TOPICS OF THE DAY.
WHAT AILS THE HOUSE OF COMMONS ?
PARLIAMENT met again on Tuesday and passed, by a majority of 231 (286-52), the second reading of the Bill prolonging its existence to the end of November. That this is a wise and necessary measure we have not the slightest doubt. A General Election at this moment would not only be a certain source of confusion and a possible source of grave danger, but it would be a farce. But though we agree with the policy of the Bill and the action of Parliament, what are we to say of the House of Commons ? It passes from futility to futility, till one is constrained to ask what is the use of it, and almost to wonder whether it is worth keeping alive till November 30th or any other date. Wlidit would sane observers have imagined would be the first thing that Parliament would do when it met on Tuesday ? Surely there can be only one answer. What one would have expected it to do would be to take into immediate consideration the Food problem, not of course to embarrass the Government or to alter their policy, but to co-operate with them in the difficult but necessary task of educating people into food- saving, into learning the hard lesson of abstinence, for it is no good to pretend that it is not and must net be hard. The House of Commons represents, or professes to represent, the nation. Therefore every member is deeply concerned in the need for food conservation, and the House of Commons should claim to exercise its rights in this respect. For example, why should not it ask for the establishment of a select and secret Committee, before which the Government could make a statement of the whole position, and then let that Committee set every Member of Parliament to work in every constituency to educate the electors, and through them the whole nation ? But even if this is too much to ask, the House of Commons might at any rate have demanded an immediate debate so as to use what we have called elsewhere the sounding-board of the House to teach the lessons which Mr. Kennedy Jones is bravely struggling in the Press to get engraven on the minds of the people at large. As it is, any subjects but those which are of vital importance seem to be fastened upon by. the House of Commons. As we have pointed out. elsewhere, when it met on Tuesday night what the House when left to itself, and apart from the Government programme of keeping alive the present Parliament, selected to debate was the trumpery business of the stopping of the export of a weekly newspaper for the very sound reason that the enemy were making use of the articles in its pages. To spend hours over such a matter and to leave the Food problem untouched was a reve- lation of Parliamentary impotence. Once again, we do not want the House of Commons to censure Government action but to help it—to claim the right not to impede the Executive but to co-operate with it.
We are wrong, however, in saying that the House of Commons did not touch the Food problem. At question time a question was put and an official answer given which one would have thought that even this jaded and lack-lustre House of Commons would have made the subject of action. Here was a case for moving the adjournment of the House ten times more urgent than that of the paltry squabble about the Nation. Captain Bathurst in answer to Mr. Williams, of the North-West Durham Division, stated that there were about a million quarters of brewers' malt in this country to-day, and added : " It is considered that the diversion of these stocks from the purpose for which they were intended would be extravagant and undesirable." This means, of course, that it would be " extrava- gant and undesirable " to use the malt as malt meal for bread or cakes, or for mixing with other cereals, or turning into malt extract. When pressed by Mr. Williams as to whether the malt was capable of being used for human food, Captain Bathurst, like the honest man he is, declared that the meal was capable of being used for human food, but that this was a most uneconomical use to which to put brewers' malt. When next Mr. Williams asked whether we were to under- stand that there was no shortage of food in this country, Captain Bathurst could only say that there was a prospective shortage. To Mr. Williams's final inquiry, " Are the Govern- ment recognizing it by allowing this food to be wasted ? " there was naturally no reply.
Surely no more unsatisfactory answer was ever made to a Parliamentary question. All practical people know that the malt now in the brewers' hands could perfectly well be used for food, even though a certain amount of waste has already oceurred. Half a cake of malt is obviously better than no bread, provided that the Food Shortage is what the Govern.. ment tell us in trumpet tones, and no doubt tell us perfectly truly, that it is. Surely somebody should have moved the adjournment of the House to call attention to the amazing position in which the Government have placed themselves and the nation. With one voice they call for the utmost sacrifice in the saving of breadstuffs and their substitutes, and with another they tell us they are keeping back a million quarters of malt because they are wanted to turn into a commodity which it is admitted on all hands has in fact no food value. Bread is to be rationed, but beer- drinkers are to get a double ration—one in the shape of food and the other in the shape of beer. The man who drinks a quart of beer a day—a not unreasonable allowance—practically consumes in drink all the cereals which Lord Devonport allows him, and then comes back and, as it were, pillages the food reserves of the community. That is a situation which the House of Commons should have insisted on being made clear, and if it was not made clear, it should have passed a resolution ensuring that no product of any kind which could be used for food should be converted to any other purpose. We do not want to make ourselves " nasty" on the subject, it is far too serious for that, or to use dialectical points, but we do implore the Government to remember, though it is much more the duty of the House of Commons to do this than of the Press, how enormously they are increasing the difficulties of those who, like ourselves, earnestly desire to help the Food Control Department in bringing the Food Shortage home to the people and obtaining a remedy. The present writer and numbers of other people engaged in the same endeavours are constantly finding that, owing to the Government's policy towards barley, they can make little impression on people when they talk about the need for food abstinence. The working-class optimist who is not endowed with much knowledge or much imagination, and who earnestly desires not to be inconvenienced at mealtimes, when you appeal to him to eat less bread and tell him of the Government warnings, smiles back and says : " Oh, don't you worry about that ! The Government only say this to frighten us. You may be sure of that, because otherwise they would never have left all that barley to be used by the brewers. That is proof positive that it is all right." Now we want in all sincerity to ask Lord Devonport and the Government generally what is the proper answer to give when one is con- fronted with such replies as this to exhortations to abstinence and self-sacrifice. Honestly, we have racked our brains to think of an answer which will hold water, or even appar- ently hold water, but we cannot find it—a reply, that is, which will reconcile the Government's instant plea for abstinence with their determination at all costs to let the brewing of ten million barrels go forward. It is not a pleasant thing to say that the brewers are kings in this country. Still less is it pleasant to say that the Trade Union leaders have coerced the Government. But sonic answer must be given, and we fully realize that it is important that all Food-Saving workers should say the same thing and not distract public opinion. Therefore once more we ask Lord Devonport to tell us, through the mouth of Mr. Kennedy Jones or some other competent person, the proper answer.
There are other points connected with the Food question which the House of Commons should help the Government to deal with. One of them is the feeding of racing and pleasure horses with oats and the subject of racing generally. Theoretically no horses kept for pleasure or sport ought to be allowed to be fed with oats at the present time.. Such food as can be spared should be kept for ploughhorses and horses used for necessary transport. We are told, of course, that the best racehorses, mares and stallions, must be kept alive to maintain the breed. We agree. The breeding of thoroughbred stock is a great industry, and we do not want to see it killed. There are, however, a great many racing geldings which are now consuming quantities of oats. There are also a large number of inferior thoroughbreds of all kinds whose only object is the winning of second-rate events. These could either be turned out as soon as the weather becomes a little warmer, or else put out of training and condition and fed on hay. For ourselves, we would place so high a tax upon racehorses that only the best would be worth keeping. Here is a matter in which the Govern., ment's hands would be enormously strengthened if the House of Commons gave them a strong lead and promise of support.
Finally, why should not the House of Commons spend some of its time in debating a most important subject, which apparently the Government have not time to consider—the apping of new sources of food supply.. We shall print next week an excellent letter in regard to the use that might be made of millet, the grain upon which, if we remember rightly, Hector's horses were fed, and which in China forms one of the staple cereals. There are many other sources of food supply throughout the Empire which if properly used might prove very valuable. A House of Commons debate would draw plenty of additional knowledge on the subject. While we await such discussion we shall be glad to have from our correspondents' suggestions for tapping new sources. We must ask that these suggestions should be put very 'shortly, and that they should tell us, besides the name of the com- modity, how and where it can be obtained and at what season.
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