Mr Ernest Brown: The examination into the prices charged by this company is being pressed forward with all speed, but I am at present unable to say how soon it will be completed.
Mr Ernest Brown: I hope before the Autumn.
Mr Ernest Brown: The hon. Member is asking for a guess, and I should say about the end of August.
Mr Ernest Brown: Black-out at this factory will certainly be removed as soon as suitable labour can be spared from more urgent work, which I hope will be in a few months' time.
Mr Ernest Brown: As my hon. and gallant Friend knows, the real difficulty is that of labour.
Mr Ernest Brown: I have been asked by the Trustees of the British Museum to present a Petition which they have to submit to this House annually, explaining the financial position and praying for aid. The Petition recites the funded income of the Trustees, and points out that the establishment is, necessarily, attended with an expense far beyond the annual production of the funds, and the Trust cannot, with...
Mr Ernest Brown: I think it will be agreed that the hon. Baronet has done a great service by raising this issue. It is one on which the House will be agreed as a whole, that members of the Forces, whether serving at home or abroad, should have not merely the fullest opportunity of making their vote effective in the first General Election after the war, but that they should take, as far as possible, a living...
Mr Ernest Brown: My hon. Friend interrupts me a little too early. I was not dealing with the point he was making, but with my own statement that there had been a factual and fair attempt at providing all Servicemen and women with the basis for arriving at their own conclusions. My hon. Friend is rather inclined to underestimate the capacity for making up their minds on controversial issues of those who...
Mr Ernest Brown: At present the system is that there is a buff card which is at the unit headquarters. Wherever the man may be it is presented to him. He is then asked to state his address.
Mr Ernest Brown: If he has not an address he is asked to say where he thinks he would have been living but for his service or other circumstances ancillary to his service. He has then a choice of stating what that address will be, so that his name can go on the register for that particular constituency, and of doing the second job at the same time on this little buff form, which is a very simple and clear...
Mr Ernest Brown: There are two great differences between this war and the last to which I did not refer in my speech, but which have not been overlooked by the Government and those concerned. They are very great differences and very great advantages for the troops—
Mr Ernest Brown: On the contrary, it was the desire of the Minister to help a rural district council which had done a very good job of work, and to pay a little tribute to them.
Mr Ernest Brown: I am sure that the whole House is indebted to the Noble Lord for having taken the initiative in raising this subject to-day. I sometimes divide the 612 unofficial Members of the House into two kinds, those who are Members of Parliament and those who are House of Commons men. If I were asked for my own simple definition I would say that a Member of Parliament is a person who is concerned with...
Mr Ernest Brown: I am making no adverse comment. I am stating facts as they were illustrated then, and as they have cropped up in this interesting Debate today. I had, perhaps, better remark that there are hon. Members who may be on one side of the fence on one occasion, and on the other at another. That brings me to a comment of the hon. Member for East Hull (Mr. Muff) when he brought the HOUSE back from the...
Mr Ernest Brown: If the hon. Member had a little patience I intended to say that I think he overlooked this: there is a double convenience in this convention in Parliament, not only the convenience of the Member who is actually speaking, but the convenience of Members of another House, which is at the moment part of the Constitution.
Mr Ernest Brown: The answer is that the arrangement is, as far as possible, that way. I am not expressing a view of my own at all. My Noble Friend holds his views, but I do not think he will find them generally shared in all quarters of the House when he describes that as mummery. Indeed, I have noticed, when showing many parties of constituents round the House, that some hon. Members who are most keen about...
Mr Ernest Brown: My Noble Friend is using metaphors, but neither of us knows how the mind of the monkey or the elephant works. So we will leave it there. In this Debate there has been criticism based on the need for relieving Parliament of part of the business which, it is said, clogs its machinery. On the other hand there has been criticism based on asking for an actual amendment of the procedure so that...
Mr Ernest Brown: Perhaps I was leading the hon. Member to think I was about to sit down a little sooner than I purposed. I was also going to say that there have been, apart from that major issue, one or two pleas on the interesting and important question of the conventions of the House. The question has arisen whether my Noble Friend's limited series of conventions should be the terms of reference to a...
Mr Ernest Brown: On that I would say that the general opinion of the Committee was that it really is the good sense of the House that is wanted, not new Rules.
Mr Ernest Brown: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has left me 2½ minutes in which to reply. [An HON. MEMBER: "Four."] No, my time is accurate. I shall convey to my colleagues the interest that hon. Members show in Parliamentary procedure, if, indeed, that were necessary. As a matter of fact, ever since 1832 we have had continuous inquiries into Parliamentary procedure, quite rightly, because there is nothing...
