asked the Minister of Health the number of unestablished medical practitioners, employed as assistants to general practitioners engaged in the National Health Service, in each of the years 1948, 1949 1950 and 1951. respectively.

The numbers of assistants employed by general medical practitioners in the National Health Service at 31st March, 1950, and at the end of 1951, were 2,088 and 1,998, respectively. Figures for the other years are not available.

asked the Minister of Health whether he will publish as a White Paper the terms of reference and the recommendations of the working party appointed to consider a new policy for payment out of the central pool of general medical practitioners; and if he will include therein statistics illustrating the distribution of the pool at the time of the Danckwerts' adjudication.

I will consider how this information can best be made available to Parliament.

asked the Minister of Health why the salaries and wages of other staff make a greater addition to the national average cost of maintaining a patient in a general hospital than do the salaries and wages of the medical or of the nursing staff, respectively.

"Other staff" covers a large variety of grades, such as staff engaged on the maintenance of plant and buildings, laundries, farms and gardens, administrative, clerical, professional and technical staff, ward orderlies and ward maids, kitchen staff and porters. The total of the salaries and wages paid to them is greater than the total salaries paid to either doctors or nurses.

asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government why rural district councils of England and Wales pay a rate towards the new town of Crawley.

I do not know what the hon. Member has in mind. Development Corporations are not rating authorities.

asked the President of the Board of Trade what steps he is taking to prevent the importation of American comics under other classifications.

The only way in which comics can be legally imported from the United States of America is under the world open general licence for periodicals, magazines and the like, imported as single copies through the post by persons who pay or have paid the overseas supplier direct and not through an agent.Most of the so-called American comics sold in this country are not in fact printed in the United States, and I have no evidence that such imports as may be taking place under this particular classification in the open general licence are sufficient to justify restricting a facility which is of obvious value to the public. All other considerations apart, it would in any case be impossible to enforce a restriction on subject matter without inspecting every periodical sent into this country through the post as a single copy.I rely on the co-operation and efficiency of Her Majesty's Customs officers to prevent comics being imported illegally in bulk.

asked the President of the Board of Trade if, for future conferences regarding trade between Britain and the Soviet countries, he will encourage the large-scale participation of British businessmen and technicians.

That would depend on what sort of conference it is. As to the recent Economic Conference held at Moscow, it was the view of Her Majesty's Government that the chief aim of the conference was political propaganda, and that there was no reason why we should encourage participation in it. Nothing has yet emerged from the conference which suggests that that view was not fully justified.

asked the Secretary for Overseas Trade, as representing the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, why he is charging the British manufacturers £147 per ton for lead, £231 for copper, and £190 for zinc, when their overseas competitors can obtain these metals for £100, £196 and £156 a ton, respectively.

I have been asked to reply.The Ministry of Materials selling prices for copper and lead are at present based on replacement costs. Neither metal is to be had in quantity by overseas buyers at the prices quoted by my hon. Friend. The Ministry's zinc price is now being reviewed. The price of lead was reduced yesterday to £131 per ton.

, asked the Secretary of State for Scotland, whether he can indicate his plans for the control of civil defence operations in Scotland.

At the centre, control will be exercised by a Scottish central control under the continuous direction of a Scottish Minister. The central control will have two outposts, each in charge of a zone controller, one for a Western zone comprising Lanark, Renfrew, Dunbarton, Stirling and Clackmannan, and the other for an Eastern zone comprising Midlothian, West Lothian, East Lothian and Fife, inclusive in each case of the cities and burghs therein.The duties of the zone controller will include co-ordination of the Civil Defence planning and operations of the local authorities and other bodies in his zone, and the provision of reinforcements for attacked areas to supplement local mutual aid schemes. In order that the necessary plans may be developed, I have appointed Sir Victor D. Warren, M.B.E., T.D., and Air Marshal Sir Thomas W. Elmhirst, K.B.E., C.B., A.F.C., as zone controllers of the Western and Eastern Zones, respectively. The appointments are meanwhile on a part-time and unpaid basis, and I am grateful to these gentlemen for undertaking this public service.In other parts of Scotland, the provision of assistance to an attacked area to supplement what is available by way of mutual aid schemes will normally be arranged by the central control, but the officers in charge of mobile columns wilt have power to send contingents to any area whose local controller has been unable, because of disrupted communications, to apply direct to the central control.