DEPRESSED AREAS PROBLEM

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21323, 16 November 1934, Page 11

DEPRESSED AREAS PROBLEM

# ; Three Commissioners To Seek Solution LABOUR CRITICISM OF PROPOSALS (BRITISH OrriCIAL WIIZLESS.) (Received November 15, 7.20 p.m.) RUGBY, November 14. During the debate in the House of Commons on the reports of the special investigators into conditions in the depressed areas, Mr Neville Chamberlain (Chancellor of the Exchequer) said the Government had decided to appoint two commissioners with very wide powers, one for England and Wales and one for Scotland, to devote their whole time to the initiation, organisation, and prosecution of schemes to facilitate economic development and social improvement in these areas.

The- commissioners have power by legislation to acquire land compulsorily for schemes. Mr Chamberlain said the most tragic feature in the depressed areas was the length of time men had b ?n unemployed. In South Wales the percentage of men who had been wholly without work over three years was 35.3, and in Lancashire more than 30 per cent. Even if there was an immediate revival in the coal trade there must still be considerable unemployed labour. He bad appealed to employers in the more prosperous southern areas to give chances to men from the depressed areas. The best hope for the men who could not be transferred lay on the land. He would ask the House to vote £2,000,000 for the current year to the depressed area fund. The commissioners' operations would begin immediately. The two already appointed insisted on working voluntarily as a matter of public service. Mr George Lansbury (leader ol the Labour party) said the Government's proposals in no way dealt with the crux of the problem, which was the abundance of production. The school leaving age must be raised to fit children for reduced hours of work, and there must be retirement of workers at an earlier age on decent maintenance.