Mr Oliver Simmonds: Is it not perfectly manifest that, in all the fields in which private enterprise operates, it is inevitably under the control not of one Department of the Government, but of a number of Departments of the Government? I would not say that civil air transport should have less—I would probably say it might need more—control from certain Government Departments than some other forms of private...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: I have not said that I regard B.O.A.C. as inefficient. I would say that, operationally, they are excellent, and I think that, from a maintenance point of view, they are also excellent, but I do not think they have ever approached the problem of the economic management and running of transport, and that is where I think the railways and the shipping companies have an advantage. On this subject...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: If the hon. Member will read my speech to-morrow, if it is not too painful for him, he will see that I used exactly those words. It has been all under war conditions and I do not blame the staff.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: The argument, clearly, is this—that if they have never understood how to run an economical organisation, it will take a little time to learn how to do it, even with the best promptings. But, if they shape their plans on a body that has learned how to run its organisation at a profit they will not take so long as if they omitted to take such a body into their organisation.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: I think I have given way to the hon. Member a number of times, but he gets wider and wider from what I am saying, and I must ask him to try to read my speech to-morrow, when he will see how its affects his own attitude to this matter. I think the hon. Member also mentioned the desire of the railway companies to have a monopoly. Let me assure him that, when the representatives of the railway...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: I find great difficulty in understanding the Government plans with regard to the entry of third parties after the three Corporations have been founded. My right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Aircraft.Production, was, if anything, speaking contrary to the White Paper, which says in page 9, paragraph 35: It is not intended to make any present commitment as to the right to operate new...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: A National Government.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: I said they were granted licences.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: It is very important.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs which foreign Governments still continue to refuse to the United Nations satisfactory assurances that they will not harbour enemy war criminals.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Where does this matter stand? Were any decisions taken at Yalta, or are we allowing the situation to go by default?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Are not this agreement and the method by which it is being worked wholly inconsistent with the procedure agreed by the Commonwealth Air Conference?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Is it not a fact that, after the great shortage of aluminium in 1940, adequate quantities were provided by private enterprise, with the assistance of the Ministry; and have not prices been continually reduced since then?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: May I ask whether the Royal aircraft establishments will remain as a unit, and come under this new research establishment?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: asked the Minister of Production if he is satisfied that the change-over from munitions to civilian consumption of light engineering industries, such as the motor industry, will not be delayed on account of insufficient notice being given to the ancillary industries on which this production ultimately depends.
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in Birmingham and in the Midlands these ancillary industries are now being cut down to the point where not only is labour being discharged, but the core of the personnel is having to be cut into; and does not he realise that this will seriously delay the starting of civilian industry when the moment comes; and, therefore, cannot the Government give a...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Is not the basic cause here that most of this design work has been done by the State, and not, as in the case of the aircraft industry, by efficient and virile private enterprise?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: Are the figures given by the Minister an increase or a decrease on those for previous years?
Mr Oliver Simmonds: I am sure we all sympathise with my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton (Dr. Russell Thomas) in his sad but lyrical recollections of his friend the Air Ministry. I support him wholeheartedly, in so far as the military effort of the Air Ministry is concerned, but for the rest, I fear I have no tears to shed. Very often, when we have a Vote for a new Minister's salary before us, we have to...
Mr Oliver Simmonds: On the contrary. I have no interests as an air line operator but I have contacts, and I know what the British Chamber of Shipping is doing with regard to air lines and what it is not. It is not doing what the hon. Member said, nor would it dream of doing so. Thirdly, he referred to the Association of Air Line Operators and said: They are attempting to alter certain arrangements reached at the...