Clause 55. — (Relief from rates in respect of industrial and freight-transport hereditaments.)

Part of Orders of the Day — Local Government Bill. – in the House of Commons at on 22 January 1929.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Mr John Jones Mr John Jones , West Ham Silvertown

I am very sorry to find that an hon. Member should move an Amendment of this character. It looks to me as though he were trying to compound a felony, because if a thing is wrong in principle it is wrong in detail. Giving relief to people who are prosperous in proportion to the amount of profit that they are making, seems to me to bo committing the same offence as the hon. Member charges his opponents with. The small thief is just as bad as the big one, and neither has the right to take advantage of the public purse for his own purposes. Later we shall be discussing other Amendments to deal with our old friends, the Forty Thieves. More arguments will be advanced in favour of them. It will be said that because they are making only 5 per cent. profit they can dip into the nation's resources. We are prepared to relieve industry in a different way. We recognise that industries may be depressed, but the depression is a matter of economic circumstances.

The Amendment seems to me to mean this: "If you are not robbing the people too much we are willing to meet you, and to find some public money to relieve you." If a firm is making only 5 per cent. the Liberals say: "You shall have 7.3 per cent. of relief." But who are the people who are to gel; the relief? They are people who have never done any work in the industry—shareholders, Tom, Dick and Harry, who may have invested some of their surplus wealth in an industry about which they know as much as a Connemara pig knows about astronomy. Then we come to those who have made 10 per cent. out of their investments. They are to have a relief of 50 per cent. of their rates; that is 50–50, "You scratch my back and I will scratch yours." Next we come to those who have made over 50 per cent. on their investments, and they are told, "You can have 25 per cent. of relief." So the merry game goes on. The hon. Member who moved the Amendment should realise that this is compounding a felony. It is against all the principles of the golden Yellow Book. I believe that the Liberal party had the jaundice when they got out that book. Thirty years ago I knew of all that is in it. The book is full of the old commonplaces of the Liberal and Radical party—how to have your eggs without taking the shells off.