fact that gilt-edged securities had risen since he took office, and thanked the bank directors and others who by their public statements had allayed the nervousness of the investing public, and counteracted the designs of speculators. He said that the watchword of the Government's policy would be not “tranquillity" but "confidence"-confidence not merely in one section, but on the part of the whole of the nation, and he believed that the Labour Government was in a position to achieve this much better than its predecessor, because of its difference not so much in actual policy as in spirit. He found the King's Speech drawn up by his predecessor a not at all inconvenient quarry, and he would probably draw on it more liberally than his predecessors would have done had they remained in office. He expressed his confidence that the Minister of Health would soon be able to come to some satisfactory arrangement with the building industry which would render possible the production on a large scale of the type of houses required for the wage-earning classes. In regard to unemployment, he laid stress on the fact that the Government had no intention of drawing off large sums from the normal channels of trade for extemporised measures which could only be palliatives. On the contrary, they would try to foster trade by speeding up the Trade Facilities Act and granting export credits. They would also, if possible, appoint a committee to investigate the effect of the National Debt on business. In regard to agriculture, he thought the complaints of the farmers were due to some extent to inefficient book-keeping, which made them think that bad seasons were normal seasons. The Government was against any kind of bounty or tariff, and would try to assist agriculture by reforming rating and supporting cooperation.

Coming finally to foreign affairs, Mr. MacDonald justified the recognition of the Soviet Government on the ground that it was the necessary preliminary to settling the outstanding differences between Great Britain and Russia. With regard to France, his first task had been to create a healthier atmosphere. He paid a tribute to the instant and hearty response of M. Poincaré to the approaches which he had made to him on the questions of the Palatinate and the Cologne railways, but declined to say anything on the reparations question till the Committees which were working on the subject had made their statements. The final aim of the Foreign Secretary, he said, must be to secure an agreement on armaments, and he declared his intention of seizing any opportunity that offered of using the League of Nations for the settlement of a dispute between countries.

The debate was opened by Mr. Baldwin, who saw evidence in the speech that the experience of office had already had a sobering effect on the Government, and had made it realise some of its limitations. He pointed out that in the matter of unemployment it was proposing to do no more than the Conservative

Government would have done if it had remained in office-that is, to make the palliatives more palatable. He thought the Government had been unduly precipitate in recognising the Russian Soviet, and warned it against the dangerous characteristics of that body. Mr. Asquith, on the other hand, agreed with the Government that recognition was a necessary preliminary for settling outstanding difficulties with the Soviet. He laid great stress on a minor issue which Mr. MacDonald had only touched upon in the course of his speech-the rescinding by the Minister of Health of the so-called Mond Order in regard to the borough of Poplar. When Minister of Health in Mr. Lloyd George's Government in 1922, Sir Alfred Mond, in response to complaints received from certain ratepayers of Poplar, had issued an Order forbidding the Guardians of that borough to grant out-relief beyond a certain scale. The Guardians had declared from the first that the Order was unworkable, and had persistently disregarded it, thereby rendering themselves liable to surcharges which in course of time amounted to something like a hundred thousand pounds. Neither Sir Alfred Mond, however, nor his successors in the next Government had made any attempt to enforce the Order, and one of the first steps taken by the Minister of Health in the Labour Ministry, Mr. Wheatley, was to rescind it, in order to relieve the Poplar Guardians from their contingent liability. A section of the public had immediately raised the cry of "Socialism," and Mr. Asquith, who as it turned out was imperfectly informed as to the facts, now in the name of his party warned the Government that he could not support it in administrative action of that kind.

The most trenchant criticism of Mr. MacDonald's speech came from Mr. Austen Chamberlain, who pointed out that there were considerable differences between the office mind and the Opposition mind of the Government. He instanced in particular their attitude to the Capital Levy. From the Labour side also a grave complaint was raised that the Government was neglecting the agricultural worker.

One of the chief points on which information was sought during the debate was the Government's attitude on national defence. Mr. MacDonald said in reply that they were considering the question not merely from the point of view of the strength of the Army, Navy, and Air Force, but also from the point of view of civil and of foreign and international policy. For some time to come the bargaining power of the British Foreign Secretary would depend not on military force, but on the reasonableness of the policy which he presented. But that did not mean that defence would be neglected. With regard to the Capital Levy, he placated Mr. Chamberlain by remarking that it was in the same position as Protection. He thanked Mr. Baldwin for his warning as to the Soviet, but was still hopeful that they should come to a proper business and settled arrangement. Coming to the question of Poplar, he corrected Mr.

Asquith as to the facts, and promised if required to set aside a day to discuss the question as soon as possible.

In the House of Lords the Lord Chancellor, Lord Haldane, expounded the policy of the Government on the same lines as Mr. MacDonald, but in the reverse order, dealing first and most fully with Anglo-French relations. In guarded language he pointed out that while it was right and proper that France should have reparations and security, the methods by which these things were to be attained required investigation. The piling up of armaments must inevitably lead to another war. Nevertheless, until other people reduced their armaments, Britain could not put herself in a weak position. If some kind of common mind could be created among the nations of Europe, then would come the chance of a reduction in armaments. But meanwhile in regard to their own defences there was not under this Government going to be any breach in the continuity of policy by which they had for years been seeking to place their defences on an improved footing. Lord Curzon, on behalf of the Unionist Party, welcomed the declaration that there was going to be continuity of policy in the matter of defence, pointing out that a policy of idealism was not safe in view of the military preparations of the new nations of Europe.

The Government was very soon called upon to explain what it meant by continuity of policy in the matter of defence. On February 19 Sir S. Hoare, who had been Air Minister in the previous Government, moved "that this House, while earnestly desiring the further limitation of armaments . . . affirms the principle laid down by the late Government that Great Britain must maintain a Home Defence Air Force of sufficient strength to give adequate protection against air attack by the strongest force within striking distance." He pointed out the great disparity in Air Force between England and France, and asked whether the Government proposed to take steps to remove it. In reply the Under-Secretary for Air, Mr. Leach, stated that the plan for the increase in the Air Force sanctioned by the late Government would not be interfered with. He made it clear, however, as did also Mr. Thomas, the Secretary for the Colonies, that the Government did not believe that aeroplanes could give 'adequate protection" against aeroplanes, and expressed the opinion that the true way to seek safety was by fostering among the peoples a pacific spirit which would lead to disarmament. His concluding remarks were heard with some disquietude by occupants of the Opposition benches, but the matter was not pressed to a division on that evening.

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A few days later the difficulties of the Government in reconciling its pacifist principles with the requirements of the hour were brought into light even more forcibly. On February 21 it was announced by Mr. Ammon, Parliamentary Secretary for the Admiralty, in answer to questions, that the Government had decided, in view of the serious unemployment, which was

especially marked in the shipbuilding industry, to proceed with the laying down of five cruisers. The announcement was received with consternation by several Liberal and Labour members, and a Liberal, Mr. Pringle, asked leave to move the adjournment of the House to discuss this decision, a request in which he was supported by nearly all the Liberal members and many of the Labour members present. The Speaker accordingly assented. When the motion for the adjournment came on a few hours later, Mr. Pringle pointed out that the Labour Party's manifesto at the General Election declared their policy to be one of disarmament and reduction of naval and military expenditure, and he asked what had brought about this new declaration of policy. The answer was given by the Prime Minister in person, who in the interval had read a sharp lesson to his more recalcitrant followers on the necessity of party discipline. He first made it clear, in contradistinction to Mr. Ammon, that the building of the cruisers would not be proceeded with without the consent of Parliament. They were, he said, only for replacement, and meant no increase in the country's naval strength. The reason for putting them in hand at once was simply to prevent men from being discharged from the dockyards. This explanation did not satisfy Mr. Pringle and his friends, who carried the matter to a division. The motion was lost by 73 votes against 372. The majority comprised all the Unionists and all the Labour members present except one, and thirty Liberals. The Liberal leaders abstained from voting. Although no Labour members voted against the Government, numbers of them were gravely perturbed at its action, which they regarded as a serious blot on the record of their party.

The only other measure taken by the Government at this time to deal with unemployment was to amend the Trade Facilities Act by increasing from 50 to 65 millions the aggregate of the loans which might be guaranteed under it, and by authorising the actual expenditure of a million a year in interest. The Government's lack of originality was the subject of sarcastic comment from the Conservative benches, but it was pleaded on their behalf that this was only a first step, and that more drastic measures would soon follow. No opposition was offered to this step, nor to the abolition of the "gap" of one week which hitherto had been interposed after every twelve weeks' receipt of unemployment relief. A motion was also passed about this time supporting in principle the giving of pensions to widowed mothers.

In the matter of rent control also the Government showed itself lacking in resolution. On February 22 a new Rent Restrictions Bill was brought forward by a private member, but with the support of the Government, to replace the measure with the same title carried by Mr. Neville Chamberlain as Minister of Health in the previous Government (vide ANNUAL

REGISTER, 1923, p. 43). The mover described his Bill frankly as a tenants' Bill, just as the previous one had been a landlords' Bill. It proposed to take away from the landlord every ground of resuming possession of a house except that he wanted it for his own occupation (in which case he would have to provide alternative accommodation), to reduce the percentage of permissible increase in rents from 15 to 10, to allow the landlord only 15 per cent. for repairs, and to extend control to 1928. The Bill was strongly criticised by Mr. Neville Chamberlain, who said that an inquiry ought first to be held into the working of the existing Act. Mr. Wheatley, in supporting the Bill, went out of his way to attack the Conservative party for favouring the rich against the poor; his speech, which was described by one member as "an immoderate speech in favour of a moderate measure," gave much offence to the Opposition. The Government was severely criticised for not itself accepting responsibility for the Bill, and though with the help of the Liberals the second reading was carried by 248 votes to 101, the Bill was held up by the obstruction of Conservative members in Standing Committee for the rest of the Session, and never emerged again into light.

The action of the Minister of Health in rescinding the Mond Order was the subject of a debate in the House of Commons on February 26. There was a Liberal motion, with a Conservative addition, censuring it as calculated to encourage illegality and extravagance. The Liberals were chiefly concerned that the Poplar Guardians should not in future be allowed to break the law with impunity; the Conservatives that the unemployed should not obtain more in relief than the employed earned by working. Mr. Wheatley defended his action with great dialectical skill, showing that the situation left by his predecessors had made the action taken by him the only reasonable course to pursue. Mr Asquith found the speech more clever than reassuring, and asked the Prime Minister to say definitely whether the Government would make it clear that, though the Mond Order had been rescinded, illegal expenditure by a Board of Guardians neither had been nor would be sanctioned. Mr. MacDonald, challenged to uphold his subordinate, once more, as in the affair of the cruisers, beat a prompt and skilful strategic retreat. He asserted that Mr. Wheatley had not spoken and the Government had not acted in defence of the Poplar administration, and assured Mr. Asquith that no illegal expenditure had been or would be incurred on account of what the Minister of Health had done. With this assurance the bulk of the Liberals were satisfied, and when at 11 o'clock the closure was moved from the Conservative benches they voted against it, helping to defeat it by 67 votes. Thus neither the motion nor the amendment was allowed to come to the vote, and the Government emerged from the debate with a whole skin.

A few days later Mr. MacDonald was for the third time called

B