Parliament's Week

COMMONWEALTH

(British Commonwealth of Nations)

The Cabinet. Premier MacDonald is to receive the French Premier at Chequers Court on May 19 for a discussion of the reparations problem.

P: As a result of the conference between Premier MacDonald and Premier Theunis of Belgium (TIME, May 12) an Entente Premiers'* Conference is to convene in June, either in London or Paris.

House of Commons. Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Snowden's budget (TIME, May 12) withstood all amendments to change its provisions. The Chancellor stated that he expected the House to pass the budget, the whole budget, and nothing but the budget. The Government decided to regard a Conservative motion against abolition of the McKenna duties (TIME, May 12) as a vote of censure. As the Government has the undivided support of Labor and a great bulk of the Liberal Party, there was no chance of its falling. The Chancellor described Conservative agitation against the budget as "ramping, raging, tearing propaganda."

P: Tom Henderson, son of the Home Secretary, asked Parliamentary Secretary of the Admiralty Ammon to order British Jack Tars (gobs) to wear shoes. "I don't like to see seamen walking on deck in their bare feet. They get corns and are liable to other dangers from severe colds."

Mr. Ammon replied that such an order would lead to mutiny. Shouted the irrepressible "Dave"

Kirkwood: "Well, do admirals go in their bare feet?"

P: Naval disarmaments again figured when the naval estimates came up for debate:

Lady Astor, Conservative, in supporting an estimate of $30,500,000 for dockyards, etc., declared that the world was not ready for peace. Said she: "The people who talk the most about it are often the most quarrelsome. When you get among them they talk about a better world and they knock you down when they get you in the lobby. The worst thing in this world you could have at this moment would be total disarmament. The greatest enemies of peace are the pacifists. . . . You might as well get rid of the police in London but you keep them because you want law."

Mr. O'Toole, Labor: "You can have law without armaments, surely."

Astor: "You might think so if you look at Britain, but never if you looked at Europe and the East."

Commander Kenworthy, Liberal: "You could by international agreement."

Astor: "Yes, but you have not even local agreement."

Kenworthy: "We will not get it if you go on talking like that."

Astor: "I am most peaceful. I want any amount of peace. I am a monument of peace. Honorable gentlemen opposite hurl insults at my head, and do I care? Not in the least."

P: George Buchanan introduced his bill to give home rule to Scotland (TIME, May 12). All went smoothly until division time when Laborites objected to Sir Robert Home being permitted to speak, because he had not been present during the debate. Len Sturrock, Liberal, arose to "talk the bill out." Booes, shooes and shouts drowned Len's speech. Laborites arose in rotation to move closure. Each time they got up, serried hosts of Conservatives stood up to continue debate and the Speaker declined to accept the motion for closure.

J. M. Hogge, Liberal: "It's a scandal."

The Speaker: "The debate is adjourned."

David Kirkwood, Labor: "We have been unfairly treated and you've got to recognize it !" (Pandemonium). The Speaker: "So long as I am in the chair I shall conduct my duties according to my conscience." (Roars and shouts).

Lord Winterton made a few curt remarks about defiance of the Speaker's ruling.

Kirkwood: "Ye are not treatin' wi' Indians, ye big long drink of water." (Howls).

The Speaker ordered the clerk to read the orders of the day.*

Neil McLean, Labor: "There will be no orders of the day."

The Speaker adjourned the House.

Kirkwood: "So you didn't get your orders of the day after all."

P: The U. S. Ambassador presented to the Admiralty, on behalf of the officers and men of the Sixth Battle Squadron of the U. S. Navy, a painting by Burnell Poole showing the arrival of that squadron under Admiral Hugh Rodman, to join the British Grand Fleet during the War. The ceremony took place in the Board Room of the Admiralty in the presence of First Lord of the Admiralty Lord Chelmsford, who accepted the painting, and the First Sea Lord, Lord Beatty.

P:The Women's Freedom League, in an open letter to Premier MacDonald said that it "is constrained to express its disappointment and regret that during the present session of Parliament so little encouragement had been given by the Government to matters of especial importance to women."

The principal sin of the Premier was his failure "to honor the constantly reiterated pledges of the Labor party in the past 30 years with regard to granting the vote to every adult woman on the same terms as to men. . . . This matter is of primary importance to the women of this country."

P: Winston Churchill, former Secretary of State for this, that and the other Government department, in a speech at Liverpool, virtually severed his connection with the Liberal Party. Showing strong affection for Conservatism, he appealed for cooperation between the two Parties against Socialism, said the Government was "one vast monument of sham and humbug," called Philip Snowden a "political cuckoo."

*Equivalent to calling the House to order.