Mr James Reid: I am not dealing with what is the proper course for the right hon. Gentleman to follow. What I am doing at the moment is to expose what is really behind the right hon. Gentleman's attitude today. Against his better judgment he was compelled to give a number of extra seats to his back benchers. I suppose that they thought that there was a party advantage in it; otherwise it is difficult to see...
Mr James Reid: Had not the right hon. Gentleman thought of that before the Bill was introduced?
Mr James Reid: It is very important to get this matter right. Am I right in understanding, Mr. Speaker, that your Ruling to the point of Order depends not on whether we have an Ambassador or not, but on the distinction between a ruler and a Government? Or is it your Ruling that in this House we can refer in different terms to a friendly nation with whom we have not exchanged Ambassadors from the terms we...
Mr James Reid: When does the hon. Lady expect this information to be ready?
Mr James Reid: Will the hon. Lady circulate it to others as well?
Mr James Reid: Has the hon. Lady any figures to show how many lost books were recovered?
Mr James Reid: I think we will all agree that this has been a most revealing Debate, and not the least revealing of the speeches to which we have listened is that which has just been delivered by the right hon. Gentleman. His contribution has been most valuable to us because it has made quite clear that the Government do not know what they want to achieve by this Clause and, therefore, it is not surprising...
Mr James Reid: —and that it is a bad thing to put hindrances in their way. What does the Clause do? If hon. Members opposite are to be taken at their word, the object of the Clause is to prevent a number of people from voting who otherwise would have voted Conservative. It can have no other purpose. If it does not do that, perhaps somebody will tell us really what it does do. I do not think it will...
Mr James Reid: Then I understand the position to be that if one even takes a single person whom one knows to be going to vote for one's candidate, that is an offence, but that one can take as many as one wishes if they are going to vote for someone else, or if one does not know for whom they are going to vote. Is that right?
Mr James Reid: Then the whole thing depends, does it, on the court's assumption ex post facto of a certain person's motives and intentions? Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman tell us of any reasonably recent legislative provision where the criminality of a man depends not on what he did, but purely on what he intended doing?
Mr James Reid: asked the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that a number of temporary sorting clerks in Glasgow, aged over 55 years are being, or have recently been, dismissed; that they are being replaced by younger men; and what steps have been- taken to ascertain whether other work is available for the dismissed men.
Mr James Reid: How does it come about that the Government lend themselves to an agreement under which men who are perfectly fit but cannot take on other productive jobs are to be replaced by men who, otherwise, would be available for production?
Mr James Reid: I am told that a number of them run from eight to 20 years, and that they are veterans of the First World War. Is that so?
Mr James Reid: Does it come to this —that, as B.E.A.C. are unable to ran their services economically, and those who can are not allowed to do so, the result is that Scotland has to suffer?
Mr James Reid: I had not intended to intervene in this matter, but there is one point upon which I would like to have the view of the learned Attorney-General. I do not agree with the general remarks which he made. I am more inclined to agree with the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) and the right hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. W. S. Morrison). The learned...
Mr James Reid: I am puzzled as to what the Subsection applies. It cannot apply to a servant, because as I understand the Bill if a chauffeur acquires petrol it is put to the charge of the owner and and owner is responsible. This is solely limited to the person who is not a servant and gets the loan of a car. As the Clause stands, it is anyone in the wide world. It does not matter whether he has anything to...
Mr James Reid: He and any other person in charge.
Mr James Reid: He need not be in charge.
Mr James Reid: This Clause must, in its context, surely be unique in the annals of our legislation. I could understand a person being deemed guilty of an offence which he had not in fact committed and which had not been proved against him if the court was left free to modify the penalty accordingly. I could understand there being a minimum penalty if we were sure that every person subjected to it had in...
Mr James Reid: I wish to add only two or three sentences. The tenor of the Attorney-General's speech is that he cannot trust the judiciary of this country, either the lay judiciary of England or the professional judiciary in Scotland. That can only be for one or two reasons; because either the Bill so offends against justice that just men would not carry it out, or the judiciary are themselves...
