said that the condition of British ships was such that they were not fit for human beings to live in. The right hon. Member for Wakefield said they were a national scandal. He went on to say that it was not a case of exceptions, but that his argument applied to the vast majority of British ships. It is no use the right hon. Gentleman now shaking his head. His words are in the OFFICIAL REPORT. He said:

The hon. Member quoted the right hon. Gentleman as referring to all ships and not tramp steamers only.

There are references which have been made repeatedly and that was what brought me into these debates in the first instance. The references which have been made repeatedly from the other side of the House have been such as to indicate that in the judgment of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite the conditions on British steamers were a disgrace to our national life. We have been told that those ships were unfit for human beings to live in and numerous other phrases of the same kind have been used. It was because of that libel on the British shipowners and indeed on British seamen officers and engineers also that I intervened in these discussions. The absence of complaint and the freedom of the industry from stoppages are sufficient indications that the machinery which governs these things is working smoothly. I think that there should have been something in the Bill to give statutory authority to the proceedings of the National Maritime Board but, in fact, the existing machinery is working so well that there has been no dispute for something like 15 years and I see no reason why that machinery should be upset.

The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield said that he was not making a general charge but he went on to use the phrases which I have just quoted. The hon. Member for the Scotland Division of Liverpool (Mr. Logan) sprang to his rescue when someone called attention to this and said that the right hon. Gentleman had never said anything which was capable of general applicability. If the words "vast majority" are not of general applicability I do not know what words mean. This Bill in my judgment—and I rely upon the assurances of the President of the Board of Trade—definitely assures that National Maritime Board wages shall be paid in every case. I was much perturbed by some of the statements made from the other side in the previous debate. Since then I have not been wasting my time but I have made inquiries on both sides and with the exception of one solitary case, in which I could not get any information one way or the other—I could not verify the charge nor could I get it refuted—I have not been able to find any case of a British shipowner paying wages below the National Maritime Board scale. In this connection and in view of what is in the Bill to improve conditions generally, I am sorry that the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs (Mr. Kirkwood) is not in his place. He made a charge against a Scottish firm, a charge which he subsequently withdraw but in withdrawing it he made an exactly similar charge against two firms on the North-East Coast. I followed the hon. Member in the debate and said that those charges would be investigated. The hon. Member in the first place made this accusation against this Scottish firm. Then the hon. Member made the amende honorable and withdrew that charge but he made precisely similar charge against Messrs. Common Brothers and Messrs. Dalgleish. I have here two letters one from Messrs. Dalgleish authorising me to contradict the statement and one from Messrs. Common Brothers stating:

If only one-half of the statements which have been made in condemning the provisions of this Bill were true they would constitute a grave reflection on the whole body of British shipowners but an even graver reflection on those who are charged with the duty and responsibility of looking after the interests of the men themselves. The men have their organisations and trade unions and pay their subscriptions to those bodies in order that their interests may be safeguarded. If only one-half of these charges were true they would be thoroughly justified in "sacking" the officials of those bodies for incompetence. But as a matter of fact the simple truth is that the officials of those organisations, the Seamen's and Firemen's Union, the marine engineers' organisation, the Merchant Service Guild and the other organisations concerned do their work remarkably well. The spirit prevailing on both sides in the industry is friendly and amicable and at this moment their representatives are sitting round a council table discussing the restoration of the wage cuts and if my information is correct when the decision is made it will be found not altogether unsatisfactory to the workers in the industry.

I wish to refer to one matter of a personal nature. The organ of the Seamens and Firemens Union has been good enough to devote a good deal of space to a criticism of my humble contributions to the previous debate on this Measure. I am not complaining of the comments which they have made, in so far as the provisions of the Bill and my comments on those provisions are concerned, except in one respect. They have not exceeded the bounds of fair comment except that by taking out selected extracts from my speeches, they have given the impression to the readers of that paper that I who have come from the ranks of the workers, am opposed to the workers in the industry. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have been associated with the shipping and shipbuilding industries all my life and it has been to me a matter of great concern in the district which I represent, the district in which I have spent all my life, to see those industries steadily and surely declining. I want to see them revive in the interest not only of the shipowners but of the workers, in the interests of the engineers, the sailors and the firemen and particularly the engineers for I am one of them myself.

I agree with the hon. Member for Dumbarton Burghs that in the complicated box of tricks which we call a seagoing vessel to-day the engineer is the most important member of the crew. These men, for whom the Bill, in my judgment, will create additional advantages have had to qualify by a long apprenticeship and serious and intensive study. They have to pass the most difficult examination in their profession in the world. The provisions made by the Board of Trade have made the examination both on the engineering side and the navigating side so severe that there is no risk of any unqualified person creeping through and it is that which has made the British Mercantile Marine the safest and most efficient in the civilised world. There are hundreds of these men who are to-day out of employment, and I welcome the Bill because I am confident that it will be taken full advantage of and that additional employment will result from its passage into law. Since the time of Elizabeth this country has been the leading mercantile nation in the whole civilised world. We have received this heritage, and it is our duty, not only to ourselves but to those who will follow us, to see that we hand it on in a state of efficiency equal to that in which we received it.

I would like to point out as an engineer—and the provisions of the Bill have a tremendous bearing on this—that very big strides indeed have been made during the last 10 or 12 years in the technique both of shipbuilding and marine engineering. A little while ago I had the privilege of going over the National Physical Laboratory at Teddington, and I want to pay my tribute to the wonderful work which is being done there to help our shipbuilders and our engineers. Very great strides have been made in the improvement of hull design and formation and particularly in the prevention of eddying round the rudder and propeller. A great improvement has also been made in the design of propellers and in the machinery, whether motor machinery, turbine machinery, or reciprocating engines. It will now be possible, under this Bill proposed by the Government, for our shipowners to take advantage of the results of these tests and to build new vessels which, in economy and efficiency, will far surpass anything which can be built in any other part of the world.

In conclusion, I welcome and support this Measure, because it will help the two great industries which I have mentioned. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade has done several things which have been of great assistance to British shipping, and I would mention in particular the Anglo-Russian Agreement, the stipulation in which respecting British shipping has done more for that shipping than any other single thing which has been done in the last few years. I regard this Bill not merely as one to assist British shipping, but, as I said in the Debate on the distressed areas on the 3rd December, as being part of the general policy of the Government to help restore our national prosperity, and in particular to bring some measure of relief to the distressed areas, which stand to benefit more than any other part of the country by the provisions of this Bill. For these reasons I welcome it as one of the most useful Measures which has been introduced into the House during the lifetime of this Parliament, and I sincerely and earnestly hope that the shipowners of this country will take immediate and practical advantage of it.

12.10 p.m.

I would not claim the knowledge of the shipping industry of the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. Dickie) who has just sat down, and I would not doubt his knowledge, but I think that when we listen to men who claim to be workmen but who are at all times ready to become lick-spittles and toadies to employers—

On a point of Order. Is a reference of that character within Parliamentary practice?

I am not quite sure what it means.

I am very pleased, Mr. Speaker, that you have not a knowledge of what those two words mean, but millions of people in this country do know and understand them perfectly, and I should say that the vast majority of those who voted for the hon. Gentleman and who will vote against him at the next election understand them very well indeed. They are the type of persons for whom we have a great detestation when we find that sort of spirit exhibited. We have not got much knowledge of the shipping industry from the speech that the hon. Gentleman has just delivered, and I cannot assure him that I have learned much from what he has said of the shipping industry. I have heard a great deal of support for the shipowners in the tramp shipping industry during his speech, but I have not heard much in his speech, nor in the speech of the President of the Board of Trade, to guarantee that any work is to be provided for British seamen from this £2,000,000 subsidy. I am not altogether opposed to a subsidy if there be a useful purpose in providing one, but I think there has been the flimsiest possible argument by the Minister and those who support this subsidy that it will provide any work at all for British seamen. I do not think there is an assurance that an additional seaman will be employed. There are £2,000,000 to be handed out to shipowners, some of them in this House, some of them out of it, who are going to pocket this money, and there are no definite conditions with regard to it. There has been no specific gift which has had so few conditions as there are with regard to this particular subsidy of £2,000,000.

We cannot do without seamen if we are to have ships, but we can do without shipowners as we have them to-day, and there is not a word in this Bill which provides any guarantee to the seamen of the country. Just at the moment when the country is aflame with indignation at the treatment of the unemployed by this Government, we have to hand out £2,000,000 to gentlemen to put into their pockets without any guarantee of any increased trade or any additional employment. I believe that if work is to be provided in Britain, and if taxpayers' money is to be found to assist in the provision of work, then Britishers ought to be the first to be considered. I was for some years attached to the Empire Marketing Board, and I was a supporter of the first principle of that Board, namely, that if you are going to buy, you ought first to buy the goods that are produced at home. I believe that if you are going to find employment, you ought to find employment on British ships, and if you are to have the taxpayers' money, it should be spent on work for Britishers.

I am a trade unionist, and I would like to see trade union conditions where-ever workmen or workwomen are employed. I want to see them members of trade unions. I have heard a good deal with regard to the unemployed in the shipping industry. It has been said by the right hon. Member for Swindon (Dr. Addison) this morning that there are thousands of British seamen unemployed at this moment—40,000, it is said. It is also said that there are tens of thousands of foreigners engaged on British ships. If that is the position, then there is room for a good deal more employment of British seamen, and if the President of the Board of Trade would take the attitude of guaranteeing that British seamen should be employed, he would reduce our opposition considerably to this subsidy. All in the House are agreed that there is great unemployment in this industry, and we all want to aid the industry, but Members on the other side have not shown themselves prepared to do anything to insert in this Bill, where it ought to be inserted in a definite manner, that British seamen shall have first preference, and shall be employed where the subsidy is to be given. That, to me, is the strong point. I do not take the assurance of anyone that this may be so when I have before me a Bill which deals only with the employer side of the industry. They are not to be trusted in this matter. I have known a good deal about employers of labour, and, as a rule, they are not so ready either to give advances or to maintain present wages if there is any opportunity to reduce them.

Therefore, I want a definite assurance. It is proposed by this Bill to hand out this £2,000,000 to the shipowners, but let us see to it that this money is distributed so that British seamen shall be employed, and not the foreigners who are employed in their thousands to-day and at miserably low wages, because that is the only reason, I suppose, that they are employed. British seamen can do the work, and why should they not have the opportunity of doing it? If the Maritime Board are the body to deal with it, as I believe they are, let them deal with that matter. Let them sit round the table, as the right hon. Gentleman said this morning, and have the opportunity of preparing a scheme by which seamen can be guaranteed employment, and guaranteed proper wages for it. An Advisory Committee is to be set up, but there is no statement that the trade unions or any representative of the workmen shall have any part on it. It is said that £10,000 is to be for the expenses of that Committee, and it may be—it looks like it—that the £10,000 will go to the same people or their friends as the £2,000,000. Then, again, it has been suggested that the coal industry might benefit. Where is there anything in the Bill that the coal industry is going to benefit at all? Why should the hon. Gentleman bring that in his support of the Bill, when there is not a word in the Bill regarding it?

I was not supporting the Bill. I was urging my right hon. Friend to use other means than those contained in the Bill to bring back prosperity to the shipping trade and the coal industry.

That is the usual attitude of the Liberal party. You never know which side they are on. They are always on the fence. I might have regarded that attitude as the most likely one they would take up, but I did not understand from the hon. Gentleman that he was going to vote against the Bill.

I voted against the Second Reading.

A good deal has been said about the use of oil from British coal. This matter has been brought to the attention of the right hon. Gentleman, and he has given answers on the subject, but I do think that we ought to have some assurance again that British coal shall be used, or that oil obtained from British coal shall be used by British ships if British taxpayers' money is to be spent. I am opposed to taking money out of the pockets of people who have hardly any—take the unemployed in this country—and who have to find this £2,000,000, which is to go to people who do not need it, and who frankly made millions during the last 20 years out of this particular industry. I do not see any reason why we should support a Bill of this character unless it provides the conditions which I suggest, guaranteeing British seamen the employment and the wages they should have, and giving them the opportunity of working if work is to be distributed, and, if there is not additional work, having the first opportunity of employment. If this can be guaranteed, I do not see that there will be any particular opposition even from this side to the subsidy of £2,000,000.

With regard to the £10,000,000 to be guaranteed for the modernising and building of new ships, there may be a different argument put forward with regard to that. I suppose that if ships are to be modernised, there will be British labour employed to a larger extent than there is in the manning of the ships. The argument is against the £2,000,000 at this moment, and it is because we are not satisfied that it is going to be used in a right way or in the right direction, that we feel that the President of the Board of Trade, if he wishes to have the confidence of the workers of the country and of the seamen who are following such a dangerous occupation, but most useful to the life of this country, ought to agree to insert in the Bill the conditions we are asking, that Britishers shall be given the first opportunity of employment.

12.23 p.m.

I think it a very great pity that on previous occasions the right hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) in particular, but also other less illustrious and even less well-informed speakers among his friends, should have taken the opportunity which discussions on this Bill provide of introducing prejudice and bringing allegations against the shipowners of this country entirely unsupported by facts. The right hon. Member for Wakefield, who speaks with the authority of an ex-Minister, should have realised that a certain amount of importance would be attached to the words—the irresponsible words—which he uttered. We are getting rather hardened in this House to the right hon. Gentleman's stock-in-trade, disguising his ignorance of the facts by adopting a flamboyant, bombastic attitude, and issuing challenge after challenge to the Government and everybody else he can think of. Anyone who reads his speech on the Financial Resolution in connection with this Bill will find that it was full of challenges—challenges to the Government, to the shipowners and to everybody else.

Unfortunately for the right hon. Gentleman, some of those challenges were accepted, and after scratching, and nosing about, among any disgruntled seamen with whom he was able to get into contact during the intervening period between the Debates, one must presume that he tried to find some sort of reason for any or all of the allegations which he had made against the shipping industry. Although several weeks elapsed between the first stages of this Bill and the succeeding stages, it will not have escaped the attention of the House or of the country that the majority of the concrete cases which were eventually brought forward were not only found to be illusory, but referred to liners, which are not dealt with under this Bill and in no circumstances participate in the £2,000,000 subsidy. I am wondering whether the right hon. Gentleman to-day will be able to do that which he and his friends have failed to do so far, and bring forward one concrete case which will show that there has been blacklegging by any tramp owner in this country.

Shipping, I am glad to say, has until to-day escaped the contamination of class conscious Socialism. Employers and employed in this great industry work together; they have recognised each other's difficulties in the past, and I am convinced that they will continue to do so in future. As a result, there has been an exceptional measure of industrial peace in the industry. I think I can even go so far as to say that they make allowances for each other's failings and shortcomings. I am not going to say there is not such a thing as a blackleg shipowner and that there are no bad employers of labour, but I say with all conviction that the wild statements which have been made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield have given, and are meant to give, an entirely wrong picture of the conditions in the shipping industry. It is a pity that the right hon. Gentleman should have introduced this tone into our Debates. It is an additional pity that in doing so he should have so ill-advisedly prejudiced the case of those men whom he was trying to represent.

Many shipowners—I might say all shipowners—when discussions were proceeding with the Government in conection with the framing of this Bill, were anxious that there should be a Clause inserted that it should be a condition for obtaining the subsidy that the national maritime scale of wages should be maintained. It was also the opinion of the Tramp Committee itself that there should be a Clause in the Bill making it a condition for the receipt of the subsidy that as high a proportion as possible of British seamen should be employed. Only yesterday I received a circular letter from the Chamber of Shipping which drew my attention to that fact. The Shipping Committee of the House of Commons came to a similar conclusion. I am bound to say that I am still unable to understand the words of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade when, speaking on an Amendment to the Bill, he said: He asked what was the sanction if it was not observed, and he raised other similar difficulties in opposing the acceptance of the Amendment, the object of which was to insert a Clause to make it compulsory for British owners to employ British seamen. Even to-day a very wrong impression is held of the number of foreigners who are employed on British tramps. Nearly all the statements made from the Benches opposite have referred to liners and not to tramps at all. The figure, which I agree needs continual inspection and might be improved, shows that foreign seamen now employed in the tramp ships are 1.7 per cent. That includes the large number of cases of exceptional circumstances which necessitate a certain number of foreign seamen being employed.

Does that number include Lascars?

There again the hon. Gentleman has not distinguished between tramps and liners. If he knew anything about the shipping industry he would know that Lascars are not employed on tramp ships. Hon. Members opposite really must remember that this Bill deals with tramp shipping, and that most of the figures which they have produced deal with liners. With regard to wages, once again I must disagree with the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade when he said: instructions to shipowners. I believe there has appeared in the Press this morning, a letter over the signature of Sir Vernon Thomson, the very able Chairman of that Committee, in which the statement is made that it will be conditional for the receipt of the subsidy that the national maritime scale of wages be maintained, and that shipowners wishing to qualify for the subsidy will at least remember that it is important that as high a percentage as possible of British seamen be employed.

The question of accommodation and victualling, which has also been raised by right hon. and hon. Members opposite, is already dealt with by the law of this country. There can be no possible point in inserting any further provisions with regard to victualling or accommodation in this particular Bill. The rules and regulations in existence to-day are at least as good as, and in many respect, I believe, better than, those which were in existence at the time when the party to which the right hon. Member for Wakefield belongs were in power. If what he says is true, which it is not, it was entirely possible for the Government to alter the regulations dealing with those questions and to bring in any reforms which he considered necessary. The fact of the matter is, of course, that among some of our oldest ships conditions exist which we should not be proud of if they were found in a ship which had been built during the last year or two. It is a very expensive business to alter a ship already built. A tramp ship lasts 25 to 35 years, and gradually becomes out of date; standards get better and better, naturally and rightly. It may be possible, although we have not had a case quoted to us by anybody in this House, that in a very old ship right hon. Gentlemen opposite might rightly say that conditions were not up to modern standards—I do not deny that—but I do say that the standards maintained by the British mercantile marine are higher than in any other country, and that on the whole, provided a ship is properly looked after by the officers and crew, the accommodation and the victualling are of an extremely high standard.

I hope that we have heard the end of these vague allegations against shipowners. I will await the speech of the right hon. Member for Wakefield to-day. If he has any concrete case, in which he really believes, and which he knows to be true, I hope that for the sake of the whole industry he will bring it forward; but if he has no concrete cases, and is relying only on vague knowledge, or ignorance, or prejudice, or class feeling, then let us have an end to the sort of rubbish to which he gave vent on the Financial Resolution.

I want now to turn to a much more serious aspect of this Bill than the series of foolish allegations of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, and to ask the President of the Board of Trade two questions which I think will be of interest to the country and certainly to shipowners. The first is whether he can tell the House when it is proposed that the "scrap and build" programme is to be inaugurated. This is not the occasion to go over once again the arguments both for and against the "scrap and build" programme. Whether we agree with that programme or whether we do not, one thing is quite certain, and that is that at the moment shipbuilding is being definitely held up because shipowners are in doubt as to when this scheme will be brought into effect. Shipowners who have one or two old ships and are contemplating the purchase of new vessels are hesitating either to sell the old or to give the order for the new, knowing, or hoping in some cases, that in a week or two or a month or two they may get the assistance of the "scrap and build" policy. Therefore, I hope the President of the Board of Trade will be able to tell the House when that scheme will begin to operate.

The second question is a much more difficult one and, in a sense, a more technical one, and I hope I shall not detain the House too long in putting my difficulties before the right hon. Gentlemen. I hope the House and the President of the Board of Trade have realised from what I have already said that I am not one who has at any time complained of the imposition of certain conditions upon the industry in order to qualify for the subsidy. Indeed, I have pointed out two conditions which I think might well have been included in the present Bill. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade, in referring to my speech on the Financial Resolution, said that it would appear that I had thought that £2,000,000 could be given to the industry without conditions. That is certainly not the case, and the Parliamentary Secretary, if he would look at my speech again, would realise that he had no right to make that statement. I think the President of the Board of Trade accused me of knowing what was going to happen as a result of the subsidy. That, again, is an error. I am not at all sure what is going to happen, but what I am quite sure about is what I want to happen, and that is why I once again ask the President of the Board of Trade the question which I asked him on the Financial Resolution. "For what purpose is the Government giving this subsidy?" The whole industry knows—I want to make this point quite clear and quite definite—that the conditions as laid down by the President of the Board of Trade are contradictory. Shipowners did not consider them hard, but they considered them impossible to fulfil. That is why I have to ask the President of the Board of Trade for what purpose the subsidy is being given. Is it offensive or defensive?

When the hon. and gallant Member says "we" will he say for whom he is speaking? Is he speaking for the Shipping Association?

I will certainly tell the hon. Member, if I have caught the drift of his question. I am speaking for myself as a shipowner. Let me assure the President of the Board of Trade that I am in no sense trying to catch him out, or tilting at the Government, or trying to make his work more difficult. Both the question and the answer—which I hope he will give—are of the very greatest importance both to the country and to the shipping industry. Let me illustrate the difficulty which presents itself to the industry and show how fundamentally the two conditions as laid down are in contradiction. I might remind the House that the first condition was that the subsidy should not be dissipated, and the second was that there should be greater employment of British ships at the expense of foreign subsidised shipping. What could the industry do to fulfil the condition that the subsidy should not be dissipated? It could act in ways such as this. Doles might be paid to ships to lay up. At one time that was suggested by certain owners. An administrative committee might be given power to compel British ships to lay up. Every effort might be made to reduce the number of British ships. Every effort might be made, by co-operation between British shipowners, to keep up the rates of freight, but every one of those suggestions entails the restriction of British tonnage and takes no account of the competition of foreign vessels. It is not by tying up British ships or by laying up British tonnage that more British ships will sail on the high seas; it is not even by co-operation that British shipowners, standing by themselves, will defeat the foreign competition which they face to-day. It may be true that that might afford some purely temporary help, but all these schemes in the end entail a policy of surrender. They are the scrap half of the scrap-and-build programme; they are what might be called a Red Star policy, and must inevitably lead to less employment for British seamen.

In every way, action taken to fulfil the first of the conditions would render useless action which might be taken to fufil the second of the conditions. This, the House will remember, is the greater employment of British ships. In so far as you tie up, lay up or restrict the free working of British ships, you make it impossible to ensure that there shall be more employment of British ships. The greater the employment given to British ships, the less likely is it that you will succeed in any policy entailing the compulsory tying up or the restriction of the movement of British ships.

Why is shipping asking for this subsidy? What is the basic reason which has forced shipowners to come to the House of Commons? It is because shipping is being undercut in the markets of the world by foreign subsidised shipping. It is not by paying ships to be idle, by scrapping, or by tying up, but by beating our competitors at their own game that shipowners will provide greater employment for British ships. It is not by keeping rates up but, wherever necessary, by depressing them below that which to-day the subsidised foreigner can take, that we shall ensure that we fulfil the one condition which, I submit, should be fulfilled, namely, to ensure the greater employment of British ships.

I hope, if the President of the Board of Trade is kind enough to reply to me later in the day, he will not say that he wants the best of both worlds; that it really is his view that both conditions can be fulfilled. If you take a plus and a minus, the answer is nothing, and if you try to fulfil both of those conditions no good will come to the British mercantile marine as the result of the payment of this subsidy. I am not saying that in a certain number of cases, a very few, some improvement cannot come in some part of the world by co-operation among British owners alone, but what interests the British shipping industry is as to which of the two basic principles, the cardinal underlying idea, the President of the Board of Trade wishes to fulfil. Is this subsidy—to use the words of a recent Amendment tabled I think by the Opposition—a dole to parasites, or is it a fighting fund? Does the President of the Board of Trade want to see the money go into the pockets of the shipowners, or to see more British seamen employed? I have no hesitation in saying that members of the shipping industry who can afford to take a long view know that all who are engaged in the industry will ultimately benefit most is the subsidy is used, not to be put into the shipowners pockets, but to ensure that more British ships, giving more employment, are in use on the high seas of the world.

If the subsidy were big enough, and if owners could make a big enough cut in the rates of freight, a position could be achieved in which there would be no foreign ship left on the seas, but we cannot go as far as that. The Government cannot give shipping enough money for that, but at least we can ensure—or I hope we can—that whatever subsidy shipowners get is used in order that sooner or later—and the sooner the better—foreign countries which to-day subsidise shipping are made to scream for help. We have sufficient resources and sufficient determination to make quite certain that, if the subsidy is used as it should be used, other nations can be made to stop subsidising their ships. A year or two ago it was impossible to get other nations to talk to us about the international rationalisation of shipping, but this month the preliminary stages of what I hope will ultimately be an international convention have been discussed by a large number of nations. There is a far greater chance to-day of international rationalisation, which is what is necessary, and I hope that there is a good deal less chance that we shall be made to sacrifice British ships by national rationalisation; that, in the end, would be only a disservice to the country and to the industry.

I have no hesitation in saying that I believe it will be found at the end of the year, when the subsidy period is up, that a further grant, in respect of next year, will be necessary. I have never disguised that opinion. So long as other nations continue to subsidise, we shall need to do so. The judgment of the House and of the country, when the time comes for the industry and the Government to give an account to the public of the effect which the subsidy has had and may have in the future if given for a further period, will not be based upon how much money shipowners have been able to put in their pockets—that is not of the slightest interest to the House or to the country—the test will be how many more British ships are sailing the high seas than were sailing a year ago. If British shipping has not obtained a higher proportion of the freights of the world by reason of the receipt of the subsidy, the subsidy will have failed, but if the Government can announce at the end of the year that shipping is winning the fight with Government assistance, and that British ships are defeating the ships of these nations which to-day pay such vastly greater subsidies than that which is being suggested for British ships, then the Government will certainly be entitled to the thanks of the British shipping industry and of the whole nation.

12.55 p.m.

I do not intend to deal with the righteous—or unrighteous—indignation which seems to fill some hon. Members, particularly those who are shipowners. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. Dickie) is not in his place. At an earlier stage of the discussions, and again this morning, he was moved to great indignation. The sum of £2,000,000, he said, was going to bring a new economic prosperity to every industry in the country. Everybody knows that that is a fantastic claim to make for this Bill. The hon. Member was a little annoyed about scurrilous letters he has received. I have received a large number of letters, perhaps a larger number than any other hon. Member but I do not find them all scurrilous. I find that some are scurrilous, but a very large number of them are of an informative character. They substantiate the statements which have been made from these benches during the passage of the Bill. As to the hon. Member for Barkston Ash (Colonel Ropner) I am not in the least disturbed by his outburst of indignation. I should not regard it as surprising f I have said things that have got under the skins of hon. Members opposite. I am bound to say that the shipowners during these discussions have been rather more thin skinned than one would have expected them to be.

In the elegant words of the hon. and gallant Member, we have been scratching and nosing about among disgruntled seamen. We have had information willingly put at our disposal by responsible organisations. It is not merely disgruntled seamen from whom we have had information, but old officers of the Mercantile Marine, with a lifetime of service behind them, have quoted their own experience to us. They have said "Please keep my name out of this, because I cannot get a job if my name comes out in connection with any disclosure." We know that statement to be true and that there would be victimisation of these people. If their names were made known, what chance would they stand of employment on any British ship? The hon. and gallant Member spoke about blacklegging. I do not know what he means by blacklegging. Did he mean that tramp shipowners are employing men at rates lower than the National Maritime Board rates? If he means that and he will look to the Officers' Federation he will get cases of officers who are signed on as able-bodied seamen. That is blacklegging. Those cases are undeniable. I have here a list of distinguished people who are vice-presidents or members of the Parliamentary Committee of the Officers' Federation—Members of this House. They are not here this morning so far as I can see, and they were not visible when a particular question in which they were interested was debated.

To whom is the right hon. Gentleman referring?

I apologise to the hon. and gallant Member. He was here but he ran away at the crucial moment.

Which hon. Member ran away at the crucial moment?

The hon. and gallant Member ran away at the crucial moment when he might have supported an Amendment in the spirit of the one to which he and his friends have attached their names; I mean his other colleagues who are associated with the Parliamentary Committee of the Officers' Federation. Cases of blacklegging of the kind I have referred to can be ascertained from any organisation of either officers or seamen. They are not odd cases, but there are scores of them, and the shipowners know it. If the hon. and gallant Member for Barkston Ash was referring to blacklegging as between shipowners, that is an open secret. Indeed, it is one of the purposes of the Bill to prevent that kind of blacklegging between shipowners.

Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would like me to make myself clear, if I failed to do so before. My point was that he had made very general and very wide allegations against shipowners. I said that I hoped during the course of his speech this morning he would give me one concrete case, only one, where a British tramp-owner had blacklegged. By blacklegging I mean that he had forced men to accept a lower scale of wages than had been agreed, or there had been some definite contravention of what the right hon. Gentleman would consider to be the right standard to be maintained by British shipowners. He has not done that so far.

No, but I have referred the hon. and gallant Member to the responsible organisations of seamen and officers. If any hon. Member has before him the names of the Members of the Parliamentary Committee of the Officers' Federation, Members of this House, let him ask them for information, or let any of those Members of the Parliamentary Committee get up and say that the Officers' Federation has not on its files cases of blacklegging in the sense of the word to which the hon. and gallant Member refers.

Have you?

I have had large numbers of cases.

We have heard that before, but the right hon. Gentleman does not bring them forward.

We have brought cases forward. Cases have been mentioned by hon. Members on this side. My right hon. Friend the Member for Swindon (Dr. Addison) did so. The Bill was introduced, so it is said, because of foreign subsidies. The hon. and gallant Member has been saying a good deal about foreign subsidies, but we have not had during these Debates a statement from the Government as to the actual subsidies which are being paid now by foreign nations to their tramp shipowners. We have had no information whatever on that point. I made a statement at an early stage—I stand open to correction if I am wrong, but I believe I am right—that the only foreign nation which subsidises tramp shipowners is Italy, and Italy is not a serious competitor. If I am wrong, why has not the President of the Board of Trade or the Parliamentary Secretary put me right? We have not had any statement as to what those subsidies actually are. With regard to the charges I make against shipowners, I have not the least sympathy with the shipowners generally nor with the tramp section of the industry. They are primarily responsible for their own plight to-day. During the earlier Debate it was said by my right hon. Friend the Member for Swindon that the tramp shipowners in two years of the War piled up £200,000,000 of profit by exploiting the War situation, by acting unpatriotically, leaving British ports to go all over the world to take up the fabulous profits that were available during War time for tramp ships. There was no industry in the country that made more hard cash out of the War than the shipping industry. Instead of husbanding their resources after the War they frittered them away. That is not denied. They embarked on a policy of shipbuilding at very high prices and submitted to the growing competition of the cargo liners, which is one of their problems to-day. They have themselves been largely responsible for cutting freight rates when they need not have done so.

Among the tramp shipowners, dog has been eating dog. The hon. Gentleman knows that that is one of the reasons for this Bill—to stop that kind of black-legging and rate-cutting as between the various tramp shipowning firms. In the past, the tramp shipping industry has shown no kind of disposition whatever for co-operation, either inside its own ranks or with other branches of the shipping industry. Largely because of these factors, it is to-day in a state of comparative poverty. Its plight has been rendered worse by the Government's own policy. I think I am right in saying that the chairman of a large shipping company stated only a week or two ago, at a meeting of his shareholders that the sum of £500,000 freight had been lost to the British shipping industry through the Minister of Agriculture's meat policy. Industry after industry has been assisted in one way or another, and many of these industries, in so far as they have been helped, have driven another nail into the coffin of the tramp shipping industry of this country. To deal with that, the right hon. Gentleman comes forward with this £2,000,000 and the scrap-and-build policy.

He is prepared to say that this subsidy shall not be paid unless the tramp shipowners play the game by one another, that is to say, that this rate-cutting and blacklegging should stop. One of our simple demands is that that provision should be extended to other forms of blacklegging. It is astonishing to hear from the hon. and gallant Member for Barkston Ash how enthusiastic all the shipowners are about the enforcement of the National Maritime Board's, rates. It is astonishing that they have not been able to convince the President of the Board of Trade of the wisdom of putting it in the Bill. Is he opposing the interests of the shipowners who want this? Had it been in the Bill, the National Maritime Board would have become a body far different from what it is to-day. The hon. Member for Consett referred to it, but he knows that its rates are not enforceable. It is perfectly true that the majority of the shipowners honour their agreements, but those rates are not enforceable. I drew the attention of the President of the Board of Trade to a speech that he had been making at Leith. I quote from the OFFICIAL REPORT. I said that: there is unemployment in the industry. The ships of the British Mercantile Marine are patterns to the world. There is nothing wrong in this industry. We know perfectly well, however, that numbers of tramp ships to-day go to sea under conditions which are unfair to the sailors, who may be aboard those ships for months. We submit, and I think we are entitled to submit, that if we, as a nation, are prepared to confiscate bad houses, we have no right to put money into the pockets of sea slum owners, and a provision of that kind ought to be in the Bill.

I must remind the right hon. Gentleman that, if the provision is not in the Bill, it cannot be discussed on Third Reading.

I am afraid, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that a good deal of this discussion has been disorderly, but that was not of my making. I am trying to reply to observations made earlier in the Debate. I do not, of course, wish in any way to conflict with your Ruling, but these are the charges that we have made. We have nothing to withdraw; I am not withdrawing one single word I have uttered in this House during the course of these Debates. If we have entered upon this policy because we think it is a right and sound and reasonable policy, it ought to have been extended by the Government so as to cover, not merely the shipowners, but to those people who are employed in the ships. To us the Bill is very unsatisfactory. The right hon. Gentleman has made not one single concession of any kind during its passage. The position which we took on the Financial Resolution and on the Second Reading of the Bill we shall continue to express, and we shall cast our votes in the Lobby accordingly.

Before the right hon. Gentleman sits down, may I point out that, when he used that expression, I understood him to be contrasting the conditions in British tramp ships with the conditions prevailing in vessels belonging to other nationals? He said then that they were the worst conditions in the world, and when I now draw attention to it I am covered with vulgar and foul abuse by one of his colleagues.

If I am right in thinking that the hon. Gentleman charges me with using vulgar and foul abuse, may I say that, when he appealed to Mr. Speaker as to whether what I had said was unparliamentary, he did not obtain the support of Mr. Speaker? The last thing that I should ever do would be to use an unparliamentary expression, either here or outside the House, but I think I am entitled to use language which I believe to be correct in describing either the hon. Gentleman or any other hon. Gentleman as I had to do this morning.

The hon. Member is sharing a tendency that is growing on the other side to mistake foul abuse for argument. It is a highly discreditable practice which is not to the credit of the House at all.

The hon. Member for Rothwell (Mr. Lunn) appealed to me. If his speech was not challenged on the occasion that he made it, obviously it was within the Rules of Order of the House. It would be better if hon. Members on all sides of the House were a little less sensitive to criticism, especially severe criticism, so long as such criticism does not go beyond the bounds of order.

I am not going to complain about the vulgar abuse that has been passed on me by hon. Members opposite, but the hon. Member must really have misunderstood what I said then, because in that part of my speech there is no reference whatever to foreign ships. I was dealing with the tramp shipping of this country. He will find it in column 774 of the Debate on 14th December.

1.16 p.m.

I should like to say a few words in support of the Bill. I have spent all my life at sea among ships and the men who sail in them, and it is very distressing to a sailor to see scores of ships rusting in our harbours and thousands of officers and men ashore unemployed. There must be some way out of the stagnant sea into which our Mercantile Marine has drifted, particularly tramp shipping. I think it is conceded on all sides that our trouble is due to the heavy foreign subsidies, against which British owners cannot compete, and also to navigation shipping laws which debar our ships from working on certain trade routes. A counter subsidy may or may not be the ultimate solution of the prolem which the Government are trying to solve, but I feel that the protection of our shipping by subsidy provides the President of the Board of Trade with a weapon which, if wielded skilfully, may well prove as effective as protection has been to the revival of certain industries which were dying owing to unfair and untaxed foreign competition. I support the Bill because it is a good fighting policy to beat unfair foreign competition. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) made a good many charges, and he accused myself and others who were responsible for certain Amendments which we were not allowed to move, as they were out of order, of running away. I was told they were out of order. At any rate, they were not called. I did not run away. I stayed here the whole day but, thanks to the long weary speeches that we had to listen to from the Opposition Benches, I was not able to get in. I know that the President of the Board of Trade has the true interests of the seamen at heart, and I would not support the Bill if I were not perfectly sure that he will provide administrative machinery which will debar shipping companies who benefit by the Bill from employing foreign and cheap labour to the detriment of British seamen. Because I believe the Bill will benefit British seamen I support it.

1.19 p.m.

I rise to speak as one who has chartered many tramp steamers in the course of my life, and as one who has acted as British Vice-Consul for some years, I made a point of examining the conditions of every British ship that entered the port. We all know, hon. Members opposite as well as ourselves, that it is absolutely necessary to see that our Mercantile Marine is kept up to the mark. We have to import our foodstuffs and raw material, and it is no use to sit down and say, "It does not matter what happens. The shipowners are making money. It does not affect us. If they cannot make it, the worse for them." I have seen British steamers, and foreign steamers which have been British, and I can very truthfully say that in no circumstances have I ever found a British ship which was not ahead of the foreigner. The wages as a rule, with the exception of America, were better, and the conditions were much more comfortable. They have to carry out the Board of Trade regulations and see that the food is all right and that the men get a proper supply.

Foreign countries are to-day trying to get away the trade that we held for a great many years. I have seen the books of some of the ships in America that are receiving subsidies, and they cannot make it pay because they do not know their business. Our shipping community are, without exception, the best and most able people there are in connection with ships. They plan out the voyages of tramp steamers. They do not simply send a cargo over, discharge it, bring it back and load another and send it off. Our people send tramps first to one port and then to another and work it out, and the voyages used in the older days to turn out very satisfactorily. I am very glad indeed that the Bill has been brought in. I hold that it is our duty as a country to see that our shipping is kept up and, if £2,000,000 be not sufficient, whatever money may be necessary ought to be given to get our shipping back, and prevent subsidised ships from taking away the trade that ought to be ours. I can remember when wages were absurdly low, but that is no longer the case, and I think the shipping industry, both the owners and the sailors, will see that fair wages are paid.

1.23 p.m.

We have listened today to almost everything that can be said in connection with ships and their construction and the conditions of almost everyone who works or who has worked on board a British ship. But that is not in the main the purpose of the Bill. The purpose of the Bill is described in Clause 1. those lines. All will agree with the last speaker that we want to preserve our British shipping. We do not want any of our industries to suffer if it is possible to avoid it. It has not been proved, and I do not think it can be proved, that simply handing out public money under conditions such as those existing in the shipping industry, can possibly be a solution of the difficulties from which those in the shipping industry are suffering.

When the present Prime Minister was Prime Minister in the Government of the party to which I belong I remember the discussions which took place with him with regard to the formation of his Government. The suggestion was made to him that a certain Member of the House at that time who was a very competent member of the mining industry should be put at the head of the Mines Department, and the Prime Minister became rather wrathful about the whole thing. I cannot remember his exact words, but he said in effect "I will never be a party to placing at the head of any department of a Government with which I have any association, any person who is interested, or has been interested in the industry which is under consideration." It will be remembered that he was responsible for placing a miner at the head of the Post Office, but never a man connected with the mines in the Mines Department or a shipping man in the Department connected with the shipping industry. The Prime Minister has changed his principles since those days, and he has placed at the head of the Department which has to deal with the shipping industry as President of the Board of Trade a gentleman who has had a lifetime's experience of the shipping industry, and no doubt, has had many interests financial and otherwise. I am not complaining. I do not complain now at the attitude of the Prime Minister. I complained of the attitude which he adopted at that time because I thought that in certain circumstances it might be wrong, and apparently he has now discovered that fact.

I suggest to the President of the Board of Trade that this is not likely to be the last subsidy for which the shipping industry will ask. It was stated by the hon. and gallant Member for Barkston Ash (Colonel Ropner) that £2,000,000 may be all right and useful for this year, but next year, if the shipping industry and the Board of Trade are satisfied that there is some improvement in the shipping industry attributed to that subsidy, the shipping industry will ask for more. I think everybody in the House will agree that that is probably true. Where is this sort of thing going to stop? When are we going to come to an end of the time when public money is subscribed in this way very largely by poor people from constituencies like mine? An instance was brought to my notice this week of the type of person who will be asked to contribute, by means of the taxes they will have to pay on all kinds of commodities, towards the subsidy to the shipping industry or subsidies to other industries which I cannot discuss at the present time. A man was summoned by the authority concerned with what we used to call the poor law in respect of a relative in a Poor Law institution. He was summoned for failing to contribute to the support of his relative. He earns £2 12s. 6d. per week. His father with whom he is living is out of work, and his brother, who lives in the same household is also out of work. There is no other income coming into the house except the £2 12s. 6d., two adults being out of work and the man in question being the only one at work. He was summoned to a court of law because he had not contributed to the support of another relative in a Poor Law institution. Men like him are expected to contribute towards subsidies to shipowners, and towards other subsidies which have been given from time to time by the present Government.

I would remind the President of the Board of Trade and the Government that there is a good deal of talk going on outside as to what is meant by all these subsidies. What is to be the ultimate end of them? Are we to go on bolstering up inefficient industries, when there is no proof that they will be more efficient in the future? Are we to hand out public money all the time in the hope that some day prosperity will arrive again and they will be able to repeat the experience of the War period? If that experience is repeated and large profits are made, the same sort of thing will happen all over again. Profits will go into the pockets of the people concerned, and no provision at all will be made for the future of the industry. It is not the duty of the Government to bolster up inefficient industries such as the one we are discussing at the present time. It is just a question of subsidy and more subsidy, a loan which is never repaid, then subsidy—loan, loan—subsidy, all the time handing out public money to industries which have proved inefficient. I should like to believe that the House would give some attention to the handing out of public money in this way. I do not consider that I was sent here just to be submissive and to accept the word of the President of Board of Trade or anybody else that public money should be continually handed out, as it is being handed out by this Government, in order to bolster up shipping and other industries.

I heard this sort of thing said outside last week, and, let me say to the President of the Board of Trade, the feeling is growing. There is very considerable feeling among ordinary people like myself, members of the working-class, who perhaps have not had the opportunity of education at the universities which some of hon. Members may have had, but who are common sense people. They have had a common education and they judge things as a result of their own experience and by statements which are made from time to time by responsible people in this House. It has been said that, after all, these subsidies are not altogether unconnected with donations to party funds. I heard that said at a meeting of very responsible persons not very long ago. Nobody can prove it—I certainly cannot prove it—but the continuation of subsidies leads people to believe that there must be some reason behind it. When you seek further advice and references on the matter you come across statements such as the one which was made, it is true a long time ago, by no less responsible a person than the right hon Gentleman the Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill). I do not know whether the Government consider the right hon. Gentleman is responsible now, but at the time they certainly did. His statement was that the Conservative party at that time were shovelling out public money by the bucketful to their friends. The late Lord Salisbury once made a statement that, after all, it was the duty of the Conservative Government to look after their friends. Common people like myself reading these speeches and seeing a repetition of the conditions which prevailed when the right hon. Member for Epping made his statement about money being shovelled out to one industry after another, ask ourselves whether it is being shovelled out for political purposes. We have been asked to give a concrete case to prove our assertion. Of course we cannot prove it; the Conservative Government never publishes a balance-sheet. They never tell us from whence their money comes, but we know that at the time of an election they are well supplied with large sums of money. These assumptions are bound to be made, and they are made by people outside.

As to the Bill, we are competing with foreign shipping and £2,000,000 is to be given this year.. At the end of this year probably further subsidies will be necessary. We on this side may not be the only persons who represent the workers but we do endeavour to represent them as adequately and as efficiently as possible. At any rate, I am now speaking on behalf of one trade within the shipping industry which is particularly concerned with the scrap and build policy, and I want to know on behalf of this organisation just what their conditions are to be when the time comes along. The President of the Board of Trade is concerned that shipowners shall not blackleg one another. We agree. We do not think that there should be black-legging amongst shipowners, just as we would like all builders to join the Federation of Building Employers. I should like to see all the shipowners join their proper organisation, and if the right hon. Gentleman puts in a condition to prevent black-legging in an industry in which he has been interested in his life is it unreasonable to ask that the same condition shall be inserted in regard to the workers I represent, who are engaged in an industry for which this subsidy is to be used. The conditions of seamen are not as good as they ought to be in some cases. I will not go further than that, but I speak from my own knowledge and I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to introduce into the Bill some provision to preserve equality of treatment amongst the men engaged in an industry in which the subsidy to be paid, so that it shall only be paid provided that a decent standard is maintained in the ship. Surely there is nothing unreasonable in that request.

The right hon. Gentleman may reply, "you can trust the shipowners, they are reasonable men and the Maritime Board will see to it, as well as the Committee which is sitting at this moment considering the conditions of employment in the industry. Therefore you can take our word that in the future, if not in the past, things will be better." In the insurance world they operate on what are called "tables of experience." Those who have had a long experience of negotiations with employers like myself and who have perhaps suffered as much from the conditions in industry as I have, will not be very anxious to take the word of anybody. Experience has taught us that unless the thing is down in black and white, is legally guaranteed, we cannot trust the employers. They will make all kinds of promises for the purpose of getting the subsidy and then will forget the promises they have made. It is remarkable how many shipowners are present in order to defend this Bill. They all turn up. They all tell us that the conditions will be all right in the future and that it is unreasonable to ask for such a provision to be in the Bill. I maintain that it is not unreasonable. About 1.7 of those engaged in the tramp shipping industry are foreigners, and these people, and many others who get British nationality in a way which would not be generally recognised, receive wages which in comparison to the rates of pay prevailing in this country is very much lower. The real position is that shipowners, like every other industry, get their labour as cheaply as they can and sell the commodities produced by that labour as dear as they can. That is the underlying principle of all trade. Shipowners sell their ships by the hour or the week, for the purpose of carrying goods, at the highest possible price and pay the least possible price they can to the workmen employed.

I do not know whether the hon. Member was present when I was speaking but I assured the House that in the interval between the Second Reading and the Third Reading of the Bill I had made the fullest possible inquiries and could find no case, with one exception, in which British shipowners are not paying the National Maritime Board's scale of wages.

The fact that the hon. Member was not able to find such cases does not prove that they do not exist. Our information comes from responsible organisations as well as responsible individuals, and it is to the effect that a considerable number of men, I do not say a majority, are working under these conditions. Surely it is not unreasonable to ask the Minister to stop blacklegging as far as the employment of labour is concerned. The shipping industry does not consist of the owners. The men and women in the industry are infinitely more important than the owners. It has been said that it is possible to run this industry or any other industry without the owners. If the State took the shipping industry over to-morrow it would not be any worse run than it is to-day. If hon. Members have any doubt about that let them ask the Postmaster-General. It used to be said that the Post Office could not be run by the State, but it is very efficiently run by the State to-day. It was not efficiently managed by the people who managed it before the State took it over, and it would not be efficiently managed if it was under private ownership to-day.

We are on the Third reading of the British Shipping (Assistance) Bill, and we cannot discuss the Post Office.

I only mentioned the Post Office as an example. I know it has nothing to do with the shipping industry, but I was arguing that the shipping industry could be run otherwise than it is to-day and that we could do without the shipowners. But no one will say that we could do without the workmen. It is their lives and their conditions with which we are concerned. They are of more importance to us than the profits or losses of the shipowners. My main argument is that this beginning of a subsidy to the owners is only a beginning. Just as this £2,000,000 will go west and nothing will happen to it except that it will go into private pockets very largely, though perhaps not entirely, so the £10,000,000 loan will never be repaid. This is the forerunner of more subsidies and loans. It is a bad policy. It is a policy which, if the public had an opportunity of giving a direct vote upon it, would not be sanctioned. The public would not allow their money to be used for bolstering up an inefficient industry which cannot manage its own affairs and keep its boats running successfully in competition with others.

1.48 p.m.

One thing that is evident is that on this subject of subsidies everyone seems to be unanimous. The shipowners are already saying that the conditions are not elastic enough and the sums not large enough. But we must remember that this fight has been forced upon us; we have not chosen it. Other countries have started subsidising their uneconomic shipping to such an extent that the existence of our shipping is in peril. I would reinforce the arguments advanced in asking the President of the Board of Trade to say that what we start we finish, that this may not be the last subsidy, that the clearer it is made to our competitors that we are in this fight to win it the sooner it will be possible to lift the subsidy and the sooner will other countries realise that they must come into some international agreement for the abolition of subsidies altogether.

We have heard some most extraordinary arguments to-day, some of them about the Bill but the bulk of them not. I have been astounded, as I always am, when any question of employment comes up, at the attitude of the Socialist party. I am filled with admiration at their sincere efforts to do what they can for the worker, but I am filled with despair at the absolutely impossible conditions they keep on suggesting—conditions which would have the opposite effect to what they wish. Take some of the remarks made by the right hon. Member for Swindon (Dr. Addison). I wish he had learned something about shipping before he started talking about it.

Must you be dead before you speak about burial law?

We are not interested when we are dead. Take the question of tramp ships. The right hon. Gentleman referred to them as being all about the world, and said that some of them might never touch a British port, as if that was something derogatory. The very strength of our position is when we get British ships that do sail about the world and never touch British ports. The power of our position comes not only from carrying British trade but from carrying other people's trade, and when we get a larger proportion of that trade we can say that our shipping industry is once again well on its legs. Let me refer to some of the conditions that have been suggested, everyone of them not helping the industry but militating against it, and everyone of them tending to put more seamen and more officers out of work. It is suggested, for example, that there should be a certain proportion of the crew entirely British. Suppose that that was put down as a regulation. In the middle of a charter the captain would have to wire home that he had lost some of his British crew, through sickness, desertion, accident or any other cause, and that he could not complete his complement with a British crew. Is he then to lose the subsidy? The same conditions might arise on a ship for which a charter is about to be fixed. It is suddenly found again that in a remote corner of the world British seamen are not available.

These are all impossible conditions, and anyone with any connection with the industry would realise that they are impossible. Then there has been a suggestion to improve the standard of living and the wages of British seamen. If such a Bill was before the House no one would more fervently acclaim it and support it than myself. But this is an international trade, and we are already suffering from the fact that other countries run their ships much more cheaply than we do, under conditions that we would not allow, and pay wages to which we would never agree. Our ships are built under the watchful eye of the Board of Trade. They are continually inspected by the Board of Trade and the wages are agreed to. All I can say of the vague assertions which are continually made from the Front Opposition Bench is that if right hon. and hon. Gentlemen could give any concrete facts I am certain that the President of the Board of Trade would agree here and now to investigate each case. But right hon. and hon. Gentlemen do not offer any concrete facts at all because they have not any to offer. I might help them in some way if they would only be sensible.

The right hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) made one of his typical speeches, and, of course, again typically, left the Chamber. He referred to black-legging and said there were certain lines that were signing on masters as seamen. What has blacklegging to do with that? I say, all honour to those captains. They are the right sort of captains if they would sooner go to sea as able seamen than be an incubus to the country by remaining on land. The idea of this Bill is to get more British ships into commission, and they will employ more captains and men. It has been said that certain firms have got officers to agree to cuts. But the President of the Board of Trade has said that before this subsidy is allocated any form of blacklegging will be very strictly looked into, and he particularly referred to blacklegging in the form of cuts in wages. Sub-section (3) of Clause 1 allows all these things to be looked after. There is to be a Tramp Shipping Subsidy Committee. An hon. Friend said that it was well to have the right type of man in the right place. Some of us think that there are rather too many of the right type of men on the Committee, rather too many of the tramp shipping owners. We shall be interested to hear who the Committee will be. But they are only an advisory committee. There is not a single recommendation that they make which may not be overridden by the Board of Trade. The ultimate paragraph of that Clause makes it quite clear that nearly every objection which has been raised by the Opposition can be met. The Bill provides that the subsidy will not be given generally been referred to but I would point out that there is nothing to prevent a cargo liner or any other liner from reducing its passenger capacity and coming within the terms of the Bill if it can get a charter. Probably such ships will not do so, but it is possible. To my mind every eventuality has been provided for. You have the terms of service of the Mercantile Marine and the Board of Trade regulations, and where they are violated, action should be taken and I think would be taken if anybody can give facts to support such action, though up to the present the critics of the Bill have not been able to do so.

There is one other point of view which I would emphasise. It is often difficult in this House to bring up matters in regard to which two Departments overlap. A Member is told that he cannot do it on one Vote, and then he finds that it is equally impossible to do it on the other Vote. One has to possess considerable skill and experience in order to raise such a matter at all. I take this opportunity, and I hope I shall be in order in doing so, of pointing out the necessity for a large mercantile marine in the interests of the security of this country. During the last War we had a very successful blockade against enemy shipping. There was no demand for chartering in the world generally by our enemies. We alone were able to do so, and it was very necessary because otherwise we should have starved. But in the next war the situation may be different. There may be more than one competitor getting a share of the world's shipping, and it is therefore necessary that we should build up a large British mercantile marine, and that we should not be dependent in a future contingency upon such a method of procuring shipping.

Various extraordinary statements have been made from the Opposition side of the House in regard to this Bill such as that we are merely handing out this £2,000,000 to the shipowners. Have hon. Members who make those statements attempted to trace out in their own minds the process by which this money will be distributed? Have they examined the different methods by which this money will be expended and how much of it will be spent before the ultimate residue comes to the shipowner? Is there anybody bold enough to say that out of this £2,000,000 even £100,000 will be left to the shipowner as his last profit? I believe that to say so would be to exaggerate the figure. Upon all the money which is spent in subsidy wages are a first claim. It is only after everything else has been provided for and the voyage shows a profit that at long last the shipowner can declare his dividend. When the gross profit has been arrived at, the shipowner must lay aside money for depreciation so as to be able to build a new ship when the time comes. The life of a tramp ship may be taken at about 20 years and the owner must be in readiness to build another ship. When eventually the dividend is declared, what happens? We all know that immediately there is Income Tax and that eventually the money which finds its way into the owner's pocket is a mere driblet. I would say that wages take up about 90 per cent. of the total amount, and for my part I wish it were more.

Sheer nonsense.

Can the hon. Member point to one single instance in which wages do not get the first cut out of a subsidy?

That was not the statement. The statement was that 90 per cent. of the subsidy goes in wages. That is sheer nonsense.

I am sure the House will realise that it is almost impossible to work out such a calculation to the last degree, but in most cases in connection with shipbuilding and certainly in connection with the construction of men of war, the shipbuilding wages represent something like 87 per cent. of the total amount spent, and I do not think that I should be far out in saying that the same figure would apply in this case.

That was not the hon. and gallant Member's statement.

I said 90 per cent. as a rough figure, and I think if the matter could be worked out it would probably be found that that was approximately correct. If I were in order I might develop this point further by showing how it is that the shipowner spends the profit which comes to him in paying wages to somebody. But I think the House will have realised by this time that I am in favour of the Bill. I deplore the fact that a subsidy is necessary but I realise that the situation which has arisen renders a subsidy essential and for those reasons I support the Measure.

2.1 p.m.

I welcome the Bill and I look upon it as a first instalment towards making it possible for our shipping industry once more to get upon its feet. The hon. Member for Waltham-stow West (Mr. McEntee) based his chief objection to the Bill on the ground that it was bolstering up an inefficient industry. There is no justification whatever for applying that description to the shipping industry. It is an extremely efficient industry and is far and away ahead of the shipping industry in other countries. We have always taken the lead in shipping, and our standard is higher than that of any foreign country. A great deal has been said about the conditions under which the men work, it may well be that in some of the older ships the conditions are not such as we would approve of today. At the same time it must be remembered that it is to the benefit of the shipowner that those who are responsible for working his ship efficiently should be well looked after. It is in the interests of the owner if you put it as low as that, and it is not in the interests of the owner that the crew of his ship should be dissatisfied, ill-housed, and ill-fed. The British shipowner is most anxious that the people serving him should be as well looked after as possible.

I would stress the point which has just been made by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for North Battersea (Commander Marsden). This is really a national question because the nation depends upon the British mercantile marine for its existence, in peace time, and particularly in war time. This is not a question of giving subsidies or doles to shipowners. That has nothing to do with it. The Minister is not concerned to give a subsidy to the shipowner in order that the shipowner shall put money into his own pocket. The Minister is concerned that a subsidy should be given to the shipping industry in order that that industry may have some chance of meeting the unfair foreign competition which relies entirely upon the enormous subsidies given to foreign ships at the present time. Unless we employ the subsidy weapon which is being employed by our foreign competitors we have not the slightest chance of success, and our shipping industry is bound to go under altogether.

It is not a question of efficiency. It is not a question of our ships being old and out of date. I believe that on the whole they are as up-to-date as any in the world, and I do not think that the "scrap and build" policy is going to achieve the object for which it has been introduced. I do not think it is a question of our ships being out of date and of requiring more up-to-date ships in order to be able to compete; it is a question of defeating the foreign subsidy. The subsidy will not prevent the foreigner building as many new ships as he pleases. He has a far greater subsidy than we have. We may scrap an old and build a new ship, but the foreigner can build two to one so far as we are concerned, because he has a far greater subsidy, and I therefore do not believe in that policy. What is required is not a scrap and build policy, but a build and employment policy for British ships. To begin with, the subsidy which is being given is only £2,000,000, and I very much doubt whether the Minister will find that that is a sufficient weapon in his hands with which to beat the foreigner. That is what he desires to do, and unless the £2,000,000 will fulfil that object, the Bill will fail in its purpose. I very much hope the £2,000,000 will be enough, but I cannot see how it is possible that it will be, in view of the far greater subsidies which are already in force in foreign countries. The foreigner will simply laugh at us, go on with his subsidy, and beat us every time.

Exactly the same thing will occur as occurred when we introduced our tariff system. The President of the Board of Trade defeated the foreigner because he clapped on enormous tariffs. What was the result? Immediately the foreigners came crawling to this country as they had never done before. I do not mean that in any disrespectful way to the foreigner, but they came begging us to make trade agreements and to reduce our tariffs. If we would only do that, they would reduce their tariffs and we should have a better chance of getting our trade into their countries; and that is what has happened. Exactly the same thing will operate with regard to the shipping subsidy. If we employ the weapon of the subsidy to the extent that the foreigner does, we shall beat him, but until we do we shall not, and the Bill will not be able to fulfil the object with which it was introduced. There is another thing that I am sorry for. The subsidy applies only to tramp steamers, but there are cargo liners which are dependent, to a very large extent at any rate, for economic running on taking cargoes, and—

I think we had better not pursue a subject that is not covered by the Bill.

I apologise. My hon. and gallant Friend who spoke last drew attention to the dependence of this country on the Mercantile Marine, and I am very anxious, in reference to the scrap and build policy, that we shall not decrease the volume of the British Mercantile Marine, because it is not primarily the size, or the efficiency of the British ships on which we depend, but it is on the number of British ships which we possess. It was the numbers of British ships which pulled us through the last War, not their efficiency, not their size, and the same thing will occur in any future War. It is the numbers upon which we shall depend, and therefore I do not altogether like this scrap and build policy, which may have a tendency to reduce the actual numbers of British ships afloat. We want to go forward with a policy, first of all, to enable our shipping industry to compete with the foreigner and then to enable that industry to increase the number of British ships employed in the carrying trade of the world.

2.9 p.m.

I ask only five minutes in which to refer to one or two points in the speech of the hon. Member for West Walthamstow (Mr. McEntee). That speech was an excellent example of the loss of memory caused by changing from one side of this House to the other. He spoke about shovelling out public money to various industries, but he forgot the time when the Government of the party to which he belongs was coming here every other week and asking for a loan of £10,000,000 A spending committee was formed to spend public money in an attempt to stem the rising tide of unemployment, largely caused by incompetence on the part of that Government. The hon. Member has said that the shipping industry would be much better managed by the State, but that was a very unfortunate statement to make. Does he remember the experience of the Government of Australia? Does he remember that the ships which they built and chartered had to be sold at a fraction of their cost?

When the hon. Member says that those ships had to be sold, he does not understand anything at all about it. They were sold, it is true, but the history of their selling is something that will not be disclosed for a long time to come, and to say that they had to be sold is just untrue.

When the hon. Member makes a statement of that sort, he should justify it.

I will justify it if I get the opportunity.

It was public knowledge that those ships were making a very large annual loss and finally had to be sold; and the Government of the United States had the very same experience. The hon. Member gave the time-worn example of the Post Office, but he must remember that the Post Office has a monopoly, with no competition inside or outside, and it also has the advantage of having at its head now a thoroughly progressive business man. It is doing very well, but, after all, we have not got back the penny post.

I do not think we ought to pursue those questions.

I apologise, but I was answering points made by the hon. Member. No one in this House likes subsidies—

Shipowners like them.

I said nobody in this House—except as a weapon with which to fight the foreigner. The foreigner is giving an annual subsidy to the extent of £36,000,000 to his shipping and has created a state of affairs which makes it impossible for our shipping, unaided, to prosper. In dealing with this matter, we must remember that shipping is more vital to us than to any other country in the world. For purposes of defence and of trade we must support our shipping, and I welcome the Bill, as everyone who has thought about the matter and watched with anxiety the shrinkage in our merchant shipping, the decaying prosperity, and the loss of employment among our seamen and the officers of our merchant service, must welcome it. I hope that it will be used, and increased if necessary, so as to save our shipping from the disaster which threatens it at the present time. I congratulate the Government on bringing in the Measure.

2.13 p.m.

I should not have intervened in this Debate except that it appeared that the speakers from the Opposition benches think that there are great quantities of money to be handed out for keeping ships in an inefficient state, but not one of them mentioned where the money is to come from. They all seemed to forget that all the money that comes to shipping must be earned by freights or carrying cargoes, and if the foreigners can sell at cheaper rates than can the British, there is no money for keeping them going on the sea at all. This is a question of great importance to the shipping industry, and the only immediate fault that I have to find with the Bill is that the amount of the subsidy is so small. If foreign Governments can give such large subsidies to their shipping, it stands to sense that we are handicapped just in proportion to the amount by which we fall short of their subsidies. Our shippers have to compete in the world markets for their freights, and when anyone has a large quantity of goods to bring from abroad, he naturally finds out what the freights are. Some of the brokers have foreign ships on their lists, and they will naturally quote against our freighters. The result is that our shipowners lose the freights, and our ships are laid up. How can ships be kept in condition? Where is the money to come from? I think that if the subsidy were given by way of a tonnage subsidy, our shiuowners would know where they were, and could reduce their freights by 5s. a ton, or whatever it might be, and so be able to compete against the foreigner.

A Member on the Opposition bench referred to what he described as slum ships. It is because our shipowners have not sufficient money to spend on the ships that led him to make such a remark. We have not got slum ships, though, perhaps, they are not kept painted as brightly as they might be if there were reasonable freights for the goods carried. Then to speak about doles to shipowners is, to my mind, to use a foolish expression, because the money which is given for the keeping up of the ships will mean an increase of carrying and earning capacity and also more men as well as more ships being employed. Thus the object of this Bill is to keep up the number of men employed and to keep the ships on the seas. If we neglect these things, the foreigner will oust us from the seas altogether, and then when the next war comes, to which an hon. Gentleman opposite referred, we shall not be in a position to keep ourselves fit, because most of our foodstuffs have to come from abroad. We have not yet arrived at the position when we can grow sufficient foodstuffs in our own country to feed our own people. We appreciate the efforts of the President of the Board of Trade for the protection of some of our foodstuffs, but we would like to see him go further, and while we do not like to speak about subsidies we have got to do this to fight those who are fighting us with that weapon. That is why I intervene in the debate. I hope the Government will be firm on this, and even meet the owners in a way which will enable them to cut their prices against the foreigner without too many conditions being attached to it.

2.18 p.m.

I do not propose to enter into the case for or against the Bill, partly because it has been argued at considerable length, but so much has been said both on previous occasions and to-day as to subsidies and so on given by other nations to their shipping, that I think an observation or two ought to be made on that point. There is a prevailing opinion—I do not express at the moment any opinion whether it is right or wrong—that money here is being shovelled out to shipowners to put in their own pockets and so on, and of course that impression has been fortified by the fact that the Government have declined to attach any conditions—though to conditions, incidentally, the shipowners themselves, according to the hon. and gallant Member for Barkston Ash (Colonel Ropner), are quite willing to agree—for the receipt of this subsidy, and the impression has been further heightened by the fact that the administration of the subsidy is very largely put in the hands of those who are to receive it.

I have no personal knowledge of the shipping industry, but this piece of legislation, like so many other pieces of legislation is brought forward by the present Government in that they say, "Trust the Government". The Government have not hitherto, I think I am right in saying—the right hon. Gentleman will correct me if I am wrong—given any details of the subsidies which, as has been repeatedly said, have been and are given by other nations. I made some little research with regard to that. I put a question with regard to the right hon. Gentleman to which he very kindly gave an answer this morning embodying particulars of certain subsidies given to tramp shipping in, at any rate, three countries. But the point I want to make is this. I, for one, would have felt far better satisfied, and I am sure that the general public would have been better satisfied, if the right hon. Gentleman had given some detailed particulars of that sort covering all the maritime nations either before or at the time this Bill was first introduced. He might have issued a White Paper, or something of that sort. The right hon. Gentleman's departmental officials have very courteously given me information, and it does appear that there are subsidies—and very considerable subsidies—both direct and indirect which have been given by other nations, but I still think that a useful purpose would be served if the right hon. Gentleman would publish some particulars of that sort. I am informed, and I accept it, that there may be difficulty in giving with exact particularity the precise details of those subsidies. The Government, however, have certain information, though possibly it is only approximate, but such information as they have on a matter of this sort, whether relating to shipping or anything else, in my submission ought to be put before the House.

I merely rose first to make that submission, and, secondly, to say quite frankly to the right hon. Gentleman that I do feel there is some substance in the contention that has hitherto been put forward by himself and by others, but which has not been fortified by evidence that subsidies are, in fact, being given by other nations, for in my view the mere fact that subsidies are given by other nations is not a complete justification, or even any justification for this Bill. The real position, I think, in regard to shipping, as in regard to so many industries is that shipping suffers from—[An HON. MEMBER: "Bad management"]—I am sufficient of a patriot—to employ a very much misused word—to believe that our shipping is at least as well managed as that of any other country. No, I think it is due largely to the nationalist policies of different nations in which our own has entered so largely into competition at the moment. It is due also to the continued impoverishment of the great majority of consumers in the world, and it is due, of course, to the fact that, as long as industry is conducted by private enterprise, private individuals, in shipping or anything else, put the profits in their pockets, and when difficult times arrive they come along to the State to help, but are unwilling that the State should have any hand or control in the running of that industry, or that any safeguarding conditions, apparently, should be laid down. Having said that, I do not propose to say anything more, except that I want, quite respectfully, to suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, even at this late stage, that it would be helpful, and possibly allay feeling, if some particulars of the kind I have indicated might be furnished to the House with regard to subsidies.

2.25 p.m.

I can only speak by permission of the House, but perhaps they would like to hear the remarks I have to make on the course of the discussion. May I first say to the hon. and gallant Member for South-East Leeds (Major Milner) that full information, or as full as is obtainable, in regard to subsidies paid by foreign countries has been provided from time to time, and in its fullest form in a document presented to the Economic Conference in 1933. I do not know whether the hon. and gallant Gentleman wants it for his own purpose or for general publication, but if for general publication we might find some means of making more public the information which we have at our disposal. I am sure that the hon. and gallant Gentleman does not assert, as has been already asserted from the Front bench opposite to-day, that there are no foreign subsidies about which we may concern ourselves. I was astonished to hear a right hon. Gentleman opposite speak as though there were no such thing as subsidies paid by foreign countries.

I think the statement which the right hon. Gentleman made was in regard to Italy.

The information which has been made public covers practically the whole of the maritime countries of the world. May I refer to one or two of the outstanding figures? If the right hon. Gentleman wants to take the fair view he will not repeat the assertion that there are no such things as foreign subsidies to shipping.

The statement to which the right hon. Gentleman refers was made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood). The President has given the impression that the right hon. Gentleman made the statement that there were no subsidies. I say that that statement was not made. The right hon. Gentleman said that the only subsidy he knew of was the subsidy in Italy.

The statement was wrong. The important thing is that we should realise the facts. I do not wonder that hon. Gentlemen opposite carry on such an opposition as they have done if they have not the facts. Let me give one or two of the outstanding facts. We cannot say what the exact figures are because they are governed by a very large number of conditions, but it is estimated that the subsidies for operation alone in the United States amounted in 1932–3, the last period for which we have these figures, to over 26,000,000 dollars, that is roughly £5,000,000. In the case of France, the subsidy for operation alone came to 407,000,000 francs, which is about £5,000,000 In the case of Italy, the amount paid comes to 207,500,000 lira, or about £3,000,000; and Japan 13,600,000 yen or £1,000,000. That is the scale on which the subsidies are being paid, and it is surprising at this stage in our discussions that any of these facts should be challenged. If it will help to alleviate the anxieties of the public mind with regard to this question, we shall be only too glad to make known what is happening to other mercantile marines to the detriment of our own.

I would like to answer one or two of the questions which have been raised before I come to some of the important main considerations. My hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Mr. Rea) wanted to know whether the Dominions were playing up in this matter. The Dominions have their own shipping policy, which is nationalistic in character, and they have not been very ready to harmonise their views with our own, but I think that they are gradually coming round to the view that it is better for us to have an Empire policy as a whole than that they should take auction in isolation. My hon. Friend asked me in particular whether, in the course of the proceedings, we could have made a better bargain for British coal. He was not aware of the fact that the export of coal from this country to Canada beat all previous records in 1934, and I am still hopeful that we shall find 1935 equally profitable. This has no direct connection, however, with the proposal before the House, and I only mention it in order to get it out of the way at once.

My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Barkston Ash (Colonel Ropner) asked me two questions of considerable importance. The first was for what purpose this subsidy was being given. I have thought that that had been explained over and over again. My hon. and gallant Friend knows so much about the shipping industry and so much about the negotiations which have gone on and the discussions through which we have passed, that it is scarcely necessary to answer that question to him. Of course, the object is not to continue the subsidy as an item of national policy for ever. The main object is to put us on an equality in competition with foreign countries. We would be very glad to get rid of subsidies altogether. I am sure it is no pleasure to me to come to the House and propose a subsidy, especially when in every one of our debates the community with which I have had the honour to be connected all my life is traduced because of it. Tramp shipping, to which the subsidy applies, has up to the present been able to hold its own and to obtain a degree of eminence and prosperity without parallel in the history of the world, entirely on its merits. I do not know whether it can be said truly that that is due to the ability of those who have gone into that branch of the industry, but I am sure that it is in a very large measure due to that. We have not only been able to hold our own, increasing fleets which have been paid for out of the profits, and increasing the high standards which have been characteristic of British tramp shipping for a couple of generations past. We have been able to do that without any State assistance whatever; indeed, in spite of many burdens which were laid upon the shipping industry, they have been able more than to hold their own. How happy would have been our case if we could have gone on doing it.

Let me take one or two samples of the kind of thing we have had to meet in recent years. One of the most important trades in which tramp shipping is engaged is that of the River Plate. British shipping has been running in and out of the River Plate ever since there has been grain to export. The meat trade is almost entirely in the hands of the liners, but the grain trade is in the keeping of the tramps almost entirely. During the last few years the British shipowner engaged in that trade has found himself in competition with other vessels which were receiving large sums from their exchequers which have enabled them to take freights far below the levels at which British shipowners could make ends meet. The effect of that going on year after year was that in that trade we were gradually losing our position because ship-owners could not send their vessels into the River Plate and go on losing money without there being in the end an inevitable catastrophe to the companies. They had to find new markets elsewhere, and some went to the Far East, but they have met the same subsidised competition, and it has been impossible for them without assistance to hold their own against those foreign flags which devoted a large amount of national money to the support of their vessels in those far distant, but very necessary trades.

It has been suggested that there is something reprehensible about the way in which British ships have run in foreign trades, but on the contrary that has been one of our national glories. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Battersea (Commander Marsden) drew attention to the fact that the reason why we were able to run in those trades was to be found in the greater efficiency of our Mercantile Marine. We were actual carriers for the world as well as our own country and our own Empire. When we were running in the foreign trades there, again, we met with exactly the same sort of opposition. I will give one national example, not because I want to pillory that nation but because it is very patent to the mind of anybody who is well informed. Japan pays a large subsidy in proportion to the size of her fleet, and in some of those foreign trades in which we have been holding our own, on merit, and on merit alone, we have found Japanese competition coming in, and it has been driving our people out. That has been going on all over the world, in the West, in Europe and in the East, and if it had continued much longer we should have found our shipping companies deprived of all capital resources, and should have been imperilled as a nation if we had become involved, perchance, in a future war.

I was very glad to hear some of the hon. and gallant Gentlemen who spoke this afternoon making reference to that fact. Let it be understood that this is not only a proposal for keeping our shipping companies in a profitable and healthy financial condition, but a proposition by which we hope to maintain the size of the merchant fleet we shall have at our disposal if, perchance, we should ever be engaged in a war again. We must have a larger number of vessels in order to maintain all our Imperial connections, and it is only by having an immense number of units, as well as vessels of the fastest type, that we can hold our own. If assistance is to be given to the British Navy in time of war it is important that we should have sufficient ships, and the only way of keeping together that large body of seamen is by having employment for them.

The Government came to their decision reluctantly. I am quite sure that anybody connected with the shipping world will know how I have dealt with the subject. I have not rushed into it, but I have insisted that if we were to give assistance from the State we must thoroughly justify our case. I had the whole position in detail riddled from top to bottom. Here I do make a complaint against some hon. Members who have spoken to-day, and spoken with great emphasis. They have not been in the position of having at their disposal this large amount of material which I have had. They do not know what are the conditions. Some of them have never been aboard a tramp ship, and certainly would not know the difference between a tramp ship and a three decker. They did not know anything about the position, probably had never seen a vessel "lying on the berth," and probably thought it indicated some ignominious position which the vessel took up. What I say to them is that I am positive that if they had been through the same kind of riddling examination of all the conditions of the shipping trade which has now gone on for over a year at the Board of Trade and in the shipping organisations they would have come down this afternoon to vote for this Bill. They would have known that it was not a question of giving doles to individual shipowners. If only they knew the personnel of the shipping trade they would realise that ships are not now owned by individuals. Individual ship-owners are becoming rarer and rarer. Ships are owned by companies. It is an innumerable number of shareholders, tens of thousands of shareholders, who really own those fleets. The element that is really of great importance is the management element, for without efficient management we certainly should not be able to hold our own.

Let me say that in discussing these matters, in which I have been very critical and have insisted on having information placed at our disposal as the Government, I have asked for information from people of the highest standing, and I have no reason to doubt the information which has been forthcoming. We received all the information that we required, and we formulated our policy, and a statement was made as long ago as July last, and if I have any complaint to make about the House it is that it has not given us a readier backing for our proposals. Now that we have reached this stage there will be no delay in doing all that is necessary. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Barkston Ash asked me when the "scrap and build" policy would begin.

I think the right hon. Gentleman has in no sense answered my first question. I do not press him to do so if it is his wish not to do so, but the right hon. Gentleman is perfectly well aware that when I asked for what purpose the subsidy was to be given the qualifying words were whether it would be an offensive or a defensive subsidy. I drew his attention to the difficulty in which the industry finds itself through the contradictory conditions laid down. He may not want to answer that point this afternoon, but I wish he could do so if it were possible.

I am too old a hand in the House of Commons to get into a controversy as to what is meant by "defensive" or "offensive" and I will only say that this proposal is defensive because it is offensive. The first condition which we laid down was that the subsidy should not be dissipated by the domestic competition of British ships carrying tramp cargoes. In that there is nothing inconsistent with securing greater employment for British shipping at the expense of foreign shipping. I am not going to bother about the dialectics of this matter; all I want is to get the proposal at work. The next question is more practical: When will the scrap and build policy be undertaken? I hope that after to-day's debate this Bill will receive a rapid passage through the House of Lords. Then we shall be able to set up, under the Statute, the two Committees which are essential, and I hope we shall without any further delay get the Committee which will deal with matters of new construction to work. I cannot say how soon we shall receive their recommendations, but I hope there will be no delay, and at all events I wish to see a conclusion of their labours as early as possible.

I cannot give the names of the Ship Construction Committee this afternoon, because the list is not complete, but I would like to give the names of those who have agreed to serve on the Tramp Shipping Subsidy Committee. As I told the House some time ago, the chair will be taken by Sir Vernon Thomson, and he will have associated with him Mr. M. K. Turnbull, Mr. Philip Haldin, both of London, Mr. Leighton Seager, of Cardiff, Sir Arthur Sutherland, of Newcastle and Mr. W. S. Miller, of Glasgow. I am putting on that Committee two cargo liner owners, Sir Thomas Royden, of Liverpool and Mr. L. C. Harris, of London, and as an independent member of the Committee I have secured the services of Sir Charles Hipwood, whom we all remember as the most efficient head of the Mercantile Marine Department until a year or two ago.

It may be said that this is a Committee on which there is a majority of tramp owners. Of course it is, and that is deliberately so for this reason. One of the specially important points in this matter is going to be the extraordinary amount of information on the variety of conditions which come into play in various parts of the world. It is impossible to find within the brain of any one man or any three or four men all that we require. We were bound to get our assistance from a wide area, and as this Committee is advisory, and has no power to say what the Government shall or shall not do, I have been very anxious to obtain the knowledge of the best men who could serve on that Committee. I venture to say that the names which I have read out to-day are not only those of impartial people, well known as men of absolute integrity, but that we can rely on it that, in making recommendations, they will hold the balance evenly between their various competing trades. It will be our business at the Board of Trade to see that the financial regulations under which the Committee operate carefully safeguard our Exchequer interests.

I think the House will now be ready to come to a decision on this matter, which has been discussed in its various aspects, up and down, during the last few months. There is only one question to which I must refer before I sit down, although it is scarcely germane to this Bill. Again and again discussion has turned on the conditions of employment of British seamen. There is no subject which lies nearer my heart than that, but there are proper ways and there are improper ways of attaining that end. As the result of the experience gained during the war there was set up, I think some 15 years ago, the National Maritime Board. Let me assure the House that the National Maritime Board is not an employers' organisation. It is composed of men representing all the interests concerned: owners, engineers, navigating officers, the stewards branch of the industry, firemen and seamen. They are all represented there. One remarkable effect of the work of this Board has been that harmony has been maintained from beginning to end. Every decision has been unanimous, and we have succeeded during the last 15 years in the industry in having nothing in the nature of a trade dispute. If any body could justify its existence, the National Maritime Board certainly has done so. When we consider the bearing that that has on the conditions under which our men are serving, let me point out that already there has been announced as an indication of the policy of the Advisory Committee—I certainly said it plainly in the House during the Committee stage—that abiding by the wages of the National Maritime Board's scale must be an essential condition of receiving the subsidy; it would be an essential condition. By that means I think we shall be assured that that very small number of men who have tried to go behind those agreements will be drawn into line.

Do not let it be supposed, or let it go out from this House, that shipowners as a whole are not playing the game by the National Maritime Board. They have done so in a way which does not need any more praise from me, because it is in their own interests. Harmony between them and their employés is absolutely essential for the British Mercantile Marine, and because the arrangement works so well let it go on doing so. If we ask with regard to other conditions which have been described here: "Are these men given good accommodation at sea? Is their feeding scale right?" and so on—and those points are not concerned with the Debate which has been taken here this afternoon—I would say that if there be anything wrong in those respects they can be, and ought to be, dealt with in a Merchant Shipping Act. Hon. Members opposite had an opportunity of amending the Merchant Shipping Act when they were in office, but they never attempted to do it.

We were not given a subsidy.

That does not make all the difference in the world. If it is reprehensible to underfeed your crew it is reprehensible whether you get a subsidy or not: if their working, sleeping and feeding accommodation are bad for their health, those things are bad whether a subsidy is paid or not. Right hon. Gentlemen did nothing whatever to amend the Merchant Shipping Act. They knew perfectly well that the conditions which they would have found in the Mercantile Marine would not justify at the present moment any sort of Amendment of that Act. There must, of course, be improvements from time to time, but hon. Members must remember that we have a gigantic code for the mercantile shipping which numbers over 700 sections, and in regard to every one of them there has been great discussion. If there is to be any amending of that Act, let us bend out attention to that. Until the necessity is proved I do not think we should entangle it with the subject which is now before the House. Considering the position in which our merchant shipping has stood right from it very inception; considering the necessity that there is for a strong merchant navy for trade purposes and for purposes of defence; considering also the fact that unless we take steps to protect our people now it will soon be too late, I beg of the House to give a Third Read-to the Bill.

2.51 p.m.

As we asked the right hon. Gentleman to tell us more explicitly what is the nature of the instruction which he proposed to give that the subsidy is only to be paid where the wages are prescribed by the National Maritime Board are adhered to, that is a very satisfactory announcement. The wages of the National Maritime Board apply to British domiciled seamen. Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to give an undertaking that the proper proportion of British domiciled seamen must be employed on the ships that receive the subsidy? That is a very important supplementary undertaking. Have any instructions been given on that matter?

I must not enter any discussion on that at this stage of the Bill because it would be out of Order.

2.52 p.m.

Before we proceed to a Division I shall desire to ask your Ruling Sir on a personal point and a question as to the extent to which personal abuse may be allowed to take the place of argument in this House. In the course of this Debate I placed my own view before this House with what I hoped was moderation and impartiality, but because I differed from hon. Members on the other side of the House I was referred to by the hon. Gentleman for Rothwell (Mr. Lunn) in the most offensive terms. The subject under discussion is tramp shipping—

I am sorry to interrupt, but the hon. Member's statement is now going beyond a personal explanation.

The terms to which I was referring were, "Lickspittle and toady." I have lived a man's life on a tramp steamer and had those terms been applied to me during that period my answer would have been a very different one. I have no desire to add to the degradation of Parliament which appears to be proceeding, but I want to know whether I am to be allowed to refer to the hon. Member for Rothwell in the same terms as those in which the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) referred to the Prime Minister.

The hon. Member knows quite well that terms of that kind are most reprehensible in this House to whomsoever they are applied. I thought that particular incident to which he referred was dealt with at the moment. I was under the impression that the hon. Member who used those words really was not serious, and I thought that it was rather an amusing vein. I did not know that he was applying them in a way which was derogatory to the hon. Member.

I am afraid I must have a perverted sense of humour. If the hon. Member for Rothwell will tell me that that was the sense in which he wanted to apply those terms, I shall be prepared to accept his explanation.

Bill read the Third time, and passed.

As I have not received notice, I have nothing further to say.

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

The House divided: Ayes, 147; Noes, 37.

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

This Bill deals with more than one matter, but I can explain it shortly and simply. The first Clause, in effect, raises the establishment of the King's Bench judges from 17 to 19. I think every hon. Member is by this time familiar with the case which has been made out for an establishment of that kind. It is perhaps not surprising, having regard to the very large amount of judicial time which is taken up in dealing with accidents caused by motor cars, that it has been found that the existing establishment cannot really cope with the work laid upon it. It is clear that nothing is more important in the administration of justice than that those who seek redress in the courts should be able to get their cases tried promptly and expeditiously.

There are at present very considerable arrears, sometimes up, sometimes down, in the King's Bench Division. Without going into detail, I might say without fear of contradiction that anyone who has taken the trouble to investigate the position has been satisfied that an increase in the number of King's Bench judges available to do the work, is necessary, if we are to administer justice in this country as we desire to do.

Clause 2 empowers the Lord Chancellor to nominate a Vice-President of the Second Division, as it is usually called, of the Court of Appeal. As I think the House knows, the Court of Appeal sits, normally at any rate, in two divisions. One division deals substantially with Chancery matters, and the other deals substantially with King's Bench appeals. The Master of the Rolls, who, of course, is a member of the Court of Appeal, presides in the court in which he sits, but, under the present law, in the other court the presiding judge is the senior judge. The Bill provides that the court in which the Master of the Rolls is not sitting—one Master of the Rolls may sit in the Chancery Court, and a succeeding Master of the Rolls may sit in the King's Bench Court—should have a permanent President. I do not think it is necessary to emphasise the great importance of the position of the presiding judge in a Court of Appeal, and it is thought right that the position should not be left to the accident of seniority.

That is not to say that, in the panel of Lords Justices for dealing with King's Bench appeals you may not want the senior one to preside. It is not that, but it is thought that from time to time in the King's Bench appeal court a Chancery judge should sit, and vice versá —that the two main departments of the law should interchange talents, if I may so put it. If a position arose, as might well be the case, in which the two Chancery Lords Justices other than the Master of the Rolls were both senior to all the King's Bench Lords Justices, you could not put your Chancery Lord Justice in the King's Bench court without his having to preside, and we put it to the House as a real improvement in the organisation of our judicature that the second court of appeal, like the first, should have a permanent President.

In another place, as hon. Members may have seen, an Amendment was moved and accepted, providing that this provision shall not apply to any of those judges who are Lords Justices at present. They were appointed Lords Justices on the present basis, namely, that seniority carried this right with it, and it is thought right that no alteration should be made so far as they are concerned. The provision, therefore, will only come into operation as and when, in the future, the Court of Appeal is manned by Lords Justices appointed after this Bill has reached the Statute Book.

Clause 3 deals with a technical and, I think, wholly non-controversial matter. It deals with the exercise by the Court of the power, which it has in divorce proceedings, for altering marriage settlements. At present no petition for alteration of a marriage settlement can be made until after the decree absolute has been given. If the petitioner died very shortly after the action, a difficult position would arise in which injustice might be done. This Clause enables those proceedings to be started and the necessary facts and issues gone into after the decree nisi, but the order, of course, does not become operative then. It is a technical matter, but those whose business it is to deal with these matters are agreed that it is a good reform. The Clause also deals with variations of settlements and the allied matter of the settlement of alimony. Clause 4 also deals with a small point which again everyone will agree is a good alteration in our law. It provides that medical evidence as to sexual capacity in cases of nullity shall be taken in camera unless in any case the Judge is satisfied that it is in the interest of justice that any such evidence should be heard in open court. I do not think that any words are necessary to commend that provision to the House. That covers the ground of the Bill. I hope it will be thought a sufficient explanation of its provisions, and I ask the House to give it a Second Reading.

3.12 p.m.

I do not rise to offer opposition to the Bill, but I should like to say a few words with regard to one or two aspects of it. It is said that only fools rush in where angels fear to tread, and I must at once make confession of my folly in having the audacity to enter into a discussion of this sort. Still there are one or two things which even a layman might perhaps legitimately ask questions about in relation to the Bill. In the first place, I should have been very glad if the Solicitor-General had addressed himself to the general case for extra judges. I do not say that in a hostile sense, because I need not assure the House that we on this side, just as on any other part of the House, entertain the firm belief that it is in the highest degree essential that every litigant should be assured of as speedy a trial of his case as possible. When there is any retardation of the hearing of a case it may very easily involve either side in very serious inconvenience, to put it mildly. I made the observation that I did for this reason. I have perused the observations made by the Lord Chief Justice in regard to the case for extra judges. He quoted an observation that he had made to someone to connection with the Royal Commission, and he went on: to be a person with Chancery experience mainly, it might very easily happen that the next person appointed President of the Second Court might also be a person with Chancery experience or with other experience; and when the next Master of the Rolls is appointed he too might have the same sort of experience. It seems, therefore, that the only way out of this difficulty is for our judges to be equipped to deal with any type of case whatever it may be. However, that is the view of a layman and may be rejected by people who know much more about the matter.

I have not risen to offer objection to this Bill, and I only make this more pleasant observation—I hope that it will sound pleasant, anyway—that I am encouraged to see every endeavour being made to prevent overtime among the judges. I am glad to see the distribution of labour being so effectively managed in legal circles as it is under this Bill. I could only wish that the same principles which are accepted as good trade unionism amongst lawyers were applied with equal vigour and cordiality amongst other trade unions in other walks of life. We on this side take no objection to the Bill as a party, although some individual members may consider that it has its shortcomings and that something more should be contained in it than is actually the case. Our main interest, however, and I am sure it is the interest of Members in all parts of the House, is that the people of the country shall be assured of a pure administration of justice and that this administration shall be as speedy as circumstances will permit.

3.22 p.m.

Members in all parts of the House will agree with the axiom of the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) that it is essential that the number of Judges should be such as will secure to litigants a speedy trial of their case. I had no idea that this Bill would have been reached this afternoon otherwise I should have brought precise figures with me. But, according to the information I have been given, even this number of 19 will not secure that there will not be serious delays to litigants. I am told that the fees earned by a Judge practically pay his salary and, therefore, I cannot see why we should run the risk of the delays which justice has undoubtedly suffered in recent years. There were 1,000 cases awaiting trial at the opening of the last sessions of the courts. That is very undesirable. There should be only a few cases remaining over. Judges are called away to go on Assize, to preside over important inquiries when an independent chairman is essential, and they are frequently prevented from attending by illness. For all these reasons, there are inevitable delays.

I am told that the number of 19 is only barely sufficient to meet the ordinary work of the courts without allowing for these adventitious circumstances, and I should like the Attorney-General to make it clear that the number of 19 is sufficient to secure litigants a speedy trial of their cases. It is essential. Members in all parties realise that the administration of justice is one of the things of which we can be proud. It has never been affected by politics or outside motives. It is essential that it should not be interfered with or that litigants should be forced to settle actions because of delay. It would not involve any material expense to appoint 20 Judges because their fees pay their salaries. I am sorry that no Clause has been inserted making it clear that Judges are in no sense civil servants, and that, just as they cannot be dismissed from office except by an address to both Houses of Parliament, so their salaries which, if reduced to a minimum, would practically secure their dismissal, should not be interfered with by Parliament unless by an Address from both Houses. In view of what recently happened, when the economy cuts were imposed by this House, I think it is unfortunate that some declaratory Clause has not been inserted in the Bill making it clear that Judges are not civil servants and are not subject to the reduction of their salaries in the same way as ordinary civil servants are.

3.26 p.m.

My hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. M. Jones) has expressed the general view of this side of the House on the Bill, and I do not propose to differ from him in any way; but he will forgive me if I deal with two points that he made. First with regard to the lack of overtime worked by the judges. Judges are somewhat akin to schoolmasters. At one time my hon. Friend was a schoolmaster. Judges and schoolmasters have very serious and anxious responsibilities. Hence their short hours. Both schoolmasters and judges have also a good deal of home work to do. Another observation made was as to the number of cases awaiting trial at the courts. My hon. Friend referred to some remarks of the Lord Chief Justice. Whether the figure be 1,000 or 2,000, in this country we certainly cannot sanction the intolerable delays which undoubtedly occur in the prosecution of cases in the High Court. Even the present number of such cases, though lower than that previously, is far too high.

The House ought to extend its congratulations to the Lord Chancellor and the Law Officers of the Government, or whoever is mainly responsible, for persevering with the question of law reform. Every two or three months for some time past we have had small Bills, and for the most part extremely useful Bills, presented to and approved by this House. As far are three out of four Clauses are concerned this Bill is no exception to that rule. But I desire to make one point very strongly. While it is necessary at once to appoint additional judges to cope with the overcrowded list of the High Court in London, the appointments do not get to the root of the problem. Justice in this country may be, and no doubt is, better than that in any other country in the world, but it is not sufficiently speedy or cheap or accessible to the great majority of the people. In my view the solution to which we shall have to come eventually is further to extend the usefulness of the county courts.

It is common knowledge that the delay in the prosecution of cases in the High Court is mainly due to the necessity for judges holding assizes, involving their absence for days and in many cases for weeks from their duties in London. In my submission the way in which to get over that difficulty is to give the county courts increased jurisdiction. At the present time assizes are held with comparative frequency in towns which are sometimes a considerable distance from the homes of the parties concerned. The expense of bringing witnesses to assizes is often considerable and, frequently, to go to the High Court, as is necessary under the present county court juris- diction, is so difficult and expensive that justice is quite out of the reach of a great number of poor people. The ideal remedy is to extend the jurisdiction of the county court and to do rather more than that—to link up the whole judicial system of the country. I think eventually we shall reach a stage in which all actions shall be initiated in the county courts just as all criminal cases at present are initiated in the police courts, ultimately arriving, if they are of sufficient importance, at the assize courts or the Old Bailey, as the case may be. Such a provision coupled with increased jurisdiction in the county courts as regards amount, would, I believe, enable the great majority of cases to be tried in the county courts.

Recommendations have been made from time to time on this matter and the Attorney-General, in reply to a question has been good enough to give me particulars of certain recommendations made to the Lord Chancellor in the last few years from the county court judges themselves, the associated provincial law societies and other quarters in favour of this increased jurisdiction. Pending the bringing about of the ideal system of linking up the county court and the High Court, I would ask the Attorney-General whether there is any hope that the Government will take into consideration increasing the jurisdiction of the county courts in point of amount to £500 from the £100 at which that jurisdiction is fixed to-day in the great majority of cases. I suggest that they should also consider giving extended power to remit actions from the High Court to the county court. That can be done at present on the application of the defendant, on the ground of the poverty of the plaintiff, but curiously enough it cannot be done on the application of the plaintiff.

I should also like to see an improvement made in the status and even in the salaries of the county court judges of this country. The Lord Chancellor could, if I may respectfully say so, help in improving that status, which, from time to time, one hears reflected upon—quite without justification. It could be done by a greater use of the rights and powers which the Lord Chancellor at present possesses, of appointing county court judges as Commissioners of Assize. That is an extremely useful provision in, I think, the 1925 Act of which a great deal of use might be made. It would enable High Court judges to remain in London instead of having to travel frequently considerable distances to more or less outlandish parts of the country for the purpose of trying perhaps only one or two cases.

We often forget that the county courts are certainly among the oldest courts in the land. They were here in this country before the King's judges commenced travelling the country to assize. They were presided over in those days, before the Norman Conquest, by the sheriff, and had a full, general, and unrestricted jurisdiction. The King's itinerant justices came along with those curious decisions limiting the jurisdiction of the county courts to 40s., as it was in those days, which was increased to £20 in 1846, and more recently to £100. There is justification, therefore, for putting the county courts back into the position which they formerly occupied, and that provision, I am certain, would be of the greatest advantage, particularly to the poorer people, who are at present practically denied justice. When their claims in the matter, for example, of motor accidents, mentioned, I think, by the learned Solicitor-General, are over £100, they have to bring a case in the High Court, and that, notwithstanding that in matters of bankruptcy the judge of a county court has, I think, unlimited jurisdiction, and in workmen's compensation cases up to £600.

I should like, in passing, to suggest that in connection with county court jurisdiction and the right which the King's subjects possess to take proceedings and present a petition of rights—that jurisdiction ought to be conferred upon county courts and not be left solely applicable to the High Courts, as is the case at present. I hope, therefore, we may have some assurance from the Attorney-General that these matters are having or will have the consideration of those responsible. The law exists to serve the people and not merely to serve those of us who happen to be members of the legal profession, and I submit that those responsible should look into the whole matter.

I want to say a few words, speaking extremely delicately, on another matter, on which I think one or two words ought perhaps to be said. I do not desire to reopen any question which made any difficulty in the other House and which was so happily solved—I think I may say solved—by the alteration in the Bill which is now before the House, but I cannot help feeling that there was an implication, which, I hope, in every quarter has been dispelled, against Lord Justice Slesser, whose seat in Leeds I have the honour to represent. I am bound to admit at one time to a feeling of resentment in regard to that matter, and I am happy to know that on all sides and in all quarters in another place—and I am sure my constituents will be happy to know, and this party also—that the result of that Debate was that not only were there, so to speak, testimonials from all parts as to what most of us knew to be the undoubted capacity, knowledge, and impartiality of the Lord Justice in question, but that the Government felt it right, as there was even a suspicion of the implication I have mentioned, however unintended, to make the full and proper alteration which is now in the Bill before us, so that Clause 2 of the Bill may not apply in any circumstances to the present Lords Justices.

I will only add this. I am not like my hon. Friend altogether satisfied that that Clause is a really necessary or really useful one, but it is merely permissive, and unless circumstances intervene it may never be necessary to bring it into effect, because there have been Justices like Lord Justice Scrutton—if I may mention one—and there are members of the Bar to-day fully competent, in my submission, to sit as Lords Justices and to deal with matters on either the Chancery side or the King's Bench side. In my view, it is far better to preserve that elasticity which prevails at the moment than to fix arbitrarily upon one person to preside in both courts and leave one court open. With these few observations, I commend the Bill to the House as a very useful piece of legislation, certainly with regard to three parts of it—I have not referred to Clauses 3 and 4—to put on the Statute Book, and to congratulate those responsible for this effort to bring about a legal reform.

3.42 p.m.

I do not intend to follow my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South-East Leeds (Major Milner) in his eulogium of the county court, but I must say I was staggered to hear that the pedigree of these courts went so far back. I understood they were purely a product of the last century, and not a survival of the old justices in eyre and the Saxon county court. Be that as it may, I rose only to say that we on these benches also support this Bill, and are glad that it has been brought forward. I would also like to say how thoroughly I agree with the remarks which were made by the hon. Baronet the Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison), who asked the learned Attorney-General whether he thought that the increase of two in the number of judges would be sufficient. This demand for more judges is not something which has cropped up in the last month or two. For some years past there has been a very strong feeling that the number of judges ought to be very substantially increased. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. M. Jones) seemed to complain that the learned Solicitor-General had not made out a case for more judges. I should have thought that anybody who was concerned in any way with the business of the courts could have only one opinion, namely, that the main reason for the delay in the last year or two, at any rate, has been the shortage of judges to try cases in London.

That was not my point. My point was that, in view of the fact that so high an authority as the Lord Chief Justice had criticised the Bill, the Government had not shown to the House the weakness of his case.

I am sorry if I misunderstood the hon. Gentleman. I think it is true to say that there has really been only one opinion as to the main reason of delay in the courts, and that has been the shortage of judges available in London, particularly at the present time of the year. It is, to me, a remarkable thing that we have been so long in getting a Bill to increase the number of judges. As I said, the feeling that the number is insufficient is not one that has grown up in the last few months. You can trace it back, I think, for a number of years. It is rather remarkable that this House is quite prepared to appoint any number of new marketing boards or organisations of that kind, involving as they do the appointment of numbers of highly paid officials, but when it is a question of appointing additional judges, that seems to be a very much more difficult object to accomplish. I would like to put one point to the Attorney-General. If after this Bill is passed it is still found that there is congestion in the courts, and that the number of judges is still insufficient, I hope the Government will be ready to reconsider this Measure and, if necessary, in the near future still further to increase the number of King's Bench judges.

3.46 p.m.

No Government legislation is properly received by this House unless a section of the supporters of the Government say that it does not go far enough. I am sure that the Attorney-General would not feel happy unless I assured him that this Bill is inadequate to meet all we want. The point which I wish to raise is a point referred to by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South-East Leeds (Major Milner) in regard to the question of the Crown as litigant. We are dealing in this Bill not only with judges, but with amending processes of law, and the Government have wholly overlooked that most important and long overdue reform. My right hon. and learned Friend will have a vivid memory of the subject because he was an important member of a committee which made one of the most authoritative reports that has been presented on a point of law. I will quote one or two remarks from it, and that will be sufficient to show in the records of the OFFICIAL REPORT that the memory of this Report is still alive. Lord Birkenhead in 1921 appointed this very potent committee, and in the letter that he wrote to the Attorney-General, who was then Sir Douglas Hogg, he said this:

"The Lord Chancellor is glad to learn that the Solicitor-General and yourself concur in his view that a change should be effected in the position of the Crown as litigant."

He then went on to suggest the main lines of that change, and said:

"The Crown within certain reservations would be placed in the same position as the subject as regards power to sue and liability to be sued in the county courts."

That is precisely the point referred to by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South-East Leeds. I believe that that recommendation has been adopted only to the extent that the Crown can now sue in the county court, but cannot be sued. Lord Birkenhead also said:

"The Crown would be liable to be sued in tort, and the Crown would have the same capacity to recover and the same liability to pay costs as the subject litigant.

That was recommended in 1927 and no effective action has been taken upon it. The position is steadily becoming worse because the ambit of the Crown's administrative activity is being steadily increased. In the last Session on two occasions we created new agents of the Crown. The first was the Unemployment Assistance Board and the second the Commissioners for the Special Areas. Both these new bodies have been created, and they are outside the ordinary processes of law as between subject and subject. I submit that this is really a serious matter to which the Government should attend when they have time.

3.49 p.m.

May I emphasise a point that has been referred to in connection with the complaint involving injustices to litigants. There is another aspect of the question in the complaints about delay. Delays are so serious that in commercial circles in particular there is an increasing tendency to refer disputes to arbitration. That is not because the parties are lacking in appreciation of the courts or of the work of the judges. It is because in those circles it is essential to have decisions as early as possible. That is a matter which should be borne in mind by the Government, and I have no doubt it will be present to the minds of the Royal Commission, where, no doubt, somebody will draw attention to it.

3.50 p.m.

We have listened to a large number of speeches, but I am bound to say that if the Government had been so bold as to include within the scope of this Measure not merely the overhaul and complete change of the County Court system but the enactment of legislation with regard to the position of the Crown we should not have been likely to obtain a Second Reading between three and four o'clock on a Friday afternoon. With reference to the point raised by the hon. Member opposite as to whether the figures given by the Lord Chief Justice were accurate, or what I have to say about them, I would merely say this, which is the same as was said by my noble Friend Lord Hailsham on the second day's Debate in another place: that I am not quite sure which figures the Lord Chief Justice had in mind. In 1923, the first full year after the present Lord Chief Justice was appointed, the number of cases awaiting trial at the end of the year was 966. Since 1928 the number of cases has never been below 1,000, and it rose to its highest figure of 1,325 cases awaiting trial at the end of 1933. That is getting on for a whole year's work for one judge, roughly disposing of something like 1,700 cases. Therefore, I think everybody will be convinced that there is a necessity for an increased number of judges.

The hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Dingle Foot) has rather suggested that this is a tardy response to a demand which has been made for a great many years for an increase in the number of judges. I am old enough, unhappily, to realise that a few years ago there was nothing like a demand for more judges. When one or two new judges were asked for it was only with the greatest difficulty we could get the House to concede them. I am very glad to hear, and I know that the legal profession will rejoice to hear, that now it is recognised universally that there is a demand in the House of Commons for more judges, and if it is necessary to appoint any more judges after this experiment I shall be glad to remember what the House has intimated this afternoon, that it is very, very anxious to have yet more judges and more judges still. That will facilitate my task this afternoon.

I hope and believe that these two judges will suffice, because I should not like to be proposing a Measure which does not go far enough. The fact is that, with the existing number of King's Bench judges, always assuming that the judges are not prevented by illness from discharging their duties, and are not taken away for other duties, the number of cases awaiting trial does get less; but as everybody knows, and as everybody will understand, with people of mature years one cannot expect only the same number of days' absence through illness as with a much younger man; though, as a matter of fact, the way in which many of the judges sit day after day, year after year, without a single day's absence, is remarkable. I believe that if these two new judges are appointed we shall find that there is just that little more power being applied to the work which will result in the number of cases each year being rapidly reduced.

One or two other points have been raised, besides the very large questions as to the powers of the County Courts and the position of the Crown. I am not going to say anything about the County Courts, except that the extension of their jurisdiction is a matter of some controversy. The Committee which recently considered it deliberately reported against it, with the exception of increasing the limit from £100 to £200 in what are called remitted cases from the High Court to the County Court. The hon. and gallant Member for South-East Leeds (Major Milner) asked me a question as to representations in favour of extending the jurisdiction, to which I have sent him a written answer giving him the three cases: He did not ask me what representations had been made against the general extension of the jurisdiction, but I will give him the information. The Law Society and the London Chamber of Commerce were both against that extension. I am not expressing an opinion about it; I am merely saying that it is very controversial.

With regard to the position of the Crown: The Committee of which I was a Member never reported in favour because they were never allowed to consider that question, Lord Haldane having changed the terms of reference and told the Committee to draft a Bill on the assumption that the reforms were desirable.

Am I to understand that the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not like the Bill which he was so active in drafting?

No, my hon. Friend is not to understand that. I was in favour of some parts of it but we were not asked to report or consider the merits after Lord Haldane changed the terms of reference. This is a matter of difficulty, but the question is certainly not one to be decided to-day. I am not going to say anything about the matter raised by the hon. Member opposite with regard to Clause 3. He thought it wise to walk delicately when approaching that question, and I am even less capable of walking delicately than he. I am much obliged to hon. Members who have welcomed the Bill, and I hope that it will have a Second Reading. I hope also that the House will give it further facilities which will enable it to reach the Statute Book and get to work at the earliest possible moment.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House for Monday next.—[ Sir G. Penny. ]

I am afraid I am not quite sure what sort of arrangement was arrived at this morning between the representatives of the Government and ourselves. As I understood it, we were not to proceed to-day beyond the Second Reading of the Bill.

The Report stage is on Monday.

Yes I know, but, if the Money Resolution is carried to-day, we shall be at a certain disadvantage on the remaining stages of the Bill, and I must enter a caveat.

I understand that this is absolutely in accordance with the arrangement made, and the hon. Member may take it as being so, so far as we are concerned.

In that case, I have no further objection.

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolution to be reported upon Monday next.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 2.

Adjourned at One Minute after Four o'Clock until Monday next, 4th February.