The consideration in Committee of the second clause of the
' Parliament Bill—dealing with Bills other than Money Bills—. was begun on Thursday. The first important amendment was that moved by Mr. Younger to limit the operation of the clause " to within three years after the passing of the Act." The intention of this was to induce the Government to bind themselves to reform the Upper Chamber in less than three years. Mr. Churchill replied that the Government did not propose to accept any temporal limitation of the period within which they would bring the reformed and reconstituted Second Chamber into being. He added, amidst loud ironical cheers from the Opposition, that they had not any intention of accepting such a limitation which might conceivably plunge them into the greatest inconvenience. The effect of this declaration of the Government's intention seems to be to render any discussion of the Preamble purely academic.
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