Wigs Instead of Haircuts

Winston Churchill's Tories finally got their first major piece of legislation through the House of Commons: a bill to make the vast socialized-medicine program created by Labor pay more of its own way. To get the bill passed, the Tories had to resort to the unpopular "guillotine" to limit debate (TIME, May 5) and employ the budget-wise arguments of a pretty red-haired M.P., Miss Patricia Hornsby-Smith.

Henceforth Britons must pay a shilling (14-c-) for prescriptions and up to a pound ($2.80) for each trip to the dentist. But, Miss Hornsby-Smith insisted, many of the new changes are not as unreasonable as Labor alleged. For instance, said she, the new -L-3 charge for orthopedic shoes (actual cost, -L-9) is what most Britons pay for ordinary shoes, and those who must now pay $7 for a wig will not have to pay over the months for haircuts. As for charging $2.80 for abdominal belts, "so far as women are concerned, this belt frequently takes the place of a generally worn garment by which they endeavor to conceal their inches and hold up their stockings," and which usually costs a good deal more.

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