I beg to move, in page 1, line 9, to leave out "sixth," and to insert "fourth."

The purpose of this Amendment is to select a date which is desired by the authorities in Burma. I do not think there is any particular matter arising out of the date.

I beg to move, in page 1, line 9, at the end, to insert:

"or such later date as may be specified by His Majesty by Order in Council being a date not earlier than the date upon which the Secretary of State shall be satisfied that arrangements have been made for the equitable treament of such civil servants not being servants of the Secretary of State as shall suffer loss or diminution of employment and emoluments consequent upon Burma becoming an independent country."

The object of this Amendment, as the Prime Minister will have appreciated, is to raise the question of the position of the non-Secretary of State's civil servants, to whom some small reference was made in the Second Reading Debate, but about whom I think the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Air implied that there was still more to be said. The Committee may not know that there are, between 31 and 50 of these European civil servants—servants of the Government of Burma but not of the Secretary of State. Out of these—I think the number is nearer 31—no fewer than 21 have already been informed that they will not be re-employed under the Government of Burma. That is the position as I understand it. But though, by reason of the fact that they now have no chance of re-employment under the Government of Burma, their position is exactly the same as the Secretary of State's civil servants, their position vis-à-vis compensation and future pensions is not the same. I believe arrangements have been made for proportionate pension, but no arrangements have been made for compensation. Compensation is payable to the Secretary of State's civil servants under the terms of the White Paper, about which the Committee knows, because, first of all, the Secretary of State acknowledges his legal obligation; secondly, it is clear in the case of Burma civil servants that the Burma Government will not give them further employment; and, thirdly, which is only an extension of the first reason, Parliament has always accepted responsibility for those civil servants in Burma, as in India, who were recruited by the Secretary of State.

It would seem that the same arguments can be applied to the non-Secretary of State's civil servants, except that there is no legal responsibility, and except that—

The hon. Member is not entitled to discuss the pensions of these civil servants on this Amendment. The only question before the Committee is that of the appointed day.

With great respect, Major Milner, this Amendment refers specifically to the position of the non-Secretary of State's civil servants, and because from the statements made by the Government it appears to us on this side of the Committee that their position is not properly safeguarded, this Amendment suggests that, before the final hand-over is complete, their position should be properly safeguarded. I would, therefore, submit that my remarks are very much in Order.

The question is chiefly one of the date—the date as set out in the Bill which is before the Committee, or the date as proposed in the Amendment—

"or such later date as may be specified by His Majesty by Order in Council being a date not earlier than the date upon which the Secretary of State shall be satisfied that arrangements have been made—"

and so on.

I would submit that the line of argument I was putting to the Committee is in Order. I was trying to show that the arrangements at present made are not equitable, and we want them improved. That is the purpose of the Amendment. I think my argument is in Order.

I do not think the hon. Member is entitled to discuss the arrangements but the point is a rather complicated one. Perhaps, the hon. Gentleman had better proceed for the moment.

The position of these men is very similar to the position of the Secretary of State's civil servants, except from the purely legal point of view. This matter was put to the Secretary of State for Burma when he was out there in August. I see from reports which I have had and reports in the Press that he stated that no compensation was being given because it was open to these men to be re-employed by the Government of Burma, and he expected at that time that these men would be given employment by the Government of Burma. In fact, I do not think it is too much to say that he said that his main argument against compensation at that time rested on that expectation—that these men would be given employment by the Government of Burma. The Committee have seen since then many reports of statements by members of the Provisional Government of Burma that they not only do not need, but will not have European members of their Civil Service once independence has been granted. Therefore, surely, the whole argument upon which the Government rested their case then, and, I think, the argument upon which the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Secretary of State for Air tried to rest his case at the Second Reading, falls completely to the ground.

The Committee may think that, since I have acknowledged that there is no legal responsibility, there is very little in my case. But surely this Committee accepts responsibility other than strictly legal responsibility? Surely, we accept moral responsibility? I say, as I have said before, that the argument that we are morally responsible for the livelihood, and for the general standard of life in the future, and for the opportunity for careers in the future of these men, is, at least, as strong as the argument that we are morally responsible for helping the future Bur-man Government financially. We have admitted the latter. We have cancelled £15 million of debt. I would say that before we cancelled all this £15 million of debt, we should have seen to it that these Britons, who have served Parliament, served this country, and served the Government of Burma in Burma, for many years in many cases, were safeguarded; and it is on that moral responsibility that I rest my case.

11.15 a.m.

I would point out to the Committee that in the majority of cases there is practically no difference between the work which the civil servants, not being servants of the Secretary of State, are doing and the work that the Secretary of State's civil servants are doing. I think I am right in saying that in one department of the Government of Burma there are two civil servants of whom one is a servant of the Secretary of State and the other is a civil servant not a servant of the Secretary of State; and I believe I am right in saying that the senior of those two, the more experienced, is in the latter category—not a civil servant of the Secretary of State; and he is the more valuable to the Government of Burma; and yet he is being treated in this shabby way. His interests are not being safeguarded by His Majesty's Government and not safeguarded by the Government of Burma This is a case of moral responsibility.

I know that the right hon. and learned Gentleman the present Secretary of State for Air, who is, presumably, to reply to this case, could get up and say that this is not a matter for us but a matter for the Government of Burma. But the trouble has been that His Majesty's Government here have never pressed the Government of Burma to give compensation to these men. They took up the same line as they took up in the case of the Government of India. They said there was a hard and fast line. Of course, if the Government of Burma are not pressed they are not going to take special steps to look after subjects of His Majesty.

I would ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman to look into the matter again, even if he cannot give a satisfactory answer today, and accept the argument that we in this House and in this country have a great moral responsibility for these men. I would ask him, also, to remember that this is not likely to be an isolated case; to remember that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Colonies may well be facing the same sort of problem one of these days. I say the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Colonies, but as I do not expect that he will be there long, I had better say that I mean that his office may be facing the same sort of problem in the future. I predict that, because there will be cases in the future of men who are recruited by local Colonial governments who will want to know that their careers are secure, or, if their careers are not secure, that, at least, their position will be safeguarded. This is a matter of more than incidental importance; more than a matter relating only to Burma; it is a matter of confidence in Colonial and, for the time being, subject countries, in the measures which will be taken to look after the interests of Britons who have served them.

I do not think that this Committee can rest content with the statement made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman on this point on Second Reading. It is not in any sense of the word a party matter, and I sincerely hope that hon. Gentlemen opposite will support us in this Amendment. As the regulation now stands, this is a shoddy and shabby way to treat loyal servants of the Crown. So far as I know, it has been the invariable rule for British Government servants, whether at home or abroad, that if a man in the service of the Crown has his service interrupted or terminated for reasons which are not dishonourable to himself—

Is the hon. Gentleman talking about servants in the service of the Crown or servants in the service of the Government of Burma?

I am talking about Europeans who have served the Crown in Burma but who do not happen to have been recruited by the Secretary of State for Burma. Those are the people about whom I am talking. They are as much servants of the Crown in Burma as if they served the Crown here or elsewhere. I say that it is the invariable rule, so far as I know, that if a servant of the Crown has his service terminated half way through his service, then he shall receive, not merely a proportion of the pension that he has earned, but compensation as well. It has been the invariable rule, as far as I know. It has been accepted in the case of one branch of service. It is perfectly outrageous that it should not be accepted in the case of these 20 or 30 men as well. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Blackpool (Mr. Low) said, I think the Secretary of State for Burma hoped at one time that these men would be kept on by the Government of Burma. It is quite obvious that they are not going to be kept on. Therefore, we have to do one of two things, either offer them alternative employment under the Crown elsewhere—and perhaps that is what the right hon. and learned Gentleman is prepared to do—or, if we are not prepared to do that, surely we must do what we have always done in the past, and that is to give the unfortunate individual compensation for the loss of his employment, quite apart from the pension which he has earned.

The hon. Member for North Blackpool (Mr. Low) stated, quite rightly, that whatever other common ground there was between us, it was certainly common ground that His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom had no legal responsibility for the engagements of those who come under the category with which we are dealing in this Amendment. Perhaps I might put to the Committee, quite shortly, the general picture. Those who are employed by the Government of Burma fall into two classes. First, there are those belonging to the Secretary of State's services, who are Burma civil servants—Burma Police in the main—and they, as the hon. Gentleman indicated, are catered for in the general scheme of compensation which was announced to the Committee some months ago. Then there are what are called the non-Secretary of State's services, which include two categories: those who belong to Class I are, in the main, Burmans, but 60 to 70 of them are Europeans; and there is another strata of subordinate officers composed almost entirely of Burmans. The object of this Amendment as I understand it, is to deal with those Europeans who belong to Class I of the non-Secretary of State's services.

It is quite true, as the hon. Member indicated, that the problem with which we are concerned today covers only a proportion of the 60 to 70 Europeans belonging to Class I of the non-Secretary of State's services. Of those, 25 have, in fact, been offered re-engagement by the Government of Burma; they are mostly technicians belonging to the engineer and railway services. But there remain the 30 to 40 who are to be dealt with, as suggested, by way of proportionate pension. The great majority of these men were engaged before the war. As the noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton)—who has occupied the same post as myself—well knows, they were not engaged through the Secretary of State for Burma. In this sense, the Government of Burma is an employer, a separate entity, and lays down its own terms of service. They were not approved by the Secretary of State for Burma; nor, indeed, were these men engaged through the medium or agency of the Secretary of State for Burma, but were enlisted direct through the High Commissioner for India, who at that time acted on behalf of the Government of Burma.

I can assure the hon. Member for North Blackpool, it is not the case that we have not sought to do everything possible to secure that these men should be well looked after. We would, of course, as he indicated, have preferred that the same terms should be offered to them as were offered by the leaders of the parties in India, namely, that they should have been kept on and guaranteed their existing terms and conditions of service. But the Government of Burma, in spite of what we had sought to do, have, after very long and careful consideration, decided that they wish to terminate these engagements. In the result they have agreed that they should be given proportionate pensions.

I realise that it is a serious position for a man of 40 or 50 years of age to have his career terminated prematurely, as is being done in this case. But at any rate we are able to point to this fact, that under their existing pensionable contracts they are not entitled to receive their pensions until they have served their full time. In some cases they had to serve until they were 55 years of age before they were entitled to draw their pension. Now they are being given proportionate pensions based upon the number of years they have served. That would mean that a member of the Forestry Service, who might have a maximum pension after 15 or 20 years' service of, say, £600 a year would, under the proportionate pension rules which are to operate, receive, after, say, 10 years' service, £300—half of his maximum of £600; and he will draw that proportionate pension of £200, £300 or £400 a year, as the case may be, from the time he leaves Burma and for the rest of his life. That may not be as much as some of us would have liked to see them receive, but I think we must take that into account in deciding whether or not they are receiving, broadly speaking, equitable treatment.

I cannot say that His Majesty's Government will automatically provide a post for every one of those 30 men, but we are endeavourig to give every assistance possible to enable them to obtain reasonable employment. The hon. Member for North Blackpool, who has taken a great interest in these matters, knows that we have established various agencies. There is the India and Burma Service Re-Employment Branch of the Commonwealth Relations Office, which has been set up to deal with applications for appointments in permanent Government service, and appointments under the Colonial Office and the Foreign Office.

Is that the one at Tavistock Square?

I could not say what the address is. Then there is the India and Burma Service Section of the London Appointments Office of the Ministry of Labour; that is another agency. In reply to the question of the hon. Member for Farnham (Mr. Nicholson), I have just been given to understand that the office to which he referred is at Tavistock Square. The India and Burma Service Section of the London Appointments Office has been set up to deal with business appointments in quasi Government agencies and associations, public corporations, and temporary appointments in the home Civil Service. Another agency is the Technical and Scientific Register, again under the auspices of the Ministry of Labour, which deals with technical appointments in the field covered by the India and Burma Services Section. Finally, there is the high level unofficial committee, presided over by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Scottish Universities (Sir J. Anderson), known as the India and Burma Services Employment Liaison Committee. That has been set up to discover openings in business firms or companies, and in trade or other associations for officers from both India and Burma.

I do not intend to mislead the Committee; that is a thing I never do. I will be quite frank and admit that I am not in a position to say that at this moment any one of those 30 to 40 officers has actually received a satisfactory appointment. They will make their applications, and it will be for one or more of these agencies to do everything possible to secure that they receive employment.

If they do not receive appointments where they are, will their passage home be paid?

The question of passage money depends on the particular contract of the individual. They are not all under the same contract. In some cases—and I think it applies in the Forestry Service—they are on a three-year short-term contract. In other cases, they are on a pensionable contract, with no limit to their service except the age limit of 55—

But these contracts have been broken, and that alters the situation very much. If they have to come home to earn their living the Burmese Government should pay their passage.

The rules provide that the great majority, certainly all those under pensionable contract, when they retire prematurely, with proportionate pension, will have their passage paid home. Their wives and dependent children will also have their passages paid. These rules will be applied to the special category of railway officers on short-term contract. In other words, the Government of Burma will pay for the passage home of a man, his wife, and dependent children.

Will the rules apply to all of them?

I am dealing with the 30 to 40 officials whose services are being terminated. While we could wish that other arrangements could have been made it is only fair to say that the Government of Burma have agreed to pay these proportionate pensions, and it cannot be argued that this Bill should be held up on the ground that these men are not receiving equitable treatment.

The Committee has listened to the right hon. and learned Gentleman with a considerable feeling of disquiet. It appeared to me, and I think it was obvious to many of us, that he himself did not think that this small number of European persons were receiving justice under the arrangements which have so far been made. The Minister spent a little time in pointing out the distinction between their engagement and the case of those engaged in the normal way by the Secretary of State for Burma. In my view, the obligation towards these people is just the same no matter how they were engaged. For the non-Secretary of State's services people were enlisted direct through the High Commissioner for India, acting for and on behalf of the Secretary of State for Burma—

No, for and on behalf of the Government of Burma—a very different thing.

The position is similar in this respect: It cannot be denied that they were servants of the Crown. Although there may have been technical differences in the manner of their enlistment, the moral obligation of His Majesty's Government must be much the same. Although we welcome the assurance that after a long—and we wonder how long—investigation, and careful deliberation, His Majesty's Government have secured some concession, some recognition of the obligation, from Burma, we are left with the feeling that the moral obligation towards this small number of men has not been discharged. It is not discharged by saying, "We shall do all we can to provide these men with further employment." The obligation to look after this small number of people, to provide for them what they are entitled to, and what His Majesty's Government have not been so far able to secure, rests fairly and squarely on the right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite. Unless he can hold out more hope of securing proper treatment for these few Europeans we shall have no alternative but to divide the Committee as an indication of our dissatisfaction of the arrangements which have so far been made.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has just given to the Committee what I consider to be a very disappointing reply. It cannot be regarded as fair by anybody if a man retires at, say, the age of 45, on a proportionate pension of £300 a year, and His Majesty's Government fail to find him suitable employment in this country. I think that goes without saying. If a man is to be thrown on the scrap-heap in middle age, without suitable employment being found for him, then we as a nation have failed in our moral obligation. I am sure that every Member of the Committee is with me in saying that.

This problem has cropped up on a far larger scale in connection with India. The multiplicity of committees and bureaux to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred have, so far, not been particularly successful. I was talking to a constituent of mine last night—and I am giving this purely as an illustration—who was a police officer in one of the Provinces of India, in the Secretary of State's service. He registered at the Tavistock Square bureau, and has been so registered for some time. The only thing they could tell him was that there were police vacancies in the British Control Commission in Germany. They told him to apply to the Foreign Office, but the Foreign Office answer was, "There are no vacancies of this sort, and there never have been any." My constituent was also told to advertise in his local newspapers. That is all that has been done for him. They have not put him into touch with any business organisations, or any organisation where his knowledge of how to deal with men and his knowledge of administrative work might be put to proper use.

I am left with a feeling of uneasiness that, as far as India is concerned, our obligations to men like these are not being discharged. As far as I can see, there is no prospect that they will ever be discharged. There have been bad breakdowns in that sphere. In the light of our knowledge of what has happened in the case of India, if, with our eyes open, we allow a similar state of affairs to arise in connection with the much smaller number of men in Burma, we shall be failing in our duty. It will be a bad blow to the reputation of the Government as a whole without regard to its particular political complexion. I beg the right hon. and learned Gentleman to think again. We have no wish to hold up the Bill 00 this point; that is not our object in moving this Amendment. Our object is to obtain remedies for what evidently may be failure to discharge a moral obligation.

I have heard the right hon. and learned Gentleman speak on many occasions and while he has spoken frankly today I have never seen him more embarrassed than he was just now at the Despatch Box. He knows that this is a mean piece of dealing with old and faithful servants of the Crown, who have done their best to serve the Crown and the people of Burma. They are being fobbed off with the most technical of all excuses I have ever heard—the distinction between one class of servants of the Crown and another. We have been told, "If the man has been engaged by the Secretary of State he is all right, he will be compensated. But if he was engaged by the Government of Burma we shall wash our hands of him." I do not think that I have ever heard a more pettifogging distinction than the one made in these circumstances. These men are a very small body, and it has been cynically said that the justice of a case in this House is sometimes conditioned by the number of votes it commands and that when there is a small body like this, an injustice can be done to them with impunity. During the time I have been in this House, I have always done my best to fight that principle. The first speech I made was to attack my own side on the question of compensation for a small body of people. I shall always fight for the rights of people when I think that they have served the country to the best of their ability and have been shamefully treated, as I think these men have been, because to give them a proportionate pension for the time they have served is not compensation.

Pensions are generally so constructed as to induce a man to fulfil a longish term of service; otherwise it is a very bad bargain for the Government employing him. That is the purpose of an increasing pension according to the period of years, and a proportionate pension to a man whose time and service are arbitrarily stopped through no fault of his own, is insufficient to support him and his family in any comfort. I think that is a most unsatisfactory way of treating these men. The Government might, when they intended to give the Government of Burma a substantial sum of £15 million, have thought of those servants who are to be dependent apparently, as the Government of this country wash their hands of their future, on the generosity of Burma. But no bargain was made. The bargaining asset was given away. I think that we should all be encouraged if the Government of Burma acted generously towards this small body of men who have tried to serve Burma, and some of whom have served Burma at great personal cost and suffering.

And risk.

And now their occupation is gone. They are a small body. Therefore, it does not matter. There are only 20 to 30 of them. They do not count. Therefore, we can treat them with injustice. We make the distinction between the established civil servant engaged by the Secretary of State and the poor fellow doing very similar work engaged by the Government of Burma. I think that this is one of the grossest injustices I have heard for some time, and that it is unpolitic. If a Government treat old servants in this shape, are people likely to enter the service of a Government with any confidence? I do not think that they will. I think that they will be very careful about the terms of engagement and what might happen to them if there is a sudden change in a Dominion, territory or Colony where they are serving. They may find that their whole plan of life is completely ruined, and they and their families, instead of continuing to serve as they had hoped, are thrown on to an overstocked labour market, because it has not been suggested that it will be easy to find work for these people. I think that it will be very hard to find work for them.

I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman because I think that, in his heart of hearts, he sees the injustice that is being caused to this small body of men. I appeal to him to reconsider the attitude which the Government have taken. This is not a matter involving vast sums of money. It is a pettifogging economy at the expense of a small class of faithful servants of the Crown, and we trust that this injustice will be remedied.

I should like to reinforce what the hon. Member for Londonderry (Sir R. Ross) has said, and to appeal to hon. Members opposite to support us, not on any party question, but on this moral issue, because I think sincerely that if the right hon. and learned Gentleman finds that the Committee is unanimously in favour of reversing this decision, he will be only too glad to have an opportunity of doing justice in this matter. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has told us that he recognises what could be done in this matter. He told us how he endeavoured to get the Burmese Government to treat these people in the same way as comparable people in India have been treated by the India and Pakistan Governments. He failed so to do, and having failed on the moral issue, he then fell back on the legal liability. I am sure that the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not want to do that, and he would be very glad to have the support of the Committee to strengthen him and enable him to enforce the moral issue.

What does this really amount to? They are being granted already one breach of their legal right in getting their proportionate pension. They are not legally entitled to that. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has recognised that there is a moral issue involved, by granting them proportionate pensions in breach of their agreement. Therefore, he has recognised one half of the issue. Cannot he, with the support of the Committee, recognise the other half as well? He has gone even further than that. He has recognised, as he told an hon. Member, that, other than the moral issue involved in the payment of the passage money home, there is no legal liability there, in many of the cases, at any rate. In order to meet that moral issue, he has waived the legalities which presumably technically precluded him from making the very proper and right payment of passage money on the earlier determination of these contracts. Why cannot he recognise that there is still a gap to be filled on the moral side between what he sought to require the Burmese Government to do on a par with the India and Pakistan Governments, and what in fact they are prepared to do in accordance with what he has told us?

It is all very well for him to inform the Committee of various steps taken to try to arrange for these people to obtain employment elsewhere when they come home. The Committee, I am quite sure, share with me the painful knowledge of the difficulties of men—ex-Servicemen particularly—who have retired at the age of 45 in obtaining reasonable employment, whether through the appointments board or elsewhere. Time and time again, particularly with men of the age of the Crown servant for whom we are appealing in this case, we have found that it has only been possible to operate in conjunction with or through the appointments board, and they are quite incapable of providing opportunities for men of that age, and men who have not the experience required by modern industrial concerns operating in this country in present circumstances. The hope, therefore, which the right hon. and learned Gentleman held out of being able to place these men in reasonable employment in this country, really is very remote indeed at the present time.

I therefore urge that the Committee should give the right hon. and learned Gentleman the strength and moral encouragement to do what we know he believes to be right. He has, on the financial side, already accepted an obliga- tion of £15 million, and the amount involved in this matter is trivial in comparison. On the other hand, the principle involved is very big indeed. It is the principle of doing justice to Crown servants when the Crown, through circumstances into which we need not go, has to breach agreements with Crown servants, and it will be a very far-reaching decision, as an hon. Member behind me said just now, if the Crown's dealings with its servants should perpetrate an action which not only involves a moral injustice to the servants, but which it is perfectly evident the Crown itself knows to be a moral injustice.

Quite frankly, I have considerable sympathy with the motive behind this Amendment, and I think it is right that it should have been brought up, although I think it is couched in somewhat extreme terms. I am certain that hon. Gentlemen opposite do not seriously propose that if satisfactory agreement cannot be reached the independence of Burma should be held up, because they know perfectly well that this is largely a local government matter. I hope, however, that the feelings that have been expressed this morning, particularly by those hon. Members on the other side who were good enough to go into the Lobby and support the Government on the Second Reading of the Bill, will be considered, and that there will be general unanimity in the Committee that something more ought to be done by the Government. I hope that they may represent to the Burmese Government that even those who wish that Government more goodwill than others are most anxious that they should try to go further towards meeting the representations that have been made in this case.

I frequently disagree with the hon. Gentleman the Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt), but I think he has made a most fair and temperate statement which we on this side of the Committee appreciate. I very much hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will rise in response to that statement, because here quite clearly is a case where this Committee are disturbed about a matter. We shall have to vote for our Amendment in any case, but I do not think we ought to vote before a further statement has been made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I hope he will tell us that he will have regard to the feelings of the Committee, and that" he will convey those feelings not only to His Majesty's Government, but also to the existing Government in Burma. With great frankness I say that no Government in this country, and especially a Government with whom we are going to be in friendly relations, can ever fail to have regard to the feelings of a Committee of this House when it has been consolidated, as it has been today.

Before I reply to what has been said just now by my hon. Friend the Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) I want to place on record the constitutional basis of this problem. With all respect to the hon. Member for Chichester (Mr. Joynson-Hicks), the initiative does not rest with His Majesty's Government of the United Kingdom. It is perfectly true to say that the employees of the United Kingdom are employees of the Crown. That would apply to employees of the Government of Burma, of the Government of Australia, of the Government of South Africa and so on, but for the purposes of contracts that employment is their responsibility, and, indeed, as I indicated to the Committee in my first remark, the terms and conditions of service are entirely a matter for the Government of the Dominion or Colony concerned, with the one exception of the Secretary of State's service.

Therefore, it is not a question of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom not facing up to their moral responsibility, or of seeking to economise at the expense of men who have rendered very fine service to the King in Burma under the Government of Burma. I certainly would not like to put it on the basis that there has been any reluctance on the part of His Majesty's Government to look after the interests of those officials. All I am saying is that the initiative rests with the Government of Burma. I would certainly be prepared, in response to my hon. Friends and to hon. Gentlemen opposite, to go to this extent—I am quite sure the Government of Burma will be well aware of the views that have been expressed on both sides of the Committee in this matter—to take upon myself to give an assurance to hon. Members that we will ask the Government of Burma to look at this problem again. I cannot go beyond that.

Would I be right in saying that the total compensation would come to not more than £150,000, that is, one-hundredth part of the gift which His Majesty's Government have made to Burma? Could not His Majesty's Government out of that satisfy their own moral responsibilities in this matter and not put it on to the Government of Burma?

I am quite sure the" hon. Member for Blackpool North, who made such a very helpful speech the other night from the point of view of the Burmese people, would not suggest that we should commit a breach of our treaty in order to meet this moral obligation. That is, in effect, what he is suggesting, and I cannot think that that is what he means.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman is a very good Parliamentarian. He must see the significance of the unanimity of opinion that there is in the Committee. I know he is in a jam about it and I sympathise with him. It is quite useless for him to get up and stress again the absence of any legal obligation on the part of His Majesty's Government. That does not get us any further at all. He may make all the representations in the world to the Government of Burma—and I trust and hope that the Burmese Government will respond—but he must admit that in this fallible world there is an element of doubt. Because there is an element of doubt, is he prepared to say on behalf of His Majesty's Government that these men will get suitable compensation or proper employment in this country? That really is the issue. I will not proceed with any of the arguments I made before or that other hon. Gentlemen have made, but I ask the right hon. Gentleman to go a little further.

I want to say one word on the point that the initiative does not rest on His Majesty's Government. We are asking His Majesty's Government to take the initiative on this and to discharge their moral obligations. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has told us that he will convey the views expressed today to the Burmese Government. I have no doubt that they will be considered there, but what we would like from him is an assurance that if the attitude of the Burma Government is not altered, at least the Government of the United Kingdom will treat these people properly by securing for them adequate compensation. That assurance has not been forthcoming, and His Majesty's Government have given no undertaking to discharge an obligation which rests upon them, if not a legal certainly a moral obligation. In those circumstances we have no alternative but to show our dissatisfaction.

I could not possibly accept the contention that there is a moral obligation upon His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. We have an interest in the welfare of all our citizens, whatever may be the position or whatever the country may be, but I could not possibly accept the contention put forward by the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller).

I should like to put this question to my right hon.

He has already said he will.

I think my right hon. and learned Friend should make it clear to the Committee, for it would help considerably the hon. Members on this side of the Committee, that he will make the necessary approaches to the Government of Burma with regard to the compensation to which these people are entitled.

The integral and inherent part of the Clause is in the first subsection, which states that, upon the appointed day, Burma shall become an independent country, etc. I think we are entitled, and that it is within the Rules of Order for us, to ask one or two questions before the Clause is passed, about the position of special communities whom, after the appointed day, we shall no longer be able to protect in any way or, indeed, to ask questions about or raise any Debate about in this House. In the confident belief that this point is in Order, I desire to raise questions relating to the position of the Anglo-Burman community.

I should like to say that this community has been of some importance in the life of Burma. As hon. Gentlemen who are familiar with the country will know, the community is composed mostly of the descendants of unions between European men and Burmese women, though it also includes a certain number of domiciled Anglo-Indians and a very few domiciled persons of pure European stock who have been settled in the country for two or three generations. As in the case of the Anglo-Indians, the Anglo-Burmans take a special pride in the strain of European blood in their veins and they take a pride also in their European culture. They are a class apart from the Burmese. They have rendered, in many walks of civil life, good service for many years, out of proportion to their numbers; that is to say, a very large proportion of them have served the Crown in one capacity or another, or have been in important business positions. They have been clerks, skilled artisans, doctors, nurses, and teachers, and they are specially good in the police. They are also very peaceful and law-abiding citizens.

Their complaint has been that the Burmese Government already started to dispense with their services in the Civil Service some time ago, and they fear that the wave of nationalist, anti-European feeling which has swept through Burma will result in their being denied a chance of making their livelihood in the positions in which they have shown themselves well fitted. This they fear if the Clause as it stands is inserted in the Bill without any special action being taken. I should like to point out that their loyalty to the Allied cause during the war was undoubted, for the volunteer forces, which I remember from the days when I was at the India Office and which existed in Burma, contained very large numbers of Anglo-Burmans, a much greater proportion in relation to their numbers than of Burmese. The units charged with the task of maintaining order were largely composed of them.

Therefore, we have the position that here is a community which did very fine service both in the Civil Service and in the Defence Services of the country, greater service in proportion to their numbers than did the Burmese. That fact in itself should commend their cause to all persons. I hope that applies to everyone in this Committee, whether in the Chamber or not, and to all who are—to use an old-fashioned term—of patriotic intention and belief. The fact is that these men did spendid service for the Crown. They suffered. They did very fine work in the resistance movement. Commanding officers of forces whose members were dropped by parachute behind the lines testify to that, and every British officer in Burma spoke in the highest terms of the Anglo-Burmans and said that they had no finer officers than the Anglo-Burman officers. They suffered very great hardships during the war and many were cruelly tortured by the Japanese. Many more lost their houses and all they had in the retreat from Burma.

That is my reason for hoping that even at this eleventh hour we shall have some statement before we part with this all-important Clause which settles the date of our complete evacuation from Burma; in other words, our Burmese Dunkirk. The Government of Burma Act, 1935, as I well remember, gave special representation to minorities, and, in accordance with its provisions, the Anglo-Burmans held two seats in the Legislature. That was the situation. Under the new Constitution, to which we cannot refer in detail but only in general terms, because it is not before the Committee, there will be no separate representation of the Anglo-Burmans, who politically will become submerged. Let the Committee realise, even though it is a Friday afternoon with a scant attendance in the Chamber, that this Committee of the House of Commons, unless something is done, is about to pass a Clause of a Bill which will remove from these people who have done such splendid service for Burma and ourselves, all the safeguards which they have hitherto had. That is no doubt a very small matter to many, but it is of great importance to these very loyal subjects of the Crown, and it is important from the point of view of the example of good or bad which it will set to people in other parts of the Empire in the same position.

I need not go into the many details which I have in this brief which I have had prepared for me on the subject of the position of the Anglo-Burmans. No doubt the Government will say—I can predict the answer in advance; indeed we had it on the Second Reading—that the leading representatives of the Anglo-Burmans have thrown in their lot with the Burmese. What else could they do? What else could any minority loyal to the British Government do when that Government scuttles from a country after making friends with those who were formerly the enemies of that country and themselves? They cannot do anything else. Of course, they were ready to do that. We have a very poor reputation as an institution, that is, the House of Commons, in the treatment of loyal minorities. We treated the United Empire Loyalists, who were loyal to us in the American Civil War, very badly. I will quote, until I am told that I am out of Order, a statement made in the Nova Scotia Legislature by a Member about the treatment of minorities by the British Government of that day. Somebody had spoken of the position of the Union. It was said:

"What else can you suppose would happen? The British House of Commons has always paid more attention to successful rebels than to devoted loyalists."

I would apply that observation very much to the action of the Government this afternoon. They are paying every attention to successful rebels and precious little to devoted loyalists.

12.15 p.m.

I do not suppose that anything can be done for these unhappy people. I would only ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman whether, even at this late hour, before we pass this Clause, he could ask whether there is anything which the Government can do to safeguard the position of the Anglo-Burmans. It would help if the right hon. and learned Gentleman would say to the Burmese Government that His Majesty's Government regard their obligations of the past to the Anglo-Burmans as still existing, at any rate in the form of moral obligations, and if he could represent to that Government the need for safeguarding for those people the special rights which by virtue of their position they have always had in Burma. I hope the right hon. and learned Gentleman will be in a position to say something of that kind and will send out some word of hope to the Anglo-Burmans. I hope he will make it clear to the Burmese Government that this is the position of His Majesty's Government. I would like him further—I ask him to make no expression of opinion on this because he would probably think it improper to do so—since I have never believed in kowtowing to any Government outside this country, to represent to the Burmese Government that the British Government are still pretty powerful and that the Burmese Government are not, and that the future of the relationships between the two countries will to some extent depend upon whether the Burmese Government treat the people who have been loyal to us in the past, as they should be treated.

I feel very worried about this community and I sincerely hope that the Committee will share my anxiety. The relatively small Anglo-Burman community are all our own kith and kin. They would never have existed if the British had not been in Burma. Now that we are leaving Burma, surely this is one section of the community for whom we must have some special regard, quite apart from the fact, as the noble Lord has said, that they have always been an example in good times and in bad of unswerving loyalty to the Crown. In other words, it is one of our residual responsibilities when we are liquidating the Empire to look after the people of our own blood who have been loyal to us.

Are these people, in fact, being abandoned? Is the situation satisfactory? I know what the right hon. and learned Gentleman is about to say. He has said it already. He will say that they are not being abandoned. He will say that the Chairman of the Anglo-Burman Association, Mr. Rivers, is quite happy about it. Can we accept that at its face value? If we can, then I admit that there is nothing to worry about, but quite frankly, I do not accept that declaration at its face value. For a start, I have had too many representations the other way round and what is more, as the noble Lord quite rightly said, there was an element of duress in the circumstances under which that statement was made. When we turn round to people and say, "We are going to clear out anyway, we are going to abandon you; make what arrangements you can," it is no good for the right hon. and learned Gentleman to quote the statement of Mr. Rivers and say that everything is fine and is quite all right.

Let us understand what will happen and, if we are abandoning these people, as I believe we are, let us be under no illusions as to what will happen to them. Burma today is suffering from raging nationalism—that is perfectly clear—even more so than India. The Government of Burma have far less experienced servants to work for them than either the Government of India or the Government of Pakistan. Nevertheless, as an indication of the extent of the nationalism raging in Burma today, they have declined to employ any European servants in large numbers. What hope is there, therefore, of these Anglo-Burmans really playing an effective part in the life of the country? The Anglo-Burmans can exist only as individuals in so far as they cease to exist as a community, and if they are prepared to give up all they have regarded in the past as the signs of their national culture and of their background. Only to that extent can they exist at all. I venture to predict that if the Anglo-Burman is to live, even physically, in Burma, one of the first things he will have to do is to give up his language because, let us be under no illusion, English will be a secondary language in Burma from now on. He must give up his way of life. He will also be forced, I believe, in the long run to give up his religion. In other words, the fate of the Anglo-Burman is to be submerged entirely in the life of the native Burmese community.

That is what we are doing. Do not let us have any high-falutin platitudinous talk. It may be inevitable, but do not let us have any unctuous hypocrisy about it. I do not feel happy about this, and I sincerely hope that no other hon. Member, on whatever side of the Committee he may sit, will feel happy about it. I do not know whether we can do anything by constitutional safeguards. After all, the Karens, who are also a minority, have constitutional safeguards under the new Constitution. These people have none. Can we turn round and say to the Anglo-Burman who wants to leave Burma that we will do everything we can to find him a home in some other part of the British Commonwealth? Australia is asking for immigrants. There are other parts of the Empire. Have the Commonwealth Governments been approached? Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared to approach them or any part of the Colonial Empire? Are we going to try to find them jobs, or are we just going to wash our hands of them and say, "We are very sorry, you must make whatever arrangements you can." If we are going to abandon these people, let us do it with our eyes open and without any hypocrisy.

I, too, know something of what the right hon. and learned Gentleman will say in reply to this Debate. He will say that it would be wrong and misleading, and, ultimately, detrimental to the interests of the Anglo-Burmans themselves if we attempted to persuade them that their interests lie outside Burma. He will say that they must make their valuable contribution to the future Burmese State. Of course, there is a great deal in that. But I believe it is incumbent upon us in this Committee to make it known in Burma that we take a particular interest in these people. We do not wish to detach them from their future country, but we have a heavy responsibility towards them. I know there is a lot of cant talked in the House about moral responsibilities, but there is no cant in what I am saying now. We have a tremendous moral responsibility towards these people.

I do not believe that even now in this country people realise what that community went through during the war. I should not have known it except for the fact that nearly two years ago I went to India with a Parliamentary Delegation and happened to come across some of the literature of a small committee which was trying to do something for the Anglo-Burmans. I do not mind admitting that what I read brought tears to my eyes—the ghastly way in which their women were maltreated, misused and cast aside by the Japanese, those women who are often of great beauty. I think the least His Majesty's Government can do is to let the Burmese Government know in the most friendly fashion that we shall always take an abiding interest in this community. I think they should pursue the line suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans), that is, approach the Dominions and, particularly, the Colonial Governments, to see whether settlement schemes cannot be arranged for them, for instance, in places like British Guiana. Could not a settlement scheme be arranged for such Anglo-Burmans as wish to emigrate?

As the Committee knows, I supported the Government on this Bill. I am not withdrawing that support, but I cannot hide from myself that, inevitably, much of the contents of a Bill, like this, must strike deeply at our consciences, and nothing strikes more deeply at mine than the way this community must, to some extent, be abandoned. Let us try this afternoon to mitigate some of this. Let us try to discharge those obligations as honourably as we can. It must be a compromise, of course, but do not let us err against this most unfortunate, most sadly treated community who, as my hon. Friend has said, are our own kith and kin.

I understand the sincerity and genuineness with which the hon. Member for Farnham (Mr. Nicholson) always speaks on these matters but I feel that, with the best will in the world, he is tending to make the position of the Anglo-Burmans a little more difficult than it need be. What is happening really is that the leaders of the Anglo-Burmans themselves are doing their best to persuade their own community that their place lies in Burma, and that they cannot look for any special protection or privileges from outside.

I am not asking that.

That is a perfectly right attitude on the part of the leaders of the Anglo-Burmans. If there is any suggestion in Burma that the Anglo-Burmans are still looking to us for some kind of extra support, what might happen—as does so often happen to minorities—is that they will get an accumulated hostility from the majority of the communities in the country, who will feel that this minority is in some way trying to put itself above them.

If I have given that impression to the hon. Gentleman and the Committee, I have failed in what I tried to do. I do not want the Anglo-Burmans to feel that they are in an in-between position and looking to us for special protection. I want the Burmese to know, however, that we regard this community with particular affection, that they are very near our hearts. I am not asking for any extra rights, but that we shall watch with particular affection and anxiety the fate of this community.

That is an unexceptionable attitude. Naturally, the Burmese would expect us to feel rather more kinship with the Anglo-Burmans than perhaps with any others and, as the hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) stated, if it had not been for us, they would not have existed at all. However, I hope we can keep out any suggestion that we want to give them special privileges, or special protection, but encourage Mr. Rivers, the leader of the Anglo-Burmans, to continue with his good work. He has had considerable success in that, and already quite a number of the higher administrative posts have, for the first time, been given to Anglo-Burmans.

I must confess that I feel that the note upon which my hon. Friend has just concluded is the right note: in other words, that we should do everything possible to encourage the Anglo-Burman community to appreciate the fact that their future lies in Burma and not in other parts of the world. Indeed, that is the view they have taken themselves. In so far as it has been possible for us to obtain information as to what they desire, as far back as 1944, the Anglo-Burmese Conference which took place in Simla passed a resolution to the effect that they should identify themselves, as a community, with Burma, and only recently a meeting was held which was attended by about 300 members of the community in the City Hall at Rangoon which reaffirmed the content of that resolution.

In addition, the four members of the Anglo-Burman community who were elected at the Election to represent them in the Constituent Assembly, did not oppose the Constitution which, as the noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton), I think, very correctly said, does in fact provide for the removal of the two Anglo-Burman constituencies which at present exist under the provisions of the 1935 Act, and provides for general constituencies irrespective of race or religion. As regards their future, I think that, individually, we would always be interested in people of our own kith and kin, whether they are in Burma, in India, or elsewhere, but it would be most undesirable for His Majesty's Government to make some pronouncement that a particular section of the population of Burma was to be the special responsibility of His Majesty's Government, and that is not what we could do.

As regards the possible treatment of the Anglo-Burman community, I would, of course, remind the Committee that the draft Constitution which is to be set up does provide for religious toleration, and I see no reason to anticipate that any attempt will be made to prevent individuals practising a particular religion. Only recently the Home Minister has stated that in the view of the Burmese Government the Anglo-Burmans in the future will be a welcome and a valuable element in the composition of the new Burmese nation. That may be what the hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) may have called a platitudinous misstatement, but I can only refer to that as an indication of the approach which the Burmese leaders have made to this community, and I have no reason to anticipate that they will fail to live up to that.

If convenient, I think we can have a general discussion on Clause 2 and discuss all the matters together.

I was going to suggest that we should discuss all the Amendments put down to page 2 as far as line 43 together.

If the suggestion meets with the convenience of the Committee, this might be done.

I beg to move, in page 2, line 9, to leave out from "person," to "is," in line 10. and to insert:

"to whom subsection (1) of this section would but for the provisions of this subsection apply who."

The Amendments are a little complicated but raise a point which, I think is of considerable importance and worthy of careful consideration. Before discussing the effect of these Amendments, I would just like to point out, as far as I can remember, the meaning contained in Subsections (1) and (2) of Clause 2 as that Clause now stands. Under Subsection (1), speaking generally, if one looks also at paragraph 1 of the First Schedule, persons who were born in Burma, or whose father or paternal grandfather was born in Burma, are deprived by this Subsection of British nationality. I do not need for the purpose of my argument to refer to the provision contained in the Schedule, but the broad purpose of Subsection (1) of Clause 2 is to say that those who were born in Burma, or whose father or paternal grandfather was born in Burma, should be deprived of British nationality.

We now come to Subsection (3) which states that those persons deprived of British nationality under Subsection (1) may have to comply with certain conditions, to retain their British nationality. The Committee will see that a person born in Burma, or whose father or paternal grandfather was born in Burma, but who is domiciled or ordinarily resident in any part of the United Kingdom, Channel Islands, Isle of Man, etc., can elect to remain a British subject. Reducing it to a simple proposition one finds that a gentleman who was born in Burma, but who is now domiciled or ordinarily resident in Newfoundland—that is his home—is by this Measure, although he may have been absent from Burma for years, deprived automatically of British nationality. I think that is clear from the content of the Clause. It then rests with him, if he so desires, to elect, but just let us consider the terms under which he can exercise that election. He is to make a declaration, before the expiration of two years—in line 31—to such person and in such a manner as may be prescribed, to remain a British subject. I am wondering whether the conditions under which that election must be exercised will become known to the individual whom I have taken for the purpose of my argument, resident in Newfoundland or any territory other than Burma, so as to enable him to exercise that election.

That is not enough. He has to do it only in the manner that may he prescribed to the person who may be prescribed. It may be that he does not know what conditions will be prescribed, or how many persons, and, also, if we look a little further, we see a proviso that a declaration made by him—

"shall be of no effect unless it is registered in the prescribed manner in pursuance of an application made within, or within the prescribed period after the expiration of, the two years."

So that the individual is, first of all, deprived of his British nationality, and is then given the right of contracting in again and, being a British subject, if he complies with certain conditions, which no one in this Committee knows, and one wonders whether they would be communicated to him within the two years. It seems to me that this Subsection has been put the wrong way round.

I believe it will be right to say that a man born in Burma, or whose father or parental grandfather was born in Burma and whose home is now outside Burma—and that is the category which is covered by Subsection (2)—should retain his British nationality unless he elects to give it up. That it seems to me, would be perfectly simple to operate. I can see no reason why the Burmese man born in Burma, but who is resident and has his home outside Burma, should not retain his British nationality, and have the right, if he so desires, to give it up. I see no reason why it should be compulsorily taken away from him. It is with the object of providing that these individuals should have the right of contracting out of British nationality, rather than being forced to contract in to retain it, that I have put down these Amendments. I should like to make it perfectly clear that the only category affected by these Amendments now under discussion are those individuals who were born in Burma, whose father or parental grandfather were born in Burma, and who are now domiciled or ordinarily resident outside the confines of that country.

I can see the objective of the hon. and learned Gentleman in these Amendments, but I respectfully suggest to him that all his arguments apply with equal force the other way round. Suppose we alter the Subsection in the way in which he would like. If it is going to apply to a gentleman now in, say, Newfoundland, who now lives there, and who has to find out about these elections, if he wishes to remain a British subject, then there will be a large number of people, possibly in India and scattered all over the world—people working as coolies, people working in ships, and all that kind of thing—and a large number of illiterates, who have to find out if they want to be Burmese subjects instead of British. They have to go through all this paraphernalia of making declarations, and so on. I should have thought that the weight of evidence and argument would have been that there would be far more people—Burmese outside Burma—who wished to be Burmese subjects, than there would be Burmese outside Burma who wished to become or remain British subjects, and at any rate those who wish to remain British subjects would, presumably, be able to establish this, and would be people of a certain educational standing who had followed events in their own country and who could very readily find out how their position was affected. I think that the arrangement proposed would be preferable to what the hon. and learned Gentleman has suggested.

The Committee has listened to two very closely reasoned speeches. The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite has put one side, so far as the balance of convenience is concerned, and my hon. Friend the Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) has put the other side. The question thus resolves itself, in the circumstances with which we have to deal, as to which will best conduce to the general convenience and well-being, and I ask the Committee to say that we have hit upon the right method. The hon. and learned Gentleman takes the case of a Burmese man living in Newfoundland.

This was only a hypothetical example of category (d).

The hon. and learned Gentleman based his case upon Subsection (2) and took as a hypothetical example a person born in Burma and resident in Newfoundland. I think the Committee will be able to agree that that sort of person is a very real person, but the way in which this nationality condition is framed is this. Persons who are, in every sense of the word Burmese, by the first paragraph of the Schedule, lose their British nationality, but there is an exception to that in favour of anybody who has any claim, apart from his Burmese connections, to be British. In other words, supposing a man were born in Burma but had afterwards gone to America, he would lose his British nationality. Any claim through his purely Burmese affinities to be a British subject will rescue him from losing his British nationality by virtue of Clause 2 (1). The result will be that the persons to whom the hon. and learned Gentleman referred will be very few in number. The great majority of people will be able to prove their British affinity, which will take them out of the provisions of the first paragraph of the Schedule. If there were likely to be a considerable number, there would be much more force in the hon. and learned Gentleman's argument.

My hon. Friend mentioned the case of illiterate persons, and said they might well predominate. I agree entirely, except that I think they would be already Burmese in the sense that they would have no non-Burmese British affinities. Starting from the supposition that this will apply to very few people and that there will be an election only in isolated and unusual cases, in the case of a Burmese who has made his home in Newfoundland, or, it may be, in South Africa, that real person is given an election.

Supposing the position were the other way round, what would the consequences be? It would be very inconvenient in this sense. When Burma is independent, representatives of the new Government of Burma, in the various parts of the Empire, would remain British subjects unless, under the Amendments of the hon. and learned Gentleman, they elected not to do so. That would lead to confusion, and they would be far more numerous. We should have a great many people, who were purely Burmese and were only abroad as representatives of their country, possessing a dual nationality which they did not desire and which did not, in any sense, belong to them, since they were Burmese in every sense of the word. We should have an anomalous position, as, if they did not contract out, they would find themselves with a nationality which they had no reason or desire to possess. I ask the Committee to say that that is a good reason for leaving the Clause as it is, since the suggested alteration would lead to a great deal of confusion. They might contract out, but it is quite likely that that might be overlooked.

There is a further consideration, which I think has weight, even in the case of a person living in Newfoundland and being Burmese in origin. If the Amendment is adopted, that person's British nationality will depend upon pure chance. For example, the question of fact is whether, on the night of 3rd January, he had gone over the border into Malaya. The way in which we have drafted the Clause will result in the question of his nationality being decided by a positive and specific act of election, registered—

When the hon. and learned Gentleman gives the instance of a man going over the border on the night of 3rd January, surely that individual would not be regarded as domiciled or ordinarily resident in Burma?

It depends what is meant by "resident." After all, even the spending of a few days in a hotel may be considered as being resident. There are a number of people on the border-line, and the very point which the hon. and learned Gentleman makes shows how undesirable it would be that the nationality of such persons should depend on the question, aye or nay, whether, at the crucial time, they were resident inside or outside Burma. The question of their nationality might arise 10, 20 or 30 or 50 years hence, and instead of its being determined by a specific act of election, registered and easily ascertainable, it would have to be determined on whether the particular date—

indicated dissent.

I see the hon. and learned Gentleman shakes his head. But the question would be, are these people British subjects or not, and the answer would be, they are British subjects if on the night of 3rd January, they were resident not in Burma but outside. Take the case of a person who frequently had to pass from one side of the boundaries of Burma to the other. It might be extremely difficult to say whether he was resident inside or not. He might have two residences. In 50 years' time one might have to think back on that event and determine, aye or nay, whether it could be said that that man, on that night, had a residence outside Burma. That would be a most inconvenient and unsatisfactory state of affairs. Not only that, but that man might have property, and the question might arise 100 years hence, if his sons or grandsons desired to establish that he was a British subject. They could establish it by saying that his election was made by a public action which was registered and easily ascertainable. Then the position could be easily ascertained. But it would be most inconvenient, in the case of the very people whom the hon. and learned Gentleman wants to help, and their descendants, if questions of nationality of particular individuals depended upon a doubtful question of fact of that sort.

The hon. and learned Gentleman put his case on the balance of fairness, convenience and justice. In all cases where the changing of nationality is concerned, this kind of anomaly and difficult position is bound to arise. We have very carefully considered the arguments of the hon. and learned Gentleman which he has put forward very cogently, but, taking into account the position of Bur-man representatives in the Empire, the small numbers that would be affected, and the possible consequence in years hence of their nationality depending on the doubtful facts of residence outside Burma and elsewhere in the Dominions, we feel that the more convenient course to follow, as a matter of justice to the individual concerned, and as a matter of general regularity and good order, would be to say that such persons, if they want to remain British subjects, must elect to do so.

The hon. and learned Gentleman says that they might not realise how they were supposed to do things like that. But, after all, this is a Measure of great public importance, and anybody affected by it would be acutely interested in it. Therefore, it is in the highest degree likely that a person affected by it will know that, if he wishes to retain his British nationality, there is a provision in the Measure which deals with that point. It is unlikely that a person, such as the gentleman resident in Newfoundland, will not have taken the trouble to look at the Measure and find out that, if he wishes to remain British, he must take the step of registering his election. I hope the Committee will agree, having given full weight to the arguments of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and accepting the sincerity of his arguments and the desire he has to reach a solution, that he cannot really displace the arguments which I have put forward, and that the balance of convenience and justice does fall down on the side that we have chosen, and that, therefore, the Clause should remain as it is.

To the mind of a layman like myself, this is a thick legal jungle through whose tortuous paths we have been ably led by experts. I hope I shall not lay myself open to the gibes of the denizens of the jungle if I try, as an ordinary man in the street, to apply myself to this problem. As I understand the hon. and learned Solicitor-General, people who are what we might call 100 per cent. Burmese, with no British affinities either by residence or descent, are automatically deprived of their British nationality by this Bill, and that the people—

If I may interrupt the hon. Gentleman, I would say that they are automatically deprived, subject to the election in Subsection (2) and subject to the election in Subsection (3), but that, otherwise, the hon. Gentleman is correct.

The point I want to make is quite clear. If they have no British affinity, are 100 per cent. Burmese, and are resident in Burma, but, at the same time, wish to retain their British nationality, what remedy have they? Could the hon. and learned Gentleman answer that question?

They cannot retain their British nationality unless they have, shall I say, a non-Burmese British affinity. If they are resident outside Burma and were British subjects because they were Burmese when this Bill becomes an Act on the appointed day, then they remain British subjects. If under Subsection (3) of the Clause there is some doubt as to where they get their Burmese nationality, because, for example, they may not have the requisite indigenous blood in their veins, and if, therefore, there is a doubt whether they qualify to become Burmese citizens, they then also get the right to retain their British nationality. It is only if they are Burmese in every sense of the word, and not British in any sense of the word, that they do not get the right to choose.

I am very grateful to the hon. and learned Gentleman; he has made the extent of the dilemma quite clear in my own mind. I can imagine that there may be many 100 per cent. Burmese, with no claim to British citizenship by reason of British affinity, who may yet be proud of their association with British nationality. Therefore, I doubt whether we are quite right in depriving them of any opportunity of election for British nationality. After all, it is not a little thing to say that one is the subject of the King of England. It has been a proud boast in the past to say that one is able to obtain British protection wherever one goes. At one time it was the proud boast to say civis Romanus sum, and then, later, a prouder boast to say civis Britannicus sum. I rather wonder whether we are doing right in depriving these Burmese, who may have been proud to be subjects of King George, of the opportunity to remain British subjects.

I have considerable sympathy with the Amendment which has been moved by the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller), but, unless he can correct me on this, I see a constitutional difficulty in applying the method which he seeks to adopt. The reason why I say I am sympathetic towards his view is because, ordinarily, where there is a person who is born in a British Dominion and becomes a British subject, it may very well be that, notwithstanding that fact, he is subject to the law of a foreign State. It is because of that fact that our law provides that, after his minority, he may make a declaration of alienage whereby he elects to which State he desires to belong—in other words, what nationality he wishes to have.

In the present case, however, it seems to me, we are in this constitutional difficulty, and as it seems to me fundamental difficulty. In the Burma Constitution it is clearly provided that every person born of parents or grand parents as there defined, in any of the territories included within the Union shall be a citizen of the Union. If that is so, in my submission there is great difficulty in seeking to provide in this particular Bill before the Committee something which is quite contrary to the Burma Constitution. It seems very inauspicious to start off in circumstances of this kind where we have conferred the right on the Burmese people to enact a free constitution of their own, to do something in this Bill which runs counter to the Constitution and to that right. That does not seem to be proper at all. That is why I say there is a very formidable difficulty in doing what the hon. and learned Member for Daventry proposes by his Amendment. The learned Solicitor-General has said in an interjection that this is not a Burmese Bill, but our Bill. With great respect to him, I do not think that is the way to treat or to approach the matter. The Burmese have already established a Constitution, and to follow that up immediately with a Bill that runs counter to that Constitution does not seem to be right at all.

The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Daventry says we should follow the normal rule, and that where you have a person who is once a British subject he should remain a British subject until he elects to be otherwise. Of course, that is in a case where the person is born either in Britain or in the British Dominions, but is under the law of a foreign State a subject also of that State. Here, however, we are dealing with the specific case of a person born in Burma. There is really a profound distinction here. In the light of all the facts in this particular context it seems to me to be right, now that we are converting Burma into a. State with a free Constitution of its own, all people who have been born in Burma ought automatically to become Burmese subjects. They are, however, not clamped down to that. They are given an opportunity, in certain cases, within a period of two years, where they are not residing in Burma but residing either in this country or in some part of the Dominions, and if they satisfy the conditions referred to in Clause 2 (2) of making a declaration stating that they desire to be British subjects. I think that that does sufficiently cover any conditions or questions of justice or of fairness that ought to be provided for and satisfied. That being, in my submission, practical, and there being this further constitutional—or, international—point because of what is contained in the Burma Constitution, I think that the Bill as it stands should be supported.

I should like to say a word in answer to what the hon. and learned Member for Gloucester (Mr. Turner-Samuels) has said and what the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-General has said. On this occasion, perhaps a somewhat unusual occasion, the hon. and learned Solicitor-General has been strongly supported by the hon. and learned Member for Gloucester. I doubt if I made my point absolutely clear in moving this Amendment, and I should like, in answer to the Solicitor-General and the hon. and learned Member for Gloucester, to put a specific case—and not, perhaps, so hypothetical a case as that of a Burman living in Newfoundland, who, as the Solicitor-General says, would be a very rare bird, indeed.

Let us imagine for a moment a person of Burmese origin living in Tanganyika or Rhodesia. I imagine that there are a good many people of Burmese origin living in East Africa. Let us suppose that he has lived there throughout the whole of his life; that he was born there; that his father was born there, and lived there throughout the whole of his life; but that his paternal grandfather was born in Burma. The effect of this Bill will be, if I understand it correctly, that that gentleman will automatically in the first place be deprived of the advantage of being a British subject.

No. If I may be allowed to intervene? I am sorry to interrupt. I understand that the hon. and learned Gentleman is citing an instance of a person living in Tanganyika, whose father had been born in Tanganyika but whose grandfather had been born in Burma. A person of that sort would be saved by paragraph 2 of the First Schedule from losing his British nationality.

I must admit that it is not at all easy to read the First Schedule with Clause 2 (2). Am I right in saying that Clause 2 (2) applies only and can apply only to persons who were themselves born in Burma, but who are not now ordinarily resident or domiciled outside Burma?

I am sorry to keep on interrupting, but that is not quite accurate, either. If a person is born in Burma, before he loses his British nationality, the question has to be asked about him, "Can we say that his father or his grandfather was born within the British Dominions outside Burma?" If that is the case, he does not lose his British nationality.

Subject to that exception—I think I am right about this—let me put the point this way. Assume that his father and paternal grandfather were born both in Burma—I am leaving out that one excepted class—am I right in saying that Clause 2 (2) will apply only to the individual whose grandparent and parent were born in Burma, who was born in Burma himself, and who is now ordinarily resident and domiciled outside?

That is right.

I should be inclined to agree that the persons affected by Clause 2 (2) are likely to be few, indeed. But what is being done to them? "Ordinarily resident" is something very different, really, as the hon. and learned Gentleman will agree, from moving across a boundary in a railway train and coming back again. He and I are, I think, fairly familiar with the meaning of the word "domiciled." That does not mean that someone is a bird of passage. Consider a man who has been living in this circumstance for 30 or 40 years in Tanganyika. Does the hon. and learned Gentleman really say that that individual will be taking such an interest in this Measure and the regulations under it that he is likely to be aware of the fact that by this Measure he is being deprived of the advantages of being a British subject? I do not believe there is any truth in that at all. I believe that we could find quite a number of this small number of people who are affected who will be totally unaware of what the Burma Independence Bill is doing to them—when they are living and have made their homes in other parts of the British Commonwealth or Colonial Empire. That being so, I would ask the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-General, How is he going to bring to their notice their position in this matter?

They are being deprived of their British nationality by Act of Parliament. If this election is to mean anything, some steps must be taken to bring to their attention the fact that they have the right of election, and the conditions with which they have to comply to exercise it. The hon. and learned Gentleman did not say anything about that either. He talked about the balance of convenience and about Burmese representatives. But Burmese representatives abroad, I should have thought, would have found it not at all difficult to contract out of British nationality if they so desired, whereas, viewing the matter quite dispasionately, I think that the Burmese gentleman ordinarily resident for 40 years in East Africa may find it very difficult indeed to be informed of his rights and to be informed that his present status as a British subject is being affected. He may also find it extremely difficult to exercise his right of election. There is a point of principle here and, although it may affect very few, I cannot see that any disadvantage could possibly ensue from adopting these Amendments, and so protecting, as I think he should be protected, the man of Burmese origin who has made his permanent home outside Burma.

I do not wish to take up any more time on this point, but I will be glad to discuss it with the hon. and learned Gentleman at any time. I ask him to look at this point again so that perhaps, on reconsideration, it may be possible to make an alteration in another place. There is no great point of substance between us, but there is a point of principle. The persons whom I wish to protect and not deprive of their British nationality by Act of Parliament are Burmese people of Burmese origin who have left Burma and have now become permanent residents in other countries.

I feel that some answer should be given to the hon. Member for Farnham (Mr. Nicholson) who allowed his emotions to lead him slightly further astray in the jungle than we were already. It is true to say—and it has been pointed out quite clearly by my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor- General—that neither the formulation which is in the Bill nor the Amendment moved by the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) has any effect on the ordinary Burman living in Burma, with no other British connections. Neither side of the Committee is proposing that such a person should have any election. It may or it may not be a pity that he is not able to assert his right to be a British subject, but that is not in question in this Amendment. Nobody is proposing anything for the ordinary Burman who was born in Burma and who lives in Burma.

The only thing we have to consider is this balance of convenience between two types of people. On the one hand, we have the type of person referred to by the hon. and learned Member for Daventry, and on the other hand we have the type referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt)—the Burman who has perhaps moved to one of the Indian parts of the British Empire—to Malaya or Ceylon, for instance—and who may be ordinarily resident there. I do not think we need limit it to the hypothetical case of the man who merely goes there in a railway train. Clearly he is not domiciled there. But there are people who may well be domiciled there. I have no figures, and I doubt whether any other hon. Member has, but I should imagine there would be a considerable number of Burmese ordinarily resident in Malaya or Ceylon, but who are Burmese in every sense of the word and who would want to retain their connection with Burma and have Burmese nationality.

1.15 p.m.

Taking the only test we can have, which is the balance of convenience, I should have thought that obviously one of these two types of people is going to be placed in the inconvenient position—it is no greater than that—of having to find out about this right of election, and of having to deal with certain forms of declaration. I should have thought that on balance it is far more probable that there would be a comparatively large number of Burmese ordinarily resident in Burma, and having every connection with Burma, who would want to retain their Burmese nationality, but who are living outside Burma, than there would be people who have abandoned their ties with Burma, whose fathers and grandfathers were born in Burma, who do not qualify by birth for any other form of British nationality, but who live permanently in some other part of the British Commonwealth, and therefore, desire to retain British nationality. I should think there is bound to be an extraordinarily small number of the latter people.

I agree that the British Government should take every step in their power to see that this matter is brought to the notice of the people, and ensure that nobody loses his British nationality through any fault of the British Government; but I believe we have no right to deprive people of Burmese nationality if they wish to retain it, any more than we have the right to deprive people of British nationality if they wish to retain it. Under the Amendment which has been moved, that danger is far greater for a much larger number of people than it is under the Bill as drafted. Therefore, the only satisfactory action that the Government can take it to see that this is brought to people's notice.

I do not think I could put my case any better than it has been put by my hon. Friend the Member for Bexley (Mr. Bramall). The hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) asked me to reconsider the matter. Any closely reasoned argument such as his will always be considered, but I do not think that so far we can see any reason to depart from the view which we have adopted. I can assure the hon. and learned Gentleman of two things. I have inquired, and I have been informed, that there are very few people of the sort that he has instanced. There are far more people of the sort described by my hon. Friend—those migrants between Burma and India. His Majesty's Government will see that all reasonable steps are taken, by way of adequate publicity, to bring to the notice of any such persons as the hon. and learned Gentleman mentioned the necessity for exercising their right to elect, in so far as they are concerned, for the purpose of preserving their British nationality. As I say, his was a carefully reasoned argument, but I do not feel that it has shown any ground for departing from the point of view that we have adopted, and therefore, I hope the Committee will reject this Amendment.

I do not think it is necessary to move the other two Amendments to this Clause, in line 4, to leave out from "day" to the end of line 5, and to leave out lines 9 and 10 and insert the words on the Order Paper. Those Amendments deal with much the same point, and we have already had a full discussion on it.

I wish to make two observations. First, I hope that the Debate we have just had will assist in the task of informing people of their rights under this Measure. Secondly, I hope the Government may at this stage be able to give us some indication of what steps will be taken to provide assistance and the usual services to those who are resident in Burma and who, by virtue of this Measure, remain British subjects. I do not know whether the hon. and learned Gentleman is in a position to do so, but I should have thought that in connection with this question of nationality, it would be of some importance to the people affected to know what provision for British Consular services, etc., are contemplated throughout Burma in the immediate future.

I do not think this Clause ought to be passed, even on a Friday in a thin Committee, without calling attention to a matter of constitutional importance, of which we had no real explanation during Second Reading. I hope the hon. and learned Gentleman will be able to give some explanation today. It concerns what, on the face of it, would appear to be the extraordinary provision that though Burma will henceforth be an independent country, nevertheless, Imperial Preference is to be continued. I should like to make two observations on this matter. In the first place, I looked up the precedents, and I find that the only precedent for this Clause is to be found as long ago as 1842 under the old system of preference which was abolished, as the Committee will be aware, by Mr. Gladstone, when the United States enjoyed the Colonial Preference accorded to Colonial-grown tobacco until 1842. Since what may be described as the modern system of preference has been introduced, there has not been one single example of any country outside the Empire enjoying preference which is accorded to the Empire, and to the Colonies.

The first question which I wish to address to the learned Solicitor-General, and which I hope he will be in a position to answer, is: what steps have been taken to consult the Dominions, and those Crown Colonies which have Legislatures to which a measure of responsibility appertains, to find out whether they are in agreement with this astonishing breach in the practice and principle of Imperial Preference? Everyone knows the importance which is attached to Imperial Preference, not only on practical but on sentimental grounds. I should like to know whether there was any consultation with the Dominions and the Colonies.

I should like also to know the reason for this most extraordinary provision. I have here some figures, which no doubt the Minister will be able to correct if they are wrong. They are the latest figures available, because there have been none published on trade with Burma since 1938. Burma exports then consisted, in the main, of rice, oil and teak; they came to something like £25 million—which is a rough figure—of which she exported to this country £6¼ million, mainly rice, in respect of which there was a preference of 1⅔d. per lb., which I understand is the present preference. In the same year, Burma imported from the United Kingdom goods to the value of £3½ million, mainly in machinery, motor-cars and certain cotton goods. From that it would appear that, from the point of view of Imperial Preference, there was not very much advantage to us; that is to say, we were giving them preference on double the amount of our exports to them, so that in itself would not look as if there was any reason for continuing it. But this matter goes much further than that, and I want to know what is the explanation, and what are the intentions of the Government under the second part of Subsection (1), which reads:

"Provided that His Majesty may by Order in Council direct that, as from a specified date …"

Why has not the date been inserted? Why have the Government said, in effect, that it may be convenient to continue these preferences for the moment but not indefinitely, without any date being inserted? We on this side of the Committee attach some importance to this matter, and because of our interest in Imperial Preference I should be very glad to hear what is the reason for what seems, on the face of it, to be a most extraordinary Clause.

The background of this situation is historical, and dates back to the year 1932 when, as the noble Lord knows, following the Ottawa Agreements, the Import Duties Act, 1932, was passed, which provided that Burman goods imported into the United Kingdom up to 31st March, 1948, were to be treated as Colonial goods; that is to say, they were to be free of Import Duties. After that date they were to be treated as Dominion goods, and entitled to such Imperial Preference as might be agreed in a trade agreement between the United Kingdom and Burma; failing a trade agreement they were then to pay full—that is foreign—rates of duty. The Isle of Man Customs Act, 1932—which is also referred to in the Schedule—is parallel to the Import Duties Act, 1932; and the Finance Act, 1933, in dealing with Customs, defined Burma as part of His Majesty's Dominions. The Isle of Man Customs Act, 1933, is, in this respect, parallel to the Finance Act of the same year.

The object of these provisions is to cover an interval of time between the passing of the Bill and the signing of a trade agreement between the United Kingdom and Burma. It has been contemplated for some years now that such an agreement should be arrived at, but there was delay in concluding an agreement between Burma and India, which prevented action being taken before the war. Since 1945 it has been considered necessary to await constitutional developments, and then the progress of discussions for the International Trade Organisation. As regards the Dominions, there is nothing in this Bill—nothing at all—which affects tariff arrangements between Burma and the Dominions.

That was not my point. I hope the right hon. and learned Gentleman will answer this. I want to know whether he has consulted the Dominions, and the Crown Colonies having semi-responsible Governments, and asked them whether they agree with this extraordinary provision of granting preference to a country outside the Empire for an indefinite time. He has now told us there is to be some limit. If so, why is it not put in the Clause?

No steps have been taken to consult the Dominions. This is a matter between the United Kingdom Government and the Government of Burma. As I say, trade agreements between the Government of Burma and the Dominion Governments are not affected, but certainly in the ordinary way the practice has been followed as in bygone days of keeping the Governments of the Dominions informed. I am certainly not prepared to say that they have been consulted, thereby implying that they have been parties to the arrangement." They have certainly been informed.

As I say the object of these provisions is to bridge this interval of time. It is expected that a trade agreement will be made in the near future between the United Kingdom Government and the Government of Burma, and this is merely to maintain the status quo. I do not think there can be any objections, internationally speaking, to the fact that we are continuing tariff treatment to Burma after she leaves the Commonwealth, because, as the noble Lord knows, in the draft charter of the International Trade Organisation, Article 16 permits the continuance of such treatment between the United Kingdom Government and Burma; as also, indeed, between the United Kingdom Government and the rest of the Commonwealth, between France, Belgium and the Netherlands and their respective overseas territories, and between the United States of America and the Republics of Cuba and the Philippines.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has not begun to answer the point I put to him. He kept harping on the point that this does not directly affect the Dominions. I claim, however, that in view of the fact that Imperial Preference is sui generis—it has been said, again and again, that it is a preference in the true sense of the word—the Government had no right to enter into an arrangement of this kind without the fullest consultation with the Dominions and the Colonies. The action of His Majesty's Government will be most unfavourably commented upon in the Dominions. The whole point of Imperial Preference is that it is, as its name implies, a preference given to the Empire. I make so bold as to say that this point has not been properly considered by His Majesty's Government. I regret that no time limit has been placed in the Clause, and I must tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that in the interests of Imperial Preference, in which we on this side strongly believe, we shall have to pursue this matter again and again unless this preference is abolished.

I cannot see the ground for the noble Lord's chagrin against this concession unless it is that he is filled with a spirit of vindictiveness against Burma, and wants to punish that country for her sin in leaving the Empire, whatever we may think about the wisdom of her decision in that respect. It would be a bad basis for His Majesty's Government to legislate upon to say, "We will not maintain certain beneficial relations because you have taken certain political steps of which we do not altogether approve." The suggestion that this decision should be made conditional on agreement with the Dominions seems to me to be placing an entirely new gloss on Commonwealth relations. It is true that Governments consult with each other, and keep one another informed, but to suggest that this Parliament should be prevented from passing laws to regulate our trading relations with other countries, because we cannot get agreement with other countries in the Dominions, would be just as wrong as to suggest that one of these other Dominions should be placed under the same burden.

The noble Lord appeared to base his argument on the grounds that we were giving a preference where the benefit was more to Burma than to ourselves. The figures he quoted purported to show that exports from this country to Burma were twice the size of imports from Burma to this country. He admitted, however, that imports from Burma to this country were chiefly made up f rice. If our inability to purchase rice in the shops here is any indication I should imagine that that trade is absolutely negligible. On the other hand, Burma has an enormous amount of reconstruction to carry out; she has to bring herself up to date with machinery and modern equipment, and this will give her a reasonable chance of purchasing from this country. On any question of mutual benefit, I believe that the benefit of such an agreement—and I imagine that agreements which are reached will be on the basis of maintaining the same types of preference which exist between the two countries at the moment—would be entirely on our side. It would be cutting off one's nose to spite one's face if we were to do away with it. It is true that there is no precedent for it, but since the secession of the United States from the Empire, there has been no precedent for this matter at all. There are precedents in other parts of the world. For instance, the United States, who are in the same relationship to the Philippines as we are to Burma, have maintained their preferences with that country. This is a provision which is entirely to our advantage.

I wish to trouble the Committee again only because the hon. Gentleman the Member for Bexley (Mr. Bramall) accused me of vindictiveness. On the contrary, I want to see the fullest trading relations between this country and Burma. Of course, the hon. Member and Members opposite are not in the least interested in this; they do not care what happens to the Commonwealth, but it matters to some of us on this side of the Committee. It is a great mistake that a date has not been put into the Bill. I want to see the fullest trading arrangement with these people, but I do not want it to be called "Imperial Preference," because it is not. I am sorry that anyone should accuse me of vindictiveness, when all I asked for was a sensible trading arrangement. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman has gone out of his way to denigrate Imperial Preference.

Those Members of the Committee who listened to me more carefully than the noble Lord did will know that I said nothing to denigrate Imperial Preference, or to give any colour to the words used by the noble Lord in describing my remarks, most inaccurately, as indicating that I had no interest in the Commonwealth or that any other Member on this side had no interest in the Commonwealth. I think this Debate has shown more clearly than probably any other Debate on this subject how much clearer a conception of the real nature of the British Commonwealth is possessed by Members on this side of the Committee than by hon. Members opposite. We regard it as a voluntary association; the noble Lord and some of his hon. Friends appear to regard it as a penal institution.

The hon. Member is getting rather wide of the Clause we are discussing.

I bow to your Ruling, Mr. Diamond, but I am glad that I have been able to answer the equally wide remarks made by the noble Lord.

I beg to move, in page 4, line 19, to leave out "abate on that day," and to insert:

"be proceeded with as if this Act had not been passed."

I understand that no proceedings are pending against the Secretary of State, but that there are four appeals to the Privy Council pending between Burmese and Burmese. It seems to me common-sense that these should be settled by the Privy Council, and that the litigants should not be left in the air, so to speak.

The hon. Member is quite right in thinking that there are four such appeals. They have been pending since 1941, but to all intents and purposes they are dormant. The solicitors in each case have lost touch with their clients, and the last step remains to be taken by the appellants. I think it is fair to say that they cannot be considered as active appeals. The difficulty about accepting the Amendment is this: after this Bill becomes law, it would be very inappropriate that these appeals, should they ever come to light again, should be heard. The constitutional position is that the Privy Council, after the appeal has been heard by the Judicial Committee, advises His Majesty as to what order should be made with regard to the appeal. It would be entirely inappropriate that His Majesty should make an order in respect of a foreign country which could not be executed, and would be bound to be ineffective. It would be constitutionally improper that the Amendment should be accepted. In the unlikely event of any further appeals arising at the last moment, no doubt an arrangement would be made to bring them on as soon as possible, in the hope of disposing of them before the appointed day.

The hon. and learned Gentleman is a most helpful and courteous Minister, and there is one point which I hope that he will consider sympathetically. I see the point which he has put, but I think it would be unfortunate if this created a precedent. I should be ruled out of Order if I referred to the possible occasion when another country which I have in mind—I was thinking of Ceylon—desired to have a different constitution from that which it has now. In that event it would be unfortunate if this were to be taken as a precedent. Perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman will say something about this in reply, or will consider asking the spokesmen of the Government in another place to say that this is due to special circumstances. I hope that in all future cases in which a country leaves the Empire and there are any appeal cases pending to the Privy Council between the representatives of that country and His Majesty's Government, the appeals will be heard. Otherwise, I think that it would to some extent strike at what is today a very important rule of British jurisprudence throughout the Empire.

May I reply to the noble Lord by saying that I agree that in each case, as and when the question arises, one has to consider it by reference to the actual circumstances obtaining.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

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

I do not wish to detain the House long. This is a short Bill of only five Clauses, but its shortness does not in any way indicate that it is an unimportant Bill. It is a small Bill of the greatest possible importance. It marks a great stage in the move forward in the history of this country and all the other countries with which it is associated. It has come into being in an atmosphere of the greatest friendliness and co-operation between the two nations. That atmosphere has augured well for the future relationship between the two countries. It has started well—let us hope that it will continue well. The Bill was very fully discussed on Second Reading, and during the subsequent stages of the Debates further points have emerged. I will content myself, therefore, in moving the Third Reading, in expressing the hope that the House will join with me, as I am sure it will, in wishing well to the future of the new country that this Bill brings into being.

I gladly accede to the suggestion which the hon. and learned Gentleman has made. We on this side of the House, having on Second Reading, registered our disapproval of the time and manner of this Bill do not want to vote against the Third Reading. We wish to be associated with what the Solicitor-General has said. We are, of course, very closely confined on Third Reading to what is in the Bill, and therefore, I hope that we shall have no comparisons of any of the politicians in Burma, alive or dead, with General Smuts. The reason I say that is because I happen to be a friend of 25 years standing of General Smuts, and, being a man of violent temper, if any one compares him with U Aung San or any other gentleman in Burma, I shall rise in my wrath, because I shall consider it a reflection on one of the greatest statesmen of the Empire. I hope also that we shall not have any clichés about the uprising of Asia. We heard about that for many years, and before the 1914 Parliament when anyone expressed any doubts about a country's ability for self-government, hon. Members of the Liberal Party got up and said: "Look at our allies in Asia; look at our gallant little Japanese allies. See what has happened in 30 years and how they have risen to a position of experience and responsibility." Since that uprising of Asia there has been the biggest blood bath that Asia has ever known in her history—in China and everywhere else. So I hope that we shall have no clichés of that kind.

As regards the Bill, I hope that it may have the effect which the learned Solicitor-General anticipates. Certainly, none of us on this side of the House wants to do anything but wish well to the new Burmese Government, and hope that they will be in treaty relationship with us. I suggested on the Second Reading that anyone who has come in touch with them finds them a most agreeable and delightful people to deal with. With great gladness, I accept what was said during the previous stage of the Debate by the Secretary of State that the members who form the present Burmese Government are doing all that they can, within the limitations imposed upon them by circumstances, to rehabilitate their country. I wish them well in their rehabilitation. I think, however, that their position is very dangerous and difficult.

I think, quite frankly, that they would have been far better in the Empire than outside it, and I see no reason why I should not say so on this occasion. The British Commonwealth is a very powerful body in peace and war. Countries who leave the Empire must not expect to have the advantages which they got in war time and peace time by association with each other. I am not aware that the Burmese, in the technical sense of the word, are very highly military people, and they are surrounded by a great many elements in other countries which might easily overwhelm them. They cannot, in future, expect any support from the Commonwealth if they are invaded, because they will be an independent country, unless a treaty agreement is entered into with them by which they undertake to supply us with bases and vice versa.

There is no reason why we should not wish the Burmese people the utmost goodwill, and I hope that their Government will be able to perform the task which has been placed upon them. I would not like to sit down without paying a tribute, which I think every one on this side of the House would echo—if they were here—to the Secretary of State, for his courtesy and for the efficiency with which he has piloted this Bill through the House. I think all of us on both sides of the House do appreciate the courtesy and the efficiency which he has shown, and I venture to hope that in the somewhat shifting and, shall we say, evanescent nature of His Majesty's Government at the present time, where nobody knows where he or she is, the right hon. and learned Gentleman will continue to keep the office which, if I may say so, he so much adorns.

I do not think that one ought to allow what the noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) has said to pass completely unnoticed. He told us at the outset of his remarks that he had a violent temper. I doubt if anyone would dispute that proposition. I felt and sincerely hoped that this afternoon would be one of the occasions when he would restrain himself. After all, he must be well aware of the considerable damage done to British and Burmese relations by the speech of his right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition on the Second Reading. To add fuel to the flames already set in motion by that speech is really a most unfortunate thing for somebody to do, who even today has been professing a great love of the Commonwealth.

The noble Lord believes in the Commonwealth; he is devoted to its interests; and he believes it to be a structure unequalled in the world and of inestimable benefit to the world. If he believes those things, why does he try to damage a country which is going to have special relations with that Commonwealth—a country with a military alliance with this country? After all, he realises that, whatever he says nowadays, cannot stop this thing, and I thought it was supposed to be one of the instincts of hon. Gentlemen who sit on the opposite side of the House that when a fact, however disagreeable to them, has been put through they accept it with good grace. I do not think that he has accepted this Bill with a good grace this afternoon.

With good will.

It is a very unbecoming thing to utter the rather wild and malicious remarks which he directed to the Burmese people and Government, and I feel sorry that he did not restrain his temper this afternoon.

I should be sorry if the concluding stages of this Bill were not to be debated on the merits of the Bill itself, but on the temper, good or bad, of my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton). It strikes me that it has very little to do with the point. The point is that here today we have come to an historic stage in the development of the world, and what we on this side of the House wish to make clear, is that, whatever may have been said on the Second Reading, which I would, incidentally, remind the House—and perhaps foreign observers have taken note of this—took place on 5th November, we are second to none in wishing God-speed and great prosperity and happiness to the new State that is being brought to birth.

After all, we are entitled, indeed bound to express our convictions, and we are used to some hon. Members expressing them with great force and vehemence. It is a question of temperament. I am quite sure those with a knowledge of our institutions and of the personalities of our Parliament will not read deeper into those speeches than is meant. As the House knows, I took a different line to my party, and voted with the Government, and as such I feel particularly qualified to assure the House definitely that there is not a scintilla of doubt in my mind as to the utter sincerity of all Members of the Conservative Party in wishing well towards Burma. We pledge ourselves that when the day comes when we are in power again we shall treat Burma with the same affection, sympathy, understanding, good will and friendliness that could be expected from any other party in the House. With these few words, I assure hon. Members and Burma of the good will of the Conservative Party.

I welcome the expression of good will we have had from the other side of the House, and I should like myself to say a word with reference to U Aung San to whom the noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) referred a little while ago.

This just illustrates the difficulty of allowing the noble Lord, who was the first speaker, to go a little beyond the terms of the Third Reading. I allowed one hon. Member to reply, but I do not think we can now discuss matters other than those included in the Bill. That, of course, is what we have to speak about on Third Reading. We cannot go into the question of U Aung San, or anything of that nature.

I must, of course accept your Ruling, I was merely commenting on what had already been said.

On a point of Order. In justice to myself I distinctly said on this Third Reading I hoped there would be no reference or comparison between General Smuts and U Aung San. I was entitled to say that, and that is exactly what I said.

Am I not equally entitled to say that there is some comparison? I will be very very brief on this subject but this is a matter of importance, because it affects our relations with a country which is going to have very special relationships with our Commonwealth about which hon. Members opposite feel strongly. I had the privilege of meeting U Aung San on several occasions and I think that many people in this country have got him all wrong.

I am sorry, but we cannot go into that question. We can discuss only those matters which are concerned with the contents of the Bill now before the House.

Then I will assume that the noble Lord and I agree to differ on that point. I hope he will realise that we have as much ground for our view as he has for his. I should like to endorse what has been said. The world is always in a state of flux and we cannot expect the Empire rigidly to continue after portions of it separate from us but still remain in special relationships with us. That is something which we ought to welcome, rather than lay too much stress on the separation. I should like thoroughly to endorse our hope that in the future our relations will remain as special relations with Burma and, in fact, I hope they will become closer, and will form a stable basis for other areas there in the interests of the future peace of the world.

Like the hon. and gallant Member for Sud- bury (Lieut.-Colonel Hamilton), I should like to welcome this Bill as a contribution to the general attitude of His Majesty's Government and of the British people towards the situation created by the second world war. It is commonly admitted that during the war, had it not been for the solidarity of the Empire as a whole—the great Dominions and those territories which have not achieved self-government—we as a nation would have gone down under the almost insuperable difficulties with which we were faced in 1940. The whole of the free world looked to Britain for a lead, not the Britain of these small islands but the wider Britain which has grown up as a result of the spreading of the ideas which men and women of our race have contributed to the progress of the world.

During this close association, for the second time, in a war for survival, not only of ourselves but of the ideals for which we stand, it was natural that grievances which the dependent territories had long had should come more to the fore, and should be kept more closely in mind by those concerned with Government at home. Hon. Members on all sides of the House have known for years, by direct and indirect approach, by study of the Press of various parts of the Empire and in other ways, of those longings for freedom and for the ability to control their own affairs on the part of many of the dependent peoples.

These matters have now been brought home to the people of Great Britain as a whole. Hundreds of thousands of people have had an opportunity—perhaps it was a compulsory opportunity in many cases—of visiting these territories. The Englishman abroad today learns as readily as did his forefathers when the Empire was being built up, and he has come to like his fellow-citizens from those other British lands, to know them more intimately, and to bring back to Britain some understanding of their troubles and their complaints. It is for that reason that it is easier today to bring in such a Bill as is now before Parliament. There is a wider understanding among our people of what it really means. The Burmese are a particularly friendly and intelligent people. We all wish to pay a just tribute to the fellowship of those who did their best to resist the Japanese invader. With regard to Burma itself, there is perhaps something of guilt in the way in which Britain acquired that country. I will not go into the details of the actual facts of the acquisition but there is no doubt that there was, even at the time, some variance in attitude—

On a point of Order. In view of the Ruling which you have just given, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and the very proper rebuke you gave an hon. Member for straying beyond the confines of Order upon this Debate, may I ask whether it is proper for the hon. Member now addressing the House to proceed to deliver a most interesting address on the subject of how we originally went to Burma? Surely, we are concerned only with what is in the Bill?

Further to that point of Order. Is it in Order, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, for the noble Lord to appeal to you to bring back an hon. Member into Order, when he himself roamed over the whole of the Far East?

That sounds like a reflection on the Chair.

I always endeavour to distribute the favours of the Chair equally. I was listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman, and I hope that he will not go any further in the direction in which he appeared to be going.

I yield to your Ruling, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but I do not really think I was about to do anything which ought to incur your displeasure. As a matter of fact, I had at that moment only just announced that I did not propose to go into the detailed history of the matter. It had been dealt with in speeches some of which must have been more in Order, and some not—I am not judge of these things—in the course of the Debates upon the Bill. I was going to mention only that there had been some variance of opinion at home on the matter. Naturally, there was the opinion in Burma that the incidents in question were unfortunate events. Because of that, we have all the more reason to praise the Burmese for the excellent attitude which they have shown towards us over many years, and for the great loyalty of the vast majority of the Burmese to the British connection, however it arose, and with whatever mixed feelings they regarded it. I shall endeavour to pay a very high tribute to the people of this new nation which is created by the Bill.

Men of the old Regular Army who have been stationed in Burma, and men of the Mercantile Marine and of the Royal Navy who have had the privilege of meeting the Burmese people in the course of their duties, have all returned with a high opinion of their character and capabilities. It was, indeed, with a feeling of shocked surprise that we found there was a section of those people who, because of their deep nationalist feelings, were prepared to coquette during the war with the enemy. The whole of the still dependent Empire is examining with great interest the way in which this Parliament is endeavouring to carry out the pledges which we made to uphold the principle of trusteeship in the postwar world. Everywhere throughout the British Empire, our Colonies are training quickly for self-government, and they are likely to be patient or impatient with the steps that are taken to confer self-government upon them as they observe the treatment which this House accords to Bills such as this for the provision of self-government for more advanced people.

I am tempted to deprecate any expression of feeling from any quarter of the House that there is regret at the passing of the Imperial domination over any of these countries like Burma which are passing from us. We still have a very close and friendly association with this new country before us, largely because of the understanding that the people of our own country and the people of Burma have of each other, because of the peculiar geographical position of that country, because of the enormous sacrifices which her share in the war entailed, and because of the great devastation which has been referred to by previous speakers in the Debate.

Burma can now take her full place among the free nations of the world, with the friendliest and strongest assistance given to her by our own country, among others. It is a good sign for the future that the leaders of the Burmese people have already indicated their desire for the closest possible association with what will no longer be the mother country, and, if it is possible, for trade agreements to be negotiated. I feel sure that many people in this country would deem it their duty to go out to assist the Burmese people to the utmost of their ability. British capital has already for long been engaged in trying to modernise its industries, and to expand its exports. The new, intangible link between us is a link of history and of future mutual benefit. Perhaps an even stronger link between Britain and Burma may be forged by the Bill.

I had hoped that the hon. Member would come to matters which may be dealt with on the Third Reading of the Bill. He has not done so, but is dealing with consequential and other matters which can only be discussed at earlier stages.

Once again, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I have incurred your displeasure, but I fear it is just a little too late to reduce me to a proper state of humiliation because I was about to resume my seat, while expressing the hope that this Bill would prove to be an even stronger link between the two peoples when it becomes an Act than are the relations which have hitherto existed and are concluded by this Bill.

Hon. Members who were here during the closing Debate on the India Bill will remember that I was able to say a few words and to express my good will towards the Indian people on that momentous day in the history of that great nation. I feel very glad that I have a similar opportunity on this occasion in the case of the Burmese, because I came into contact with both the Burmese and the Indians at one and the same time when I served with the Indian Army in the 1914–18 war. Even in those far-away days, as they now appear, I had the feeling that humanity in the East was on the march and that the great day of awakening could not be denied or delayed very much longer. We have come to it now, and here we are on the Third Reading of a Bill granting to this other nation its complete independence.

I had the privilege a short time ago of meeting some of the future leaders of this new nation. What particularly struck me about them was the tremendous sense of responsibility possessed by those young leaders, many of whom were well under 35 years of age. They had a deep sense of responsibility as to what the future was bringing in its trail. They realised the tremendous demands that had been made upon them, but they also had a tremendous enthusiasm for their cause. When I was speaking to them I felt that whatever might be the ultimate fate of some things, these people at any rate believed in themselves and their cause and were prepared to work, to sacrifice and to learn in the interests of their own cause.

I would like to make one or two appeals. The first is to the Burmese people themselves. I believe, and in this respect I must agree entirely with the noble Lord, that it is in the interests of these people to keep very close to the old country and the old Empire because, despite what many people say about us, despite the many defects in our make-up and despite the many fallings by the way, hardly an institution in the world in the last 50 years has done more for many nations than has our own Empire and nation. I am not one who decries the good deeds of our people. We ought to shout them from the housetops, because they are perfectly true. I am going to appeal to the people of Burma. It may be that, like many other nations, they may feel with this new sense of independence that they can break with old associations and traditions, but I hope they will believe me when I say that in the long run some of their best friends are in this country. There are many people in this country, representing both sides of the House, who are very anxious indeed to help them in the very difficult and hard times that inevitably lie ahead. I therefore say to the Burmese: Do not ignore your best friends in this House, in this country and in this Commonwealth; you may find in the long run that they will be your best friends and the friends who will help you to get the best out of your new conditions of life. Also, I sincerely hope that they will not only turn their eyes to us from the political—

The hon. Gentleman may be addressing himself to the subject of Burma, but he is not addressing himself to what is in the Bill before the House. He must really do that.

I am really trying to deal with the basic spirit of the Bill in the sense—

The hon. Member would be quite in Order in doing that on the Second Reading, but not on the Third Reading of the Bill.

I welcome the provisions of the Bill and sincerely wish the Burmese well, and as there is a reference in the early part of the Bill to the work of our people in the Civil Service there, I sincerely hope that our people who have been associated with that service will not break with the Burmese people but continue to give of their advice, guidance and services to this new nation. I wish them well. I know their difficulties will be very hard, but the harder the task the greater the opportunity and the greater the victory when it is finally achieved.

I feel with most of my hon. Friends on this side of the House that before we dispose of this Bill it should be made abundantly clear not only that the Government are unanimously supported from this side of the House but that we are confident that the people of this country are overwhelmingly behind the Government with regard to this Bill. I must say that before I pass on, because I should not like it to be misconstrued that the ungracious, if not threatening, speech that we have heard from the noble Lord expresses in any way at all the feelings of the people of this country. It is most refreshing to find that it is not the voice even of the whole of the Opposition.

That question will be decided by the electors of Gravesend.

The noble Lord is still under the delusion that it is necessary to consult the people of this country in order to find out whether they are prepared to grant a measure of freedom to other peoples equal to that which they insist on enjoying here. I should also like to congratulate the Government on having expedited the bringing of this Bill before the country. I cannot accept entirely the view even of some of my hon. Friends that this Bill will bring a new nation into being. The Burmese have been conscious of their nationhood for very many years. This is rather a belated recognition of the sense of nationhood which has animated the Burmese for several generations. I hope the Opposition will take note of that. I can quite understand the truculence of a diehard Imperialist who does not believe in freedom for other people and even his caustic rather than indiscreet references to what happened in the Far East and to Japan, but the noble Lord should have been the last to have indulged in references of that kind because it was under the inspiration and drive of the Tory Party, the Imperialist crowd of this country, that that nation was armed in the inter-war years out of the scrappings of the shipbuilding yards and other big works in this country.

This Bill is a great gesture, and I am certain that the Government and all its supporters will make any and every contribution possible to see that the splendid constitution anticipated for Burma will soon materialise. I hope that the Burmese will appreciate and reciprocate the spirit that has animated the passing of this Bill through the House of Commons, and I hope that the happier aspects of the contacts which have existed between Burma and this country will not only be continued, but increased and strengthened as they are building up their new constitution. I wish to thank the Government for having speeded up this large Measure of freedom and independence for a great nation in the Far East.

Two of my hon. Friends in addressing the House on this Bill have spoken of its advantages in terms of political repercussions, in some cases, in this country and, in some cases, in Burma. In considering whether it should give a Third Reading to this Bill, I believe the House must think about its advantages to His Majesty's Government and to this country in respect of its political repercussions elsewhere in the world. It is a germane point to make that the record of His Majesty's Government with regard to India, Burma, and some Colonial and mandated territories has done a great deal to offset criticism of the general external policy of His Majesty's Government in countries in which such criticism had serious adverse effects upon relations with them. Therefore, not least amongst the reasons why the House should support His Majesty's Government in the passage of this Bill, is that it takes away some of the anger of the severe critics of this country, for example in America, who have pointed to our policy in Burma with a good deal of criticism in the past, and in Russia, where the charge of being an Im- perialist Power is thrown about very lightly indeed.

May I pass from the political sphere to the effect of this Measure upon the economic relationship between this country and Burma which, again, seems to me not the least important of the effects of this Measure. Clause 3 lays down certain provisions in general terms which, clearly, will form the basis of the regulations that will govern the economic relationship between this country and Burma. It is quite clear from the deliberately general terms in which the Clause is drawn that it leaves the way happily wide open for a considerable development and extension of economic relationships between this country and Burma which will be firmly based upon that independence that the Measure now before us gives to the Burmese.

May I make two points in this connection? Burma has a potentially great part to play towards redressing that unbalance, both in economic affairs and in currency affairs, existing at present in the world. I am not altogether sure that after this Bill is passed, after the independence of Burma has been established, she will not be a much more valuable economic partner of this country than she could ever have been whilst under the suzerainty of this country. Burma is rich in many things that are in great world demand. She is rich in oil, which means a great deal in terms of currency, exchange, and balance of payments. That great river, the Irawaddy, washes a considerable amount of gold down from its source, gold from an origin which I understand nobody knows as yet, but none the less welcome because its origin is shrouded in mystery. That gold will help this country and other countries at present at the thin end of the currency situation. Burma has wolfram. Burma has the Northern end of the great tin seam which runs right through Malaya. She is rich in hardwood, and she is an exporter of extremely valuable precious stones, jade in particular. It will have been noticed with satisfaction that the Burmese, from their own indigenous resources, recently presented a wedding gift to Princess Elizabeth of a very valuable precious stone. All these things count for something in redressing what I called the general economic and currency unbalance existing today.

The second economic point I want to make has already been touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for East Harrow (Mr. Skinnard) who spoke about the ties which might be built up between this country and Burma on the basis of this Bill by our sending the Burmese capital goods for the development of these raw materials and for the ancillary industrial occupations which will follow from such development. It is a pleasure, at least to my hon. Friends on this side of the House, to know that the Burmese have taken national ownership of their valuable resources of metal. It is a pleasure to know, as the hon. Member for East Harrow has said out of a deep experience, that the Burmese are a hardworking people who will take full advantage of this fact. We can do a great deal by helping them with technical development, both by exporting capital equipment—something of immense value to this country at present—and also by lending them technical services and technicians. In this connection I ought to say, in case it should need saying that one hopes there will be no exploitation of the peoples of Burma, especially the frontier peoples, either by business men or technicians from this country or, indeed, by "smart Aleck" business men from Rangoon going up country to see what they can "milk."

On these grounds I think that the ties which will exist after the passage of this Measure between this country and Burma will be even closer in the future than they have been in the past. They will be closer if for no other reason than that they will be based on the free association of two free peoples dealing with each other, with respect towards each other, and with self-respect, each knowing that it has a great contribution to make to the welfare of the other, as well as to the welfare of the world in general. I urge the House to give a Third Reading to this Measure.

There are various points on this Bill upon which I, at least, should like some clarification. There are points which do not only affect the people of Burma, but may affect the procedure of our courts, and indeed the status of married life in this country. Be- fore I come to this point, which really comes under Subsection (2) of Clause 2, there are some points on Clause 1 which are of some importance. I want particularly to refer to Clause 1 (3), which reads as follows:

"The suzerainty of His Majesty over the part of Burma known as the Karenni States shall lapse as from the appointed day, and with it all treaties and agreements in force between His Majesty and the rulers of the Karenni States, all functions exercisable by His Majesty with respect to the Karenni States, all obligations of His Majesty towards the Karenni States or rulers thereof, and all powers, rights, authority or jurisdiction exercisable by His Majesty in or in relation to the Karenni States by treaty, grant, usage, sufferance or otherwise.

It is those last words which I find of particular interest, because there does not seem to be any definition. How do we know which are treaties, grants, usage and sufferance? What does "sufferance" mean? I really do think that this is a matter upon which we ought to have some explanation. I do think it should be made clear to us as to whether the present Burmese Government are going to be our successors with regard to all these various matters. The treaty which goes with this Bill seems to be silent upon this matter. How will these suzerainty rights affect these people? In the backwood areas, of course, it is very difficult indeed to make a census. Nobody really knows how many people there are living among these Karenni tribes—how many souls are affected by this simple process, and what in future is going to be the effect of these, very general words in the case of any schedule to which these matters are transferred. I feel that there are seeds of great dissension within this new nation unless some proper definition is set out here. When one comes to the provision in this Bill, the matter is much more complicated, because that deals with what is always an intensely difficult subject in law, and that is status and nationality.

All this concerns, for instance, the jurisdiction of the divorce court. We have a quite simple point here which seems to me to raise a good deal of argument. What is the nationality of a man who was born in Burma, whose grandfather was born in Burma, but whose father was born in Australia? That may have a tremendously important effect when you have to deal with the question of domicile and jurisdiction brought before the divorce court. [Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but this is very serious indeed. I think very few of us will not have had those tragic cases in our own constituencies where you get people tied together in marriage simply because no jurisdiction can be established in our courts here to cut these marriage bonds. It really does make tragic circumstances in people's lives, and, therefore, when we come to deal with these questions of nationality, passports, etc., we must ask under whose protection will these people be when travelling abroad? All these are very important matters, and from the days of refugees from the Hitler regime, we began to learn the dreadful importance of these papers of nationality, and of having a country to which one can look for protection.

Is the hon. and learned Member putting up a case that married couples should carry both Burmese and British passports?

There does seem to be very great difficulty in that very objectionable circumstance of joint nationality, because if we look at Subsection (1) of Clause 2, we find:

"Subject to the provisions of this section, the persons specified in the First Schedule to this Act, being British subjects immediately before the appointed day, shall on that day cease to be British subjects."

From that, one has to turn—

I only wish to make a friendly interruption on the point which the hon. and learned Gentleman is making. I suggest to him that, if he had been present during the Committee stage, he would have heard a most interesting Debate, but he was not here.

I am most grateful for the interruption of the noble Lord opposite. Of course, we all know that the noble Lord's interruptions are always of a most friendly description, and assist the Debate, and, we hope, the proceedings of this House. As the noble Lord observed, it was a very great Debate, and I sincerely regret I was not able to be here on the Committee stage, but there are some points here on which I was not quite clear, and I thought the Third Reading was the occasion upon which all the various questions on which one is not entirely clear could be cleared up. Perhaps the noble Lord will assist me?

I would assist the hon. and learned Gentleman by saying that a Third Reading speech is a speech that an hon. Member was unable to deliver on the Second Reading.

No, on Third Reading, it is what is in the Bill and not what one would like to see in the Bill. The latter is the Second Reading rule.

I am most grateful to the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Baxter), because I feel that my speech would fall at least within his definition. The hon. Gentleman and I once took part in a brains trust. [Interruption.] I am afraid I have perhaps been distracted from the point I was making on Clause 2 of this Bill. I was in some difficulty, as I informed the House, about the case of a man, himself born in Burma, whose grandfather was also born in Burma, but whose father was born in Australia. That is the sort of case which will arise in practice. [Laughter.] Hon. Gentlemen may think this is funny, but we have to remember that we are passing a Bill which is creating a jurisdiction which is not the jurisdiction of this Parliament. We cannot alter this Bill once we have passed it, and we cannot bring in amending legislation to put this matter right, because it will be for the Burmese to make their own laws.

May I ask my hon. and learned Friend a question, because I am sure he is anxious to be correct on detail? He has suggested that this relationship might well happen, and that there is the possibility of a Burmese generating a child as the result of a visit to Australia. In view of the policy of Australia to exclude certain nationalities and particularly Asiatics, does he not think that this is unlikely?

My hon. Friend must not be confused about this, because, if he will go back to Clause 2 of the Bill, he will find this:

"Subject to the provisions of this section, the persons specified in the First Schedule to this Act, being British subjects immediately before the appointed day, shall on that day cease to be British subjects."

That is not confined to Asiatics. This may affect people in the position of Anglo-Burmans, people of pure Western blood who are residing in those parts or travelling about the world. Turning again to the Schedule—

May I interrupt? My hon. and learned Friend referred to the specific case of the Burman-Australian. Does not this also apply to the Australian-Burman?

I think so; I think the argument would be of general application. If we turn back to the First Schedule, we find this:

"The persons who, being British subjects immediately before the appointed day, are, subject to the provisions of Section two of this Act, to cease on that day to be British subjects are the following persons, that is to say—

(a) persons who were born in Burma or whose father or paternal grandfather was born in Burma, not being persons excepted by paragraph 2 of this Schedule from the operation of this subparagraph."

That is clear, anyway.

In the next paragraph, there is the case of women who were aliens by birth and who become British subjects by marriage. Surely, this does give rise to the possibility of a married couple one of whom may be of one nationality and the other of another. Again, let us take the case of a married couple where we have this separation of nationalities within a single household. If one or other of those parties wished to obtain a divorce, into which court do they go? Where is the jurisdiction? That seems to me to be a question that should be considered. Paragraph 2(1) of the First Schedule says:

"A person shall be deemed to be excepted from the operation of sub-paragraph (a) of paragraph 1 of this Schedule if he or his father or his paternal grandfather was born outside Burma in a place which, at the time of the birth,—

(a) was within His Majesty's dominions, was a British protectorate, was a British protected state, was a territory in respect of which a mandate from the League of Nations had been accepted by His Majesty and which was under the administration of the Government of any part of His Majesty's dominions or was a territory under the trusteeship system of the United Nations—"

—and I believe that, for the time being, that would cover Palestine, and the Jewish people involved in this matter, although, again, what the position will be later on one does not know:

"which was under the administration of the Government of any part of His Majesty'9 Dominions;"

That means that a person shall be deemed to be excepted from paragraph I if these three relationships which are there referred to can be brought into paragraph 2. Then, we come to the treaty races, "capitulation, grant, usage," and so, and we find this:

"Provided that a person shall not be excepted under this sub-paragraph from the operation of the said sub-paragraph (a) by virtue of the place of birth of his father or paternal grandfather unless his father or, as the case may be, his paternal grandfather, was at some time before the appointed day a British subject."

So we have these very complicated provisions in which, I should have thought at first glance—and no doubt the Secretary of State will explain it all to us in due course—that there seems to be some contradiction between paragraphs 1 (a) and 2 (b).

Then we come to a paragraph with this curious provision with regard to opting; that is, the people who change their nationality under paragraph 2. They appear to be in the curious position that the two years British nationality is in a sort of suspension, because, if they opt for British nationality within those two years, then their option shall have retroactive effect so that it goes back from the first day. How is the Burmese law going to deal with that situation. Are we really here, with this new nation which is just starting, going to say "We will make a law that various people who are your citizens may suddenly cease to be your citizens"? Are we not really legislating for some future undefined period to take away citizens of Burma without any particular reference to the Burmese or any reservations as to what the Burmese may do in any future legislation which they may pass?

Again, when it comes to Clause 3, there are some difficult provisions, because it deals with the question of customs preferences, and here there is a vital question. I am deeply impressed, as I think we all were, by what my hon. Friend the Member for Reading (Mr. Mikardo) said about the mineral wealth of Burma and the value that comes down the rivers, but we must observe that, primarily, Burma is an agricultural country. There is wholesale starvation in that part of the world today. India depends, in large measure—

The hon. and learned Gentleman insists on turning his back on me. I think he might at least address the Chair.

I do apologise most profoundly for my discourtesy. I was turning to my hon. Friend the Member for Reading and dealing with what he has said. If I might refer to this very vital question, which is, of course, deeply affected by the Customs Union, which appears to be envisaged by Clause 3, in view of the circumstances of great shortage which exist in that part of the world today, one ought to have an idea of how this severance of Burma is going to affect food production in that area. After all, rice growing is no longer a peasant industry, and it is no longer a question of a man just tilling a few yards of land in order to be able to raise enough rice for his own particular use. We have reached the stage when mechanisation has become vital in this, as in so many others of our great agricultural expanses of the world. How is the heavy machinery—and, indeed, today, it is heavy machinery that is required—for rice growing in Burma going to be assembled? Again, and this is another vital question, the animal population was simply decimated by the occupation of the Japanese. Two years have gone by, and I daresay that some have been bred, but we can visualise some assistance, for instance, on the question of artificial insemination. Can we here provide semen for the fertilisation—

The hon. and learned Member is now speaking of something which is quite outside the Third Reading of this Bill.

I was only -attempting, although, I daresay, badly, Mr. Speaker, to direct my remarks to Clause 3, which says:

"Notwithstanding any of the provisions, of this Act, the enactments relating to customs (including the enactments relating to customs in the Isle of Man) shall on and after the appointed day, have effect, until such date as may be specified by His Majesty by Order in Council, as if Burma were part of His Majesty's dominions."

It then provides that:

"His Majesty may by Order in Council direct that, as from a specified date, all goods or goods of specified classes or descriptions shall be charged under the said enactments either as if the preceding provisions of this Section had not passed or at such rates as may be specified in the Order, not being rates higher than would have been chargeable if the said provisions had not passed."

That seems to me to bring in the question of imports and exports. Of course, under the Artificial Insemination Act, which we have recently passed, there is a bar upon the export of semen outside this country, and therefore, it seems to me to be important to know whether, for the purposes of that Act, the export of semen to Burma was still to be contemplated on the assumption of Burma being part of this country, or whether the export of semen, which may be very necessary in regard to what has happened to their cattle population, would be an infringement of the Artificial Insemination Act.

If the hon. and learned Member were to continue on his present line he would be going outside the scope of the Third Reading Debate on this Bill. Because goods are imports and exports, one cannot go into every possible export, as, otherwise, there would be no limit to what one could say.

Would it be in Order, Mr. Speaker, for my hon. and learned Friend to take just one example and to confine it to that?

The hon. and learned Member ought not to go into even one example in detail. One can mention a thing broadly, but to go into it in detail would be wrong in a Third Reading Debate.

I accept your Ruling, of course, Mr. Speaker, and I will not go further than that. But it was a subject in which we take a special interest, and I wondered how the two Bills would work together. It may be that my hon. Friend will have an opportunity to consider the point at some other time.

I come now to my final point. Under Clause 4—it is the Clause which deals with legal proceedings—there seems to be a rather striking provision. It appears that where there are references to the courts of this country, and appeals to the Privy Council—matters which are very costly indeed and in which great costs may be incurred—quite suddenly we can say that they are to lapse. What provision is to be made to cover costs which are thereby thrown away? As everybody knows, costs in litigation tend to be a very important matter. And I feel that that is an omission from this Clause which ought to be seriously considered.

Having dealt with the more detailed aspects, may I join with almost all other hon. Members—with, perhaps, the possible exception of the noble Lord, the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton);—who have spoken upon this Third Reading Debate, in saying how deeply I feel that everyone of us in this House wish well to the people of Burma; how we hope that they may bring their new experiment in nationhood to a prosperous fulfilment, and how we hope that the lives of those who live in the mountains and the plains of Burma, and upon the rivers of Burma, may be the happier for what we have done today.

I welcome the opportunity of adding my voice to those of my hon. Friends in support of the Measure before the House today. I believe that this Bill should be recognised as a great statesmanlike Measure. It is certainly not an act of patronage to the Burmese people. They are a great people who have played their outstanding part in the long chronicle of the history of the British Empire; and whilst we will all regret that in Clause 1 it is made quite clear that they leave the British Empire officially, I know that the feeling of the House will be that the ties which have bound us together in the past will still remain effective. It is never easy for this House to make a complete break with the past. It is still less easy for the noble Lord the hon. Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) who has been in this House so long, to accommodate himself to the fact that time marches on, that people awaken to a sense of their rights and to an awareness of their own national responsibility.

I believe that this break in our history is both desirable and necessary, in view of the developments of the past decade. It is impossible to have two major wars, as we have had, in which we have made appeals to these people on grounds of their nationality, and then to expect them, when the end of the war comes, to forget that they have been reminded that they are a people with their own special contribution to make to the common welfare of humanity. These people realise that they are now well able to govern themselves, but I trust that, as this Bill becomes operative, it will be operative in the spirit as well as in the letter.

In Clause 1(3), there is a reference to the Karenni States. I earnestly hope that those who will guide the destiny of the Burmese people will make every effort to see that the relationship existing between these subordinate peoples and the Burmese people themselves will be such as will bring an end to the communal differences from which they have suffered in other days. There is the unhappy example of Burma's neighbour, but I trust that Burma will be a shining light in Asia. I trust that we shall find that the bitterness, the jealousies, the fears and the suspicions which have divided these various peoples from each other will now be wiped out. We want to see in this great new nation, a nation now established as an equal partner with the other Powers of the world, one race. We are one in this United Kingdom. Although it is a long time since the English troubled us in Wales, and although I know that, at first, things were not easy, we have learned to understand one another. I trust that in Burma it will be possible for the Karenni States to find themselves at one with the great Burmese people; that they will be one race, one people, one nation, with an overall desire to help each other and thus to help the world.

My hon. Friend the Member for Reading (Mr. Mikardo) has referred to the economic condition of this little country. I would remind the House that the standard of life of the ordinary working man in Burma is very low. If we, who sometimes complain of hardships and austerity in this country, could realise how these Burmese people have had to live in the past, we might be more appreciative of the great advantages we have in our own country. I trust that the people of Burma will appreciate that in this House, as long as the present Government are in power—and, I hope, as long as any other Government may be in power—there will always be an eager readiness for cooperation, an anxiety that the bond of friendship which we have forged in other days shall be strengthened rather than weakened by the action which has been taken in this Bill.

It is significant that the Labour Party looks to Commonwealth relations in a new spirit. We appreciate that a Commonwealth cannot exist with subject and subordinate people who are kept down against their will. We believe in the rights of men. From the noble Lord the Member for Horsham we have heard great fulminations because we propose to treat the Burmese as men and not as subject people. We believe—and I trust the Government will always bear in mind—that it is possible to gain more by dealing with those members of the free Commonwealth of the British Empire as equal partners, rather than as people to be controlled by the might of our military machine. I congratulate those who have participated in the negotiations, both on the Burmese side and on our side. All that I can do is to express my earnest desire that in the days to come, in the great tomorrow which shall follow, we shall find there has been lit in Burma a flame which will cause a greater light of knowledge and truth to spread through Asia and the whole of this wide world.

This is a momentous occasion. When this Bill gets its Third Reading, as we hope it will shortly, there will be in the Far East one more independent country—that of Burma. There will have been given by this Labour Government to yet another people—alien from us by race and language, but not in the common brotherhood of man—the liberty which will enable them to form their own institutions and develop in their own way. When this Bill has passed its Third Reading, it will be, so far as this House is concerned, a final Act affecting the present lives and future destinies of a large number of men and women, the very many different peoples who form Burma.

Would my hon. and learned Friend permit me to interrupt? He said, "many different peoples who form Burma." Would he state how we can find where all those various peoples are? It is Clause 2 (1) that I find so unsatisfactory.

I hope shortly to be able to satisfy the very reasonable curiosity of my hon. and learned Friend. Those of us who have read the Report of the Frontier Areas Committee of Inquiry in 1947 can agree, at any rate, that there are in Burma not only very many peoples, but peoples living in very different circumstances, Of different races, leading different lives, and each of them having, in many respects different prospects.

When we notice, as we do notice, in the report of that Committee that, for instance, they found it impracticable to get any evidence for the purposes of their inquiries from some of the more primitive peoples who live in Burma, and with whom we are concerned today, but that, on the other hand, they obtained such a volume of evidence from various other sources there, then we do begin to appreciate the complexity of the country and, incidentally, the difficulties of the task which was undertaken by that Committee of Inquiry. In the work of that Committee, and in the work of many other people from this country and from other parts of the British Commonwealth of Nations who have had to deal with Burma, and with one or another of the peoples of Burma, we can look for the beginnings of what we are doing today.

If this Bill stood entirely by itself it would, indeed, be a somewhat formless thing; but it does, of course, go with the Treaty between this country and Burma which was signed a few days previously. I am certain that, as the hon. Member for Central Cardiff (Mr. G. Thomas) said so eloquently, our good wishes—the good wishes of the whole of this House—will go out not merely to Burma as an entity, not merely to those people who are more strictly called Burmese, but to all those various races and various aggregations of people who make up the population of what is geographically called Burma. To many of those, we in this country owe much for what they did in the late struggle against the Japanese. Many of them showed gallantry; gave us help at a time when we were, indeed, in need of all the help we could get; many of them were humble people who risked their lives in fighting or in other ways to help us. It is all the more appropriate that at this moment the right thing should be done and that their future should be placed in their hands. It is one of a series of promises fulfilled and gestures made by this Government. It is, I believe, one step towards an enlarged Commonwealth of Nations, even though for the moment this or that country, including Burma, may not form part of it. It is one step towards that Commonwealth. In taking that step we are also taking a very valuable step in the cause of peace in the world.

That much by way of generality. But we on this occasion, so far as this House takes its part in the matter, are granting to Burma complete independence, and it behoves us to consider our responsibility in so doing towards those other people who will be in a minority in Burma. Though it would be inappropriate to take much time on that question, there is one small point which I should like the Secretary of State to answer at the end of this Debate. We all know that the Kachins in Burma are one of the bravest and most independent minded of the peoples in that country. I notice that in the Constitution of Burma there is provision, and proper provision, for a Kachin State Council. There is also provision for filling 12 seats in the Chamber of Nationalities, and as regards the Kachin State those 12 seats are to be filled as to half only by representatives of the Kachins, and as to the remaining half by representatives of the non-Kachins of the Kachin State. Now, I claim no special knowledge of these matters, other than can be obtained by reading the very careful report and the other information generally accessible on Burma. But I confess, it seems to me to require a little explanation as to why, in regard to the Kachin State, there is a representation of only half of the seats for those who are themselves Kachins, and why the non-Kachins—immigrants into the Kachin State—are allowed the other half of the seats.

This is not a responsibility falling upon us merely because at this moment we are granting independence to Burma. It is also a responsibility because we ourselves, in what we have had to do with Burma, have been largely responsible for that immigration, and those who have gone into the Kachin State from outside have gone there under our responsibility, at a time when we were allowing, and, indeed, encouraging them to do so. In those circumstances there is a moral duty upon this House at least to see that nothing is being done which will be in any way unfair to those native people in the Kachin State. I entirely agree that the Constitution of Burma is most essentially a matter for the Burmese, but in a country containing such important and diverse minorities, though primarily responsibility may rest upon the Burmese, it is yet a matter into which we are called upon to inquire, and as regards which we, too, must take some responsibility. I trust that the Secretary of State in replying will be able to deal with that particular point.

I have little to add, save this. We rise in this House, one after another—at any rate hon. Members on this side of the House have so risen today—to express our good wishes to the inhabitants of Burma, to whatever race, creed or way of life they may belong. In so doing, we speak not only for ourselves but for the people in this country whom we represent, many of whom know little of Burma, but who will, nevertheless, have in their hearts and minds that same concept of freedom which must at this moment be filling the hearts and minds of many Burmese. It is essentially the same thing. We in this party have had to make our way to political power, and to some measure of economic freedom, through difficulties which, in their way, have been as great as those of Colonial peoples struggling towards freedom. We can, therefore, the more readily and with the more understanding be glad, with them, that on this day, they have reached a definite mark along the road of their progress, that they have now reached the stage, when they themselves can decide on their future and their relations between one another.

We have not, on the Third Reading of this Bill, heard much from hon. Members opposite, but on previous stages there was a tendency for them to gibe that hon. Members on this side of the House were deriving some pleasure out of the fact that Burma was leaving the British Commonwealth. I believe it would be quite untrue to say that any hon. Member on this side was glad to see any constituent part of the British Commonwealth leaving the Commonwealth. At the same time, I claim that those of us who welcome this Bill, as I do most heartily, have, in the attitude we take up towards it, a very much truer realisation of the real character of the Commonwealth than hon. Members opposite, who attack us and the Government

I believe, with the Prime Minister, that it is a sad thing that the Burmese, in deciding on their future, have not decided to stay with us in the Empire. On the other hand, we can only have the greatest pleasure when we find, from the negotiations which have taken place, and from the treaty which has been contracted between His Majesty's Government and the Government of Burma, that Burma will continue to occupy a very special place in her relationship to the British Commonwealth. In taking this step, we are perhaps laying the foundation of what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) called a wider British Commonwealth. It is too narrow a view to suggest that this British Commonwealth of ours is something which is limited purely by the concept of common sovereignty. It is true that that has been the concept up to the present, but I believe there is a place within this conception for new relationships with countries which desire to take up a new status.

We are seeing, in this new step which is being taken by the Burmese people, the beginning of such a relationship. For instance, we are to have a special military relationship with Burma, in that Burma is not accepting any military missions other than British. We have also stipulated in this Bill that Imperial Preference shall continue temporarily, and we have been told that it will be prolonged by a trade treaty when that is satisfactorily concluded between our two countries. In that, we have a special economic relationship which we know will be of the greatest benefit to both countries. We have no need to be ashamed in feeling pleased at the fact that it will be of great benefit to ourselves. Burma will be doing her best to develop on modern lines, and it is natural that she should look to us to further that development. Had the conceptions of hon. Members opposite pre vailed, the Burmese would have tended to look in any direction other than to this country. Had the conceptions prevailed that were so vocally expressed by the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition on Second Reading, I think that they would have regarded any economic, military or other connections with this country as a badge of servitude.

As it is, because of the way in which the present Government conducted negotiations with Burma, they have plainly seen that any connections that they retain with this country are those of one free people with another, forged for their mutual benefit. I believe that those of us who see in this British connection with Burma a great force for good in Burma's future must have been gratified when we read the terms of the new Burmese constitution. It is a constitution the terms of which can well make us proud of the good that has come out of the British connection with Burma.

On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. I understand that you ruled on Second Reading that one was not entitled to refer to the constitution of Burma in this Bill? In consequence of that ruling a number of us refrained from referring to it on the Second Reading and in Committee.

I should have thought that it was in Order just to refer to the constitution, but not to go into details. I do not think that it should be discussed in detail.

I am very conscious of that, Mr. Speaker, and I have no intention to refer to details. I intended to refer to the fact that this constitution is drawn up in a certain spirit, and in a way which, I believe, lends colour to the view that we on this side of the House are expressing, that it is a great and far-sighted Measure which the Government are taking in giving idependence to Burma. Provision is made in the constitution for the British conception of the rule of law and for many specific British legal processes. The fact of the generous treatment, as I think, that has been conferred on the minorities of Burma—

Those were exactly the points that many of us would have liked to raise on the Second Reading and Committee stage, and we had a distinct ruling, Mr. Speaker, that we could not refer to those matters. I suggest, with respect, that these are questions of detail.

May I suggest that, as other hon. Members have referred to the disquiet which they felt at the certain lack of provisions for the minorities, it must be in Order for me to state that in my view good provision is made for the minorities.

I gave no Ruling, so far as I can remember, on Second Reading. Whether when I was not in the Chair, a Ruling was given, I do not know, but I have no knowledge of it. I agree with the noble Lord that one does not want to go into details. One can mention the spirit in which the new Government is set up but not the details.

It is a long-standing Ruling of this House which you and your predecessors have constantly enforced, Mr. Speaker, that on Third Reading one can only refer to what is in the Bill. There is not one single reference in this Bill to the document which I hold in my hand—the Constitution of Burma.

Further to that point of Order, Mr. Speaker, is it possible to discuss a Bill conferring independence on Burma without referring to the Constitution of Burma?

If one wishes to bring in some content of the Bill, surely it is admissible to adduce arguments in justification, and, with respect, Mr. Speaker, that is what my hon. Friend seems to be doing

Is it not a fact, Mr. Speaker, that Clause 1 (1) refers to the fact that on the appointed day Burma shall no longer be entitled to His Majesty's protection. It must, therefore, be material, in my submission, that we should know the extent and quality of His Majesty's protection, in order to ascertain whether this House agrees that that protection shall be taken away on the appointed day.

I do not intend to err any further in this direction, if you rule, Mr. Speaker, that it would be out of Order to refer further to the point raised by the hon. and learned Member for Kettering. I would be glad if you, Mr. Speaker, would rule whether it would be in Order to answer the point which he made about the provision with regard to the minority races.

I thought that was the point made by the hon. Member when he said that when giving independence to a country -we must give independence to a country with a constitution, and, therefore, the constitution can be mentioned. However, I still stick to my original opinion that while the constitution can be mentioned, one ought not to mention it in detail. Anyway, this is a matter for the Burmese themselves and not an affair for us.

Does that mean that we can refer to some provision giving a constitution although we must not go into the details of the constitution?

I do not think one can discuss it in detail or go into the provisions, because, after all, this is not an affair for us but an affair for the Burmese themselves.

May I give an example? In Clause 2 (2) of the Bill there is raised the question of British nationality. The point which could arise on the Third Reading is the validity of this particular provision, and one would necessarily have to refer to that constitution to show that any other provision than this would be incompatible with the constitution. It seems to me, with great respect, that unless one can adduce that it would be difficult to support this provision, and I should like your Ruling on it.

That matter was dealt with in detail by the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) and he seemed to have dealt with this Clause pretty fully.

It is perfectly true that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) dealt with it very fully indeed, but in my submission the one material point to which I was referring was not introduced by my hon. and learned Friend. Assuming that one were addressing oneself to the Third Reading and was referring to this particular and very important provision, I should have thought it was not only permissible but essential to introduce that element of the constitution.

I should not have thought that there would be enough time between now and 4 o'clock to discuss all these matters.

I rise to make another point of Order. I think this is a very important matter. Of course, I in no way challenge your Ruling, Mr. Speaker, but I should like a Ruling on the point as to whether it is not the case on the Third Reading of a Bill that hon. Members must refer to something that is in the Bill and not to something else. I say, with the deepest respect, that this will guide the Opposition in the future when the Government are anxious to get a decision, because if we are entitled to raise every sort of question not referred to in a Bill, we shall do so.

The Ruling is perfectly clear On the Third Reading hon. Members can discuss what is in the Bill, and not what they would like to see in the Bill, which is Second Reading matter.

I hope I shall not be out of Order to turn from these points of Order to try to complete the remarks which I was making. I was only referring to the fact that in my submission, in passing this Bill, we are not placing the minorities in Burma in jeopardy, and I feel that people who think so should have their minds set at rest by the fact that the constitution of Burma makes provision, which I think must be unusually generous amongst such constitutions, that the minorities in that country, are actually to have a majority in the Second Legislative Chamber. When a constitution is drawn up in that spirit, we can feel not only, that the Burmese are giving us very good safeguards as to the manner in which they intend to use their independence, but that we have by our connection with Burma in the past left something very lasting of the British spirit of justice and rule of law. Therefore we can wholeheartedly, and I hope from all sides of the House, join in wishing good luck to' Burma, as a result of this great Measure.

There is a tendency in the British Press, and even more so in the foreign Press, to give undue prominence to speeches by the Leader of the Opposition. I hope that when Burmans read the Debates on this Bill they will realise that in this matter, as in other matters, the Leader of the Opposition does not speak for a majority of the British people. I wish to add my voice to the chorus of good wishes to the people of Burma, although I do not think it is a secret that many hon. Members do not regard the Bill as ideal, and would have preferred Burma to remain within the British family of nations. I believe most hon. Members think that that would have been in the better interests of the Burmese people themselves. There is an old adage, however, that good government is no substitute for self-government. The Burmese people have decided upon the present solution, but I suppose we may still express the hope that one day they will return to the British family of nations. That is entirely for them to decide.

I have risen to make one last plea on behalf of the Christian minority in Burma. The noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) made a plea on behalf of the Anglo-Burmans. We have an equal feeling for the Karens, who so well supported our British Forces during the war and for whom we therefore have a special responsibility. The Government of Burma should not feel resentment if a special word is uttered on behalf of those people today. Our representatives in the negotiations took the quite proper line that the Burmese, representing a country which has reached maturity, were responsible people who, when granted full independence, would carry on the government of their country in compliance with all the recognised rules of civilised government. The world will watch with special care to see that the Burmese justify that trust by the way in which they treat the minorities which have been mentioned, and especially the christian minority in Burma. I hope that when the Secretary of State replies he will be able, even at this late hour, to give us some satisfactory promise or assurance that these people will not suffer in the ways that have been suggested.

I would not rise had it not been for the chance remark of the hon. Member for Central Cardiff (Mr. G. Thomas) when he referred to "this little country in East Asia." It is as well for us to remember on this occasion, when we are witnessing the last scene in the granting of complete independence to what was formerly one of the brightest jewels in our Imperial Crown, the full implications of this historic act. It is not true in any sense to say that Burma is a little country. From the point of view of acreage alone, it is at least three times the area of our own country, and from the point of view of population, it is at least three times the population of my own county of Lancashire. It is indeed no small act in which we are participating today, and it is as well that we should realise its full significance.

Not only from the point of view of its population and its material resources ought we to realise this act of historic significance, but more particularly because in all its long history of intimate connection with the British Crown there is perhaps no more glorious chapter than that written by our troops during the recent war. None of us can easily forget what they endured, and while from this day forth, the future of Burma may remain completely in the hands of the Burmese nation, we are fully conscious of the fact that the blood of many of our own kith and kin remains in that soil. There are other significant factors about the future of Burma which we should do well to bear in mind. Apart from the fact that it was before the war the world's chief exporter of rice, a vital commodity, so essential now to the health and welfare of the vast populations n. Eastern Asia, the fact remains that the Burmese people are one of the most gifted of Asiatic races. They possess an innate sense of artistry which shows itself in every corner of that country. They are noteworthy in possessing no caste system of any kind, and we would do well to bear in mind that in Burma women are held in the highest respect, given a basis of complete equality, and allowed freely to take their part in the manifold activities which must fall to the lot of any independent country.

Whatever hon. Members opposite may say about our discarding one of the brightest jewels in the British Crown and throwing it down the drain, the facts of the case are entirely different. We are indeed removing one of the brightest jewels in the British Crown but we are placing it in its natural setting, and enabling the people of Burma themselves to fashion it in the future in its own natural radiance. Hon. Members on this side of the House unite in wishing them well and expressing the hope that this bright jewel may be able to shine with an ever increasing radiance in the years that lie ahead.

I am sure that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree that we have had a most interesting Debate this afternoon. I am also sure we are all united, at any rate in the desire to see the new ship of State launched on its way in calm and even water and in the wish that its future voyage shall bring it the highest degree of prosperity. I regard it as a great personal privilege to have this opportunity of winding up the final Debate on what I suggest is an historic occasion. I do not believe that in the history of the world can there be found a precedent for such a Bill as we have been considering today. For the first time, a great nation like our own, not subjected to defeat or even to the threat of force, but because it believes it is doing the right thing, has freely and voluntarily come forward with legislation which has as its immediate object the granting, not of partial freedom or partial independence but complete freedom and complete independence. I am quite sure we can take it that the strength of this country, paradoxical as it may seem, will not be diminished by one iota, although it appears that a great area of territory with 17 millions of population is to branch off, take its own course and control its own destiny.

The noble Lord the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) and I have many differences, but I think we are united by our common faith in the value of, and the necessity for a family of nations such as we have in the British Commonwealth. I believe that the moral strength and moral influence of the British Commonwealth will be all the greater, all the more influential, because of the realisation which must manifest itself in every part of the world that we live up to our claim that the fundamental basis of our Commonwealth is the free association of free people. Even today, in spite of everything that we as a nation, we as a Parliament, can do to manifest our desire to have association with other people, based upon free and friendly cooperation, we are still being attacked from some quarters on the ground that we are just as Imperialistic as we ever were. I say that this Bill is conclusive evidence that His Majesty's Government is not following any policy of Imperialism but, on the contrary, is setting an example to countries, whether situated in the East or West, in granting freedom to subject peoples.

One of my hon. Friends raised the question of minorities in Burma and mentioned specifically the Karens. While it would be out of Order for me to go into detail, I think it will be permissible to illustrate my argument when I suggest that the present Burma Government and the Constituent Assembly have sought to protect and to give a square deal to the various minorities existing in their country. By way of illustration, I would refer to Article 180 of the Draft Constitution, which allows for the establishment at a later date of a separate Karens State within the Union, if such a course is agreed among the majority of all the Karens themselves. Meanwhile the Karens Affairs Council, headed by a Minister of the Union Government, is to look after the cultural, educational and other special interests of the Karens in general, and administer a special region to be set up in the Salween district. All I wish to do is to make that reference to the draft constitution as support for my attempt to reassure my hon. Friend so far as the Karens are concerned.

I would like just to pay this compliment, en passant, to the Constituent Assembly. They have shown themselves to be guided by capable and wise men. They have drafted a Constitution which I think most constitutional lawyers would admit was a very fine piece of work, and they did it in record time. I think that they have shown themselves to have a very real sense of responsibility. At the same time, it will be for them in their future life to live up to their Constitution, to carry out all the guarantees and assurances that have been given to all those who form part of Greater Burma, and I am quite sure that we may expect that they will do so.

I have only one further point to make. There has been a certain difference of opinion manifested this afternoon, but I believe that both sides of this House, representing the Parliament of this country, in turn, representing the great majority of the people of this country, whatever their political affiliations may be, are united, at any rate, in wishing Godspeed to the leaders and people of Burma in this great new venture upon which they are embarking. They are going to find, as they come up against the problems that confront their nation, as the Governments of every other country find, that they will have to solve their problems themselves. But, in so far as we in this country or in any other part of the British Commonwealth can help them to deal with their problems and to meet their difficulties, I am quite sure that I can say here and now that His Majesty's Government and this House will do everything possible to help them. We believe that the change of nexus between the people of Burma and the people of this country, substituting an era of cooperation for the domination of a greater power, will bind the peoples of both countries together much more firmly and much more permanently than would have been the case in any other way, and I think that every one of us can look forward to the future in a spirit of confidence, and in the hope and with the belief that we in this country and the people of Burma will derive a mutual sustenance and strengthening from this new relation, based upon free and voluntary co-operation between equal partners.