Parliament's Week

House of Commons:

P:Sir R. W. Hamilton (Liberal) asked the Government if it intended to intervene in the Moroccan War and, if so, would it permit debate before military and naval operations were begun. Foreign Secretary Austen Chamberlain replied: "I cannot give that assurance. If the Government comes to the conclusion that there is a serious menace in the Tangier zone* its hands must not be tied."

P:A Cabinet committee, headed by Lord Birkenhead and created to consider the Admiralty's plea for six new cruisers, approved the construction of four.

P:Captain G. M. Garro-Jones (Conservative) asked the Government if it were insisting on pari passu treatment with the U. S. in the matter of War debt payments, and if France and Italy had not defied Britain's contention that they should not make separate settlements with the U. S. Lieut.-Col. Walker Guinness (son of the stout and beer manufacturer, Lord Iveagh), Financial Secretary of the Treasury, replied: "The gallant gentleman is under a misapprehension.

"We have never said that they should not make separate agreements. In fact, it is the natural procedure that they should agree with each one of their creditors separately. We have only said we should be paid pari passu, and on equally favorable terms."/-

P:Lady Astor asked, amid cheers, that a committee of inquiry be set up for the purpose of repealing the law under which the police arrest women for soliciting. She observed that, if a man were charged with annoying women, evidence of the persons annoyed was required to effect his condign punishment.

With women it was otherwise, and a number who were not prostitutes were daily arrested on the sole evidence of the police. She asked that these sex discriminations be removed.

P:Premier Stanley Baldwin, fearing the miner's threat of a general strike on Aug. 1, appointed W. C. Bridgeman, First Lord of the Admiralty, to mediate between employers and employed. Mr. Bridgeman was, however, unsuccessful, and the Government named a court of inquiry to make an investigation into the causes of the mining industry dispute.

House of Lords:

P:Their lordships debated the important subject of Britain guaranteeing a treaty between France and Germany for the maintenance of the territorial status quo between them (TIME, Mar. 16 et seq., INTERNATIONAL). Lord Balfour for the Conservatives, Lord Oxford and Lord Grey for the Liberals, and Lord Haldane for the Laborites gave their blessings to what is called the peace pact.

P:Lord Birkenhead, Secretary of State for India, made a long statement on Indian affairs. The subject was whether or no the 1919 Government of India Act (conferring limited responsible government) would be revised before the stipulated date of 1929. The Cabinet, said Lord Birkenhead, had not reached a decision; but he could say that "the door of acceleration was not open to menace, and still less could it be stormed by violence."

The Act of 1919, he continued, had not failed--it had never had a fair chance.* He insisted that if Britain were to leave India, Moslem and Hindu differences would immediately disrupt the Empire. "When we see everywhere among the responsible leaders of Indian thought, the evidence of sincere and genuine desire to cooperate with us," the Secretary for India told their lordships, "we shall not be niggardly bargainers if we meet the generous friendship which is near and dear to our hearts. We no longer talk of holding the gorgeous East in fear, but ask India to march side by side with us in fruitful, harmonious partnership which might create the greatest and proudest days of Indian history."

P:Lord Darling, who, until he retired in 1923,/- was the wittiest and the most sarcastic Judge of the King's Bench, introduced a bill to regulate press reports of law cases. The bill calls for a maximum fine of $2,500 or imprisonment for three months, or both, for the publication of any indecent matter which is revealed in court. The measure is aimed particularly at divorce cases and under the proposed laws--as in France--newspapers are to be limited to publishing the purely legal aspects of the proceedings, provided, of course, that it does not violate the general clause banning indecent matter.

* Internationalized Tangier commands the Strait of Gibraltar. This Strait is at present dominated by Britain at "the Rock" (Gibraltar), and it is a fixed tenet of British policy to brook no rivals. The "menace" referred to by Mr. Chamberlain referred to reports that Abd-el-Krim was preparing to attack the Tangier zone.

#134; "The honorable and gallant gentleman" was guilty of redundancy. Pari passu means simultaneously and equally. * "The noble lord" was wrong. With the exception of Bengal and the Central Provinces, the Act has had a fair chance which is proved by its success.

/- Lord Darling returned last year to the King's Bench to aid his colleagues.