Orders of the Day — CONSOLIDATED FUND (No. 3) BILL.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 23 June 1942.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Mr John Tinker Mr John Tinker , Leigh

Statements were made to-day by the hon. Member for Mossley (Mr. A. Hopkinson) to which one ought to reply. First he said that we were wasting Parliamentary time by dealing with family allowances. Then he made a remark, which I resented very much, to the effect that last week we wasted a day in dealing with old age pensions. When I questioned him just now he said it was nothing but cant and humbug, that something like poor law assistance was being given to aged people and that therefore we should not waste time upon it. I resent such a statement being made by any responsible Member of this House. If we are to carry on the war successfully we must have regard to the many classes of suffering people in the country. If we disregard them as being of no consequence, ultimately the country must go down to defeat. I take the opportunity of saying that I thought Parliament used last Wednesday in a way that was a credit to the country by examining the position of old age pensioners in the hope that we could do something better for them. As to the other points in his speech, naturally he has a right to express his views, as everybody has, but what troubles me is that in one breath he was trying to praise the Prime Minister and in the next trying to pull the right hon. Gentleman right down to the bottom. It has neither been praise on the one hand nor open opposition on the other hand. If the hon. Member does not believe in the Prime Minister, I would rather he said so, but, as it is, he has only damned the right hon. Gentleman with faint praise.

I hope to-day we shall have some regard to the present position of affairs. I do not want us, when we do come across a set-back or a defeat, to lose all control of ourselves and start blaming everybody. It is far better that we should realise that we are up against a most powerful and well-equipped enemy and that there will be occasions when we shall meet with reverses. The right thing for an Englishman to do then is to stand up to events and try to make them better for the future. Never let us give way to depression as we are doing now. I deplore what has happened in this Debate. Here are we, the people who as Members of Parliament should be telling the nation to have courage and endurance, acting as though we were beaten. [Interruption.] Yes, we are doing so. Well, that is how it appears to me. If it is not so, I am glad that I have brought out that retort. It appears to me that because we have suffered a reverse in Libya everybody is depressed and wandering what the next blow will do. Let me tell hon. Members this: We shall come through this struggle all right. We shall rise above this temporary set-back, and Britain, in my belief, will come out victoriously.