Parliament's Week

The Lords -- P:Reversed a previous chancery Court decision and held that British holders of "gold clause" bonds of the Societe Intercommunale Beige d'Electricite are entitled to demand and receive interest and capital payments in gold at the par value of the pound.* "The original intention of the contract was to prevent the loss from falling upon the bondholder should sterling become depreciated," argued counsel for the bondholders, and this view the Lords upheld. Because the U. S. Supreme Court gives great weight to pertinent decisions at the fountainhead of Anglo-Saxon law, holders of U. S. gold clause bonds hoped that last week's decision will help them when their suits come up in the U. S. Supreme Court. The Commons-- P:Weighed every carefully chosen word uttered by Chancellor of the Exchequer Neville Chamberlain as he consented to allude at last to the long-rumored merger of Cunard and White Star.

"Negotiations," the Chancellor said, "have reached a stage at which the Government feels fully justified in assuming that an effective merger of the North Atlantic fleets of the Cunard and White Star Lines will become an accomplished fact at an early date. It is the intention of the Government in that event shortly to lay before the House proposals for furnishing the necessary financial facilities for completion of the new Cunard liner" --scheduled to exceed the French liner Normandie as "largest and fastest liner in the world" (TIME, Nov. 7, 1932). P:Adjourned over the holidays at 1:30 p. m. after a furious round-the-clock session which began the afternoon before. Battling every clause of the Government's bill to saddle the British taxpayer with the national debt of bankrupt Newfoundland (TIME, Dec. 18), the Laborite-Liberal Opposition were helpless to oppose the Government's Conservative steamroller but finally grew so angry that the House resounded with homely English abuse. "You dirty dog!" shouted Laborite Aneurin Bevan at Minister of Dominions James Henry ("Jim") Thomas who was driving the steamroller. "You swelled head!"

*The pound was 33% below its gold par last week, the dollar 36% below.

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