Mr Herbert Spencer: As a new Member, I should hardly have intervened in this Debate were it not that I have some little knowledge of the textile trade and because I wish in particular to take up the statement of the President of the Board of Trade as to the colour users being in favour of the Dyestuffs Act. The right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Salford (Lieut.-Commander Astbury) said that the colour...
Mr Herbert Spencer: It was resolved further on the same date That in view of the fact that it is now over two yean? since the victorious termination of the War, this association declares that it is time the dyeing trade withdrew its declaration that it can take no risk on goods which arise from looseness or fading of colour and that the trade should now undertake to give a standard of dye equal to pre-War. The...
Mr Herbert Spencer: They may do. I do not want to talk soley about my own trade. I began to talk about the trade of my own town. I will talk now of my own business, if I may. Three years ago I sent away £2,000 worth of printed delaine. It is a ladies' fabric made of Australian wool, spun, woven, and printed in the Bradford district. It is a cloth in which we have always had the keenest competition with the...
Mr Herbert Spencer: On a point of Order. In my speech I showed that that had happened.
Mr Herbert Spencer: No, in Bradford.
Mr Herbert Spencer: As a new Member may I ask whether we have to address you, Mr. Chairman, or other Members?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Do we understand that a factory employing 600 people lost £180,000 in one year's trading?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Can the hon. Baronet tell us how many people were employed by the group of factories which lost £180,000?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Then they lost about £200 per head.
Mr Herbert Spencer: I will give a homely parallel to the hon. Baronet the Member for Central Wandsworth (Sir J. Norton-Griffiths) who has been pleading the cause of some 4,000 girls who are employed making gas mantles. I have the honour to represent, I suppose, between 15,000 and 16,000 girls who make their living by weaving textiles for which work you want a good light. I could take the hon. Baronet to a...
Mr Herbert Spencer: I will not pursue that argument. I want to make this point, which I think shows the very worst side of this Order, and it is that the whole level of our industrial and commercial legislation is lowered, and it is lowered by each Member thinking that he must look after the trade of his own constituency. I do not want to set myself up as better than anybody else, but I do want to make this...
Mr Herbert Spencer: The hon. Gentleman must remember he is not dealing with gas mantles in the seclusion of his own study.
Mr Herbert Spencer: Is not that an error of judgment, Mr. Speaker— [HON. MEMBERS: "Order, Order"]— Does not this paragraph deal with salaries also, and was not the hon. Gentleman dealing with salaries when he was E topped?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Does the hon. Member suggest that the royalties should go to the trade or to the nation?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Because of the cost of her preparations for war.
Mr Herbert Spencer: Can the right hon. Gentleman consider relieving these smallholders of rates on improvements?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Has not very very serious damage been done, especially in Lincolnshire, since the Royal Commission sat, and is not that sufficient reason for reconsidering the matter?
Mr Herbert Spencer: What is the estimated loss on each house?
Mr Herbert Spencer: Are we to understand that the report is not available for the council or councils interested in the cases?
Mr Herbert Spencer: In view of the fact that Socialism has completely broken down in Russia—